Shepherd's Moon (11 page)

Slowing, I glanced over my shoulder to see the officers nearest me stop running, their hands thrown up in irritation. Frustrated, they abandoned their pursuit and turned to head back the way they came, but Billy was hot on my trail. We both slid to a stop. He stood patiently next to me as I panted heavily, catching my breath. One advantage Billy would always have over me was endurance. He wasn’t even breathing hard.

I’ve noticed over the years that my “animal” instincts manifested much stronger when I spend a lot of time with the pack and the closer we got to the small house, the stronger the scent of blood became.

The house itself had been painted a soft beige, the color of sand, which made it blend more easily into the natural landscape. Colorful flowerbeds had been planted around the pool and wooden shutters that didn’t serve any function other than décor adorned its exterior. Any other day, and it would be just another middle-class family home with a white picket fence and kids swimming in the pool.

But tonight, it had become something very, very different.

A cool breeze drifted through the darkness while fear filled the air, further highlighting an evil shadow that hung over the home. Billy followed behind me.

I sensed his inevitable shift as he pulled his shirt off, then reached for the buttons of his pants. He sought the more comfortable form of a coyote. But that would be a less than optimal situation for Richard’s media department. My touch slowed his shift and we stood together in front of the ominous house, allowing for a brief moment of clarity as we took a precious moment to remember that this was no way to enter a crime scene.

“You’re the one who said we needed a plan,” he whispered, not even bothering to take an extra breath.

I placed my hands on my knees and leaned over, inhaling gulps of air, then glanced up at him curiously. Granted, planning had never been my strong point, but it had never been Billy’s strength either, so his statement caught me off-guard.

His dark eyebrows slanted into a frown as he grabbed my shoulders, forcing me to stand and face him. A rim of amber formed around the black pupil making him look more animal than human.

Taking a deep breath as my heart began to regulate its pattern, I lowered my weapon. “There’s a kid in there.”

“So I heard…” He whispered, his voice reflecting a note of sympathy. If anyone knew how much a child hostage affected me, it was Billy. He pointed to himself. “Coyote. Remember?”

I smiled, despite the gravity of the situation.

“Can you get into this guy’s head?” Billy asked, raising his head to stare at the house.

“Nothing.” Shaking my head, I glanced at the beige door. “He must be something other than animal. Okay, we need to figure this out. If we go in there half-cocked, it’s game over.”

His expression was tight with tension, as he pushed the hair from his eyes. “Planning isn’t usually our strong point.”

“Well, I’m thinking our usual style won’t work this time. Look at all the choppers up there.” Motioning overhead, we stared at the three separate helicopters from three major news stations hovering over us, the loud rotors making my ears hurt. The police had cleared the area in accordance with Richard’s orders, but the news stations were stubborn in their refusal to abandon what was obviously going to be tonight’s leading story. And the media was far more dangerous than the police.

Cursing silently, I pushed a lock of hair behind my ear. Beyond the occasional werewolf movie, the general public didn’t know anything about our world. And it was my job to keep it that way.

The threat of death lingered in the night and both of us knew we were running out of time. I pushed my head against the wooden fence of the alley feeling my frustration intensify.

Sensing my impatience, Billy leaned towards me, whispering, “What’s the plan, Shepherd?”

It was the first time he had ever used my official title, and the responsibility that accompanied the inherited name sent a shiver down my spine. His eyes never left mine as he reached around me, his shoulder brushing against my own. Reaching into my back pocket, he removed my phone and dialed Richard.

“We’ve still got the press,” he said softly into the receiver. “I can’t phase until they’re cleared out.”

Spotlights suddenly shone down on us from every direction and cold fury fled through me. Billy calmly ended the call, handing my phone back to me.

Deep breaths. I have to focus on what I can do, and right now, that requires getting Billy and I
into
the house and the bad guy
out
of it.

“What the hell are they doing?” Billy exclaimed, ducking behind a small garden shed and pulling me with him.

