Cesar’s men had their backs to each other. They shot at anything that came near them and threw a few sprays toward the pack that circled Lupin and Slate. I saw one of the wolves turn and crouch.
“Look out!” I cried. I was too late. The wolf was in the air by the time I reacted and had his mouth around one of the men’s throats in the next second. As he fell, the man’s gun discharged wildly and knocked one of his buddies down.
“Fuck! He got my leg!”
“Shut the fuck up and get it off him!”
The lone-standing thug took aim and picked the wolf off his compatriot. I could tell, even in the dim light of the woods, that it was too late. The man’s head was nearly ripped off.
While the three stooges distracted me, one of the wolves broke from the pack around Slate and Lupin. He made a lunge for me, and his claws connected with my shoulders.
The weight of him pulled me down as much as my lack of balance. He pinned my gun arm and snapped at my face. Rancid dog breath grazed the tip of my nose. That was close.
I wrestled loose my other arm and punched him in the throat. While he was stunned, I pulled out a pen and jammed it into his chest. He whimpered and rolled off me. I leveled my gun at his head, but he was already in the last throes of a painful, burning death. Good dog. Stay.
Slate and Lupin had thinned the herd around them down to three. I charged the one nearest me and plunged a pen into its spine. Manuel sliced open the other, and Slate slashed open the final wolf’s belly. The forest was suddenly very quiet.
Cesar’s men broke it. One of them was limping now, trying not to groan with every step. The other one had him stop so he could wrap the wound with some bandages from his jacket. Slate wasn’t the only one who came prepared.
“Is everyone accounted for?” I asked, and then realized the body of Cesar’s man still on the ground. “Minus one?”
“We’re fine,” the other man said. “Let’s just finish this up.”
I retrieved my extra gun from the ground and changed out the clip on the one I’d been using. I nodded to Slate and Lupin, and they walked further into the woods. We couldn’t be that far from Donald’s hideout.
Sure enough, we didn’t have to walk very long before the woods ended and an old gravel parking lot began. The station was larger than I expected, probably meant to serve long-haul truckers and the like. The pumps had long ago been removed, and most of the glass in the windows was gone. A light shone somewhere inside.
Cesar’s men fanned out to cover the rear entrance, and the remaining three of us took the front. I felt a little like Rambo with two automatic weapons and a belt full of epi pens. I had four left. Hopefully there weren’t too many wolves inside.
Manuel took point this time. He led us through the main area where a looted cash register hung like a broken limb, attached only by wires. Glass crushed under my feet. Oh well, it’s not like they didn’t know we were coming. The automatic weapons outside surely must have tipped them off.
The light came from the back area, which looked like it used to be a restaurant. Donald had a thing for those, apparently. I heard a single, low voice speaking too quietly for me to make out. Slate and Lupin flanked us, keeping their noses high. We walked deeper inside and eventually caught up with Cesar’s men.
I turned a corner and saw Donald sitting on a makeshift throne made from two overturned freezers. The light came from a single bare bulb in one of those hooked enclosures, like a mechanic might use under a hood.
He was bleeding…a lot. I saw the dagger he used on me sitting next to him and mine in his right hand. He whispered in Gaelic as he carved into his own chest.
“Welcome, friends,” he said. “Witness my bloody rebirth.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
“Glad you could come, PJ,” he said. “And bring friends. You should all see this. Tonight I become a new creation. I thought I needed you for this, but as it turns out your dagger works just as well.”
Cesar’s men took aim and looked to me. I held out a hand. We were going to kill him, of course, but my curiosity was piqued. “What do you mean, Donald? I figured you were just a simple man. Revenge on the latest descendant of my clan. Kill me, turn me, whatever. You’d be done. What more could you want?”
Donald laughed in a high-pitched titter. “Oh, little girl, you have no ambition. I gave up on revenge years ago. Wealth was a nice salve for that. No, I’m interested in becoming more. Your ancestors didn’t realize the power they bestowed on my kind. The magic they messed around with was just the tip of the blade.”
