Kitty and the Midnight Hour

by Carrie Vaughn

  Too much exposure. Carl had always warned me this might happen. He really was going to kill me this time.

  Cormac and I got a ride in the nice police car. He’d already called his lawyer, who he thought would represent me as well, if I asked him.

  I shuddered to think of the kind of experience a lawyer got working for Cormac. But hey, the bounty hunter wasn’t in jail.

  They put Cormac and me in separate rooms. Mine was similar to the interview room I’d been in before, the size of a small bedroom, institutional and without character. I didn’t get coffee this time.

  It must have been four in the morning. I hadn’t slept, and I was feeling light-headed. I wanted to ask someone for a glass of water. The door wasn’t locked. I opened it, looked in the hall outside, and didn’t see anyone. I had a feeling that if I tried to sneak out, a swarm of cops would suddenly appear. I went back inside.

  I laid my head on the table, thinking about how much this week had sucked, and dozed. When the door opened, I jerked awake, startled, and shivered inside my coat. I felt worse for the few moments’ worth of napping.

  The man who entered was in his early thirties. He was rumpled, with swept-back, mousy blond hair that needed trimming, a stubbled jaw, a gray suit jacket that fit but still managed to seem too big, and an uninspiring brown tie. He slouched and carried his briefcase under one arm.

  He strode to the desk, switching the briefcase out from under his arm so he could extend his hand for me to shake.

  “Hi, Kitty Norville? I’m Ben O’Farrell. Cormac says you need a lawyer.” He had an average voice, but spoke with confidence and met my gaze.

  “Hi.” Tentatively, I shook his hand. I tried to get more of a sense of him. He smelled average. Normal. The jacket maybe needed washing. “I don’t know if I do or not.”

  He shrugged. “Never hurts when the cops are around. Here’s my card, my rates.” He pulled a card out of one pocket, a pen out of another, tried juggling them and the briefcase, then set the briefcase down so he could write on the card, which he handed to me when he was finished.

  That was a big number. It was a per-hour number.

  “You any good?” I said.

  “Cormac isn’t in jail.”

  I smiled in spite of myself. “Should he be?”

  When O’Farrell matched the smile, he looked like a hawk. It made me feel better; at least, it would so long as he was on my side. It made me glad I hadn’t pressed charges against Cormac that night he barged in on the show.

  “Can you stick around for tonight? Hopefully I won’t need you any longer.”

  He nodded and went to the door.

  “Wait.” I winced, only starting to realize the kind of trouble I was in. He was letting the cops in. I wanted to run. Wolf started itching, and I didn’t need that now. “I don’t want to tell them what happened.”

  He looked thoughtful a moment, then said, “Okay.” He glanced out the still-open door and gestured someone inside. Detective Hardin.

  O’Farrell took a seat at the table and looked busy with his briefcase. Hardin closed the door and remained standing by the wall, arms crossed, grouchy.

  She said, “What was that hit man doing in your apartment?”

  That wasn’t a good place to start the conversation. Was there a good place to start this conversation?

  I glanced at O’Farrell. He shrugged, noncommittal, and continued shuffling papers. Did that mean it was okay to talk or not? I could refuse to answer. Mainly because I didn’t know what to say, and not because I was hiding anything.

  “I called him. I was pretty beat up earlier, and I needed help. We’ve been in touch. Professional consulting.”

  “No hard feelings over what happened last month, then?”

  “I guess not.”

  “What was the dead guy doing at your apartment?”

  I swallowed, my throat dry. O’Farrell said, “Could we get some water in here? Thanks.”

  With an even more surly frown, Hardin leaned out and called to someone. A moment later a couple of cups of water arrived.

  This all just wasted time.

  “You going to answer me?” Hardin said. Her hair was sticking out in all directions, and her eyes were shadowed. She hadn’t gotten any sleep either.

  “He—he was waiting,” I said, stammering. “For me. He wanted to hurt me.” I took another drink of water and ducked my gaze. I was having trouble talking.

  “Why?”

  I couldn’t answer that. I couldn’t say it. It would take too long to explain.

