Kitty Takes a Holiday

Chapter 5

I turned on the computer and wrote. Typing whatever came into my head, I wrote about the random shocks of life, the events that brought friends to your doorstep beg­ging for help, even when you felt that your own life had tumbled irrevocably out of control. You did what you had to do, somehow. You kept racing ahead and hoped for the best. I wrote about being at the end of my rope and made a list of the reasons I had to stay human. Chocolate, as always, was near the top of the list. I was in the kitchen eating chocolate chip cookies when Cormac woke up, after dark.

I was looking out the kitchen window, to where Deputy Ted's patrol car was parked at the end of the road, hidden in the trees. I spotted him when he turned on his dome light to eat a sandwich.

Cormac sat up, rubbed his face, then stretched, twist­ing his back, pulling his arms up. Something cracked. "What're you looking at?"

"Take a look," I said. "You'll like this."

He came to the kitchen area, and I moved aside to give him room to look out the window. The deputy still had his light on, making his car a glowing beacon among the trees.

Cormac made a derisive grunt. "They're not going to catch anyone if that's how they run a stakeout."

With the cop sitting there, nobody would come within a mile of my place to lay any sort of curse. Nobody smart, anyway. "At least I won't have rabbit guts all over my porch in the morning."

"You're a werewolf, I thought you'd like that sort of thing. Fresh meat, delivered right to your door. Maybe it's a secret admirer."

"I like picking out my own dead meat, thanks."

"I'll remember that."

He crossed his arms, leaned on the counter, and looked at me. I blinked back, trying to think of a clever response. Finally, I offered him the bag I was holding. "Cookie?"

He shook his head at it. "How's Ben?"

"Asleep. How are you?"

"Feeling stupid. I keep thinking of everything I should have done different."

"That's not like you. You're a head down, guns blaz­ing, full steam ahead kind of guy. Not one to dwell in the past."

"You don't know anything about me."

I shrugged, conceding the point. "So what's the story? You know all about my dark past. I don't know anything about yours."

"You're fishing," he said and smirked.

"Can't blame a girl for trying."

"Save it for your show."

Ouch. If only I were doing the show. It occurred to me to consider how big a favor I would have to do for Cormac before I could talk him into coining on the show for an interview, if taking in him and Ben in their hour of need didn't do it.

Cormac pulled himself from the counter. "You have a bathroom in this place?"

"In the bedroom."

He stalked off to find it. A minute later, the shower started up. At least he'd be clean.

I found my cell phone, dialed the number I wanted, and went outside. The air was cool, energizing. The inside of the house had become stifling. I sat on the porch and put my back against the wall.

A woman answered, "Hello?"

"Hi, Mom."

"Kitty! What a nice surprise. Is everything all right?"

"Why wouldn't it be?"

"Because you never call unless something's happened."

I sighed. She had a point. "I've had kind of a rough couple of days."

"Oh, I'm sorry. What's wrong?"

Between the extracurricular shape-shifting, animal sac­rifices on my front porch, my lawyer getting attacked by a werewolf, and a werewolf hunter camping out in my living room, I didn't know where to start. I didn't think I should start.

"A lot of stuff. It's complicated."

"I worry about you being out there all by yourself. Are you sure you don't want to come home for a little while? You've had such a busy year, I think it would be good for you to not have to worry about things like rent."

Strangely enough, rent was one of the few things I wasn't worried about. As much as going back to my parents' and having Mom take care of me for a little while sounded like a good idea, it wasn't an option. Not that Mom would have understood that.

"I'm actually not by myself at the moment," I said, trying to sound positive. "I have a couple of friends staying over."

"That should be fun."

If I would just break down and tell Mom the truth, be straight with her, these conversations would be much less surreal. I'd called her because I needed to hear a friendly voice; I didn't want to tell her all the gory details.

"Yeah, sure. So how are you? How are Dad and Cheryl?"

She relayed the doings of the family since her last call—more of the same, but at least somebody's world was normal—and finished by turning the questions back on me, "How is the writing going?"

"It's fine," I said brightly. If I sounded like everything was okay, maybe it would be, eventually. "I think I've got­ten over the writer's block."

"Will you be starting your show again soon? People ask me about it all the time."

I winced. "Maybe. I haven't really thought about it."

"We're so proud of you, Kitty. So many people only ever dream of doing what you've done. It's been so much fun watching your success."

She couldn't have twisted the knife any harder if she'd tried. I was such a success, and here I was flushing it down the toilet. But she really did sound proud, and happy. To think at one point I'd been worried that she'd be scandal­ized by what I was doing.

