by RJ Blain
My entire body ached, and the effort of sitting up left me shaking.
My stomach, however, didn’t care if moving sapped all my strength. It wanted fed, and it wanted fed now. My wolf and cheetah whined their hunger in my head, and I surrendered to them, biting back a groan as I eased my way out of bed.
There was something disconcerting about waking up naked in an unfamiliar bed, but the bathrobe solved the issue of decency, and I took extra care to tie the sash securely. I didn’t really consider myself a prude, but at the same time, I wasn’t comfortable with running around naked, especially without knowing who was in the other room.
Despite my spirit beasts enhancing my hearing, everything was quiet. I crept across the room, grimacing at the faint creak of the door when I pulled it open. Lights mounted in overhead recesses were dimmed to offer faint illumination. Another room had an opened door, which I saw was a spacious bathroom with a jacuzzi. I had faint memories of spending an unreasonable amount of time in the room as a consequence of my rebellious stomach.
I shuddered and slid my feet over the carpeted floor as I headed down the hallway. A massive kitchen opened up to an even larger sitting room, and a lit panel guided me to the light switch. With my spirit beasts driving me on, I flicked on the lights and headed for the fridge.
Maybe rummaging through someone’s refrigerator classified as rude, but if I didn’t eat something soon, I’d be tempted to find out if the granite countertops were edible. Once I got my life back to normal, I could replace what I took.
I wasn’t exactly a heavy eater, and hopefully, as long as I stuck to the common foods, no one would notice my pilfering. My wolf approved. My cheetah, on the other hand, didn’t even care about the concept of property. Whoever owned the refrigerator had left a wealth of food unattended. In the wild, those who controlled the food survived, and it was their loss if they didn’t defend what was theirs.
My two spirit beasts squabbled over the ethics of food theft while I helped myself to a sandwich. Any other day, I probably would have turned my nose up at roast beef, but Idette had done more than just change me into a wolf, apparently.
I really wanted to eat the meat and leave the bread behind, but since my wolf had hounded me about behaving like a proper human, I layered on lettuce, tomatoes, and several slices of cheese in an effort to keep his ire directed at my cheetah.
While I could sense emotions from both of them, I almost wished I could translate their warbles and yowls. When they wanted me to understand them, I caught the general idea of what they wanted, although the nuances escaped me.
It was something I’d have to ask Marcello—or someone—after my stomach stopped complaining. After I ate, I’d have time to figure things out. Hunger, at least, was a problem I could solve.
Chapter Twelve
I demolished the entire loaf of bread and every last bit of food I could turn into a sandwich without making a dent in my hunger. If anything, my stomach’s acceptance of food spurred me into testing my luck. In a feeding frenzy more appropriate for a shark than a man, encouraged by both of my spirit beasts, I ate everything in sight and then some. I was dismayed, astonished, and amused by how much I managed to cram down my throat.
When I no longer felt like a starved beast, I restored the kitchen to order and went on a hunt for coffee.
Whoever owned the house had something against coffee. I couldn’t find grinds, a maker, or filters, leading me to believe I was the hostage of someone of a demonic nature. What sort of household didn’t have coffee?
I growled my frustration and huffed as I sat on a stool at the counter to glare at the kettle on the stove. Instant coffee would have been an acceptable alternative, but if there was any in the cupboards, it evaded my search.
The gentle patter of feet on tile behind me warned of someone’s approach, and Andrea’s startled bark of laughter set me spinning on the stool. Like me, she was dressed in a bathrobe, and she was shaking her head, taking in the opened cupboards and the assortment of items I hadn’t yet put away in my search for coffee.
“Whatever are you doing, Sean?”
I considered my options and decided there was no way to emerge with my dignity intact. “A crime against man has been committed in this kitchen, Andrea. There seems to be a lack of coffee.”
Covering her mouth with her hand, Andrea made a sound suspiciously like a laugh, went to the refrigerator, and opened the door, pulling out a white bag lined with foil, which she set on the counter. “The French press is in the cupboard under the counter beside you.”
“Barbaric,” I muttered, hunting for the device. I found it tucked behind an electric kettle. “Next you’re going to tell me I have to drink it out of a tea cup while holding my pinky out. Don’t you know it’s cruel and unusual punishment to withhold coffee from someone?”
“It’s two in the morning, Sean. Normal people wait until a reasonable hour to make coffee.”
I glanced at the stove, wrinkling my nose at the display. Glasses with an old prescription were a lot better than no glasses at all, but I still couldn’t make out the time. The two looked more like a seven to me, although all the numbers were a blurred mess. “In my defense, I can’t actually read the clock right now.”
Andrea sighed. “I was worried the prescription would be off, but it was the only pair we could find at your house.”
Since my glasses weren’t doing me a lot of good anyway, I took them off and squinted at the frames. “I’m pretty sure these are about ten years old.”
“At least. You were wearing them the first time I saw you try a case in court.”
“That perfect memory of yours drives me absolutely insane, I hope you know,” I informed her, pointing my glasses in her general direction. Without them, the woman was a blur wrapped in white. “You’re worse than a shark, circling and waiting for the first teeny tiny inconsistency. Then you’re more like a piranha, stripping flesh off the bones of your victims in a matter of seconds.”