  “Then can you tell me who else was there?”

  I couldn’t answer that either. Once again, I looked at O’Farrell for help. Hardin looked at him, too.

  He said to Hardin, “I’m assuming she hasn’t been Mirandized? She doesn’t have to answer any question she doesn’t want to. She’s here as a voluntary witness.” Voluntary? Nominally.

  “At this stage,” Hardin said. She turned back to me. “It wasn’t a wild dog that bit that guy’s head off, and I’m pretty sure it wasn’t you. They found blood under the victim’s fingernails and in his mouth. I’m willing to believe that it’s yours and that part of your story checks out. If it does, it means you were there and you probably know who did it. Was it that rogue werewolf you’ve been telling me about? The one we’ve been looking for in the mauling deaths?”

  “No,” I said, forgetting myself. “This doesn’t have anything to do with the rogue.” This was all inside the pack and none of her business.

  Hardin started pacing. “Ms. Norville. Kitty. Right now you’re a witness, not an accessory to murder. Don’t make me have to change that assessment.”

  “What?”

  “If you know who did it and you don’t tell me, I can charge you with being an accessory to murder.”

  “That’s a bluff,” O’Farrell said. “The most you could charge without more evidence is obstruction of justice.”

  What the hell were they talking about?

  Hardin plowed on, ignoring him. “If you’re trying to protect whoever did this, you’re guilty of a crime.”

  “It wasn’t . . . like that. Zan made the challenge; he was asking for it—this isn’t . . . this isn’t . . . criminal.”

  “Ms. Norville.” O’Farrell made a calming gesture. I sat back.

  Hardin said, “A man has been murdered and you’re saying there’s nothing wrong with that?”

  “No, it’s just—” It’s just that yeah, within the law of the pack, it was all right. T.J. was the dominant wolf and Zan had overstepped his bounds. I wanted the double standard, now that it would benefit me. “He did it to protect me. Zan attacked me first, and—”

  “Ms. Norville.” O’Farrell’s tone was cautioning.

  I was doing everything I could to not say the name. And really, it wasn’t defensive. Zan had backed off. T.J. killed him anyway. In the eyes of human law, T.J. was a murderer.

  I curled up in the chair and pressed my face to my knees.

  O’Farrell stood up. “Detective Hardin, could I have a word with you?”

  The lawyer and detective moved to the opposite corner of the room and spoke in low whispers. They didn’t seem to know I could still hear them.

  “Ms. Norville is cooperating to the fullest extent of her current ability. She’s been injured, hasn’t had any sleep, and is in no state to answer your questions at this time. Let her go home and get some rest. You can talk to her later. She’ll probably be more helpful then.”

  “Let her go so she can get together with this other guy and straighten out their stories?”

  “Look at her record—she’s not even a flight risk. Clean as a whistle.”

  “Except for being a werewolf.”

  He shrugged. “Not her fault.”

  Hardin looked away with a huff. She pulled a cigarette out of her trousers pocket, patted the other pocket for a lighter, but didn’t find one. She pointed at O’Farrell with the unlit cigarette. “If I let her go, promise me you’ll ta
lk some sense into her. I don’t want to have to arrest her for anything.”

  “I’ll do my best, Detective.”

  I had to talk to T.J. That was all I wanted right now.

  O’Farrell stood next to my chair. “Ms. Norville? Come on, let’s go.”

  Hardin stopped me before opening the door. “Don’t leave town.”

  My throat was still dry. This place tasted dry and cold. All I could do was press my lips together and nod, my eyes downcast.

  Outside, the sky was gray with dawn. Almost too bright. My exhausted eyes stung with the faint light. The air was biting, reaching into my bones.

  The lawyer and I stood for a moment on the sidewalk outside the police station.

  I said, “Me being a werewolf. Does it bother you? Are you an antimonster crusader like Cormac?”

  He smiled as if I’d said something funny, an expression reminiscent of one of Cormac’s smirks. “If Cormac were a crusader, he’d have shot you the first time he met you, no matter what the circumstances were.”

  “Then what is he?”

