“What the hell do you mean breaking into my house…

“puting wiretaps on my phones, setting up surveillance equipment? Are you completely insane? I ought to call the police right now and turn you in—you could lose your license for this! I can’t believe the arrogance—”

Ky smiled. “Getting over your crush on me, are you?”

It was such a ridiculous thing to say; his smile was so unexpected and sexy and charming. For a moment Amy could do nothing but gape at him. Once she recovered, she answered, “By the minute.”

“That’s good,” he said, “because from now on neither one of us is going to have much time for flirting. Now, what I need from you is—”

“All right, that is it.” Amy flung up both hands in a gesture of defiance and spun on her heel toward the door. “I don’t need this. Get out. You’re fired!”

Rebecca Flanders has written over seventy books under a variety of pseudonyms. She lives in the mountains of north Georgia with a collie, a golden retriever and three cats. In her spare time she enjoys painting, hiking, dog training and catching up on the latest bestsellers.

Shadow of the Wolf
Rebecca Flanders

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

PROLOGUE

New Orleans, Louisiana

July

“This is Amy Fortenoy, reporting live from the scene of what appears to be another bizarre murder, similar to the ones that took place last month. The victim, identified only as a white female between the ages of twenty-five and thirty, was found near the French Market about six o’clock this morning. Her throat, like those of the two previous victims, had been cut with a jagged-edge instrument. Though the body was found partially clothed, police say there is no evidence of sexual assault….”

August

“Another body has been discovered tonight with its throat cut, a young man this time. This is the second victim this month of the so-called Werewolf Killer, known as such because of his propensity for attacking only during the full moon, and because of the brutal nature of the crimes. But Channel Six Action News has learned exclusively tonight of a particularly bizarre piece of forensic evidence that has been a part of each of these murder scenes. Black animal hair—yes, animal hair, like that of a dog—has been found on each body….”

September

“The grim total of the werewolf killings rose to six this morning with the discovery of a body in Jackson Square. The victim is thought to be a homeless man of about forty years old and, like the others, died of wounds to the throat. Last night’s rains will no doubt make the collection of forensic evidence very difficult, but police have confirmed the similarities between this death and previous victims’—the brutality of the attack, the nature of the murder weapon, which is still being described only as a ‘jagged instrument,’ and yes, the presence of black animal hair on the body. While the pathologist admits that the animal hair taken from the scene has been classified as belonging to the canine family, he is adamant in denying the possibility that it could belong to a wolf. Meanwhile, ASPCA officials report a dramatic increase in the number of black dogs being turned in to shelters and caution against a general panic over the possible link between these killings and black dogs. This is Amy Fortenoy for Channel Six Action News.”

October

“This beautiful harvest moon behind me is an eerie backdrop to the scene of yet another violent slaying by the man we’ve come to know as the Werewolf Killer. With Halloween only a few days away, it seems inevitable that the death toll will begin to rise even higher.”

November

“This is Amy Fortenoy live from the banks of the Mississippi River, where the discovery of the partially submerged body of a middle-aged woman brings the total death count to twelve for the Werewolf Killer. Detectives and forensic specialists have been here for hours, securing the scene and collecting evidence, but this time it seems the killer has left them more to go on than on previous occasions. The crime-scene investigators have spent a great deal of time photographing and taking plaster casts of the footprints that were left on the riverbank, and this is what we want to show you. Can you get that close-up, Paul? As you can see, many of the tracks—there’s no other words for them—are clear enough to be read even by an amateur like me. The clear imprint of a rubber-soled shoe—can you see that?—apparently belongs to the victim. This one near it may belong to the attacker—a large print, apparently a bare foot. But these others—these are what are fascinating—appear to have been made by a very large animal. A dog…or a wolf. Is this someone’s idea of a sick joke, or has the Werewolf Killer begun to take his nickname seriously?”

December

“In New Orleans, Louisiana, a serial killer holds the city under siege. During the past six months, attacking only under the full moon, a man the media has dubbed the Werewolf Killer has claimed a total of thirteen victims. Amy Fortenoy with our affiliate in New Orleans has that story.”

January

“This is Amy Fortenoy, live outside the mayor’s office, where, at a press conference this afternoon, Deputy Police Chief Devereaux denied the accusation that the police department has failed to give its full attention to the werewolf killings because the victims so far have been homeless street people. With the discovery of the fifteenth victim yesterday, the public outcry has become understandably intense. The police department insists that it is doing everything in its power to bring the killer to justice, while continuing to caution the media against exploiting the so-called ‘sensationalistic’ elements of this case. Meanwhile, the death toll continues to rise. Back to you at the station…”

CHAPTER ONE

Mardi Gras

March

Amy Fortenoy manipulated the controls of the tape editor until the smooth, too-handsome-to-be-true features of Deputy Police Chief Marshall Devereaux came into center frame. She muttered, freezing the tape, “There you are, you smug, self-righteous son of a—”

“Oh, real helpful, Fortenoy.” Her producer, Janice Waters, paused to look over her shoulder. “Let’s start a war with the police department. Guaranteed to get you lots of publicity. Of course, you won’t be getting any interviews…”

“Watch this.” Amy let the tape play through.

“Before we go any further,” the deputy chief said with hands upraised in the manner of a born politician, “I’d first like to express my sincere disappointment with certain members of the media who, although repeatedly cautioned to use discretion regarding certain sensitive aspects of this case, have nonetheless chosen to turn this series of tragic and senseless killings into a virtual circus—”

“Me!” exclaimed Amy indignantly. “He’s talking about me!”

“Who else?” said Paul Shelton, her cameraman. “You’re the one, after all, who made the Werewolf Killer what he is today. With a little help from your friends, of course,” he added smugly and perched on the edge of the desk to admire the results of his work as it flickered across the screen.

Amy frowned. She didn’t like the way that sounded, any more than she had liked it when Marshall Devereaux had said virtually the same thing earlier that day. Of course, from Devereaux she had cause to take offense, while with Paul…well, he was one of her own. He knew, as well as she did, that it was all part of the business.

“To remind you, once again,” Devereaux was saying on tape, “that disturbed individuals such as this very often thrive on the publicity engendered by their crimes.”

And that was where Amy came in. She leaned forward to mark the tape. “Excuse me, Deputy Devereaux,” she called out clearly from the back of the room. “Surely you don’t mean to suggest that we should cease our coverage of the activities of this ‘disturbed individual,’ as you call him?”

Paul swung the camera to Devereaux. She marked a cut. Close-up on Devereaux’s angry face. “What I mean to suggest, young lady—”

“Young lady!” Her voice was practically a squeal. “He called me young lady!”

Paul grinned. Janice frowned. The tape rolled on.

“—is that without the insistence of certain members of the press upon turning an otherwise unremarkable series of killings…”

Chaos erupted from the pressroom, but it was, once again, Amy’s voice that rose above the fray. It was sweet and polite, laced with Southern sugar—a tone those who knew her well did their best to avoid. “Could you describe to us, sir, what you would consider a remarkable series of killings?”

Janice exclaimed in amazement, “What an absolute jerk!”

Paul’s grin broadened as he watched the action unfold on the screen. “Nail him, babe!”

“Now, this is a perfect example of how my words are twisted every time I come before you people,” returned Devereaux angrily.

“You people!” Janice was practically chortling with delight. “That man is going to hang himself by his own—”

Amy held up a hand for attention as Devereaux went on, “What we have is a sick, deranged individual preying on the weak and helpless among us, who, for some reason that’s totally inexplicable to me, has been glorified by the media into what very nearly approximates a cult hero.”

“Well, I resent that,” muttered Paul.

“Cut it,” Janice told Amy, but Amy had already marked it for editing.

“The press has all but convinced the public there is a real werewolf out there, a man who changes into a beast during the full moon and tears people’s throats out. But worse, there is a strong possibility you’ve actually convinced the killer of it, as well. And that’s all we need, isn’t it? A deranged killer who’s convinced of his own invincibility?”

“Well, I never,” murmured Paul, feigning insult.

Amy ignored him.

Devereaux continued, “You might recall that it wasn’t until the media started bandying about the term werewolf killer that this maniac actually began leaving evidence suggestive of a wolf at the scene—”

“Now that’s a downright lie!” exclaimed Janice indignantly. “There was animal hair on the first body!”

Amy simply frowned at the screen.

“Those ridiculous paw prints, which our forensics people had no difficulty dismissing as a hoax, the widely publicized claw and teeth marks…”

“We didn’t widely publicize them,” complained Paul, disgruntled.

“Not to mention the fact that the number of killings has actually increased with each successive cycle, as though the killer is becoming emboldened by his own success. I attribute this directly to what I can only call the media’s exploitation of a tragic situation. Let me be clear on one thing, people—I will not have panic in the streets.”

“Might not the quickest way to avoid that,” Amy spoke up on tape again, “be to make an arrest in the case?”

Devereaux’s contempt for her, and the press, in general, was clear through the tape. “That, of course, is at the top of our list of things to do.”

“Oh, great,” groaned Janice. “The man is dog food.”

Someone else called out, “Do you have an update on the progress in the case?”

But Amy overrode him. “Is it true the FBI has been called in?”

Devereaux glared at her. “It is customary for the FBI to take on a consulting role in all cases of this sort. We’re working closely with federal investigators and expect a break in the case very soon.”