I took a deep breath and kept my voice steady. Wouldn't Jo any good to break down now. "Thanks, Mom. That means a lot."

"When are you finally coming to visit?"

"I'm not sure… you know, Mom, it's been great talk­ing to you, but I really need to get going."

"Oh, but you only just called—"

"I know, I'm really sorry. But I told you I have friends staying, right?"

"Then you'd better get back to it. It's good to hear from you."

"Say hi to Dad for me."

"I will. We love you."

"Love you, too."

I sat on the porch for a long time, the phone sitting in my lap. I was looking for someone to lean on. Cormac and Ben showed up with all this, and I wasn't sure I could handle it. Wolves were supposed to run in packs. I was supposed to have help for something like this. But I didn't have anyone. I went back inside, back to my milk and cookies.

From the bedroom, the shower shut off. Ten minutes or so later, Cormac, hair damp and slicked back, came into the front room. He'd shaved, leaving only his familiar, trademark mustache. He was cinching on his belt and gun holster.

"I'm going to help Rosco out there with his stakeout. Do a little hunting around on my own." The contempt in his voice was plain. He was restless; I hadn't really expected him to stay in bed for twelve hours.

"Be careful."

He gave me a funny look, brows raised. "Really?"

Exasperated, I sighed. "I wouldn't want him to shoot you because he thinks you're the bad guy."

"Who says I'm not?"

Wincing, I rubbed my forehead. "I'm too tired to argue with you about it."

"Get some sleep," he said. "Take the sofa."

"Where'll you sleep?"

"The floor, if I decide I need it. You looked after Ben all day, I'll keep an eye on him tonight. Take the sofa."

This cabin was not built for three people who weren't actually all sleeping together.

"Fine." I'd lost a lot of sleep over the last couple of days and was tired. Before I trudged over to the sofa, I faced Cormac. "If Ben wakes up, tell me, okay? He'll be con­fused, I'll need to talk to him."

"I'll wake you up. Don't worry."

"I can't stop worrying. Sorry."

"Go to sleep, Norville." He raised his hand, started to reach out—for a moment, he seemed about to touch me. I braced for it, my heartbeat speeding up—what was he doing? But he turned around and left the cabin before anything happened.

Slowly, I sat on the sofa, then wrapped myself in the blanket. The cushions were ancient, far too squishy to be comfortable. But it wasn't the floor, so I lay down.

This was a mistake, I thought as I fell asleep. Cormac and I staying in the same house—absolutely a mistake.

I woke up to find Cormac putting a log into the stove. I didn't feel cold. I probably would have let the fire burn out. Outside the window, the sky was pale. It was morning again already. He closed the door to the stove, then sat back on the rug and watched the flames through the tiny grill in front.

I hadn't moved, and he hadn't noticed that I was awake, watching him. Shadows still darkened his eyes, and his hair had dried ruffled. He'd taken off his jacket and boots—and the gun belt. He wore a black T-shirt and jeans. His arms were pale, muscular.

Suddenly he looked over and caught my gaze staring back.

I stilled the fluttering in my stomach and tried not to react. Just stay cool.

"Is 'Rosco' still out there?" I said.

"Yeah. He fell asleep around two a.m. I expect he'll wake up soon and get out of here."

"And no dead animal on my porch?"

"None."

I turned my face into the pillow and giggled, "If it weren't happening to me, this would be downright hilarious."

"I did find this." He held out his hand.

I looked at it first, then gingerly opened my hand to accept it. It was a cross made of barbed wire, a single strand twisted back on itself, about the length of my fin­ger. The steel was smooth, the barbs sharp. Not worn or rusted, which meant this hadn't been sitting outside for very long.

"You think this is from my sacrificial fan club?"

"Could be. If so, the question is Did they leave it on purpose, or did they just drop it? If it's on purpose, then it means something. It's supposed to do something."

"What?"

"I don't know."

I could almost feel malevolence seeping out of the thing. Or maybe the barbs just looked scary. "What am I supposed to do with it?"

"I recommend finding somebody with a forge and have them melt the thing into slag. Just in case."

He thought it was cursed, and he brought the thing into my house? I groaned with frustration. I wanted to throw it, but I set it on the floor instead.

"Why a cross?"

"There's a dozen magic systems that borrow from Christianity. This part of the country, it might be an evan­gelical sect, or maybe some kind of curandero."

"Curandero. Mexican folk healer, right?"

"They do all kinds of stuff. Sometimes, they go bad."

"You know a lot about this sort of thing."

"It helps, knowing as much as I can. The people who hire me—they're believers. They have to believe in were­wolves and magic to call me in the first place. The sym­bols may be different, the rituals are different, but they all have one thing in common: they believe in the unbeliev­able. You know what I'm talking about. You're one of them. One of the believers."

