September 12 | Before Daybreak
I had done this. I had turned Aurie Edison—in contempt of the law, undeterred by my lover's protestations, against my own best instincts—although the latter was least reliable. I was rapidly losing my mind, and I wondered if the change had only seemed like a good idea because I was going insane.
The she-wolf paced the length of the semi-reclined hospital bed and whimpered. Her tawny fur was sorrel and cocoa, and her eyes were terra-cotta. She had all four legs. She was a beautiful specimen, but an aberration. She circled the narrow cot with growing disquiet, foreclaws tearing at the bedding.
When she barked in distress, each sound caused Mys to flinch and glare at the hospital room door. I hurriedly donned my clothes, worried, too. Through the privacy window, I spotted our accomplice inconspicuously flirting up a nurse, even though it was well past visiting hours.
Kittie would signal if anyone headed our way, but we couldn't very well carry a wolf out. I skipped to the window overlooking the city. Jackpot. The bay window wasn't sealed. I got it wide enough for an oversized wolf to squeeze out. We could feasibly scale the building together.
However, the buffeting winds tried gamely to yank the window latch from my clutch. We were on the uppermost floor of the modest-height hospital. I fought the gusts until I had to accept we couldn't go outside in this weather.
Blinking against the rain, the smell of the storm made me crave expanses where I could run wild and free. As I receded into the private hospital room, closing the window behind me, I dug two fingers into my temples and rubbed at the pounding headache. I was deteriorating, but this wasn't about me.
My gaze flew to Haley. "Can you call it off?" I asked brusquely.
The teen shook her head. "The bad weather is to keep humans from seeing what we do tonight. When you explained the Overlay laws, I thought a storm could cloak our get-away. Now the hurricane is too close; it'll take hours to move it."
"Not to mention," Wallace said quietly, "she's too agitated to climb down." The dauntless angel approached the feral wolf on the bed. A menacing growl rumbled through the room, but he petted the canine, and his touch seemed to have a curative effect. The wolf hopped down and settled at his feet.
Mys pleaded with me, "You have to fix this."
"If I'm wrong about Cyprian being at the Ashivant sisters' estate in Ponchatoula, I don't know if I can." The words dropped from my mouth like lead. I hated to admit it. Inside every shifter was an animal spirit that was separate from us, but one with us. I had apparently freed the animal within Aurie while the woman was still without.
I jerked my head to fend off another flash of savagery that clawed and scraped in my skull. Aurie was a feral husk of what she should have been. Just like I was becoming. The flaky, briny redness drying on my lips was like a lover's kiss, and the call of the hunt was almost too loud to ignore. It had taken herculean effort to refrain from biting her more than once.
Soothing fingers traced my spine, but dervishes of foreboding swirled inside me. "Are you okay?" Mys whispered.
I pressed a hand to my head. "Nahin, I should've realized sooner that my partner was covering for Cyprian. God, I wish I knew how deep Tegan's involvement was. So many unanswered questions. I've never trusted my instincts less."
"She was behind the wheel," said Wallace, giving the she-wolf a vigorous scratch.
"Come again?" I wasn't sure I had heard him correctly.
The Guardian Angel looked at me. "You asked the depth of your partner's involvement. Detective Tegan Stoney was behind the wheel that night, trying to get help for Aurie. She saw Aurie disoriented and scared outside Century Luxe. Unfortunately, Tegan was too impaired, herself, to manage the big SUV she borrowed from her ex."
I choked, remembering the scent of coffee, mouthwash, and something else on her that night...liquor. When Tegan and I had arrived on the scene, I told myself what she did on the weekend was none of my business, but I knew she had been drinking.
"Are you saying Detective Stoney hit my sister? On accident?" Haley broke our stunned silence.
The angel tipped his head.
"Ho-ly shit," Mys uttered in disbelief.
"Why didn't you tell me sooner? You could've saved Aurie from falling into Cyprian's hands!" I almost shouted. Mys grabbed me and shushed me. The truth hit me, and I sobered. "You couldn't say anything that would affect her destiny."
"That's no longer an issue," Wallace said with a nod.
"How did Tegan get involved with Cyprian?" I drilled him.
"He sent his security guards after Aurelia, but they made it to street level too late to save her. One of his men saw Tegan leaving the scene."
"But, of course, the vampires fled Century Luxe before the ambulance and police arrived." I filled in the blanks.
"I protected Aurie as best I could. Her mother unwittingly picked up the slack by keeping information about the family from leaking to the press. Later, Cyprian used his knowledge of what Tegan had done to blackmail your partner into disrupting the investigation," Wallace explained.
Shaking my head, I pushed my hands through my hair and let my head fall back. My eyes stung, and my throat burned.
"Everything she did tonight, she did for you," he added. "There was no malicious intent. Tegan didn't believe she was delivering Aurie's actual ghost to an actual vampire. She knew Aurie was right here at the hospital. She thought a hoax could be exchanged for your exoneration."
Haley tore at her thumbnail, mumbling to herself, "Yeah, well, whatever Tegan was thinking doesn't matter. We've gotta get this wolf outta here."
I considered mentally flooding the she-wolf with the awareness we needed to get her downstairs without fanfare.
Wolves like me—raised with awareness of the flimsy barrier separating man-thoughts and the wildness waiting in our heads—had no trouble understanding the complex mental language. But this fledgling had never been trained. Her mind would struggle to retain the slippery concepts I tried to slide inside.
"Conjure a leash. We'll have to lead her," I said to Haley.
"Hand me the I.V. line. It's easier to work with something tangible than to create it out of thin air. The only question is...how do we get past the nurses' station with a wolf on a leash?" She blinked at me as Wallace tore the line from the drip and handed it to her. Running the plastic tubing through nimble, graceful fingers, Haley began to flatten it and transfigure it into a leather strap. With a few more strokes of her hand, she dropped the leash and collar into my palm.
"Haley, change into Aurie's hospital gown," Mys blurted.
My eyes lit up at what the Empath had in mind. "It could work," I said as Haley darted to the en suite to change.
Mys held up fresh scrubs from the wardrobe and peered at me for my opinion. "I could be a nurse?"
"Absolutely. Staff here have seen my face enough to know me. They won't stop Detective Zyr Ravani and Dr. Wallace Edison from transporting a sensitive patient."
"I'll use a glamor to appear bandaged and beat-up. One more thing." Haley brushed her father's shoulder's in passing, and the Guardian's unassuming business suit was covered by a white coat. "But the wolf?" she asked, hopping onto the hospital bed to play her part.
"An oversized police dog," I suggested.
"The divine comfort I've provided should last the duration of our descent, but try not to rile her," Wallace replied.
"What's Plan B?" Mys asked. Even out of the all-black joggers and hoodie, the pallor of their skin was impossible to miss. I raided the drawer for bandages and changed the dirty butterfly tape at their temple, wishing I had never gotten them into this.
"Plan B is we don't fuck up Plan A," I said wryly. Mys flashed a smile and pulled me into a kiss.
Opening the door of the private hospital room, the group of us filed out again—completely transformed from how we had entered. Mys pushed the hospital bed, and Haley lay immobile as I led the "police dog." Wallace strolled ahead of us to the elevators with the aloof gait of a busy physician. Kittie Cad looked up from flirting and grinned in surprise. Quickly excusing herself, she darted into the lift with us.
The good doctor blocked the elevator camera by holding up the patient's file until we reached the ground floor. No one seemed to notice when we ditched the props in the parking garage and sprinted across the car park to Kittie's Nissan, disappearing into the tempestuous night.