Frostbitten (8 page)

“Yes?” she said, her voice as tight as her skin. Her gaze slid over me, taking in my ski jacket, hiking boots and jeans with disapproval.

“This is Elena Michaels,” Garth said. “She works for the Canadian press.”

“
Canadian Press
,” I said. “It’s like Associated Press, only much, much smaller.”

Garth laughed, too loud for the mild joke. Mallory’s expression didn’t flicker.

I repeated my spiel, expanding it to explain that we’d had wolf activity in Algonquin Park in the last few years, and I wanted to tie this into that as an examination of the issues surrounding humans and wolves sharing an ever-shrinking world. I thought it sounded good, but from the expressionless way she stared at me, you’d think I’d accidentally switched to French.

When I finished, she said nothing, just looked at me as if waiting for the rest of the explanation.

“So, I told Elena you could probably spare her a few minutes—” Garth began.

Her look made him shrink back.

“It really is only a couple of questions,” I said. “I know how busy you must be—”

“Garth? You can go now.”

He fled.

I continued. “I would love to buy you coffee. Or lunch.”

“I’ve eaten. So you’re looking for someone to write your story for you, Ms. Michaels? Crib from my article? Save yourself the legwork?”

“Um, no… as I said, I only have a few questions, ones that will launch my own investigation. And, of course, anything I discover, I’ll share with you.”

“Your own investigation?”

I sensed her hackles rising. “For my own article. For my own newspapers. I’ve already been to the general area where the deaths occurred, but…” I forced a smile. “It’s a lot bigger country than I’m used to. If I had a better idea where the—”

“Everything I can tell you is in my articles. I presume you’ve read them?”

“Yes.”
Wanna quiz me
?

She stepped back and did an openly critical assessment of me. “How old are you, Ms. Michaels?”

“I’m not fresh out of college, if that’s what—”

“Married, I see. Kids?”

“Two,” I said carefully.

“Little ones, I suppose?”

“Yes, but—”

“An outdoors type?” she said, taking in my boots and jacket.

“You could say that.”

“Anchorage is an outdoorsman’s dream. A full-service city minutes away from a wilderness filled with lakes, rivers, mountains, glaciers…”

“It is pretty amazing,” I said.

“Warmer than you thought, too, I bet. No mounds of snow or sub-zero temperatures…”

“Having experienced sub-zero, it’s a very pleasant surprise.”

I smiled, but her expression didn’t change. What was with the tourism spiel? Was she going to try selling me timeshares?

She continued. “Good city. All the amenities. The great outdoors in its full glory at your doorstep. The perfect place for a young family to relocate.”

“Relocate?”

“But first, you need a job.”

“Job? I don’t need—”

“You’re not in the building five minutes and you’re already shaking hands with the editor. I bet you think that’s all it takes, don’t you? A backwater place like Anchorage, there can’t be any
real
journalists here. Probably all housewives, churning out articles before the kiddies come home from school. You can just show up, the perky Canadian girl—”

“Perky?”

“—and you think a spot will open up for you. A good spot. Maybe
my
spot.”

“Um, no. I’m sure Anchorage is a great place to live, but I’ve already got a life—someplace else. I’m here to talk about the wolf kills.”

“I’m sure you are. And I have nothing to say about them that isn’t in my articles.”

She walked away.

* * * *

Garth hailed me as I reached the doors.

“Did Mallory give you anything useful?”

I made a noncommittal noise.

“I might have another story for you,” he continued. “I’ve been covering the disappearances of young women.”

“Oh?”

“We’ve had three vanish in the last few months. It might make an interesting article for your readers back home.”

Sadly, even in Canada, three missing girls wasn’t news. It should be. Believe me, I know that, and I can rail against it all I want, but unless they’re three teens from good families, even the police paid little attention. When I’d been in Winnipeg this winter, enjoying their twenty-below temperatures, I’d been researching a series on missing and murdered local women. The police had almost twenty cases of unsolved sex-worker deaths in as many years. Many of the victims were young, many Native Canadians, and all prostitutes.

One of my reasons for doing the articles was that Jeremy had sent me there to check out potential werewolf activity. Young sex-trade workers and street girls were the preferred prey of werewolves, who know how little attention will be paid to the deaths. It turned out that a few of those deaths had been a mutt. But it would be odd to have a man-eater in Anchorage mixing vanished young women with men left lying in the open.

“Were the girls from Anchorage?” I asked.

“One was. Two were from Native communities farther inland. Why don’t we go grab a bite to eat and discuss it?”

“I’d love to, but I’m supposed to meet my husband for lunch.”

His gaze dropped to my hand. “Oh, right. Sure. Well, if you decide to run the story, call me.”

He headed back into the offices without giving me his last name, card or any way to “call him.” I reached the exterior doors this time before he hailed me again. He walked over, looking chagrined, as if realizing how it must look, taking off once he discovered I was married.

“About Mallory’s story,” he said. “The wolves. There’s someone else you could talk to. A local woman who knows more about the case than anyone, including Mallory.”

“Oh?”

He waved for me to step outside. It had started drizzling. We ducked under an overhang.

“Her name’s Lynn Nygard,” he continued. “She works for the state police. Mallory used her as a source, but I know she didn’t give Mallory everything.” Garth lowered his voice. “Mallory can rub people the wrong way.”

Really? Huh
. “Will Ms. Nygard talk to me?”

“Oh, sure. There’s just one thing. Lynn has this theory about the deaths and it would, uh, help if you didn’t… discourage it.”

“Theory?”

He waved to a coworker stepping out for a cigarette, then lowered his voice. “She thinks they were killed by some kind of Inuit shapeshifter. There’s a name for them—I can’t remember it. You don’t have to say you believe in them, just…”

“Don’t laugh when she mentions it?”