"I only believe because of what I am. I don't know anything about any of it."

"Hell, I don't know anything. This is just scratching the surface. There's a whole world of freaky shit out there."

He was being uncharacteristically chatty. I didn't know if it was stress or sleeplessness. Maybe something about sitting in a tiny cabin in front of a wood-burning stove on a cold morning made people personable.

"How did you find out about the freaky shit? I found out the morning after I was attacked—the whole pack stood there telling me, 'Welcome to the family, have fun.' But who told you?"

He smiled, but the expression was thin and cold. "I don't remember anyone telling me werewolves are real. I've always known. My family—we've been hunting lycan­thropes for over a hundred years. My dad taught me."

"How old were you when he died?"

He looked sharply at me. "Who told you he died?"

"Ben."

"Bastard," Cormac muttered.

"That was all he said," I said quickly. "I asked how you two met and if you'd always been so humorless, and he said you had a right to be humorless. I asked why and he told me."

He was staring at me, and I didn't like it. Among wolves, a stare was a challenge. The thought of a challenge from Cormac made the wolf inside me cringe in terror. I couldn't fight Cormac. I looked away, hugging the blanket tightly around me.

"You still talk too much, you know that?" Cormac said.

"I know."

Finally, he said, "I was sixteen. I moved in with Ben and his folks after my dad died. His mother was my dad's sister."

"Then Ben knew, too. He was part of the family history."

"Hard to say. I think Aunt Ellen was just as happy to leave it all behind. Jesus, what am I going to tell her?"

"Nothing," I said wryly. "At least not until the full moon falls on Christmas and Ben has to explain why he's not coming home for the holidays."

"Spoken with the voice of experience."

"Yup. If Ben wasn't in on the werewolf hunting from the start, how did you drag him into it?"

"I didn't drag him—"

"Okay, how did you get him started in it?"

"Why do you want to know all this stuff about me?"

"You're interesting."

Cormac didn't say anything to that, just went back to staring at me with a little too much focus.

I said, "Could you not look at me like that? It's making me nervous."

"But you're interesting."

Oh, my. That clenching feeling in my gut wasn't fear—not this time.

I'd kissed Cormac once. It had been another situation like this. We were sitting and talking, and I let the urge overcome my better judgment. And he kissed back, for about a second, before he marched out of the room, call­ing me a monster.

Too many incidents like that could give a girl a complex.

He wasn't running away this time.

I swung my legs over the edge of the couch and slipped to the floor. I ended up kneeling in front of him, where he was sitting, close enough to grab. And he still didn't run. In fact, he didn't move at all, like he was waiting for me to come to him. How did wolves do this? Weren't the boys supposed to chase the girls? He wasn't a wolf, though. He wouldn't understand the signals.

Wolf was uncurling, overcoming her anxiety. Yeah, he was scary. Yeah, he was tough. That meant he could protect us. That was enough for her. That, and he smelled like he wanted me. He radiated warmth, and had a tang of sweat that wasn't even visible. A tension held him still as stone. All I had to do was touch him and break him out of his immobility. I raised my hand.

"I—I can smell you." The voice was low and painfully hoarse.

I must have jumped a foot. My heart raced like a jack­hammer and I got ready to run.

Ben stood in the doorway to the bedroom, leaning against the wall. Still shirtless, his skin was pale, damp with sweat, and his hair was tangled. He only half opened his eyes, and he winced with what looked like confusion, like he didn't know where he was.

"I can smell everything," he said, sounding like he had bronchitis. He touched his forehead; his hand was shaking.

"Ben." I rushed to him, intending to take his arm and steer him back to bed. He wasn't well, he shouldn't have been up.

As soon as I touched him, though, he flinched back. He crashed against the wall, his face stiff with terror. "No, you smell—you smell wrong—"

His new instincts identified me as another werewolf—a potential threat.

I turned to call Cormac, but he was already beside Ben, holding his arm, trying to keep him still.

"No, Ben. I'm safe. It's all right. Take a deep breath. Everything's okay." I tried to hold his face still, to make him smell me, to make him recognize that scent as friendly, but he lurched away. He would have fallen if Cormac hadn't been holding him.

I put myself next to him again, intending to help drag him to the bed. This time, Ben leaned closer to me, squint­ing as if trying to focus. His eyesight was changing, too.

"Kitty?"

"Yeah, it's me," I said, relieved that he'd recognized me.

He slumped against me, resting his head on my shoul­der, like he wanted to hug me. He found my hand and squeezed it tightly. "I don't remember what happened. I don't remember any of it," he murmured into my shirt.

