Sadie Hart (10 page)

“No. It’s not your job.”

“As the Hound on her case, actually, it
is.”

Caine shook his head. “They don’t deserve to
hear it from a person they’ve never met. The Rawsons deserve to
hear it from me.”

Caine met Brandt’s gaze, saw the
understanding clear in the wolfhound’s gaze. About Claire. About
Holly. About everything. Caine hoped he was wrong, that they’d all
read too much into a bloodstained sheet of paper, but he doubted
it. Which meant if he didn’t walk away right now, the Rawsons
weren’t the only family he’d have to face.

And one was hard enough.

“Take care of yourself,” Caine said, and
walked away. This time, she didn’t call out and he didn’t look
back.

Chapter Eight

Ollie watched
him go, the shadows reaching out to tug him close, his pale skin
vanishing under the evening haze long before he reached the sleek
black car. Evening had a way of making things darker, despite the
shreds of light still lingering on the horizon. Dusk came with a
haze that seemed to linger, haunting the edges of distant trees and
bushes.

She closed her eyes and listened for the soft
thunk of the car door, the rumble of an engine, the fade of tires
over a dirt road. Her brother stepped up beside her, one hand
finding her shoulder as he moved around her to get a look at her
face. “Ol?”

She hadn’t missed the desolation in Caine’s
eyes. Not that she could blame him. She didn’t really want to be
the one to tell the Rawsons that their daughter had died. The
moment he’d refused, relief had formed a cold knot in her belly,
enough to make her want to be sick, but she had pressed a hand to
her stomach and turned away. Back to the crime scene tape, slowly
vanishing under the coming of darkness. “I should have reminded him
that I was there when she died. Her parents...”

Brandt squeezed her shoulder. “It’s his
place, Ol, not yours.”

She opened her mouth to protest when Brandt
shook his head before she could say another word.

“Her family deserves the time alone. As the
Sanctuary Falls alpha, he’s as much a family member as any of their
pack. You are not.” Her shoulders slumped, and Brandt gave her a
sympathetic smile. “Besides, you need sleep. I don’t even want to
know how long you’ve been running.”

This time when Brandt ushered her back
towards the house, Ollie let him, Star trooping in on their heels.
Nana sat in her recliner, yarn spread out over her lap as she
crocheted. She saw the worry in her grandmother’s eyes as Brandt
escorted her down the hall to her room. Ollie didn’t have the
strength left to protest, readying herself for bed in a state of
sleep deprivation and emotional exhaustion.

By the time she’d curled up under the covers,
Star stretched out next to her, the house had fallen silent. Night
had cast the old sycamore tree outside her window into a shadowy
silhouette, the tree darker than the sky, but it was still nothing
more than a shadow. The wind rustled softly, and a branch scraped
over the glass. The familiar sound tugged heavily at her eyelids.
It came again, soft. A whisper much like the sandman in her ear,
and Ollie let herself drift easily into sleep.

When the quiet scrape came again it roused
her gently from sleep, and she blinked blearily into the complete
blackness that had settled over her room. Star snored softly beside
her, a quiet, rattling huff of breath, followed by the twitch of
her feet shuffling against the sheets. Ollie smiled; another
squirrel dream, most likely. She touched the collie softly on one
shoulder and waited for sleep to take her again.

The wind rustled through the tree again, a
branch scuffing down the window, only this time the soft scratch
lifted the hairs down her neck and left her rigid with a fast bolt
of fear. Ollie forced herself to laugh, passing her fears of as the
stress of the past few days obviously catching up to her. Then it
sounded again, and Star jerked at her side, a warning growl
rumbling from the collie. Dark in the already black room.

She reached a hand out, burying it in Star’s
silky fur in a quiet order to hush. She roused her inner-dog, the
wolfhound coming lazily to the surface, almost sleepy, and Ollie
waited. The branch scraped the glass again, and this time neither
her wolfhound nor Star seemed at all perturbed by the sound. She
blew out a breath. For all she knew, Star could have simply had a
nightmare and stirred herself awake. It was crazy to start jumping
at shadows now.