I needed to get my act together, and quick.
Leaders don’t panic like this,
I thought. Gathering my senses, I focused on the best solution and grabbed Billy’s elbow. “If I let you go first, you have to agree not to kill the guy. If he’s a newborn, he may be able to lead us to Azrael’s Handler.”

Billy glanced away and I knew the anger he felt at the thought of this guy getting out of here alive. But, once he agreed to the terms, I knew he would adhere to them. Pulling his chin towards me, I forced him to look at me. “Deal?”

He nodded. “Fine.”

“I’ll distract the press until Richard can get the no fly zone enforced.” Besides the three news choppers, the sky was clear. “You get this guy into custody and try to save whoever is left. Once you get him out, I’ll let medical in.”

He nodded once.

“All right, then. Let’s do this.” The words were barely out of my mouth before Billy disappeared and I knew that I had to do something, anything that would divert attention from the unusually large coyote that would soon lope into an open window. An urban coyote would not be unusual to see in the city, but one that was twice the size of a large dog running under the floodlights of three choppers in the middle of the night would definitely be viewed as abnormal.

My pulse soared, my heart pumping loudly against my chest as I stepped into the spotlight and drew both guns. One gun drawn, they might be able to determine I was a cop. Two guns drawn, and I’d have their attention regardless of who I was.

The floodlights from the choppers converged over me as I stood in the alley. Lowering my head to shield my face from the cameras, I bolted away from the house to draw them off.

As predicted, the choppers followed. After thirty yards, I stopped and raised my hands above my head. All the lights were upon me, as I watched Billy’s bushy tail clear the windowsill. But, what was he up against? We still didn’t know what was in there. Nervously, I glanced over my shoulder waiting for a signal.

A minute passed. Then two. Finally, I took a large step away from the lights, letting the dark shadows consume me as I waited and observed. Shadowing was a trick I had learned from a very old vampire who had stayed with us years earlier. To my knowledge, I was the only Shepherd who could do it successfully.

Crouched in the darkness, I made my way back towards the house while watching the spotlights sweep the area where I had stood only seconds earlier. They knew they had seen me, but were unsure where I had vanished.

The loudspeaker from a fourth chopper with red and blue lights flashing, suddenly descended on the news crews. Richard would get the press out of here soon and I had to get back to that house. As I edged towards the relative cover of the shed, I sensed movement in the darkness. A man, or something that once resembled a man, crept from the back of a house two doors down from the one we were supposed to be watching. The creature moved slowly, like a specter in the night, and I could pick up no brain patterns from the man. As the sky cleared of machinery, I realized that I had to stop worrying about the choppers and start worrying about the new threat that was loping towards me.

It had to be the one we hunted. Who else would be wandering around this old neighborhood at midnight with the police clogging the streets and a would-be murderer on the loose? The creature moved awkwardly, looking more like an injured, frightened animal as I stood in silence. Finally it hopped towards the dull glow of high-pressure sodium streetlights that somehow penetrated the darkness of the alley.

Raising the gun, I carefully eased the bolt back, cringing against the rifling sound as the firing pin slipped into place.

While I always keep my weapons loaded, I never keep a live round in the chamber, something that Billy and Richard always chided me about, but I didn’t want to take a chance on killing someone or something due to a faulty safety. The creature didn’t pause. Either he was distracted by all the attention, or he was so newly turned that he had not yet learned to use his enhanced senses. I was hoping for the latter. He continued moving towards me, oblivious to either me or my weapons.

My heart raced, the beat echoing in the sudden silence, but I forced myself to relax enough to call upon any animals in the area. A large calico cat answered my silent request by gracefully leaping to the top of the block wall opposite me. The feline crouched like a silent sentinel, staring with wide, dark eyes at the approaching creature, giving me a much clearer view.

