Nick was, for all intents and purposes, unconscious. He groaned from time to time as Doc kept checking him—under his eyelids, his pulse. Jeff was back from the woods, hovering. He knew. He knew what Nick was going through because he’d been there only a week and a half ago.
Jolene’s eyes were red. “He lives with his folks. What are we going to tell them?”
“That’s a fair point, Jolene,” said Doc. “Jeff, I trust you won’t have any objections to a roommate.”
“No. No, anything he wants. I owe him.” He shot a desperate look toward me.
“Of course, he can stay. He’s going to need help.”
“And I will need more help brewing wolfsbane,” said Seraphina. “I hope Jolene wouldn’t mind—”
“Anything to help,” she said tearfully.
Erasmus stood aloof in the corner, watching all of us with critical eyes. But it was Ed I had to talk to. I tapped his shoulder and motioned for him to follow me. I noticed Erasmus watching us as we left the room. Once the kitchen door swung closed, I said quietly, “Ed, how well do you know George?”
He shook his head, perplexed. “I’ve known him since we were kids. I mean not well, but we were both from Moody Bog. Hard not to know everyone in town.”
“When I saw him at the Chamber of Commerce thing, he was sort of siding with Ruth. How much do you trust him?”
“With my life. I have to. What are you suggesting?”
“If Ruth sacrificed Dan Parker, she would have to have had help.”
“No way. Not George. He might be a bit stiff and kind of a loner, but he is not like that.”
“Well…he’s not really a loner. He’s…he’s with Nick.”
“What do you mean?”
O mighty detective. “I mean he and Nick are together. Together together.”
He stared at me for another second before the penny dropped. “Oh! Jeez, I didn’t know that. You know a guy for years and… Why didn’t he ever tell me?”
“I don’t know. Nick said that he’s a private sort.”
“That’s for sure.” He rubbed his chin and stared at the floor. “You just don’t know people, do you?”
“Well, that’s the assumption I’m working under. That maybe people in town are up to no good and we wouldn’t know it.”
“I can’t believe it of George.”
“You didn’t know he was gay.”
“That’s different. That I can believe, but not this other thing.”
“Putting that aside, what do we do about George?”
Ed looked back at the closed kitchen door. “You’re asking if we should tell him everything?”
“He’ll have to be told if he and Nick—”
“Now hold on, Kylie. If George isn’t out, it isn’t fair to drag him into all this.”
“It isn’t fair not to. What’s he going to think when Nick suddenly falls off the radar? He’s going to know something’s up.”
“Isn’t that Nick’s decision?”
“Nick’s going to need all the help he can get.”
“And what if George rejects him?”
I didn’t want to think about that.
Ed rubbed his chin again. Looked like he needed a shave. The last thing I wanted was for him to look like Doug. “We’ve got to wait till Nick…wakes up.”
“That might be a while. And wouldn’t it help you if George knew?”
He shook his head. “But it’s different now. How would you feel?”
I stiffened and the anger and hurt returned. “You mean he might say he wanted to take a break?”
Bullseye. Ed’s mouth clenched. “I’m…I’m sorry for that. I felt a little overwhelmed. And for the record…it was a mistake.” He made a beaten puppy face at me. “My timing is terrible. But I’m sorry I ever asked for a break. I don’t want one anymore. But I’m afraid…” He looked toward the other room where Erasmus was. “Maybe it’s too late now.”
Was it? I thought about Erasmus—his literal smoldering looks, his kisses, the way he made love. And I thought of Ed, too, and his very human reactions and sensibility. And his lips, and the way he made love. I still didn’t want to make a choice.
“I hadn’t want a take a break.”
“Then, are you saying there’s…hope?” He hesitated, before finally lifting his hand and taking mine.
“We’ll just have to see. Right now, I can’t really think straight.”
His hold on my hand tightened involuntarily. “You mean you still want to see…that guy? The demon?”
When I thought of leaving Erasmus for good my stomach clenched. “I might.”
Ed wasn’t happy when we left the kitchen together to check on Nick. Erasmus followed us with narrowed eyes.
Nick’s moans were morphing into low growls. All of a sudden, he started whipping about. Doc tried to hold him down, but Jeff pulled him out of the way.
“Jeff!” he cried. “What are you doing?”
“Saving your life. Look!”
Nick thrashed as thick, black hair began sprouting all over him. He screamed as his mouth and nose elongated and darkened into a snout, while his ears grew into longer, pointed appendages. His whole body shook and cracked and changed. He growled and howled from the pain. It had to be painful, what was happening.