Apparently being compared to a flesh-eating fish was a compliment, because Andrea snorted, and I was pretty sure she was concealing a laugh and a smile. “You have no idea how to use a French press, do you?”
“Not a clue,” I admitted, wondering how a canister was going to provide me with coffee. It didn’t even matter if it was bad coffee, as long as it was hot.
“Step away from the French press, Mr. Scott.”
I obeyed, hopping up onto one of the stools. “Sorry for the trouble.”
“It’s no trouble at all. Banging around looking for something to eat and making coffee is an improvement over you throwing up in twenty minute intervals. If you’re quite done with that nonsense, I’ll consider it even.”
I winced, grateful I didn’t remember much and horrified I had been so much of a bother. “I think I ate about half the fridge. I haven’t had any mishaps yet.”
Andrea turned on the stove to heat the kettle before glancing in the direction of the refrigerator. “Try to keep it that way. If you’re still hungry, eat. If you want something a bit more substantial, I can raid the freezer.”
“At two in the morning?”
“Considering our efforts to feed you were a miserable failure, two in the morning is fine. Seriously, if you can eat without getting sick, we’ll call it even.”
There wasn’t much I could say to that, so I watched Andrea make coffee instead of opening my mouth and embarrassing myself further. My thoughts wandered to Marcello’s claims, but the Andrea making coffee at two in the morning was no different from the one I faced in court. She didn’t smile, and while she seemed like she was in a good mood, she was as difficult to read as always.
However, I remembered her reaction in the police station. Until she had thrown herself at me and cried into my fur, I hadn’t been sure Andrea was capable of tears.
My wolf and cheetah quieted in my head, and I was aware of their attention focusing on me and Andrea. Before I could deal with my mixed feelings and the problem of my werewolf wif
e, I needed to learn what sort of future I’d have.
Disappearing for over a month had to have made a mess of my life, and I had no idea how I was going to recover, or if I would be able to at all. Asking Marcello seemed like a safer choice, but perhaps Andrea would have insights the cop lacked.
She usually did, and she often revealed them at the most inconvenient time possible during a trial.
Before I worked up the courage to ask any questions at all, she presented me with a mug of coffee. “Cream or sugar?”
“Black’ll do, thanks.”
Andrea poured herself a cup, hooked a stool with her foot, and sat near me. “You have a question.”
“More than one,” I mumbled, taking a sip of my coffee to buy myself some time.
“Ask.”
There were too many things I needed to know, so I started with my most immediate concern. “What happens next?”
“We begin by coming up with a pretty story to explain your month-long disappearance, put you on medical leave for a while, and ease your return to society once you’ve had a chance to adapt to being a Fenerec.” Andrea set her mug down and sighed. “We’ve found it’s best to stick as close to the truth as possible.”
I considered the ways a bunch of cops and attorneys could make such a thing happen, and the variety of methods disturbed me. All of them put the blame directly on Idette’s shoulders.
My spirit beasts approved, and the viciousness of their desire for justice surprised me almost as much as my willingness to burn my wife in court. Ex-wife, if I had my way.
“Attempted murder charges, then,” I said.
Coffee at two in the morning was as close to heaven as it got, I decided, savoring another sip. I hadn’t been paying enough attention to how Andrea had made it, but it was substantially better than the crap my cheap machine at home gave me.
“That was one of the ideas we were discussing.”
“We could hunt the bitch down, give her a pair of concrete boots, and toss her in the ocean. If we go out far enough before we dump her, no one will ever find her.” My cheetah especially approved of the idea. My wolf, however, lusted for bloodshed and the satisfaction of ripping my wife to shreds.
Andrea choked on her coffee. “Sean!”
“I will grudgingly accept an attempted murder charge along with a finalized divorce.”
Andrea set her coffee aside, coughed, and covered her mouth with her hand.
Did her slender fingers hide a smile? The thought alone was enough to content my cheetah, and the noise I made in my throat was suspiciously like a purr.
The defense attorney didn’t seem to notice my slip. She coughed several more times before saying, “That won’t be a problem. Our current story is that Idette found out you were in the process of serving her divorce papers before your trip to New York. She waited until you were hiking together and attacked you, striking you in the head, probably with a rock. The resulting head trauma caused a great deal of blood loss and amnesia. To hide the evidence, she stripped you, tore up your clothes, and dragged you away from the scene to make it look like an animal killed you near the resort. Add in the wolf tracks that were found, and she might have gotten away with it. Her plans failed when you were still alive when found and taken to a small hospital.”
“The fact I didn’t go to any hospital might be a bit of an issue.”
Andrea shook her head. “It’s not. Fenerec are monitored and supervised by a group called the Inquisition. They operate a few hospitals in the New York area, and they’ve already indicated they will provide the witnesses to support the case.”
“That doesn’t sound like a friendly group.”
Instead of meeting my gaze in the steady way I expected, she stared at the floor and shrugged. I sipped at my coffee and narrowed my eyes as I took in her tense body posture.
