He turned away and went to his knees, but his friend was right behind. I didn’t give them a chance to regroup. I turned on my heel and made it back to the lights of the parking lot. My bag was still there. I scooped it up and kept running until I was at the front of the restaurant. A crowd of people stood there waiting. I opened my bag and felt for my gun. Silver bullets worked just as well on humans, if that’s what they were.
I could see them from where I was, just outside the cone of light from the parking lot. They looked at me for a minute, and the big one paced back and forth twice before grabbing his buddy’s arm and retreating back into the night.
What the fuck was that all about?
By now a couple of people from the crowd out front had broken off. One of the men walked over to me. “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” I said. I did my best to fix my horribly tangled hair. It fought back. “Thanks. I was just leaving.”
I kept my hand in my bag until I was inside my car with the doors locked. Then I pulled my gun out and stuck it in the cup holder behind the gearshift. I took some deep breaths, shifted to reverse, and went home.
Connor was working when I got back, naturally. He greeted me with a smile until he saw the condition I was in. He herded me into his office and closed the door. “What happened, Bon? I swear to God, if Justin tried anything—”
“No, Connor,” I said. I sat down on the chair for clients and felt the butcher paper crinkle under my ass. “Justin was fine. Perfect fucking gentleman. Two guys jumped me in the parking lot.” I held up my right thumb, still caked in blood. “I got a piece of one of them though. They ran off before I could get a good look at them.”
Connor wasted no time. He slipped on a pair of gloves, sat down on his stool, and pulled out the first aid kit. I didn’t think I’d hurt myself until he poured alcohol on my thumb and it stung like a motherfucker.
“Fuuuck! You could have warned me!”
My uncle ignored me, just like he had since I was a little girl coming in with scraped knees from falling off my bicycle. The nail on my thumb was bent back. He clipped it and wrapped the wound while I squirmed. I’m much more for inflicting pain than receiving it. Also, sitting in that chair with Connor working on me brought out my inner petulant child. Once I was patched up, he backed his stool up to the door and leaned against it. Clearly he wasn’t going to let me get away without hearing the whole story.
“What happened, Bon? Is this more of that shit Poppa told you about?”
“No,” I said. I prodded my wrapped thumb and it answered me with a fresh shot of pain. “At least, I don’t think they were wolves. Usually they don’t take the time to blindfold you first.”
“You should call the cops. File a report.”
“What good would that do, Connor?” I got up and walked to the door. He didn’t budge. “I didn’t see enough of them to even give a description. They can’t exactly put out an APB for ‘big’ can they? I just want to go to bed.”
He gave me a look that said this wasn’t over, but moved out of the way. I pulled the door open and left. Once I was upstairs and behind two locked doors, I took the time to look at myself in the mirror. I had leaves and pine needles in my hair, and I’d broken a couple of nails. My necklace was still in one piece, and I hadn’t lost either of my earrings. That was something.
Robbery wasn’t their motive, obviously. Why the blindfold? Had they been wolves? There was the woman in the restaurant. Was she their scout? Hell, I was lost. I decided to take a hot shower and go to bed. I still had to meet up with an old friend tomorrow, and hope she didn’t want to rip out my throat.
Chapter Eight
There were no new bodies in the morning paper, but I did get a note from Justin saying he had a lovely evening. He wanted to meet me again. How nice. I tossed the paper and note onto my kitchen table, and headed out to the scene of the murder I’d read about before.
It was technically fall outside, but someone forgot to tell the weather. My car’s dashboard readout said it was ninety-two degrees at ten a.m. Forecast for today includes sweaty back, sticky shirt, and a one hundred percent chance of pissy PJ. The body was found under the bridge on Waugh and Allen Parkway, right where people like to watch the bats come out. I never saw the draw, personally. They’re flying rodents who eat bugs and shit everywhere, fascinating. I parked at a grocery store a block over and walked toward the scene.