It was a man — although he was only partially phased. Whether he was phasing into his animal or out of it, I couldn’t tell, but I suspected the latter. His head still bore the shape of a muzzle and he walked on two legs, making it an awkward, deformed gait. He raised his long nose and sniffed, sensing I was there, or at least that something or someone was nearby, but he couldn’t see me, and that clinched the fact that he was newly turned. An adult would have identified me within two hundred-yards. The creature hesitated, sensing something was not quite right. At a height that would probably be close to 6’2” on any convenience store door height chart, he towered over me.

An attempt to get a mind lock on him was futile at best. His thoughts were inscrutable — which again struck me as bizarre. He was the second animal in less than 24 hours that I couldn’t read…

The sudden disappearance of the squad cars had provided the man with a false sense of security and I could only assume he believed they had moved to the front of the house they surrounded.

In addition to being a murderer and a partially-phased monster, the guy was obviously an idiot as well.

I stayed completely still, breathing shallowly and willing myself into a perfect calm. This one would have to be taken down the hard way. While part of me, mostly my injured part, was not looking forward to what had to be done, the rest of me was positively salivating at the chance to get my hands around the man’s neck. It would be even more glorious if Billy could get involved, but I suspected he was busy inside the house.

The creature was uneasy — that much was obvious. He glanced around nervously, not with the confidence a Were would normally have. There was no sense of purpose, no feeling of security. Waiting until he turned away, I placed a suggestion into the cat’s mind. With a loud yowl, my new feline friend jumped from the wall and fled the scene, making quite a racket upon departure.

As the creature turned towards the noise, I waited a heartbeat then erased the distance between us, hitting him in the chest. The air exploded from his lungs as he fell to the ground.

Dropping the gun I’d held onto for so long, I drew the stake from my boot a second before I fell upon him.

His surprise quickly turned to fear as I held him down, wincing as the returning choppers blinded me with their burning spotlights. It was times like these that I really wished I could shift, just become a wild creature and bound off into the darkness where the lights couldn’t follow.

But I couldn’t shift. And I couldn’t run. And the man I held down was now fully shifting back to his human form.

The news reporters that were no doubt broadcasting live had their cameras focused on us wrestling in the dirt like two street fighters, and while I originally had every intention of keeping a low profile, survival took over and I moved past that noble thought.

For now I just wanted to drive the stake I held through this man’s heart. He was positively covered in blood—blood that wasn’t mine or his — and my hands slipped around his throat.

Richard’s calm voice echoed through my earpiece and I tried to focus on his steady assurance as he undoubtedly watched the scene unfold on live TV, and made his best attempt to calm me down remotely.

I tried. Really, I did…

But I could barely control my rage against the — thing — that lie on the ground. I may not be as strong or ruthless as an animal, but I was one hell of a lot faster and stronger than the average human.

Unfortunately this wasn’t an average human…

The man grunted as he pushed me off of him sending me flying backwards. I cursed as I hit the ground, dropping the stake.

It lay only a few feet out of reach and I knew that the second I went for it, the creature would take me out. We both regained our footing with ease and I didn’t even hesitate as I dropped into a spin kick, sweeping his legs from under him and slamming his head into the ground. His left fist struck me hard in the chest on the way down and the air collapsed from my lungs as I fell backwards. Gasping for breath, I did my best to ignore the pain and pushed myself up until we stood facing each other, less than five feet apart, in the darkness. This time I attacked with a flying front kick to his head, followed by an elbow to the throat as he hit the ground.

Straddling his chest, I liberated my spare pistol from the shoulder holster and held it against his head.

“Alex — stop.” Richards’s calm voice echoed through my earpiece and snapped me out of my rage. “We need him alive, and you can’t afford to be in the spotlight with the Council right now.”

He was right. The one thing the Council doesn’t like is drawing attention to ourselves. Killing a partially-phased werecreature on live television would certainly qualify.

Dropping the gun and flipping my quarry to his side, I rotated my legs into a scissor lock around his right arm and pinned his shoulder back with far more force than necessary to subdue him. An audible pop told me I had dislocated his shoulder, but I was past caring as I loosened my grip on the worthless arm, exchanging it for the graphene-lined plastic bands in my back pocket, then slapping his wrists into the plastic cuffs.