But I didn’t press. Instead, I nodded, waiting for the other shoe to drop. The metaphorical footwear didn’t take long to fall.
Luke pierced me with eyes so blue I couldn’t so much as glance sideways. “I propose a partnership.”
This time I did wince. Bastion and I were partners. Grace and I—when our history didn’t tear us apart—were partners.
This stranger and I? We weren’t partners. At best, we were—
“Partners of convenience,” I clarified.
Luke’s eyes smiled, but his mouth remained rigid. He was amused by me, but just as intent upon getting his way. “If you wish.”
“You’ll help me find my item...”
“And you’ll help me protect Clarence.”
I eyed him, considering. Tested him with the obvious roadblock. “But that still doesn’t solve the issue of there being only one job available.”
“Not a problem.” This time Luke did smile. “I work pro bono. After all, I am a friend of the family.”
I raised my eyebrows in question. Luke hadn’t seemed like a friend of the family when he snuck around outside the residence two nights earlier.
Then I realized how he intended to twist the truth. Blue eyes sparkled with mischief as Luke laid out his game plan.
“How could I charge the Smythewhites money when Mrs. Smythewhite thinks she and my mother joined the Daughters of the American Revolution at the exact same time?”
FEIGNED FAMILY CONNECTIONS weren’t his only in, as I discovered once the married couple stopped bickering. Luke told the Smythewhites straight up that hiring two employees rather than one would allow us to take shifts rather than leaving Clarence to his own devices after hours. He touched ever so lightly on his hefty donation to the leukemia-research foundation, then used that to segue into his own pro-bono status...contingent upon me being hired also, of course.
Basically, by the time Luke was finished, the Smythewhites were falling all over themselves to invite us both into their family. We were less employees than we were long-term house guests. Within the hour, we’d been moved into adjoining guest rooms.
But we didn’t start working immediately. Our official job was delayed by Clarence’s ill health—he was too sick to see us. And my unofficial job was derailed by the fact that the halls were full of cleaning staff dismantling the previous evening’s event.
Snooping now would get me tossed out on my ear. So I retreated to my room, put Justice on speaker phone, then paced back and forth like a wolf stuck in a cage.
“Is Bastion any better?” I demanded while eying the space around me. There was no reason to stash a stolen pelt in an empty guest room. But I’d feel pretty stupid if it did turn out to have been hidden here all along.
“No.”
I winced, and not just because I’d caught my finger in a closing drawer. Justice’s tone was gritty, growly. And full of the unspoken question—why was I bothering him instead of finding my cousin’s skin?
I hurried to explain. “I’m hoping to sneak Bastion in. Tonight. To find his pelt. Do you think that will be possible?”
To my surprise, Grace’s voice was the one that emerged through my phone’s speaker now. “Possible? Yes. But highly unlikely. He can’t stop vomiting....”
The last word wobbled, and I wished I was there so I could hug her. Wished she would have let me even if we were in the same room.
Justice saved us both from a doomed twin moment. He’d regained his equanimity and was all business. “Bastion only has to be conscious. I can carry him. Charge your pelt and tell us when you’re ready. We’ll come.”
I hummed assent even as I dragged the bed away from the wall and noted the lack of dust in the spot vacuum cleaners would have a hard time reaching. The Smythewhite’s cleaning crew was impressive. Would the thief really leave Bastion’s pelt somewhere the staff could find it during the course of their usual duties?
“It’ll be awhile,” I warned them. “Maybe after midnight. This house is a hornet’s nest at the moment.”
Justice’s voice didn’t wobble, but it might as well have. “We have nothing better to do than wait.”
I PLANNED TO SNEAK out and charge my pelt. To shift beneath the neighbors’ ungated shrubbery. To pretend to be a dog while running until my toenails bled.
I wasn’t counting on Luke trailing behind me, invisible and silent. I didn’t realize he was present until I’d toed off one shoe and started on the next.
“Really? Here? In broad daylight?”
