But if she did something, the inevitable questions would start—questions she didn’t have good answers for. Or even believable, rational answers. Where exactly were you Friday night? If you were with Lucy, why didn’t you report anything? Why did you lie? You say this guy kidnapped you? Why? Who is this guy, anyway?
Zach leaned against the doorjamb, still blocking any view of the hall. The grayness resolved into streaks of fluttering transparency, easing around him. “It’s Sellers. I thought you guys were good with names. As for where we spent the weekend, that’s private. If you know what I mean. Now, if you don’t have any other prying personal questions, I’ve got a crying girlfriend I need to feed and calm down. Have a nice night, Anderson.”
“It’s Andrews, Mr. Sellers. I’d like to speak to Miss Wilson, please.”
“I don’t think she’s in any condition to talk to someone who can’t even get her name straight.” Zach half turned his head. “Sophie?” he called, as if she was in the bathroom. “Some cop’s here. You want to talk to him?”
Oh, Jesus. Dear God. She made her arms work, pushed herself up out of the chair. It gave a protesting groan.
The gray things wouldn’t go away no matter how many times she blinked.
She teetered, on old-woman legs, to the hall. Andrews was making notations in his steno pad again. Zach’s body language didn’t change. Her knees almost gave out as she tried to figure out a way past him. If she could reach the hall she could run away from both of them, and everything else, as well.
Just keep running. Only she didn’t have anywhere to go. The last time she’d run, she’d had a plan—a desperate one, but a plan nonetheless, and a friend to help carry it out.
Oh, Lucy. Her eyes brimmed with hot salt water.
Zach put out a hand as soon as she was within reaching distance, slid it over her shoulders, and pulled her into his side just like a protective boyfriend. “This the guy who told you about Lucy?” He tucked his chin to look down at her, and Sophie didn’t flinch only through sheer willpower. He was very warm, a flood of heat closing around her. And that musk smell, which was beginning to be curiously comforting. The gray things pressed closer, floating as if the air was water.
She didn’t trust her voice. She nodded. A horrible idea bolted through her head—she’d seen what Zach could do, the way his shape changed into something lean and wickedly clawed, covered in dark pelt.
What if the tubby little brown-eyed detective, who was still in the rumpled tan mackintosh, his tie a little askew, made Zach angry?
Her knees almost gave out. Which pitched her directly into Zach’s side, and his arm tightened. Her heart crawled into her throat, and fresh hot tears slid down her cheeks. What had she done to deserve this? She’d only wanted to go out and have some fun, for God’s sake.
“I’m sorry to disturb you.” Andrews did look sorry, his muddy eyes as sad as they had been earlier. “You were with your fella here all weekend?”
Well, technically that’s true. And he’s a werewolf. And pigs will fly. She managed another nod, and Zach’s arm tightened again. Maybe he even meant it to be comforting, but it felt like a warning.
Still, that musk smell was soothing. Something about it made her feel a little steadier. How was that for completely, totally insane?
“She usually comes to my place,” Zach supplied. “But this weekend she wasn’t feeling well, and I brought her takeout and tried to keep her in bed.”
And Christ on a crutch, but his voice dropped, and he made that sentence sound…well, positively indecent. Her legs all but failed her, and now Zach was holding her up without any apparent effort. As if she needed a reminder of how freakishly, inhumanly strong he was.
“Where would your place be, Mr. Sellers?” The detective’s eyes were suspiciously sharp behind their muddiness, and Sophie began to feel faint. Her head was full of rushing noise, and she had the urge to simply sink into the floor. If a huge cavern had opened up right then and there, she would have dropped in with only a grateful murmur.
“About four blocks away. Why?” He actually sounded innocent. It was hard to imagine him growling like a huge, very angry dog. Or holding her up against the wall, or pinning her to a bed.
But then, she knew all about men who could sound innocent when questioned, didn’t she?
“Just curious.” The detective examined Sophie for a long moment, and his face softened. “Sorry to disturb you, ma’am. You look worn out. Hope your fella here takes good care of you.”
“I intend to.” Zach loomed over both of them, suddenly seeming taller, and Sophie blinked. The lights in the hall were doing funny things, shadows weaving between them like gauze scarves. But that could have been the water in her eyes. Or the panic attack still reverberating in her nerves. Or— “Anything else we can help you with, Detective?”
“Not at the moment.” Andrews was still watching Sophie’s face.
Her cheek throbbed. Did she look like a beaten woman? She’d had plenty of practice. I must look guilty. Oh, Lucy, I’m so sorry. It should have been me.
A long, heart-stopping moment later, the detective tipped Zach a curious little salute and nodded at her. “Good night, then.”
“Good night,” she said faintly, and Zach pulled her back, sweeping the door shut as Andrews turned away. He locked both dead bolts, put the chain on, and took another two steps back, dragging her with him as if she weighed nothing. Paused, his head cocked again, as the heavy man’s footsteps retreated down the hall.
“They’ll probably let him pass,” he murmured, and made a quick movement, letting go of her shoulders as he bent to pick up her purse. Sophie teetered, half fell against the wall, and let out a long breath she hadn’t been aware of holding. “Not worth their time to kill a cop. But we’ve got to get out of here.” His eyes swept down her body, a curiously impersonal glance, and Sophie braced her shoulder against the wall even harder. “Good work, by the way. The dewy-eyed innocent thing looks real nice on you.”
“I thought you were…” Going to kill him. Going to kill me. Going to do something awful.
He thrust her purse into her hands. “I figured he was fishing for your alibi, sweets. He suspects something, he just doesn’t know what. As long as you stick with that story—that you were with me and we were here—he can’t do anything. Not like it matters—we have to get out.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you.” Instead of ringing and declarative, the words came out thin and tired. Her head swam. “I think I’m going to pass out.”
“Pass out later.” He grabbed her arm and reached for the door again. “Right now we need to move.”
The ceiling fixture in the hall began to dim, and the bulb in the living room began to make a strange fizzling sound.
Chapter 14
They’ll be watching the fire escapes—it’s what I would do. His world of options was rapidly narrowing, and she wasn’t making it any easier by becoming limp deadweight whenever he slowed down enough for her to lean against anything. The smell was rough and clotted in his mouth, an old-rust corruption of spilled blood and rotting spice that raised almost every hackle he had. Then there was her smell—ice and moonlight sharpened into the scent of a triggered shaman, his triggered shaman. With a wide wine-dark river of fear boiling underneath and rasping against his nerves until he didn’t know whether to scream or hit something.
It didn’t help that Sophie was pale, visibly trembling, and all the sharp intelligence had gone out of those lovely gray eyes. Her glasses were still shiny, her hair was a wild mass of electric, beautiful curls, and the gray pencil skirt and sheer nylons over those sweetly curved legs was enough to make a man’s train of thought derail. But one glance at her pale, terrified face, fever spots of wild color high on her perfect cheeks—one of them slightly swollen, as if she’d been slapped—and the way she looked anywhere but at him, almost cowering if he made a sudden movement…