I poked Rafferty’s shoulder once, then again urgently and almost instantly. “Okay. Christ. Give me a chance,” he grumbled as he reached down to the floorboards for my laptop. He pulled it out of the computer bag, opened it up, and set it on his lap, swiveling it in my direction; then he fished back in the bag for my pencil. Once it was set up and ready to go, I typed in a question.
He turned to read it, but not before Cal peered around me and read it out loud. “Where’s our car, General Jack-off? General Jack-off?”
Rafferty shook his head. “Don’t ask. It’s a theme. Although the cat thing apparently got me promoted. And I left the car, Catch. I stripped it of ID-the license plate was stolen anyway-in case it gets towed. I need to sleep. To rest up for Suyolak. I can’t drive and do that. And the last time I let you drive, I got my license pulled. And you ended up in the pound because your rabies tag was expired. Some cops, they can’t just let you go with a warning, huh?”
My cousin’s sense of humor aside-the best place for it-leaving the car did make sense. Or… or maybe it meant he thought he wasn’t going to walk away from his battle with Suyolak. Worse, maybe he didn’t want to. The guilt, the burden of me; it was more than anyone should have to carry, but Rafferty wouldn’t do that. He wouldn’t give in. Anyone else would have. No Wolf alive would go on and on as he had, not even for family. They would’ve seen the sense long ago. Wolves prized family, prized pack, but we were also practical creatures.
Except for Rafferty. He hadn’t given me life to throw his own away, but what if I was gone? Before Suyolak, what if I fell into my wolf half and didn’t resurface? What happened if the next “episode” was the last episode? What would he do then? And how do you ask that? I hesitated, hit the CAPS LOCK for emphasis, then typed, HUNT NO MORE? And Cal, whose scent still had the hair along my spine bristling, faithfully repeated the three words. What was wrong with him anyway? Couldn’t he read without moving his lips? And Goodfellow, of course, jumped on the bandwagon. His mouth was faster than a speeding bullet, in all sorts of ways I didn’t want to think about, like all pucks, but definitely when it came to talking.
“Hunt no more? That’s dead for Wolves,” he pounced. “If you can’t take Suyolak, you’d better speak up so we can turn this parade around. I can think of better ways to die. Ten thousand at the very least.”
Rafferty ignored him, but this was a puck we were talking about. You couldn’t ignore one of them any more than you could a kindergarten class with each kid hyped up on five pounds of pure cane sugar. Goodfellow asked again… and again… and then again. That was when my cousin paralyzed the puck’s vocal cords. When Goodfellow turned in the seat and started to swing a quick and what looked like a lethal fist, Rafferty leaned out of reach and, unimpressed, said, “Keep it up and your hair will fall out, your eyes cross, and I’ll make you impotent for the rest of your long life.” His eyes flickered back and forth between the colors of a noontime sun and a setting one. “There’s immortal and there’s immortally limp dicked. Think about it. You’re asking me to kill a healer. ‘Do no harm’ has fallen by the wayside. Got it?”
He didn’t wait for the puck to ponder the pros and cons of yapping endlessly like a newborn cub versus being the bald, double-visioned actor on the erectile dysfunction drug commercials for the rest of eternity. Instead, Raff handed the computer to Cal, slid down, leaned against me, and went to sleep, but not before murmuring too low for human hearing, “I’m not leaving your furry ass, Catch. Got that? Never.”
I didn’t complain at his weight against me as he began to snore. He needed it. He’d been up all night driving, and I’d heard Cal ’s call for help when Suyolak’s little present got him. I might have been getting my tail half chewed off by that mutant cat, but I could still hear. I rested my muzzle on top of Rafferty’s head, my fur mixing with his hair. He never had cared that much about getting haircuts in the old days… in high school or college. He was just that kind of guy who waited until his girlfriend dragged him to a barber. He didn’t think about it at all now; he just chopped at it with scissors when it got too long and hit the Salvation Army when his clothes wore out. That was his life now with me. I wanted it to be better when I was gone. I hoped he meant what he said, because I didn’t want him throwing that life away on Suyolak.
“Did healing you somehow infect him with your attitude?” Robin frowned at Cal, his vocal cords working again as one hand checked his hair and the other checked his crotch. He gave a long exhalation of relief when he was assured he was as puckable as he ever was. I rolled my eyes. Pucks. They were enough to make a Wolf change his mind about the whole Humane Society’s neutering campaign.
“Half human, half monster, all attitude,” Cal replied mockingly. He had attitude all right, but he came by it honestly. I had my problems, but I wasn’t sure I would’ve exchanged them for his. Although his girlfriend… Kin or not, she was something. White fur-I’d always had a thing for white fur. It reminded me of snow, racing across it under the moon and stars, and having sex in the chill under a pine tree laden with icicles. Rafferty wasn’t the only one who needed to get laid.
“I’m starving. And if I’m starving, I know Delilah is,” Cal went on, idly searching my computer for games. I perked my ears up. Delilah, that was good; talk more about Delilah. “I can wait. Delilah probably could wait, but I doubt she will.”
A Wolf with appetites; I liked that. Of course at this point, any Wolf with a pulse was looking good. It had been a long, long time.
“That’s what drive-throughs and bad diners are made for, not to mention what you live for. I’ll stop at Omaha,” Niko said, not that concerned with his brother’s state of near starvation. “Did anyone-”
Cal interrupted him, “I was sick. I’m never sick. I could’ve died. I need to build my energy back up. At least-”
This time it was Niko’s turn to interrupt. A box of Twinkies was tossed over the top of the front seat to hit Cal squarely in the chest. That was a good interruption. Straight to the point. Niko was a man of few words and flying sugary snacks. I liked that in a human. “There,” he said sharply. “Happy? Convert your entire body to a Cal-shaped pile of sponge cake and crème. Now, may I continue?”
Cal immediately smelled contrite-more so than he would have for just annoying his brother. He’d said something to Niko that had sharply hit home, cut deeply to the bone. I didn’t know what it was, but he must’ve felt genuinely bad, because he let the Twinkies drop carelessly to the floorboards, which was a crime. I loved Twinkies. “Yeah, sorry. I was being a fucking idiot as usual. I’m listening now,” he responded quietly.
Okay, there was sorry and then there was stupid. He might not want a Twinkie, but I did. Before I could turn my head, though, and yip a protest, Niko exhaled and the scent of brooding worry faded to the more appropriate irritation. “Eat your Twinkies. You probably do need the energy.” He watched in the rearview mirror and waited while Cal unwrapped the first one, which I promptly snatched from his hand without disturbing Rafferty’s comfortable slump of sleep against me. Cal glared at me, which I ignored in crème- filled bliss, before he opened another. That was when Niko said, “Dr. Jones called again last night. Seattle professor Daniel Kirkland hasn’t been by his wife’s side for several days now, according to friends on the faculty, which is not just unusual. It’s unbelievable to them. They were the closest of couples. He has never given up hope and has never left her side since she slipped into a coma. They even said he typed on his computer with one hand while holding her hand with his other.” The computer he could’ve done his research on, found out the most likely location of Abelia-Roo’s clan… and Suyolak. “So there is a very good chance he is our man and our driver all in one. He might have hired men to do the stealing, but he didn’t trust anyone but himself to do the actual delivery.”