“I’ll see that you get your phone back, so you can try to contact your parents. I have just one more question, then I’ll make sure that you get some food, too.”
“Go on,” he snapped. “There’s nothin’ stopping you.”
“Did Emily know any of your shifter friends? Did she meet any of them, when she visited you the year before she died?”
“No.Godno. She was here with her husband. We hung out doing touristy things. Touring local parks and caves and shit. Not hanging out with my friends. Not that I really had many shifter friends, back then.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah, I’m sure. Do you really think she was infected? That someone, what? Bit her? Scratched her?”
“I don’t know,” I told him. “But I think it’s a possibility.”
“You think it was some kind of accident? Like maybe she startled someone in cat form? I mean, you don’t really think it was murder, right? I mean there are easier ways to kill someone.”
“Yes, there are. And no, I don’t think killing her was the point. Assuming shewaskilled.” I stood and moved my chair back to its position against the wall. I wasn’t prepared yet to answer the rest of his questions. “Hey Nolan, do you know, or have you ever heard of a woman named Brittany Walsh?”
“No. I knew a Brittany Edison a few years back. Can’t say I’ve ever known a Walsh, though.”
“What about…” I pulled the folded obituaries from my pocket and scanned Brittany’s until I found her maiden name. “Brittany Heller? Ever meet her?”
“No. The only Heller I ever met was old man Heller. Grouchy old dude who used to hunt on the common run, years ago. He told me once that he was an alcoholic for the first forty years of his life, and he only quit drinkin’ after he was infected, because it cost him too damn much, then, to get drunk. And he never could stay drunk anyway.”
I managed a smile.
“He was definitely a dude, though. Not a Brittany.”
“Okay. Thanks. I’ll have some lunch sent down.”
“Charley, when am I getting out of here?”
“I’m working on that,” I assured him as I turned back from the doorway to face him.
“But I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill Yvette Mattheson, and I sure as hell didn’t kill my own sister. You’ve got the wrong guy locked up.”
“That may be true. But it’s as much for your protection as anything.” I wasn’t sure what else to tell him. I truly didn’t believe he’d killed Emily. But I couldn’t tell how much to believe of everything else he’d told us. And I still couldn’t be sure Bishop wouldn’t kill him on sight.
“Isn’t that my choice, though? Shouldn’t I get to decide whether or not I need protection? I could just leave for a while. Head to one of the free zones.”
“Not while you’re still a person of interest. I’m sorry, Nolan.” Then I left before his grief could influence my objectivity.
EIGHT
Afragrant carpet of moldering leaves and pine needles sank beneath my paws as I ran, my claws digging for purchase in the slick spots. The air was clean, clear, and a more than a little chilly that late at night, and though it was pitch black out, thanks to the clouds covering the sliver of moon already riding low on the horizon, I could see very well. My feline eyes were perfectly suited to take advantage of light humans wouldn’t even be able to register.
In the northern zone, the two places shifters were most likely to gather were the common run and the Fat Cat, which made it difficult for me to indulge in solitude during normal-people hours. But at three am, I had the common run to myself, as near as I could tell.
Wind ruffled my fur as I ran. My breath puffed up in little white clouds. My lungs—and my legs—gloried in the blissful burn of exertion.
I ran as far and as fast as I could, and when I could go no farther, no longer, I collapsed in a pile of leaves and rolled around in it, huffing in indignation when an entire family of mice fled squealing from my invasion of their territory.
Fortunately for them, I wasn’t hungry.
I blinked up at the sky, watching as clouds rolled slowly across it, briefly revealing that silver of a moon. Tiny, bright flashes of starlight seemed to swell as I stared at them, oblivious, on a cosmic scale, to my petty human—and shifter—troubles.
The sky always felt so serene out here. A velvet expanse of peace and quiet from my perspective, even though I knew the reality, if I could travel out there, might feel much different.
I mean, how peaceful could giant balls of flaming gas really be, up close?
