by Jackie May
Is this my fault? There are too many factors to consider. Too many unknowns, besides the fact that Dario was obviously involved with dangerous things, dangerous people. Still, I had never meant to be one of them. It may be we’ll find out later that this was always going to happen, no matter what, but in this moment it sure feels somehow like my fault. Suddenly weary, I drag myself away.
Hauling Ben down the stairs is slow work. The detective’s white shirt is damp with sweat and smeared with blood. He doesn’t say a word the whole time but keeps his head on a swivel. Every time a car drives past the alley, he freezes up, eyes wide. When finally we reach the ground, I pause to readjust my grip around Ben’s mane and chest. We’ve only got one more stretch around the side of the building to my car.
“Ready?” I grunt.
“To your car?”
“Right.” We get going. “What about you?” I huff between breaths. “Car?”
He nods, also winded. “Dark sedan…across the street…you had parked…right behind me.”
“Listen…when you…get to your car…you need to drive home…and forget everything…that just happened…trust me.”
He’s shaking his head when bright headlights blind us. A massive black SUV bumps over the curb and into the alley, blocking our path. Both driver-side doors open to reveal the two vampires from before. The detective drops his end of our load and goes for his gun.
I shouldn’t try to help him. What the vamps want to do to this guy is exactly what needs to be done, for all our sakes. What I should do is walk away, without even looking back. But I can’t help it. I have a weakness for gorgeous man faces, human or not.
“Wait!” I shout as Ben’s coyote drops awkwardly through my arms. I leap to the detective’s side and grip his gun with both hands. “Don’t!” He struggles against my hold. “Look at me. Look at me!” He won’t. His whole body trembles. Useless. So I turn my attention to the vamps and shout, “I need him! He’s with me! And I’m with the Agency. I’m taking him in.”
The vamps step aside to make room between them for a third man approaching. I know immediately who he is, and I no longer have any hope of salvaging this situation. Henry Stadther is Master of the largest vampire clan in Detroit (most just say the clan). He looks us over with eyes long disinterested by the fragile anxieties of mortals. I’m overpowered by the smells of starch in his impeccable suit and oil in his impeccable hair.
“I’m not saying to let him go,” I clarify. “I’m just saying don’t kill him.”
Henry’s bored eyes observe Ben at my feet. “Why?”
Why not kill the human? It takes less than a second for me to realize I won’t be able to muster an answer they’ll care about. The most I can do now is try with the detective one more time. “Hey,” I say to him, tugging on the gun. “At least let me have this. It’s not going to stop them.”
“It slows them down,” he rasps, sweat rolling down his cheek. I decide that now’s not the time to ask him how he knows that.
One of Henry’s men steps toward us with a snarl. But he suddenly stops short, lowers his head, and reluctantly retreats to Henry’s side. I know I’ve just been given my only chance to walk away. As Master, Henry has the ability to send mental commands to his subjects. For the moment (most likely a very short moment) and for my sake, he’s keeping his men leashed. It’s never been more obvious to me that I have to fold. I release the detective’s hand, encouraged by the fact that he doesn’t raise the gun at the vamps, which would have been the last thing he ever did.
Gathering Ben’s coyote into an unwieldy embrace, I drag him away. “I already called it in, you know,” I say over my shoulder. Total lie, of course. “Nick Gorgeous knows about this guy. He’ll be asking about him.” I don’t want to look back. Don’t want to see the detective’s eyes. I can hear his quick, shallow breathing, his panic threatening to turn into full hysteria. I’m nearly to my car when he lets out a high-pitched scream that is suddenly cut short. By the time Ben is laid across the backseat of my car, the doors of the SUV are slamming shut. It backs out of the alley and cruises into darkness down the street.
And here I am again with the choice. Turn around, drive away, remain ignorant? Again, I choose to look. I inch my Crap-pile off the dirt lawn, into the street, creeping forward until the alley comes into view. To my amazement, the detective is raising himself from hands and knees, very much alive. Not a scratch on him.
I roll down my window, exhaling relief into the night air. “You lost?” I call out.
