Well, one person might, but not several. At some point, they must have had bronchitis, pneumonia, or—
Ms. G. must have had a chest X-ray. Since she’d been diagnosed with congestive heart failure, she’d definitely had a heart to congest somewhere along the line. So when had the thing gone poof?
I pulled up in front of town hall and hailed Joyce, who was just leaving, as I got out of the squad. “You’ve lived here since the dawn of time, right?”
She lifted her black eyebrows. “Do you want me to smack you?”
My lips twitched. Joyce always cracked me up. “Anyone in town strike you as different?”
“Different how?”
“I don’t know, just weird. Not like everyone else.”
“No one’s like anyone else.”
“Okay, let’s try it this way. Did anyone leave Lake Bluff and come back later acting strangely? Or maybe disappear without a word for a few days and come back without ever saying where they’d gone?”
“Do you have a fever?” She reached over before I could stop her and placed a palm against my forehead.
“Stop that!” I stepped out of her reach.
Joyce narrowed her eyes. “The only one acting weird is you. What’s going on around here this time?”
We’d kept what had happened last summer under wraps. The only people who knew the truth were me, Mal, Claire, and Doc, but Joyce wasn’t dumb. She knew something bizarre had gone down, but so far we’d been able to put her off the scent by ignoring her questions.
As long as we stuck together, she’d never find out, because the Jäger-Suchers had, as usual, done a bang-up job of lying their asses off to explain away any out-of-the-ordinary weirdness.
“We got another rabid wolf in the woods?” she asked.
J-S doublespeak for werewolf.
“Not this time.”
“Then what?”
“Nothing, Joyce.” Or at least nothing I could put a name to. Yet.
She opened her mouth, and I jumped in first. “Gotta go. You know how Claire is when I’m late.”
Her teeth came together with an annoyed click. “Oh yeah, she’s a regular slave driver.”
I fled. If Joyce set her mind to discovering what was going on, I’d cave. The woman had been like a mother to me—hell, she’d been a mother to me and to Claire. The only reason we’d kept the truth from her so far was because she’d let us. And she’d probably let us because she understood, on the level that all great mothers have, that she really didn’t want to know.
Six o’clock and town hall was deserted. My steps echoed in the cavernous marble foyer. They didn’t build places like this anymore. Between the labor, the materials, and the slashing of municipal budgets, they couldn’t afford to.
Claire, Mal, and Noah reclined on the floor of Claire’s office, Claire making fart noises by placing her mouth against her son’s stomach and blowing. He thought it was hysterical. Typical man.
Noah kicked his legs, wiggling with joy. Claire’s expression was full of a happiness I’d feared I would never see on her face again. And Mal’s eyes were so full of love and wonder, I had to glance away. I wanted someone to look at me like that so badly I ached with it.
“I see you’re bringing him up right.” I flopped into the nearest chair. “Can’t start too early teaching them how funny farts are.”
“Boys will be boys.” Claire blew one last, loud raspberry on Noah’s baby belly.
God, I wanted one just like him.
Claire got to her feet. Noah made a squeak of protest and Mal scooped him up.
“Who wants to go first?” Claire asked as she rummaged in the bag on her desk, then tossed a bottle to her husband.
Mal caught it with one hand, flipped the top with a thumb, and popped the nipple into Noah’s mouth. “That’ll be me,” he said. “The only vampirelike creature in Irish legend was the Dearg-dul, or red blood sucker—an unhappy maiden forced to marry not for love, but by arrangement, and so commits suicide. Then she walks the night luring first her husband, then her father, to their doom. Ever after, she leaves her grave several times a year to prey on any young man she sees.”
“I don’t think we’re dealing with a vampire,” I said.
“She’s also a shape-shifter,” he added, “turning into a lovely bat-winged creature as soon as her victim is in her clutches. The other Irish shape-shifters are the Children of Lir, who became swans, and a host of others who turn into various creatures, including insects, as a result of a curse or magic.”
“I don’t think we’re dealing with any of those, either.”
“Don’t you now?” Mal murmured softly as Noah’s eyes fluttered closed. “What, then?”
“Hey,” Claire interrupted, “don’t you want to hear what I scrounged up on Scottish shape-shifters?”
“If we must,” I said.
“I did spend a lot of time searching. Apparently the Scots aren’t big on shape-shifting. I found only one.”
“Which is?”
“Selkies—seal shifters. Since we’re not anywhere near the sea, I’m not feeling the magic on that one. So there goes our theory that the victim is the supernatural.”
“Not necessarily.” I told them all I’d discovered, and they didn’t laugh, though Claire did roll her eyes at the “alien” theory.
“You got any better ideas?” I asked.
She glanced at Mal and together they shrugged.
“We’re at a dead end. I’m not sure what to do next.” I hated to admit that. I always knew what to do. That’s why I was the sheriff in these parts.
“We’ll keep searching for a connection.” Claire spread her hands. “Sooner or later something’s going to pop, and then we’ll be on whatever demon or monster or alien like white on rice.”
I never had understood the “white on rice” adage, but now didn’t seem the time to bring that up.
