by Noir, Roxie
Then, an air horn would sound, and the wolves would be released.
Dane shuddered. He didn’t miss it, but he could understand why someone might.
Above the pit and on the side opposite Dane was a small wooden platform, where the referee sat during a fight. The wolf fights didn’t have a lot of rules, but they had some: no going for the eyes or throat, no attacking someone who was down or someone who’d surrendered. The rules got broken all the time, but whoever broke them forfeited automatically. They were a deterrent, but not a preventative.
“Help you?” asked a man. He walked out of a dark corner of the room, wiping his hands on a handkerchief, looking every inch the business man.
“Would you mind answering a couple of questions?” Dane asked.
Seeing Pete again, being in the sub-basement with the wolf pits, Dane started to sweat. He hadn’t been down here in a long time. The last time he’d said more than a few words to Pete was right after his final match, one that he’d lost but not catastrophically. Even then, Pete had said little more than ‘You had a good run, kid, good luck out there.’
“Of course not,” Pete said. He wore a light blue polo shirt, the collar crisply pressed, and khaki pants, right down to black sneakers.
His eyes, though, were hard as ever, the same color as the rock walls of the room surrounding them. That was something else that Dane remembered, far too well.
“Were you in The Downstairs the night before last?”
“The night someone killed Nicky?” Pete asked. “Sure was.”
His eyes seemed to glitter in the dim light.
You’re an officer of the law, Dane reminded himself. Not a scared kid about to get the shit beat out of him by a bigger wolf.
“Do you remember who else was there?” Dane asked.
Pete raised one hand to his chin and pretended to think, but Dane knew that the other man had his answer ready instantly. Most of Pete’s business relied on memory: who owed who what, who had a grudge against who, that sort of thing. Remembering who was at The Downstairs two nights ago was second nature.
“Nicky Grant was there of course, poor thing,” he said, without a trace of sympathy. “Todd and Tobias, of course.”
Todd was the dealer, a mostly taciturn man with the habit of giving people nicknames that they inevitably hated. He was always there, for obvious reasons.
“Elaine Golden,” he said, then tapped his chin and pretended to think more. “That lovely new young thing showed up later in the evening. I believe her name is Grace, though Todd calls her Princess, which she hates, though she doesn’t want to let him know she hates it.”
Fucker, thought Dane, his wolf just barely growling at the nickname.
Dane wrote everything down and waited, patiently. He didn’t want to let Pete know whether he was surprised or not at any of the names; best to let people think that he had all the information already and was simply corroborating.
“Oh, and Norbert Engle,” Pete said. “I believe he goes by Shovel.”
Dane nodded. The name sounded familiar, but he couldn’t put his finger on why.
“That’s everyone?”
“Well, me,” Pete said, a wolfish smile coming onto his face.
Duh, thought Dane, though of course he didn’t dare say it out loud.
“Was anyone acting unusually?” Dane asked, pen poised over his notebook.
“Not that I recall,” Pete said. “Though Norbert — that’s Shovel — did get quite drunk, much more than usual.”
Dane raised his eyes.
Then it hit him why he knew that name: it was the name of the person who’d claimed to see Grey murder Nicky. Dane hadn’t questioned him; he’d let Ramirez do that, while he hung out in a jail cell with Isaac and Grey.
“Can you recall anything that he might have said or done?” Dane asked.
“Well, he lost pretty badly,” Pete said. “Though I believe that was a symptom, rather than the cause.”
“And what do you think the cause was?” asked Dane.
Pete knew something, he could tell. He could practically smell the knowledge on the other man.
“Norbert fancies himself an underworld figure,” Pete said. “He nicknamed himself Shovel, after all.”
Dane nodded. He knew who Shovel was, and thought that they had possibly exchanged pleasantries once or twice.
“He and Nicky got into some kind of argument,” Pete went on. “It was very heated but also very quiet, and there were no specifics, just talk about the guys and the stuff.”
Dane didn’t exactly believe Pete. He didn’t think Pete was lying, precisely, but he was almost positive that the other man wasn’t telling the full truth.
“What else?” Dane asked.
“Nicky finally got up and stormed out,” Pete said. “And about thirty seconds later, Norbert — Shovel — slammed the rest of his drink and followed him out.”
Dane stopped writing and looked up at Pete, slowly, his irritation mounting.
“You’re telling me,” he said, deliberately, “That you watched someone get into an argument with a murdered man, then leave right after him, and you didn’t come to the police?”
Pete just gave a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes and clapped Dane on the shoulder.
“I knew you’d get here,” he said.
“You won’t come downtown with me, will you?” asked Dane. He wished that he could question Pete properly, get the other man on the audio recording, but there was no way that Pete would go voluntarily. If he arrested Pete, he’d never get a thing out of the man.
“I don’t think so,” said Pete. “But I’m happy to answer any more questions you might have right here.”
It took another two hours.
Dane grilled Pete about the order in which the poker players had come in, when they’d left, which doors everyone had left through. Pete’s memory was even better than Dane had hoped, and he was willing to give more detail than Dane was expecting.
