I pulled open the door to the butler’s pantry, and immediately saw what I wanted. One whole wall was taken up with an enormous deep freezer. I yanked it open and pulled out a large leg of lamb. Perfect. I didn’t have time to defrost it – I just had to hope it would work.
I tore a page from a Jamie Oliver cookbook on the shelf, and scrawled a message across it in red whiteboard marker. I found some twine in a drawer, and used that to tie the page to the lamb leg. I lifted the leg and took it back to the front door.
Opening the door a crack, I stared out into the garden and the edge of the forest beyond. The sun was just peeking above the trees, and the garden appeared deserted, the box hedges and beds of hydrangeas and nasturtiums appearing somewhat eerie, sinister. Water trickled from the large concrete fountain; the only sound I could hear, apart from my own heart pounding in my ears.
I knew they were out there, just waiting for their chance to take a bite out of me. I could feel their eyes on me. The wound on my neck throbbed even harder. I pulled my arm back, and with all the strength I had, I tossed the lamb leg down the steps, slamming the door behind me.
I leaned against the door and listened. Within seconds I heard feet pounding up the steps, animals snarling as they fought over their prize, teeth snapping and dogs whimpering as they lost the battle over the meat. I prayed Marcus had got my message, and had destroyed it before the other shifters could see it.
I didn’t have to wait long. From the adjoining room I heard something scratching at the window. I ran across the entrance hall into the room, and saw him standing on the other side of the glass. He had shifted into human form, and his sandy hair flopped over his eyes as he jabbed his fingers frantically at the latch.
I leaned over a leather couch and tentatively pushed open the window a crack. “You got my message?” I asked.
“I certainly did,” he flashed me a cat-ate-the-canary grin, sending a chill down my spine. In an ideal world, Marcus would be quite handsome, even if he did look as if he spent too much time in a tanning bed. His sandy blonde hair fell in curls over his ears, and his white teeth gleamed from between thin, expressive lips. A line of stubble covered his strong, square jaw, and I could see from the way his t-shirt clung to his body that he was toned and muscled. I wondered where he’d got the t-shirt and twill shorts from. Maybe he too had secret stashes of clothing hidden around Raynard Hall.
All of him was rather appealing, until I gazed into his eyes. What I saw there made me want to recoil, to run out through the front door and take my chances with the wolf and his minions. Those eyes were the eyes of a wild beast, a rabid dog. They gazed at me with a mixture of lust and amusement. This man was unpredictable, dangerous. I had to tread carefully.
I hesitated, my hands clutching the sill. “You agree to my terms, then? You will protect me from Isengrim and these shifters, and in return, I will give you the child you want.” My stomach churned as I said that. I had a plan, but I just hoped it would work.
His eyes gleamed. “It’s a deal. Now, hurry and get down here, before they finish devouring that lamb leg and notice I’m missing.”
I pushed the window open the whole way, and climbed up onto the sill, my jeans pulling against the bare, underwearless skin of my ass. Marcus held out his arms to catch me. I braced myself to make the jump.
“Alex, no!”
I whirled around. Ryan was running awkwardly down the hall, his wounded leg dragging behind him. He headed straight for me, his face wild, his naked chest gleaming with sweat.
“Don’t go with him!” he cried. “I can explain everything. You’ll be killed if you leave the Hall, and he can’t protect you now! Please, Alex, listen to me–”
I shook my head, blinking away those pesky tears. I wrenched my eyes away from him and jumped toward Marcus, just as Ryan reached the sill, and his fingers grazed my back. My skin burned where he touched it. The wound on my neck stung, as if it had been freshly opened.
Marcus caught me, and set me down on the ground. He grabbed my hand, and began pulling me behind a row of bushes flanking the drive. “Quickly, Princess,” he cried. “We don’t have much time.”
We raced along the drive. On the other side of the shrubberies I could hear the snarling and snapping continue. The other shifters were still gnawing on that leg, but who knew when they’d be finished with it, or when they’d see us running for that open gate?
