by Geonn Cannon
"Sounds good. Thank you, Milo."
She nodded and left the room.
Gwen walked to the couch and sat down. For the first time Dale saw vulnerability in her, and in it saw a resemblance to a side of Ari that she tried hard not to show. Like mother, like daughter, she supposed. She put down her hammer and nails and walked over to sit next to Gwen.
"You tried to end this peacefully. The hunters wouldn't let that happen." She took Gwen's hand. "You did everything you could. And this is just an extension of that. You're trying to protect everyone."
"Before the... assault, I had no idea hunters even existed. My parents died when I was very young, so I wasn't taught about our history. Afterward I tried to figure out everything I could about the bastards who had done this horrible thing to me. I discovered the story about Johanna and Agatha, the history of wolves and hunters that stretched back so far. We were supposed to be at peace, but it was obvious people aren't as white-and-black as all that. Treaty or no, the hunters had seen me as a thing instead of a person. I knew it was only a matter of time before something like this happened. And even though I've spent the past thirty years waiting, I still feel unprepared."
"Those canidae out in the woods and the ones upstairs... they were a pack long before they came here. They have history together. But the second you declared yourself their Alpha, they agreed. They fell in line behind General Gwyneth not because you just happen to be older and available. They trust you. They've seen you in action and they're confident enough to let you call the shots. Plans are useless. We make plans to keep our minds limber so we can think on our feet when the shit goes down. The fact that Ari has been coming to you for help says loads about how much she respects your opinion."
"I wasn't sure if she'd told you about that."
"She hadn't. Still hasn't. But there are bigger things to worry about now. I understand why she did it so I'm not going to hold a grudge. I'm glad you were there to help take some of the load off her shoulders."
Gwen squeezed Dale's hand. "Are you this good with Ariadne?"
Dale grinned. "Well, you two aren't as different as she'd like to believe."
"Good to hear. Thank you, Dale. We should finish these windows. We have no way of knowing when the hunters will arrive."
"Yeah. I was thinking we could have them on a hinge of some sort, so we could leave them open until we spot the danger and then just drop them down in a hurry for security."
"I'll see if Benji has any construction experience. It's a good idea, Dale."
Dale nodded and said, "Well, it's my first siege situation. I'm trying to make it a good one."
Gwen smiled and stood up. "We'll take a break for lunch. But for now..."
"Right. Back to work." She went back to her hammer, hoisting it and swinging at the air a few times to test the weight. "You know, it's too bad I don't have a hard hat and a tool belt. Of course it's not much of a fantasy if Ari isn't here to appreciate it."
"Dale?" Gwen cleared her throat. "I'm still her mother..."
Dale blushed. "Right. Geez. Sorry."
Gwen chuckled and left the room, and Dale focused on the windows rather than her growing humiliation that she'd just said something so sexual in front of Ari's mother. She took comfort in the fact that, had Ari been there, she would have definitely been laughing her ass off.
#
Television had lied to her about so many aspects of her private investigation job, and she was discovering it had lied in equal measure about police work. Lorne was slumped at his desk with his fist against his temple like a kid counting the minutes until the bell rang, talking on the phone with someone to get warrants for yet another security camera. They were trying to track the wolf van through the city to its point of origin but they were running into roadblocks. Instead of lunch she got a plastic-wrapped sandwich out of a vending machine and forced it down as she checked rental statements against real people. Eighteen black vans had been rented in the week leading up to the accident, and she was starting to judge people's taste. Seriously, a black van, out of all the options available? Who would make that decision unless it was tactically necessary?
One thing television had gotten right, however, was the horrific coffee. She grimaced as she sipped it, held it on her tongue as she looked for a place to spit it out, then finally and with great reluctance swallowed it down. She took the mug out to Lorne's desk and placed it next to his keyboard. "It looked like you could use a drink. I couldn't find anything stronger, so this will have to do."