He grabs his head, as though racked with the world’s worst hangover, and takes a few clumsy steps. “Where am I?”
“Roosevelt. Not the best part of town this time of…ever.” I jerk a thumb toward the street behind me. “That must be your dark sedan parked there.”
He squints at it. “I don’t…I’m not sure.”
“You a cop or something?”
The gun in his hand seems to fascinate him. “I think, yeah.”
“Have I seen you before? You look familiar.”
“No, I’m sorry, I…”
“Don’t worry, I’m not a hooker or anything. Just saying.”
With a shake of his head, he staggers away. I watch in the rearview mirror until he has safely dropped behind the wheel of his car. Then I allow one last, lingering gaze up at the third-floor fire escape window.
Halfway across the field, I start honking my horn so that by the time I pull up in the weeds behind the wagon train three people are already standing there waiting. Nolan, grim-faced, shields his eyes from my headlights and steps aside with a gesture for me to pull forward. I can tell he already knows something bad has happened, even though I hadn’t called ahead. Dad is there, looking short and scrawny beside Ray Cody, a prototypical alpha. Without a word, Dad and Ray open the backseat, easily heft Ben’s motionless form, and hurry him toward the fire pit. Nolan waits for me but offers nothing more than a stoic glance.
“He followed me,” I explain. The edge in my voice sounds angry, and I am angry, just not so much at Ben. I’m more annoyed by the inevitable shit storm which is about to come down on me, even though this is so not my fault.
A crowd quickly gathers at the fire. At first there are only murmurs and concerned looks. Dad, unfortunately, has had experience with this sort of thing before, and immediately sets to work extracting the bullets. At the first dig into his hide, Ben starts awake with a bark, and that’s the end of the calm. It takes both Ray and Nolan to wrangle him while Dad twists and grinds with pliers. Little nieces and nephews crowd in, hopping up and down for a better view. Mrs. Cody, nerve-racked at the best of times, paces and moans. Even Little Bunica, my hundred-year-old great-grandmother, hobbles out to the fire with a look of consternation and a comment about little Benny and Shayne and their damn fool shenanigans.
And then…shit and sigh and roll my eyes…my mother marches through the parting crowd like Moses through the sea. She doesn’t even look at Ben but comes straight at me with dozens of bangles and jade circlets rattling around her skeleton wrists. Beneath a threadbare T-shirt, her sagging mom boobs sway freely—she hasn’t worn a bra ever since a boy first helped her out of one when she was fifteen (and don’t you believe her when she insists that boy was Dad). Mom is beautiful when she smiles but terrifying at all other times. She’s not smiling now. “What’s it take, Shayne? How long can it possibly take for somebody to grow up?”
I throw my hands out. “You don’t even know what happened.”
“Ben’s stolen wheels. A demon had them. You found out who, and you went to get them back.”
Okay, so she knows a little, for which I shoot a glare at Nolan.
Mom steps into my line of sight. “Only this isn’t high school anymore, and the bullies aren’t just throwing sand, are they?”
“Mom, high school was eight years ago. Oh, and I’m fine, by the way. All the bullets missed me.”
“Too bad for you. A little blood goes a long way for attention.”
&nbs
p; “Good to know. Next time, I’ll be sure I get shot.”
“Might do you good.”
“You’d love that, wouldn’t you? If I got my eye shot out and had to wear a patch? A constant reminder of how stupid I am.”
“Why not a glass eye that pops out at the dinner table? Don’t be so dramatic. And yes, it was stupid, obviously.” She flips an accusatory hand toward Ben.
“He’ll be fine! He’s recovered before from twice as many shots.”
Mrs. Cody gasps. “What? When?”
Oops. I wasn’t ever supposed to mention that to the moms.
Nolan steps forward. “It wasn’t Shayne’s fault. Ben followed her there. He probably—”
“No, that’s not true,” I say flatly. I don’t know why. Besides not wanting Nolan’s help, that is. Why defend Ben?