“They have one job and only one job, and that’s to protect Normals—people like you. Since they—since we—failed at our duty, it’s up to us to make sure you can slip back into society.”
“You’re a part of this Inquisition?”
“Most Fenerec are. Your wife is what we call a rogue, a Fenerec who lives outside the system. If we had known she’s a Fenerec, things would have been much different.” Andrea’s expression darkened. “You’d also still be human.”
My spirit beasts’ confusion bled into me, and I wondered if there was really any truth to Marcello’s claims. My wolf took her expression and tone as a challenge to prove I was worthy of her. All I could sense from my cheetah was dismay.
As she had from the beginning, Andrea disliked me, and I didn’t understand why.
I drained the rest of my coffee, slid off the stool, and said, “Humanity’s overrated anyway. I’m not much different from a wolf, after all. I merely choose to hunt those who deserve it while you protect those who don’t.”
Setting my empty mug in the sink, I stalked in the direction of the bedroom marked with my scent and didn’t care whether I hissed or growled on the way.
I needed to run. After closing the door of the bedroom, I paced around the confined space, halting often to stare at the lone window. It was large enough to let in a decent breeze, but I couldn’t squeeze through it and neither could my wolf.
My cheetah, however, could.
Running as a wolf had its own pleasures, but nothing matched the speed of a cheetah, and I missed the way the ground flowed beneath my paws. As a cheetah, I could outrun the wind, and the need to escape the strict, rigid structure of society closed in around me.
I had never been truly human anyway. I was no different from Idette, although I was a rogue of a different sort, padding through the world undetected. That I shared the world with other predators was as much of a curse as it was a blessing.
Slipping out of my bathrobe, I tossed it onto the bed, shoved the window as open as it would go, and stared out into the night. Distant lamps illuminated patches of grass, and beyond the yard, a forest of thin trees waited for me. The still quiet of somewhere remote, broken only by the far off cries of animals, promised the space I needed to be free of the human concerns I wasn’t ready to face.
For a while, I’d leave it all behind and simply run until I couldn’t any more. When fatigue caught up with me, I’d skulk back to civilization and slip in before dawn, leaving the Fenerec unaware of my temporary escape.
Tomorrow, I’d try again to understand my changed world. Maybe I’d figure out what I had done to earn Andrea’s loathing. Maybe Marcello thought I meant something to the defense attorney, but I had heard the disapproval in her voice and had seen the displeasure in her expression.
In her eyes, I belonged to a different world, and she didn’t welcome me in hers.
As a cheetah, I could run away from that, too, at least for a little while. Maybe my wolf wanted me to win the woman and make her mine, maybe my cheetah wanted me to openly adore her as he did, but I would never allow myself to fall to Idette’s levels.
I knew too well what it was like to be hunted. As I had from the first time I had seen Andrea in court, I carefully boxed up my interest in her and shoved it into the darkest recesses of my mind.
My spirit beasts could content themselves with their interest in her. As for me, I would run for as long as my wolf and my cheetah allowed. I could always change my mind if Andrea did.
That concession was enough to appease my spirit beasts. When I drew on my cheetah so I could assume his form, my wolf went with me, and I welcomed him, so he might feel the joy of being a living wind racing across the land.
My wolf’s cooperation and my cheetah’s eagerness eased the transition from man to feline, and I sighed my relief at the relatively painless change. Stretching out the stiffness in my muscles came first, and when I could move without wincing, I jumped through the window, soared over the rosebushes circling the building, and landed in silence. The grass under my paws would hide the evidence of my passage, and I headed out, lashing my tail at the overabundance of human scents.
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The cinnamon belonged to the Fenerec, I decided, and it annoyed me it marred my feline’s gentle musk. My cheetah didn’t mind; the scent reminded him of Andrea.
I growled, long and low, until my cheetah surrendered and his presence retreated. Later, I would worry about the woman with a wolf’s spirit.
The night was no longer young, and I hungered.
I prowled to the woods, slinking through the grass on my belly, careful to keep my movements slow and smooth to avoid catching the attention of predator and prey alike. The graceful movements had been the first thing my cheetah had taught me the first time I had assumed his form. The hunt hadn’t ended well for us, but I had learned.
I no longer needed his guidance for the hunt, although I welcomed him and my wolf to share in the thrill of stalking for prey. Despite being so close to the den of predators, the forest was alive with animals, and I slaked my hunger with a few mice unfortunate enough to cross my path.
The dire need for sustenance gnawed at my belly, driving me to hunt larger prey. If luck was with me, I’d come across a herd of mule deer or a stray boar.
Either would provide me with a challenge and satisfy my hunger.
Once I was far enough into the trees the only evidence of the sprawling house behind me was a glimmer of light, I abandoned my prowl for a lope. I wouldn’t do a chase until my body warmed and I wasn’t so stiff, or I would regret it as a human for days to come.
The phantom pains of injuries sustained as a cheetah lasted a long time.
To my cheetah’s nose, the musk of deer blended with the sharper stench of the rutting bucks, and a shiver of anticipation swept through me. I dropped to my belly, the tip of my tail twitching as I followed my nose in the direction of the herd.