Except that he remembered that something had hap­pened, and that he should have remembered. A lot of his agitation was probably stress—the anxiety that came from blocking out the trauma.

I held him still for a moment, whispering nonsense comforts at his ear until he stopped shaking. Cormac, look­ing stiff and awkward, was still propping him upright.

"Come on, Ben. Back to bed." He nodded, and I pulled his arm over my shoulder. Between us, Cormac and I walked him back to the bed. He sank onto it and fell back to sleep almost immediately. He kept hold of my hand. I waited until I was sure he was asleep, his breathing deep and regular, before I coaxed back his fingers and extricated myself from his grip.

Cormac stood at the end of the bed, ran his hands through his hair, and blew out a frustrated sigh. "Is this normal?'

I smoothed back the damp hair from Ben's face. "I don't know, I only know what I went through. I slept through the whole thing. At least, I only remember sleeping through the whole thing. I was hurt a lot worse than he is, though." I'd had my hip mauled and half my leg flayed. Not that I had any scars to prove it.

"Don't lie to me. Is he going to be okay?"

He kept asking me that. "What do I look like, some; kind of fortune-teller? I don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know?"

I glared at him, and part of the Wolf stared out of my eyes. I made the challenge and I didn't care if he could read it or not. "His body will be fine. Physically, he's heal­ing. Mentally—that's up to him. We won't know until he wakes up if this is going to drive him crazy or not."

Cormac scrubbed a hand down his face and started pacing. Tension quivered along his whole body; sheer willpower was keeping him from breaking something.

"Ben's tough," he said finally. "This won't drive him crazy. He'll be okay. He'll be fine." He said the words like they were a mantra. Like if he said them enough they'd have to be true.

My glare melted into a look of pity. I wished I could find the right thing to say to calm him down. To convince him that yes, he'd done all he could. Cormac had never been weak. He'd never been this helpless, I'd bet. I won­dered if I'd have to worry about him going crazy, too.

Crazier than he already was.

Cormac left the room, and a moment later I heard the front door open and slam shut. I didn't run after him—I didn't dare leave Ben alone. I listened for the Jeep starting up, but it didn't. Cormac wasn't abandoning me to this mess. Maybe he just needed to take a walk.

I brought the laptop into the bedroom, pulled a chair next to the bed, kept watch over Ben, and wrote.

I wouldn't have wished lycanthropy on anyone, much less a friend. Life was hard enough without having some­thing like this to deal with. I'd seen the whole range of how people handled it. In some people, the strength and near-invulnerability went to their heads. They became bullies, reveling in the violence they were capable of. People who were already close to psychosis tumbled over the edge. One more mental handicap to deal with was too much. Some people became passive, letting it swallow them. And some people adapted. They made adjustments, and they stayed themselves.

I regretted that I didn't know enough about Ben to guess which way he'd go.

My cell phone rang, and I fielded the call from Sheriff Marks.

"The deputy I had on the stakeout didn't see any sign of your perpetrator," he informed me.

"You know he had the interior light on in his car half the time he was out here?" I replied.

Marks was silent for a long time, and picturing the look on his face made me grin. "I'll have a talk with him," he said finally. "I'll try to have someone out there tonight, too. You let me know if you see anything."

"Absolutely, Sheriff," I said.

Hours passed, dusk fell, and Cormac still hadn't returned. I decided not to worry. He was a big boy, he could take care of himself. I certainly wasn't capable of babysitting both him and Ben.

Ben hadn't stirred since the last time he passed out. I had no idea how long he had to stay like this before I had to start worrying. When I did start worrying, who was I supposed to call for help? The werewolf pack that had kicked me out of Denver? The Center for the Study of Paranatural Biol­ogy, the government research office that was undergoing reorganization after its former director disappeared—not that I knew anything about that.

I stared at the laptop screen for so long I started to doze off. The words blurred, and even though the straight-backed kitchen chair I sat in wasn't particularly comfortable, I managed to curl up and let my head nod forward.

That was when Ben spoke. "Hi."

He didn't sound delirious or desperate. A little hoarse still, but it was the scratchy voice of someone getting over a cold. He lay on the bed and looked at me. One of his arms rested over the blanket that covered him, his fingers gripping the edge.

I slid out of the chair, set the laptop aside, and moved to the edge of the bed.

"Hey," I said. "How do you feel?"

"Like crap."

I smiled a little. "You should. You've had a crappy week."

He chuckled, then coughed. I almost jumped up and down and started dancing. It was Ben. Ben was back, he hadn't gone crazy.

