He grabbed Miranda by the hips and pressed her softness against him, feeling her hair against his shoulders, and the heaviness of her pink-nippled breasts against his chest. He reached down and felt the warm slipperiness between her legs.
They kissed, tentatively at first, then with increasing urgency. Her hands tugged at his arms, caressing his shoulders, then gripping his hips. He held her right breast in one hand, arousing the nipple between his fingertips until it became pointed and stiff.
He looked down and saw his erection rise against her belly. She put her hand down and held it tight in her fist, pressing and rubbing it against her thigh.
Miranda never needed much foreplay, and that made her a lot different from Diane. Sex with her was always forceful, urgent, and uncompromising. She had to almost always be on top.
“Be a wolf,” she said in that husky voice of hers.
Hank spun her around and placed her hands on the table. Standing up, he entered her from behind, grasping both of her shoulders as he went in as deep as he could. Miranda gasped with every thrust. Hank felt as if his entire body would blow up, but the explosion went on and on and on, and she spread her legs wider so that he could thrust deeper. Her fingernails dug into the table.
“Harder, Hank. Harder!” Miranda urged him on and he grasped her hips in his hands and pounded away until she yelped and thrashed her head from side to side.
He could feel the orgasm begin to tighten and ripple inside her like shock waves just before an earthquake. She said something he couldn't understand, breathy and high-pitched, almost as if she were conjuring up a spell. Her eyes were squeezed shut and her face locked into a grimace of pain and pleasure. Her breasts and upper chest flushed red, her nipples tight and erect.
He pulled her hair back with one hand and placed his right hand on her waist, thrusting even deeper.
Looking down, he saw the tramp stamps that Miranda had on her lower back. They were of a wolf’s eyes.
“You'll have a religious experience,” he remembered her saying when she first got the tattoo. Thrusting as hard as he could, staring down at the crack of her ass and the tattoos, he felt like a man reborn.
He caught their reflection in the window as Miranda began to yell louder. Her faced seemed to melt in the reflection. She looked young and innocent at times, then shifted into a lustful savage. Their eyes met in the reflection, her face passion-filled and accepting.
Then, with her eyes closed, she yelped again, her face slowly becoming an expression of dreamless serenity.
Hank pulled her hair back, a declaration of triumph. Miranda yelped as the light of the full moon struck down on them through the window.
Hank looked up at the moon. Something up there loved him.
CHAPTER 14
Hank didn't remember when he fell asleep. The sudden humming of his laptop awakened him. He looked up and saw it blinking on and off on the kitchen table. Then it dimmed out like a dying firefly.
He felt an abrupt rise in temperature but could not tell if it came from his body heat or the room itself. He thought he heard laughing inside the house. Rubbing his eyes, he thought he heard a shuffle of feet, which died away in a flurry. Then he heard a door close.
The neighbors?
He looked over and saw Miranda sleeping sweetly next to him. He couldn't decide if he were in love with her or in love with the fact that she wasn't Diane. He knew he wasn't filling his end of the bargain, financially. Hank wondered how long Miranda would keep throwing herself at him like a sexually-deprived tigress. Here he was, a man with fears and a broken spirit, a might-have-been that never was his whole life. It would only be a matter of time before she would leave him.
She rolled over and draped her arm on him as if she wanted to prevent him from going.
Hank slid out from under her arm and the bed. He thought about grabbing a baseball bat, but he forgot where he put it.
He looked outside their first floor window. The branches of a cherry tree trembled in the wind. Beyond that, he saw a smattering of lights from the houses across the street. Through his reflection in the window, he saw that their front door had been opened.
His mouth went dry and his heart started to race.
He dashed over to the kitchen counter and sifted in the drawer for a knife. Then he remembered the knives that he had made for the old man.
The silver knives.
He raced over back to the living room couch and took out two of the knives from his satchel.
“Hank!”
Miranda's voice sounded desperate.
Hank sprinted over to their bedroom and saw Miranda bent over the bed.
Javier stood behind her. His two buddies held Miranda's arms down.
“Put those cheap ass knives down, bitch!” Javier barked.
Hank did not listen.
Javier ripped Miranda's undies down to her ankles. Then he unbuckled his pants.
“Don't,” Hank said.
“Or what?” Javier asked.
Hank looked at his two friends holding Miranda down. They were sprouting claws that sunk into her arms. Hair grew out of their face and their jaws shifted into a point.
Javier howled like a wolf as he looked down at the bare butt of Miranda.
“Get away from her!”
“Every man's worst nightmare,” Javier smirked.
Javier thrusted himself inside Miranda and she screamed.
And Hank jolted awake.
He took several deep breaths and slipped the covers off himself. Then he looked down at Miranda in the rumpled-up blankets. He nearly jumped out of the bed and ran to the living room.
He checked the front door and the locks. All good.
Hank grabbed his laptop off the counter and leaned back on the couch. Googling “werewolf attacks,” he did not expect much. He scrolled down and saw pages that chronicled the history of werewolves. Digging deeper, he found a conspiracy site that opened with the headline “Werewolves Are Real.”