Amy had the last word. “Hopefully, before the next full moon.”

Devereaux looked at her long and hard, and then turned his gaze to the assemblage in general. “Are there other questions?”

Amy turned down the volume.

Janice gave a rueful shake of her head. “I assume he didn’t have anything else important to say?”

“You heard the best parts.”

“The man is such a jerk, it’s almost no fun to torment him. Okay, put the best parts together with a nice little narrative, and we’ll run it at six and eleven. What else have you got?”

“At the moment, nothing. But I’m going to try to get a quote from the mayor tonight. If I can snag it in time for the eleven o’clock show, I’ll let you know.”

Janice lifted an eyebrow. “The mayor, huh? How do you plan to arrange that?”

“Simple. He’s going to the Governor’s Ball tonight. So am I.”

Janice gave her a grinning thumbs-up and left the editing room.

Paul said, rising, “Governor’s Ball, huh? Boy, I wish my folks had money.”

“Money,” replied Amy, running the tape backward, “is nothing. Connections, on the other hand, are everything.”

“So, is your dad going to be there or what?”

Amy did not look up. “No.”

Amy’s father, Byron Fortenoy, the internationally renowned cardiac surgeon and researcher, inventor of the synthetic reflux valve that had saved countless thousands of lives, rarely found time in his busy schedule to visit among mere mortals anymore. His name, however, still carried more than enough influence among the New Orleans elite to guarantee his daughter anything from a bank loan to Saints tickets merely for the asking. Sometimes, such notoriety was a pain. More often than not, however, it was incredibly convenient.

Amy said absently, studying the frames as they moved through the editor, “Anyway, I’m only going for the quote. You know how I hate these Mardi Gras balls. And it’s not like there won’t be a half-dozen other reporters there.”

“Yeah, but none of them who are on first-name basis with the mayor. And none of them,” Paul added pointedly as he turned for the door, “who have the Werewolf Killer in their pockets.”

Amy shuddered. “Did anybody ever tell you you have a creepy way of putting things?”

He shrugged. “Hey, in this business, if you don’t learn to laugh, you spend your life crying.”

“Boy, that’s the truth,” Amy murmured, focusing on the tape.

Amy had been a crime reporter for WLAK’s Channel Six Action News for the past four of her twenty-nine years. In that time, she had covered gang slayings, child murders and child murderers, rapes, molestations, abuse, home invasions, drive-by shootings, arson, bombings. Whatever twisted evil lurked in the hearts of men and whatever violent or obscene way they chose to express it, Amy had seen it all. She had quickly learned that to allow herself to become emotionally affected by the stories she covered was a short road to self-destruction, and she was careful to maintain a professional detachment in every situation.

Until now.

“Paul?” She glanced up as he opened the door, trying to keep her voice casual. “You don’t think…I mean, Devereaux couldn’t be right, could he? About us—about me—encouraging this guy?”

Paul scowled sharply in a mixture of annoyance and amusement. “Come on, babe, you know he’s just trying to torment you. If you ask me, he’s just jealous.”

Amy tried to relax. “Of my good looks, no doubt.”

“You better believe it. Hey, if I weren’t married…”

“In your dreams, sweet thing.” Grinning, Amy turned back to the editor. But her amusement faded as she watched the frames scroll by and she said again, “Hey, Paul.”

He looked back. “I’m on my dinner break,” he reminded her impatiently.

Amy said thoughtfully, “What was all that garbage about the forensic evidence, anyway? I never heard anyone declare those paw prints a hoax before. And he out-and-out lied about animal hair on the bodies. Until today, no one said anything about teeth and claw marks on the bodies. It was as though he was trying so hard to tell a lie, he tripped all over the truth.”

“And this is unusual? Devereaux wouldn’t know the truth if it jumped up and bit him on the ankle.”

“But would we?” she wondered, only half to herself.

“Huh?”

“Did you ever hear the phrase, ‘Methinks he doth protest too much’?”

“Come on, Amy, I’m going into serious sugar deficit here.”

“It’s just that…maybe I’ve been going about this whole thing the wrong way. Maybe the truth has been staring us in the face the whole time.”

“What? That the killer really is a werewolf?”

Amy didn’t smile. “That the police really don’t know what he is.”

Paul looked confused.

“Think about it, Paul.” Amy’s expression was serious. “A serial killer in one of the most populous cities in the country evades detection for ten months. Fifteen people dead, and not a single witness. The FBI, local police, all the crime detection capabilities of the modern age are involved, and there’s still not so much as a computer sketch or a psychological profile of this guy. Devereaux aside, you don’t really believe for one minute the police are that incompetent, do you?”

Paul frowned. “So what are you saying? That they’re covering up something? Hardly a new theory, Ace.”

“Exactly.” Amy chewed a thumbnail thoughtfully. “Police and corruption. We’ve all been pursuing that angle. It’s politically motivated because all the victims are homeless and the police are heartless. The evidence is being tainted because the police are careless. Competition between law enforcement agencies is hampering the investigation. But, Paul—” she lifted eyes to him that were dark with worry “—what if the simple truth is that the police are doing their best, and they still can’t find him?”

Paul regarded her gravely. “Now, that,” he told her, “is damn scary.”

“Yeah.” She released a breath. “No kidding.”

They looked at each other for another long moment. Finally, Paul said, “I, uh, wouldn’t mention this theory of yours to anybody just yet.”

“Right.”

He turned toward the door again, then looked back. “I’d rather it be a real werewolf,” he said.

Amy smiled, though the expression was faint and empty of humor. “Yeah. I know what you mean.”

“On the other hand, it’s not as though something like this has never happened before.”

Amy, who had started to turn back to the editor, glanced at him in confusion. “What?”

“That a serial killer eludes detection for months on end in one of the most populated cities in the country,” he explained. “No witnesses, no clean suspects, nothing.”

Amy was interested. “Oh, yeah? When was this?”

“London, 1888,” he told her. “They called him Jack the Ripper.”

“Great,” she muttered, pushing back her smooth blond hair with her hand. “I think I’ll put that in my story tonight. Citizens of New Orleans, there’s hope—London survived Jack the Ripper, we can survive the Werewolf Killer.”

He shrugged. “As long as we aren’t prostitutes or street people, that is. Say, do you have a date for that wingding tonight?”

“Don’t need one. This is business, not pleasure.”

“My tennis partner is getting a divorce, you know, and I’ll bet he’s available on short notice.”

Amy should have seen that one coming. Paul was always trying to fix her up, and his wife was no better. What was it about happily married people that made them incapable of letting their friends be happily single?

She said, “When he actually gets a divorce, let me know. Meanwhile, the party’s black-tie.”

“Oh.”

Paul sounded disappointed, and Amy guessed his friend did not have his own tux.

Then he cheered. “Anyway, Cindy says for you to come to dinner next week.”

“Is the tennis partner going to be there?”

“I guess not, if you’re going to take that attitude.”

“I’ll call Cindy.”

Still Paul hesitated. “You don’t, uh, need a camera for that interview tonight, do you?”

Amy looked up at him and grinned. “You big baby. No. I’m not going to drag you across town to the Governor’s Ball and no, I’m not going to make you put on a tux. Go home to your wife. You’re off duty.”

Paul returned her grin and kissed his fingers to her. “You’re a prince, Fortenoy, an absolute prince. I’ll name an offspring for you.”

“You’d better go before someone sees you hanging around and puts your name on the assignment board.”

“I’m out of here. And be careful crossing Canal to-night—you’ll be hitting the worst of the parade traffic.”

Amy waved him away, smiling, but she was deeply immersed in the editor now and did not look up.

Amy Fortenoy had spent her life laboring under two handicaps: her looks and her family name. Amy was blond, petite and cute in a business that valued tall, svelte and striking. Her shoulder-length hair was the sundrenched color of a three-year-old’s and the texture of satin, her nose a perfect button, her face round and ingenuous. Her eyes were large and fringed with thick dark lashes, and the only thing that kept them from being breathtaking was the fact that they were more hazel than green. She had flawless Fortenoy porcelain skin, and a perfect size-six figure, which was due as much to her own efforts and the demands of the camera as it was to the Fortenoy genes.

In a business that values physical attractiveness at least as much as it did ability, if not more—there were, after all, very few ugly news anchors—being a cute blonde might not be considered a disadvantage. But cute was the operative word, and Amy was a reporter. She was tough, ambitious, alert and perceptive. All she wanted was a chance to prove what she could do, yet she had spent her career fending off advances, fighting the stereotype and being offered jobs as the weather girl by station directors who took one look at her and wondered if she could read…or if it mattered.

But the prejudices she fought in the work force were nothing to the disapproval—indeed, the disappointment—with which she had to contend in her own family. The Fortenoys were a grand old Southern family who bred tradition, snobbery and intellectuals. Amy had two brothers and three sisters, all of whom had earned at least one Ph.D. in suitably exalted subjects like philosophy or mathematics. Two were university professors, one was a doctor like their father, one was a museum curator, one was the director of a major European symphony orchestra. Among her cousins, aunts and uncles were bank presidents, Supreme Court justices, research scientists and poet laureates. Not one of them worked in television. Most of them, in fact, did not even own television sets, and those who did, only brought them out on the occasion of a presidential election or a particularly compelling PBS special.

