Bitten (Otherworld 1)

Jeremy took my good arm and led me away before Clay could argue.

On the way back to the house, we talked. Or, I should say, Jeremy talked, I listened. The danger seemed to be escalating with each passing hour. First we'd been spotted in the city. Next we'd found a body on the property. Then we'd had a confrontation with the locals, calling attention to ourselves and probably raising suspicion. All in twelve hours. The mutt had to die. Tonight.

When Clay came back to the house, he wanted to talk to Jeremy and me. I found an excuse and hightailed it up to my room. I knew what he wanted to say, to apologize for screwing up, for confronting the searchers and causing trouble. Let Jeremy absolve him. That was his job, not mine.

After Jeremy and Clay had finished their talk, Jeremy took the others into the study to explain what had happened. Since I didn't need the instant replay, I stayed in my room and called Philip. He talked about an ad campaign he was trying to snag, something about lakefront condos. I admit I wasn't paying much attention to his words. Instead, I listened to his voice, closing my eyes and imagining I was there beside him, in a place where dead bodies in the backyard would have been cause for indescribable horror, not quick cleanup plans. I tried to think as Philip would, to feel compassion and grief for that dead boy, a life as full as my own cut short.

As Philip talked, my thoughts wandered to my night with Clay. I didn't have to work very hard to guess how Philip would feel about that. What the hell had I been thinking? I hadn't been thinking--that was the trouble. If I hadn't felt guilt a few hours ago, I felt it now, listening to Philip and picturing how he would react if he knew where I'd spent the night. I was a fool. Here I had a wonderful man who cared for me and I was screwing around with a self-absorbed, conniving monster who'd betrayed me in the worst possible way. It was a mistake I swore not to repeat.

After a late lunch, Jeremy took Clay for a walk to give him instructions for that night. I'd already received mine. Clay and I were going after the mutt together--I didn't have a choice in the matter, but I'd still argued. I would find the mutt and lure him out to a safe place where Clay would finish him off. It was an old routine and, as much as I hated to admit it, one that worked.

While the others were cleaning up the dishes, I slipped away. I wandered through the house and ended up in Jeremy's studio. The mid-afternoon sun danced through the leaves of the chestnut tree outside, casting pirouetting shadows on the floor.

I thumbed through a stack of canvases leaning against the wall, scenes of wolves playing and singing and sleeping together, curled up in heaps of intertwining limbs and varicolored fur. Juxtaposed with these were pictures of wolves in city alleys, watching passersby, wolves allowing children to touch them while mothers looked the other way. When Jeremy did agree to sell one of his paintings, it was the second style that earned him the big bucks. The scenes were enigmatic and surreal, painted in reds, greens, and purples so dark they looked like shades of black. Bold splashes of yellows and oranges electrified the darkness in incongruous places, like the reflection of the moon in a puddle. A dangerous subject, but Jeremy was careful, selling them under an assumed name and never making public appearances. No one outside the Pack ever came to Stonehaven, except chaperoned service people, so his paintings were safe displayed here in his studio.

Jeremy painted human models too, though only members of the Pack. One of his favorites was on the wall by the window. In it, I was standing on the edge of a cliff, naked, with my back to the viewer. Clay was sitting on the ground beside me, his arm wrapped around my leg. Below the cliff, a pack of wolves played in a forest clearing. The title was scrawled in the bottom corner: Eden.

On the opposite wall hung two portraits. The first showed Clay in his late teens. He was sitting out back in a white wicker chair, with a wistful half smile on his face as his gaze focused on something above the painter. He looked like Michelangelo's David come to life, youthful perfection all innocence and dreaminess. On a good day, I saw the portrait as Jeremy's wishful thinking. On a bad day, it smacked of outright delusion.

The portrait that hung next to it was equally unsettling. It was me. I was sitting with my back to the painter, twisting to give a view of my full face and upper body. My hair was loose, falling in tangled curls and hiding my breasts. Like Clay's picture, though, the expression was the focal point. My dark blue eyes looked clearer and sharper than normal, giving them an animal-like glint. I was smiling with my lips parted and teeth showing. The impact was one of feral sensuality, with a dangerous edge that I didn't see when I looked in the mirror.

"Ah-ha," Nick called from the doorway. "So this is where you're hiding. Phone call for you. It's Logan."

I was out the door so fast I nearly knocked over a pile of paintings. Nick followed and pointed me to the phone in the study. As I was heading down the hall, Clay walked through the back door. He didn't see me. I slipped into the study and shut the door as I heard Clay asking Nick where I was. Nick made some noncommittal answer, not daring to risk Clay's anger by admitting the truth. Clay was still pissed off over me contacting Logan during my absence. He didn't suspect I was screwing around with Logan or anything so banal. He knew the truth--that Logan and I were friends, very good friends, but that was enough to ignite his jealousy, not of my body, but of my time and my attention.

I picked up the phone and said hello.

"Ellie!" Logan's voice boomed through a blanket of static. "I can't believe you're actually there. How's it going? Still alive?"

"So far, but it's only been two days." The line buzzed, went silent for a second, then hissed back to life. "Either L.A. has worse phone service than Tibet or you're on a cell phone. Where are you?"

"Driving to the courthouse. Listen, things here are wrapping up fast. We got a settlement. That's why I called."

"You're coming back?"

His laugh sizzled across the line. "Eager to see me? I'd be flattered if I didn't suspect you just want a buffer against Clayton. Yes, I'm coming back. I'm not sure exactly when, but it should be tonight or tomorrow morning. We've got to finish up work here and I'll catch the next plane out."

"Great. I can't wait to see you."

"Likewise, though I'm still miffed you wouldn't let me come to Toronto at Christmas. I was looking forward to burnt gingerbread. Another great holiday tradition lost."

"Maybe this year."

"Definitely this year." The phone crackled and went silent, then clicked back. "--lo?"

"I'm still here."

"I'd better sign off before I lose you. Don't wait up for me. I'll see you tomorrow and I'll whisk you away to lunch so you can relax for a while, catch your breath. Okay?"

"Definitely okay. I'll s

ee you then."

He said good-bye and hung up. As I put the receiver back in the cradle, I could hear Nick in the hall, rounding up players for a game of touch football. He stopped outside the study door and tapped.

"I'm in," I said. "I'll meet you out there."

I looked back at the phone. Logan was coming. That was enough to make me forget all the problems and annoyances of the day. I smiled to myself and hurried out the door, suddenly eager for a good roughhousing before the excitement of the mutt hunt.