"Thanks, Willow." He took a sip and swallowed without problem, and Ari figured he'd been slowly working up a tolerance to the toxin. "We're not getting security footage from Whole Foods. I thought those guys would be more laid back."
"They are laid back. They turned you down because you're The Man, and this is where having a private consultant comes in handy. I could go by, see if they're more amenable to a private investigator." She looked around the room. "Where's Keighley? Think he'd give me a hall pass to go wandering around the city unchaperoned?"
"He went to the bathroom. If you hurry you might be able to slip out unseen."
Ari took her jacket off the back of the chair. "If he asks, tell him I'm downstairs or something. I'll call you if I make any headway."
"Good luck."
She walked out of the bullpen and started for the stairs. Keighley appeared at the end of the hall and she resisted the urge to roll her eyes. He slowed as they met up, stopping her by raising his hand.
"Where are you off to?"
"I've been looking at those tapes so long I think I'm going cross-eyed. I wanted to head out and get a look at the actual scene. Plus Lorne couldn't get anywhere with the Whole Foods crowd, so I thought I'd try a little badge-less intervention to get their tapes."
"I'll come with you."
"That's really not necessary."
"Detective Lorne drove you to work this morning. Do you have your own vehicle?"
"I... don't live far from here. I was just going to walk..."
"Why? When you have the offer of a perfectly willing chauffeur?"
Ari felt her freedom slipping away. "You sure you want to leave Lorne here without anyone to supervise him?"
Keighley put his hand on her elbow and turned around to escort her to the stairs. "Oh, you're far more interesting to watch than Detective Lorne. Come on, it'll be fun. A little fresh air will do us both good. We can get to know each other a little better."
"Oh, yay."
Keighley sent a text to Lorne explaining where he would be and then returned the phone to his pocket. "So, Ariadne Willow. That's quite a peculiar name. Not exactly a hunter name."
"I was raised by my mother, like I said. She used her maiden name. As for Ariadne... I don't know. Maybe she just liked labyrinths."
Keighley laughed. "Seems reasonable enough I suppose. This is my car."
"Really? The non-descript sedan? Consider me shocked. Am I driving or are you?"
He gestured at the passenger side of the car and she got inside. "So I'm an open book to you, Keighley. You know I'm a private investigator, my sordid parentage, you know I'm gay..."
"I actually didn't know that."
"Well, that's one more for the checkbox. You, though, I don't even know your first name. Why is Lorne answering to you? Are you some bigwig with the police department?"
For a moment she thought he wasn't going to answer. Finally he exhaled sharply and said, "I suppose it's only fair that you get to know something about me if we're going to be spending time together. My first name is Jacob, but I would prefer if you continued to call me Keighley. It's the name I prefer. I'm not associated with the police department. I own K1, the outdoor equipment agency. I donate heavily to the police fund, and in exchange, I'm granted leeway in certain hunter-related matters. It helps to have hunters in high places."
Ari had heard of the company. It made sense for a hunter to own a company that outfitted people for weekends in the great outdoors.
"I'm al
so an investor in Orarian. I helped fund that wolfsbane that went missing, so you can understand my irritation with everything that happened last night."
"So one thing that hasn't been explained to me," she said. "What happens when February rolls around? Is there a bell that goes off, and we all put down our guns and go back to ignoring the wolves?"
"No. This is just the renewal of hostilities. We're honoring wolf manoth by taking out as many of them as we can, and once the month ends we'll focus on more long-term plans."
Ari tried not to react to the news. "Great."
There was a parking lot next to the accident site, a location Ari felt she knew extremely well from all the times she'd seen it that day on various recordings. He parked facing the road, which had been cleaned up and reopened at some point in the past sixteen hours. Keighley took out his phone and accessed photographs that had been taken at the scene. Broken glass, blood, tire marks, but no vehicles.
"Lorne's boss was probably pretty angry he left the scene of the accident."
"He wrote it off to hot pursuit. Slap on the wrist." He looked up and scanned the street. "The wolves had to have been lying in wait. But even then, how could they have known when we were coming? How could they have even known which van was ours?