“Maybe one of us should check in with Elise,” Claire said.
“I will.”
“You will? No way.”
Since I wanted to ask about Ian’s disappearing wife, I didn’t have a problem calling the wise and furry doctor, but I wasn’t going to tell Claire that. I didn’t want her sympathy about another doomed affair, especially one she hadn’t even known I was having.
“I’m a professional.” I lifted my chin. “If she knows anything worth knowing, I’ll get back to you later.”
Claire didn’t argue further but she did stare at me suspiciously. I got out of there before she pulled out the thumbscrews.
Since I hadn’t been to the office all day, I stopped before I went home. Both Jordan’s and Cal’s shift had ended hours ago. Cal had left a note on my desk—or at least I thought he had. When I picked it up, I saw it was merely another Chuck Norris chuckle.
When Chuck Norris crosses the street, the cars better look both ways.
I set the sheet aside to give to Jordan tomorrow.
Several other messages lay beneath Cal’s, people who had called during the day but not been urgent enough to contact me about. I shuffled through them. All were from citizens, wanting to know why I was ordering autopsies and digging up corpses. I wasn’t going to tell them. I’d already met with the next of kin and shared what I could.
I tossed the messages into the trash. I was certain people would accost me on the street if given a chance, so I’d do my best not to give them one.
I snuck out the back door and slid into my brand-new squad car. At home I changed out of my uniform into jeans, a red tank top, and sandals. Then I headed upstairs to the third-floor office to call Elise.
Like Ian, I was drawn to that room. The view of the mountains from the window soothed me. I sat at the desk facing them as I dialed the super-secret phone number of the Jäger-Suchers.
“What now?” Elise asked without benefit of “hello.” The longer I knew her, the more like her grandfather she became.
Edward Mandenauer had founded the Jäger-Suchers over sixty years ago. From what
I’d seen of him in the short time he’d been in town, he wasn’t much on “hello” and “good-bye,” either. Edward liked to shoot first, ask if you were human later. It saved time.
“Caller ID is wrecking polite conversation as we know it,” I said.
“If I know who’s calling, why waste time making nicey-nice?”
See what I mean? Edward junior.
Well, two could play at this, and I didn’t want to chitchat with wolf girl any more than she wanted to chitchat with me.
“We’ve got a new kid in town, and I was wondering if you had any info on him in your handy-dandy ‘Big Brother is watching you pee’ database.”
“You’ll be glad we’ve got that database if he’s in there.”
I didn’t argue.
“Name?”
“Ian Walker.”
“What do you think he is?”
“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be calling you.”
“Nothing here,” she said, and started to hang up.
“Wait!” I shouted. “I was actually more interested in his wife.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because she disappeared without a trace, which sounds suspiciously like your work.”
“Doesn’t it though? Except it wasn’t.”
“You know that off the top of your head?”
“If we’d disappeared her, we’d have a record of that right next to any record on her husband, which there isn’t. We like to keep our lies straight, and the only way to do that is to keep track of them.”
“When it comes to lying, I guess you’d know.”
“Got that right.” She sounded proud, and maybe she was. Her lies, and those of her colleagues and underlings, were what allowed the world to continue turning on its merry axis, secure in the false knowledge that monsters were not crawling all over the place.
I started to thank her, but Elise was already gone.
Chapter 23
As I ended the call on my side, something howled out there in the night. Spirit wolf or real wolf? Didn’t matter. The sound reminded me that I needed to check on Quatie. I got to my feet and headed for the door.
The rush of air from my movement caused something to swoosh out from under a bookcase against the front wall. Whatever it was, it was as light as a—
“Feather.” I snatched it up.
I’d never had a feather in here that I could recall, except for Ian’s, and this wasn’t his. Not only had I seen the eagle feather in place in his hair earlier today, but the one I held in my hand wasn’t from an eagle.
Big and black without a hint of white, I had no idea what kind it was or how it had gotten here. Feathers this big didn’t appear out of nowhere. Or maybe they did in this new world evolving every day in Lake Bluff. I put the feather into the top desk drawer for later perusal.
Aaaewww!
I jumped. The howl seemed to come from right outside my window.
“Coming.” I ran down two flights of stairs.
However, when I went outside, the wolf wasn’t there, and she had gone as silent as the ghost she no doubt was. I jumped into my dad’s pickup and headed north.
Quatie sat on her porch. As I got out, she stood, moving a lot easier than the last time I’d visited. That balm of Ian’s really needed to be bottled and sold.
Seeing her get around so much better, I was relieved. I’d brought Ian to Quatie—at her request, true, but I never would have forgiven myself if his cure had harmed rather than helped.
Several sticks lay on the ground in front of the house. Kindling, most likely. I scooped them into my arms, frowning when I saw the ends had been honed to points.
“I whittle,” Quatie said without my asking. “Not very good at it.”
If she’d been trying to make a mammal or a bird, she wasn’t. If she’d been aiming at poking out someone’s eye, I’d have to change my mind. Physicians recommended handiwork to soothe arthritis, the movement working out the kinks. Quatie must have taken up whittling for just that reason.
