Stolen

by Kelley Armstrong

  I couldn't sleep that night.

  I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, fighting off an unease that kept me from closing my eyes.

  First, there was the question of the witches. Were they witches or not? Either way, I didn't trust their motivation. Too much of what they'd said didn't make sense. I should have called Jeremy as soon as I'd left their hotel. He wasn't going to be happy when he found out I'd waited a full day to tell him. At least two people knew I was a werewolf and I hadn't told either Clay or Jeremy. Where the hell was my head at? Should I call Jeremy now? It was 2:45 A.M. My flight left at 8:00. This could wait. Could it? Should it?

  I went for a run to clear my head. Jogging, I mean. While Changing into a wolf and running around Pittsburgh might be fun, it was definitely not the kind of excitement I needed. I pulled on shorts and a T-shirt, left my hotel room, and followed a maze of alleys to a deserted industrial area. Big cities weren't the place for late-night jogs. Anyone seeing a young woman running around Pittsburgh at 3:00 A.M. was going to be looking for the guy chasing her.

  I'd jogged about a quarter-mile when I realized someone was following me. No big surprise. Like I said, young women jogging at night attract attention, usually the wrong kind. Sure, if some guy jumped me, I could slam him into the nearest brick wall and there'd be one less potential rapist for the world to worry about. But that meant a body to clean up in a strange city. Not only that, but I couldn't do it. I can talk the talk, but I ain't that tough. Even if some mugger pulled a gun on me and I had to kill him, I'd regret it. I'd wonder if I'd overreacted, if maybe this was the guy's first offense and a good scare would have set him straight, if maybe he had a wife and kids at home and only wanted a few bucks for food. Better to avoid getting into a situation where such action might be necessary. Wild wolves survived by avoiding confrontation with humans. Smart werewolves did the same.

  When I heard soft running footfalls nearby, I first made sure it wasn't a coincidence. I turned down the next three streets and circled full around to where I'd been. The footsteps followed. Next I got downwind and checked the scent, in case it was another werewolf. As the only female werewolf in a country with a couple dozen males, I was considered a trophy. The fact that my lover was the most feared and hated werewolf around only added to my value. If mutts didn't want to fuck me, they wanted to fuck Clay over--and the chance to do both at once was more than some could resist. Though I didn't know of any mutts in the Pittsburgh area, they were a nomadic lot and my dossiers were always out of date.

  My pursuer wasn't a mutt. Werewolves have a distinct underlying scent and this guy didn't. It was a guy--a man, I mean. Other than that, his smell didn't give me much to go on. No aftershave. A touch of body odor, as if his deodorant had reached its time limit. Otherwise clean. Very clean. I didn't expect that with a rapist or mugger. Yes, I know not every creep is a scruffy, unshaven vagrant. Most aren't. But they aren't usually hygiene fanatics either. Curiosity aroused, I decided to get a look at my stalker.

  Still eager to avoid confrontation, I did both at once, getting a closer look while sneaking away. To find him, I stopped in the middle of the empty street, bent over, and retied my shoes. Then I muttered under my breath, yanked them undone, and redid them. By the third tie-up, stalker-guy got antsy, probably cursing me for stopping in the road instead of in some nice shadowy corner. He leaned out of his hiding spot, giving himself away with a blur of motion in the otherwise still street. He was hiding in a building alcove to my left.

  Straightening, I launched into a set of hamstring stretches. Midway through my second set, I took off. Running full-out, I raced into the alley alongside the building where my stalker hid. By the time he came after me, I was behind the adjacent building. I stopped in a rear doorway and searched the ground. A few yards to my left, I saw what I wanted. Something dark and missile-like. A half-dozen beer bottles were scattered around the door. Grabbing the nearest one, I pitched it down the back alley. It crashed somewhere behind the next building. Fortunately, my stalker wasn't deaf. When he got to the end of the side alley, he turned toward the crash and headed in that direction, moving away from me.