He carved another rune into his sternum, and then tossed the dagger away. “It goes so much deeper. Tonight I’m going to tap into some of it. Prepare yourselves.”
He stood and recited something in Gaelic. Okay, I wasn’t curious anymore. Donald was just nuts, end of story. I gave the signal, and Cesar’s men unloaded a clip a piece straight into him. He fell back into the freezers and went limp.
I took a step forward to retrieve my dagger, but Manuel stopped me. Slate and Lupin growled long and low. One of Cesar’s men whispered, “Madre de Dios.”
Donald’s bullet-riddled body twitched. His left hand contracted into a claw, and then froze. Fur began to pop out of his skin in uneven patches. His right hand elongated and became a paw and his spine lengthened. It gave a ghoulish, too-long quality to his torso.
“Fuck this,” Cesar’s man unloaded another clip into the changing body. It didn’t stop moving. Now Donald was sitting up, head drooped onto his chest. His nose and jaw pressed out into a fleshy muzzle naked of fur. His right leg ripped out of its pant leg and changed, but his left remained the same. He seemed caught between man and beast.
I dropped my guns. Clearly those weren’t going to help any more. Cesar’s men got the hint and backed away. Their part in this fight was over. Slate walked forward, unfazed by the creature, and retrieved my dagger between her teeth. She returned it to me, and the look in her eyes was clear—Finish this.
“Your silver won’t help now,” Donald said. His voice was too throaty coming from a muzzle. He looked up, and the light from his single bulb shined off one brown eye and one yellow. “I can’t die. Your ancestors’ magic made sure of that.”
Slate took up a position to my left, Lupin to my right. “I don’t know, Donald. Looked in a mirror lately? I wouldn’t want to live like that forever.”
He laughed, and then just disappeared. The next thing I knew he had ripped the head off one of Cesar’s men. For having one human leg, the bastard sure was fast. I whirled to face him. He tore out a chunk of meat from the head and licked up the blood like it was a pink ice cream cone.
“Not bad, but the real test will be your blood,” he said. “Give us a taste.”
He disappeared again, turning himself into a dark blur. I tried to follow him, but he was too fast. A hand closed on my throat and pulled me in close to him. His breath stank of blood and wolf.
He barely had time to breathe on me before his hand tightened around my neck and he threw me to the floor. I rolled and faced him. Slate was latched onto his human leg, ripping away at the flesh and cloth until she hit bone. Manuel brought his machete around to lop off his head, but the blade became caught. Donald picked him up and threw him against one of the standing freezers.
Lupin bit down on Donald’s forepaw and tried to drag him down to the floor. Donald snarled and brought his human fist down on Lupin’s back. He grabbed the wolf by the scruff of his neck and threw him off like a puppy. I closed in and plunged my dagger into his chest. He batted me away and tried to kick off Slate. Her grip on his leg was solid.
The dagger did nothing. Donald ripped it out and tossed it away. Was he right? Did this second set of runes really make him invincible? I knew one thing—if he wanted some of my blood he was going to get it.
Slate’s grip finally failed and she was thrown clear of Donald. He turned to face me. I pulled out my remaining four pens, two in each hand. “Ready when you are, boy. Come fetch.
”
He blurred out of my line of sight, and I reached out with every sense I had. His smell clued me in, and I was able to dodge his first swipe. I saw him now, staggered. He hadn’t expected me to move out of the way.
Manuel was up again, this time with a pouch and a lighter. He tossed the lit package to the floor in front of me and smoke began to fill the room. I took a long whiff of the wolfsbane, then closed my eyes and waited for Donald’s next strike.
He came at me again, but this time I heard him cough in time to react. I positioned myself so his clawed hand rolled off my side and I came around to plunge all four vials into his back. He picked up the smoking packet and tossed it away.
