I handed her the copy of the anthropologist's e-mail. We sat at the table, and when she was done reading, she handed it to me. "I'm not Romanian. "
"I've seen you coming out of the woods twice dressed in a white robe and nothing else. "
"I'm Cherokee. I like to commune with nature. "
"Why don't I believe that?"
Her lips tilted. "Yesterday you were arguing with me about the existence of werewolves, today you think I am one?"
"I saw that wolf with Balthazar's eyes. Seeing goes a long way toward believing. "
"Well, until you see me sprout a tail and fangs, would you mind not shooting me?"
"I wouldn't have shot you," I said.
"Damn straight, with the safety on. "
I should have known she'd notice that.
"What's with the dead toad?" I asked.
"He was Gramma's. "
"How old is that thing?"
Her green eyes met mine over her second cup of coffee. "You don't want to know. " She took a sip, then set the mug down, revealing a slash of dirt across her wrist.
"What happened?"
She turned her hand over; it was filthy. "I fell. "
Grace had been voted least likely to fall in high school. Grace was. . . graceful, almost freakishly so.
She lifted one foot onto her knee. The sole was scratched. "I should know better than to walk around in the woods barefoot. Stepped on a stone. Winced, tripped. Bam. " She spread her hands. Both of them were in need of a good scrubbing.
"You should get cleaned up. "
"I will. Then we'll head to the camp. " She studied me for a minute. "I've been thinking that maybe silver doesn't hurt them at all. "
"Sure hurt Balthazar. "
"If that was a silver bullet. "
"From Doc's eyewitness testimony, I'd say that was a silver bullet. "
"What if silver doesn't hurt them in human form?"
I thought about Mal's earring, the testing Grace had done of the Gypsies. "That could be a problem. "
"Or maybe our culprit is superwerewolf," Grace continued. "Able to resist silver, wolfsbane, and pentagrams. "
At my curious glance she continued. "I did a little research, too. Wolfsbane, or monskshood, is said to driv
e off werewolves. Which makes sense because it's extremely poisonous. "
"And the pentagram?"
"There are quite a few different beliefs about those. A few state that the symbol will repel a werewolf like a crucifix repels a vampire. "