“Oh, no,” Marcus moaned. He poured on speed, dragging me along behind him. My bare feet stung as they slapped against the coarse gravel. I tried to look over my shoulder, but all I could see were tall bushes flying past my face as he pulled me along at top speed.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“Run!” He yelled, running even faster. “They’ve seen us.”
He didn’t have to tell me twice. My heart leapt against my chest as I pumped my legs as hard as I could, sprinting toward the gates. My breath came out in short, ragged gasps. The gate seemed to be miles away. I could see Kylie’s car parked on the street, the windows wound up. Something snarled as it pounded behind me, snapping at my feet. I could feel hot breath on the backs of my legs. No, no, no, no. Any second now it would pounce, tearing my skin–
Behind me, I heard Marcus curse. Feet thudded against the gravel. I heard something crash through the trees, more snarling, and a fox cried out in pain. I didn’t stop, didn’t look back, just kept running toward that car.
Kylie saw me, and leaned back to unlock the passenger side door. I could see a small medieval mace gleaming in her hand. Good old Kylie. She’d raided Ray’s medieval re-enactment bag again.
Heart pounding and legs like rubber, I reached the car, yanked open the door, and leapt inside, I slammed the door behind me, just as a large, red fox slammed into the side of the car, cracking the glass and leaving a dent in the door. Kylie screamed and dropped the mace, and it clattered against the central console, burying one of the sharp spikes into the plastic.
Another fox slammed against the windshield. Cracks spiderwebbed out as it tried to use its claws to break through the glass. Kylie slammed the car into reverse, and the fox slid off, toppling across the cobbled drive.
“This is crazy!” Kylie yanked the wheel around, swerving as two foxes bounded from the bushes and leapt at the car. They rolled together, missing the wheel by mere inches, and leapt to their feet, snapping and snarling at each other. One of them had a distinctive sandy-coloured coat.
“That’s Marcus!” I leaned over and jammed the button to wind down the window. “Get in, you stupid mutt!” Marcus lifted his head, then with a swipe of his paw dislodged the other fox, sending it sprawling across the drive. He leapt through the air and scrambled inside the car, cowering in the corner of the backseat as his attacker scrambled to climb in after him.
“Go, go, go!” I yelled, reaching across Marcus’s panting figure to shove the snarling fox off the car and wind the window up. Another fox tried to jab his paw through at the last moment, but the glass trapped his hand and he whimpered as he was dragged along the drive for several feet before his paw came free.
Kylie turned the wheel hard around, the tires squealing in protest as she sped away. I screamed as something slammed into the side of the car, smashing the glass in the backseat. It was a giant stag, its graceful legs churning as it lowered its head to butt the door again. Kylie swerved toward the stag, hitting it on the side and sending it sprawling across the road. I glanced behind me to see a large wolf with glowing yellow eyes bounding down the road after us.
“Jesus!” cried Kylie, leaning forward as she accelerated down the street. “This is unbelievable!”
I watched from the rear window as the wolf slunk back into the bushes, heading back towards Ryan’s house. I knew better than to assume it had given up, though. Isengrim didn’t strike me as someone who gave up easily.
“Where to now, Princess?” Marcus asked, as he shifted back into his human form, his naked torso shimmering with sweat and one torn sleeve of his t-shirt sti
ll clinging to his shoulder. I didn’t look again to see if that was the only clothing he had left.
I snapped back. “I’m not the shifter expert here. You tell me, what are the shifters doing now?”
“They’ve probably gone back into the forest, except for a few that still guard the house. They’re meeting together, trying to decide what to do. We don’t have long. Twenty minutes, at most, before they come to hunt you.”
“In broad daylight?” asked Kylie, as she turned onto Roundoak Drive, gripping the wheel so tight her knuckles had turned white. “Wouldn’t that draw attention?”
“They’re vulpines. They’ll just change into their human forms. They could be serving you coffee, fixing your car ...” he wiped shards of glass off his shoulder. “... or passing you on the street. That’s the beauty of fighting a battle like this. You humans are already fucked.”