  Keeping in the shadows, I watched the man as he walked away. Six-two, maybe six-three. Average weight. Dressed in dark pants and jacket. Some kind of hat. Baseball cap? He slowed, paused, getting his bearings. Then he hunkered down and crept forward, head moving from side to side, like a sniper creeping through the jungle. Something dangled from his hand. A gun. A big gun. Right, Elena. You're being stalked through Pittsburgh by an armed Vietnam vet. That's what I got for watching Platoon with Clay last week. The guy was probably carrying a bottle of Wild Turkey.

  Sticking close to the wall, I slunk toward my stalker. Light from a naked bulb flashed off what he held in his hand. Definitely a gun. I narrowed my eyes to get a better look at his outfit. He wore black fatigues. Okay, enough with the Platoon flashbacks. Fatigues didn't come in black, at least I didn't think they did. The guy wore black baggy pants, an equally baggy jacket, a dark ball-cap, and dark, thick-soled boots.

  He stopped. I flattened myself against the wall and waited. Tugging off his ball-cap with one hand, he scratched his head with the other. In the silence of the night, his fingernails rasped through his short hair. Very short hair. Like military buzz-cut short. Keeping his cap off, he took something from his pocket, flicked his wrist, and lifted it to his ear.

  "She come out that way?" he murmured into the two-way radio. I assumed it was a radio because I didn't see him punch in a phone number. "Yeah ... no. She musta made me. Spooked and ran. Caught me off guard ... yeah ... no, no. I woulda noticed that. Kinda hard to miss a wolf out here."

  Wolf? Did he say wolf?

  This really wasn't my day.

  CHAPTER 4

  HOUDINI

  "No," my stalker said into his radio. "What? ... Yeah. Probably. You gonna check with Tucker? ... Nah, I'll walk. Tell Pierce to park it around back ... Yeah? Well, it's not far ... See ya in a couple."

  He stuffed the radio into his pocket. Then he lifted his gun and did something to make it smaller, folded back the barrel or unscrewed it or something. Hey, I'm Canadian. I don't know street guns. Somehow he made the weapon half the size, lifted his jacket, and stuck it in a holster.

  I followed stalker-guy back to the street. There he met up with a second man, also dressed in the whole cat-burglar/gothic-fatigue getup. Both removed their ball-caps and shoved them in a collapsible knapsack. Then they unzipped their jackets, making themselves look as normal as possible without revealing the guns. They headed east. I followed.

  By the third turn, I knew where they were going. We were still a half-mile away, but I knew. As I expected, they walked three blocks, made a left, made a right, walked three more blocks, and ended up in front of the hotel where I'd met the Winterbournes that afternoon. So my concern about gun-toting men hiding in the Winterbournes' hotel room hadn't been so paranoid after all. Only instead of having their cohorts/minions jump me there, they'd waited to go after me under cover of night.

  I expected the men to walk straight in the front lobby. When they didn't I was surprised, then realized two guys dressed in black walking into the lobby of an expensive hotel at 4:00 A.M. would raise a few eyebrows ... and a few alarms. Invited or not, they were taking the back route. They skirted around to a side door. My stalker leaned against the wall, blocking my view, while his friend fiddled with the lock. Two minutes passed. Then the door opened and they slipped inside. I counted to twenty, then went after them.

  The two men took the stairs. They climbed to the fourth floor, opened the exit door, and peered out. After a few moments of discussion, my stalker's companion slipped into the hall, leaving stalker-guy in the stairwell.

  Now I had a dilemma. From my vantage point below the stalker, I couldn't see anything--not him and certainly not his companion, even though the door was propped open. I did have an option. When I'd come in with Paige, I'd noticed a second set of stairs on the far side of the
lobby. I could exit on the third floor, find the alternate stairs, go up to the fifth, and circle back to the staircase. From the steps above, I'd be able to see. Plus, the stalker would be more likely to expect danger from below, someone coming up from ground level. On the other hand, the plan also meant I'd be out of hearing and smelling range for at least a few minutes. Was it better to stay where I could use those two senses? The longer I waited, the more risky it would be to leave. I crept down the stairs to the third floor.