Okay, I do know why, but it’s so dumb. If this were a movie, right now we’d jump into a high school flashback of the time me and the teenage Cody boys made a solemn pact that we would never rat each other out, no matter what. Being brothers, they said their word was good enough for the pact, but the only way they could trust me was if I showed them my breasts. So maybe that booby flash gave enough weight to the pact that I still feel obliged to live by it today. Plus, I actually enjoy stoking Mom’s disappointment in me when I know she’s absolutely wrong, even if she’ll never know it. But don’t ask me to understand the twisted psychology there. “I set up the meeting and told Ben to meet me there,” I lie. “All he did was show up.”
“How many of them were there?” asks Ray.
“Three,” I answer, “but it’s not what you’re thinking.”
“Do they know who we are?”
“They could have followed you back here,” Mom says, and Mrs. Cody gasps again.
“No. I’m trying to tell you, there was only supposed to be one who we were dealing with, and he wasn’t dangerous.”
“He’s a demon,” Mom spits.
“And he was a friend of mine.” Suddenly, there’s a collective pause while everybody considers what I’ve just said, and then all at once everybody is groaning—a group face-palm—and talking at once. I can only hear snippets in the chaos, like Mom’s “…sleeping with him, are you insane!” and Mrs. Cody’s “…have his filthy demon spawn?” and ancient, hunchbacked Little Bunica’s “…all night long with a demon once. Did you know they can’t get an orgasm without dirty talk? It’s true!”
In my jacket pocket, my phone buzzes. My pulse skips a beat when I see it’s Nick Gorgeous calling. This can’t be good.
“Shayne,” Mom warns as I turn away from the group.
Whirling on her, I shout so everybody can hear. “It’s Nick Gorgeous, Mom, because all this stuff”—I gesture toward Ben—“isn’t just high school shit. It’s actually part of something bigger I’m working on for the Agency, so excuse me while I do my job.”
That shuts everybody up. Everybody but Mom, who doesn’t buy it for a second. When I walk away, she calls out, “You’re not taking your meds!”
I flip her off without looking back as I answer the call. “You gonna yell at me, too, Gorgeous?”
“What did I tell you? Earlier today—”
“—I’m fine, thanks for asking—”
“—I said to stay away from the demon thing—”
“—even though Ben is shot up, and a friend of mine is dead—”
“—all on you!”
“Not on me!” I shout, momentarily forgetting who I’m talking to. No underworlder—not even Terrance the ginormous troll—is stupid enough to disrespect Nick Gorgeous. Add it to my list of idiotic things I’ve apparently done today. “I had everything under control until Ben showed up.” Except that even before that… “And there was some other guy, a detective.”
“Just shut up for a second and listen—”
“How do you even know about this?”
“Not from you.”
“I was just about to call you, I swear.” Sure I was, right after never.
“Henry Stadther beat you to it by an hour. He personally called the Director, and then she called me. And you know how much I love getting calls from her.”
Oh. Yikes. So I take it back: one underworlder would dare to disrespect Nick Gorgeous. I guess that’s why Madison West is the Director.
“What did Henry say?” I ask. “What the hell do they want with that detective? And maybe Henry could shed some light on the two guys with assault rifles—”
“Oh, don’t worry, Shayne, you’ll have all the answers you want when you get here.”
“I’m getting there?”
“Be here at four.”
That would be four in the morning. “That’s in six hours. Why not now?”
“Just tell me something, Shayne. And no bullshit.”
“What do you mean? When have I ever—”
“Shayne.”
I shut my mouth.
“Think hard,” he says, and there’s no command in his voice. More like a plea. “And please be very clear when you answer.”
“Okay. I’m scared.” I hadn’t meant to say that last bit out loud, but whatever.
“Are you absolutely sure that in the demon’s apartment you saw all the stuff needed to make a bomb? Don’t answer yet. Think.”
I don’t need to think. But I pause obediently. Then: “Look, it’s not like I know what kinds of chemicals you need to make a bomb, but if the buckets I saw were labeled correctly, if they weren’t just buckets being used to store other things…” Which they weren’t, as they were still sealed with biohazard warning labels.
