Code Wolf

Nevertheless, Derek didn’t even consider turning around. He blamed this brazen act on the wolf that tugged on his insides in need of freedom.

When the elevator doors slid open, Derek looked around and then turned to the left. Number 310 was halfway down the hallway. Double doors. Brass plaque.

He read: Dr. Riley Price, PhD.

Price...

The name had a familiar ring to it. Then again, there were probably hundreds of people in the city with that name. Riley was unusual, though. He decided it suited her.

Riley Price had walked away from the attack as if it had been a minor thing when he knew better than to believe that. He had felt the quakes that rocked her and could still see the expression of fear, hurt and confusion in her eyes.

His hand stopped in midair before his knuckles actually stuck wood. He closed his eyes, able to feel her in there, knowing such a connection with a human was also unusual.

He knocked three times. So that he wouldn’t frighten her more, he called out, “Seattle PD, Miss Price. I just need one more thing to help with this case. The security guard told me you were here. Can I have a minute? I know it’s late.”

Stepping closer to the door, Derek willed her to respond. To grant his request.

The strange thing was that she did.

Chapter 7

Riley hesitated before turning toward the door, annoyed by the interruption. The glass was still in her hand, though she had only managed one more sip.

There was a cop in the hallway. The front-desk guard wouldn’t have let him in without showing proper identification, which meant she didn’t have to worry about that. She could either respond and let him in or ignore him. He wasn’t going to break down the door if she stayed where she was. Eventually, he’d go away.

Riley found herself heading to the door, hoping that this would all be over with sooner, rather than later, and then she could get on with her life.

She paused with her hand on the knob. “What’s your name, Officer?”

The same deep voice that had requested a minute of her time said, “Miller. Detective Miller.”

“I’m quite busy, Detective.”

“I won’t take up much of your time, Dr. Price.”

Riley took a deep breath to settle down and opened the door. The man in the hallway appeared to be as surprised as she was when their eyes briefly met. There was something familiar about him.

“Do I know you, Detective Miller?” she asked, breaking the silence that had stretched for several seconds. “You seem familiar.”

“I’m sure we’ve probably passed on the street. I get around on the job, as you can imagine.”

That could have been true, Riley supposed. But besides the eyes, there was also something distinctive about his voice that caused her to tighten her grip on the glass in her hand.

His gaze drifted to the glass.

“For my nerves,” Riley explained.

The hunk in the hallway nodded. “You’ve had quite a night.”

Detective Miller truly was a hunk. He was tall, dark-haired, and obviously more badass than desk jockey in his worn leather jacket and fitted white T-shirt. He said, “Can I come in, or would you prefer answering questions like this?”

Her sudden interest in guys who looked as good as this detective surprised her.

This guy, at first glance, hit most of her attraction buttons. She liked the shaggy hair, his height and the shape of his face. Action and adventure were probably his middle names. But he was a cop, and she had vowed never to put herself through what her mother had suffered, never really knowing whether her husband would come home at night or be killed on the job.

With that thought firmly in mind, Riley stepped back, opened the door wider and gestured for him to come in with a wave of the glass.

The room was dim, lit only by a lamp on her desk, and yet she easily saw every move this detective made. She was glad the dimness wouldn’t allow him a closer look at the paleness of her face. Putting the desk between herself and the detective, she said, “What do you need from me?”

He hesitated for a few beats too long for her not to notice. “You’re a psychiatrist?” he asked.

“Psychologist. And very new to the business.”

“That’s good.”

“Why?”

“Maybe you can better manage what happened tonight and put it in perspective.”

He again glanced at the glass she was clutching.

Detective Miller’s voice was deep enough that its vibration quietly filled the room. His eyes, however, told another story, and made Riley imagine he was on good behavior and playing nice at the moment.

“What is it you need?” Riley repeated.

She set down the glass.

The detective had only walked far enough into the room to get a distant view of the window, but he looked there. “Will you be able to identify your attacker?”

“I’ll never forget his face,” she said. “I have a knack for remembering faces.”

More beats of silence passed and the detective still hadn’t said anything to warrant this visit. She had already told this same thing to the officers at the scene.

“I just needed to corroborate your place of employment, Dr. Price, and to make sure you’re credible,” he said.

“Credible how? What’s my job got to do with anything?”

“It makes things easier for us all if you are believable in your statements.”

Riley pointed to her throat. “Want to see the bruises that guy inflicted?”

She flushed when his gaze landed on her neck, and began to think this detective might have had another reason for coming here. However, since she had already allowed her imagination to run amok once tonight and had landed in trouble because of it, Riley waited for whatever he’d say next.

“I’m sorry to have brought this up so soon and to have disturbed you,” he said. “Tonight’s attack must have been terrible for you. So how about if I apologize for the intrusion and let you get on with whatever you were doing? You can answer more questions tomorrow.”