  Circling around wasn't a problem. The exits were marked at each end of the hall. I came back to the first stairwell, took off my shoes, slipped through the fifth-floor door, and eased down the stairs until I was a half-dozen steps from the fourth-floor landing where stalker-guy waited. Sliding my shoes back on, I crouched to peer through the railing. Perfect. Now I had sound, smell, and sight. My stalker's partner was at room 406. The Winterbournes. He was crouched before the door, fiddling with lock-pick tools. So they weren't invited guests. Maybe the Winterbournes had been telling the truth about being in danger. At least, telling the truth about themselves being in danger. And me? Well, I wouldn't have been in Pittsburgh if it weren't for them, right? Somehow I doubted these militia-wannabes would have been stalking me tonight if I'd stayed home. Whether or not the Winterbournes were complicit in this, I could still blame them for it. Lucky thing, because I definitely wanted to blame them for something.

  Stalker-guy rolled from his heels to his toes, muttering under his breath. Down the hall, his companion wiped his sweaty face on his shoulder. He stood, stretched, and crouched again. Several times he tried the door handle, then turned to his partner and shook his head. Finally my stalker waved him back. I quickstepped up three stairs, out of sight. They came into the stairwell and closed the door.

  "No go," lock-pick guy said. "I don't get it. I'm sure I popped the lock, but it won't open."

  "Dead bolt?"

  Lock-pick guy shook his head. "I checked out the place this morning. Old-fashioned key locks."

  "Call Tucker. I saw a pay phone out front. Ground line. I'll wait here."

  Lock-pick guy trotted down the stairs. As the first-floor door swung shut behind him, I heard another door open, this one on the fourth floor. Stalker-guy cracked open the exit to look down the hall. Then he made a noise deep in his throat, a stifled chuckle. I sneaked down a few steps, crouched again, and looked through the door crack.

  Paige Winterbourne stood in the hall, arms folded across her chest, dressed in a green silk chemise and matching wrap. Frowning, she surveyed the corridor. Then she stopped and stared at the exit where we hid. Though the door was open only a couple of inches, she must have seen light or shadow peeking through. As she watched, stalker-guy hesitated, holding the door handle, ready to close it. If she'd gone back into her room to call security, he would have bolted. But she didn't. She narrowed her eyes and started toward us. Yet another horror movie cliche. When the ditzy ingenue hears a bump in the night, does she retreat to safety and phone for help? Of course not. She has to see what's behind that partly open door. All Paige needed now was to lose the negligee, so she could run naked and screaming down the hall when she flung open the door and found the killer lurking behind it.

  Stalker-guy broke from the script. Instead of waiting for Paige to throw open the door, he took out his gun and snapped it back together. Then he eased the door open another half-inch and lifted the gun to the door crack. Last year, I'd seen an innocent woman gunned down because of me. Whether Paige was innocent or not was a matter of some debate, but I doubted she deserved to be murdered in a hotel hallway. I leaped over the railing and landed on the man's back. He fell forward. I grabbed his head and twisted his neck. The simplest, quietest, and cleanest kill.

  As he dropped face-first to the floor, I looked up to see Paige holding the door open and staring.

  "Stand guard," I said. "Is your room unlocked?"

  "My--? Umm, yes."

  I hoisted the dead man onto my shoulder and pushed past her into the hall. "I said to stand guard. He wasn't alone."

  "Where are you--oh, wait. My room? You can't put him--" She stopped. "Take him to the suite next to ours. The near side. It's empty."

  "All the better."

  "I can unlock the door with a spell," she said.

  She hurried down the hallway alongside me, murmuring words in a foreign language. While she was talking, I covered my hand with my shirt, reached over, and snapped the vacant room's doorknob.

  "Run back and get the gun," I said. "Then wake your aunt and get in here."

  Paige hesitated, like a knee-jerk reaction against taking orders. She seemed to think better of arguing and paused only a second before jogging to the stairwell. I dragged the dead man into the bathroom, closed the door, and checked his pockets for ID. Nothing. Seeing the two-way radio in his pocket reminded me that there was a second gunman, and Paige and her aunt were taking their sweet time evacuating their room.

  I opened the bathroom door as they walked into the vacant room. Paige was still wearing her chemise and wrapper. Ruth's long housecoat covered her nightwear. Both carried a change of clothing and their purses, and Paige had the gun.