Hank scrolled down and read the typical conspiracy fare about how the government had suppressed reports of supernatural goings on.
He moved his mouse over the back button but stopped when he saw a sketch drawing the blogger had made.
It looked exactly like the wolf he saw attack the Hispanic man.
“They go from town to town,” the blogger wrote. “Preying on humans. They're the hunters and we're the prey. They're higher up on the food chain from us. Maybe they're even more evolved. It is almost as if they have a sixth sense when it is time to move one. I have tracked them as they started in the southern part of Mexico and moved their way slowly up. I believe they are in my city right now. I could try contacting the FBI and telling them of my findings, but they would only put me under lock and key. Something is up. There are reasons why no one is saying anything about these killings. They are consuming us. They are carnivores. We are their food supply.”
Hank saw the man's return e-mail address listed and clicked on it. He composed a letter. He didn't know how much he should reveal and even if the man would write him back.
“My name is Hank,” he wrote. “I know what you are saying is true. I witnessed a murder tonight. A man being disemboweled by a creature similar to the sketch drawing you have on your site. Of course, no one believes me and thinks I'm crazy. How long has this been going on? I am in Oakland. Hope you are well.”
He sent the message.
Moments later, he received an e-mail in his inbox with the “sender unknown” message.
The FBI probably took the guy's e-mail down, Hank joked to himself.
But he continued scrolling down the man's website. A boon of information, he had a FAQ section where he went into great lengths to describe the powers and tendencies of “the enemy”.
“Movies have lessened the credibility of the phenomenon,” he wrote. “There are real documented cases in history where men have been executed for being werewolves. The only way we can survive is to bring those executions back.”
“There is no scientific explanation for the shape-shifting. All I know is that it happens. Why bother to understand it? We just have to find ways to kill them. But what I find interesting is that the subject will shape-shift personality wise. They don't target 'normals'. The wolf spirit targets the outliers. Criminals. Transients. Their spirits are easier to occupy for whatever reason. There can be no exorcism of this demon from the spirit once it is infected. The wolf pushes aside the man and takes the body whole.”
“They don't become werewolves as much as they become possessed by the wolf spirit.”
CHAPTER 15
“What do you mean he's missing?” Spinks said as the patrol car pulled up in front of Frias' last known post on San Pablo Avenue.
The sounds of bullhorns in the distance echoed in Lopez ears as he and Spinks stepped out of the vehicle.
Five college students walked by.
“Hands up, don't shoot!” they chanted at the officers. “Hands up, don't shoot!”
“Fuck off,” Spinks said as he turned his back on them and closed his left ear to block out the ambient sound, holding the cell phone to his right.
“Well, who did he ride up with? And not a sign of him? And no radio contact?”
Spinks disconnected his cell phone and looked around. “They said he was right here. Now the person who was supposed to meet us here has had to assist with the dumb ass protests. Ain't this some shit?”
“Maybe he's at the protest?” Lopez asked.
Spinks shook his head. “I trained this dude. He's one of my own. He wouldn't buck orders. He would stay put. But maybe they got their lines crossed somehow and he went to do something else.”
In the distance, they heard sirens and gunfire. Then screams from the protesters.
Spinks looked around. Lopez knew him long enough when he had a bad feeling about something.
“This is not good.” Spinks looked at the makeshift blockade set up where Frias was supposed to be standing guard.
Spinks began walking north. Lopez followed. Spinks got back on the radio.
“Who did he ride in with again?”
Lopez heard a howl coming from the bar to their right. “Did you hear that?”
“Hear what?” Spinks asked.
Lopez began running toward the bar with his gun drawn.
“Hey!” Spinks followed.
Lopez reached the bar first. He put his ear to the door.
“What is it?” Spinks whispered.
“Inside,” Lopez said.
They tried the door to no avail.
“Fuck it!” Spinks took out his gun and blew a hole through the door. Then he kicked it down.
Broken glass and crack pipes filled the dusty floor. Crudely drawn pictures of wolves lined the walls.
Then they saw the blood.
Crimson paw prints dotted a rear door. At first glance, Lopez thought it might be the work of a little kid. Some school children making a cut out of a wolf's paw and dipping it in red paint.
But the paw prints led to blood on the ground. Which led outside.
Spinks tightened the grip on his gun as they entered the back patio.
There, hanging from a tree, was the disemboweled body of Arturo Frias with his intestines spilling from a hole in his stomach.
He had been put there on display. Hung up like a piñata where it looked like everyone took a bite.
Bite marks could be seen around his legs. His pants bore large holes where large chunks of flesh had been ripped out.
“They did the same thing to Laguardia,” Spinks said, grimacing as he looked over the dead body of Frias.
“What kind of-” Lopez started to talk and then stopped himself.
“We got a serial killer on our hands,” Spinks said. “And he likes killing cops.”
“They'll kill whoever they can,” Tannenbaum said.
Hank had gotten his e-mail when he logged on that morning. Turned out that Tannenbaum used the “recipient unknown” message as his default to weed out the nuts and FBI agents who frequented his site. Or so he said. He gave him his phone number and he called back immediately.