Riley nodded. “Thanks for showing some concern.”

She wasn’t going to vocalize how Detective Miller’s presence lent an air of safety to a truly awful night, or how knowing that guys like this were on the streets doing their job made her feel slightly better.

There was no way in hell she was going to submit to fanciful thoughts about this guy, or let herself believe he was strikingly similar in size and looks to the man that had come to her rescue on the street...because that would have been pathetic.

“Well, I’m glad to see that you’re going to be okay,” he said.

“Yes, thanks to two of your guys out there.”

The detective’s inquiring gaze returned. “Did you mention anything concrete about them to the officers who took your initial statement? Descriptions? Conversations?”

“It happened so fast, I’m afraid I wasn’t in good enough shape to speak or to note many details about who those guys were. One of the officers later suggested some ideas about who my rescuers might have been, though.”

“So you wouldn’t be able to identify them?”

Riley eyed her glass on the desk, wishing she actually liked whiskey and that she’d taken another sip if there was going to be much more of an interrogation.

“I was just glad they showed up in time to save my ass,” she said.

Detective Miller’s gaze was like being caught in a tractor beam. Never one to shy away from a challenge, Riley met that gaze with an equally studious one.

“Nothing?” Detective Miller asked. “You can’t describe them in any way?”

“Other than the fact that neither of them wore shirts, not much was clear...which is strange, when I think about it. So I’d prefer not to think about it and just be grateful.”

When the detective smiled, a further ripple of familiarity returned to her in a flash of repressed memory of the night’s events. Her rescuer had dark hair and light eyes that were a lot like this guy’s. They both had the same kind of unshaven face that highlighted handsome, angular features. She had sensed wildness in the man on the street as well, and both of these men possessed the same kind of male vibration that affected her after only a glance in her direction.

She ran a fingertip down her cheek—the same cheek her rescuer’s lips had illicitly touched. That touch left her feeling breathless.

Detective Miller’s expression was again one of concern, though he didn’t close the distance.

“Are you all right, Dr. Price?”

“Yes. I... I just need time to process this.”

“Did you remember something just then?” he asked.

Rile shook her head. “Nothing that would help.”

The detective nodded, turned and walked to the door. Riley tracked his movement without calling him back, though every cell in her body urged her to ask him to stay. At the door, he paused as if he might have been reluctant to leave her.

“I don’t see myself as a victim,” Riley said.

He looked at her over a broad shoulder. “I can see that you don’t.”

As he crossed the threshold, she added, “Actually, the man who came to my rescue looked a little bit like you.”

He paused again, then said, “I get that a lot. I’m thinking it must be the jacket. Good night, Dr. Price. Maybe we’ll meet again tomorrow.”

As he closed the door, Riley took her first deep breath and headed after him. Changing her mind at the last minute, she leaned against the door and strained to hear the sound of the elevator, but felt as if she were listening for something else. Like the howl of a wolf. Or the velvety growl of a light-eyed, dark-haired, chisel-faced, half-dressed werewolf with the kind of voice that resonated, even now, in her soul.

Just like Detective Miller’s had.

Derek leaned a shoulder against the wall of the elevator and looked up, as if he could see through the ceiling to a couple floors up.

“Good night, Riley Price,” he muttered. “He looked like me, did he?”

He had taken a chance by coming here to speak with her, but at least he now knew the things she did and didn’t remember, and could take comfort in the fact that she hadn’t been able to identify him outright while standing several feet apart.

“I’m no less interested, just so you know,” he added.

She was safe up there in her office with the guard manning the front desk. At the very least, he didn’t have to worry about that. Her memory was another issue altogether. Psychologists were familiar with all sorts of tricks to spark repressed memories. Meeting her again would not be wise.

And yet he wanted to see her again. He wanted to see her again right now and get to the heart of the werewolf remark she’d made on the street. But that would probably serve no purpose whatsoever other than to place his pack in jeopardy.

He signed out and exited the building with a curt wave to the guard. From the sidewalk in front of the building, Derek glanced up at the moon and said, “Fine. Let’s get on with it.” He walked toward the car he had parked near here earlier in the evening, before the night’s antics had begun.

He removed his jacket, tossed it on the seat and took one more look at the street corner from the shadows of the two buildings that hid Riley Price’s building from sight. Then he ducked into the alley, where the subtle scent of werewolves filled the night air like its own brand of dangerous perfume.

From her window, Riley watched the detective turn the corner. He did look a little bit like the man who had rescued her. At least, she thought he did.

Grabbing her jacket and her purse, she locked the door and went down to the street, determined to find the truth of what she now had come to suspect—that Detective Miller and the man who had helped to save her life could, in fact, be one and the same. If not, maybe Miller had a brother on the force. A twin.

