Things had gone downhill after the reporters left. Lacey had been talking to Sheryl while Alex had been up on the dais with McDonald, Curtis, and the detective. Whatever they were saying, it wasn’t making him happy. She’d seen his eyes get that reflective flash she’d always thought was a trick of the light. Then she’d realized that both his hands were dripping blood. His claws had come out, and he was squeezing his hands into fists to hide them, which was making his palms bleed.
Mumbling an apology to Sheryl, Lacey had hurried onto the dais and taken his arm, saying she wasn’t feeling very well and asking him to take her home. That had snapped Alex out of whatever haze he’d been in, and he led her out of the building. His claws had retracted back to normal by the time they got to his truck, though he had to use a rag from under the seat to wipe off the blood.
It didn’t seem like Alex had wanted to talk on the drive to her place, so Lacey hadn’t said anything, but now that they were back in her apartment, she couldn’t contain her curiosity any longer. She glanced at him as she scooped some dry dog food into Leo’s bowl. At the sound, Leo trotted into the kitchen.
“Are you going to tell me what got you so upset at the press conference?” she asked Alex as she opened the fridge.
She didn’t feel like eating, but she’d figured out over the past few days that Alex needed food—frequently. She scanned the shelves, spotting the covered casserole that Wendy must have dropped off that morning while they were out. Lacey pulled off the foil and revealed beef and black bean burritos smothered in red sauce.
“You mean besides McDonald and the chief using the entire event to score political points with the television audience?” Alex asked caustically as he took the casserole out of her hands and slid it in the microwave.
Lacey couldn’t help noticing that they still seemed to work well together in the kitchen, even though everything had changed between them. “Yeah, besides that.”
Alex’s eyes flashed gold for a moment, and he let out a little growl. By rights, it should have freaked her out, but for some crazy reason, it didn’t. Was she really getting used to this whole werewolf thing?
“It was that prick from homicide. He told me that he was taking over the investigation, and that SWAT assistance was no longer required.”
She frowned. “But they wouldn’t have a case without you and the other guys from SWAT.”
“Tell me about it.”
Lacey chewed on her lower lip, remembering the sensation she’d gotten that he was more about finding the murderer than Kelsey and the other missing girls. “This guy knows what he’s doing, right?”
Alex shrugged. “I don’t know a lot about him…except for the fact that he’s one of Chief Curtis’s pet detectives. He runs around inserting himself into every case that might have high visibility. Curtis backed him up. He doesn’t want SWAT to have anything to do with the investigation.”
Her heart began to beat faster. “But we’re still going to keep looking for Kelsey too, right?”
Alex put gentle hands on her shoulders. “We’re going to keep looking for Kelsey until we find her. I won’t let anyone get in our way.”
Lacey gazed up at him. “Do you think Kelsey is still alive?”
“I do,” he said.
She was surprised by how much comfort those words gave her, and she found herself leaning into him. She’d almost forgotten what it felt like to have his big, warm hands on her.
His hands.
Crap!
She reached up to grab them, then flipped his hands palm up, expecting to see four deep puncture wounds in each. Instead, there were only some light pink marks that couldn’t even be called scratches.
“Your hands were bleeding when we left the press conference,” she said. “How can they possibly be healed up already?”
He laughed and carefully pulled his hands away. Then he reached over her head and opened the upper cabinet beside the stove, taking out two plates. “I guess that’s something Everly hasn’t gotten around to telling you yet. Werewolves heal faster than regular people. Simple puncture wounds usually heal up in a couple of minutes.”
The nonchalant way Alex said those insane words should have shocked Lacey, but she supposed she was past that. Maybe she was finally coming to terms with the bizarre world she suddenly found herself living in.
Over the past few days, she’d spent a lot of time with Everly and Wendy. They’d both tried to get her to accept that knowing werewolves were real didn’t necessarily have to be such a big deal. She could understand why Everly was so invested in getting her on board, but she was a little shocked that Wendy had bought in so easily.
Still, she had to admit that she’d gotten to the point where she could truthfully say that Alex and his pack mates—God, she felt ridiculous saying that—weren’t monsters. But it was still a lot to take in all at once. None of that had kept her from being curious, though.
“There are some things that Everly didn’t want to tell me about. She said they should come from you instead. I guess this is one of those things.”
Alex nodded and went back to getting the stuff out for dinner while she got them iced tea to drink. She carried their glasses out to the coffee table in the living room. She hadn’t been able to eat at the kitchen table since Kelsey disappeared. It just didn’t feel right eating there without her sister.
“Did it hurt when you dug your claws into your palms?” she asked as she walked back into the kitchen.
Alex shrugged. “Yeah, but that was the idea. I was hoping the pain would get me to focus on something other than what that jerk from homicide was saying so I wouldn’t shift right there in front of them.”
