She tipped her chin up, a sort of decisive half-nod.
"I saw dogs fighting. That's all I saw. But for God's sake, call me next time."
She walked away.
Cormac had my clothes in the passenger seat of his Jeep. I put them on, but still kept the blanket around me. I was cold.
He stopped the Jeep in front of my apartment building and shut off the engine. I had to work up to moving, taking a deep breath because I knew how much it was going to hurt.
When I gripped the handle of the door, Cormac said, "You need me to come in with you?"
The question was laden with meaning and unspoken assumptions. We weren't exactly a couple on a first date, testing the waters to see if the evening was going to go on a little longer, him wondering if I would invite him, me wondering if I should. But there was a little of that. Maybe he wanted a second chance. Maybe I wanted him to have a second chance. I had to decide how hurt I was—but if I was hurt enough to need help, I was probably too hurt to give him that second chance. Maybe he was just trying to be nice. But why would he be trying to be nice if he didn't want a second chance?
Or most likely I was reading too much into it. My head hurt, and I needed a shower. And sleep. Which meant no second chance.
But he had stopped the engine, like he really wanted to come inside.
"I'll be okay." I opened the door and eased myself to the sidewalk. I left the blanket on the seat. "Thanks. Thanks for everything. I think I probably owe you a couple now."
He shrugged. "You saved me a bullet."
I looked down, hiding a smirk. "You're not angry at me for stealing your kill?"
"Just like a wolf to think that way when there's plenty to go around." He started the Jeep. The engine roared, then settled into its rhythm. "Watch your back."
"Yeah. You, too." I shut the door.
He drove away.
I spent the walk to the building still wondering if I should have asked Cormac to come with me. He had guns and wasn't injured. There was the spot where T.J. killed Zan. What else was waiting in the shadows to attack me? Not the rogue wolf. Not anymore.
I'd killed the rogue. All by myself, I'd killed him. That should have made me feel strong, like I could walk down any dark street without fear, like I'd never have to be afraid again. Wolf could stand tall, her tail straight, unafraid.
But all I felt was tired. Tired, sad, sick. Even the Wolf was quiet. Even she'd had enough.
Behind every shrub and corner was a monster waiting to challenge me. The hair on my arms and neck tingled. I kept looking over my shoulder.
James had said she could give him a pack. She had made him, and she wanted him to kill the alpha.
Meg. Had to be. I didn't know what to think. What had she been thinking, taking this guy under her wing? Had she really wanted him as head of the pack? He must have looked tough, tough enough to take on Carl. But James wouldn't have lasted. He didn't have the mind to lead—he'd groveled to me, after all. The pack would have torn him to shreds. Meg must have realized this, changed her mind, and left him hanging.
It was too much. I should have expected it. It still hurt. At the same time, the path before me seemed clearer.
She was still out there. Who would she send after me next? Or would she come herself? I might have killed James, but I wasn't in any condition to fight like that again tonight.
Maybe she was waiting in my apartment. I crept up the stairs, slinking close to the wall. My head throbbed, I was concentrating so hard on listening. The building was quiet. I took quick breaths, testing the air, hunting for a scent of danger. If a werewolf had been through here recently, I should have been able to smell it. If someone had carried a gun by here, I might have caught a trace of oil and steel.
Nothing but the old apartment smells of sweat and aged drywall.
I got to my apartment door. Still locked. By some miracle, the key was still in my jeans pocket. I tried to slide it in the lock and turn it without making a sound. No luck. The scrape of metal rattled my brain. I listened for noises within the apartment, wondering if someone had gotten inside somehow and was waiting for me. Still nothing.
My heart was pounding in my throat when I opened the door.
The place was empty.
I searched everywhere, even in cupboards too small for a rat to hide in. But I looked anyway. I locked the door behind me and pulled the shade over the window. Then I sat on the floor and covered my face, holding back hysterical laughter on the one hand and helpless tears on the other. Caution had degenerated into paranoia, and I was exhausted.
Huddled on the floor, I spent ten minutes debating whether to take a nap or a shower. Nap, shower, nap, shower. The skin over my entire body itched, so I decided I needed a shower more than anything. I smelled like the bad part of town.
By the time I got to the bathroom, I'd changed my mind and decided what I really needed to do first was brush my teeth. I brushed my teeth five times. Flossed twice. Didn't look too closely at the bits I spat out.
I woke up. The sun glared around the edges of my window shade with late-afternoon light. I stretched, arching my back, reaching with my arms and legs, and smiled because while I was stiff, nothing hurt. No injuries cracked along my back.
For the moment, I didn't want to move any more than that, because then I'd have to figure out what to do next.
Meg had overstepped her bounds.
T.J. didn't answer his phone. He hadn't for the last few days. He was far away, running from the cops, and I couldn't call him for help.
Taking the bus to Meg's place was much less cool than riding T.J.'s bike.
It also took longer, which meant I had a lot of time to reconsider.
I didn't have any proof. I could tell Carl about what had happened last night, but I couldn't trust him to do anything about it. After all, he hadn't done anything about Meg's conspiring with Arturo to kill me, when he had concrete evidence. Then again, he had essentially asked me to fight her. To kill her, really. Take her place. But I didn't want to be Carl's alpha female.
Pack dynamics were predicated on a two-way relationship. I owed the alphas, Carl and Meg, total loyalty and devotion, and they owed me protection. I hadn't felt protected in a long time. Carl seemed to value supporting Meg more than protecting me. All that trust was gone. The center did not hold.
While I'd felt pretty cocky about facing Meg, I didn't think I could face both of them. Not by myself.
I had to tell them what had happened last night. Doing so would probably start a fight. Their patience with me had probably worn thin enough that it wouldn't be just a dominance, slap-her-around-a-little fight. Maybe Meg would be by herself.
I really, really missed T.J.
I got to the house. The front door was locked. Nobody home.
Meg had a real job. She kept up a pretty good semblance of a normal life, working as a stock clerk in a warehouse. It paid for the house, the car, the extras. Carl didn't work. It looked like she wasn't home yet and Carl was away.
The back door was locked, too. I sat against the wall on the patio and looked out to the hills, to the scattered trees that grew more frequent until they became the woods of the national forest property. The sun was shining straight at me. A warm, lazy afternoon, a scent of pines on a faint breeze. I closed my eyes, wanting to nap. If I didn't think too hard, I could enjoy the moment.
I caught a scent, a trace on the breeze, a familiar taste of wolf, of pack. Shading my eyes, I looked. Someone was out there. Not close. I scanned the hills, but couldn't see anything, not a flicker of movement. Then the scent was gone. Probably an echo, a shadow. This place was covered with the smell of pack.