The central fact stayed the same, though: Nicky had left, and then shortly after, Shovel had followed him, angry. Grey hadn’t even come in for an hour after that.
When he finally left the stone sub-basement, Dane wondered why Pete had given him so much information. The other man wasn’t really known for helping the police — after all, everyone knew that he ran wolf fights, which were technically legal, but also ran the gambling on them, which was anything but.
As he walked back up the stairs to the regular basement, Pete called his name.
“Dane,” he shouted.
Dane turned.
“His fight’s tonight at nine,” Pete said. “We gonna see you there?”
“Probably not,” said Dane, and he turned and ascended the rest of the stairs.
Back in the basement, he saw Tobias again, standing by the staircase looking doleful.
“You get what you came for?” he asked.
“I did,” said Dane. “Thanks.”
Tobias just nodded, and Dane went out the back door, the one that led up the concrete stairs and into the alley. The late afternoon sun meant that everything was deep in shadow: the dumpsters where Nicky’s body had been found, the entryway of the alley, half of Main Street itself.
As he walked back to his car, he radioed back to the station for backup.
They were going to go arrest Shovel.
Chapter Nine
Grey
Grey couldn’t be in her apartment. Even though she’d tidied everything and spent half the night cleaning, it still felt wrong and weird to be there, where the police had gone through all her stuff. Instead, she’d taken her book to the Rustvale Roastery, where she sat and sipped on a triple latte while she read her book.
Not that she could concentrate on her book. For one, operating on little sleep never helped her concentration; plus, at four in the afternoon, the coffee shop was busy with high school students just getting out of school, moms on the way to pick their kids up, and anyone who’d sneaked out of work
a little early.
Last, she wasn’t sure if she should go to Isaac’s fight. She knew that Dane wasn’t going — he’d made that dead clear, and she understood his reasoning completely — and she felt like someone should be there to show Isaac a little support.
Besides all that, she wanted to see him again. That was dead simple. She liked everything about him: the way he’d comforted her as she cried near-hysterically in a jail cell, the way his smile reached his eyes when he laughed, the way his strong arm felt around her shoulders.
She also liked thinking about him and Dane, the two of them in a different jail cell in a different city...
In the coffee shop, Grey blushed and looked down at her latte, even as the heat shot through her core.
I don’t even know where to go, she thought to herself.
Yeah, but you know who to ask.
Admit it. You want to go see him again, and see him fight, even if it is as a wolf. After all, shifters shift naked.
“Hey there, Miss Macauley,” a voice said.
Grey jerked out of her reverie, her face still bright red, visions of naked Isaac and Dane dancing through her head.
Standing there was Evan’s mom, wearing a silk blouse and black slacks.
“Hi,” she said.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you,” the woman said. In her hand she held a cup of coffee, and she swirled it. “It’s good to see you here!”
Grey just smiled and nodded.
The woman stepped closer.
“I heard about last night,” she said in a much lower voice. “We were all a little worried that you might not come in to school today on short notice, if you know what I mean.”
Grey raised one eyebrow.
So you thought it was plausible that I killed someone, she thought.
“They just wanted to ask me some more questions,” Grey explained, feeling tired. She gulped more of her latte, willing it to work. “I wasn’t charged or anything, and I did find a dead body, after all.”
“That must have been terrible,” the woman said, putting one hand on Grey’s arm. “Don’t worry, the whole parents’ listserve was rooting for you.”
“Thanks,” said Grey.
“Well, I’ve gotta be off,” the woman said. “Have a nice weekend!”
“You too!” Grey said, hoping that her fake-cheery voice was good enough.
Then she went back to her latte, taking several more sips.
They have a listserve?
Of course they do.
She sighed.
That was the problem with Rustvale: wherever she went, she was practically guaranteed to see someone she knew. At the coffee shop, at the grocery store.
At the wolf fight.
That was another point against going that night, she knew: what if she saw one of the parents there? She didn’t have to be experienced in attending wolf fights to know that good kindergarten teachers didn’t go to them.
Grey swirled the dregs of her coffee in her cup, her brain scrambled and buzzing.
Fuck, she thought.
Chapter Ten
Isaac
Sitting in his office, Isaac could barely keep his eyes on the page. He felt wired, like his veins were all electrified, sending little impulses through his whole body, so he was practically twitching in his seat.
He looked at the clock on his computer.
4:40.
Twenty more minutes.
He cracked each of his knuckles and got out of his chair, standing to shake himself off. He knew it was a weird wolf thing, but as long as no one saw him, he didn’t mind.
Then, he sat back down and tried to concentrate on the tax document in front of him.
Enter the total from line 14 of the Worksheet for Form 2210, Part IV, Section B...
He closed his eyes for a moment, imagining the bright lights. The smell of dirt and fur, the delicious feeling of snapping teeth just narrowly missing his neck.
Isaac shook his head and looked at the clock again.
4:41. His button-down shirt was starting to itch around the collar, and his feet felt caged in his work shoes.