I could smell the bats as soon as I got out of my car. The noxious cloud of wet concrete and bat droppings got stronger as I approached. I looked down the steep grass hill that led down to the bayou. Crime scene tape blocked off a section of the biking trail that ran along the shore and under the bridge. Somewhere in Houston, an angry hipster was complaining over his latte that he had to take a detour on his morning run.
Unfortunately, I didn’t have any special senses like the wolves. I couldn’t just walk up close, take a whiff, and tell if one of their kind had been there in the last few days. I had to rely on my eyes. I walked the trail and got as close to the scene as I could. The body was gone, but she’d left a depression in the grass along the water.
“Spooky isn’t it?” a woman’s voice said from behind me. She was dressed in a track suit and matching shoes.
“Yeah, I guess it is,” I said.
“Could have been one of us, you know? I always kind of found this bridge a little creepy. The bats.”
She was a talkative one. Might as well take advantage of it. “I know what you mean. Do you jog here every morning?”
“Yeah. If I hadn’t slept in a couple days ago, I might have had to call this in. Poor thing.”
“You saw her body?”
She nodded. “The cops were already here, but they hadn’t covered her up yet.”
“Did you see anything strange? Anything surrounding the body?”
She shifted in her running shoes. “I kind of have to get going.”
“Please,” I said. “Did you see anything?”
“Well, I asked the cops if they’d found her dog. Poor thing probably ran off scared to death.”
“How did you know she had a dog?”
“The paw prints. Big ones, all around her body.”
Bingo.
I went back up the hill and stopped into the grocery store for a coffee. The smell of roasted beans trumped bat shit any day. I hadn’t really learned anything I didn’t already know—a wolf killed the girl. I’d need to case the clubs around here and hope he came out on the prowl again. I doubted he met her on the trail. They weren’t ambush predators. At least, not our local wolves. They liked the thrill of the chase.
Was Dreama one of them now? I mean, I knew she was a wolf. That much I’d known for years, but what I didn’t know was how much of their instincts she’d taken on with the change. Maybe Poppa knew more. I drove back to the shop and went upstairs. Connor was too busy flirting with a young woman by the flash counter to notice me.
I went to my closet and pulled out the book with our family crest, and sat down on my bed with it. I’d sat next to Poppa right here as he told me stories from the Old Country. He said it like that, where you could hear the capitals. He’d comforted me when I found the note at Dree’s apartment and knew she was gone for good.
“It’s a curse, Bon,” he said. “A curse our family started. I tried to tell all this to your uncle, but my Connor is just as stubborn as me. He won’t believe an old man. Will you?”
“Of course, Poppa,” I said. I was still shocked by what I’d seen the night she left. “Tell me everything.”
He did. He told me how his great aunt had been disgraced by a gypsy boy, and how the first Mackenzie took his revenge. He showed me the runes that had been carved into his back, cursing him to become an animal, to live near forever in a state of conflict between his instincts and his humanity. They were all in our family album—one rune for each branch of the clan, six in all. The order mattered. He told me to look for the one with our branch first. He was the one we had to kill
.
I recognized the pattern immediately—Dreama had it on her back. All the women he fouled carried his mark to their deaths. Poppa said they died not long after he turned them, but that much I knew wasn’t true. Dree was still out there, for sure. How many others were still around?
I knew there were turned women in the city. I’d seen them in passing, but I hadn’t killed one…yet. They were monsters in their own right, but victims too – victims of my family’s revenge. Poppa felt sorry for them toward the end. He said I had to promise to try and wipe them out.
“It’s nigh time we ended it, Bon. The whole bloody mess has gone on too long. The key is inside ye.”
He tapped my chest with an ancient finger. “Your blood kills them. It will protect ye, and your daughters when ye have them. But at the same time, they’re drawn to it. This one that took your friend wanted you instead. I did’nae want to believe it at first.”
Poppa had chased the two of us, Dreama and me, out of his bedroom with the same revolver I kept under my pillow. I’d thought he had finally lost it, and Connor probably still did. My uncle didn’t know I’d kept Poppa’s gun.