Amy’s Grandmama Fortenoy still lived in one of those wonderful old antebellum houses on St. Charles Avenue, shaded by creeping ivy and oaks dripping with Spanish moss. On Sunday afternoons she served tea from bone china that had been in the family for three hundred years, and friends and relatives and the social elite would gather in her high-ceilinged parlor with its small brocaded chairs, and speak, in their soft sugared accents, of things lofty and genteel and utterly civilized. The Werewolf Killer would never be among their topics of conversation. And if, by chance, some well-meaning soul asked about “poor little Amy,” throats would be cleared, eyes would be averted and the subject delicately changed.

Amy was a source of bafflement and embarrassment to her family, but no more so than they were to her. Sometimes she felt like a changeling, and she could no more understand how that most carefully regulated Fortenoy family tree had come to produce her than they could.

Amy had wasted far too much time and energy early in her career fighting the tide of other people’s prejudices against her, but when she had finally realized she could do nothing about either her looks or her family, the solution to her difficulties was clear: She simply started using both to her advantage, instead of allowing them to work against her. No one expected a petite, blond, wide-eyed young woman with a sparkling smile and bubbly personality to be a crime reporter. And nobody expected her to be any good at it. Thus she was not only allowed into places a more experienced-looking reporter could never go, she actually, more often than not, had the door held for her as she went in. No one expected Byron Fortenoy’s daughter—Joseph Fortenoy’s granddaughter—to sully her hands with anything as distasteful as the news. She was therefore privy to certain information relevant to scandal, corruption and white-collar crime that would be guarded furiously from an “outsider.”

People expected Amy to be dumb, so she played dumb. They expected her to be helpless, so she acted helpless. They wanted her to be a socialite, a dilettante, a hothouse flower, and she was more than happy to play the part—when it suited her purpose. Only one thing mattered to Amy Fortenoy: success. And she knew that with the werewolf killings, she was as close to that elusive goal as she had ever been, maybe as close as she would ever get.

So, if she was a little obsessed with the case, there was more than one reason. If, like Devereaux had suggested, she had been a little overzealous in reporting the story, she had good cause. After all, the story of a lifetime only came along once, and this was hers.

Amy was on the air at six, giving her report and showing the tape. There was, of course, nothing new at all to report—the full moon was still almost two weeks away—but it was important to keep the story in the public eye. To her credit, she did not make Devereaux look like too much of a jackass on the final edit, and she left in the part about the sick, deranged individual being glorified by the media. She was trained to be fair, after all.

She left the studio at six forty-five, which left just under an hour to get across town, put on her party dress and get back downtown in time to get a quote from the mayor for the eleven o’clock news. She would also love to get a reaction to Devereaux’s remarks this afternoon from the chief coroner, and it was possible she would be able to catch him at home if she didn’t spend too much time at the party. He had been ducking her calls all day.

During Mardi Gras, Amy gave up trying to drive to work. It was impossible to keep up with which streets would be closed for what parade or for how long. It was easier and faster to simply take public transportation. She took the St. Charles trolley as far as Jackson Square and then had to walk a block and a half to catch the streetcar to Midcity. Ordinarily, this was no problem; the streets were well traveled and well lighted, and Amy enjoyed the brief walk. It gave her the chance to unwind from a busy day or, as tonight, to organize an even busier evening. But for some reason, she had forgotten about the parade.

Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Music, laughter, crowds and lights, extravagant costumes, gala parades. To the several hundred thousand visitors who packed the city streets every year, Mardi Gras was magic, pure and simple. To New Orleans residents like Amy, however, Mardi Gras was traffic jams, missed appointments and dancing in the streets until 4:00 a.m. when she had to get up at six. To her, there was nothing romantic about the shoulder-to-shoulder bodies that screeched and waved and cheered and blocked the sidewalk as she tried to elbow her way past, nothing thrilling about the towering floats and harlequins on stilts and fire-eating jugglers that inched down the street, blocking off both foot and vehicular traffic for six blocks in each direction.

The noise was deafening. A Dixieland band blared its trumpets in her ears as it passed less than five feet in front of her; the stereo speakers on a float a dozen yards behind roared out a marching tune. Grinning masks bobbed and leered, street lamps glinted eerily off of glass eyes. The air was alive with writhing strips of pink and purple confetti, dragons and mermaids danced in the street. Behind her, the door to a pub opened and a new mass of screeching, jostling, beer-cup-waving bodies spilled out. Amy felt as though she had stumbled into a madman’s nightmare and she thought, I don’t need this!

Gauging a break in the procession between a float featuring a giant Poseidon and a gaggle of acrobats in silver suits, Amy prepared to dash across the street. Her foot had barely left the curb when something grabbed her hard from behind.

“Hey!” she cried. Amy tried to spin around, but someone held her firm. She tried to jerk away, but an iron arm clamped around her ribs, dragging her back and jerking her off her feet.

She cried out, struggling. No one in the jostling, excited crowd seemed to notice. She wrenched around, flinging out a hand to strike, but stopped, gasping and disoriented, as she found herself staring into the grinning face of a wolf.

CHAPTER TWO

Ky Londen knew something was wrong when he was halfway up the stairs. He might have blamed it on the reaction of Voodoo, the half mutt, half black Lab at his side, but it was more than that. The minute they reached the landing and the door to Ky’s apartment came into view, man and dog froze in place. The dog dropped into a half crouch, pressing himself against Ky’s knee, his hackles rising. Though there was absolutely no visible reason for it, Ky felt his hackles rise, too.

Ky’s apartment was on the second floor of what once had been a fruit market on the corner of Rampart and Canal streets. The first floor was home to nothing but rats now, completely boarded up and always locked. The entire building might have been condemned long ago had not the Historical Preservation Society taken a particular, and in Ky’s opinion, inexplicable, interest in the place. Ky had stayed because the rent was cheap and because the historical society could occasionally be persuaded to foot the bill for improvements that kept the building, for the most part, on the right side of health-code standards. Security doors did not, unfortunately, fall into that category and on more than one occasion Ky himself, having forgotten his key, had opened the door with a well-placed shove of his shoulder.

The apartment was reached via an ironwork staircase that might once have been used as a fire escape. The scarred wooden door that faced the alley was closed, just as he had left it. There was no sign of forcible entry. Nonetheless, someone was indisputably inside. Voodoo knew it, and so did Ky.

He had never worried about intruders before. He didn’t have anything anyone would want to steal, and personal safety was the least of his concerns. But this was different. Now he was worried.

He reached down and placed a restraining hand on Voodoo’s neck, signaling the dog to stay put as he moved forward carefully. The big black dog looked fierce, but he was no hero, and was more likely to melt into a puddle of admiration at the intruder’s feet than launch an attack. Some people kept dogs for protection; Ky spent far more time protecting the dog than the other way around.

He took the remaining steps silently, and the closer he got to the door the harder his heart beat, the drier his throat grew. He paused once to glance back at the dog, but he needn’t have worried. Whatever was waiting for him behind that door had terrified the poor animal into paralysis. It was a state with which Ky could sympathize.

With every instinct in his body, Ky knew that what he was about to encounter was unlike anything he had ever dealt with before. Not a burglar, not an escaped convict he had once put away, not a homicidal ex-client. This was…different.

Ky was licensed to carry a handgun. He worked some of the roughest streets in the city, and the people he encountered were not always feeling friendly toward him. However, since leaving the New Orleans police department three years ago, he had not carried a gun. Until now, he had never felt the need for one.

Although he didn’t really believe that a gun would have protected him from what was inside his apartment, he would have felt better having one in his hand.

He did not waste time looking around for something that could be used as a weapon. There was no point in plotting a strategy. Ky had lived a rough life in an unfriendly world and had survived for almost forty years on his wits, his instincts and his lightning-fast reflexes. Even if he had wanted to, there was no time to change his modus operandi now.

He gripped the handle of the door and turned it slowly. It was unlocked. He flung open the door and flattened himself quickly against the wall, making as small a target of his body as possible.

“I assure you, I am unarmed,” a male voice said from inside the room. “Like you, I have no need for crude mechanical weapons.”

The voice was deep and powerful, now faintly amused or perhaps bored. The accent was cultured and precise but otherwise indefinable. And something about that voice—or perhaps it was the man himself, still unknown to Ky—was compelling. Perfectly aware that his life might be the price he paid for curiosity, Ky stepped cautiously across the threshold of his own apartment.

It was full dark outside, and no lamps were on inside. The only illumination came from the streetlights and car headlights below the windows that faced the street. Nonetheless, Ky’s night vision was excellent. He had no difficulty at all making out the figure who stood before the uncurtained window.

Fight-or-flight adrenaline rushed through Ky’s veins. His heart pounded in his throat, his breath was quick and strong. Every sense was more acute than it had ever been. He recognized the man immediately for what he was. And he had never seen him before in his life.

He was a big man, powerfully built, with a thick mane of silver hair that fell below his shoulders. He wore a patchwork fur vest, which was distinctly out of place for New Orleans, and carried an elaborately carved wooden walking stick. His face was stern and imperious, his eyes crystal blue.

Ky knew he was in the presence of greatness. His knees were abruptly rubbery and he wanted to sit down, but he dared not show any weakness. He thought, This can’t be.