Focus, he thought. Twenty more minutes. You can do it.
He looked down at the documents again.
If line 19 is equal to or more than line 18 for all payment periods...
Normally, Isaac actually liked doing taxes. It was nothing like farm work or fighting, but it was immensely satisfying to figure out the puzzle of how much someone owed or was owed, and he liked the feeling that he was doing something that few people could figure out.
Besides, he was pretty good at math.
Not today, though. Today he would have given an eyetooth to be out of his office early and running through the forest in wolf form, or punching the bag in the garage, letting out some of his nervous energy before the fight.
Your last fight, he reminded himself. The thought made him a little sad and slightly nostalgic, but he knew it was the right thing.
If the amount on line 27 is not...
Isaac gave up on taxes. He peeked out of his office door to find that his boss’s door, down the hall, was closed.
She’s probably already gone, he thought. I can just go. I’m useless today, anyway.
In a flash, he turned off his computer, grabbed his jacket, and flew out the door.
The moment he reached his car, he had his shoes and socks off, and only half-glanced around before tearing the rest of his clothes off, then jumping out, locking his car, and shifting.
Right away, the smells of the parking lot assaulted him, and a car drove by, the driver raising both his eyebrows at a wolf in the parking lot. Another time, Isaac would have tried to slink off, but he didn’t really care just then.
Tail wagging with delight, nerves, and sheer excitement, he darted between buildings and into the woods behind town.
The only thing he could think was: I get to fight!
Chapter Eleven
Dane
Dane exited the interrogation room, shutting the door behind him, rubbing his eyes. Shovel — or Norbert, whatever his name was — was an idiot, that much was certain. He’d also probably killed Nicky, but he was also a stubborn bastard and wouldn’t admit to anything, and right now, all their evidence was circumstantial. Somehow, the asshole had managed to commit a crime without much physical evidence.
Worse, the cops searching his house couldn’t find a thing to actually connect him to the crime. One of the knives was missing from his knife rack — a knife that could easily be the one that killed Nicky — but Dane knew better than anyone that absence of evidence didn’t count as evidence, so he couldn’t do anything.
Dane was left with the near-certainty that he’d done it, but no way to prove it. If only he could find the knife that Shovel had used, or the clothes he’d been wearing. Nicky’s blood would be all over them for sure.
“We gotta come at this from another angle,” Ramirez said, walking to the coffee maker.
Dane eyed the black liquid, but didn’t think he could stomach any more.
“Give me five minutes,” he said. “I need a break. My brain’s totally worn out.”
Ramirez nodded once, and Dane headed back to his desk in the middle of the police station. He had one still from the surveillance tapes on his computer screen, a still that just showed Shovel, walking down Main Street, five minutes after they thought Nicky had been killed.
There has to be something, Dane thought. I wish I could think of it. He’s not smart, he’s just lucky, and luck runs out.
He blinked. Nothing. His brain felt emptied, and he looked at the time on the big wall clock: 8:45.
Isaac’s fighting in fifteen minutes, he thought. His heart twisted in his chest. Please let him be okay, he thought. And please let him not be angry that I’m not there.
He shook his head quickly, rubbing his temples. After questioning Shovel for hours, it felt like his brain was ready to leak out of his ears.
Even though I’m the
one who should be angry, he thought. He told me he was done, and now this?
He sighed, fiddling with a stray paperclip on his otherwise-spotless desk.
It’s hard to give up what you love, he thought.
Ramirez walked back through the room, heading for the interrogation room, and Dane’s eyes tracked him. It was probably time to go back, but Dane had no idea what else he could do to get the man to talk. It was unbelievable that someone so dumb had gotten so lucky.
He glanced at the clock again. 8:48.
Twelves minutes until Isaac fights, he thought, feeling adrenaline shoot through his already-jangling nerves one more time.
Dane exhaled and stood, then opened the drawer on the right of his desk, dropping the paper clip neatly into its holder.
As he closed the drawer, he looked down, and stopped.
On the bottom of it was a single yellow square post-it note, and on that post-it note was one of the ugliest hearts he’d ever seen. The right side was nearly flat and the left side was weirdly oblong, and extra pen-strokes connected the two halves. If anything, it looked more like a very bad map of Africa.
Dane would have known Isaac’s drawing of a heart anywhere.
He stared at it for a long time, until Ramirez came back in.
“You coming?” Ramirez asked.
Dane licked his lips, then swallowed. He didn’t take his eyes off the heart.
“Something’s come up,” he said, finally shutting the drawer and looking Ramirez in the eyes. “I need to go take care of some family stuff. He’ll still be here in the morning, right?”
Ramirez just nodded.
“Hope everything’s okay,” he said, then wandered into the back of the police station.
Dane grabbed his jacket and practically bolted from the police station, glancing at the clock one last time on his way out.
8:49. Eleven minutes.
Rustvale was small, but Dane ran to the liquor store anyway, and he made it in five minutes flat. The clerk barely looked up from his phone. Inside, a whole bunch of wolves milled around, mostly trying to look innocent.