The rain drizzled around us, clouds parting enough to allow sunlight to turn it liquid gold.
“I was trying to help you.” His words were small, uncertain in a way I hadn’t heard since we were kids. “It was...a lot to process. I’ve had training. I know how to deal with creatures beyond the human. But that was.... Every word was painful. And he wasn’t even talking to me. I can’t imagine—how did you just sit there? How did you tell him no over and over again?”
“I’m meant for this, Ryder. My family’s been doing this for generations. I know how to deal with gods, how to handle Mithra because that’s not the first time I’ve ever had to deal with him. If you had listened to me, I would have kept you safe.”
“Maybe I don’t want you keeping me safe, Delaney. Maybe I want you to let me in.”
“I let you in. You remember that one and only date we had? You pushed me away.”
“It had taken me a year to get you to even look at me. A year of watching you be a cop, following in your father’s footsteps because that’s what he expected of you. You didn’t see me as anything other than another person in town you had to protect. I didn’t want to be your responsibility. And I didn’t want you tangled up in the agency I work for.”
“You could have told me that.”
“You could have told me the secrets you were keeping.”
We sat there for a moment. I didn’t know what he was thinking about, but I was thinking about missed chances and stupid decisions.
“So where does that leave us?” I asked.
The clouds shifted again, dulling the gold drizzle to silver and ash.
“I’d like...I’d like it to leave us at a beginning.”
“A fresh start like nothing happened?”
“No. A fresh start like something did.”
“Does that fresh start come with you buying me coffee?”
He smiled. “I might even toss in the cream and sugar for free.”
I pushed out of the Jeep and so did he. We started toward the shop. Before I’d even reached the concrete sidewalk running in front of the building I heard the muffled growl.
It was a sound that reached in and plucked the primal chords of fear and hunter and danger inside me. I held perfectly still.
Ryder stopped. “Laney?” he whispered.
I held up a finger and tipped my head to my left, while shivers prickled across my skin.
The growl sounded again, low, angry, deadly.
I knew that sound, though I’d never heard it like that before.
There was a werewolf close by. A werewolf in pain.
“Easy,” I said, keeping my voice soft. “I know you’re hurt. I’m here to help you.”
“What?” Ryder asked.
I held up another finger, waited for the answer. The wind pushed through the fir trees behind the bait shop. The cars shooting down the highway behind me were a steady hiss.
Werewolves ranged outside Ordinary all the time. It wasn’t all that odd for one to be here at the bait shop. But the thing that was unusual was to hear one. Werewolves were shadow-silent unless they wanted to be heard.
Or were injured.
“You’re going to be okay,” I said to the wolf I could not see. “I’m Delaney Reed and if you’re part of the Wolfe clan, you know I’m a friend. I’m going to make sure you’re okay. So I’m going to turn now and come to you, all right?”
I waited, didn’t hear anything else. I headed left toward the end of the building where I thought I’d heard the sound.
Ryder followed quietly behind me, his boots crunching in step with mine on the loose, wet gravel.
I saw the blood before I rounded the corner of the building.
Then I saw the werewolf. Not just any werewolf: Jame.
“Shit,” Ryder whispered.
Jame was mid-shift, lying on his stomach, his body lengthened and nude and mostly human, but his face elongated, hands and feet sharp with claws, face fully fanged and dark fur covering most of his body.
“Is he a...is that a...”
I shot Ryder a look and he shut his mouth.
“Jame,” I said soothingly, “it’s Delaney. You’re hurt. I need to see how badly you’re hurt, okay?”
He was breathing too hard, his back rising and falling as he panted, growling as his ribs, lumpy and looking to be broken, shifted.
“Call 911,” I said to Ryder as I eased my way forward. “Request Mykal Rossi and only him. We need an ambulance out here.”
Jame growled, but it ended in a low whine, as if even that took too much effort.
Ryder hadn’t moved, probably still trying to decide if werewolves were as easy to accept as vampires, or if they fell under the unbelievable like gods.
“Reserve Officer, Bailey,” I said. “Now.”
He snapped out of whatever trance he’d been in, and pulled his phone, quickly dialing and reporting the details.
I scanned the scrubby area and looked into the trees, wondering if Ben was anywhere near. I thought they’d told me they were going on a fact-finding mission.
Crap. They probably had done that.
This was the result.
“Jame, I’m going to touch your shoulder, then your head.” I stopped beside him, then crouched down. He hadn’t moved except for breathing.
The smell of mud and rain, motor oil and blood filled my nose.
I reached out and put my fingertips on his shoulder.
An angry werewolf had reflexes like lightning and could tear a person’s arm out of the socket with one swipe. Jame felt hot to the touch, his fur thinned so I could feel the flesh beneath. It was sticky with blood.
“You’re okay. It’s going to be okay.” I touched the back of his head and winced at the give of his skull. Something had hit him hard enough that it was probably only his werewolf healing ability that was keeping him alive.
“Don’t move, we got you.”
“Ambulance is on the way,” Ryder said. “Shouldn’t we be applying pressure to his wounds?”
“Nothing big enough I can see to cause all this blood,” I said.
We’d need to turn him over and make sure he wasn’t gushing out of a gut or chest wound.
“Help me roll him over.”
Ryder walked to the other side of Jame, who opened his eyes—gold and hot—and snarled at me.
“It’s Ryder. He knows. He’s safe. Trust me.”
Jame’s eyes clouded with pain and his mouth opened in a silent whine.
“This is gonna hurt. But we got you. Ready?” I glanced at Ryder.
It had started raining harder. Ryder was wet with it and I knew I was too even though I didn’t feel it.
“It’s me Jame,” Ryder said. “You took a hell of a hit buddy, but we got you.”
Ryder and I locked eyes, then moved Jame as easily as we could onto his back.
Jame whimpered, a soft almost child-like sound, and then went completely limp as he passed out.
“Holy fuck.” Ryder pulled his hands away from Jame and shifted on the balls of his feet. “What the hell is that?”
It was blood.
A lot of blood.
Written in scrolling symbols across his skin. His fur.
But it was not his blood.
There were no gushing wounds.
I had seen these symbols before.
On Sven.
Ichor techne.
“Get some pictures,” I told Ryder.
He paused.
“Before the rain washes it away. Photos. Of the symbols, his body, then the surrounding area.”