And yet it was.

He squared his shoulders, closing his fists. He demanded, “How did you get in here?”

The other man smiled, and gestured toward the door. “Locks pose no problem for us, do they?”

Ky’s heartbeat jumped again. It was hard to swallow. “Who are you? What do you want?”

The intruder moved away from the window a few paces closer to Ky. Ky stood his ground, but all the man did was lift a medium-size canvas satchel from the coffee table. The satchel was not Ky’s, so he presumed the man had brought it with him.

“My name,” he said, “is Sebastian St. Clare, and I have a business proposition for you.”

Ky said nothing.

“You don’t have a business address,” St. Clare went on. “I presume I was right in coming here.”

Ky said, “How did you find me?” His voice was a little hoarse. He tried to swallow.

“You are a private investigator, are you not?” inquired St. Clare mildly. “How do clients usually find you?”

That was not what Ky had meant and the other man knew it. The rules had been established, and they were simple: St. Clare would ask the questions.

The door behind him was still open. Ky considered turning and leaving. He wondered how far he would get.

Instead, he crossed the room to the kitchen area, opened the refrigerator and took out a beer. He turned, twisting off the cap. “I do divorce cases, insurance fraud and process serving. Which are you?”

“Homicide,” Sebastian St. Clare replied.

A fraction of a second’s pause in the movement of his hand, but no more. Ky lifted the bottle to his lips and drank. He did not take his eyes off the other man.

“I think we should talk.”

“Yes, I think so, too,” Ky replied.

“But first…” St. Clare’s eyes moved past Ky, toward the open door. “Will you allow that pathetic creature to come inside? Please assure him that I won’t bite.” He said it with a perfectly straight face.

Voodoo poked his head around the corner of the door frame, ears flat, eyes wary. When Ky snapped his fingers, the dog crept inside, his tail low and his manner anxious, and went quickly to Ky’s side. He, too, never took his eyes off the stranger, and he made a wide circle around the carpet upon which St. Clare had trod.

“Might we sit down?”

Ky nodded. St. Clare took the lumpy plaid sofa, and Ky, with Voodoo clinging like a shadow to his side, sat cautiously in the reading chair across the room. Every sense, tangible and innate, was working overtime, assessing and observing, accumulating information and processing impressions, trying to make sense of what could not possibly be sitting on his sofa, lifting the satchel to his knee, opening it, showing the contents to Ky.

The satchel was filled with money. The cash was neatly stacked and wrapped with teller’s bands: tens, twenties and fifties. Ky’s eyes scanned the bundles quickly as he tried to keep his expression neutral. There must have been over…

“Fifty thousand dollars,” St. Clare said. “It represents half the amount we are willing to pay for your services. This is yours now, the remainder due when your assignment is completed.”

Ky took another sip of his beer. The dryness in his throat was only partially relieved. “And who was it,” he inquired carefully, “that you wanted me to kill?”

St. Clare closed the satchel and placed it on the table. He said, “You are aware of the man they call the Werewolf Killer.”

It was not a question, so Ky offered no reply. His thoughts were spinning, and there was no way he could predict what the old man was going to say next. None. How could he defend himself if he didn’t know the battlefield…or even if this was a battle?

“I represent a consortium that would like to see this reign of terror brought to an end,” St. Clare stated simply. “You have been chosen for the task.”

Ky could not quite prevent a lift of his eyebrow. “I’m flattered. But we have a very fine police department that specializes in this kind of thing. Maybe you should give them a call.”

“Yes,” murmured St. Clare, holding Ky in that steady blue gaze. “Your police department. The world has seen how effective they have been in dealing with this menace. Not that they are to be held at fault. They are incapable of stopping this killer, we both know that.”

I don’t know anything! Ky wanted to shout at him. This whole thing was insane. None of it could be happening, it all had to be some kind of colossal joke, none of it made sense.

He didn’t say any of that, of course. He didn’t raise his voice or tighten in muscles or even breathe hard; he did not in any way betray his agitation, but he wasn’t fooling himself, either—St. Clare knew what he was feeling. The old man could smell it.

Ky asked the only remaining relevant question. “Why me?”

St. Clare smiled. “Who else,” he demanded simply, “is there?”

“You,” returned Ky sharply. “If you want this killer brought to justice and you insist upon taking the law in your own hands, you go after him. Don’t come to me with your bag of money and expect me to risk my life for people I don’t even know.”

“But isn’t that what you did every day when you were a police officer? And for far less money than this.” He nodded toward the satchel.

Ky brought the bottle to his lips again. “Yeah, well, I’m not in that line of work any longer.”

“A story in itself, I’m sure,” replied St. Clare politely. “And to answer your question…I’m an old man, as you can see. I would be foolish to take on such a dangerous task at my age.”

Ky restrained a snort of disbelief. He suspected the old man could have taken on a dozen men half his age without even becoming winded.

“As for the others,” St. Clare went on, “I could send a squad of trained specialists down here, I suppose, but I’d rather not attract the attention, or to be frank, risk losing any of my top men. None of them know the city like you do, its people, its legal customs, its resources. None of them has as great a chance of going undetected by the killer as you do. Besides—” he glanced toward the window “—there is a great deal of water surrounding this city, which often makes it hard for us to track a moving target. I assume, to function as well as you have here, it doesn’t bother you?”

With Sebastian St. Clare’s first statement, Ky’s throat had seized. His breath stilled, his muscles froze and he didn’t hear anything after the word others. Others.

When his breath returned, it hurt his lungs. His voice, when he spoke, was hoarse. “Do you mean…there are more? Others like—”

“Us?” St. Clare inclined a regal nod. “Of course.”

It was one of those moments, and there are only one or two at best, where an entire life changes. Whatever happened from now on, Ky would be able to look back and effortlessly determine when everything crossed over, the point at which the life he once had lived became the life he could never go back to, and it was at that moment when Sebastian St. Clare looked at him with clear unsurprised eyes and said, “Of course.”

Ky’s heart raced. His thoughts scattered in a dozen different directions at once. Part of him wanted to shout “Liar!” and seize the man by the throat and shake the truth from him. Yet another part echoed quite calmly the truth he had always known. Of course.

St. Clare too easily read the struggle in Ky’s eyes and his expression grew sharp with interest. “So,” he murmured, “you didn’t know. I had wondered.”

“How many?” Ky asked, his voice oddly flat.

“Enough.”

Something inside Ky snapped. He flung the beer bottle against the wall. It exploded like a bomb, spewing suds and glass across the room. The dog ran to a corner and began to bark hysterically. Ky was out of his chair shouting, “Answer me, you son of a bitch! Tell me the truth or I’ll take you out, I swear I will! Answer me!”

Sebastian St. Clare was utterly unmoved. Like a patient father enduring the temper tantrum of a deprived child, he waited until Ky’s diatribe had worn itself out. Even Voodoo’s barking became less certain, slowed and finally ceased of its own accord.

Ky stood across from him, his fists bunched, his breathing hard, perspiration beading on his forehead. St. Clare’s calm silence should have infuriated him, and it did; it also made him feel foolish.

Finally, Sebastian St. Clare said gently, “All in good time, my boy. All in good time.”

Ky glared at him, muscles knotted and breath tight, for another moment. Then he swung away, feeling impotent and furious.

“I understand this must come as a shock to you,” St. Clare said. “I confess, it did to me, too, but I’ve had more time to adjust than you have. There are still a great many questions to be answered on both our parts, I think.”

Ky turned back to him slowly, his eyes narrowed. “How long have you known about me?”

“I had heard rumors, but until today I wasn’t sure of any of them. To be frank, it had occurred to me that you might actually be the renegade killer we’re trying to dispose of. The moment I entered your domicile, however, I knew that couldn’t be the case.”

Ky frowned sharply. “How?” he demanded. “How did you know?”

“Dog hair,” replied St. Clare simply. “It’s everywhere. Our killer would not live with a dog.”

Ky stared at him, letting the words roll around in his head. Then he said slowly, “So you’re telling me that this Werewolf Killer is—”

“Appropriately named,” replied St. Clare.

Ky refused to be surprised by anything further he heard. He would not be shocked, dismayed, disappointed or hopeful. Most of all, he would not let anything the man said from now on cause him to lose his temper.

“What makes you think I can do what the best law enforcement officials in this state—hell, in the nation—haven’t been able to do for the past ten months? And if I could, why wouldn’t I have done it by now?”

“You didn’t know what he was,” replied St. Clare simply, “until now.”

Ky turned away again, pushing a hand through his straight black hair, calming himself. For a time, neither of them spoke.

Then Ky looked back at the satchel on the table. He said, “It’s not enough.”

“What?”

“Your price. It’s not enough.”

Abruptly, St. Clare burst into laughter. It was a full, rich laugh, and the genuineness of it caught Ky off guard.

“So,” said St. Clare, “you are more like us than I suspected.”

He looked Ky over thoughtfully. “You’ll take the money,” he said, not so much offering an opinion as stating a fact. “But you’re right, I have something you want even more.”

Ky didn’t answer. He dared not.

“Your mother died in your twenty-first year,” St. Clare went on. “She must have told you about your father, otherwise you wouldn’t have been able to survive this long. But she never told you who he was, and you have spent your entire adult life trying to find out. Looking for him.”

