“He had to have control of his change before this,” Newman said, “or his family wouldn’t have let him walk around the house in leopard form.”
“He was trying to suicide by cop when he started to shift,” I said. “He may have carried that thought over as he started to change.”
“Would that have been enough to make him lose control like that?” Newman asked.
“I think it was,” I said.
“Yes,” said Olaf. When the others looked at him, he explained, “If he were a normal person that was intent on suicide by police, he would raise his gun instead of putting it down, so we would have to shoot him. His beast is his gun. That is the only difference.”
“Win, don’t put yourself and Blake in a car with him. I don’t want to have to explain that to Haley,” Duke said.
“Don’t do that, Duke. Don’t bring Haley into this.”
“I know you want to help Bobby, and I know you believe he didn’t kill Ray, but is any of that worth not having a lifetime with the woman you love?” Duke seemed so reasonable, even caring and gentle. It was another glimpse of a good person, a good cop who was in there somewhere. Maybe I really hadn’t seen him at his best.
“Damn it, Duke,” Newman said.
“I’ll call an ambulance and see if they’re willing to look him over. Okay, Win?”
Newman nodded and lowered his head until it was almost touching Bobby’s. If the wereleopard woke up now, it could go badly. But Newman was as aware of that as I was, so I let him be. Duke went into the office to call for an ambulance just as Bobby took a long, shuddering breath.
28
NEWMAN STARTLED SO badly, he sat down hard beside Bobby. I was beside Newman before I’d thought about it, grabbing him under the arm and pulling him to his feet and moving both of us toward the door. Even though he had been damn near crying over Bobby a second before, he didn’t fight me. He wanted to save Bobby, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t scared of him. Livingston moved smoothly away from the door so that the two of us could get out. Olaf closed the door behind us, and we all watched as Bobby coughed and sputtered awake.
“You broke my nose,” Bobby said in a voice that was thick with blood and all the things that happened when someone smashed your nose into their knee repeatedly.
“You’re alive,” I said from the safety of the cage bars.
“What the hell does that mean?” Bobby asked as he lay on his side, raising his manacled hands up to touch his face. He winced and jerked his hands back from his nose.
“Do you remember anything about the fight?” I asked.
He rolled onto one elbow, but apparently having his head hanging down was bad, because he moved so his face was pointed more upward. He pushed stiffly to a sitting position, wrapping the blanket around his shoulders. If we didn’t kill him soon, we really needed to give him some clothes.
“No,” he said.
“Nothing?” I asked.
“No.”
“You said, ‘You broke my nose,’” Newman said. “Who broke it?”
“She did.”
“Who’s she?”
“Her,” Bobby said, and pointed toward me.
“If you don’t remember anything, how do you know I broke it?” I asked.
That seemed to stop him, his blue eyes blinking confused in their mask of fresh blood. “I don’t know.”
“You’re lying, Bobby,” I said.
“Wait,” Olaf said.
I hadn’t expected him to join in much, so that one word made me look up at him. He was studying Bobby. “Wait for what?”