It was like the first time we’d met, only somehow very different. I hopped around to face him, realizing as I did so how absurd it was to care whether I got my sock coated in mulch.
I’d planned for this scenario, of course. The spot was secluded and rarely visited, but there was a chance the neighbor kids would be outside playing. That’s why I’d spread my pelt on the ground beside me, skin up so I could dive atop it and shift if caught in the act.
But what do you do when interrupted by a werewolf instead of by a human? Stand there like an idiot for far longer than necessary, apparently, then spit out an entirely unbelievable lie.
“I had a pebble in my shoe.”
“Both shoes?”
“Magical pebble.”
“Don’t turn into a rock, Sylvester.”
I cocked my head, having no idea what he was talking about. And Luke was the one who reddened. “It’s a children’s story. About a talking donkey.”
“Oh, so now you’re saying I’m an ass?”
Luke’s eyes smiled, and I couldn’t resist smiling back at him. Then, so fast I barely saw him move, he was sitting cross-legged atop my pelt, patting the spot beside him with a welcoming hand.
“Let’s talk.”
The weight on my belly should have been heartening. It meant Luke had no clue I was a woelfin. Even one of the skinless wouldn’t be so bold as to plunk himself down on a woelfin’s pelt if he knew what it was.
My secret identity was secure...and I needed to keep it that way. So I countered: “Let’s not.”
Luke’s gaze left mine and the sun went behind a cloud at the exact same moment. The air was still. Our minds were not.
“I know that was you last night, Honor. In the rain. As a wolf.”
He spoke to a bird perched on a treetop. It didn’t answer and neither did I.
“You don’t seem as inexperienced as Clarence. But...”
“Clarence?” I’m not sure how I ended up sitting beside him. But I did. I only hoped Luke didn’t notice when the pelt curled up around me, pushing us in close.
“He hasn’t shifted yet. Still....”
From six inches away, Luke’s eyes were like super magnets. I broke free of their pull long enough to interrupt. “You’re saying Clarence is a werewolf?”
“Surely you can smell the fur on him?”
And the difference between woelfin and skinless was coming back around to bite me. “Sinus trouble,” I mumbled. Maybe if my pelt wasn’t a dead giveaway, lack of lupine senses while human wouldn’t be either?
Luke seemed to accept my evasion. “I plan to help him with the transition. I can help you also. Take my car. There’s a park a few miles away. Much safer to run there than down city streets.”
He was offering assistance to what he thought was a packless werewolf. Keys sat in his palm like a poisoned apple. If I accepted the offering, we’d become more than partners of convenience. Luke would have questions. As a woelfin, any answers I gave would be lies.
And did it really matter when I intended to swipe Bastion’s pelt tonight then make tracks out of town in short order? Did it matter when Luke was both skinless and lacking a twin?
“I was thinking I’d take the night shift,” I suggested, trying to make the idea sound like a spur-of-the-moment decision.
“I’ll take day then. Not a problem.”
My arm brushed against Luke’s as I knelt in preparation for standing. The point of contact was like a minor sunburn, tempting m
e to press the spot with my hand to see if it stung.
Instead, I lurched upright and bent to retrieve my shoe from where it sat inches from his left knee. Tying the laces, I knew without looking that Luke had risen also. Knew the instant he began brushing off my fur.
Invisible hands skimmed across my torso like the prelude to a full-body massage. I leaned into the pressure...then nearly fell as my pelt was lifted to lie between me and Luke.
I snatched it up. Found, underneath, keys waiting in one open palm.
Luke didn’t mention them. Just waited, oozing sex appeal.
I ignored the tantalizing suggestion. Both tantalizing suggestions.
“I’ll spell you at eight.” That gave me plenty of time to charge my pelt. Gave Luke plenty of time to talk Clarence into, what, a recuperative transition into lupine form?
Was being a werewolf likely to cure leukemia? Did the kid even have leukemia, or were the doctors confused by his imminent transition?
Two skinless in one house. I shivered. That was the relevant part. Two skinless getting in the way of retrieving Bastion’s pelt.