"You seem awfully happy about my crappy week."

"I'm happy to see you awake. You've been out of it."

"Yeah." He looked away, studying the walls, the ceiling, the blanket covering him. Looking everywhere but at me.

"How much do you remember?" I asked.

He shook his head, meaning that he either didn't remem­ber anything or he wasn't going to tell me. I watched him, feeling anxious and motherly, wanting simultaneously to luck the blankets in tighter, pat his head, bring him a glass of water, and feed him. I wanted him to relax. I wanted to make everything better, and I didn't have the faintest idea how to do that. So I hovered, perched next to him, on the verge of wringing my hands.

Then he said, his voice flat, "Why did Cormac bring me here?"

"He thought I could help."

"Why didn't he just shoot me?"

As far as I knew, Cormac's guns were still under the bed. This bed. Ben didn't have to know that. What if Cormac was wrong, what if Ben did have the guts to shoot himself? What would I have to do to stop him? I couldn't let Ben die. I wouldn't let him—or Cormac—give up.

I spoke quietly, stiff with frustration. "You'll have to ask him."

"Where is he?"

"I don't know. He went out."

His gaze focused on me again, finally. A glimmer of the old Ben showed through. "How long have I been out of it?"

"A couple of days."

"And you two have been stuck here together the whole time?" His face pursed with thoughtfulness. "How's that working out?"

"He hasn't killed me yet."

"He's not going to kill you, Kitty. On the contrary, I think he'd rather—"

I stood suddenly. "Are you hungry? Of course you're hungry, you haven't eaten in two days."

Footsteps pounded up the porch then. Ben looked over to the next room at the same time I did, and his hand clenched on the blanket. Slowly, I went to the front room.

The door slammed open, and Cormac stood there. He carried a rifle.

"You have a freezer, right?" he said.

"Huh?" I blinked, trying to put his question into con­text. I failed. "Yeah. Why?"

He pointed his thumb over his shoulder to the outside. I went to the door and looked out. There, in the middle of the clearing in front of the cabin, lay a dead deer. Just flopped there, legs stiff and neck arced back. No antlers. I couldn't see blood, but I could smell it. Still cooling. Freshly killed. My stomach rumbled, and I fiercely ignored it.

"It's a deer," I said stupidly.

"I still have to dress it and put the meat up. Is there room in the freezer?"

"You killed it?"

He gave me a frustrated glare. "Yeah."

"Is it even hunting season?"

"Do you think I care?"

"You shot a deer and just… dragged it here? Carried it? Why?"

"I had to shoot something."

I stared at him. That sounded like me. Rather it sounded like me once a month, on the night of the full moon. "You had to shoot something."

"Yeah." He said the word as a challenge.

So which of us was the monster? At least I had an excuse for my bloodlust.

"Ben's awake," I said. "Awake and lucid, I mean."

In fact, Ben was standing in the doorway, holding a blanket wrapped around his shoulders. His hair was ruffled, stubble covered his jawline, and he appeared wrung-out, but he didn't seem likely to topple over. He and Cormac looked at each other for a moment, and the tension in the room spiked. I couldn't read what passed between them. I had an urge to get out of there. I imag­ined calling in to my own radio show: Yeah hi, I'm a were­wolf, and I'm stuck in a cabin in the woods with another werewolf and a werewolf hunter…

"Hey," Cormac said finally. "How are you feeling?"

"I don't know," Ben said. "What's the gun for?"

"Went hunting."

"Any luck?"

"Yeah."

My voice came out bright with false cheerfulness. "Maybe you could cut us up a couple of steaks right now and we could have some dinner."

"That's the plan. If you can stoop to eating meat that someone else picked out," he said. "Oh, and I found another one of these." He tossed something at me.

Startled, I reached for it—then thought better of it and stepped out of the way. Good thing, too, because a piece of barbed wire clattered on the floor. It was bent into the shape of a cross, like the other, which was still lying on the floor by the stove. I kicked the new one in that direction.

Ben moved toward the front door, stepping slowly like he was learning to walk again.

Cormac could change his mind, I thought absently. He gripped the rifle, all he had to do was raise it and fire, and he could kill Ben. Ben didn't seem to notice this, or didn't think it was a danger. Or just didn't care. All his atten­tion was on the front door, on the outside. Cormac let him pass, and Ben went out to the porch.

I went after him.

He stared at the deer. Just stared, clutching the blanket around him and shivering like he was cold, though I didn't think the chill in the air was that sharp.

"I can smell it," he said. "All the way in the bedroom, I could smell it. It smells good. It shouldn't, but it does."

