Now what? I didn’t carry a cell phone—I’d lost too many—so I looked around for a pay phone. No luck, of course. Who used pay phones anymore, besides me? Over toward the waterfront, I could see a crane swinging slowly, a huge container dangling from its cable. There’d be people over there. Maybe somebody would let me borrow a cell phone or at least point me toward a pay phone. Poor Mrs. Williams. I pictured her sitting in a rocking chair, trying to relax but wringing her lace-trimmed handkerchief and looking anxiously out the window, waiting for a demon slayer who wasn’t appearing.
So I’d head toward the pier, using the crane as my guide. I’d taken about three steps when I heard an engine rev, hard. Tires screamed. A black van shot around the corner and bumped up onto the sidewalk, screeching to a stop in front of me. The side panel jerked open, and two big men in ski masks jumped out. They charged right at me, but somehow I didn’t think they’d stopped to ask directions. I braced for a fight.
The first one ran at me, opening his arms like he wanted to give me a bear hug. I slammed both hands into his wide-open chest and shoved. He flew backward and crashed into the side of the van, denting it. I heard a crack as his head hit. Then he slithered down the van and sat lopsided on the ground.
I spun to locate the second one. He jumped back as I turned. Behind the mask, his eyes were wide, like he couldn’t believe I’d hit his buddy that hard. He jogged from side to side like a prizefighter, watching me, and when I swung at him he grabbed my arm and spun me around, twisting my arm behind my back. Pain shot down from my shoulder and lit up the demon mark like a bonfire. I screamed with anger—this one was going to be sorry he’d messed with me. But the way my arm was twisted, I couldn’t wrench it free. He got his other arm around my neck and tried to drag me toward the van. No way was I getting in there. Using my free hand, I gripped the arm that held my neck, finding and squeezing the wrist. At the same time, I kicked backward. My heel met only air.
“Let go of me now,” I said, my voice a choked half-whisper, “or I’ll crush every bone in your wrist.”
He tightened his hold on my neck, cutting off my air. Panic hit. I couldn’t get a breath. I stopped squeezing his wrist and clawed at his arm. “Hey!” he yelled toward the van. “I need some help over here. Ken’s knocked out, and I can’t hold this wildcat and stick her at the same time.”
The driver’s door flew open and a third man got out. He also wore a mask. If I hadn’t been choking to death, I’d have made some comment about how Halloween was still two days away. But blackness was closing in on my peripheral vision, and bright spots swirled before my eyes like sun sparkles on a lake. A lake that was drowning me.
The thug from the van advanced, holding something. A needle. I hate needles—even worse than I hate ski-mask-wearing thugs. I kicked backward again, hard, and this time my heel bashed my captor’s knee. I felt the kneecap move and heard it go popa split second before he let out the most god-awful, earsplitting yowl I’d ever heard come from a human. He let go, thrusting me away. Still on one leg, I lost my balance and collapsed sideways, gasping. The guy who’d been holding me hopped around, gripping his knee and howling. But the other guy, the one with the needle, was bearing down on me like a sprinter with his eye on the finish line. I didn’t have the breath to get up and run. I watched the guy come, and I snarled.
The moment I made the sound, I could feel the shift begin.
It started in my fingers and toes, as my nails lengthened, hardened, honed themselves into sharp points. That sent ripples of energy charging up my arms and legs, like a flash fire across a wheat field. My limbs contracted, coiled, then reformed in a new shape. The muscles in my chest, my back, and my thighs bunched and thickened; black fur sprang up along my arms. For an agonizing moment, it felt like my head was being crushed in a vise, but then the skull gave and adjusted. I blinked. The colors around me had changed. Sounds, distant and impossibly high-pitched, pricked my ears.
And then the smells. The world reshaped itself into smells. Too many at first; too powerful. Confusing. Oil, burning, metal, ocean, sweat. One smell, sharp and salty with a metallic tang, rose up. Fear. Delicious. My limbs tensed with desire. I growled low in my throat.
There. The source of that mouthwatering fear smell. A human. Or some creature like a human. It had something over its face, but I could see its eyes. Wide, white with fear. A creature paralyzed by fear is such easy prey. I growled again.
Hungry. When you’re hungry, nothing smells better than terror.
I licked my lips. Teeth sharp and strong under my tongue. I laid back my ears, tensed my limbs. Claws eager to pierce flesh. Ready to spring.
“Jesus God!” screamed the prey. And then it ran.
I leaped, claws out. I landed on its back, felt skin give way as claws sank in, gripped. The prey went down. Blood flowed, that metallic-sweet scent. I went for the throat. The prey’s arm got in the way, and my teeth sank into a bicep, tore. More blood scent. I growled, lunged again, claws holding firm. My teeth grazed skin. I couldn’t get at the throat.