“Thanks for that earth-shattering insight, Marcus. If you’ve got some kind of telepathic link to Isengrim, can’t you tell me what the plan is?”
“Isengrim is clever,” replied Marcus. “He doesn’t reveal much, and the call only functions between shifters of the same species. Most of Isengrim’s followers are vulpines, so his thoughts are invisible to our call, but even if they weren’t, I couldn’t hear them, because of my bad blood. You’re out of luck there, Princess.” He spat out the words bad blood, like they were poisonous.
“Great.” Kylie’s hands were visibly shaking. “Where do we go now?”
I gazed out the window, staring into the dense oaks as they zoomed past. There was a turnoff just up ahead, and I realised that I recognised it. “Turn off up here. I need to find my car.”
2
“Holy shit,” Kylie had her hand over her mouth.
We were standing at the top of the bank, looking down at my car. Or rather, what was left of my car. Deep ruts in the dirt marked the spot where Ryan and I had left the road and hurtled down the bank. The front right side of the car had plowed into the tree, folding upward like an origami crane, the metal bent and twisted. One wheel lay in the dead leaves a few feet from the wreck, the tire torn to shreds. Seeing it in the daylight, I felt my stomach churn with fear. I couldn’t believe I’d survived that.
Taking a deep breath, I started walking down the hill. “Alex!” called Kylie. “What are you doing? What if it’s dangerous? What if the engine explodes?”
“This isn’t a Bruce Willis film,” I yelled back. “I’m looking for my bag.”
“Don’t leave me here with him.” Kylie pouted, walking a little closer to the edge of the bank to watch me. Marcus sniggered. “He’s naked and strange.”
“If you fall and break your neck, Princess, I’m not coming after you.” Marcus yelled. He still sat in Kylie’s car, using a torn strip from his t-shirt to mop up the blood from a claw mark on his leg.
Ignoring them both I half walked, half-slid down the slope, each step jolting my wounded shoulder. My bare feet crunched over dead leaves and dry sticks. Up close, the car was in an even worse state than I’d realised. I slid past the driver’s side door, which lay in the leaves several feet from the car, a great dent in the middle of it. Jagged metal teeth curled up from one side, where it had been torn from the car.
Ryan. He’d torn that door away to rescue me. I marvelled at the strength he must possess in order to do that. Odd that it had never occurred to me last night. Perhaps being a vulpine gave him more strength than an ordinary human, as well as super hearing.
But that doesn’t stop him being a liar, I thought angrily. I swiped at my eyes, trying to force away the tears I didn’t want to cry. Ryan wasn’t worth the tears. I blinked, and my gaze fell on a pair of boots hanging in a branch not far from the car. Ryan’s boots.
Don’t think about him now. It’s over.
I stepped closer, and peered inside the car. I had been driving, so I would’ve placed my bag on the back seat. I pulled open the back door on the passenger side, and searched through the empty takeout containers and dirty laundry. Where was it? I leaned over and felt under the seats. Nothing. It wasn’t there.
As I stood up, I noticed something on the back of the driver’s seat. It was a pawprint, caked in dirt. I rubbed the edge of it. Dry. It was from last night.
I backed away from the vehicle, my mind spinning. My bag was gone, and shifters had been in the car. They had taken it. Which meant they had keys to my flat. They had a swipe card for the Halt gallery. They had my cellphone and date planner, with contact details for all my colleagues and friends.
Holy shit.
3
“Shit, shit, shit.” Kylie punched the steering wheel with each curse word. We were driving back along the high street, toward Halt. I was due at work forty-five minutes ago. Hanging paintings was the last thing on my mind right now, but I had to tell Matthew about my lost swipe card. If the shifters could get into the gallery, they could destroy Ryan’s paintings … or something even worse.
In the back of the car, Marcus laughed cruelly.
