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“You’re really Fliesbynight?” Slim craned his neck to speak to Bastion over one shoulder as we sliced through his zip tie.
My cousin shrugged, handing back the older man’s gun. “I prefer Bastion in the real world.”
For once, his internet celebrity was working in our favor. Without it, I wouldn’t have dreamed of releasing someone who’d just accused me of murder.
But the two had interacted extensively on the forum. Bastion vouched for Slim’s sanity. And, for his part, Slim seemed willing to at least listen to my proposed deal.
Not just because of Bastion either. Slim was one of those bounty hunters working solo. His partner had retired. He hadn’t trained anyone worth working with. Most gigs were two-person jobs, so the contracts he landed were measly and few.
Bastion and I were at the opposite end of the success spectrum. Thanks to my cousin’s gift with words, tales of our exploits had become a staple on the Bounty Hunter’s Forum. We were offered so many gigs we could pick and choose.
And that’s what I dangled in front of Slim. Bastion would write up a story like the ones that had made us famous, but with Slim as the protagonist. The act might just turbocharge the middle-aged man’s career.
In exchange—“I need twenty-four hours.” I tried to look damsel-in-distressy, wincing when a lash rolled under and got caught against an eye already irritated from the contacts I’d ditched halfway through the previous evening.
Okay, that wasn’t working. Instead, I backpedaled, rationalizing the necessity of a buffer period. “Give me one day to figure out what’s going on. To find Jimmy English’s killer.”
“And if I get arrested in the meantime?” Slim was starstruck by Bastion’s offer, but he was still a businessman.
“Then you’ll have a confession letter on hand for insurance.” I, rather than Bastion, was the one who put pen to paper to make good on this promise. Writing to Slim as if he were a confidant, I apologized for hoodwinking him, for letting him think Jimmy had escaped while I hung back, for dragging the bond jumper into my car and pushing him out....
I looked up from my foray into fiction. “Where did Jimmy die?”
“Hold on.” Justice had been poring over the newspaper while Slim and I negotiated. Now, his nostrils flared as he found the answer. “He was found two blocks over from the Smythewhite residence.”
Our gazes met and locked. Just as I’d suspected, both deaths tied together not only through me but also through Bastion’s stolen pelt....
This wasn’t the time to scratch that investigative itch however. Instead, I finished my story. Told how Jimmy’s head had struck the pavement. How I left him there to bleed out alone.
“Envelope?” I barely had to ask before Bastion was handing over more paper products. My favorite cousin had pen pals all across the country who exchanged old-fashioned missives. He said the tangible approach made them feel more connected. Whatever the reason, I was glad that I didn’t have to hunt down a post office to come up with a stamp.
“There’s a mailbox on the corner,” I told Slim. “We’ll walk there together. Drop this in. You’ll get it tomorrow. So the worst you’d have to deal with is one night in jail.”
And the worst I’d have to deal with would be begging my sister to sweet-talk the mailman so we could regain the letter. No wonder Slim eyed me distrustfully.
Except the flaw he brought up wasn’t the most relevant one. “Why,” he asked, “would a murderer write a letter like that to me?”
“Because she thinks you’re hot.” Grace’s gaze poured across him like sunshine in winter. His chest puffed back out, but for an entirely different reason this time.
Her task complete, my twin twitched her fingers in a come-hither gesture, not for Slim but for my benefit. Obediently, I handed the envelope over...
...And Grace turned it into a love letter. Puckered up her lips and kissed the back to create a heart-shaped lipstick stain.
“Now are you convinced?” I eyed Slim, trying to decide whether he’d run to the closest police station the moment we released him.
“Twenty-four hours,” he answered.
Not 100% convinced then.
Still, I’d take whatever I could get.
***
OF COURSE, SLEUTHING around Jimmy English’s death was secondary to stealing back Bastion’s pelt. My cousin’s abrupt return to health coupled with Mrs. Smythewhite’s supposed connection to our mother was an unmissable opportunity. Could we perhaps parlay that into an invitation, allowing Bastion to take an unchaperoned turn through their fortress of a house?
To that end, Grace gussied us up as rapidly as possible, then we piled in the car to head for the Smythewhite residence. Unfortunately, we didn’t make it even halfway there before Bastion’s face turned blotchy and sallow. “I need to....”
Justice barely managed to pull the car over before his ailing twin was retching in the storm gutter. Grace held his shoulders. Justice and I exchanged a glance consisting of equal parts misery and frustration.
“It’s time,” I said quietly, bringing back up the option I’d presented to the group—and that had been roundly rejected—a few minutes earlier. The Smythewhite mansion had proven impenetrable when I tried to break in two nights earlier, and it had been too full of strangers to search properly during the benefit party last night. With Bastion declining again and unable to pinpoint his pelt the easy way, we needed to send in someone who could spend serious time tearing the Smythewhite residence apart.
The obvious person was me. And a want ad in the back of the newspaper had suggested a long-term way to insinuate myself into the Smythewhite family.
Justice, unfortunately, was adamantly opposed to the notion of denning with murderers and thieves. “You think that’s wise? You don’t think that’s just asking to have your wolfsfell stolen also?”
“Four days, Justice. It’s been four days since this started.”
Four out of seven. Eighty-odd hours of Bastion’s life remaining.
Neither of us missed the fact that I hadn’t answered his question. What I planned wasn’t wise. But Bastion had so little time remaining....
No wonder Justice ceded my point even though his fingers whitened as they reopened the door and helped his twin back inside the vehicle. “Straight there?”
“No. We’ll swing by the motel first. These clothes were great for visiting, but they won’t work for a job interview.”
I glanced in the rear-view mirror, fully expecting a snarky response from my twin. After all, my wardrobe never lived up to her standards.
But Grace was instead bowing down over the fetal form of Bastion. Her fingers ran through his curls like a wolf tongue licking her pup back to health.
I winced. He looked even worse now. His brow was sweaty. His whole body was shaking.
“Take my pelt.” I started to hand it over, but Grace raised a finger to her lips to silence me.
Justice translated. “Save it. We might need the boost to get him up the stairs at the motel.”
I hated this. Hated being unable to fix my cousin. Hated being on the outside looking in on a family that neither wanted nor needed my help.
Hated what I saw ten minutes later when we slowed at the approach to the motel parking lot. Luggage—our luggage—squatting on the concrete walkway that joined all of the second-story rooms together. Who had been inside our rented den and why had they left our possessions sitting out in the sun to be stolen...?
“Keep driving.” My order was louder than it should have been. Bastion groaned. I could feel my twin dishing out the evil eye behind me.
But Justice obeyed. Whipped the car into an alley just as I caught sight of a familiar face behind the wheel of a vehicle heading in the opposite direction.
What was Luke doing cruising past our motel? Had he been responsible for our eviction? Or was he hunting the “werewolf” who’d fled from him during last night’s thunderstorm?
Not that it mattered. Whether our eviction was due to Luke’s string-pulling, to Slim changing his mind about calling the cops, or to an overdrawn credit card, we were now homeless. We couldn’t risk gathering our gear when anyone might be waiting for us in that parking lot.
Which meant I’d be heading to a job interview dressed like an heiress. And there wouldn’t be an opportunity later for my wolf energy to perk up Bastion’s ailing strength.
This time when I handed my pelt back to Grace, she didn’t protest. This time, she merely wrapped up our dying cousin in my recently shed skin.