He had headed east with purpose, as though he knew exactly where he was going and what he’d find there. His stride had been graceful when viewed from above, and radiated confidence. Miller was a dangerous man in his own right.

Riley gripped her cell phone tightly in her hand as she exited the elevator, signed out and started out after the detective, hoping she’d catch his trail before both sanity and the need to think about her own safety returned. The fact that she wasn’t alone helped somewhat. There were plenty of cars moving in both directions. Couples laughing and holding hands breezed by her, and she had a momentary pang of desire to be like them.

She couldn’t really recall the last time she had shared a light, loving moment with anyone. The flicker of wildness in her nature made her want to find her soul mate instead of settling for anything less, and she had never found that certain someone.

At the intersection, she paused, knowing Miller was long gone and that she was a fool for thinking she could have found him.

But then...

She heard a sound that made her hands quake. Was it an engine turning over, or could it have been a growl?

You know better, Price.

Go back to the office or go home.

She ignored both of those options. As if tonight’s events had never happened, Riley crossed the street. She headed for an area where shadows pooled and moonlight failed to reach the sidewalk, drawn there for reasons that felt insane. If Detective Miller had been looking for trouble, the shadows were where he was going to find it.

Chapter 8

Derek again scented a problem.

Two of his packmates had already come this way, and he could almost picture them in his mind. They were riled up and anxious because they had found something nearby. He knew what that something had to be.

The alley he had entered was a dead end. He searched the dark before climbing over a short brick wall, and jumped down on the opposite side with both of his hands raised and ready for whatever showed up. But he didn’t step into the moonlight. He wanted to see what kind of creature would come out for a look at the man who had just possibly walked into a trap without realizing it.

His packmates had beaten him here and were hidden from sight. One of them was on the rooftop, all wolfed up and as motionless as a Gothic ornament. The other wolf was behind a partially boarded-up window.

If these vampires didn’t feel the danger in their midst and were inept as to how the supernatural world worked, they would soon show themselves, the way their cousins had earlier. If they were seasoned bloodsuckers, they would avoid three werewolves like the plague and ply their trade elsewhere.

Derek kind of hoped for the latter on this occasion. He would have preferred more time to think about Riley Price, but just couldn’t allow personal issues to take precedence over his job. Nor could he afford to let a perfectly good full moon go to waste.

“Anyone here?” he finally called out, lowering his hands and feeling his claws spring as he turned in place, very near to the light.

His two packmates were silent, intent on what might happen next. Derek took in a breath that was tainted with a new and potent scent of Otherness before a figure appeared in the distance. Derek squinted to make it out. The damn thing seemed to be wrapped in its own fog, and that left its outline unclear. The creature also appeared to float several inches off the ground.

The whole image was murky at best, and decidedly different from anything in Derek’s experience in dealing with vampires.

He inched closer to the stream of moonlight next to him, ready to meet this thing head-on, and said, “Who are you?”

The voice that came from the fog might have been either male or female. Derek couldn’t be sure as he heard it say, “You trespass here, wolf.”

This was a seasoned vampire that knew a wolf when it saw one. And that could potentially make the task of taking this creature down a hell of a lot messier.

“I could say the same thing about you,” Derek returned.

“Werewolves belong in the forests,” the newcomer said.

“And vampires belong underground. Which makes me wonder why you’re walking around.”

“It’s a very long story.”

“I’m all ears,” Derek said.

“The thing is, I’m not sure I owe you anything, certainly not an explanation for my existence. I just am. Nothing more. Nothing less.”

“And you’re here now, in this alley, for what purpose?” Derek asked.

“I came to warn you.”

“About?”

“Where to find your next fight.”

“You mean the next fight after dealing with you?” Derek said.

As he watched, the fog began to dissipate slightly. Not enough to actually see the thing hidden inside it, but Derek did see a tall, thin figure of unknown gender.

“You can’t fight me, wolf,” the creature warned. “I think you already know that.”

“I’m not sure I do. Why don’t you enlighten me?”

The creature’s reply was as cryptic as the rest of this conversation. “I believe you have better things to do at the moment than to deal with the likes of me.”

“Such as?” Derek said.

The fog floated to the left, which gave Derek a decent view of what was beyond it. He saw the street, and cars going by. Then he saw someone stop to peer into the shadows in the break between the buildings.

He felt a chill on the back of his neck. His heart gave a thunderous roar and a few treacherous beats.

“It helps to find out that wolves have not only soft underbellies, but other vulnerable spots as well,” the creature remarked.

Damn it...

The wolf on the roof began a quick descent. In seconds, one of Derek’s packmates was standing beside him looking big, dangerous and lethal, with his sharp canines exposed. The fog remained on the sidelines, like a dark cloud that had swallowed whatever the thing was that used it for camouflage.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Derek said.

But he did know, of course. And for the first time, Derek also understood that he had exposed himself to the vampires tonight in another way. A new way. Because it was Riley Price who stood there on the street, looking on.

