My worries for him fell away, and I found myself smiling.
“Anyway, we’re all headed home, see you soon.” He ended the message.
Sherwood smiled at me. “POTUS,” he said. “I called it.”
The time stamp on the second message was about five minutes later than the first message. Before I could listen to it, my phone rang again. This time it was my half brother, Gary.
“Kind of busy here,” I said.
“I’ll call back later,” he said. And he hung up.
My half brother had called. And, I remembered abruptly, last night I’d had a dream that I couldn’t remember. A dream that apparently involved Coyote.
I called him back.
“I thought—”
“What did you call me for?” I asked.
“It’s pretty stupid,” he told me.
“Just spit it out,” I said.
“Our progenitor called me a few minutes ago and asked me to call you—and see if you’d reached for your dreams.”
And that was all it took.
“Son of a bitch,” I said.
“He is, I suspect, no one’s son,” Gary said apologetically. “Created rather than born. What’s he done?”
“Interfered,” I said.
“For good or ill?”
“I can’t tell,” I said. “I’ll let you know if I survive. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Do you need me to come down?” His voice was serious.
“No,” I said. “Yes. But there’s no way you could arrive in time. If it helps, your part in this might have saved the day. If the day is saved.”
“Good?” he said, a question in his voice.
“I’ll tell you tomorrow.” I disconnected.
“Mercy?” Sherwood asked.
I held up a finger. I needed to think. To absorb what I remembered.
I knew who and what the Hardesty witches were because I’d spent weeks in the mind of Sherwood’s kitten. I knew what they wanted—and Sherwood was on the top of their list. I knew what they could do—and I didn’t want any of the wolves within a hundred miles of those witches.
Magda—that was the name of the zombie witch—was a Love Talker, all right. And her power was a lot bigger than Elizaveta had thought. I was pretty sure she would have no trouble controlling a werewolf, because she had taken them before.
“Mercy, are you all right?” Sherwood asked.
“I’ve been thinking,” I told him. “Since the pack is fine—” They were. I had to do this without telling a single lie. Sherwood would know if I lied. “—could you drop me off at the garage?”
He frowned at me. “Sure.”
I nodded briskly and got into the passenger seat of the car.
We were on our way when Sherwood said, “Does the reason I’m dropping you off at your shop have something to do with the phone call from your brother?”
I nodded. “Yes. I have some thinking to do—and it’s a madhouse at home right now. The shop is quiet.”
He smiled. “That it is.”
I watched the road ahead of us and asked, “How is your cat doing?”
“I stopped in to check on him after work,” he said. “It looks like he’s going to make it.”
“Good,” I said.
Sherwood’s lips turned up again. “He purred when I held him.”
“Tough cat,” I said.
“Yes.” He sounded happy.
When he pulled into the dark parking lot, he insisted on coming into the garage with me and sniffing around for intruders. He wasn’t happy when he left, but he did leave.
As soon as he turned out of the parking lot, I listened to Adam’s second message. I had waited until Sherwood was gone because I didn’t think that Coyote would have timed my brother’s phone call so precisely without a reason.
“Hey, love,” said Adam. “Elizaveta just called. She wants to check something out at her house, and she doesn’t want to do it alone. I’m going to go pick her up. Don’t worry. Love you.”
Yes, I thought, I’d have had trouble convincing Sherwood that I just needed a quiet place to think for a while if he’d heard that message.
I grabbed a set of keys, turned out the light again, and relocked everything up. Then I got into Stefan’s bus and headed for Elizaveta’s house for some recon. As I traveled I called Stefan’s phone and got his voice mail—which I’d expected.
“I stole your bus,” I told him. “And I am headed to Elizaveta’s to look for Adam. I believe that the Hardesty witches are there, and that they have Adam and Senator Campbell. If I don’t call you back in a few hours, would you call Darryl?” Hopefully Marsilia didn’t plan on keeping Stefan bound and gagged for long. “Tell him that I think the zombie witch can control werewolves and he should take precautions.”
I found a place to park the bus next to a haystack about a half mile away from Elizaveta’s. With any luck, it wouldn’t draw too much attention. It wasn’t exactly a stealth vehicle, but at night it wasn’t as noticeable as it was in the daylight. I gave Scooby a pat on his fuzzy head for luck, then stripped to my skin, opened the driver’s door, and hopped out.
I shut the door quietly and shifted to coyote. Then I went off to do the thing that coyotes do best—sneak.
There were lights on in Elizaveta’s house. I slunk down the edge of the driveway from shadow to shadow, moving as slowly as I could bear. Quick movement catches the eye. If I had been dealing with mere humans, I’d have trotted right along. But I had no idea how well the witches could see in the dark, so I crept.
Elizaveta’s driveway was nearly a quarter mile long, and there was a newish RV parked between the house and the garage. Adam’s SUV was parked right in front of the house, as was a Subaru Impreza. I watched the yard from under a raspberry bush. The underbrush had been cleared out and the bush trimmed, so there was plenty of room for me to hide.
I watched for maybe five minutes but saw no movement inside or out—despite the lights in the house.
Maybe they were all in the basement.
That thought had me sliding out of my hiding place. I was halfway out when a sound made me freeze.
A bluish-gray wolf, distinctively marked with darkened feet, muzzle, and tail, walked across the yard. Adam. The deliberate pace of his movement, his pricked ears, and the slow swing of his head told me that he was on patrol.