Silver Kiss (6 page)

“
Make mine a vodka and
coke,” she said when Lawrence offered her a drink. “A
double.”

“
Hard day?” I asked,
catching her hand in mine.

She kissed my cheek and settled on the bar
stool next to me. “Just long. I’ve been doing some digging for the
Brady case—trying to get in touch with the local police and social
workers to see if they can help and it’s like getting blood from
stone. They’re just so suspicious of a private eye asking
questions. I think they’re expecting something out of a James
Ellroy novel.”

There was bitter frustration in her voice
and it cut into me. I knew what she was thinking. Back home she had
contacts, friends, allies. Here she had nothing. I wondered
guiltily if she was starting to regret moving down here. It had
been for me, after all, not her. It wasn’t just her reputation and
contacts she’d left behind; all her family and friends lived up
north too.

I covered my sudden anxiety with a swig of
my drink. “Well, we’ll find a way in,” I said. “There’s bound to be
somebody who knows somebody who’ll help.”

Lawrence handed Shannon her drink. “So
you’re a PI. Pretty funky! Have you ever gone undercover as a
gangster’s moll or anything?”

Shannon laughed. “I once went undercover at
a Chinese takeaway to prove they had illegal immigrants working for
them. Does that count?”

“
Only if you had to dress
in a sequined gown and sing for it,” he replied, then sighed when
she shook her head.

“
Did you get a chance to
speak to Vince?” she asked me.

I nodded, then shrugged, remembering how
abortive the conversation had been. “He recognized Tina Brady’s
name but didn’t know anything about her.”

“
Oh well.” She dipped her
finger in her drink, prodding an ice cube then sucking her finger
dry. The movement fascinated me. “I’m not beaten yet. It’s only day
one.”

“
Can’t you just ask Tina?
Clearly she wants her daughter found—isn’t she pretty much obliged
to tell you anything useful?” I asked.

“
People have funny ideas of
what’s useful sometimes.” Shannon plucked the ice cube from her
glass and popped it in my mouth, laughing as I flinched at the
sharp cold snap on my sensitive gums. “Most people in situations
like this are usually afraid of being thought of as bad parents.
They keep things back.”

“
Have you tried water
torture?” Lawrence asked. “Bamboo under the
fingernails?”

“
Funnily enough, no,”
Shannon said.

I crunched my ice cube and
turned the problem over in my head. Vince hadn’t known anything
about Tina Brady. But my parents might. Mum was always
well-informed on Pack gossip and going-ons; once you got her
started it was impossible to shut her up. It was a facet of her
personality I’d loathed growing up, because it meant the whole Pack
knew every argument we ever had over my sexuality—my
phase
as my parents had
called it. Everywhere I went as a teenager, some big-nosed Pack
member was there dropping hints and making insinuating comments
about my private life. When was I going to just settle down and
start a family? Didn’t I know what a disappointment I was to my
parents?

Pack gossip could be vicious, devastating.
In such a tight-knit community as ours, there was little real
privacy and I’d decided early that the best way to deal with that
was to leave town. Now I was back and homosexuality was less of a
taboo than it had been eight years ago, I might be able to turn the
Pack’s penchant for tittle-tattle to my advantage. That would make
a nice change.

FOUR

I arranged to go to
my parents for
dinner on Thursday night. Shannon gracefully declined the offer. My
parents had made a real effort to accept our relationship but there
was still a hint of uneasiness about their interactions, like they
still thought I might wake up one day and fancy men. I tried not to
let it get to me—and it didn’t get to me as much as it had when I’d
been younger. Maybe I’d mellowed with age. Or they’d become less
obvious in their disapproval.

Either way, I arrived at my childhood home
alone, clutching a bunch of flowers for Mum. The smell of
chrysanthemums and daisies wafted around me, mixing with the fatty,
buttery aroma of roasting potatoes coming from the house. I paused
on the front step, looking around at the neighborhood as I always
did. Like me and Shannon, my parents lived on a mixed, but largely
human estate, the Oaks. The main reason for their choice was so I
could get into Sparrowfield Middle School, the better of the two
middle schools in the city. On a werewolf estate, we would have
been out of the catchment area.