Fresh blood spilled on the ground, hot and rich, seeping out of cooling meat and crunchy, marrow-filled bones—I knew exactly what he was talking about. My mouth would be watering, if I wasn't so nervous.

"It's because you're hungry," I said softly. "I could eat it right now, couldn't I? If I wanted, I could eat it raw, skin and all—"

"Come inside, Ben. Please. Cormac'll take care of it." Ben stood so tautly, his whole body rigid, I was afraid that if I touched him he'd snap at me, and I didn't know if his snapping would be figurative or literal. Something ani­mal was waking in him; it lurked just under the surface. Very gently, I touched his arm. "Come on." Finally, he looked away from the deer. He turned, and let me guide him inside.

Hours later, Cormac stacked cuts of wrapped venison in the freezer, while I pulled steaks out of the broiler. Turned out everyone here liked them rare. Go figure.

Cormac came in from cleaning up outside and went to the kitchen sink to wash his hands. "Tomorrow I'll find someone to take care of the hide. The rest of it I buried—"

"I don't want to know what you did with the rest of it," I said, giving him a "stop" gesture while I took plates out of the cupboard.

"Come on, it's not like you haven't seen any of it before. In fact, you might have offered some help."

"I don't know anything about dressing a deer for real. I usually just rip into it with my teeth."

Ben sat at the kitchen table, staring blankly at the table­top. Cormac had given him a change of clothes, but he still wrapped himself with the blanket. I tried not to be worried. He needed time to adjust. That was all. Not having him take part in the banter was weird, though.

The table, an antique made of varnished wood with a couple of matching straight-backed chairs, was small, barely big enough for two people, totally inadequate for three. After I arranged the steaks on plates, Cormac picked up his and stayed put, eating while standing by the counter. I brought the other two plates to the table. I set one, along with a set of utensils, in front of Ben. His gaze shifted, startled out of whatever reverie he'd been in, and tracked the food.

Determined not to hover, I sat down with my own meal. I couldn't help it, though; I watched him closely.

Meat looks different to a werewolf. I didn't used to be much of a meat eater at all. I used to be the kind of per­son who went to a steakhouse and ordered a salad. But after I was attacked, and I woke up and had a look at my first steak, so rare that it was bleeding all the way through—I could have swallowed the thing whole. I'd wanted to, and the thought had made me ill. It had been so strange, being hungry and nauseous at the same time. I'd almost burst into tears, because I'd realized that I was different, right through to the bones, and that my life would never be the same.

What would Ben do?

After a moment, he picked up the fork and knife and calmly sliced into the meat, and calmly put the bite into his mouth, and calmly chewed and swallowed. Like noth­ing was wrong.

We might have been having a calm, normal meal. Three normal people eating their normal food—except for the spine-freezing tension that made the silence painful. The scraping of knives on plates made my nerves twinge.

Ben had eaten half his steak when he stopped, resting the fork and knife at the edge of the plate. He remained staring down when he asked, "How long?"

"How long until what?" I said, being willfully stupid. I knew exactly what he was talking about.

He spoke in almost a whisper. "How long until the full moon?"

"Four days," I said, equally subdued.

"Not long."

"No."

"I can't do it," he said, without any emotion. Just an observation of fact.

He was making this hard. I didn't know what else I expected. He'd acquired a chronic disease, not won the lottery. Ben wasn't a stranger to the supernatural. He was coming into this with his eyes wide open. He'd seen a werewolf shape-shift—on video, at least. He knew exactly what would happen to him when the full moon rose.

"Everyone says that," I said, frustration creeping into my voice. "But you can. If I can do it, you can do it."

"Cormac?" Ben said, looking at his cousin.

"No," the hunter said. "I didn't do it then and I won't do it now. Norville's right, that isn't the way."

Ben stared at him a moment, then said, "I swear to God, I never thought I'd hear you say anything like that." Cormac looked away, but Ben continued. "Your father would have done it in a heartbeat. Hell, what if he'd survived? You know he'd have shot himself."

My mind tripped over that one entirely. My mouth, as usual, picked up where intelligent thought failed. "Whoa, wait a minute. Hold on a minute. Cormac—your father. Your father was killed by a werewolf? Is that what he's saying?"

We embarked on a three-way staring contest: Cormac glared at Ben, Ben glared back, and I glared back and forth between them. Nobody said anything until Cormac spoke, his voice cool as granite.

"You know where my guns are. You want it done, do it yourself."

He walked out of the kitchen, to the front door, then out into the night, slamming the door behind him.

Ben stared after him. I was about ready to scream, because he still wasn't saying anything.

"Ben?"

He started eating again, methodically cutting, chewing, swallowing, watching his plate the whole time.