  "Good idea," I said. "Is all your ID in there?"

  "No sense leaving them any clues if they break in," Paige said. "If we have to, we can leave the rest of the stuff behind."

  "Paige told me what happened," Ruth said. "We're very grateful. Also very impressed. You have excellent reflexes."

  "Self-defense classes," I said.

  "Still not admitting to the werewolf thing?" Paige asked.

  I walked to the bathroom and held open the door. "Either of you ever see this guy before? Don't touch anything. The cops will dust for prints."

  "Cops?" Paige repeated.

  "Yes, cops. Who do you think will handle the murder investigation? Hotel security?"

  "Murder? You mean he's dead?"

  "No. He's resting comfortably," I said. "People always sleep best with their heads at a ninety-degree angle. He looks comfortable, doesn't he?"

  "There's no need for sarcasm," Paige said tightly. "Maybe you're used to hauling corpses around, but I'm not."

  "Sheltered life. You're supposed to be a witch and you've never had to kill anyone?"

  Paige's voice tightened another notch. "We use alternate methods of defense."

  "Like what? Cast a spell to make your attackers think happy thoughts? Turn their guns into flowers? Peace and love for all?"

  "I'd have used a binding spell," Paige said. "Kept the guy alive so we could question him. Wow. There's a novel idea. If you hadn't killed him, maybe we could have talked to him."

  "Oh, that's right. Paige's ultra-efficient binding spell. Tell you what. Next time I see a guy pointing a gun at you, I'll let you do things your way. You start your invocation and see if you can finish before he guns you down. Deal?"

  Paige lifted the gun, opened it, removed a tranquilizer dart, and held it up. "No one wanted to kill me."

  "Are you sure about that?" a male voice asked.

  Paige and I jumped. Even Ruth looked up, startled. In the corner of the bedroom stood a man dressed in the same black fatigues as the dead man on the floor. He was of average height and weight, with average brown hair cut short but not military short. Only one distinguishing feature--a paper-thin scar running from temple to nose--assured me I'd never seen this man before. I glanced toward the hall door. It was still closed and locked. Paige's change of clothing lay undisturbed in front of it. So how'd this guy get in?

  "I'm glad to hear you wouldn't have killed poor Mark," the man said, sitting on the edge of the bed, stretching his legs and crossing his ankles. "Very sporting of you. I guess what they say about witches is true. So selfless, so concerned for others, so unbelievably naive."

  I stepped toward him.

  "Don't!" Paige hissed.

  "This is the werewolf?" The man turned dirt-brown eyes on me in a smirking once-over. "Better than I expected. So, are you coming
along, wolf-girl? Or do things have to get"--his smirk broadened to a grin--"physical."

  I glanced at Paige and Ruth.

  "Oh, they're coming too," the man said. "But I'm not worried about them. Only witches, you know. They'll do what they're told."

  Paige made a noise in her throat, but Ruth laid a restraining hand on her arm.

  "So you're kidnapping us?" I asked.

  The man yawned. "Looks that way, doesn't it?"

  "What's in it for you?" Paige asked.

  "See?" The man looked at me. "That's witches for you. Make me feel guilty. Appeal to my kinder, gentler side. Which might work, if I had one."

  "So you're working for Ty Winsloe?" I said.

  "Oh, come on, ladies. As much as I'd love to chat about my motivations and the Yankees' chances at the World Series--"

  I lunged at him, sailing the five feet between us. My hands went out, ready to catch him in the chest and topple him backward. But they didn't. Instead I hit empty air and tumbled onto the bed, twisting fast to right myself before the counterattack. It didn't come. I whirled around to see the man standing by the bedroom door, the same bored expression on his face.

  "Is that the best you can do?" He sighed. "Major disappointment."

  I advanced on him, slowly, eyes locked on his. When I was close enough to hear his heartbeat, I stopped. He grinned again and his eyes sparked with boyish anticipation, like a kid impatient for the game to begin. His throat pulsed, words moving up to his mouth. Before he could say anything, I swung my right foot out, hooked his legs, and yanked. He pitched backward. Then he vanished, one second dropping like a brick, the next--not there. Just not there.