Donald paused and yanked the pens out. The smoke cleared, and for a single panicked second I thought my last resort had failed. Then I saw him twitch. His muzzle jerked up, then to one side. One of his arms shook violently. His wolf leg gave out, and he braced himself with one hand.
“No,” he said. “No, this shouldn’t happen. I said the words perfectly.”
Donald screamed and fell backward, arms outstretched. He looked like he was having a seizure. His chest rose and fell in ragged, uneven breaths. Fur burst out on his face, but receded on his chest. He howled in pain. Donald’s skin seemed to boil, rising and falling as though bubbles were forming underneath it.
Slate and Lupin joined me on either side, as rapt with the scene as I was. The last of Cesar’s men stood slack-jawed, still clutching his gun. None of us knew what would happen next.
Donald’s muzzle split at the tip, and his skin peeled back. He threw open his mouth in a yawning cry, bare muscles tensed, and then spewed blood like a fountain straight up. One final spasm later, he lay still.
I approached him cautiously. Slate and Lupin closed in nearer to me, and I placed a hand in each of their coats for reassurance. Strange that I’d find comfort in that. We walked up to Donald’s body, which had begun to shift back to its human form. Besides the horrific flesh mask, you’d never know of the creature he had become.
Cesar’s man knelt by his comrade and fished a cell phone out of his pocket. He dialed a number and waited.
“It’s done,” he said finally. After a beat, he pressed a button on the phone and Cesar’s voice came over the speaker.
“Good work, Clan Mackenzie. You’ve evened the odds for my organization, and for that you have my thanks. We’ll meet again at the church where I will return your friend, the doctor, to you.”
The wolves guided us back to our cars. On the way, the remaining member of Cesar’s group extended his hand to me. “You’re one tough bitch,” he said.
“Thanks, I think. Don’t let me tell you your business or anything, but are you just going to leave your two buddies out here to rot?”
He shook his head and tapped the phone. “Cesar makes things disappear. He always takes care of us.”
“Always?” Manuel asked. The man nodded.
“Except when he sends you off to die for a stranger,” I said. I couldn’t help it—the arrangement seemed strange.
Cesar’s man shook his head. “He saved me from the street. I owe him my life. We all do.”
“Salvation doesn’t come at the end of a gun barrel,” Manuel said, “Or a machete.”
He picked up his pace until he was far enough ahead of us that I almost didn’t catch his last comment, “I would know.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
I drove us back so Slate could clean up her wounds as well as Lupin’s. He’d broken a few ribs, and both of them had several deep gashes from their tangle with Donald’s wolves. They would be healed by the time we got back to the church.
I envied them. The dark imprint of Donald’s palm was still on my throat, and I’d picked up a slit down my arm from a shard of broken glass. I was pretty sure my ankle and wrist were twisted as well. Every time I stepped on the gas or turned the wheel pain shot through me.
“What did he mean about the magic going deeper?” I asked.
Slate shook her head. “I don’t know. What my da knew of magic, he kept to himself. I didn’t even know about the curse until I was a victim of it.”
“I’ve heard whispers of it over the years,” Lupin said. “Honestly I paid it no mind. There’s enough superstition about our kind without adding to it.”
“What did you hear?” I asked.
Slate finished cleaning off the deepest of his wounds, and he pulled himself up to a sitting position. “The curse was just one of about a dozen rituals that your clan used to know. They had them for everything—fertility, healing, protection against evil spirits. One was said to have the power to resurrect the dead. I looked for evidence for a while. I hoped maybe there was something that could reverse this.”
“Did you find anything?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Old wives’ tales, mostly. Your buddy Manuel might have something though.”
“What makes you say that?”
“I saw him grab a book from the service station before we left. It looked old, might have been Donald’s.”
We pulled up to the church about an hour later. This late at night the streets were completely empty. Cesar stood outside the sanctuary with two of his men, looking every bit the secretive gangster.
“I don’t see Justin,” I said as we approached.
Cesar shook his head. “It appears you took out a little insurance of your own in that regard. Am I right, chica?”
