Tony butted in, shouldering past me and in front of Marks like he really was breaking up a fight. “Hello, Sheriff Marks? I’m Tony Rivera. I’m afraid this is my fault, I asked Kitty to show me around. She said some weird stuff’s been happening and I wanted to check it out.”
He held out his hand, an obvious peacemaking gesture, but Marks took his time reaching out to it. Finally, though, they clasped hands. They held on for a long moment, locked in one of those macho who’s going to wince first gripping matches.
Finally, they let go. Tony
’s face had gone funny, and it took me a moment to figure out what it was. He was frowning. He hadn’t frowned once all morning.
He looked at me. “He’s the one. One of them, anyway.”
“One of them, what?” I said, perplexed, at nearly the same time Marks said, “One of who?”
Then my eyes widened as I realized what Tony was talking about: what he’d come here to look for, the curse, my house—Marks was the one.
“You?” I drew the word out into an accusation and glared at Marks. He didn’t seem like the type to hang skinned dogs from trees. I’d have expected him to just shoot me. I’d never have pegged him as someone who knew anything about magic, even if what he knew was wrong. He was just so… boneheaded.
“What the hell are you people talking about?”
Tony said, “Anyone ever tell you that when you lay a curse, you better do it right or it’s going to come back and smack you?”
If Tony was wrong and Marks didn’t have anything to do with it, I’d have expected denials. I’d have expected more of the sheriff’s blowhard posturing, maybe even threats. Instead, the fury left him for a moment, leaving his face slack and disbelieving.
His protest was too little, too late. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said in a low voice.
Tony ignored him, and glanced between Ben and me. “Remember what I said about spirits having fingerprints? Everybody’s soul has its own little flavor. It follows them around, touches everything they do. This guy’s stamp is all over your place.”
“I called him out there a couple of times, to check things out. That could be why,” I said.
“No. Too strong for that,” Tony said. “This has malice in it.”
Marks seemed to wake out of a daze. His defenses slammed into place, and the look of puckered rage returned. “You’re accusing me of being the one who pinned those dead rabbits to her porch, and all that other garbage? What a load of crap. I don’t believe this hocus-pocus nonsense.”
I said, “But you believe I’m a werewolf—a monster that could do something like slaughter a herd of cattle. You can’t have it both ways, Sheriff. Believe one and not the other.” I’d learned that quickly enough.
“Okay, I won’t say I don’t believe it. Somebody’s done something out at your place, I won’t deny that. But I wouldn’t know the first thing about cursing someone.”
“Maybe you were just following directions,” Tony said.
Again, that blank look while he organized his defense. “That doesn’t even make sense.”
I said, “Sheriff, you don’t like me. You’ve made no secret of that. You don’t like what I am, you don’t like that I’m in your town. Maybe you’re not the only one. And maybe you didn’t do it, but I’m betting you backed whoever did.”
The three of us—Tony, Ben, and me—surrounded him, pinning him against his car almost. If Marks had reached for his gun, I wouldn’t have been surprised. To his credit, he didn’t. He appeared stricken, though. Frozen almost, like he expected us to pounce.
I said, “I haven’t hurt anyone. I didn’t kill those cattle. I don’t deserve what’s been done to me, and I just want it to stop. That’s all.”
His lips pursed, his expression hardening. We weren’t going to get anything out of him. In his mind, he’d drawn some kind of line in the dirt. I stood on one side, he stood on the other, and because of that we’d never come to an understanding. I might as well pack my bags and leave.
Tony reached out to him. He moved quickly. Marks and I held each other’s gazes so strongly I didn’t even notice it until Tony held Marks’s collar. Marks only had time to flinch before Tony had pulled out a pendant on a hemp cord that had been tucked under the sheriff’s shirt.
Tony held the pendant flat in his hand, displaying it: a flint arrowhead of gray stone, tied to the cord.
“Zuni charm,” Tony said. “Defense against werewolves. He knows all about this magic.”
Was that why I wanted to growl at Marks every time I saw him?
Marks snatched the arrowhead away from Tony, closing his hand around it. He took a step back, bumping against the hood of his car. His armor had slipped; now, he seemed uncertain.
“It wasn’t my idea,” he said finally.