Sebastian St. Clare’s eyes were steady on his, as cold as the center of the earth, as hot as blue fire. “I have the answers you seek, Ky Londen,” he said. “And I may be the only person in the world who does.”

Once again, everything inside him grew still. Ky looked very carefully at the man who sat on his sofa. He said, with the same care, “You know who my father is?”

“At present,” said St. Clare, “I have my suspicions. They will take time to confirm. And no,” he added, reading Ky’s mind, “it is not me.”

Ky was silent, this time for much longer. When he spoke at last, his tone was utterly expressionless. “So. This is blackmail.”

“Not at all.” St. Clare seemed genuinely surprised, perhaps even offended, by Ky’s choice of words. “I’ve made you a proposition. You are free to accept or reject it.”

“And if I reject it?”

“Then,” said Sebastian St. Clare, getting to his feet, “you will no longer be any concern of mine. You seem to have lived a full and busy life before I came into it, no doubt you will continue to do so after I depart.”

He picked up his walking stick and moved toward the door. For the first time, Ky was able to see the carvings that decorated the stick. The gleaming mahogany was inscribed on every surface with elaborate renderings of the heads of wolves. Of course.

Sebastian St. Clare walked toward the door, obviously expecting Ky to stop him.

Ky said, “You forgot your money.”

St. Clare looked back at him. “No,” he said. “I didn’t.” He opened the door and was gone.

When he was alone, Ky had to grip the back of a chair to remain upright. Voodoo came over to him, pressing against his knee, and whined anxiously. Ky dropped his hand to the dog’s head, taking two slow deep breaths, one after another. He pushed aside the thoughts that kept trying to explode inside his head, breaking his concentration, and he forced himself to listen, to breathe, to focus.

After a moment, he turned toward the door, lifting a staying hand to Voodoo, who looked at him alertly. “Sorry, old bud,” he told the dog quietly, “this one’s too dangerous for you. Hell, it’s probably too dangerous for me.”

Sebastian St. Clare had been right about one thing. Ky Londen might be the only person in New Orleans who could find the Werewolf Killer. But with those same skills, he could just as easily track St. Clare.

He left the apartment, locking the door behind him only because Voodoo was there alone. He went swiftly and silently down the stairs and into the street below, close on the trail of the werewolf.

CHAPTER THREE

At first, Amy thought it was a joke. What else could she think? A man in a wolf costume—wolf, for heaven’s sake—grabbing her on the street and affecting a kidnapping in the middle of a Mardi Gras parade. It had to be one of her colleagues with a warped sense of humor. That was why, after the initial shock, she didn’t struggle as much as she should have or make enough of a fuss to attract the attention of anyone in the rollicking parade crowd.

“All right, very funny,” she said, and, with a little more alarm. “Hey! Do you have to be so rough? Who are you, anyway?”

His stride grew so forceful that she trembled. He jerked her up sharply. When he picked her up bodily and began to force his way through the crowd, Amy started to grow frightened. “Put me down!” she demanded and kicked out wildly. The arm that had been around her shoulders moved up to encircle her neck, instead, cutting off her breath, and a cruel, black-gloved hand pressed over her mouth. He was so strong that even with these maneuvers he did not lessen the grip that kept her crushed against his chest. If anything, his hold grew even stronger.

Amy knew then it was no joke.

She couldn’t breathe. Those leather-encased iron fingers dug into her face, leaving bruise marks on either side of her mouth. His arm was heavy across her throat, twisting her head back at a painful angle, crushing her windpipe. She fought back panic, then tried not to waste her energy and her precious breath with futile struggles. He was killing her. Black spots danced in front of her eyes and the sound of traffic and Mardi Gras music grew fainter, gradually replaced by a high, thin whining in her ears.

She had spent enough hours in police stations and courtrooms to know the most important thing she could do right now was try to stay alert, to identify her assailant if she could, to pay attention to where he was taking her, to diligently remain aware of any opportunity for escape, no matter how small, that might present itself. But all of what she’d known and should have done fled her head. All she could think of was breathing, of how desperately she needed air, of how terrified she was that she would never be able to draw a deep breath again and of what a horrible, slow way this would be to die.

She must have blacked out for a moment or two because the next thing she knew, they were no longer in the street. She was aware of the creak of door hinges and going into a dank, musty-smelling room and abruptly she could breathe again; he released her and she tumbled, or was tossed, onto a torn, soiled mattress in a corner of the room.

For a moment, she huddled there, gagging and coughing as she struggled for breath and fought back the star-bursts of dark and light that exploded before her eyes. When she finally was able to drag a few deep breaths into her aching lungs, her vision began to clear. She was aware of a small, brick-lined room furnished with wooden crates and crumpled newspaper and illuminated with candles, a dozen or more of them supported in bottles and on bits of broken saucers. The place had the feel, and smell, of a cave, but she suspected it was part of one of the old warehouses that were scattered here and there throughout the Vieux Carre. She tried to remember which way they had turned, how many turns they had taken, making an effort to visualize where he might have taken her, but she couldn’t concentrate. She was trembling, and she couldn’t stop coughing.

“Well now.”

His shadow fell over her, causing Amy to gasp and choke on her own breath. She pressed a hand against her throat, trying to ease the ache that turned to fire every time she coughed.

He said, “A rather poor beginning to what I had hoped would be a long and satisfying relationship for both of us, I’m afraid. I apologize.”

His voice, so smooth and articulate, startled her. She had expected the coarse, angry roar of an uneducated street thug, not the cultured accents of a gentleman. The monstrous costume in which he was dressed only made the discrepancy more bizarre.

The mask was one of those latex affairs that was far too realistic; covered with gray and black hair, the eyes were glittering yellow, the snout drawn back in a snarl to reveal sharp, discolored teeth. Below the mask, he wore black—black turtleneck, black tights, black gloves and boots, even a black cape. For a moment, while her eyes adjusted to the flickering candlelight, it almost looked as though the wolf head were floating above her in midair, and had she had the breath she would have screamed.

“Here. Drink this.”

She noticed that he held a water glass half-full of some clear liquid. She merely stared at it.

“It’s quite safe, I assure you,” he said. “I wouldn’t drink the water here, but I chose the wine myself. And the glass is clean.”

Hesitantly, still gasping and choking back coughs, she took the glass from him. She had to hold it in both hands to keep from spilling it. She brought it to her face, just close enough to smell the contents, but she didn’t drink. He told the truth: it was wine, at least partially. She did not want to take a chance on what else might be in the glass.

“Oh, for God’s sake,” he said impatiently. “It’s not poisoned. I never poison my victims. It spoils the taste of their flesh.”

Amy didn’t move, or breathe or even think. She huddled like a rabbit trapped in the glare of headlights, clutching the glass and staring at him, and she knew the purest terror she had ever known in her life.

And then he laughed. “What a foolish little human you are, after all!” he exclaimed. “I had hoped for more courage from you…or perhaps simply more intelligence.” He shrugged elaborately and turned away. “Drink or don’t, whatever suits you. I was merely trying to be hospitable.”

Amy’s fingers tightened on the glass. “Who—who are you?” Her voice was hoarse and breathless, barely above a whisper. It hurt to make even that effort.

“You know the answer to that, chérie,” he replied gently. Was there a hint of a smile in his voice? “You gave me my name, after all.”

Amy wanted very badly to drink from the glass. She managed to hold it steady against her chest, no drops sloshing out. “Me?” she whispered. Firmly, determinedly, she put more effort into her voice, making it audible. “What are you talking about? I don’t know you.”

“Ah, but you do, chérie. You’ve followed my career from the beginning.” He seemed amused as he added, “Well, almost from the beginning, anyway. And you were the first—I’m quite certain because I made a note of it—to call me by my rightful appellation. The Werewolf Killer. How did you know, I wonder? Will you tell?”

Amy thought, No. A nightmare. And then she thought, A joke. A very bad practical joke that had gotten out of hand. Or a deranged fan, would-be copycat who let himself get carried away by the Mardi Gras spirit…Yes, that had to be it. Because otherwise, she was being held captive by a man who had already killed fifteen people, and no one knew where she was. A man who stalked and slashed, who tore out the throats of his victims and left them like so much discarded rubbish by the side of the road…a madman who had held the city under a spell of terror for ten months, just as he now held her.

She looked around the dismal, dank-smelling little room. What were those stains on the floor? And the spatters on the wall, were they simply a trick of candlelight? Was this where he brought his victims, then, before he killed them? And she didn’t really have to try very hard, did she, to smell the terror in this room like a lingering miasma, to hear the pleas for mercy that lingered in the ether like ghosts…

Sternly, she stopped herself. She was talking herself into hysteria.

She looked at the glass in her hand. She looked at the wolf-thing standing over her, arms crossed, grotesque head slightly tilted as though in speculation or amusement. She thought, Better to die of poison… She took a sip of the wine.

“Well now,” he said with obvious approval. “I’m glad you’ve decided to be civil.”

“It’s very good,” she said. Keep him talking, she thought. Keep your wits about you and keep him talking and you have a chance—small, but a chance—to get out of this alive.

“A simple Pinot,” he replied. “Unpretentious but amusing, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know much about wine.”