Ollie shook her head and slipped out of bed,
her bare feet touching the cool hardwood as she padded over to her
slippers and slid them on, her dog-half lending her eyesight an
extra boost of night vision. Frayed nerves gnawed at her gut and
left her unsteady, shaky, neither of which boded well for
sleep.

“A nice warm drink, then,” she told her dog,
leaning over to give Star a kiss across her long muzzle. “Need to
go outside?”

Like a flash, the collie was off the bed and
prancing in front of her bedroom door, nails clicking softly
against the wood. Tick-tick-tick. Her long tail swayed, brushing
against the wall. The branch scraped behind her. All normal sounds
of a normal night. So why couldn’t she settle her jumpy stomach and
go back to sleep?

Fresh air would do them both some good.
Still, Ollie turned and slid her gun out of the nightstand drawer,
tucking it away in the pocket of her robe as she tugged it on. As
stupid as she thought she was being, she couldn’t bring herself to
be that dumb. The Hunter had made it obvious that this was
personal, that he’d come for her sooner or later. She couldn’t
sleep, the dog needed out, and what better way to settle herself
down than a walk in her yard?

But she wouldn’t do it unarmed.

“Okay, girl,” she said and twisted the door
handle, letting Star bound down the hall towards the kitchen. Ollie
followed her out, unlocking and tugging open the sliding glass door
so that the night air slipped quietly into the kitchen, cool enough
to raise goosebumps over her arms. She tugged the robe closed,
cinching the belt more tightly around her waist, and slipped
outside. Star was already off the back porch when Ollie whistled
out, calling her back. Nor was she about to let the dog go running
helter-skelter around the back yard again. Not after last time.

It’d been too close. Way too close. “With
me,” Ollie said, and Star swung around to pace at her hip, head
lowered to the ground. Short, snuffling sounds rose as Star sniffed
her way across the grass, leading them out to the field and the
crime scene still quartered off.

Even the birds had quieted with sleep,
leaving the night silent. Ollie longed to shift and let the
wolfhound out to run, to chase this restlessness out of her and
exhaust herself to the point where even a bomb going off wouldn’t
wake her. But that’d be just as stupid as leaving her gun
inside.

“Hurry up,” she told Star as the collie
circled in the long, tangled grass. A small sliver of a moon cast
ribbons of light across the field, nothing more than soft breaks in
the shadows. Nothing good enough to see by, at least not without
her inner wolfhound peeking out.

A branch snapped to her left and Ollie
stiffened, turning. Her hand found her gun, the familiar press of
it against her palm instantly soothing. Star circled a few more
loops before squatting, and Ollie found herself glancing back up at
the house, a massive silhouette that stood out in clear contrast
against the night sky. Stars blanketed the sky around it.

Grass rustled behind her and Ollie headed
back for the house. “Good girl,” she said, recognizing the fast,
prancy trot behind her. Star staggered, drawing up suddenly short
and Ollie found herself turning. A low grumbling, growl sounded in
the darkness, and she tightened her hand on the gun. “Star,” she
called softly, but the collie didn’t even flick an ear her way.

Star’s long, tapered muzzle lifted to reveal
teeth, gray in the darkness, and she growled again, body stiff.
Ollie’s heart picked up speed, a steady thump-thump-thump that
suddenly had her breathless. “Coward,” she whispered, taunting.
“You want me to run; you have to come out of the shadows for
that.”

A click sounded in the darkness. The safety
of a gun switching off? A snap of a branch? Her heart was thudding
so fast Ollie could barely hear beyond its pounding and the rush of
blood in her head. “Come here. Look me in the eye while you shoot
me. I’m not scared of you.”

Though the slamming, panicky race of her
pulse told a very different story.

Ollie forced her leaden legs to take a step
closer to her dog, closer to the sound. The Hunter, out here
playing with her again. The grass rustled, a demon stalking through
it in a rush, and Ollie pulled out her gun, hands shaky as she
jerked it up to take aim. Star lurched forward a few steps and
Ollie opened her lips to scream at her, to call her back, “Leave
it” on the tip of her tongue, when a coyote yipped from the woods.
A second answered out in the field, their throaty cries shattering
the silence.