I wondered if Ian had been back to visit without me and had suggested it, but I wasn’t going to ask. The subject of Ian Walker was still a little raw.
She’d shoved one spike into the ground at the corner of the house; the pointy end stuck straight up.
“A little dangerous.” I indicated the stick.
“For squirrels.”
I wasn’t sure if they were meant to keep the squirrels away, entertain them, or skewer them, and I had no chance to ask before she went into the house. I followed, marveling again at how much her gait had improved. Even with the miracle balm, the progress was amazing. Then I saw a probable reason why on the table and forgot all about pointy sticks and squirrels.
“Moonshine’s illegal.”
“You going to turn me in?” She squinted through cataract-murky eyes. “This settles the pain in my old bones.”
It would probably eat her old bones if she drank too much. I was concerned it might eat right through her stomach lining, too, but she slammed back a shot, licked her lips, and smiled with more teeth than I recalled her having. She must have gotten dentures. I only hoped the moonshine didn’t ruin them.
I declined her offer of a shot. I spent a lot of time chasing stills in these mountains. Theoretically, moonshine was dangerous. Too much alcohol in the mix and a person could go blind. In truth, the old folks who made it had been brewing the stuff for decades and they knew what they were doing.
I could tell by the jar and the shade of the brew that Quatie had gotten hers from Granny McGinty, the biggest moonshiner in the county because she made good hooch for a reasonable price.
Since Quatie appeared a lot better now than she had the last time I’d seen her, I wasn’t going to complain. In the old days, people doctored quite a few things with moonshine—rheumatism, arthritis, toothache. They managed with what they had. I couldn’t fault Quatie for doing the same.
“How are you doing?” I took a seat.
“Better.” She took another gulp. “You don’t need to keep checking on me, child. I’ve been alone a long time.”
“Is your great-great-granddaughter still coming to visit?”
“Soon.” She laughed with such joy I had to smile.
“Where’s she coming from?”
“Not far. Enough about me. How’s your young man?”
He wasn’t my young man. But the eagerness on her face, her genuine fondness for Ian—I couldn’t tell her he was a lying, married weasel. At least not today.
“He’s fine, Quatie.”
“Very fine.” She winked and took another sip of moonshine.
“You aren’t going to take a walk later, are you?”
“No walking tonight.” She didn’t seem affected by the alcohol at all. I suppose familiarity bred resistance. “Have you read your great-grandmother’s papers yet?”
“No, ma’am.”
She seemed to think about that. “That’s probably for the best.”
“Why?”
She got up from the table and walked without a wobble to her couch, where she lay down. “They’ll just make you sad.” She closed her eyes.
The silence that settled over the room was so thick I began to get nervous. She hadn’t died, had she?
“Quatie?”
My only answer was a snore.
* * *
I went home. I didn’t have much else to do.
Heading down the highway, I let my mind wander. I’d driven these roads a thousand times; I knew how they twisted and turned. I considered ignoring my house and returning to work or maybe going to Claire’s or even—
The wolf appeared as if from nowhere, right in front of my truck. I slammed on the brakes, but it was too late. I braced for the impact, but the truck passed right through the animal and came out the other side.
I peered into the rearview mirror. The wolf stood behind me, not a mark on it. I got out of the vehicle.
A flurry of movement, the scrabble of claws against pavement, and the
animal ran through me again. Cold wind, a heavy rain, I felt thick and full, then thin and empty. I had a mental image of my body and the wolf’s melding, stretching, coming together, then suddenly flying apart.
I swayed, and when I could see clearly once more, the beast had stopped several yards ahead. She glanced back, then ran a few feet.
“If you wanted me to go in that direction, all you had to do was wait. I was already doing it.”
The wolf snorted. I had been thinking of going anywhere but home.
“You can read my mind?”
I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. It wasn’t as if the wolf could tell anyone my thoughts, but they were my thoughts, and I preferred to keep them that way.
“What difference could it possibly make if I go home or not?”
As if in answer, the air seemed to shriek. I put my hands over my ears and glanced up just in time to see a shower of sparks falling from the sky.
The wolf whined. I would think a noise like that would hurt her ears worse than mine, even if they were spirit ears.
The animal ran south again, then turned, waited. South, the direction of peace and good health—the direction of home.
I peered at the area of the sky where the sparks had disappeared. Just like last time, orange glowed against the night.
Cursing, I jumped into my truck, fumbling for my cell phone even as I thrust the vehicle into gear and drove over the messenger wolf. The animal didn’t seem to mind, catching up in seconds and loping alongside, oblivious to the trunks of trees that lined the road. The wolf just ran right through them.
I reached the fire department and gave them the approximate location of the blaze; then I called Cal. “Remember when the sparks came down and started the fire that wasn’t?”
“Where is it this time?”
“I think it’s my house.”
“I’ll be right there.”
I continued to drive as fast as I could on the narrow, winding roads, praying that this fire was as much a myth as the last one. The wolf ran beside me until I turned down my long, rutted driveway; then she disappeared.
The orange glow had only brightened as I approached. I knew even before I shot out of the trees and into my yard that my house was toast.
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