“Oh, that can’t be true, chérie. A woman of your background and education? Don’t be modest. In fact, I chose the wine because I knew you would appreciate it. Subtle but elegant. Understated but genuine. Like you.”

Amy thought, Oh, God. She said, “I appreciate your thoughtfulness.”

He seemed pleased. “My pleasure.”

She searched, in the flickering candlelight, for the door. There was only one, and he stood between it and her.

“Is this your place? Do you live here?” she asked.

Again he laughed. The sound, though muffled by the mask, was not particularly sinister. It was the laugh of a child—or a madman.

“Hardly,” he said. “No one could live in a place like this, not even those poor miserable creatures I send to their eternal rest. How could you think that?”

It was becoming easier to swallow. She took another sip of wine. “Why did you bring me here?”

“To talk. I’ve wanted to meet you for some time now, and after tonight’s newscast, it seemed…appropriate.”

“You—watch my broadcast?”

“But of course. Doesn’t everyone? And why should it surprise you to learn that I, your protégé, in a manner of speaking, am one of your biggest fans?”

Amy felt ill, a cold heavy dread weighing down her stomach, filling up her throat. She said, “Why do you say that? You’re not my protégé, I told you, I don’t even know you.”

“Alas, I am wounded.”

With a sudden swooping motion, he bent down and took her chin in his fingers, grasping hard. Amy shrank back, too frightened to even cry out. Wine sloshed on her blouse.

“You know me, chérie,” he said quietly. His breath was hot on her cheek, and oddly pleasant-smelling. Like fresh grass. His eyes, yellow glass eyes in a hairy-covered mask, were dead and glittering, horrifying. How did he see behind those eyes?

“You were the first to know me,” he said, still soft, still low. His fingers were like talons, gripping her chin, bruising the bone. “That’s why I have chosen you.”

“Chosen me,” she whispered, and she had never before imagined she possessed the courage it took to look into those flat yellow eyes and not shrink away. “For what?”

The seconds ticked off before his reply. Life or death, torture or pleasure; she imagined him weighing the options.

And then he said, “Well now, that remains to be seen, doesn’t it?”

Abruptly, he released her and moved away. She felt the throbbing imprint of his fingers on either side of her chin and she thought irreverently that she would have to wear extra makeup for the show tomorrow to hide the marks. Then she wanted to laugh. Tomorrow, makeup, the show…she, whose chances of surviving the hour were growing increasingly slim, obviously had much bigger worries.

And with nothing to lose, she lifted her chin, tilting her head back a little to look him in the eye, and said, “You expect me to believe you are the so-called Werewolf Killer?”

“Since that is who I am, yes. I should say so. You have an opinion to the contrary?”

Amy glanced around, not too obviously, she hoped, for something she could use as a weapon. There was nothing. If she broke the glass in her hand, he would be on her before she could get to her feet and would probably use the broken glass to cut her throat. In other circumstances, she might throw the wine in his face and try to dash for the door while he was blinded, but the mask would protect his eyes. The room was small and empty and left her with few options.

She said, “You could be anyone behind that mask.”

“Ah, but couldn’t we all?”

He seemed to be enjoying himself. And why shouldn’t he? He held all the power.

Amy struggled to keep her gaze steady, not to show her fear. She said, “You might at least let me see your face.”

He chuckled. “I think not. Having done that, I would have to kill you, and I’m sure you don’t want that.”

Her heart caught a little on hope. “Isn’t that what you plan to do, anyway? Kill me?”

Again the head tilted to the side, assuming a posture of thoughtfulness. “Why, no, actually. I hadn’t planned to kill you, not right away, anyway. I have plans for you first.”

He came to her and dropped to one knee beside her on the mattress. The yellow eyes glittered in the candlelight, the bared teeth menaced. But none of that was as terrifying as his posture, so close to her: intimate, powerful, in control.

Amy stiffened and choked down a scream as he lifted his gloved hand to her face, and stroked it tenderly.

Ky knew that St. Clare was probably aware he was being followed. He was a powerful werewolf with resources at his command Ky could not even begin to guess. At the very least, he might be leading Ky on a wild-goose chase; more likely, into a trap. But not for one moment did Ky consider abandoning pursuit.

A powerful werewolf. The words echoed in his head with a measure of disbelief. In fact, when Ky looked back over the events of the past half hour, he was almost inclined to believe he had imagined all of it. And yet, hadn’t he always known this day would come? Hadn’t he spent his life waiting for it?

Still, in his wildest reckonings, he had not pictured anything like this.

He wasn’t exactly sure what he intended to accomplish by following St. Clare. He might spot his car, get a license-plate number, find out what hotel he was staying at or what flight he was taking home…find out where home was for him and who lived there with him and for how long and how many of them there were and who they were and how they lived and a thousand, thousand other things…

He knew of course that little, if any of this, was a possibility. He would find out only what St. Clare allowed him to find out. But how could he not try?

The old man walked for half a block, then got into a car with a driver. Ky had not anticipated this, which only went to show how rattled he was by events in general; even his normal investigative instincts had deserted him. He had assumed that, since there was no car waiting outside the building, St. Clare had come on foot, but of course a person who was planning on breaking and entering would hardly park his car in plain sight.

Ky hesitated, then decided it would be more efficient to follow for a while on foot while the trail was still fresh, then go back for his car when he had a better idea in which direction St. Clare was headed. He did not, after all, seek another confrontation with St. Clare tonight, so time was not a consideration. He simply wanted to know where the old man was going.

There were a thousand, a hundred thousand sensory clues crowding up the well-worn streets of this ancient city, yet the scent of the werewolf was unmistakable, and Ky followed it effortlessly. Even encased as he was in two tons of metal and disguised by exhaust fumes and fresh rain puddles and the succulent outpourings of open-air restaurants as the car made its way in an unhurried fashion through the Vieux Carre, Sebastian St. Clare left a signature upon the night that was as easy to read as a map.

And then it wasn’t.

Ky followed the trail the car left for three blocks—long enough to realize he was being led in a circle, or a square, actually, that would take him right back to Rampart Street. At first he was irritated, and mildly disappointed because he had expected something more inventive from St. Clare. But then he understood.

St. Clare’s driver had taken the circuitous route not necessarily to confuse Ky but to avoid crossing Canal Street, which was closed for a parade. The parade, now fully in progress and blocking out both visual and aural clues with its color and raucousness for a good quarter mile in either direction, had swallowed up the last scent of the werewolf.

His quarry was gone.

Amy said steadily, “What, exactly, are your plans for me?”

She should have been terrified. She was, in fact, on some visceral level almost too intense to be recognized, frightened out of her wits. And yet she could deal with it, she could sit here on the soiled mattress and gaze into that nightmarish monster face and let him fondle her, without breaking into hysterical, mindless screams, because of him. Because there was something about him—his touch, his voice, his manner—that didn’t seem monstrous at all.

He said, drawing a gloved index finger down her cheek from the edge of her eye to the curve of her jaw, “Perhaps I shall just keep you as a pet.”

“That might be difficult. I’ll be missed. And, as you might know, I have a few influential friends.”

He chuckled softly. “Ah, yes. Your friends. Perhaps then, I should think of some other, more amusing, use for you.”

The threat was implicit, the meaning unmistakable. Had Amy been able to see his face, there was no doubt in her mind that he would have been undressing her with his eyes.

She said, “Is that intended to frighten me?”

“Does it?”

“No.”

“I’m not certain whether I’m insulted or flattered.”

“The Werewolf Killer never sexually assaults his victims,” Amy said. “If you were to rape me, you’d only prove to me that you’re not who you claim to be.”

He laughed. “A rather twisted piece of logic, but oddly compelling. And you’re right. I haven’t the least interest in ‘assaulting’ you, as you put it.”

“What are you going to do with me?”

He sat back, regarding her with an attitude of what Amy could only imagine to be amused speculation.

Then he said, “I am going to use you, my dear, to bring my story to the world.”

Amy lifted the wine glass and took another sip. The wine, the conversation, the urbane manners of the gentleman sitting across from her…it could have been lunch at Arnaud’s, cocktails poolside, a casual interview in the lounge of the Ritz Carlton. She concentrated on forgetting that she was not in any of those places.

She said, “I thought that was what I was doing.”

“Indeed.” He inclined his head. “And you’re doing a superlative job. But you only know half the truth. I would like you to know all about me.”

Because the reporter in her wouldn’t die, Amy said, “I’d like that, too.”

He was silent for a time. Amy could feel his eyes on her, the eyes behind the yellow eyes and she wished desperately to see his face…not just for identification purposes, but to see his face, to know the man behind the mask.

“Yes,” he murmured after a time, as though having reached a conclusion in thought, “I think you may be ready to know the truth. Not the whole world, perhaps, but you…yes. And I would like it if at least one person knew.”

Amy said, softly, so as not to break the spell of gentle sadness that seemed to have come over him, “Knew what? What is the truth?”

He looked at her, and though of course she could not see through the mask, she imagined that he smiled. “The truth,” he replied, “is that I am a werewolf.”

Ky stood on the corner, impatiently trying to see over the heads and around the shoulders of jostling parade watchers, reflexively falling back on the ordinary human senses of sight and sound when his extraordinary ones failed him. There was, of course, no sign of the werewolf, nor of the car in which he had been driven away. There were twelve-foot-high floats and belly dancers and acrobats in the street, there were children riding shoulders and men lifting beer mugs on the sidewalk; it was enough to confuse anyone.

