Kitty Goes to Washington

'I forgot how much you like stories,' he said. 'I caught it from my sister. I thought she was hurt, I was trying to help her. She shifted in my arms. I didn't know about her, until then. Even when she bit me, I hardly knew what was happening. It was an accident, she didn't mean it. But she panicked, and I was in the way.'

'Wow. That's rough. She must have felt terrible.'

'Actually, when she shifted back to human and woke up, she yelled at me. Wanted to know why I couldn't mind my own business and leave her alone. By then I was sick, so she yelled about making her take care of me.'

'Let me guess, older sister?'

'Yes,' he said with a laugh.

'It sounds familiar.'

'She was angry, but she was sorry, too, I think. She took care of me and helped me learn to live with this. Now we help each other keep our parents from finding out about it.'

At least I didn't have that problem anymore. I'd never have to come up with another excuse about why I was missing a family gathering on a full moon night. 'Your sister's in Brazil?'

'Yes. You know what she does? She spies on companies doing illegal logging in the rain forest and reports to the environmental groups. Sometimes I think she's a bit of a terrorist. Frightened loggers come out of the forest with stories about giant jaguars with glowing green eyes.'

'She sounds like an interesting person.'

'She is.'

We'd been there maybe an hour when I glanced at my watch. I shouldn't even have brought it. But I did.

'Could we get back to town by four, do you think?' I said.

He put his hand on my knee. 'Is there nothing I can do to you convince you to stay a little longer?'

Oh, the agony. I put my hand on his and shook my head. 'I'm sorry. Here you are, doing everything you can to sweep me off my feet, and I'm refusing to cooperate. I'm lucky you're still trying.'

He grinned. 'I love a challenge.'

He leaned over to me, putting his hands on either side of me, trapping me with his arms, and moving closer—slowly, giving me plenty of time to argue and escape before he kissed me.

I didn't argue. Or escape.

I barreled into the Crescent at a quarter after four, convinced I was too late to find Fritz. Not that he'd ever speak to me again. I should have been happy with what he'd revealed last night on the show, but enough never was, was it?

My vision adjusted to the dimness of indoors. I watched Fritz's usual table, expecting his hulking form to be there, once I'd differentiated it from the shadow. I focused, squinting hard, but the table was empty.

Jack stood, elbows propped on the bar, reading a magazine. I leaned on the bar in front of him, and he looked up and broke a wide smile. 'Hey! I heard your show last night. That was cool !'

'Thanks,' I said, distracted and not sounding terribly sincere. 'I missed him, didn't I? Fritz already left.'

'He didn't show today.'

'But it's past four. He's never late. Does he not do weekends?'

'He never misses a day.'

A weight settled into my gut. 'Do you think he's okay? Do you have a phone number for him? Should I go check on him?'

'I don't have a clue where he lives.'

This was my fault. Fritz was in trouble and it was my fault. He'd talked, he'd spilled the beans, and someone didn't like it. 'Are you even a little bit worried?'

He shrugged. 'Wouldn't do any good if I was.'

Great, another disinterested isolationist. 'Is Ahmed here?'

'I don't think so. I can call upstairs if you want, maybe he's there.'

'Sure.'

He hit a line on the phone behind the bar, stood there with the handset to his ear for what must have been five minutes, then shook his head. 'Nothing.'

'Do you think he knows where Fritz lives?'

'He might.'

I asked for a pen and wrote my cell phone number on a napkin. 'If he does, have him call me.'

Jack tucked the napkin by the cash register. 'You're really worried about him.'

I smiled wryly. 'Remember, it's not paranoia if they really are out to get you.'

I called Flemming. Please, no voice mail, no voice mail—

'Yes?'

'Dr. Flemming? It's Kitty.'

The pause was loaded with frustration. 'I really don't have time—'

'Where's Fritz?'

'Who?'

'Don't give me that. He's an old werewolf, German. He said you talked to him. Where is he?'