“You’re fucked now,” he sneered, his wild eyes dancing with merriment. I watched him carefully in the rearview mirror, and caught the faint stretches and changes of his face mid-shift, his ears pulling back, his snout protruding. I blinked, and his face was human again. As a mutt, he must have trouble holding himself in human form, and he seemed to be unable – or unwilling – to control the shifting.
“If I’m fucked, Marcus, that means you’re fucked, too. We’re all fucked together. So could you stop stating the obvious and shut up so I can think.”
“Do you think they’ll go after anyone in your datebook?” asked Kylie.
I shook my head. “Why would they need to? They have super powerful senses. They can probably track us down without having to threaten Great Aunt June or my ex-boyfriend from college. My main concern is the swipe card. If they destroy the paintings ...”
“Do you think they’ll go to our flat?” Kylie asked, her knuckles white against the wheel.
“They’ll probably be guarding it, and they have a key now. We can’t go back there unless we want them to know where we are.”
“I’m so glad Ray is out of town for the week,” said Kylie, patting the handle of her mace. “I don’t know if I could explain this crazy situation to him.”
“He’s probably going to wonder why you buried his mace into the console, though.” I glanced at the clock in the car. “I’m more than an hour late. Matthew is going to kill me. As if I needed another thing to dread today.”
Marcus would have to come into the gallery with me, to help deter any daytime shifter attacks. At least having him around would mean I could recognise any shifters disguised in their human form. But first, we had to do something about his lack of clothing. Luckily, a department store in the market square was open, and they had some men's clothing on sale. Kylie and I grabbed some dark jeans, casual shirts, socks and shoes in Marcus’s size. I found a packet of cotton underwear and a soft cashmere sweater in lilac with a high turtleneck collar and threw that in as well. It would cover the rather inappropriate t-shirt I was wearing as well as the unsightly bite mark on my neck. After putting it all on my emergency credit card (Hey, naked shifters in the back of your car count as an emergency, right?) I shoved the bags through the open window. Marcus stared up at me with fake, puppy-dog eyes.
“Get dressed,” I ordered him. He snarled at me, baring long, canine teeth, but snatched the bags away and began to pull on a shirt.
Kylie squeezed my shoulder. “He’s so different from Ryan,” she said. “Back in the forest, I was asking him about himself, and he got so agitated, he nearly bit me at one point.”
I pulled the tags off my sweater and pulled that over my head. I tried to avoid looking in the rear view mirror while Marcus changed in the backseat, then cursed myself for being so pathetic. Why was I being loyal to Ryan? He wasn’t loyal to me! I could look another shifter’s naked, toned body if I wanted to. But I wasn’t sure if I wanted to. Marcus had sworn to protect
me, but that didn’t mean his demeanour wasn’t somewhat disconcerting.
How did everything get so messed up so quickly?
Kylie dropped us off outside the Halt Institute’s staff entrance. “Where are you going to go?” I asked, knowing the shifters were probably on the hunt for her car.
“To the library,” she replied. “In movies, when the clever, plucky heroines come across a supernatural enemy, they always head to the library to search for answers in arcane texts. I’m going to look up lore on shifters, especially legends about Crookshollow. Maybe I’ll find something that can help us. And I’ll be careful not to talk to any strangers.”
Marcus snorted again. I ignored him. “Good idea. Stay safe.”
She held up her medieval mace, and gave me a crooked smile. I hugged her through the car window.
“Hurry,” Marcus pulled me away. “I don’t like being out in the street like this.”
I led him through the staff entrance to Halt, down the same corridor I’d walked with Ryan only the day before. Marcus held his head up, sniffing the air. He frowned. “A shifter has been here.”
“Yes, Ryan.”
“No, someone else.” He frowned deeper. “I recognise the scent, but it’s been disguised with heavy cologne. I can’t tell who it is.”
My heart pounded. Please don’t let them have got to the paintings already. As I entered the staffroom, Belinda looked up from her photography magazine. “Alex? You’re finally here. Matthew is looking for you. He’s not happy.”
Crookshollow foxes box set: The complete fox shapeshifter romance series Page 11