The main difference between purely wolf
estates and mixed ones was the lack of green, open spaces. The Oaks
was built like a maze, little twisting streets and passages that
seemed to lead to a different place each time you walked down them.
There was one small play park at the heart of the estate, but no
real room for a wolf to shift and run freely. I suddenly had a
renewed appreciation for my little house in Foxglove, which
bordered one of the city parks.

Dad opened the door before I could knock,
greeting me with a broad smile. “Ayla! Just in time. Your mum’s
just dishing up. We’re having your favorite.” He ushered me into
the dining room, where Mum was indeed serving up plates heaped with
steaming vegetables and generous cuts of roast lamb. My mouth
watered as I watched.

“
Hello, love,” Mum said,
setting a plate down in my place. “Oh, are those for me?” She took
the flowers with a sweet smile. “They’re lovely.”

“
Yeah.” As always, I
couldn’t quite find the words to convey my sentiments.
They’re because I love you
didn’t feel right, even if it was true. “I thought you’d like
them.”

“
Sit down, tuck in,” she
ordered. “I’ll put these in some water.”

I obeyed, spooning mint sauce onto my lamb.
I felt like I’d slipped back in time, reverted to a child. Whatever
tensions had—and did—exist between me and my parents, I always felt
a little safer here; a little more at home.

“
So have you heard from the
police yet?” Dad asked.

I shook my head. “Could be another six weeks
yet.”

“
You’ll get in,” he said
confidently. “Before you know it you’ll be out on the streets being
insulted and spat at by junkies and yobs.”

“
Oh Dad, don’t. It’s not
going to be like that.”

“
Depends where you get
sent,” Mum said, sitting down opposite me and smoothing out the
checkered tablecloth absently. “The city center is fine, but I
wouldn’t want you out on the beat in some of the
suburbs.”

“
I think I can take care of
myself,” I said, spearing a baby carrot. “I doubt they’ll send me
after the crack whores and baby killers on my first
shift.”

“
No, they’ll save that till
they’ve broken you in,” Dad said. “How’s Shannon doing?”

“
She’s working on a case.
Actually, I wanted to ask you about something.” I turned to Mum,
figuring she’d be more willing to divulge any scandal than Dad. “Do
you know a wolf named Tina Brady?”

Mum frowned, chewing a piece of lamb
meditatively. “It rings a bell. Tina Brady… Would that be Christina
Markham, do you think?” she asked Dad.

“
The wolf that was made
outcast?” Dad wore a frown that matched Mum’s exactly. It was cute.
I wondered if Shannon and I would develop synchronized expressions
over time. “She was married to Robert Markham, wasn’t
she?”

“
Yes, but they divorced
before she was outcast,” Mum said. “She had an affair, I
think.”

“
I thought he had the
affair?”

“
Maybe they both had
affairs?” I offered. That couldn’t be why she was outcast.
Infidelity wasn’t anything like a strong enough reason to exile a
Pack member.

“
No, it was definitely
her,” Mum said. “Because she got pregnant, didn’t she, and that’s
why…” She trailed off, staring down at her food.

I prodded, sensing some juicy secret. “Why
was she outcast anyway?”

My parents exchanged dark looks, a ripple of
disquiet passing between them. Mum was suddenly very occupied with
her roast potatoes and Dad took a long chug of his water. I waited
patiently while they eyeballed each other.

“
You tell her, Paul,” Mum
said. “It makes me feel ill.”

Dad set down his cutlery and sighed. “She
had an abortion.”

“
Oh.” I set down my cutlery
too.

I suppose I should have suspected something
like that. There was no law against abortion in the Pack, same as
there was no law against homosexuality. But there was an unspoken,
acknowledged rule that it was not done. In the past few
generations, birth rates amongst wolves had dropped dramatically.
There were lots of theories why—pesticides, pollution, too many
vegetables in our diet…You name it, someone blamed our decreased
fertility on it.

Most wolf couples nowadays produced one cub
in their lives, more than one child was a celebrated rarity. Twins
were unheard of. So it followed that abortion was a pretty big
deal. Obviously there were always times when it was the only
option, but I guessed that wasn’t the case with Tina or she
wouldn’t have been outcast.