'How should I know—'

'He always comes to… to this one place to have a drink. Four o'clock, every day. He didn't show up today, and I don't think it's a coincidence. He talked on my show, and someone isn't happy —'

'Why should I be that someone?'

'I don't know. But you're my only lead. You must have some idea where he might be.'

'Look—yes, I know Fritz. I've spoken with him. If he called your show that's his own business, and I don't know why anyone would have had a problem with it. Not enough of a problem to take drastic action.'

I wasn't thinking straight. If I didn't get anywhere with Flemming, I had nowhere else to go, no one else to ask. 'I'm worried about him.'

'He's a tough old man, he can take care of himself.' His voice had changed; it had stopped being flat. I was getting to him.

'He's old. He's falling apart. Werewolves don't get sick, but they do get old. He doesn't have anyone looking after him, does he?'

He sighed. 'I have his home address. If you'd like, I'll check on him.'

'Can I meet you there?'

'Fine.' He gave me the address.

I got the 'Thanks' out about the same time I clicked off and ran out to the curb.

Luis was still waiting in the Miata. 'Now where are we going?'

I told him the address.

He raised his brows. 'You want me to take this car into that neighborhood?'

I smiled brightly. 'You paid for damage coverage, didn't you?'

Long-suffering Luis rolled his eyes and put the car into gear.

I bit my lip. I was really going to have to do something nice to thank him later on tonight.

The address turned out to be a tenement building, about forty years old, in dire need of a coat of paint. Or maybe a wrecking ball. Flemming was waiting by the front door, arms crossed, looking around nervously.

His frown turned surly when we pulled up.

'I'm sure there's no need for this,' he said as I hopped out of the car. Luis left the engine running.

'You're worried, too, or you wouldn't be here,' I said.

'He's on the third floor.'

The elevator didn't work, of course. I ran, quickly getting a full flight of stairs ahead of Flemming.

'What room?' I shouted behind me.

'Three-oh-six.'

The door was unlocked. I pushed it open. The place smelled like it hadn't been cleaned in a long time: close, sweaty, dank. Too warm, like the heat was turned up too high. The door opened into a main room. Another door led to what must have been a bedroom; a kitchen counter was visible beyond that.

Stacks of newspapers lined all the walls, folded haphazardly, as if Fritz had read them all, front page to back, and had meant to throw them out but never gotten around to it. Some of the piles leaned precariously. In the middle of the room, an old sofa sat in front of a TV set that must have been thirty years old, complete with rabbit ears wrapped in tin foil. It sat in a corner, on a beat-up end table. A static-laden evening news program was playing.

Something was wrong. Something in the air smelled very wrong—coldness, illness.

Dr. Flemming entered the room behind me, then pushed past me. I'd stopped, unable to cross the last few feet to the sofa. Flemming rushed to it, knelt by it, and felt the pulse of the man lying there.

Fritz lay slumped against one arm of the sofa, staring at the television, perfectly relaxed. His face was expressionless, his eyes blank.

Flemming sat back on his heels and sighed. 'If I had to make a guess, I'd say it was a heart attack.'

'So he's—he's dead.'

Flemming nodded. I closed my eyes and sighed. 'It couldn't be something else, something someone did to him?'

'You said it yourself. He's old. Something like this was going to happen sooner or later.'

'It's just when he called last night, he almost sounded like he knew something was going to happen to him.'

The phone—a rotary, for crying out loud—sat on the table next to the TV. He'd hung up and put it back before this happened.

'Maybe he did.' Flemming stared at Fritz's body, like he was trying to discover something, or memorize him. 'I've seen stranger things happen in medicine.'

I bet he had. He claimed he wanted his research to be public, but he sure wasn't sharing. My anger, the shock of finding Fritz, was too much. Words bubbled over.

'Which is it, Flemming? Medical applications or military applications? Do you have dreams of building a werewolf army like the Nazis did?'