Ari assumed the men involved in the traffic tie-up on Fifth Avenue had texted the information to her mother. If witnesses saw one of the men tapping on his phone, they would assume he was calling 911 or a lawyer. A quick description of the van with a warning of when to look out for it was all it would take. She didn't feel like suggesting it to him in case that string ended up leading them to Gwen and Milo.
"Your assistant... secretary? Whatever she is. She called you with a warning about that car accident not long before it happened. How did she know?"
Ari shrugged. "No idea. I haven't spoken with her since yesterday. My phone got busted in the accident. I didn't have time to swing by the office this morning since someone decided to be an early bird. I'll be sure to ask her the next time I see her."
"Hm." He rubbed his top lip. "She's not a hunter, right?"
"No. I've been keeping her out of this thing as much as I can."
"And yet she stumbled over a vital piece of information mere moments before it became relevant. Maybe the reason you haven't spoken with her is because the wolves have her. There's a chance they discovered your true nature and they're using her against us."
Ari shook her head. "I find that hard to believe. Dale would have found some way to warn me."
"I suppose so. Still, it's very peculiar." He shifted in his seat and reached into his jacket pocket. "Do you have a theory? Some idea how the wolves got the upper hand on someone like Detective Lorne?"
"I think they're smarter than we give them credit for. We like to pretend they're animals, but they're people the same as we are." He looked at her and she was forced to shrug. "Okay, maybe not. But they definitely aren't dumb animals. They have the same instincts and the same analytical mind we do. They plot, they plan, they create contingencies. The only real difference is they can smell us and we can't smell them."
Keighley nodded. "True. Although there are ways to spot a wolf in human's clothing."
"Oh? Lorne hasn't mentioned any."
"Ah, Lorne's young. The ability comes with experience. You start to notice things that you would normally discount as eccentricities. A pretty young woman who wears a dog collar, for instance." Ari looked at him but he kept his face forward to look out the windshield. "A woman who is referred to as a werewolf over a police wire, who calls her detective agency ‘Bitches.'" He looked at her and raised an eyebrow. "Everything about you screams ‘wolf', Ariadne."
She met his gaze without blinking. "And how exactly does one prove they aren't a werewolf? Not changing into a wolf? I'm proving that right now. I've been proving it every second I've been in your sight." She smiled sweetly. "I think you're just a hammer, Mr. Keighley. You've been looking for nails so long you're starting to see them everywhere."
"That might very well be true. And I would like to think Detective Lorne hasn't worked with you for over a year without noticing some of these traits. He would have to be a piss-poor detective and a pathetic excuse for a hunter if he was going around fawning over a wolf. Can you imagine?" He laughed. "It's very difficult to prove a negative. But there are ways to confirm something you know to be true. Lots of things are genetic, Miss Willow, so I just have to ask... how is Gwen?"
Ari reached for the car door, but Keighley was faster. He shoved something against the soft skin of her side and pulled the trigger. Every muscle in her body went rigid, her feet kicking out against the floor as her shoulders pressed back against the seat. Her head rocked back as he held the Taser against her, taking away her ability to move or think about anything other than the pain and fear as she realized she was being electrocuted. When he pulled the weapon away she collapsed, helpless and dazed, her senses swimming as she struggled to stay awake.
"I noticed it the first time I saw you," Keighley said, his voice echoing as if she had a glass bowl over her head. "You look just like your mother did at your age..."
It was the last thing Ari heard before she hit her head on the window and let herself slip into the darkness.
Chapter Ten
Mia and Hannah arrived at Milo's house a little before dark. They took Hannah to the upstairs bedroom, which they had rearranged so that the bed was near the window. She propped herself up on pillows, wincing as her stitches pulled, but she assured everyone she could handle herself. It was Milo who suggested driving Dale home to get a change of clothes, and Dale gratefully accepted the offer. She didn't know how long Gwen planned to hold the fort, but she would need a few outfits regardless of how long they ended up in the house.
