Page 15 of Werewolves Don't Howl
He walked down a dark alley. Instead of following him, I ran as fast as I could around the block to cut him off on the other side. I waited there, but he didn’t come out of the alley. Had he noticed me? Was he waiting to grab me?
I smiled my wolf smile and then crept into the alley, letting the smells of the night wash over my senses. Ridley was a subtle pulse out of the ebb of the evening, waiting behind a dumpster for me to come out.
He’d actually peed on my cashmere.
Rage fed my strength and speed as I lunged at him, ripping out his left Achilles tendon before I whirled away, out of reach of his swiping paws.
He grinned at me when he saw my adorable wolf, ignoring the wound I’d given him. One arm shifted into a massive paw and glittering claws. “Hello pretty, soft, sweet. I’m going to enjoy this.”
I bared my teeth in a smile. I was going to enjoy it much more than he would. Then I shifted, expanding, bubbling up in to the massive force of power and destruction that wasn’t cute. Not at all. My fur in this shape was patchy, my form more humanoid than canine, except for my head. That was all teeth and jaws. I drooled, because I didn’t have a lot of lip to keep back the hunger. And when I looked at him, I was hungry.
He stared at me, shock and horror replacing his contented smirk.
“Run,” I rumbled in my deep, low bass of noxious misery.
He turned and run, but sprawled when he put weight on his left leg. I leapt on him, landing on his back, knocking the air out of him. He tried to roll over and shift, but for a moment I held him, letting my massive weight crush his lungs before I leapt off and let him roll and shift into a trembling, wicked beast. His were form wasn’t anything like mine. He backed up while I slowly advanced.
“What happened to you?” he whined. “You’re disgusting.”
I narrowed my gleaming red eyes at him. That was the last thing he was going to say tonight. I lunged and ripped into him, his pretty fur flying. He fought back and left some good gashes, but the pain only made me hungrier. Werewolves don’t eat werewolves. But I was so hungry. And he’d heal. Eventually.
I left him in the alley, bleeding, because he was still alive. He’d heal, but he wouldn’t be assaulting any women, werewolf or not, for a long time.
I shifted back into my adorable wolf and headed home, clinging to shadows and feeling extremely satisfied. That lasted until I reached the yard. I leapt over the wall, landed, and then bright lights came on, blinding me, and there was Senator Silverton, crouching in front of me, a dark scowl on his beautiful face.
“You’re covered in blood! How badly are you hurt?” His hand brushed the deepest gash, and I whimpered and looked up at him with my big eyes like honey, really working the adorable angle. He sighed deeply and picked me up. I was so surprised that I let him. He took me right into the main house, to the kitchen, and started cleaning my wounds. It was the strangest thing to have someone touch me while I was in wolf form, either one of them. Not that he’d ever see my beast. My adorable little wolf was as much of my monster as he’d ever see.
“If you were going to exact vengeance, you should have asked me to come along,” he murmured.
His hands were so gentle, and to be honest, channeling the big bad wolf took a lot of energy. I relaxed on the towel on the kitchen counter and let him clean the blood out of my fur, the dirt out of my wounds, and, in general, take care of me. I dozed off, comfortable and content, until he picked me up and carried me to the bay window seat. He left me there while he cleaned the kitchen, then shut off the lights, and left me there. I was inside the house. I couldn’t open the doors unless I shifted into one or the other. But I’d heal more quickly in this form than the two-legged one.
That decided, I closed my eyes, and slept on the nicely padded window seat cushion. I woke up in the morning from Senator Silverton smacking a newspaper against the table, waking me up with a jerk.
“You killed him?” His voice was even, but his eyes were hard.
I peered at the paper, but I couldn’t focus on the fine print very well in this form. It would give me a headache. I dropped off the bench and padded to the living room, where a throw blanket dangled over the arm of a couch. Mm. Cashmere and silk blend. I pulled it down with my teeth, climbed underneath and then shifted. I straightened up, pulling the blanket around me. The Senator had followed me, still holding the newspaper.
“I didn’t kill him,” I muttered, taking the paper out of his hands, then flinching when I saw the mutilated body of Ridley. Had I done that? I’d done a lot of it, but not that huge gash across his neck that nearly severed his head, and not the gouges ripping out his kidneys, either. Had I? Maybe I’d lost control and my memories and…No. I hadn’t lost control like that, not ever.
“No? But you did attack him.”
I gave him a look. “I messed him up rather well, but I didn’t kill him.”
“You weren’t in that adorable wolf form. How big are your claws in your beast form?”
I stiffened up. “Why?”
“Because you’re going to have to prove that you didn’t kill him. I’m your lawyer, remember? You need to think about your defense when you assault someone. Things tend to escalate,” he said drily.
I backed away from him, feeling defensive, also incredibly underdressed, me in a blanket, him in his neat three-piece suit. “It was a fair fight between werewolves. Not murder. And you aren’t my lawyer. I can’t afford you.”
His violet eyes almost glowed with resolve. “I am absolutely your lawyer, and you can’t afford not to have me. I don’t care if you killed him or not, except insofar as it implicates you. We both know that he killed those missing girls in Golden City. You were next on his list. But he was well-connected, or his former crimes wouldn’t have been buried. So tell me every detail so that we can prepare a good defense.”
I sputtered for a moment. “I didn’t kill him! I left him breathing. I took some good chunks out of him, but not enough to kill him. I didn’t slice his throat, and I didn’t eviscerate him. Someone else finished him off, a wolf by the looks of it, but even larger than me.”
He raised a brow, implacable, immovable. “Show me. I need to document it if I’m going to prove your innocence.”
“I’m not exactly innocent. I mean, I did rip him apart, but I didn’t finish him off. I don’t want to shift.”