He tore at his clothes with the claws that were now on his fingers, and soon he flipped over onto his paws, crouching down on the sofa with back arched and hackles raised, a fully black-furred wolf. His green eyes snapped open. He looked about the room at us, lip curled back in a snarl, revealing sharp canines.
We all drew back. It looked like he was about to leap at any one of us, when Jeff shed his clothes and shifted in seconds into a wolf. He bared his teeth and bark-growled at Nick, who just as quickly cowered back, bushy tail curled under him.
There was some wordless communication between them, as Nick seemed to understand the pecking order in the…the pack, I guessed. Jeff was his alpha. What a weird thought.
As he cringed back on the sofa, his fur sifted off of him in big chunks and his face slowly contorted back to normal. I snatched the knitted throw off of the sofa back and tossed it over him just in time.
Sitting up and naked except for my grandmother’s throw in his lap, Nick swayed, clutching his head. “Oh, shit,” he sobbed. Seraphina was closest. She sat beside him and cradled him in her arms, letting him cry.
Doc ushered the rest of us away to the dining room. “Kylie, you’ll need to get some supplies from the shop,” he said quietly. “And maybe you should grab the crossbow while you’re there. I think it’s going to be a long night. Seraphina and Jolene will have to work through most of it to make the wolfsbane.”
“Okay. I’ll get Erasmus to drop me off.”
The demon was still standing in the darkened corner. When I approached him, his countenance almost made him look like a stranger to me. I didn’t know how else to describe it. “I need a favor.”
“Of course, you do.”
“What does that mean? I’m sensing some resentment. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. You made an agreement with your constable. Why should I resent that?” He crossed his arms over his chest.
“Why should you?”
“No reason whatsoever. What is the favor?”
“As usual, you don’t know what you’re talking about. I need you to transport me to my shop.”
“Done.” He reached out, and almost before the word echoed off my ears, we were there in a breathless wink of darkness and cold. He was gone again before I had a chance to tell him what a jerk he was being. Jealous much?
He’d put me across the street near the woods, and it was a good thing, because Deputy George’s black and white cop Jeep was parked right next to mine in front of the shop. He and his mustache were outside the place in his heavy jacket and Smokey Bear hat, peering into the windows of my darkened place.
I casually walked across the street and hailed him with my hand raised…and realized I wasn’t wearing a jacket.
He shined his flashlight in my face. “Oh. I was looking for you. You know, you’ll catch your death like that.”
I rubbed my arm while reaching for my key in my jeans pocket. “Yeah. Pretty brisk, these Maine Octobers.” Unlocking the door, I switched on the light as I let him in. “Is there something in particular I can do for you, deputy?”
He turned the flashlight over and over in his fingers. “I was, uh, just, uh, checking.”
Was I going to trust him? Ed did. But Ed hadn’t known about all the magic before. Of course, Nick trusted him. Wasn’t that enough to go on? “You were just checking what?”
He sighed and pushed up his hat. “The thing of it is, Ms. Strange—”
“Kylie, deputy. You can call me Kylie.”
“Kylie,” he said tentatively. “The thing of it is…Ruth Russell called me and asked if I’d come over here and ask you about a gold locket…” He trailed off. Plainly, Ruth accused me of stealing it and, knowing I was seeing Ed, she called on George instead.
That…that…witch! Except…“witch” was a relative term these days.
“You can tell Ruth—” I started but then stopped and calmed myself. With more aplomb, I said, “George, you can tell Ruth that I haven’t seen the locket but I am still turning over my place looking for it.”
He swiped his hat off his head and breathed heavily. “I tried to tell her that, but…” He shook his head. “She can be stubborn. And wicked mean.”
I was glad to hear him say it. It didn’t look like he was acting to me.
“That she can be.” Though I felt a little guilty, because we actually had stolen it.
He’d said his piece and accomplished his mission, yet still he lingered. “Yes, George? Was there something else?”
“I, uh…I had an appointment with Mr. Riley, and sometimes he comes here in the evenings. I was wondering if you’d seen him.”
It was an opening staring me right in the face. But should I say? Did I have the right to involve the poor, oblivious George in all this, and effectively out Nick without asking first? But this was a matter of life or death. Things were getting decidedly serious.
But how would he react to it all?
He was looking at me so expectantly that I had to say something.
Think before you leap, Kylie.
I leapt anyway. “George—can I call you George? George, maybe we need to sit down.”