“I've been tracking them for seven months,” Tannenbaum said excitedly, talking as if he were electronically juiced. “They kill and then they move on. Mostly homeless people. Specifically homeless men, of course. No one investigates. Like here in Oakland, they found a guy that was covered in rats, eating away at his flesh. But did they do an autopsy? Do they find out what did him in first? It was a wolf.”
“A wolf?” Hank said.
“Yep,” Tannenbaum said. “That wolf you saw. Now they're just blending in with the environment. With the protests going on, they can get in and get out. There is so much chaos going on that no one notices what's happening. It's a perfect scenario. I mean even if people did take me seriously, who would I get? Just the Ghost Hunters or some other kooks surrounding my house like a flock of buzzards. But if I know about the werewolves, then you can be damn sure that the powers that be know about them. So I want to know why they are keeping this all a secret.”
“Because it's fucking crazy,” Hank said. “At least that is what they'll say.”
“Of course,” Tannenbaum said. “Because everyone is ahistorical. They look at things only through modern eyes. Everyone has been brainwashed to believe only the rational and the non-magical. But back in the day, in medieval Europe, they knew the wolves were real. They believed in magic, they believed in the devil, and they believed in God. Now, we only have people who give lip service to the latter. But the former still exists. You know what I mean? We look back on history and feel superior when we see people being put on trial for being a witch or a werewolf. But what if they were right and we are wrong? You see that they are targeting the cops now? They eliminate the cops and they have free reign over the city.”
“That sketch on your site. That is one that you saw?”
“Clear as day. Only it was a damn dark night.”
“Where?”
“Here in the hills. I saw them. I was homeless before. Hard times, man. Saw one of them under the bridge eating on one of my friends. Now if you want to think I'm crazy, fine. I didn't want to end up that way. Wife took me for all I had and that wasn't a lot. So I wound up on the streets for a while. And that's when I caught wind of them. I was the only one that could hear their howl.”
“I can hear it, too.”
A wolf howled outside Hank's window.
A long pause at the other end.
“Did you hear that?” Tannenbaum asked.
“Can we meet? I'd like to discuss this in person.”
CHAPTER 16
Hank drove to 38th Avenue and Foothill. A part of him wanted to keep driving until he reached someplace safe like Nebraska or Montana or someplace where craziness like this just doesn't happen. Turning down Foothill Boulevard, he marveled at how dark, constricting and old the entire neighborhood looked. A liquor store had an iron gate window where customers placed their order. A former pet store with the word “Connie's” emblazoned on the front now stood faded and abandoned. He used to hang out there as a kid and look at all of the exotic fish.
He noticed that the whole street was an entire succession of long dead businesses, echoes of a thriving past that would never be resurrected.
He parked in front of the address Tannenbaum had given him: an apartment complex with eight units.
A Hispanic teen rolled up by his car on a silver dirt bike. He wore an A-shirt with a gold cross necklace dangling near his chest. His baggy pants sagged down past his ass, revealing light blue boxer shorts.
“You looking for someone, esé?”
“Nah,” Hank said. “I'm waiting for someone.”
“You can't wait here.”
“Excuse me?”
“This is Lobo territory, homes,” the teen said defiantly. “If you ain't from around here, you get the fuck out.”
The kid sped away on his
dirt bike.
Hank waited for ten minutes. Then he got a call from Tannenbaum.
“There's too much heat, man,” Tannenbaum said excitedly. “You see that? There's another full moon tonight.”
They both heard another howl in the distance.
“Just go home, man,” he said. “Just go home.”
“Aw come on, man, I'm waiting outside.”
“Go home, dude.”
“Bullshit! I'm coming up.”
Hank heard a click and saw that the line disconnected from his cell phone.
He exited his vehicle and looked up at the dingy apartments.
Tannenbaum thought about meeting Hank, but decided to nix the idea. It was too risky and he just didn't want to be bothered anymore. A loner by nature, people always took him as a weird ass. But just because he was a weird ass, that did not mean he was wrong.
He decided to make a run for it.
Reno would be his destination. He had an aunt there that would take him in for a short duration. He'd find work and leave the Bay Area behind.
He left through the side exit of the apartment building. To his right, he saw what someone who was most likely Hank head into the front of the building.
Tannenbaum was glad that the man didn't know what he looked like.
Then he heard the wolf's howl. Closer now. Louder than it had ever been.
Hurrying his pace, he stepped to the parking lot and heard footsteps behind him. Then he started running toward his car, a late model Toyota Corolla.
“Going somewhere, homey?” Javier asked.
Tannenbaum turned around. He scrutinized the wolf tattoos on the man's arm. The black eyes that didn't seem all that human and blazed with scorn.
“I know who you are,” Tannenbaum said. “And you don't scare me.”
“You're a lousy liar,” Javier said as his thin lips curled slowly over growing fangs. His jaw stretched wider and longer.
Tannenbaum knew he had to run, but he froze in place instead.
He watched in fascination as hair grew out of Javier, covering his entire body.
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