Chapter Ten
MARLOW DIDN’T HAVEmuch family. There was an aunt out in Julian, a couple of cousins. They traded Christmas cards once a year and sent birthday wishes online if they were in time.
He knew more about Jenny Oldman’s life.
She was single, a realtor, loved musicals and shoes. The worst thing about pregnancy was how much she had to pee. Her wife had been the one who talked her into IVF—“I had four kids and custody of the gerbils. I didn’t need any more appetites in my house.”—and then broke up with her for a dental hygienist, “living the cliche!”
Jenny could also juice pineapples with her bare hands. Her fingers dug into Marlow’s arm hard enough he was sure he’d have a bruise later as she breathed through her contractions.
“Fuck fuck fuck,” she panted as sweat dripped off her face. “Fuuuuuuuccccck.”
Pippa, the midwife, timed the contraction on her phone.
“Nearly there,” the hack said over her shoulder. “Fucking construction! What did the wolvesdolast night, dig up the fucking roads?”
She braked hard in front of the blocked-off section of road, reversed, and took the detour that pointed down the road to the right. The back of her neck was sweaty, and there were already wolves on the street. Two of them had nearly run the cab off the road a few minutes before when they’d side-swiped it in the middle of their fight over a torn-up deer carcass.
“Talk to me!” Jenny demanded in a thin, anxious voice. Her fingers pinched Marlow’s arm as she squeezed. “Tell me what’s going on!”
“That Night Shift killer is still on the streets,” the hack offered up. “I heard he’deatenparts of the body.”
Jenny made a thin, discontented noise in her throat. “What?”
“I didn’t see that on any of the news channels,” Pippa said, with a disapproving glance at the hack. “It’s just fear-mongering. The truth is bad enough.”
She gave Jenny’s knee a reassuring pat. Jenny swore at her, and the hack finally turned onto the road into the hospital. It was already in lockdown; shutters slammed down over the doors and windows and armed guards on the roof.
They weren’t Night Shift, Marlow reminded himself as the back of his neck crawled with panic. They wouldn’t recognize him from up there. Not even through the scope of a rifle.
The hack spun the wheel and screeched into the bay in front of the entrance. Just as she straightened out of the turn, a wolf—fur gray-streaked black in the flash of the headlights—charged them. Marlow felt the jolt of impact as the car hit the wall of muscle and fur. It snarled and smacked its hands down on the hood. Long talons dug into the metal.
“Son of a bitch!” the hack cursed and slammed her foot down on the gas. The engine screamed, the smell of burnt oil sickly sharp in the back of the cab, as she tore through the forecourt with the wolf hunched on the car like a hood ornament. She turned hard to circle back around. The wheel spun under the flat of her palms, and the wolf was thrown from side to side. It hunched down, dug in, and wrinkled black lips back from ragged teeth in a snarl that showed the flesh caught in its teeth.
“Jenny,” Marlow said. “Could you hold on to Pippa for a second?”
She panted—whether from fear or labor, Marlow wasn’t sure—and transferred her death grip from Marlow’s arm to Pippa’s leg.
“Oh, my—” Pippa choked off whatever she was going to say with a wince and put her hand over Jenny’s.
Marlow unbuckled the seat belt and leaned into the front of the car. Slaver coated the windscreen, thick and viscous, as the wolf snapped and scraped at the glass.
“What are you doing?” the hack asked as she reached up to shove at him.
“Helping.”
Marlow braced his hand against the steering wheel and leaned on the horn. It blared out, an angry goose honk of machine-generated noise, and the wolf flattened its ears to its head. Yellow eyes narrowed—it wasn’t Cade under the fur, his amber-gold eyes were distinct—and it howled at him. Marlow kept his hand on the horn. The wolf shook its head, and its ears flapped wildly.
“Ha!” the hack said gleefully. “I should have thought of that.”
“Brake,” Marlow ordered as he braced himself against the passenger seat. Pippa and Jenny were already strapped in.
The hack took a deep breath and slammed both feet onto the brake. The car screeched to a halt, rear tires fishtailing and the sour smell of burnt rubber in the air. Jenny made a startled noise—half eep and half urp—and the wolf was thrown off the hood of the car. It hit the road and rolled twice, skin and fur scraped off on the tarmac. The wet, raw flesh had already started to heal as it scrambled onto all fours.
This time the hack didn’t need to be told what to do. She hit the gas, and the car roared forward. Marlow hung on to the passenger side headrest as he was thrown backward. This time the sound out of Jenny was definitely a retch. The bull bars caught the wolf just under the shoulders and flipped it up in the air. It landed on the hood hard enough to dent the metal and bounced up onto and over the roof. It hit the road with the sort of smack that broke bones, and this time, it took longer to get up.
The hack kept her foot down and jerked the wheel around hard as she U-turned back into the forecourt. This time, when she hit the brakes, Marlow let himself fall back into the seat.
Jenny had been sick on Pippa. It was mostly bile, but it smelled foul. The hospital doors opened, the hack popped the back door, and they maneuvered the awkward off-balance bulk of Jenny’s belly through the door ahead of her. On the other side of the doors, nurses waited, hands poised over the emergency lock button as Marlow and Piper hustled Jenny in. The hack brought up the rear with a running commentary of what the wolf was doing.