And there was probably a vampire to keep him from reaching her if this vamp had brought friends.

Riley hit the wall with a shoulder that was already sore, and winced. The protests she wanted to utter got stuck in her throat. Either the shadows were playing tricks with her eyesight and she actually did have a concussion from hitting her head earlier, or there was a werewolf in this alley.

A real, live werewolf.

No joke.

She stumbled back and toward the street, numb with shock. The fact that she had wanted to find a werewolf melted away behind the actual sighting of one. The phrase that kept repeating over and over now in her mind was that she wasn’t insane after all, and might never have been.

Still, she refused to believe that seeing a werewolf in Seattle was anything other than the very definition of insanity. So she turned around and walked away, heading back toward her office with her skull humming and her pulse hammering away at warp speed.

She’d call Detective Miller and tell him about what she had seen. Would he think she was crazy? Could he possibly understand that no governing body would issue a license to a therapist whose own sanity they doubted? As for proof of what she had seen...by the time she got to the precinct or found another way to reach the detective, that werewolf would probably be long gone.

As Riley consciously willed her legs to carry her forward, she knew there was no way she could win this, prove this, or convince anyone about what had been in that alley. She also knew that she had to try.

Derek glided into the moonlight to join his packmate in a standoff with a vampire that was far too enlightened for anyone’s good. He wondered what the wolf beside him thought of this discussion.

There was a chance the abomination hadn’t meant its remark the way Derek had taken it after seeing Riley there. Yet it had sure felt that way. The comment had seemed pointed and personal.

He knew that Riley had to have seen his packmate in full moonlight, and that for her the werewolf comment she had made earlier had now taken on new weight.

What would she do next?

Where would she go to feel safe?

Who will you tell, Riley?

His shape-shift took seconds. Derek roared in the moonlight, daring the creature in the alley to challenge two Weres in spite of what it had said. But the creature, which had to be some special kind of vampire, didn’t rally. It hovered near the street for some time before Derek decided to break the face-off.

He rushed forward, wanting to get to Riley, knowing that in order to reach her, he’d tear this bloodsucker apart if he had to.

Intending to ram the vampire’s body, Derek barreled forward with his backup on his heels. The foggy bastard he lunged for wasn’t solid, so he passed right through it and pulled up a few feet from the street, snapping his not-quite-human teeth.

His packmate had no better luck.

Angry, Derek whirled around to try again. But the vampire remained elusive, shifting in time to avoid any direct confrontation as it drifted over the Weres. It was as if the spooky sucker had the ability to fly.

Again and again, Derek and his mate challenged, spun and went for the abomination. Time after time, their teeth and claws came away empty. Finally, the bloodsucker floated to the street and spoke. “You see, wolf, that I was right to warn you, and to call to your attention the vulnerability attached to your new weaknesses.”

The next remark the vampire made came in the form of a touch on his mind.

“She is not for you, wolf. Stay away from her or our next meeting will not go nearly as well as this one.”

Derek clutched his chest—he was suddenly short of breath. He hadn’t been wrong. The warning had been pointed and had pertained to Riley Price. Who else could this sucker have been talking about?

Madder than ever and refusing to give up, Derek and his packmate sprinted toward the creep like rabid animals, biting, clawing and punching at nothing even remotely physical enough to maim or injure. They kept this up until the vampire simply disappeared, as if it had never really been there at all.

Derek stared at the empty alley with his heart racing. When his packmate turned to him in an equal state of confusion, Derek sent a message. “I hope to God there aren’t more of those things around.”

It was at that moment that Dale arrived, alone and calm. After a quick look at the two Weres, Dale asked, “Did I miss something?”

“I think it must have been a ghoul,” Derek’s current fighting partner, still wolfed up and wild-eyed, messaged back. “That thing was seriously demented.”

Though Dale looked to Derek for an explanation, Derek was already miles beyond thinking about the fight. There were new questions to be answered—carefully, cautiously and with as much diplomacy as possible. The thing they had faced had shown off new tricks, and also knew about Riley. It didn’t seem to want him hanging around her, and had issued that warning.

It was possible the creature had purposefully allowed Riley to see the werewolf in this alley, so that she’d be frightened enough to stay away from the streets. Why, though? What did that creature have to do with her, and more to the point, what did it want?

“Derek?”

Derek glanced at Dale.

“Maybe you can explain what happened after you’ve changed back, boss. Tonight was quiet everywhere else we patrolled. The pack is reconvening at the park for your summary and for further instructions.”

Derek didn’t feel like downshifting. He felt like running. Like howling. Like tearing apart that damn fog in any way he could so that he’d be able to sleep.

But who was he kidding? There’d be no way to sleep when he had to find Riley Price and convince her that she hadn’t seen what she had seen.