  “He just likes seeing how close to the edge he can get without falling off.”

  Somehow, Cormac as mercenary-with-a-death-wish was a scarier proposition than Cormac as mercenary-with-convictions.

  “What are you?”

  He shrugged. “Equal opportunity attorney-at-law.”

  “Yeah, I guess. Thanks for getting me out of there.”

  “It was easy. Hardin likes you. Can I give you a ride someplace?”

  “No thanks.”

  “A word of advice, Ms. Norville. You should tell the cops his name. That way, only one of you goes down. If he’s your friend, he’ll understand.” He was a good fit for Cormac, as lawyers went. I could picture him in a gangster movie, finding loopholes and talking tough at the judge.

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “At the very least, don’t talk to this guy. If you go to him, you’ll make it real hard for me to prove you’re not trying to cover anything up.”

  “I’m—we’re not used to human law. We’re usually a lot better about cleaning up our bodies.”

  He didn’t say anything. I got tired of waiting for him to speak, so I shoved my hands into the pockets of my coat and walked away. I could sense him staring after me.

  I went to T.J.’s.

  If Hardin sent someone to follow me, I didn’t know about it. It wouldn’t have surprised me if she had. It was stupid to go, to possibly lead her right to him. But I wasn’t thinking straight by then.

  I had a little bit of sense and took side streets and footpaths where cars couldn’t follow. I ran, and I could run fast, even injured, like any werewolf worth her salt.

  The front door of his house was unlocked. I slipped in, closed the door quietly, and locked it. He had two rooms, a living room with a hide-a-bed and a kitchen/utility room. The bathroom was in back.

  He was lying asleep on the living room floor, naked and tangled in a blanket. He must have been out all night, too. He had a great body, muscled arms flowing into well-defined shoulders and back. He was curled in a ball, tense, like he was having a nightmare. His hair was damp with sweat. He hugged a pillow to his chest.

  I took off my jacket and shoes and knelt beside him. I touched his cheek, holding my hand near his nose so he could smell me. He shifted, moaning a little. I lay next to him and snuggled close as he woke up, slipping into his arms.

  He didn’t open his eyes, but I could tell he was awake because his embrace tightened around me.

  “I’m sorry I yelled at you,” I whispered.

  He smiled and kissed my forehead. “Hm. Are you okay?”

  “Yeah.” Now, I was. At least for a little while. “Why’d he do it, T.J.? I didn’t think he was that dumb. If he’d wanted to challenge me, why didn’t he do it in front of the pack? This wasn’t going to win him back his standing.”

  He waited so long to answer I thought he’d fallen asleep again. The question was half-rhetorical anyway. I’d never understood why Zan did things.

  Then T.J. said, “Someone put him up to it. Someone wanted him to kill you without the pack watching.”

  So it wasn’t Zan’s idea. That almost made sense. “How do you know?”

  “Because I told him if he ever went after you again, I’d kill him.”

  My eyes stung, tears slipping down, because I had to tell him about the police. I had to ask him to tell me what to do. He couldn’t go to jail. What would they do with him during full moon nights?

  I nestled closer, resting my head on his chest. “Who put him up to it?”

  “Someone who outranks me. He’d only listen to someone who scared him more than I did. That leaves Carl or Meg.”

  Time passed, and sunlight began to trace the window shades when I said, “I think it was Meg.”

  “I think it was Carl.” Then, very softly, “I used to be in love with Carl.”

  In so many ways, the alpha of the pack was god to us. I remembered my first few months with them. I trembled whenever Carl came near. I cowered at his feet, worshiping him, adoring him. When had that gone away?

  “Me, too,” I said.

  We slept for a time. I was only half-awake when he stretched his back and sat up. He paused, took several deep breaths, then brought his face close to me, smelling my hair, moving down to sniff my neck and shirt.

  He said, his tone doubtful, “You smell like a police station.”

  I told him everything while he made bacon and eggs for breakfast. Even the smell of frying meat filling the kitchen couldn’t make me hungry. We sat at his Formica table, plates of food in front of us, and neither one of us ate.