She chuckled as Milo drove her across town. "You know, this is the second time in the space of a couple of months I'll be staying at your house."
"Damn, you're right. Wow. I've had girlfriends who didn't live with me as much as you do. Have you tried calling Ari again? It's only fitting that she moves in with you."
"I tried before we left. Still no answer."
Milo said, "I'm sure she's just..."
"Yeah," Dale said. "Probably fine. Just hectic and busy..." She looked out the window and then had an idea. "Do you mind swinging by the office if there aren't any messages at home? She may not have been able to get through to my phone, but she might have left a message there."
"Sure thing."
Milo waited in the car while Dale went upstairs. To her relief, the bed was slept in and there were dishes in the sink. Ari had been home, had spent the night in her own bed, and that was telling enough to put her mind at ease. She was looking for a note when she spotted the shattered phone sitting on the coffee table. Suddenly every missed call made sense, and the anxiety she'd been nursing flew away like a startled bird let out of the cage.
With her worries slightly abated, she focused on preparing for her sleepover at Milo's. She tossed a few random outfits into an overnight bag, retrieved some toiletries from the bathroom, and found a piece of paper that would stand out when she hung it on the bedroom door.
"Ariadne: Your poor phone!! I'll get you a new one ASAP. We're at Milo's house. Please come stay with us. Your mother is there, but don't let that keep you away. Love you, puppy. Dale."
She turned out the lights and went back downstairs. Milo watched her cross the sidewalk and offered a hopeful smile. "You look chipper."
"Ari spent the night here. She hasn't answered her phone because she left it upstairs with a shattered screen. It's almost like someone, or some wolf, tackled her to the asphalt last night."
"Whoops."
"Yeah, whoops. It's okay. Better than the alternative, I guess."
"Do you still want to stop by the office?"
"Yeah. I should probably go through the messages and check the mail. I was kind of hoping we could get back to a normal caseload despite wolf manoth, but it's not looking likely. I'm
starting to think normal is something we passed a long time ago."
"Things will calm down. The hunters are just... running a little wild."
"You call drugging every wolf in the Pacific Northwest and inciting all these horrific murders is just running a little wild."
Milo shrugged. "It's horrific, yeah. But they've been cooped up all their lives. We just have to hold our own through this first little bit and then we'll have a chance to make up our losses."
"You really believe that?"
"I have to," Milo said softly. "Because otherwise it means we're prey, for now and forever, and I don't know how I'd handle that."
That left Dale at a loss for words, so she let the car fall into silence. Milo turned the corner toward the office and parked. Milo elected to come in rather than waiting in the cold car, and Dale found the right key as they went inside. She was looking down at her key ring, so Milo was the first to see the message. She grabbed Dale's arm and stopped her from getting closer to the door, and Dale froze when she saw what had alarmed her.
The word WOLF was painted across the Bitches logo, still wet and dripping down the glass. Something was hanging on the doorknob, and Milo moved closer to take it off. It was a simple loop of brown leather with a silver clasp, and she frowned as she held it up. Dale's eyes were wide, her face pale, and she swallowed the lump in her throat.
"It's Ari's collar." She hugged herself to try the tremors from being obvious, but her knees betrayed her. She swayed to one side and Milo caught her before she could fall. "They have Ari," Dale said. "They have Ari, they know she's a wolf. They have her, Milo."
Milo guided Dale's head to her shoulder and held her tightly. "They do. But we're not going to let them keep her."
#
The genial atmosphere in Milo's kitchen vanished like a switch had been flipped as soon as Milo reported what had happened. "They have Ari. They left her collar at the offices and painted ‘wolf' on the door. They found her out and they're letting us know."
Gwen looked at Dale and then held out her hand for the collar. Milo handed it over, and Gwen stood up. She walked to Dale, placed the collar in her hand, and then forced her to close her fingers over it. Dale watched with detached interest and then looked up to meet the disarmingly bright eyes Ari had inherited.