Hair of the Dog

throw had cut him good over the eyes and blood poured down his face, making him look like some kind of nightmarish monster. He stomped down at me, but I rolled and he slipped and almost fell. I made it back to my feet, feeling wobbly and sick and weak. My whole face felt swollen and thick, and my right eye swelled nearly shut. We circled each other there in the back yard, him with his shield and me flexing my fists, trying to keep the blood flowing. We both sucked air like we were fish out of water, and my recent injuries were screaming for attention I didn’t have time to give. My stamina was nil and the wound in my chest, where I’d been shot not long ago, ached down to the core, making me feel weak and limp.

Jerome feinted left with the shield, then came right at me. I didn’t fall for the feint and danced to the side as agilely as my shaking legs allowed, coming up with a knee that clipped his hip. I followed it with a short hook to his right kidney and kicked him in the back of the right knee, buckling him. I snaked an arm around his throat and was just about to secure the carotid when he jumped straight up and back with enough strength to defy gravity, taking his body and mine all the way off the patchy grass and driving us to the ground, him on top, his body crushing into mine. That bullet I took had been over a month ago, but it hadn’t been long enough. For the second time in just a few minutes, all the air was stolen from my body.

Somehow Jerome managed to maintain his hold on the shield and as he rolled off me, he swung back with it, the metal edge striking my cheek and exploding suns behind my eyes.

Staggering to my feet, I barely dodged another swing of the trashcan lid. I tried a haymaker and missed. Jerome kicked for my stomach, but it was a tired, halfhearted attempt that didn’t even come close. My nose, eyebrow and cheek were bleeding and my knuckles were pretty torn up. Jerome started in again and I tried a side kick that he slapped away with the shield. He jabbed, his fist hitting me in the shoulder, but it was more shove than punch. We both sort of collapsed to all fours, breathing hard and watching each other wearily.

“Whach you want, white man?” said the giant. “Whach you after?” I could tell the words came hard, costing him a lot.

I sucked in and out three times before answering, sweat and blood dripping.

“The girl,” I finally managed.

It was the wrong thing to say. I saw fire spark way down deep in his eyes and he exploded at me.

9

Max slept soundly in the back seat of the Escalade, dreaming of his days in Germany before the Great Gray Wolf decimated his pack. His front paws twitched in the air and his lips pulled back from his teeth in a doggy smile as he ran and wrestled with his siblings in the thick forest grass that surrounded the farm on the north side, in the small valley at the base of the mountains. The air, moist with snow melt, tasted wonderful in his lungs and the sun shone brightly through the lush foliage that packed the landscape.

His eyes snapped open. The Alpha was in trouble.

Sounds of fighting, the smell of adrenaline flooding the air, his Alpha’s grunt of pain. Max waited for the door to pop open, crouched, ready to lunge from the vehicle and find him. But the door didn’t open. The sounds escalated, allowing him to triangulate an approximate location, but still he remained trapped inside the car.

Max jumped into the front seat, checking for an opening, then jumped to the far back, but there was no exit. He went back to the middle section, coiled his powerful legs under him and launched full out into the front windshield. The sloping, reinforced safety glass took the impact and recoiled him so forcefully that it almost knocked him unconscious. He landed heavily on his side across the front seats and bounced into the front dash.

Max rose and launched again with the same effect. His nose and lip coursed hot blood that dripped to the leather seat he stood upon. Max tried the side window, but was unable to gain the momentum needed to shatter the safety glass. Snarling, crimson foam coating his teeth, he turned for the back window. He charged and jumped, clearing the back partition and rolling his shoulder to take the impact. The tinted back window exploded outward and Max landed on his side and neck on the rough asphalt of the street. He rolled with the momentum and sprang to his feet, the Alpha’s scent strong in his nostrils and the sound of combat leading him true.

I tried to rise, but he caught me midriff, driving me up and back into the sliding glass doors behind me. A bomb went off and glass showered us both as we fell into his living room. I managed to get a knee into his chest, and as we rolled, I vaulted him over me. He crashed into an end table, disintegrating a lamp beneath his weight. And rammed up against a flower patterned couch that smashed into the far wall. I staggered to my feet, the world spinning, my eyes trying to adjust from bright sunlight to the darker interior. I heard a little girl scream and saw her sitting at the kitchen table, a white-bread sandwich in her hand and her eyes big and scared.

I wanted to tell her it was okay, that I was here to help and that I would take her away from the bad man, but there was no time. Jerome charged, his face a bloody mask of rage and his big fists swinging fast