Page 24 of Way of the Wolf

Duncan looked up, his lips parting. With surprise? Sympathy?

“I’m sorry. That must have been rough on you. And your kids.” He nodded toward the photos of them on the wall.

I snapped my jaw shut. I hadn’t meant to let that rant out and reveal so much of my personal life to a stranger.

“He’s been gone for almost three years,” I said, answering his earlier question. “You think the magic in these could have worked and been transmitting for that long?”

“Yes.”

“Is there any way to tell where they were transmitting?”

Duncan hesitated. “There might be, but it’s beyond my knowledge. We’d have to find an expert. I can ask my contacts or the local alchemist when I give her the information on this.” He held up the potion. “It’s helpful that some of the ingredients are written on the label. Gardenia oil, dried snakeskin, banana slug slime, birch bark, and blood of the natterjack toad. Must be a tasty tincture.”

“I shove chocolate in my mouth after swallowing it.”

“Understandable.”

Duncan picked up a tube on the dresser. Hell, was that my estradiol cream? I hadn’t expected visitors, so I hadn’t tidied up.

“What’s this?” he asked. “Another potion?”

“No.” I winced. “Put that down. Or in the drawer, please.” I hopped down from the nightstand to grab it from him.

He started to obey, pulling out the drawer, but he also read the label. That prompted him to squawk and drop it on the floor.

I rolled my eyes. “Really, dude? The slug slime and toad blood didn’t bother you, but the hormone cream made you shriek?”

“No. Yes.” Duncan lifted his hands and backed into the doorway, as if he’d dropped a viper and it was slithering after him. “It wasn’t ashriek. I just didn’t realize… I mean, I knew women didthings for…things,but I thought it was when they were older. You seem, you know. Healthy. And, uhm. Vibrant.” He looked me up and down.

“Iamhealthy and vibrant. I’m just of an age where the hormones are fluctuating.”

“The, uhm, your blood doesn’t… keep you and your parts all… fit?”

Not when I took a potion to dull the wolf, no. Was werewolf blood even supposed to change anything about female hormones? I could have asked my mother if we’d spoken in the last decade…

“Just finish writing down the potion ingredients, please,” I told him.

“Yes, of course.” Duncan took his magic detector and the vial out to the table.

Well, I’d found a way to keep guys out of my bedroom at least. Snorting, I put the tube in the drawer. I tucked the camera in the drawer too, stuffing it in a sock so that it wouldn’t see anything until I could find an expert to examine it.

“Are you going to check the duct?” Duncan asked.

“Maybe later.”

Inprivate, I didn’t say. A part of me wanted to leave it be, but what if the person or people who’d put the cameras in my bedroom figured out I’d found them? And what if that prompted them to activate whatever else was in there? Some Plan B. Maybe I could sleep in my sons’ room for a while…

“It’s none of my business, of course,” Duncan said while he wrote down ingredients, “but the cameras seem a little malevolent.”

“Tell me about it.”

“If you unearth a dangerous artifact, it could have defensesthat’ll do more than knock you back. You might want someone here in case things go wrong.”

Not a bad point, but I didn’t want to have to trust a stranger—a stranger who might have ulterior motives—to call an ambulance for me. WhocouldI trust?

I had friends that I’d made during my years living as a normal human, but they didn’t know anything about the paranormal. If I tried to explain this, they would think I was insane. The same held true for the tenants, especially since my alchemist lady had disappeared. I was on friendly terms with a lot of the long-term residents here, but you were supposed to ask neighbors for a cup of sugar, not to call 9-1-1 if a magical artifact kicked your ass.

Maybe I could have Bolin stand by. He knew about magic, and, even if I barely knew him, I’d worked for his parents forever. That meant I knew a lot more about him than I did about Duncan.

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