“We’ll find him,” I said again.
“Don’t want him found,” Granny turned her gaze back to Jame, who was staring blankly into the middle distance, unmoving as she stroked his hair. “Just want him dead.”
~~~
I sent Jean home to get some sleep, knowing the Wolfes would keep Jame safe in the hospital, as would all the other creatures and humans who worked there.
I was still trying to process what Jame had said. There was a vampire, an old vampire who wanted Rossi’s attention. Ben was kidnapped, still alive, and Rossi had been given two blood messages, one on Sven’s dead body, one on Jame’s beaten body.
What did the messages say?
As dawn crept up over the eastern sky, pulling long shadows away from the town, I found myself sitting outside Rossi’s house. He probably wasn’t in. Probably was still hunting, just like the rest of the Wolfe family was out hunting.
Just like every vampire in Ordinary was out hunting.
But I needed to talk with him. Needed to know what those messages meant.
I got out of the Jeep, knocked on the door.
The house was dark.
No one answered. No one was home. Something about that felt oddly final, as if without Rossi, the old place went from home to mausoleum.
I drove. I wanted to stop for coffee, but it was early enough that even the drive-thrus were still closed.
I didn’t know where Jake was staying, but Ryder would.
I knocked on his door, and the sound of footsteps reached me through the door. There was a pause, which I figured was him looking out through the peephole. Then the door opened.
“Hey, Delaney, come on in.” Ryder looked like he hadn’t slept all night, and from the spots of mud at his jeans’ hem, was still wearing the same clothes from yesterday. “Coffee?”
“Gods, yes.”
He headed into the kitchen and I followed him. “You get any sleep last night?”
He shook his head and reached into the cupboard to get out a mug. “Jake’s missing.”
I sighed and sat on the barstool at the island. “How do you know?”
“His phone won’t pick up. I drove over to the Nordic, and he wasn’t there. Said he checked out yesterday morning.”
“Why were you looking for Jake?”
He poured coffee into the mug, then into another mug that was already on the counter. Turned with both in his hands, offered me one.
“After finding Jame in all that blood. Seeing him shifted...He’s a werewolf, right?”
I nodded, drank. The coffee was thick and hot. I wanted to crawl into the cup and pretend the world didn’t exist.
“I needed to update him. Tell him about Jame. About werewolves being in town.”
“Were you going to tell him about the gods?”
“I don’t know. No?” He shrugged at my look. “I’m still not sure I believe that they’re here, that they’re real. Until I know, really know, I probably won’t bring it up.”
“Being fetch-boy to a god isn’t enough?”
“That was...Yeah, that was weird. But what proof do I have that he’s really a god? He could just be something else.”
