“For now, I think it’s safe to head back to the apartments,” Charlene said.

Carlos and I went to the car.  This time Grey and Jim joined us.  As soon as Jim settled into the front seat, he turned to Grey.

“Think we can stop somewhere to eat?  Our fridge is cleaned out.”

If their food supply had been like ours, I didn’t see how that was possible.

“Where do you put it all?” I said.

“In my stomach.”  He winked at me, which earned the bottom of his seat a nudge from Carlos.

“Nice bruise, by the way,” Jim said, studying my face.  “What’s the other guy look like?”

“He’s still breathing,” I said.

Jim grinned then faced forward.

Grey pulled out of the parking garage, stopping to pay before joining the slow stream of traffic.

“Gabby says Olivia is moving,” Grey said.  “She thinks a car maybe.”

“What direction?”

“So far, north.”

I nodded and hoped we wouldn’t need to follow her north.  It was cold enough here.

Grey turned a familiar corner and pulled toward the garage door.  The security guard opened the door and waited while our three vehicles drove in.

The security guard’s gaze stayed on Winifred as she got out.  Because of the robe she was wearing, she showed quite a bit of leg in the process.

“Excuse me, ma’am,” the older man said, looking at her.

I grinned at his emotion and waved everyone to keep moving.

“We’ll see you upstairs, Winifred,” I said.

Sam frowned at me and lingered enough that he walked beside me.

The guard watched us leave, making no move to say anything more to Winifred.

“Why are we just leaving her?” Sam asked as he stepped into the stairwell.

The door shut behind us, and I turned to peek out the narrow security window.  The guard was slowly walking toward Winifred.

“Because he’s sweet on her.  And worried that she’s walking around in a robe,” I said quietly.

“Sweet?” Sam said.

I glanced at him when I felt his unease.

“As Elders we can’t—”

“Hush.  Every woman wants to know she’s pretty.  Winifred just exposed herself on national TV.  Let her have this moment.”

I watched the man speak, though I couldn’t hear what he said.  Winifred blushed, smiled, said a few words to the man, and left him with a small wave.  She caught me grinning at her through the door.

“Time to go,” I said.

When I spun around, ready to sprint up the stairs, I almost took out Carlos.  He moved aside and followed me up.

It was a relief when he closed our apartment door behind us.

“Well, that was an exciting morning.  What should we do this afternoon to top it?”

“Rest,” Carlos said.

I wrinkled my nose and walked toward the fridge.

“Boring.  What are you going to make me for lunch?”

“What would you like?” he asked from just behind me.

Since leaving the building that morning, I’d felt very little from him through our connection.  Now, however, it surged forward.  His complete devotion wrapped me in a mental blanket.

“What are my options?”

His hands settled on my shoulders.

“Burgers, pizza, cereal?”

I grinned and slowly turned.  His gaze found and held mine.

“You speak my language,” I said.

He gently touched my face.

“How long will it take for this to fade?”

I shrugged.

“I dunno.  A week.  Maybe a bit more.  Why?”

“Because I want to kiss you.”

My pulse leapt.

“So kiss me.”

He shook his head slowly.

“I won’t hurt you.”

I put on a fake pout, and he swatted my butt.

“Hey,” I said.  “What happened to not hurting me?”

“Go sit, and I’ll cook for you.”

I went to the couch and turned on the TV.  A news feed ran on the bottom.

“Check this out,” I said as I read it.

Carlos closed the refrigerator and came to stand beside me.

Live air interruption causes widespread speculation.  Are werewolves real?  Tune in at 10.

“Well, we seem to have gotten the attention Bethi wanted,” I said, lifting the remote to check other stations.  Similar messages displayed on several of the channels.  One mentioned Blake by name and had a phone number for anyone to call with his whereabouts.

Carlos drifted away from me.  While I continued to watch the coverage, he made burgers.

“Crap,” I said when one of the stations cut over from the regular programming with images of Carlos hitting one of the Urbat in the head.  The angle was from behind the Urbat so the camera caught me too.  Full face.

Carlos came to stand by me again.  We watched the replay together as the men fell to their knees, and Carlos knocked them both out.  The screen changed to close ups of both of our faces.

“Well, the good news is that I’m barely recognizable thanks to the bruise and swelling.”

“Grey and Winifred are coming to watch.”

A second later, the door opened.  I kept my eyes glued to the TV.  Someone had obviously gone through the security footage.  In addition to the close ups of Carlos and me, there were grainy images of Gabby, Luke, and Sam.  Clay was fairly ambiguous because of his hair, and Bethi often walked with her head down.  Somehow, each image only managed to catch the back of Grey’s head, and he consistently blocked any clear image of Charlene.

Well, that’s convenient for her, I thought.

“Perhaps we should leave New York,” Winifred said.

“We don’t know where we’d be going yet,” I said.  “I think we should hole up, let this blow over a little bit, and give Gabby a chance to figure out where Olivia is headed and Bethi a chance to dream some answers.”

“I think Isabelle is right,” Grey said.  “We are safer here than driving around out there.”

Winifred sighed heavily and nodded.

“Reach out to everyone, Grey, and let them know of the aftermath of what we’ve done.  We need to keep our people safe.”

He nodded as she stood and walked toward the door.

“I’ll speak with Bethi and see if she has any guesses where we might go from here if she doesn’t receive any new information from her dreams.”

Grey ate burgers with us as we continued to watch the news stream.  When he finished, he left to check on the others.  I didn’t move from the couch.

Reporters took to the streets, asking random people what they thought of the day’s revelation.  Some were still unaware and showed their shock.  Many claimed it was a hoax, as I’d anticipated.  That, in turn, led to several very detailed analyses done by “experts” on the live footage of Winifred shifting.

“How detailed can this report be if it was done in just a few hours?” I said under my breath as I listened to the current analyst claiming Winifred’s change to be a hoax.

I wanted to applaud the news anchor when she asked, “If this is a hoax, why then is there a large scale search being done for Blake Torrin, the named Urbat leader?”

They continued their debate for several minutes before the station cut to commercials.

“This is kind of fun,” I said, standing to get myself a glass of water.  “Who would have thought mere minutes of air time could turn into hours of speculation?  Do you want something to drink?”

“No, thank you.”

I went to the cupboard, grabbed a glass, and filled it at the faucet.

“You haven’t said what you think of everything,” I said, turning off the water.  I took a drink as I turned and almost spit water all over Carlos.

I swallowed quickly and scowled at him.

“You’ve got to stomp when you move around.  You’re going to kill me with this sneaking.”

“I like surprising you.”

“Really.  Why is that?”

“The surge of adrenaline,” he inhaled deeply, “changes your scent.”

“Um, I’m guessing in a good way?”

“Yes.”

“Hmm.  Well, you’re just going to have to find a different way to make your sniffer happy because scaring the daylights out of me for the rest of our lives isn’t going to cut it.”