The car had obviously passed this way before the parade reached the corner, but in which direction it had gone was anyone’s guess. Whatever residual trace of the werewolf scent that remained was masked completely by the chaos that surrounded him now.

“Damn!” Ky said, and turned to push his way back through the crowd. To be this close, the chance of a lifetime, and to lose him in a Mardi Gras parade…

But St. Clare wasn’t entirely lost. Ky had his money, which meant St. Clare would be in touch. No one just walked off and left fifty thousand dollars without following up on the contract. And he had a name, which he had absolutely no reason to believe was a false one. No, St. Clare was too arrogant, too sublimely confident in his own invincibility, to try something as banal as concealing his identity from a private investigator. Finding St. Clare again would not be the problem. Getting to him would.

“Damn,” Ky muttered again, and broke through the crowd, turning the corner that led to his apartment.

That was when he caught the scent.

“I see,” Amy said.

Her tone wasn’t convincing, even to herself, and she wasn’t surprised that he was angered by it.

“Don’t humor me!” he snapped and got to his feet. “You forget your place, human! I have the power, do you understand that? I am in charge here, and I will not be patronized!”

His fury, though not entirely unexpected, was nonetheless terrifying, like a quick harsh storm that broke tree limbs and blew shingles off roofs and then, as abruptly as it began it was over. The roar of his voice actually hurt her ears and she even imagined—surely she imagined—a gust of wind created by the force of his rage. He seemed to grow larger, more menacing, and when he loomed over her in that horrible mask, she could believe he was anything….

“Is this how you use your power then?” she cried. “Frightening helpless women? Kidnapping them and holding them captive and then terrifying them with threats? Does that make you feel strong? Does that make you feel like a man?”

She couldn’t believe the words were coming out of her mouth. The minute they were spoken, she wanted to drag them back in. She was antagonizing a madman, taunting a killer who was already enraged. She expected him to strike her, to pull his gun or his knife and finish doing what he had obviously brought her here for. She prepared herself for the worst.

And then he said, quite matter-of-factly, “Now you do insult me. I should kill you for that, but I won’t. As I said, I have other plans for you. And…” Again he cocked his head at her, and she imagined a smile. “I admire your pluck. Not that I will put up with a great deal of it, but I did choose you for your spirit, among other things. I can hardly blame you for being true to your nature…any more than your kind can blame me for being true to mine.”

Amy felt like a condemned felon upon receiving that phone call from the governor; like that rabbit trapped in the glare of headlights when the car suddenly swerved to miss it. She had been given a reprieve when she had had no reason to expect one and every muscle in her body went weak with relief.

“Your nature?” she managed to say. Her throat felt gummy. She wanted another sip of wine but didn’t trust her hands to hold the glass steady if she tried. “And what would that be?”

There was pity and impatience in his tone. “You haven’t heard a word I’ve said. I had forgotten how slow even the brightest human can be. I do the planet a favor by thinning your herd.”

He sat beside her again, and she held herself very still, refusing to tremble. He moved closer.

“I am,” he said, “a werewolf. My nature is to hunt, to kill, to run with the night and to follow the moon. You think you’re very clever for discerning a connection between me and a dozen or so dead vagrants, and I suppose you are, by human standards. But listen to me, chérie. You’ve only found what I wanted you to find. You only know what I wanted you to know. There have been hundreds, do you understand that? Hundreds.”

Amy felt ill. She liked to think she had been born with reporter’s instincts, an innate sense of who was telling the truth and who was lying, when she was being given a genuine lead and when she was being led down the garden path. Those instincts were telling her now that she was looking into the masked face of a madman and a killer, and that every word he spoke was the truth as he knew it. Hundreds. He had killed hundreds.

She said, “Why are you telling me this?”

And he replied, “I already answered that. I like your style. I saw you on the news this evening with that piece of horse fodder Devereaux—something will have to be done about him, I’m afraid—and I saw how you stood up for me with such calm nobility of character and it was then it occurred to me—you are a woman of deep convictions and genuine involvement. You, and only you, can be trusted to bring my story to the world.”

Still she kept her voice calm, her gaze steady. She thought she was beginning to understand him. That did not make her less afraid of him, but she thought she knew enough to deal with him, or at least to prolong her life until she could think of something to do, some way to escape or to convince him to let her go.

“That presupposes, of course, that I believe your story. That you are who—and what—” she added to pacify him, “you say you are.”

He bent a gaze upon her that was long and filled with silent menace. “You try my patience,” he said at last.

He got slowly to his feet. “Very well, chérie.” His voice was soft, calculating, and even more frightening than a shout. “I shall give you what you want. I’ll show you proof. And you may yet be sorry you asked.”

His lifted his hand to the mask.

Ky’s heart was thundering in his chest and a fine sweat appeared on his upper lip, and he couldn’t explain why. He stood still, focusing his senses, but he couldn’t make his heart stop pounding. The scent. Strong now, on a southerly breeze, now fainter on still air. The same, only…not. St. Clare…and not.

For the first time in his life, Ky knew what it was to doubt his own senses, to know confusion instead of clarity, to be at the same disadvantage as any one else who walked the street. He had never found a scent he didn’t know before. He had never encountered a sensory clue he couldn’t visualize. And yet this…It left him baffled and unsure.

He had never smelled a werewolf before today, and yet he had known the scent immediately for what it was. This, it was the same, it was like St. Clare, only it was…diseased, yes, or in trouble or…

No, he couldn’t define it, and a sharp pain pierced his head with the effort. It was distinct yet muted, familiar yet—wrong. Frightening.

And even though all his instincts shrieked a warning, even though he knew it was the stupidest thing he had ever done in his life, Ky turned down the empty alley, crossed a narrow street and moved into the darkness, following the scent.

Amy held her breath, watching as his hand moved beneath the neck of the hideous wolf head. She thought he was going to take off the mask. Dread and anticipation warred inside her for what she might see.

But he didn’t remove the mask. With a quick snap of his wrist, he jerked a thin gold chain free from his neck and tossed it to her. Instinctively, Amy lifted her hand to catch it.

“Ask the police whether anything was missing from the body of the August victim. Sherry Wilson. Yes, you see, I remember their names, when you are good enough to identify them for me.”

The jewelry was warm in Amy’s hand, and it made her feel strange to hold it knowing that only seconds ago it had been against his skin. Suspended from the chain was a small heart-shaped locket. On a compulsion she immediately regretted, Amy pushed the catch with her thumbnail and the locket opened. Inside was the blurry picture of a blond-haired little girl of about three. Amy felt ill.

“There might even be traces of blood left yet,” he commented matter-of-factly, “that they can identify as hers. Of course, they might also pick up traces of my DNA, which should prove to be very interesting when they try to analyze it.”

Amy dragged her eyes away from the locket and upward to him. She was quite sure he was smiling behind the mask.

“Why won’t you let me see your face?” she demanded hoarsely. “What’s really behind that mask?”

“Perhaps simply another mask.” And then suddenly he stiffened. His casual, controlled manner was gone and in its place the alert defensive posture of a startled animal. He spun toward the narrow door, and then back to her. “What have you done?” he shouted at her. “Who have you brought here?”

He threw back his head suddenly, almost as though sniffing the air, and turned again, sharply, toward the door. “How can this be?”

Amy didn’t hesitate another minute. The moment he looked away from her, she threw the glass of wine against the opposite wall. When he whirled toward the sound, she plunged past him toward the door. She didn’t weigh her chances; she didn’t consider her options; she didn’t think about it even once. She simply ran, and the unexpectedness of her action, combined with his distraction, gave her the advantage she needed to get almost to the door before he caught her.

She screamed as his hand snatched her hair with such force that her head snapped back. He flung her back with such strength that her feet actually left the ground. She screamed again as she bounced against the mattress. But he was no longer interested in her. He spun back toward the door even as it burst open and then the oddest thing happened.

It was dark outside, and the candlelight in the room provided only the dimmest illumination so Amy could see little of her rescuer’s face, only a figure, tall and lithe and crouched in the attack/defense position. He wore jeans and a T-shirt. His straight black hair swept over his collar; his face was in shadows. Amy’s captor was directly in front of him, less than three feet; Amy expected him to lunge for the door, to attack the man or to push past him and disappear into the night. But he did not move.

It lasted ten seconds, perhaps a little more, and it seemed like centuries. Amy counted every exploding beat of her heart, every half-choked, stammering breath. She wanted to scream; she wanted to run. But the strange paralysis that had afflicted the two men had her in its spell, as well. They stood there, staring at each other, poised on the brink of conflict or the edge of murder, yet startled, studying each other with a kind of mutual horror.

Later she would decide that was exactly what it was. Mutual horror.

And that was when Amy was witness to something she could not explain and would never forget. There was a sound, a low rumbling sound that seemed to come from the throat of one of the men. A growl, only louder and more fierce than a growl, deadlier and more controlled. And with the growl, something began to happen, and afterward Amy would never be able to describe it with words or even recreate it in her mind; it was more of an experience than an observation.