He motioned to one of his men, and I suddenly felt very vulnerable. They could mow us down right here. Why hadn’t I slipped that vest back on? Cesar’s man opened the door to the church and pulled out a figure in a hood. Justin?
“You see, although I gave you my word your friend would not be harmed, some of my men took it upon themselves to…anticipate my next move.”
He turned to the thug on his right and pulled a machete out of a sheath on his belt. It couldn’t be Justin. The man in the hood was much too muscular.
“Your friend got the good doctor free before this fellow could do any permanent damage. I must apologize for his behavior. Apparently, it’s come time to cull the herd. This will serve a dual purpose, however. I wanted you to witness what happens to people who betray me, just in case you get it into your head to talk to any authorities about what went on between us.”
He raised the machete and brought it down right there on the steps of the church. The hood and its payload rolled onto my feet. It was a fairly clear point.
“I know how to keep secrets, Cesar,” I said. “I hope you’ve also learned tonight that I’m not easily messed with.”
“He sure as hell better have,” Dree’s voice said. She walked into the light of the church steps next to Justin. He looked a little battered, but no worse for wear. I walked up to him and gave him my best imitation of Connor’s bear hugs.
“You’ve had a busy night,” he said. “You look like hell.”
I laughed. “I’m sure you can fix me up. Provided you’re still interested in being around me, that is.”
“I don’t know,” he said. “This one came to my rescue naked. I might just have a case of wandering eyes.”
That got him a nice solid punch in the chest. Dree just smiled. She had dressed herself before they came back, and I had to admit I was a little glad after his comment.
“Pleasure doing business with you, PJ,” Cesar said as he walked to his SUV. “I hope we never have need of each other again. You’re hard on my men.”
We went back to Celtic Knot, and Connor unlocked the door for us. He smiled at Slate, and she actually smiled back.
“Connor,” she said, “This is Danny, but he prefers to go by Lupin. You should see some of his tattoos.”
Connor laughed. “I’m sure I will. Bon, welcome back. I was a little worried. Been out on the town with the gang?”
“You could say that,” I said. “You living at the shop now? It’s a little late, even for you.”
“Just keeping a vigil is all,” Connor said. “Nigh
t everyone. Bon, see you in the morning. Don’t let the good doctor keep you up too late.”
Once Connor was gone, I started toward the back of the shop. Justin put a hand on my arm. “I should really get home,” he said. “Early rounds tomorrow…or I guess now it’s later today.”
I hugged him. “Are you sure you’re okay by yourself?”
“Not my first kidnapping,” he said. “Besides, I can crash at the hospital. Don’t want to go back to the condo until I can get the locks changed. Maybe a better security system.”
“You can stay here,” I said.
He looked around at the rest of the group. “We’ll talk. Tonight it looks like you have a full house.”
We shared a kiss that told me I’d be seeing more of him, and he walked to the front door. He had one foot out and froze.
“Uh, anyone mind giving me a ride to the hospital?”
I was about to volunteer, but Lupin beat me to it. “No problem, I’ll go. The ladies need their rest.”
“Be careful, Lupin,” I said. “Nothing crazy like earlier. I like that one.”
He half-bowed and gave me a wink. “Fear not. My performance for the night is over.”
I locked the door behind them. The rest of us went upstairs, and I trudged to my bedroom and flopped face-first on the bed. I didn’t bother getting undressed.
“Make yourselves at home, I guess,” I spoke into the bed.
“I actually would rather get going,” Dree said. “No offense.”
“Suit yourself,” I said. “Where are you three staying anyway?”
“Memorial Park,” Slate said. There was an awkward silence as my too-tired brain worked out that they meant in the actual park and not a hotel near it.
“Oh,” I said. “Well, you could have told me that before I came all the way upstairs.” I pulled my head up and looked at Slate. “I suppose you want to go too?”
The older woman nodded. I rolled onto my back, and then begrudgingly got up. Dree led the way to my front door. When she was through, I pulled Slate aside.
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