I, on the other hand, had lost my appetite. I pushed my plate away and comforted myself with the knowledge that if Ben was eating, he probably wouldn't kill himself. At least not right this minute.

After supper, Ben went back to bed and passed out again. Still sick, still needing time to mend. Or maybe he was avoiding the situation. I didn't press the issue. In the con­tinued absence of Cormac, I took the sofa. Dealing with Ben had exhausted me. I needed to get some sleep. Or maybe I was just avoiding the situation.

I fervently hoped Cormac wasn't out shooting another deer. My freezer couldn't handle it.

I dreamed of blood.

I stood in a clearing, on a rocky hill in the middle of the forest. I recognized the place; it was near the cabin. When I turned my face up, blood rained from the sky. It poured onto my face, ran across my cheeks, down my neck, matting my fur. I was covered in fur, but I couldn't tell if I was wolf or human. Both, neither. The forest smelled like slaughter. Red crosses marked the trunks of the trees closest to me. Painted in blood. Then the screaming started, like the trees themselves were crying at me: Get out, get out, get out. Leave. Run. But they hemmed me in, the trees moved to stop me, ringing me, blocking my way. I tried to scream back at them, but my voice died, and still the blood rained, and my heart raced.

It only lasted a second. At least, it only felt like a sec­ond. It felt like I had just closed my eyes when I woke up. But early sunlight filled the room. It was morning, and Cormac was kneeling by the sofa.

"Norville?"

Quickly I sat up. I looked around for danger—for blood seeping from the walls. I expected to hear scream­ing. My heart beat fast. But Cormac seemed calm. I didn't see anything unusual.

"How long have you been there?" I said, a bit breath­lessly.

"I just got here. I found something, I think you should come take a look."

I nodded, pushed back the blankets, and followed him, after pulling on a coat and sneakers.

The air outside was freezing. I wasn't sure it was just the temperature. After that dream, I expected to find another gutted rabbit on the porch. I expected to see crosses on every tree. I hugged myself and trudged over the forest earth.

Cormac stopped about fifty paces out from the cabin. He pointed down, and it took me a minute to find what he wanted me to see: another barbed-wire cross, sunk in the dirt as if someone had dropped it there.

"And over here," Cormac said, and led me ten paces farther, along a track that paralleled the cabin.

Another cross lay on the ground here. Without prompt­ing from him, I continued on, and after a moment of searching, I found the next one on my own.

I looked back at Cormac in something of a panic.

He said, "There's a circle of them all the way around the house."

The barbed wire had become more than a symbol. The talismans literally fenced me in. They created a barrier of fear.

"Who would do this?" I said. "Why—why would some­one do this?"

"I don't know. Do you smell anything?" he asked.

I shook my head. I didn't smell anything unusual, at least. "That's weird, I ought to be able to smell some trace of whoever left these. But it's like the crosses just appeared out of thin air. Is that possible?"

"If these things are more than just a scare tactic, then I suppose anything's possible. I kept watch all night I should have seen something."

"Were these here before last night?"

"I didn't see any."

I kicked the dirt, stubbing my toe on the ground. I let out a short growl at the pain. "This is driving me crazy," I muttered.

"That's probably the idea," Cormac said.

"Huh. As if I'm not perfectly capable of driving myself crazy."

"Is that what you've been doing stuck out here in the woods? Driving yourself crazy?"

It kind of looked that way. I didn't have to admit that, though. I started picking up the crosses, searching for the next one around the circle, intending to find every single one.

"Kitty—" His tone made him sound reprimanding, like he was about to burst forth with some great wisdom. We both knew it: picking up all the crosses was probably futile. Until we learned who was leaving these things, there'd always be more.

"You should look in on Ben," I said. "After his talk last night, he shouldn't be left alone. Or you could get some sleep. Or something."

He actually took the hint. After a moment's pause, he ambled back to the cabin.

When I finished, I had sixteen barbed-wire crosses pock­eted in the corner of my coat. Eighteen when I added them to the two Cormac had brought into the house. I found a plastic grocery bag, put them all in, tied the bag closed, and left it out on the porch. I didn't want those things inside. Cormac's idea of melting them to slag sounded wise.

Inside, Cormac and Ben were sitting opposite each other at the kitchen table, dead quiet. Cormac looked at Ben, and Ben didn't look at anything in particular. I started fixing breakfast, pretending like nothing was wrong, try­ing not to throw glances at them over my shoulder. It felt like I had interrupted an argument.

"Eggs, anyone? Cereal? I think I've got some sausage that isn't too out-of-date. Frozen venison?" Silence. My own appetite wasn't what it should have been. I settled for a glass of orange juice. Finally, leaning back against the counter, I asked, "Who died?"

