It would have felt good—it was her first shower in days—if she hadn’t had to worry about what came next. But the problem with washing up was she felt even more tired, like she could lie down in the tub and go to sleep. She guessed the doctor was right. She still needed time to recuperate.
Debbie decided to take a bath instead so she could soak and relax before her next attempt at escape. She began filling up the tub, hoping she wouldn’t drown in it if she fell asleep.
*
Allan picked the lock of Debbie’s bedroom door so he could make sure she was in the shower and hadn’t tried to take off again. This was really not good. Somehow, she must have figured something was wrong, despite acting as though everything was fine.
He heard her stop the shower, then start running water in the tub.
While he waited for her to actually get into the tub, he texted Paul: She’s acting like she knows nothing about us, but I think it’s a ruse. She left the house to get something out of her car when she was supposed to be taking a shower. She didn’t need to get anything out of her car. And of course, the car wasn’t there.
Allan glanced at the bedroom window and texted: She had to have slipped out the bedroom window. She’s taking a bath now. But I suspect I’ll have trouble with her.
Paul texted back: Let me know if you need backup. You’ve got the sedative that Doc gave you, don’t you?
Allan: Yeah, but I only want to use it as a last resort.
Paul: Gotcha.
Allan heard her turn off the water and step into the tub. He left the bedroom and closed the door. He couldn’t lock it. He wasn’t going to give her an explanation for that if she asked. He figured she knew to some extent what was going on.
He didn’t want to start making lunch if she was going to be a while soaking in the tub either. But when she didn’t leave the tub after a good twenty minutes, he knocked on the bedroom door. “Debbie? Are you all right in there?”
He was afraid she had slipped out the window and…
His heart pounding, he headed back through the duplex, and when he reached the front door, he opened it. Covered in an inch of snow, his hatchback was still there. He closed the front door and returned to the bedroom.
Worried about Debbie even more now, he knocked on the bathroom door. “Debbie? I’m coming in.”
He was afraid she’d accidentally drowned in the bathtub. He twisted the doorknob. It was locked. He used his lockpick on it and yanked open the door, afraid of what he might find.
He hadn’t expected to see a wolf shaking water from her fur coat and had no time to react before she lunged.
Chapter 15
Debbie had fallen asleep in the bubble bath only to wake to find she was a damned wolf! She couldn’t believe it. She hadn’t discovered any bite marks on her anywhere when she stripped out of her clothes. The oddest thing was that her scars had vanished. Yet it hadn’t really registered in her tired brain until she turned into a wolf.
How had they turned her? Maybe it was like with vampires, even if they weren’t real. But in some stories, the vampire could seal the wounds and then the bite marks were gone.
Now she was soaking wet and staring Allan down as he stood in her bathroom doorway. He had to have picked her lock!
She shook off the excess water, getting him all wet.
She was so angry, she wanted to rip Allan to shreds. He just stared at her in disbelief, as if he had never seen a wolf before. As if he wasn’t a part-time wolf himself. Maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he was a minion to a wolf pack, like Dracula had minions working for him.
Ohmigod, this was so unreal. She growled, and she couldn’t believe she’d made such an angry growly sound, right before she lunged at him.
She slammed her paws into Allan’s chest, but he quickly grabbed her head to keep her from biting him. He was strong and she thought she could yank free of him, but after her injury and surgery, she was way too weak. Her growls sounded menacing though, and she snapped her wickedly sharp teeth.
He held her head securely, despite the fact that she was shaking it, snarling fiercely, and trying to break free from his titan grip.
“Debbie, you were going to die if we didn’t save your life the only way we could. Your heart quit beating twice. We have faster healing properties. No one else would have been able to keep you alive like we could.”
She called him a liar, only the word was just a menacing growl. It didn’t matter that she looked like, felt like, and sounded like a wolf. The notion just didn’t register in her brain, and she’d expected to hear human words, not an animal growl.