Still, it unsettled me. Given my situation,
I hated the idea of the woman being judged so harshly for her
choice. Shouldn’t the Pack be past the age where this was such a
big deal?

“
Oh,” I said again.
“That’s…bad.”

We all resumed eating in silence. I churned
Dad’s words round in my mind. Did this help Shannon? Not really,
unless Molly’s disappearance had something to do with Tina having
an abortion several years earlier, which I doubted. I shoved my
vegetables round my plate glumly, barely noticing when Mum whipped
the plate away and replaced it with a bowl of trifle.

I didn’t stay long after dinner, which–after
the turn the conversation had taken–seemed to relieve my
parents.

I’d walked over straight from work, knowing I’d probably want to
run home to work off the masses of food Mum always insisted on
feeding me. I stripped off on the doorstep and left my clothes with
Mum. We said our goodbyes and Mum told me to bring Shannon next
time. I thought she even meant it.

Nightfall brought a light snow shower and
flakes melted on my skin like cold little kisses as I stretched,
preparing for the bone-popping pain of the change. Although the
waning moon was obscured by thick snow clouds, I could still feel
her energy firing through my blood. I threw my head back and howled
as the change took me, relishing the answering howls that echoed
through the night. Other wolves, other Pack members, ran tonight
and I was one of them again. Despite all my reservations, the glow
of that knowledge hadn’t diminished yet.

I padded through the streets, claws clacking
on the pavement. To my wolf senses the night was alive with sounds
and scents that were muffled and dull to my human body. I could
smell the gravy from the meal I’d just eaten, hear the slam of a
back door a few streets away. An owl hooted softly somewhere nearby
and a cat yowled in response. As I passed through the estate, a few
dogs barked and snarled at their windows, upset by the presence of
a werewolf.

I picked up speed as I left the estate and
entered the city again. It was getting late and most people were
inside. A few small groups drifted past me, snapping photos with
their mobile phones.

Snow dusted my black fur as I paused to
sniff a discarded pizza box. A few shreds of pepperoni remained in
the box and I gulped them down before moving on. The change burned
through a lot of energy, so despite Mum’s massive meal, my stomach
was already growling. As a human, I’d have turned my nose up at
cold pizza, but as a wolf it was a nice little treat.

I headed west, out of the city and towards
the park that bordered Foxglove. I could get a proper run there
before reaching home. I could already smell the slightly sickly
perfume of the flowers that gave the estate its name and hear the
muted yaps of two other wolves rough-housing together. The sound
tugged at me, urging me on. I wanted to join in, tussle and wrestle
with them.

I found the pair of them a few minutes later
as I entered the park. One adult wolf, one younger—a tawny
adolescent—chased each other round, snapping and snarling at each
other in that kind of play-fighting that verged on real. That drew
me up short and I dropped to my belly before they saw me. My paws
crunched in the fresh-fallen snow and I laid my ears back with a
whine, no longer sure I wanted to play. The older wolf, a dusky
blond, bowled over the younger and clamped his teeth round the
other’s throat with a rumbling growl.

There was something different about this
wolf. He didn’t smell like Pack, but wildly foreign, an odor that
both excited and scared me. I crouched low, ears flat, tail tucked
between my legs as I watched. When he released his grip on the
younger wolf with a snarl, the cub flopped to the snowy ground,
exposing his belly with a whine. The dominant wolf nudged at his
flanks, tail held erect in a classic posture of strength and the
youngster scrambled back to his feet and shot off into the park
with a yelp.

For a second I thought the dominant wolf
would chase after him, ignoring me. I stayed low, hoping to avoid
notice, but the breeze was going the wrong way, carrying my scent
straight to him. He swung his great head straight towards me,
hackles high. I held my own submissive position, quivering with a
cocktail of nerves and energy. He was a feral, there was no doubt
about that. In all my years as a lone wolf, I’d never met a feral.
They were almost mythical; werewolves who chose to live as wolves,
cutting away their humanity in favor of the wilderness that lurked
in us all.