Blue moon - By Lori Handeland Page 0,23

were quiet. Something was coming.

The cry of the wolf sounded again - closer this time - and a second wolf answered.

Why were they howling in the daylight? Had Man-denauer gone after them? He didn't have a gun, or at least one that I could see.

The whisper of stirring foliage wended my way. I glanced up. The tops of the trees were as still as a lake beneath a new moon. Any wind there had been earlier had died. Then what was moving through the bushes?

A twig snapped. I froze. So did whatever was out there. I had my pistol in my hand. I don't know when I pulled it. I was merely glad that I had.

In the dark, in the forest, it's nearly impossible to tell from which direction a sound is coming. I discovered it was just as impossible in the bright light of day. I stood amid the bushes and the trees as the back of my neck prickled. I was being watched.

"Mandenauer?" I shouted. "Get back here, right now!"

That oughta work, my mind mocked. If he was here, he'd be here.

My breath rasped; my heart thundered; a trickle of sweat ran between my breasts and skated down my belly. I cocked the gun, and the birds began to chirp again.

A movement at the corner of my vision had me crouching and swinging my weapon in that direction.

Mandenauer raised a brow. "My, aren't we jumpy?"

I uncocked the gun, but I didn't put it back into the holster. "Yes, we are. Where were you?"

"Out there."

He waved in a vague circular motion. The movement pulled his shirt tightly against his body and I saw the outline of a gun. I should have known.

"Did you hear the wolves?" I asked.

"I'm old; I'm not deaf."

"You didn't go after them, did you?"

He shook his head. "Those are not the animals I seek."

I frowned. "How would you know?"

"I know."

Whatever. I wanted to get out of here. I hated to admit it, but I'd been well and truly spooked. Birds didn't stop twittering for no reason. And I didn't feel as if I were being watched unless I was.

"Done?" I asked.

"Most certainly."

We headed for the car and if we left more quickly than we'd come, tough. I didn't get spooked often; when I did, it shook me.

"You can put up the pistol, Officer."

I glanced down, surprised I still held my weapon in my hand. I was also surprised to discover I didn't want to put the gun away.

"Where's your rifle?" I asked.

"Locked and loaded and back at the Eagle's Nest."

So Mandenauer was staying at the Eagle's Nest Resort and Spa, spa being a relative term in Miniwa. It meant there were towels available by the lake and an ancient sauna that tilted drunkenly toward the water from its perch on a nearby hill.

"A gun doesn't do you much good in the case under your bed." Or hidden beneath his shirt, for that matter.

Mandenauer put a hand on my shoulder and I paused. "The wolf will not attack us in broad daylight."

"Why not?"

He smiled as if I were simpleminded. "It will not. Trust me."

I snorted. I trusted no one - except Zee and sometimes Clyde. I'd learned the hard way that those you trusted the most were the ones who could hurt you the most, too. So my circle of trust was a very small circle.

"You won't trust me?"

I gave him my "do you think I'm stupid?" glare and he nodded. "Good. Trust no one, Jessie. You will live longer that way."

Mandenauer and I were in agreement on a lot more than I would have imagined.

I tightened my ringers on the grip of my pistol and was comforted. Other women might keep relics from their childhood - dolls, stuffed animals, blankets - and pull them out when the going got tough. Me? I preferred a .44 Magnum anytime.

I didn't care how many wolves Mandenauer had killed, how many times those animals had behaved in a predictable manner; I wasn't going to bet my life, or even his, that this one - or twenty - would behave appropriately.

I remembered Karen Larson's eyes. I would remember them in my sleep for years to come. Right before she'd died there'd been a flicker of knowledge. She'd still been in there behind the insanity caused by the virus, and she'd been very, very afraid.

I hated being afraid. Fear smelled of weakness, and the weak did not survive.
Chapter 9
I deposited Mandenauer at the Eagle's Nest.