Page 5 of Wolf, Willow, Witch
“I’m guessing you’re not a Martínez anymore,” she said.
“Stone.” He straightened his shoulders and nodded toward the door. “Are we done here?”
Good name.She nodded and stepped backward, propping the door with her foot. “After you.”
Lincoln hesitated on the porch. He lowered his ears submissively and toed at the powdery snow. Tehlor cradled Gunnhild beneath her chin, watching the wolf-man inch forward, placing his boot firmly on one step, another, then the ground. The way he breathed—deeply, slowly—reminded her of beasts at a zoo. Predators in comfy cages, unused to wilderness.
In the car, Lincoln shrank in the passenger’s seat, clutching his duffel against his chest. He stared straight through the windshield. Tehlor tried not to look at him, but she snuck quick glances as they idled at stoplights, appreciating his jutting profile.
“How old are you?” he asked.
Tehlor drummed her hands on the steering wheel. “Twenty-six. You?”
His furry brow knitted. “Thirty.”
“Thought you were younger.”
He hummed slyly and turned to look at her, resting his cheek on the seat. “Figured you were older.”
She rolled her eyes. “Where’d you rank in the, you know, red, white, and blood-sport gig?”
“Low enough not to matter. Do you live in the forest with a bunch of old crones, deboning deer and boiling bats?”
She snorted. “I rent a townhouse two miles away. Did you deserve it?”
Silence. She reveled in discomfort. Loved the way a simple question could unmake a conversation. Polite niceties had never been her strong suit, but she’d always appreciated candor. Even when it was dangerous.
“Deserve what?” he asked, turning back toward the windshield.
“What Bishop did to you.”
Lincoln was quiet for a long time. Gunnhild’s little hands scrabbled on the dashboard, and Tehlor tried to level her breathing, to become unnoticeable. After her pulse quickened, and her knuckles whitened on the steering wheel, Lincoln finally sighed.
“Maybe.” His voice was coarse and heavy. He cleared whatever gummed his throat. “Probably, yeah. From their perspective.”
“What’syourperspective?” she tested.
“I thought we were in it together, I guess. In it for the power, for each other, ‘til the end.”
Strange, how he placedpowerbeforeeach other. She understood the sentiment, though. Viscerally.
“What about you, Tehlor? You the bad guy in anyone’s story?” he asked, smoothly, laughing.
“Most likely.” She parked in the driveway and unclicked her seatbelt, thinking about Maggie, the girl she’d sliced open with her boline, and Xenith, the person she’d dated because they collected ancient tomes and she’d wanted to steal one. She thought about the girl she'd kissed in high school, too. The lead in Swan Lake—her first taste of revenge. “Yeah, actually,” she decided, remembering how Maggie had saidwhat the fuck is wrong with youwhile she bled on Tehlor’s bed, and Xenith had askedwho are youafter the memory spell she’d tucked under their pillow had taken effect, and the sound of bone splitting after she'd made a terrible mistake. “I definitely am. C’mon.”
A white door and glossy shutters gussied up the ivy-green, rectangular townhouse. Sharing a wall with her neighbors wasn’t ideal, but she didn’t mind the kitchen clatter and baby cries every once in a while. As long as the cute transplant couple from California who’d purchased the connecting house continued to ignore her existence, no one would have a problem.
She held the door for Lincoln and swept her arm toward the narrow hallway. “So, I still have to figure out the guest room situation, but for now you can use the pull-out.”
Lincoln kicked off his boots and strode into the house. “So, I’m yourguard, but you weren’t expecting me to stay with you?”
I wasn’t expecting Hel to listen.She snorted. “It’s comfy, pinky swear.”
Doors spanned the hall—a laundry room equipped with stacked machines, the first-floor washroom, and a coat closet—and ended at the mouth of an open floorplan. The kitchen was small and boring, and the mustard-yellow couch filled most of the living room. Candles perched on the windowsill and sat close together on the coffee table, and books were crammed on a shelf next to the flatscreen. Gunnhild skittered across the laminate flooring and climbed into her corner hutch, peering at Lincoln from the safety of her bedding.
Anxiety sparked beneath Tehlor’s skin. She glanced around the room. Noticed the stale beer bottle on the table and the dishes piled in the sink and hated herself for blushing.
“There’s a bathroom with a shower on the second floor. My room is at the far end of the hall, and my stud—” Her tongue tripped over the word.Studio. She corrected herself. “The guest room is the first door at the top of the stairs. Feel free to whatever's in the fridge. There’s juice and, like, pizza, maybe. It’s a few days old.”