I grabbed Luke’s keys one second before turning and walking away from the temptation he represented.
Chapter 13
The park. Trees, leaves. Birds, squirrels, and open air.
I ran, loving it. I hated myself for loving what my family couldn’t take part in.
I forced myself to continue past pleasure and into heel-drumming exhaustion, until I was so tired I could barely drag myself back in the direction of Luke’s car.
There, I found my clothes, keys, and cell phone behind a tree just where I’d left them. They weren’t the way I’d left them, however. Instead, they’d been unfolded and subtly pawed through. Perhaps by a raccoon searching for a granola bar?
No, not by a raccoon. There was something missing. Not my cash or credit cards. Not the car keys. Instead, my half-wolf-paw necklace was gone. The one I’d worn since childhood, the one that matched another half-wolf-paw dangling around my sister’s neck.
“No! Really?” The jewelry was small, shiny, worth no more than five bucks when brand new, which it very much wasn’t.
It was worth far more to me, though. I hovered for a moment, tempted to shift back to wolf form so I could sniff at each item with lupine nostrils.
But Bastion needed every ounce of my stored energy. Each shift drained the battery.
“Grace will understand,” I lied to myself, pulling on the little black dress she’d picked out for me.
Then I slid behind the wheel of Luke’s sleek, modern car and headed over to the faded opulence of Walmart.
NEAR THE BUILDING’S entrance, the parking lot was hopping. But off in one corner, our family’s car sat silent and alone.
Urban car camping was Bastion’s and my backup plan when we needed a free place to stay while out bounty hunting, but I wouldn’t have dreamed of dragging my twin and Justice into anything so lacking in amenities. Bastion must have mentioned the trick in his letters, though, because they’d chosen it for themselves when our joint credit card refused to operate and our pooled pocket change came to only sixty-three bucks.
Now, I pulled into the same camera-free zone they’d selected, nodding a silent greeting at Grace and Justice before giving in to the need to check on Bastion. The shadows in the back seat at first made it impossible to pick him out amid the jumble of unfolded sleeping bags. Then I stepped out of the glow of a streetlight and saw that the top sleeping bag stopped just beneath my cousin’s chin.
Despite the fact that I was soaked with sweat from my recent run and the heat of the evening, Bastion was shivering. Shivering, red-cheeked...and entirely unaware of where he lay.
This was the cousin who loved mountaintops and wide open spaces. The times we’d had to camp in our car previously, Bastion had rebelled against the close confines and had slept out on a street bench, leaving me the entire interior. Now, he was too far gone to even chafe at the cramped confines.
I took a step closer, swallowing against the pain of memory. I’d barely seen this stage of our parents’ illness. When the first three faded, Aunt Promise had handled their decline behind closed doors. She’d chosen Grace and Bastion as the most able to assist her when she neared her own end.
Now Justice was the one who drew back the sleeping bag to reveal Bastion’s unclothed torso. I was the one who spread my pelt atop our fading pack mate.
I clenched my teeth, knowing we were failing just like everyone else had failed before us. A stolen pelt was a death sentence.
Pain rocked me, but Bastion didn’t so much as stir.
AN HOUR LATER, WE HAD to admit the energy transfer wasn’t going to revive Bastion. There was no point bringing him to the Smythewhite residence if he wasn’t conscious. United momentarily, Justice, Grace, and I padded over to Luke’s car, far enough away from my cousin so we wouldn’t disturb him while we talked.
I cleared my throat. “If he wakes up, call me. Night or day. I’ll find a way to get him in there.”
As I spoke, ice splinters slid through my veins. But I ignored them. Pain was good. It meant the pelt was doing something even if there was no obvious change in Bastion’s coloring.
Rather than answering, Grace swiped one finger across the slick paint job on the side of Luke’s vehicle. I couldn’t tell if she coveted his ride or was nurturing anger at me for not explaining where it had come from.
I hoped she hadn’t noticed my missing necklace....