I woke up with a sore neck. I’d managed to doze off sitting up, with the family album still on my lap. I pushed it off and rubbed feeling back into my legs. It was still light out, so I hadn’t been asleep that long. I hobbled to the bathroom and splashed water on my face.
Why had the gypsy man chosen Dreama instead of me? Was there something that clued him off? I had no memory of the night Dreama was marked. Was that his doing? Perhaps the time had come for me to ask.
“Bon?” Connor’s voice came from outside my front door. “Package for you. Leaving it here.”
“Thanks,” I called. He probably didn’t hear me. I unlocked the door and saw a small cooler. Manuel had come through for me again, and none too soon. I pulled out a fresh pen and stuck it in my bag. I started to go back to my bedroom, but dropped in a second pen instead.
The clock told me I had about an hour until nightfall. It was just enough time to make it to the northeast side of town, as long as traffic cooperated. Metal clicked against my teeth and I realized I was chewing on my necklace again. I spat it out.
I packed my small gun along with the two pens, and threw in another small silver necklace just for good measure. Poppa never explained the connection to silver, why it hurt them on contact. I told myself I’d resist the urge to torture them with it. I’m human after all, not a monster. Then again, if the creature that marked Dreama was there tonight, all bets were off.
Chapter Nine
Kingwood Drive is enough of a traffic nightmare in the daytime, much less at dusk. The street was narrow and lined with trees that blocked everything from view, including oncoming traffic. People who lived there thought the speed limit was a suggestion and whipped through blind turns like their house was on fire. I was cut off twice.
I pulled into the apartment complex just past the golf course and felt a wave of deja vu. I’d turned here a hundred times to see Dree. She was a good friend, but also a pet project. Her sex life was dismal, and I’d tried very hard in those days to fix that.
The complex had been repainted since I was there last, but you can only polish a turd so much. Beneath the slathers of paint I knew there was a rotting corpse thirty years past ripe. The office had burned down while Dree lived there, and they never rebuilt it. It was a wonder the apartments hadn’t done the same.
I drove past the covered spots and into the single row of visitor parking. I looked all around me before getting out of the car. Every shadow was in its place, none of them moving strangely. I kept one hand in my bag just in case.
The parking lot was pretty full—people coming home at the end of the day carrying bags of groceries or children’s car seats. They wouldn’t want to try anything here. The one who marked Dree had been a showman, but he was surprisingly shy with his kills.
I went one building down, to the apartment facing the woods. Thunder rolled, and I looked up at the sky. Clouds were moving in fast. Lovely night to meet an old friend. The apartment was occupied. The horribly rotten back porch had been covered in a jungle of potted plants and kitschy yard art.
I stood with my back to the rear wall of the building, watching the corners to either side of me and the woods in front. I wished suddenly that I had their night vision. Light was getting scarcer, and they could be very quiet when they wanted to be.
A shadow formed at the edge of the tree line. I heard footsteps, which meant she wanted me to know she was coming. I pushed off from the wall and closed my hand on the gun. I was damned lucky my bandaged thumb was on my left hand. If she tried anything, Dree would get the quick death. I owed her that much at least.
She wore a bright pink tracksuit, but no shoes. Her dark brown hair had grown in straight brunette waves. It reached down to the small of her back now and flowed as she moved. She walked like them, with a smooth animal grace. Her eyes weren’t brown any more. They glowed amber in the last of the daylight.
“Hi, PJ,” she said.
“Dree,” I said. “You look like shit.”
She laughed, and I loosened my grip on the gun a little. Maybe she wasn’t here to kill me. Then again, I didn’t see the others she’d left with. Could be she was just here to make me drop my guard.
“It’s good to see you, PJ. I’m sorry I didn’t come back earlier. Things were…complicated.”