“Yes, if they were what they appeared to be…” Nick repeats.
“Then yeah,” I say, “they’re chemical and powder compounds labeled with extreme cautions, lots of warning signs, highly explosive, toxic, all that. And cell phones, which are used for detonators.”
“Should I even ask why you know how bombs are detonated?”
“Police shows.” And I have obnoxious guy friends who talk about so much random shit while playing poker.
Gorgeous lets go an exhausted breath. I can picture him rubbing his face, his eyes, his smooth head. Finally, he says, “Four o’clock,” and hangs up.
I ram the phone into my pocket and march toward the creek that serves as border between the mobile home park and Newport Woods. It’s no wildlife refuge like the enormous Detroit River preserve just east of here, but it’s dark, dense, quiet, and I know every inch of it. Newport Woods is just as much a home to me as unit #2 of the wagon train.
I need those woods now, because there are times when words fail. Not that I don’t have the words for times like this. I’ve got plenty: unfair, frustration, shame, anger, guilt, blame, failure. It’s just that it would take words all night to explain feelings that are felt in an instant. They rage through my heart, sting my eyes, and make me want to scream. That’s how I know I’m being called by my other side—the simpler side that can only register the most essential needs of life: food, sleep, shelter. The animal side. Deep into the woods, I rip my clothes off and shift. Because a fox’s emotions are never complex, and foxes definitely don’t cry.
For half an hour I simply roam aimlessly, allowing my ears and my nose to explore any little thing that calls attention. Caterpillars laboring up a tree trunk. A broken branch hanging down. I take it between my teeth and pull and pull and thrash my head, growling, but the only thing that gives way is my bite, and I tumble backward.
The scuttle of a critter beneath the ground lures me sniffing over fallen leaves and half-eaten grass to the tunnel opening of a meadow vole, a little thing that looks and tastes just like a mouse. Worth a shot. Crouching low, coiling like a spring, with a wiggle of my butt and my brush laid out straight behind me, I jam a paw into the tunnel, then immediately I pounce to my left, twisting through the air and diving toward a second hole where I expect to see the critter escaping. I land with a dull clap of my paws together, and only then—an instant too late—does the vole jet out
and disappear beneath a tangle of tree roots.
Right, so…eluded by a puny vole, bested by a dead tree branch. Even as a fox, I can’t do anything right.
On the breeze, I catch a strong scent. A normal fox would run and hide, because that scent means predator. But I’m not a normal fox, so I run and hide, because that scent means Nolan. Losing him won’t be difficult. Among our kind only foxes have retractable claws, giving us the distinct ability to climb trees. And if you’re thinking, Hey, just like a cat, then you win a prize.
With claws unleashed, I scamper up the nearest tree, a middle-aged white oak with gnarled, twisting branches. Several minutes later, Nolan’s coyote trots into view far below me. Unlike Ben’s more pronounced contrast of dark gray, black, and red legs, Nolan’s coat is an even golden brown, with white in his scruff and chest. Though younger than Ben, Nolan’s coyote is bigger—not in height, but in fullness of coat. The word I use (because Nolan hates it) is puffier. Like a giant plush toy.
He examines the broken tree branch, then takes it between his teeth and easily jerks it to the ground. Show-off. His attention turns to the vole tunnel, where he sniffs and wheels in circles, after which he peers one way into the woods, then the other way. Looking for me, no doubt. He makes several more turns, scanning the woods in all directions, but he never thinks—as coyotes wouldn’t—to look up.
And I don’t go down. I can’t imagine what he might want to say to me right now. I stopped listening to him years ago, when we came of age and his natural tendency to be protective of me started to feel a lot more like ownership of me. In any case, if I went down there and his tone were the least bit severe with me right now, I can’t promise that I wouldn’t claw his eyes out, so I stay put. Besides, to talk we’d have to shift, and having an argument in the nude would feel too much like we’re actually married.
At length, he moves off. I decide to stay in the tree, even though I probably won’t be able to fall asleep here. The last time I slept in a tree I rolled off the branch, and my landing proved one way that foxes are not like cats.