Another click as a branch snapped and the
tension drained out of her shoulders. Idiot. Ollie squeezed her
eyes shut, instantly hating the tears that came with the rush of
fear pouring out of her. Dammit. She was letting him win. Letting
him get to her.

“Let’s go now.” Ollie turned and headed back
for the house. Star was still growling, but the dog stayed with
her, darting ahead and then turning around to snarl at the shadows
behind her. Ollie headed straight up the back steps, spine
straight, and jerked open the sliding glass door, ushering her dog
inside and slamming it shut.

Safe inside, she yanked a beer out of the
fridge and headed for the living room. Sleep was already a distant
memory, one she didn’t think she’d revisit any time soon. But a
cold beer and “I Love Lucy” reruns, that might give those demons
nibbling away at her resolve a run for their money. Besides, when
all else failed, she’d wake Brandt up, put him on watch duty, and
drink herself stupid.

“Can’t sleep?”

Speak of the devil. Ollie twisted to see her
brother standing in the hall, flannel pajama pants loose around his
hips, his ratty t-shirt rumpled with sleep, and a gun in one hand.
She shook her head. “No. Coyotes.”

Among other things. She pressed her lips
tight against the rest of the words. He sighed.

“Then I guess I’m joining you.” He sank down
onto the other side of the couch.

The Lucy episode was almost finished when
exhaustion won out, Brandt having started snoring long before her.
But somehow not even the distant calls of coyotes managed to keep
her awake in the end.

***

Sawyer flopped down on the wheelie chair next
to her, kicking her feet up on the desk as she glanced over at
Ollie. “The lab techs are ranting up a storm. He ‘contaminated
evidence’ and all that jazz.”

The lioness lifted both eyebrows, and Ollie
found herself laughing for the first time that day. “I could barely
even smell him on it, but the latex gloves he used to write,
yeah...”

Still, she’d already had ‘the chat’ with
Lennox about botching up what could have been evidence, even if her
superior had understood. Ollie had done what she could with it,
scented it, poked at it with her magick, anything to see if there
were clues. And when she’d been done, Brandt had taken over.
Nothing, nada, zip. “He’s going to get away with yet another one at
this rate.”

Sawyer closed her eyes. “God, I hate serial
killers. I thought...”

The words shriveled up and died in her
throat, one second a sentence was on its way out into the world,
and the next the lioness had clamped it down with a sharp sigh and
glanced away. Ollie understood. The office buzzed with activity,
Hounds milling from desk to desk, phones ringing. They had a stack
of cases to go through, paperwork to fill out, and Ollie could
barely keep herself in her seat. “Let’s go.”

Sawyer jerked her feet off the desk,
startled, the chair swiveling with the sudden motion. The slim
woman’s hand caught the desk with a loud slap, causing several
Hounds to jerk their way. “Where?”

Ollie really didn’t care. Just out. “For a
walk. Lunch. It is past our lunch break.”

Without another word, they left the stack of
unfinished work behind and headed out the door. The cool autumn air
settled her in a way that the building behind her used to. It eased
the nerves running wild under her skin, and Ollie forced herself to
suck it down deep, letting the brisk wind fill her lungs until she
let it all go with a sigh.

Sawyer stepped up behind her, holding out her
leather jacket. Ollie took it with a smile. “Thanks.”

She slipped it on, stuffing both hands in her
pockets, and headed down the road. For a while they just walked.
The trees were filled with color—reds and golds, canary-bright
yellows and the lingering touches of green, poignant reminders of
summer. An occasional car horn blared from the street, the rumble
of traffic filling the air around the Enforcement office. And
threading through it all was the nearly constant chatter of people
on cell phones merrily going about their ordinary lives.

Some days Ollie wondered what it’d be like to
be so naïve. To be able to walk down the street and forget there
was a killer on the loose. Be able to live with the belief that
it’d never happen to her. Ollie paused on the corner in front of
the park, glancing both ways before crossing the street.

It wasn’t until they were both surrounded by
trees, the scent of decomposing leaves and acorns strong in the
air, that Ollie spoke, her voice a low, half-whisper. “I always
wanted this stupid case.”

She glanced over her shoulder in time to see
a smile steal over Sawyer’s face. “Not me.”