She came closer and I backed up instinctively. She stopped where she was. “I’m not going to hurt you. I can control it. I’m not like the ones you’ve—”
“So you heard then?” I asked. “A lot can happen in five years, Dree. A lot can change.”
“I heard about Poppa. I’m so sorry. I know he meant a lot to you.”
“Is he here? Your Alpha? That’s what you call him, right?”
She looked back toward the tree line. “No. I came alone. He wanted me to tell you something though. He said he wouldn’t harm you, ever. He and Slate are in love. They just want to be left alone.”
“Slate’s the other one then? Good to know.”
Dree took a step closer and I tightened my grip on the gun. She put her hands out to either side, palms up.
“Damnit, PJ, I’m not going to hurt you! I don’t know what Poppa told you about us—”
“He told me enough. Look, I can’t promise anything. The one who marked you…I promised Poppa I’d kill him.”
“There’s more to the story than Poppa told you, PJ. He only knows the one side. I can’t tell it the way they can. If you’d let them explain—“
I pulled the gun out, letting my arm fall to my side. The gesture wasn’t missed. Dree backed off.
“Dree, you left so suddenly. That cop you were dating looked everywhere for you. They assumed you were dead after they found the gun on your stalker. Fuck, why did you have to come back?”
She kept both hands up. I couldn’t be sure in the waning light, but I thought I saw a tear running down her cheek. “Lupin brought us back. He didn’t explain it to me, just said an old friend needed a talking to.”
She froze, and then whipped around to face the woods. A man stepped out, silent as a ghost. I brought my gun up and took aim. He had covered his face with a ski mask. “This a friend of yours, Dree? Come to finish me off after you softened me up?”
“I’ve never seen him before in my life. Goddamnit, PJ, why don’t you trust me?”
A cold blade bit into my neck and I lowered the gun. I’d been so preoccupied with Dree and the mystery man, his partner had snuck up on me. Why did you have to come back?
“How about we have a quick little chat,” the man behind me said. “Sans weaponry, eh?”
I dropped the gun, and he pulled my bag off my shoulder. Dree divided her gaze between the two men, but didn’t move.
“We underestimated your spirit the first time. Won’t happen again. I have a message for you. Stop your little hunting trips, or we start hunting you. Got it?”
&nb
sp; I was pretty sure I could land a crotch shot from the way he was standing. Of course, he might just slit my throat on the way down. There was that to consider.
“Loud and clear,” I said. “Now any chance you could ease up on that metal against my neck? Stainless steel doesn’t do much for my complexion.”
He didn’t ease up. Instead, he jerked me to one side and spoke to Dree. “Got one for you too. You tell your Alpha he ain’t got no friends left here. He’d best just move along. Let us handle ours.”
Dree took a step back toward the woods and lowered her hands. “Why not tell him yourself?”
A massive black wolf bolted out of the woods. It moved like a demon, shadow made flesh with teeth that flashed and went for my throat. This is it, I thought, one good snap and I’m dead, blood or no. Before I had time to finish the thought, I was on the ground. So was the man who had held the knife. I checked my throat, but somehow the wolf had batted the knife and me out of the way in the space of a second. I’d never seen one that moved so fast.
It sat on top of him now, its teeth clamped down on the man’s throat hard enough to draw blood. It could have killed him easily. Why did it hold back? I heard shuffling feet as the other man turned to run, but another wolf came up behind him. This one was slate gray and slightly smaller, but only just.
“How did you find us?” Dree asked.
The one with the wolf at his throat answered first. I can’t say I blamed him. “Her scent. It’s strong once you find it. We tracked her here.”
“He’ll gut you for that!” the other one screamed. “You’ll be the next meal. Best shut your mouth!”
The one who had the knife laughed, and fur sprouted from his skin. His face pushed out under the mask. He shook it off his expanding muzzle. His pants ripped and he kicked them off. The larger wolf held him down. I heard a sound and looked back. His friend had changed as well. He launched himself toward me.
Marked Clan #2 - Red Page 4
