Page 26 of Enspelled

“What is it?” I ask.

After peeling her head away from the glass, she shifts her gaze from me to her window, but just ahead. As if there’s something she wants me to see.

“You want me to go there?” I search out the thing she’s so eager to explore, hoping it’s not another squirrel or mole she’s desperate to chase down.

She nods.

“What’s down there?” The moment the words leave my lips, I realize how pointless they are. Briar isn’t telling me anything.

Briar just gazes back at me as if waiting for me to remember she’s a wolf.

When I slow the truck down, that’s when I spot the break in the trees that line the road. Not a big break, but enough to suggest one thing.

“A road.”

Briar makes an approving sound in the back of her throat.

Since Briar is in short supply of friends and family, I doubt she’s got another friend waiting down that lonely road to help us get out of this shitshow. Unless Sera is the one who lives down there?

After darting a glance at Briar, who's gazing back at me expectantly, I sigh. “Might as well,” I mutter. “It’s not like there’s anywhere else we can go.”

I make the turn down a lonely side road that someone must have created by cutting down two of the tall fir trees.

I eye the distance between the side mirrors and the nearest tree with alarm, but somehow, the mirrors survive the long, narrow path, and I pull up to a stop in front of a two-story wooden lodge.

All the lights are off, and there’s no vehicle parked in front. Whoever lives here is either deep asleep—though that doesn’t seem a possibility, since it’s not even eight yet—or they’re away.

I turn to Briar. “This is what you wanted me to see?”

In response, she starts scratching at her door, a sign clear as anything that she wants me to open it.

“Watch the door,” I snarl. “Unless you’re ready and willing to replace it.”

She stops scratching.

After turning the engine off, I climb out of the truck and slam the door shut before rounding the front to let Briar out.

She leaps out, immediately rushes up the four porch steps, and stands bouncing with excitement by the front, her head angled back toward me as if to tell me to hurry up.

There’s no doubt in my mind that whoever lives here left the door unlocked. I might not have been back in Madden Grove in ten years, but this is the sort of place that never changes.

The steps creak under my feet, but just as I’d thought, the handle turns easily and I push the door open.

Briar shoves her way past me, bumping hard into my leg and making me growl.

“What the fuck is your hurry?” I grumble as she disappears inside.

I switch on the light beside the door, illuminating a large open-plan space with two leather couches, a kitchen, and a dining room.

The house is empty, and even though I dart a glance to my right where a narrow staircase leads up, I’m not hearing or scenting anyone up there either. We’re alone in the house.

My gaze swings in the direction Briar took. I spot her sitting on her haunches in front of a tall white refrigerator, staring back at me as if wanting to know what the hell I’m doing by the door when there’s food right there.

I gaze back at her, letting the front door snick closed behind me. “You wanted to break into someone’s house because you werehungry?”

She shakes her head.

My eyes narrow. “Because if you did…”

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