“Jesus," Tackett whispered.
He staggered backward a few steps and unconsciously clapped a hand over his chest, as though his heart might actually stop. Then the sheriff fumbled for his gun, and drew it out of the holster.
With a single, fluid motion, Bill reached out, grabbed him by the hand, and removed his gun. The enormous, brown-furred Prowler walked over and put the sheriff 's gun on the far side of the man's desk, and then just left it there.
“You . . . you're one of them," Tackett muttered, staring in fear and amazement.
As they all watched, Bill changed back. It took perhaps a second longer than the first change. Jack knew that extra moment was necessary because this change was more difficult. The first had been simply revealing the beast within. This one required the biological manufacture of skin and the alteration of bone structure . . . the rebuilding of a faÆade.
“I'm a Prowler, yes," Bill said, voice thick with his reluctance and anxiety over where this would all lead. “But I'm not one of them, not the way you mean. The ones who've been preying on this town? There have been dozens of disappearances and killings in the mountains around here that might have been Prowlers.
I don't hunt anymore. Haven't for a very long time."
Tackett stroked his mustache and stared at Bill, tilting his head first this way and then that, as though trying to see the magician's trick that had made the transformation possible. But it was no trick.
“That's a comfort," the sheriff said dryly.
Jack was about to step in when Molly beat him to it. He breathed a sigh of relief. It would be better coming from her. Tackett seemed to trust her, at least a little.
“We thought you were one of them. The Alpha, actually," she explained. “That's the pack leader."
Tackett leaned against his desk and stared at the three of them incredulously. “Should I be flattered?"
“In a way," Molly replied awkwardly. “The thing is, you've got to know that we're not it. We're not who you're looking for. We need your help to figure out who in this town isn't what they appear to be."
The sheriff 's gaze moved back and forth between Molly and Bill. Jack knew that he was barely on the man's radar at the moment. Molly was the one forcing him to think logically in the presence of a monster. Or, at least, a being Tackett could only see as a monster. Bill wasn't, but even Jack had a hard time coming to terms with that fact, and they were practically family.
Idly, Tackett wandered back to his gun. Jack could have shot him, then. Bill was fast enough to attack and tear the weapon from the man's hands. But the time had come for the chips to fall. Nobody moved as the sheriff lifted his gun off the edge of the desk. He gazed at it a moment, and then slid it into his holster.
“All right," he said, a rasp in his voice. “What've you got?"
Almost in answer there was a soft thump somewhere down the hall.
“Sheriff ?" a female voice called.
“Damn it," Tackett muttered. “Your weapons." He glared at them and it was obvious he meant they should hide them.
Jack stuck one of the 9mm pistols in his rear waistband, next to the third that was in its clip there. The second he placed on a shelf beneath a stack of file folders. When he glanced over at Molly, she had taken up a position near the window, and Jack could see her shotgun leaning against the wall under the curtains. The breeze billowed them slightly, and he hoped it didn't draw attention.
A second later it was too late to worry about it.
Tina Lemoine stepped into the office. There were tears on her cheeks, and angry streaks of mascara ran like war paint down her face.
“Sheriff ?" The frightened woman glanced around at the others gathered in the office and frowned in confusion. But she did not let her surprise distract her very long.
“Tina, what happened? What's - "
“I was attacked," she told him. “Two men, snarling at me like animals . . . they chased me."
Tina gripped Tackett's hands in her own, clearly becoming more self-conscious about those around her. She glanced at them, as if she felt foolish. Jack's heart went out to her. Then she frowned deeply and stared for a long moment at Bill, as if she had suddenly recognized him from somewhere.
“Where?" Jack asked.
Tackett glared at him. Then he turned to Tina and rephrased the question, speaking softly.
“Where did you see them, Tina?"
“Out behind the inn," she said. Once again she looked at Bill, oddly distracted from her own plight, and she shuddered slightly.
“Tina!" said a stern voice from the open doorway.
They all turned to see her father, Henry, standing in the hall. He still carried himself with a dignity and an air of power that Jack had seen in wealthy men before, but at the moment Henry Lemoine looked rattled.
“This was a mistake," he told his daughter. “Come away, now, before you say something you will most certainly regret."
Jack frowned, confused but also repulsed by the questions in his head. What was it Lemoine was afraid his daughter would tell the sheriff ? What had he done to her?
“No, Daddy, don't do this," Tina pleaded. “You don't understand. All I wanted was to get the journal back, to stop all of this."
Her father froze. “You mean it's here?"
Tina nodded slowly. Her father began to smile, but his expression faltered and he sniffed the air, then
