Page 21 of Way of the Wolf

“I’m fine.” I wished he hadn’t seen my hands clench, my face contort with barely restrained fury. No, not fury. The call of the wolf.

His face softened with understanding. I looked away. I didn’t want empathy or sympathy or whatever he was offering. I wanted my privacy and my humanity back.

“There’s no magic in my apartment other than this.” I held up the vial, the couple of drops of the potion remaining in the bottom.

“Ah.” Duncan glanced toward the ceiling corners. “Of course.”

He nodded and returned to the dining table, setting the device on it.

I scowled and didn’t move, my gaze shifting to the ceilings. They were painted in unassuming white eggshell, and there was absolutely nothing magical about them. Nothing unusual at all. Nor was there anything odd about the floor under the nightstand.

But…

Was it possible therewassomething magical that I’d somehow forgotten about? I couldn’t imagine what. Other than my potions, I’d eschewed all things paranormal after rejecting my werewolf heritage. I didn’t hang out with witches, didn’t go ghost hunting,and didn’t even read books about the supernatural. Nor had I ever invited my alchemist, or anyone else I suspected of magical tendencies, into my apartment.

Still…

“Bring your doohickey back in here, Duncan.” I made myself add, “Please.”

My ex hadn’t appreciated taking orders from a woman. Not many men I’d met did. But sometimes orders slipped out, a vestige of the days when I’d been with my family, a member of the pack and my mother’s daughter. She’d been grooming me to be the female alpha, the mate of a male alpha. Had I stayed, I might have helped run the Snohomish Savagers one day.

“My, ah… doohickey?” In the doorway again, Duncan glanced down at his crotch, before snapping his fingers with enlightenment and turning to grab the supposed magic detector.

I scowled again. This guy was turning it into my regular facial expression.

“Sorry,” he said. “Americans have somanyterms for their sex organs that it can be bewildering to newcomers to your land.”

“Uh-huh, I’m sure women you barely know invite you to bring yoursex organsinto their bedrooms all the time.”

Duncan opened his mouth, a cocky statement probably on his lips, but he considered my scowl and only shrugged. “It’s happened on occasion.”

I snorted but didn’t tell him he was full of himself. Hewashandsome, silvering pelt not withstanding, and he had that European accent that we American girls fall for. Bedroom invitations probably happenedregularlyfor him.

“There shouldn’t be any magic in the room besides this.” I lifted the potion. “Why is your thing beeping at the ceiling and floor?”

“Let’s find out.” Duncan turned it back on and followed the quivering antennae—the device reallydidappear to be pullinghim—to one of the corners. It vacillated between wanting to draw him to the ceiling and to the floor under the nightstand.

I walked around the bed, put the potion vial on my dresser, and shifted the furniture aside. The floor was easier to investigate than the ceiling.

A rug covered vinyl planks designed to look like hardwood boards, an upgrade I’d helped put into a lot of the units over the years, after the owners had gotten tired of replacing carpets whenever there was a turn. I knelt and swept my hand across the planks but didn’t feel anything strange. I also peeled back the bottom of the rug and probed under the nightstand.

Duncan stood close, though he stayed far enough to the side so that he wasn’t touching me.

I arched my eyebrows up at him. “There’s nothing here.”

He’d been gazing up at the ceiling, a finger pointing toward what also appeared to be nothing, but he looked down. The metal detector drew his arm until the antennae tapped the vinyl planks in a spot I’d already checked.

“Could there be somethingunderthe floor?” Duncan asked.

“I helped install this stuff,” I said skeptically. “There’s definitely nothing between the plywood underfloor and the vinyl planks except adhesive. Under the plywood, there’s a crawlspace for the building. Therecouldbe something there, I suppose, but maintenance people go down there regularly. Shoot, I’ve been down there as recently as this spring. We put some rat traps down there. I would have noticed something magical sitting on the vapor barrier.”

Probably. Did I really know whatsomething magicalwould look like? Unless a golden chalice had been glowing at me from the dark, maybe not.

“There are ducts?” Duncan waved toward a heat vent under the bed’s headboard.

“Oh.” Duh. I hadn’t considered that. But… “Who would have put something in theducts?”

“Who would have put something in your ceiling?” He waved upward.

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