He stepped in something that slid under his boot. Marlow hopped back and tilted the light down. A splatter of blood on the floor, bright red as the light hit it, with his boot print in the middle.
The wolf had come through the front door. He had probably hit the living room first, maybe while Victor hid. Then, when Victor thought Barney was occupied, he’d… What? Marlow turned the beam of the torch onto the stairs and tracked the route of escape straight down and out the front door. If he’d been in the kitchen instead, why not go straight out the back door?
Marlow filed that question away to answer later and pulled his gun. He held it low and ready by his side as he edged into the kitchen, weight balanced on the balls of his feet in case he had to move fast.
Most of the blood was in here. It splattered the floor and over the kitchen surfaces, a single long spray of it up the wall. Marlow was careful not to step in it this time as he circled around the island.
Barney lay on the ground in front of the kitchen sink. He was dead. It was the only time a wolf was human under a full moon. He was also naked, which made cause of death easy to pinpoint—a bullet hole in his chest, the skin singed around the edges. Marlow crouched down to check his pulse anyhow, fingers pressed against the slack, still-warm skin.
Nothing.
“Charlie-fifty, you there?” he said into the radio. “We’ve a dead wolf in here and no sign of a null. Where are you?”
“Door’s locked,” Franklin said, his voice sullen. “If a wolf can’t kick it in, I can’t either. Open up.”
Marlow stood up and headed over to the back door to let Franklin in. It wasn’t locked. The handle turned easily when he grabbed it.
So what the hell had taken him so long to make entry?
The pieces came together just as Franklin rammed his shoulder into the door from the other side. It smashed into Marlow. He’d already started to back up, but it was reinforced metal, and it hit his chest hard enough that he was knocked backward.
He hit the floor and skidded until he smacked into the base of the fridge. He felt the curved metal dent under the impact, and the gun slipped from his hand.
“I’d hoped the wolf would do you in,” Franklin said as he walked into the kitchen. He rubbed his shoulder with one hand as he talked, his thumb dug down into the joint. “Give you a bit of dignity; let you go out the way you want to go.”
Marlow snorted. Or tried to. His lungs hadn’t quite recovered from the door yet. He got his elbow under him and tried to push himself up.
“I don’t want to die by wolf,” he said.
Franklin kicked his arm out from under him. The ground came up fast, and Marlow saw stars as his head bounced off the floor. His voice stayed conversational as he put his boot on Marlow’s wrist and pressed down.“Then why are you fucking one? I mean, seriously? You know better. If I didn’t kill you tonight, he would have sooner or later. At least you know I’ll remember your face.”
The pain in his wrist actually helped. It was immediate, occurring, and Marlow had abused his body enough over the years that it knew what to focus on. The ache from being clotheslined by the door faded into the background, and the hot, fresh pain that radiated up his arm cleared the fog from Marlow’s head.
“You’re Piper’s second?” he said. “And I thought it was Bennett. I owe her an apology.”
“You owe me an apology,” Franklin said. “You thought I was an idiot, right?”
Marlow shook his head. “You don’t get to Night Shift by being stupid,” he said. “I just thought you were unlikeable.”
Anger thinned Franklin’s lips over his teeth for a moment, and he put his weight on Marlow’s wrist. Then he got himself under control again.
“Always a smartass,” he said. “I do what needs to be done, and Iknowwhat needs to be done. It’s a wolf’s world, Marlow, and if you want to live in it, you have to live by their rules. It doesn’t count if it happens under the full moon.”
“You tried to kidnap Lance Rilkes under a new moon,” Marlow pointed out. “How does that fit?”
Franklin looked at him for a second and then grinned. It was wide and seemed entirely genuine.
“That’s your problem, Kit,” he said. “Too smart for your own good. The others buy that shit, but you see right through it. Too clever to be conned, and too moral to corrupt.”
“You could try,” Marlow said. “Who knows. I went along with Piper for way too long.”
Franklin shook his head. “The penny-ante stuff,” he said. “Piper always said you’d balk if you got too deep. That’s why he was so easy to convince that it was you who’d squealed.”
He winked.
Marlow drove the heel of his hand into the side of Franklin’s braced knee. It wasn’texactlyhow he’d wrecked his, but the torn-gristle pop of it sounded very similar. Franklin made a wet retch of sound in the back of his throat as his knee bent the wrong way. He lurched backward, and Marlow scrambled to his feet.
He tackled Franklin, shoulder aimed at the vulnerable slice of flesh where the Kevlar vest rode up, and took them both to the ground. Franklin grunted and hammered punches into Marlow’s ribs and back as they scuffled in the blood. He managed to flip them over and pinned Marlow down, his forearm jammed into Marlow’s throat.
