Sisters Of The Craft: Heat Of The Moment Part 15

"I ... uh ... put on..." I indicated my scrubs. "Lay down and the next thing I knew someone was smas.h.i.+ng a pillow on my face."

"That pillow?" She pointed.

I nodded.

"Why did he stop?"

"I-" Should I mention the wolf or shouldn't I? Probably had to.

"There's this wolf..." I began. "She ... uh ... likes me."

"A wolf likes you," the chief repeated. "Why?"

That I didn't know. "She just does. She hangs around. Follows me when I run. Stuff like that."

"And you're telling me this why?"

"She scared the guy away."

Her eyes widened. "A wolf came in the apartment?"

"The door was open."

Deb blinked. "You're sure?"

"That the door was open? Yeah. How else would she have gotten in?" I wiggled my fingers. "She doesn't have thumbs for the doork.n.o.b."

Which got me thinking-for Pru to have gotten in someone had to have left the door open and it hadn't been me. The intruder?

Or Henry.

"Very funny." Deb set her hands on her hips. "Is this wolf black, with weird eyes?"

"You saw her?"

"Not me personally. But we've had reports."

And here I'd thought I was the only one who'd seen her. I guess that was because I'd thought I was the only one who could see her.

"Her eyes?" Deb pressed.

"They're green."

"Which is weird, right? Most wolves have brown eyes."

"Most," I agreed. "Some might be a lighter shade, yellowish or hazel, which could appear green in certain light."

But none would ever be the green-green of Pru's eyes. Even hybrids-part dog, part wolf-would be more likely to have blue eyes than green. Pru being a hybrid would explain why she felt comfortable hanging around town, walking into apartments. It did not explain why I could suddenly hear her now when I hadn't before. But that was more my weirdness than Pru's.

I made a soft sound of amus.e.m.e.nt. The chief glanced at me, but I shook my head. I wasn't going to tell her the wolf's name was Pru. That would just add more weird to the weird, and how was I going to explain how I knew her name? I couldn't. Wouldn't. Definitely shouldn't.

"I need to send a report to the Department of Natural Resources," she said.

"What? Why?"

Deb jumped. I guess I had shouted.

"It's what we do when wild animals misbehave."

"She hasn't misbehaved. She saved my life."

"By walking into an apartment. Wolves don't do that. They also don't hang around towns or follow people when they're jogging. You know that."

I did.

"She seemed harmless." At least to me. She hadn't been harmless for the intruder.

"I doubt she's harmless. She's also the only wolf that's been seen, which makes her a lone wolf and they're unpredictable at best."

Pru was definitely unpredictable. Still ...

"What will the DNR do?"

"Send a wolf expert."

"What will he do?"

"Decide if she needs to be relocated or shot."

"I don't think you should call them."

"Thanks for the advice."

"Sarcasm?"

"You think?" I narrowed my eyes, but Deb moved on. "How did the wolf stop the masked intruder from smothering you?"

"Yanked him away by his s.h.i.+rt. Once the pillow was off my face, and I could breathe, I was a little harder to kill and he ran."

I'd left out how the guy had flown through the air and smacked against the wall. I was funny that way.

"If you had a pillow over your face you couldn't see exactly what happened," Deb pointed out.

"No. But I can add. The guy stopped. The wolf had a piece of his s.h.i.+rt in her mouth." I searched for it amid the debris. "There." I pointed to the bit of brown material peeking out from beneath the leg of what was left of my end table.

"Anything else?"

"He dropped his ring." I s.h.i.+fted my pointer finger to where it still lay on the floor.

Deb walked over, bent, squinted. "What is that on the face?"

"I think it's a snarling wolf."

"Weird, considering."

"Mmm," I agreed. What wasn't?

She straightened. "How did that happen?"

For a minute I thought she could tell that the ring hadn't actually fallen where it now rested. But that didn't mean she knew it had gotten there thanks to the powers of Henry, the telekinetic ghost.

I was losing my mind.

"I mean, how could his ring fall off if he was wearing gloves?"

"You think I lied about his wearing gloves?"

Her eyebrows flew up. "Did you?"

"Why would I?"

"Why would you lie about anything?" she asked. "Don't you want this guy caught before he tries it again?"

"Again?" I echoed.

"You're not dead. As he apparently wanted you that way badly enough to try it in broad daylight in the middle of town, he seems pretty motivated."

"He didn't just try to rob me, see me here, and-"

"Decide to kill you? No."

"How can you be so certain?"

"Thieves and murderers are two different types of criminals. If a thief had been inside when you got here, he would have run out instead of engaging you, especially since you were asleep. If he came in after you got here, he would have left as soon as he saw you."

She indicated the sight line from the door; my bed lay dead ahead. He couldn't have missed me. Still ...

"You don't know that."

"You're right. I don't. So, what did you lie about?"

"Nothing." Everything I'd said was the truth. It was what I hadn't said that was the problem.

A chill wind seemed to ruffle my hair. I should probably shut the door, but I'd just have to open it again when Ross arrived. I hugged myself.

Chief Deb's gaze fell, narrowed. I glanced down. My fingernails were b.l.o.o.d.y.

"I scratched him!" I held out my hands as if admiring my new manicure. "You'll be able to find him now."

She reached into her pocket. "Maybe."

"You can check people's forearms."

"Because a guy who attempted murder is going to hang around in the cafe wearing a T-s.h.i.+rt and no coat? I can't just go up to people and demand they bare their forearms for my examination."

"You can't?"

She shook her head. Then she pulled two evidence bags from her pocket. "Hold 'em out."

I did, and she put the bags over my hands then secured them at my wrists with rubber bands. "What I can do is have Ross sc.r.a.pe your fingernails for DNA, and if this nut is in the system..." She clapped her hands together so loudly I started, and my plastic bags rattled. "We got 'im."

"What system?"

"The Combined DNA Index System, CODEX for short."

"FBI?"

"What was your first clue?"

"The acronym?"

Her lips twitched. "It's a federal thing."

My surprise that she knew what an acronym was must have shown on my face.

"I'm good with letters," she said. "R-E-B-O-U-N-D!"

Now my lips twitched. "I'm sure you're good with more than that."

The amus.e.m.e.nt in her iris-blue eyes faded. "Is that a 'cheerleaders are s.l.u.ts' dig?"

"I didn't mean it to be."

I hadn't known that was a thing. Cheerleaders were pretty far out of my social circle in high school. I hadn't cared; I'd had Owen. I'd gone to a college with over forty thousand students. Add over twenty thousand in faculty and staff, and that was one huge campus. Cheerleaders? I'd seen a few, but I certainly didn't know them.

"I meant that I doubt you'd be the police chief just because you can spell to a beat."

"Oh. Thanks."

I suppose someone like Deb had a tough time being taken seriously as a cop. That she was the police chief at all said she wasn't as blond as she looked.

Silence descended. I tried to figure out how to suggest she send the ring to the FBI without sounding like I was telling her her business, or insinuating she was stupid.

Or explaining that the wolf had told me to.

"That ring-" I began.

"I should probably show that to the feds too."