Only when my twin looked up, tears pooling in her eyes, did I realize she wasn’t thinking about either possibility. She swallowed then said what we were all thinking. “He’s fading faster than Aunt Promise did.”
Justice swore low and foul. Then he left us. Turned on his heel without a word of farewell and stalked back toward his twin. If we didn’t have even the three full days we’d counted on, he didn’t want to spend another second away from his twin.
I couldn’t blame him. I didn’t want to leave either. But the Smythewhite house called me. The house, with its promise of a stolen pelt and Luke’s sturdy strength to guide me through finding it.
I shook my head, knocking loose that extraneous moonbeam. This wasn’t about Luke. This was about Bastion.
Opening the driver’s side door, I waited for Grace to step back and let me do my duty. But she just hovered there, as if we still had something to talk about. As if, for once, she needed something I was able to provide.
My twin didn’t say anything, though. So I was the one to fill the silence. “I’ll tear apart the house until my pelt stops working. Then I’ll come back and recharge it. We’ll repeat the maneuver as often as we have to. We’ll make this work.”
Grace nodded, but it might as well have been a shrug. She didn’t move, even when I sank into the seat and turned the key in the ignition. Didn’t step away as tires rolled by inches from her feet and the side mirror bit into her gut.
Just stood there and watched me disappoint my pack.
IT WAS STRANGE TO CREEP back into the Smythewhite home without my pelt slung across my shoulders. Strange not to see Luke or anyone else when I entered.
To ease my mind, I cracked open the door to the teenager’s bedroom. Padded closer until I was sure the lump beneath the sheets was human and alive.
A tiny red light on the bedside table caught my attention. The indicator LED on a baby monitor, the other half of which I suspected sat in Luke’s bedroom.
So Clarence was taken care of. Time to return to my primary objective—finding Bastion’s pelt.
The bedrooms were off limits at the moment, but this was my opportunity to tear apart public spaces I’d been forced to avoid the previous evening. So I searched. Picked up vases and stuck my hands inside them until dust bunnies rubbed against my fingers. Dug through the kitchen, peeking behind boxes of oatmeal and jars of peanut butter. Pawed through the linen closet, not quite managing to refold the fitted sheets when I was done.
Bastion’s fur had to be
here, but it wasn’t. The house had felt endless when I started, but there were only so many places large enough to stash a full wolf pelt.
By three in the morning, I’d gone through all potential hiding spots twice and had stopped noticing pins and needles of pain where my own pelt propped up my cousin. No wonder I spoke aloud to nobody, alone in the dark.
“Time to run.”
My left foot fumbled a step as I followed the main stair’s sweeping curve upward to check the second-story hallway one last time before heading back to Walmart. I was exhausted. The idea of snagging my pelt then hunting in lupine form for a few more hours was inconceivable.
But I’d do it. I had to do it. When all of this was over, I couldn’t afford any additional regrets.
Not like last time when I’d chosen to stay home while the rest of my family went out to a dinner party. “It doesn’t matter that they’re not woelfin. Kind people are kind people,” my mother had told me.
Her self-name was Charity. Perhaps that’s why she was always trying to see beyond differences? At fifteen, I’d considered the trait a weakness rather than a strength.
“Just go,” I snarled, fingering my necklace. In retrospect, it was probably relevant that Grace had pretended not to see me between classes that morning. Once we hit high school, she ran with the in crowd. I hovered around the borders of the geeks.
At home, of course, Grace was still my sister. But I was confused by her behavior. An evening alone with my favorite TV show sounded like a beach vacation.
“You’ll mind our wolfsfells?” Uncle Reason’s focus on the tangible always calmed me.
“Of course,” I promised. “I am Honor.”
His trusting assent was enough to send me to bed early. I slept deep and dreamlessly...right up until the front door slammed so hard against the wall behind it that the knob broke through the drywall....
Now, my fingers slid to my pelt for reassurance. Only, of course, the pelt wasn’t present. This wasn’t ten years ago. This was the time to focus on correcting my decade-old cowardice.
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