“Exactly. If she warms to you, you can also ask about the missing girls. She has a theory on that, too.”

“Alien abductions?”

He laughed. “Met a few Lynns in your time, have you?”

“I have. You said she works for the police?”

“They tolerate her eccentricities because she’s the best damned crime-scene photographer and sketch artist in Alaska. Of course, according to her, that’s because she’s the reincarnation of Leonardo da Vinci.”

“Ah.”

“Yes, she loves that paranormal shit, but obsession can be good if you’re looking for the best source of detailed information. You’ll find Lynn in the phone book.” He spelled her last name as I wrote it down, then gave me his card and offered, genuinely it seemed, to help if he could.

* * * *

I called Clay from the SUV.

“How’d it go at the paper?” he asked.

“She called me perky.”

“Ouch.”

I told him about Mallory Hirsch. After he said a few choice words about that, I explained the lead on Lynn Nygard. “I called her place. No answer. I’m going to swing by there on my way, then grab lunch.”

* * * *

I made it three blocks before Clay called.

“Change course, darling,” he said.

“Did Reese show up?”

“Yeah. And we’ve got a situation.”

I was still ten feet from Reese’s hotel room when I smelled blood. I slowed, my stomach giving a reflexive clench.

Yes, I hadn’t wanted Reese hurt, but if he gave Clay any trouble, fists would fly and blood would flow. That was a given. There was a time when I’d convinced myself that Clay liked hurting people, because that fit the way I wanted to see him. But I’d always known it wasn’t the truth. For Clay, beating a recalcitrant mutt was like brushing his teeth. It wasn’t something he liked or disliked—he was just doing what needed to be done. A swift beating helped stop the spread of respect-decay, the kind that led to strikes against the Pack and its Alpha.

That’s why Clay and I made such a good team. I played good cop and no one thought it a sign of weakness because, well, I was a woman, so naturally I’d be the soft touch. When a mutt wouldn’t listen to me, he had to deal with Clay’s fists. The mediator and the enforcer. It worked fine until half the team wasn’t around.

So as I approached the door, I rubbed my face, erasing any sign that said I regretted anything Clay had done to Reese.

“Door’s open,” Clay called.

I found him pacing inside, cell phone at his ear. Reese sat on the edge of the bed, with a bloody towel around his right hand.

“I didn’t do it,” Clay said.

I motioned to the phone.

“Jeremy,” he said. Getting medical advice, I presumed.

“What happened?” I asked Reese.

He glanced down at his towel-wrapped hand, as if startled to see it. His pupils were dilated and he blinked hard, having trouble focusing on his hand, still holding it up and staring. I glanced at Clay, but he’d turned his back to me as Jeremy gave instructions.

When I took Reese’s hand, he didn’t resist. His skin above the towel was clammy, despite the warm room. I slowly unraveled the towel until I saw his hand, and winced. Two finger joints of his ring finger and the last joint of his pinkie had been cut off.

“I didn’t do it,” Clay said.

“Feel the need to make that perfectly clear, do you?” I said.

He grunted and tossed the phone onto the bed.

“What happened?” I asked.

“No idea. I haven’t gotten that far. Jeremy says we need to get him stitched up. We can get the details after.”

* * * *

Clay retrieved my bag—with my first-aid kit—from the car. He had one in his luggage, too. Jeremy would sooner let us travel without clothing than forget emergency medical supplies.

I got Reese’s hand cleaned, stitched and bandaged while Clay played nurse, taking away the dirty cloths and getting new ones. As for how he lost his fingers, Reese was staying mum. It seemed more shock than reticence, though, so Clay and I tried to distract him by discussing the latest injuries in our lives—our kids’ fall.

“Logan wouldn’t talk,” I said. “But I finally got Kate to admit what happened, which was exactly what we thought.”

“They jumped because they’d seen us doing it.”

I explained to Reese. “Our kids have realized that our days don’t end after they go to bed. We go for walks in the forest, we talk by the fire, the food comes out…”

“Especially the food,” Clay said.

“Naturally they felt left out and kept getting up. Rather than turn bedtime into a battleground, we started going to bed at the same time, then sneaking downstairs or outside.”

“Only they heard us if we went downstairs,” Clay said.

“Being so young, they shouldn’t have secondary powers. We aren’t even sure they’re werewolves—one or both or… it’s complicated. Anyway, at this age, we don’t know whether they have enhanced hearing or we’re just louder than we think we are. But we thought we were safe, avoiding the stairs and jumping out our bed room window. Apparently not.”

“They tried it?” Reese said, his first words since I’d come in. “Are they okay?”

“One sprained ankle, one sprained wrist and one very guilt-stricken parent.”

“Two,” Clay said. “We’re going to have to come up with another solution.”

“Other than tying them to their beds?”

“That’ll be option two.”

I cut off the bandage. “I know, we should probably just clamp down—bedtime is bedtime—but I was thinking of a compromise. We’ll let them stay up until eleven two nights and we’ll go to bed early, and the rest of the week, they’re down at the normal time. If they don’t settle, then we get tough—no special late nights.”

“That might work.”

“I hope so. Or it’ll be time to invest in bars for the windows.”

I stood and stretched my legs. Reese had followed our conversation with equal parts interest and bewilderment, and now he just looked confused. He’d heard stories about us—any mutt who’s been in the United States more than a month has. Tales of Clayton Danvers, child werewolf turned vicious psychopath, who at seventeen chopped up a trespassing mutt and passed out photos of it. Then he bit some poor girl in Toronto, made her his mate, imprisoned her with him at Stonehaven, forced her to bear his children, and dragged her along on his assignments as Pack enforcer, so she could—I don’t know—wash his socks and serve him breakfast in bed, I guess.