Then I wished I hadn't. Ben looked sharply at me, and Cormac crossed his arms with a frustrated sigh. I couldn't read the series of body language. Maybe if I could get them talking, then close my eyes and pretend I was doing the show, I could figure out what was wrong.

"No, really," I said, my voice flat. "Who died?"

Ben stood up. "I'm taking a shower." He stalked back to the bedroom.

That left me with Cormac, who wouldn't look at me. I said, "You going to tell me what I missed, or are we all going to go around not talking to each other for the rest of the day?"

"I'm inclined to say that it's none of your business."

"Yeah, that's why you brought Ben here in the first place, because it's none of my business. Real cute. What's wrong?"

"Ben and I worked it out."

"Worked what out?"

"A compromise."

I wanted to growl. "Will you just tell me why he won't talk to me and you won't look at me?"

Taking that as a challenge, he looked right at me. If I hadn't been against the counter I would have backed up a step, so much anger and frustration burned out of his gaze.

He said, "After the full moon, if he still wants me to do it, I'll do it."

I had to take a moment to parse that, to understand what it meant. And I did. I still had to spell it out. "You'll shoot him. Just like that. The only person in the world you trust, and you'll kill him."

"If he wants me to."

"That isn't fair. That isn't enough time for him to adjust to what's happened to him. He won't be any happier after the full moon than he is now."

"And how long did it take you to become the stable, well-adjusted werewolf you are today?" His tone dripped with sarcasm.

I crossed my arms and pouted. "Very funny."

"It's what we decided."

"Well, you're both a couple of macho dickheads!"

He stood. "Is it still okay if I sleep on the sofa?"

"I ought to make you sleep on the porch!"

He ignored me, just like I expected, and went to the sofa, wrenched off his boots, lay down, and pulled the blanket over his head.

So much for that.

I went to the desk and fired up the laptop. I started a new page and wrote a title at the top: "Ten Ways to Defeat Macho Dickheadism." Then I realized that most of the world's problems stemmed from macho dickheadism, and if I could defeat that I could save the world. It made for a pretty good rant, since Cormac and Ben were both refusing to get yelled at in person.

Ben came out of the bathroom an hour later, slightly damp and wearing jeans and a gray T-shirt that he must have borrowed from Cormac. It gave him this James Dean look. Or that might have been the only partially suppressed snarl he wore. I expected him to say something about me actually sitting at my desk and working. The old Ben would have said something snide and encouraging at the same time.

This new Ben just looked at me, then sank heavily into the kitchen chair.

I watched him. "Did you have breakfast while you and Cormac planned your suicide, or should I fix something?"

His voice was low. "I expected you of all people to have some sympathy."

"No way. I'm a sentimentalist, remember? You're the bitter, cynical one. I just can't believe you'd go down without a fight."

"I've already lost."

I moved to the kitchen table and sat across from him, where Cormac had been. I stared him down. He fidgeted, nervous, and looked away. Ah-ha, wolfish instincts were kicking in. He didn't try to challenge me back. Good.

"This is what I see: I have three days, plus a full moon night, to convince you that life as a werewolf is better than no life at all."

"Kitty, this isn't about you. It isn't any of your business."

"Tell that to Cormac. He's the one who dumped you in my lap."

"I told him off about that already."

"You really think he made a mistake, bringing you here?"

He pursed his lips. "I do. He should have taken care of this back at Shiprock."

Ben had always been there for me. Now, when it was time for him to accept help, he was throwing it back in my face. Well, screw that.

"You know what, Ben? You're wrong. This is my busi­ness. You know why?" He gave the ceiling a long-suffering stare. That was okay, the question was rhetorical anyway. "Because I'm adopting you. You're part of my pack, now. That means you're under my protection and I refuse to let you go off and kill yourself."

He blinked at me. "What are you talking about?"

"Wolves run in packs. You're in my pack. And I'm the alpha female. That means you do what I say."

"Or what?"

"Or… or I'll get really pissed off at you."

He seemed to consider for a moment. In a mental panic, I wondered whether I could take him in a fight, if I had to back up my oh-so-brave words. He wasn't yet used to the strength he gained as a werewolf. He was still sick, still finding his feet. I had experience with this sort of thing. The thing was, I didn't want to have to assert my position by fighting him. I wanted to be able to just talk him into it.

Finally, he said, "Why do I have this urge to take you seriously?"

"Because the wolf inside you knows what's best. Trust me, Ben. Please."

"I thought you didn't have a pack."

I smiled. "I do now."