Page 104 of Winter Lost

Warren passed by the police officers and accident victims without stopping to talk, taking in the group dynamics as he strolled. One driver, a sobbing girl, her face battered by an exploding airbag, was all but leaning on the broad shoulder of the very young policeman who had put himself between her and a middle-aged red-faced man who was shouting at the cop. Never a good policy, but people tended to get the sense knocked out of them after a bad scare.

“My dad’s going to kill me,” sobbed the girl, and other such words that amounted to pretty much the same thing, mostly, he thought, designed to elicit sympathy from the young cop.

“You damned near killed me,” snapped the man. “And you would have if the werewolf here hadn’t been able to move our cars before the train came. I can smell the alcohol on you from all the way over—”

“If you don’t calm down,” warned the officer, sounding less like a calm official and more like a defensive boyfriend, “I’m going to arrest you—”

It was a good thing, Warren decided, that Sherwood had taken himself out of that situation.

One of the officers stood to the side, looking uncomfortable. He appeared vaguely familiar, and when he saw Warren, relief dawned on his face. He tipped his chin toward Sherwood’s last stand as if Warren might have missed him.

Or, Warren thought, as if the cop thought it might be a good idea for Warren to be here. Because of his work for his boyfriend’s law firm, a number of the police officers were familiar with Warren and might recognize him by sight and know that he was a werewolf.

He picked up his pace a bit, and as he approached the battered Toyota, he saw why Sherwood had his crutch out. One jean-covered leg ended in a boot, and the other ended in an empty space. The prosthesis that gave Sherwood the ability to walk like everyone else was missing.

Like the girl, Sherwood’s face was battered. There was a lot of blood on the front of his shirt where his jacket was open. Warren was pretty sure that some of the stains on Sherwood’s pants were blood, too.

Sherwood raised his head, and his wolf stared at Warren. Before Warren could figure out whether to meet his gaze—Sherwood had called him for help—or to look away, Sherwood closed his eyes.

Freed from that dilemma, Warren looked away and saw something odd with the tracks on the ground next to the Mercedes. He dropped to one knee so he could get a better look at the marks in the snow where someone had pulled—not pushed—the two interlocked cars off the track.

He’d grown up in a time and place when tracking was part of a survival skill set. The marks told him a story as clearly as if he’d been here to see it. The places where Sherwood’s good foot had slipped, unable to gain purchase on the icy ground. The round mark made by something like a pipe that had no trouble breaking through the ice to the ground beneath it.

“Break your prosthesis in the accident, or did you do it deliberately so you could get the cars off the track?”

“Deliberately,” Sherwood said tightly.

“Hey, you, werewolf!”

Both Warren and Sherwood looked over to see the young officer striding toward them.

Warren fished his key fob out of his back pocket and tossed it at Sherwood.

“Why don’t you go sit in my car and warm up,” Warren said, walking toward the cop to intercept him.

Warren didn’t mind facing off with the angry cop, especially when the other officer was an ally of sorts. Tony was on his way—and if all else failed, he could threaten them with Kyle. Kyle’s specialty was family law, but that didn’t hurt his reputation as a shark at all.

Moreover, Warren hadn’t been injured in a car accident and forced to expose his greatest weakness in front of an enemy. He had a lot better chance of holding on to his temper than Sherwood did.

Sherwood caught the fob and carefully started to cross the icy road using his crutch. It wasn’t graceful.

With another pack member, Warren would have carried them over to the car—or given them his arm or escort. Sherwood wouldn’t be able to accept that right now. Warren wasn’t worried about Sherwood—much—but his wolf was old and dangerous. The last thing that their pack needed was for him and Sherwood to get in a real fight out where a scared cop and some people with cell phones could watch.

The cop tried to angle after Sherwood, but Warren got in the way.

“I’m Warren Smith,” he drawled with a big old friendly smile. “My friend Sherwood is hurt, and he’s going to take a time-out over there in my car. He ain’t gonna take off. What did ya need him for?”

The cop wasn’t completely stupid. He stopped well short of Warren and regarded him with suspicion. “I need his license, registration, and insurance, and his story about what happened.”

Warren looked at him. “I hope that you ain’t plannin’ on giving tickets to two drivers who were stopped at an active railroad cross’n. Because even a stupid hick like me knows that it’s the lady who hits the stopped cars who gets the ticket.”

“Hey, Warren,” said the other officer before the angry one had a chance to respond. “Good to see you. That lawyer of yours did some righteous maneuvers for my friend whose ex tried to take his kids back. I understand that it was some of your work that made that case go the way it should.”

Hell, he’d almost forgotten that he had a little more pull with the KPD this week than he’d had before. In his defense, most of his work on that case had been completed a couple of months ago. “Your cop friend needs to have better taste in his next wife,” he said.

“That’s what I told him.” The friendly officer stepped casually in front of his angry coworker and held out his hand. “We never met officially.” Which explained why Warren couldn’t come up with his name. “I’m Trent Oliver.”

Warren shook it. “Good to meet you, Trent.”

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