As I closed the door behind me, Mal asked, “What’s a bat channel?”
I glanced at my watch. My shift had ended over an hour ago. A quick call to Jordan revealed there were no pressing emergencies that required my attention.
“I’m headed home,” I said.
I could do my research in the office, but I’d learned it was better to do anything funky on my personal computer. All I needed was to be under investigation for blowing up a citizen with a silver bullet and have the investigators discover I’d been researching werewolves during my on-duty hours.
I checked in with Doc Bill on my cell as I drove out of town. He was on top of things—having already done the paperwork for the additional autopsies and the exhumations. The lack of a heart in Abraham had freaked Doc Bill out as much as it had me.
“What are you going to tell the relatives?” I asked.
“As little as possible.”
“Seriously, Doc, we should get our stories straight.”
His sigh sounded tired, and I felt kind of bad. The man was at least eighty and should have retired years ago. But his wife had died, and he’d kept working. He’d always seemed happy about it, until now. Can’t say that I blamed him, but I needed Doc on the job. I certainly couldn’t explain this mess to someone who wasn’t already with the program.
However, when he spoke again, he seemed stronger. Doc knew what was at stake; he wouldn’t fail me.
“I’ll tell anyone who insists on an explanation that we’re doing a study for the Centers for Disease Control.”
“Okay.”
“I can make it sound official. Government ordered. Hush-hush. Blah-blah-blah.”
“And when they panic about the Ebola virus?”
“I’ll swear whatever this is, it isn’t contagious.”
“In other words, you’ll lie your ass off.”
“Without a qualm, Sheriff. We don’t know what we’re dealing with, and a panic won’t help anyone.”
“I like how you think.”
“That’s because I think like you.”
“And smart, too. You’re my kind of co-conspirator.”
He chuckled. “I’ll get back to you,” he said, then hung up.
Another thing I liked about the man—he didn’t bother with niceties. He got the job done. I only hoped he’d get this job done before we had more bodies on our hands.
I turned into my long dirt drive, holding tightly to the steering wheel as my dad’s truck jerked over the muddy ruts left by the storm. I hadn’t had a chance to ask Claire about my new squad car, but since the truck worked so well on the still-saturated side roads, that was probably for the best.
The wheels bounced over a particularly large hump and rolled down the other side, sliding into my front yard and nearly slamming into the car already parked there.
“Crap.” I’d forgotten about my date.
Ian Walker wasn’t in his car. He wasn’t on the front porch. I glanced toward the trees, wondering if he’d gone to the creek, hoping to find me there as he had last night. How mortifying that he might think I’d actually wait for him at the water for more of the same ... although it wasn’t a half-bad idea.
I had to remind myself that this was an affair, nothing more. Even though I’d broken my self-imposed rule on sleeping with a resident of Lake Bluff, that didn’t mean this was going to be anything more than a short interlude that would end badly.
If that’s all this was, then where lay the harm in going directly to bed? After the day I’d had, I could use a little comfort, a chance to forget for a few moments everything that was whirling in my head.
I climbed the porch steps and opened the door. Ian sat at my kitchen table. How had he gotten in?
“The door was open,” he said.