  He picked at his for a while, breaking the yolks of his fried eggs and stirring them with bacon. He looked at me, and I stared at my plate.

  Finally, he said, “This is what you get for going to the cops in the first place.”

  “It’s because I went to the cops and got on their good side that I’m not in jail now.” There I was, arguing again.

  “I can’t go to jail,” he said. “Neither can you. You’ll tell them I did it. That’ll get you off the hook. And I’ll run. I’ll go into the hills, maybe go wolf for a while. That way I can hide.”

  I didn’t like the sound of that. It wouldn’t get him off the hook. We had no idea how long he’d have to hide. I wanted some solution that would let everyone believe T.J. was innocent. But he wasn’t, really. That was the problem.

  Any way we looked at it, I was in danger of losing him.

  My voice cracked when I said, “Have you ever heard of someone Changing and not being able to shift back?”

  “I’ve heard stories. It hasn’t happened to anyone I know.”

  “I don’t want you to go wolf. You’re not a wolf.”

  “It can be a strength, Kitty. If it can help, I’d be stupid not to use it. That’s something you’ve never learned—how to use the wolf as a strength.”

  “I’ll miss you. Who’ll look out for me if you go?”

  He smiled. “I thought you said you could take care of yourself.”

  I wanted to say something rude, but I started crying.

  “You can always come visit,” he said.

  I went home. The police cars, coroner’s van, swarms of people, and Zan’s body were gone. A few scraps of yellow crime-scene tape fluttered, caught in the shrubs outside the building. A guy sat in a sedan parked across the street, sipping coffee. Watching. I ignored him.

  I threw away the bloody towel and shirt that were still lying in the kitchen sink. I opened a window and let in some air, because the place felt like Cormac, Hardin, and the cops were still trooping through, making the room stuffy. I pulled O’Farrell’s card out of my pocket and left it on the kitchen counter. I washed my face and brushed my teeth, looked at myself in the mirror. Red, puffy eyes. Greasy, tired hair. I looked pale.

  I started to tell myself that I just had to wait for everything to get back to normal. Take it one step at a time, thin
gs would settle down, and I’d feel better. But I stopped, because I tried to think of what was normal, and I couldn’t remember.

  Shape-shifting once a month, waking up tangled with a half-dozen other naked bodies, sniffing armpits as foreplay. Was that normal? Letting Carl beat up on me, fuck me, tell me what to do, just because it felt right to the wolf half? Was that normal? Did I want to go back to that?

  Normal without the Wolf was so long ago I couldn’t remember what it was like anymore.

  I had two choices regarding Carl. I could leave him, or challenge him. Leaving him meant leaving the pack. That made it hard. Too hard to think about.

  Could I make it on my own?

  Could I fight him and win?

  Six months ago, I would have said no to both those questions. Now, I wasn’t sure. I had to be able to answer yes to one of those, if I couldn’t go back to being what I was six months ago.

  Now all I had to do was decide which one I could answer yes to.

  “. . . be kinda cool to look through a bunch of autopsy reports and find out how many of those people were shot with silver bullets.”

  “I’m going to add that to my list,” I said into the microphone. “Do the police check bullets for silver content?”

  “They ought to,” the caller said with a humph. “Seems kind of obvious, doesn’t it?”

  “Indeed. Thanks for calling. This is Kitty, and in case you’ve just tuned in, I’m putting together a list of questions that law enforcement officials might want to start asking about certain crimes. Our topic tonight is law enforcement and the supernatural. I’ve got some national crime statistics here, a breakdown of murders that happened all over the U.S. last year—murder weapons, causes of death, that sort of thing. It says here that police reported that fourteen people died with stakes through their hearts last year. Of those fourteen, eight were also decapitated, and three were found draped with crosses. All were reported as, quote, ritualistic slayings, unquote. I should think so. My question is, did they check to see if those murder victims really were vampires? Could they check? Probably not. Some varieties of vampire disintegrate upon death. Though there exists a CDC report describing tests for identifying lycanthropes and vampires. Let’s take a call. Hello, Ray, you’re on the air.”