A sound behind. I swiveled my ears back. Too late. Something slammed into my haunch. A blast of pain, like a tree had fallen on me. I snarled, jumped, spun. Another human. It stood two leaps away, holding a club. The club was in both hands, lifted above its head.
It shouted: “Get away, you damn monster!”
I growled, ears back. Tensed to spring.
Another sound, from the west. I swiveled an ear. Shrill, piercing. Getting louder. I sniffed, but I couldn’t smell the source. Looked back at the human. Hungry. Smells of blood and fear so strong.
Still, though, that sound. It bothered me. Something told me: Danger. Louder still. The human glanced toward the sound. Yes, danger. It wasn’t safe here. I had to run.
I leaped over the human that should’ve been my meat. It was on its back. As I jumped, the human shouted. A sting on my leg, like a wasp. But danger was coming. I ran, hard. As hard as I could. Away from these humans. Away from the danger sound.
I ran down the street, around a corner. Behind a building. Hard ground under my paws. High, I should get up high. But there were no trees.
Something was wrong. My legs felt heavy. My head felt heavy, too. Slow. I felt slow. Still no trees. I crawled between a big metal box and a wall, exhausted. Dark, narrow space. Like a den. It felt safe.
Good smells came from the metal box. I was still hungry. But tired, too tired to explore. I sank to the ground.
My back leg ached, throbbed. I turned to lick the spot. Something strange hung there, lying against the black fur. Gently, I took the thing in my teeth and pulled it out. Like a thorn. I tossed the thing away from me. I wanted to lick the sting, but my head felt heavy, so heavy. Too heavy to hold up. I lowered my head to the ground. Closed my eyes. Good smells close by. Food smells. Then darkness.
18
TWO BEADY, CLOSE-SET EYES PEERED AT ME THROUGH THE gloom, an inch from my face. Something moved in my hair, then brushed against my cheek. Whiskers—oh, God, it was a rat.
I screamed and sat up, flailing my arms at the rodent. It skittered away.
It was dark, and I was cold. My shoulder hurt; I’d scraped it against something when I sat up. Where the hell was I? In a narrow space between—I felt behind me—a brick wall and a Dumpster. It had to be a Dumpster. The stomach-churning stench of ripe garbage was unmistakable. And I was completely naked—as in completely, bare-ass, buck naked. Okay, I’d shifted. That much was clear. But into what? What had happened?
Reaching back in my memory, I groped for the last thing I could remember. Phone calls—I remembered returning some phone calls. Mrs. Williams, the little old lady I was going to hypnotize. South Boston, the wrong address, the black van. Thugs in ski masks rushing me.
From there the quality of the memories changed. They became impressions, flashes, actions without words to shape them into thoughts. I remembered smells—all kinds of smells—and hunger, blood, danger, food. I remembered sleek black fur, powerful limbs, claws hooking into flesh. I remembered tearing, biting, running.
A panther. The anger and fear I’d felt during the attack had shifted me into a panther.
I peeked out from my hiding place. The streets were deserted—not that they’d been busy during the day. The moon was descending in the western sky. I had no way of knowing exactly how long I’d been out, except that it was night and I was back in human form. Shifts could last anywhere between two and twelve hours, so it was impossible to tell how long I’d been a panther. But whatever that thug had jabbed me with had really knocked me out, and I had no clue how long its effects might have lasted. For all I knew, I could have been sleeping naked behind this Dumpster for two days.
I felt around me, patting the ground gingerly. My fingertips touched gravel, cardboard, broken glass, but not what I was looking for. I could see a little in the dim light, but it would’ve been nice if I still had a panther’s superior night vision. Leaning forward, I extended my reach and felt the cylindrical shape I’d been searching for: the hypodermic needle I’d pulled from my leg.
Crawling out from behind the Dumpster, I looked around again. Not a soul in sight. I held the needle up toward a streetlight so I could see it better. Light glinted off a clear liquid that almost filled the syringe. The guy who’d stuck it in me hadn’t depressed the plunger, so I couldn’t have gotten more than a few drops in me. Whatever it was, the stuff had hit me so hard that I never would’ve made it to the end of the block if I’d taken the full dose.
I remembered the needle; I’d seen it before I shifted. But the memories of what came next wouldn’t jell; they swirled and changed like patterns in a kaleidoscope. I’d been hungry, I knew, and on the hunt. I held my hand up to the light. There was blood under my nails, staining my fingers. A man’s screams echoed in my ears.
Sirens, I thought, suddenly. I remembered hearing a siren. That was the danger sound that sent me running. So what had happened when the cops arrived? I had a strong feeling, like a memory in my bones, that I’d mauled one of my attackers. Maybe killed him. Shit.