The man in the werewolf mask seemed to change somehow; she could see little in the dim light and with his body disguised as it was by the long cloak and the mask, but it was as though he were shrinking into himself and at the same time expanding, growing larger and more menacing. The air around him seemed charged and actually appeared to quiver, and there was a hot, electric smell like static electricity filling the room. It prickled on her skin and caught in her chest and filled her with a visceral terror…and wonder.

And suddenly everything exploded. The man in the werewolf mask gave a great roar and leapt into the air, flying—yes, flying—toward the man in the doorway with an acrobatic strength that was supernatural. The roar echoed in Amy’s ears, hurting them. She screamed and covered her ears, pressing herself back against the wall as the werewolf monster struck out at the man in the doorway. The man went down and Amy screamed again, propelling herself off the mattress and toward the door.

When she got there, her rescuer lay crumpled against the doorframe, his throat covered with blood. The werewolf was gone.

CHAPTER FOUR

The memory of those next few moments was confused by shock, jumbled together, irrational and unclear. Amy remembered screaming into the night, “Help us! Someone, please! Oh, God, help us! I think he’s dead!”

She dropped to her knees beside her rescuer and he was not dead; when she touched his shoulder, he pushed against her and groaned, trying to get to his feet. There were running footsteps in the distance, but she could not tell if they were coming toward her or moving away; if they belonged to the killer or to someone answering her call for help.

She whispered, “Lie still, lie still, you’re hurt…”

And he mumbled, “Let me go, he’s getting away…”

He put his hand to his bleeding neck. Amy saw that his throat was not cut, as she had imagined in that first horrified moment, but marked by three parallel slashes, as though raked by some kind of sharp instrument…or claws. She stared at the injury in shock and fascination before she came to her senses and began to search for something to stanch the flow of blood.

“Thank God you found me. If you hadn’t come, I don’t know what would have happened. He was crazy…” She was babbling breathlessly, trying to keep him still, searching her pockets and the small wallet-purse that she wore on a long strap across her body for a handkerchief or a tissue or even a scrap of paper with which she could clean his wound. She was aware she was bordering on hysteria, but she was entitled.

He tried to push her away, turning his head impatiently when she tried to dab at his cuts with the scrap of a fabric softener sheet she had found in her skirt pocket. “Lady, leave me alone, get out of my way. Don’t you see he’s getting away? Let me go!”

He had been stunned by the blow, but now his senses were returning. He jerked away from her clumsy ministrations and, bracing himself against the doorframe, pushed to his feet. By now, a small crowd had begun to gather in the alley, and Amy cried, “Please, someone call the police—and an ambulance! This man is hurt! Someone, please do something!”

“He’s gone,” said the man, and he slumped back against the wall, dark eyes haunted with defeat. “I let him get away.”

Amy looked at him intently. His eyes were deep, deep violet, filled now with a pain that was more than physical, his face sharp-featured and defined by a dark beard-shadow, his coal black hair swept back from a high forehead in a way that made him look both bleak and romantic. There was such a grimness in those eyes, such a determined set to his mouth, that she almost expected an answer to her question as she whispered, “Who was he?”

But he merely returned to her a look that was strained and frustrated and still edged with residual shock, and he said simply, “You know who it was.”

Amy opened her closed fist, and looked down at the locket she still clutched there. “Yes,” she whispered shakily, “I think I do.”

Abruptly, the events of the past hour swept over her in a single, gripping wave. She clapped her hand to her mouth but was able to stumble only a few feet away before the nausea overcame her and she sank to her knees, retching.

People were watching, but she didn’t care. He was kneeling over her, sweeping back her hair with one hand, touching her shoulder, and she did care about that. She was humiliated, miserable and still very frightened. She was Amy Fortenoy, star investigative reporter of Channel Six Action News, and she was throwing up in the street like a common drunk while everyone watched…while he watched, the Dark Knight who had saved her life.

She was supposed to be intrepid, in control, unflappable. She had always pictured herself in that way; she had convinced other people she was that way; she had always believed it of herself. But she had never been through anything like what she had just experienced. She had never seen anything like what she had just seen.

The foundation of her world had been knocked out from under her feet and she wasn’t brave at all. She was weak and terrified and she would never feel in control again.

When at last the spasm had passed, her rescuer helped her to her feet, and turned her back toward the building, shielding her with his body from the curious onlookers. She cast him a grateful look.

“Are you okay?” he inquired quietly.

She started to nod, then replied more honestly. “No.” Her voice was still unsteady, and she blotted her damp face with the back of her hand. “But I think I will be.”

Understanding was in his silence. Then he said, “Did he hurt you?”

Amy shook her head, trying to repress a shudder. “No, I—he only threatened. I was just frightened.” She looked up at him, trying to regain her composure with one unsteady indrawn breath. “I’m sorry, I don’t know your name. I’m Amy Fortenoy.”

He said with a faint smile, “I know who you are.”

Even the shadow of a smile transformed his face, making Amy realize that he was a handsome man—more than handsome, striking-looking, memorable—making her wish to see more of it, more of his face, more of his smile. She was actually so taken by his face, by those deep indigo purple eyes, that she forgot what she was going to say for a moment. Then they heard the fast-approaching sound of a siren and they both turned toward it.

Chaos overtook them shortly after that, and by the time Amy realized that she still didn’t know her hero’s name, he was gone.

“You really ought to have stitches,” the paramedic told him as he placed the last strip of adhesive tape across the bandage on Ky’s neck. “Why don’t you come in with us and let the ER check you out?”

Ky shook his head, wincing a little at the pull of the tape. “I’m fine. They’ll just give me a tetanus shot and tell me to see my doctor in the morning. Had one last month and I will, first thing. Okay?”

The young EMT looked unhappy. “I’ll have to put you down as ‘refused treatment.”’

“You do that.”

Ky touched the bandage gingerly as he stepped down out of the ambulance. His shirt was still damp with blood and his fingers came away sticky. He felt a little sick as he thought, He knows the smell of my blood now…

“Is this character giving you trouble, buddy? Don’t take any of his lip, he’s known for it.”

Ky turned to meet Detective John Handley Sentime the Third, known to friends and family simply as Trey. Ky and Trey had been partners for the last three of his ten years on the police force.

“So they’re sending you down to the slums now. Who’s wife did you get caught with?” Ky said.

“Yeah, very funny, Londen. Your sense of humor was always the thing I loved best about you. You okay?” He gestured to the bandage.

“Just a scratch. I’ve gotten worse in barroom brawls.”

“What’d he get you with? A switchblade?”

“Could have been,” Ky replied evasively as they walked away from the ambulance. He didn’t like to lie to a colleague, and he would never have done anything to hinder a police investigation…not if he had thought the police had any chance at all of catching his assailant.

He knew there was no switchblade. The only weapons the man who had attacked him possessed were his hands…and his teeth.

That was all he needed.

Ky asked, “Are you taking statements?”

“Trying to. You want to sit down? You’re not looking your usual chipper self, if I may say so.”

Ky’s reply was a little dry. “Well, it’s been a full day.”

But when Trey gestured him toward the police car parked at the head of the alley, Ky shook his head. He wanted to stay within easy hearing distance of the crime scene investigators…and he didn’t want to lose sight of the woman. Amy.

The little building and the half block surrounding it had been cordoned off with police tape, keeping back a curious crowd, although there were not as many onlookers as one might expect. In this neighborhood, people stayed as far away from the police as possible, even when the trouble the cops were investigating was someone else’s.

The area was bathed with strobing blue-and-white lights, and the red counterpoint pulse of the ambulance gave the whole scene a surreal air. Flashbulbs popped from inside the building where Amy had been held as investigators gathered evidence. Ky was quite certain nothing they would find would put them any closer to catching the killer than they had been before.

Amy was sitting in the back seat of an open police car, her feet resting on the ground and her back toward the interior of the car so that she could see everything that was going on around her. Ky was dimly amused to note that she, like he, couldn’t stand to be cut off from the action, although he suspected their reasons were far from the same. Amy was being interviewed by two detectives, a male and a female. Ky knew the female—he had, in fact, dated her once—but he didn’t recognize the man, who appeared to be in charge of the case.

Trey said, “So what were you doing down here?”

“What do you mean, down here? It’s only a few blocks from my place.”

“If you don’t mind getting a knife between your ribs taking the shortcut home. What are you, working a case in the neighborhood or something?”

“I was on my way out for Thai food,” Ky said. “I got cut off by the parade. I cut through the alley to circle around and I heard a woman scream.”

“You hear women scream every hour on the hour in this neighborhood,” commented Trey. “Men, too. Go on.”

“I heard a woman’s scream,” repeated Ky, “coming from that building. And a crash, like she was being knocked around. Well, you know my Good Samaritan instincts…”

Trey gave a grunt but did not look up from the notes he was taking.

“So I tried the door, and it was unlocked. I opened it. She was in the shadows, on the floor, I think, crying or screaming. He was wearing a black turtleneck, black boots, black gloves, black tights. A costume. Black cape. The mask was one of those full-head things, glass eyes, fur-covered, big snarl—a wolf.”

“Jeez.”

“Not something you want to meet in a dark alley,” agreed Ky. “Which I guess was the point. He was about my height, minus the ears, and slim built. One-sixty, I’d guess. Moved fast.”

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