could hear it in his voice. “Too perfectly?” I asked. “Jeez, Philip, you don’t think it’s some kind of trap?”
“I want to think it’s a distraction,” Philip said, sounding angry and disgusted. “Damn goose chase, in fact. But there’s a life on the line. I can’t let another person die because I sat on a lead.”
My eyebrows raised. Another person? “You do what you have to, Philip,” I said. But his reference kept bugging at me, and finally I asked, “Another person… do you mean Spleen?”
“What did you call for, Dakota?” Philip asked sharply.
“I need to find Wulf,” I said, and I heard him hiss. “I’ve lost my contact, and he’s not answering the number we have on him—”
“Can you give me that number?” Philip said.
“I need to find him,” I said. “Do you know where he sleeps?”
“Yes, but he’s skipped, Dakota,” Philip said. “We already tried to pick him up—”
“You tried to pick him up?” That was more of an accusation than a question.
“Dakota!” Philip said. “A werewolf looking for a tattoo turns up right where we expect to find a tattoo killer that strikes on the full moon. Mysterious forces are plotting against him. His tattooist is attacked—twice! His handler ends up dead, savaged as if by an animal. Sounds exactly like a ‘person of interest’ in the full vagueness of that awful phrase. Of course we tried to pick him up. Please, if you give me his number—”
“He saved my life,” I said. “Or at least, helped save me from someone other than himself. He’s not your guy.”
“Dakota,” Philip said. “This is me we’re talking about here. You really think I’d accuse him without damn good proof?” I didn’t immediately respond, and he said: “Dakota?”
Finally I said, “No.”
“All right then,” Philip said. “Give me his number and I’ll try to—”
“Give me his last known location and I’ll try to find him,” I countered.
Philip paused. “You need to stay out of this,” he said. “Stay away from Wulf—”
“It was you” I snapped, “that told me I should do his tattoo—”
“That was before Spleen ended up dead,” Philip barked back. “Before someone else tried to shoot you at the Masquerade! It isn’t safe—”
“It’s not safe for him,” I said. “The full moon is one day away. I have to help him—”
“He’s an old wolf,” Philip said. “I researched that suit of his. The style’s at least thirty years out of date. He survives the full moon twelve times a year. He knows how to do it again. If you really want to help him, you’ll lie low until the moon is on the wane and we’ve nailed this killer, or at least driven him off. Shack up with Saffron if you have to—”
“She’s gone,” I said, “To Africa.”
“Bloody hell,” he said. “Bloody fucking hell. I was counting on her! Hell of a time to— damnit, look, call Rand, get into protective custody—”
“Fuck that,” I said.
“Dakota!” Philip said. “You’ve had four attacks on you recently—”
“Four?” I said. “Only two, and the one by Transomnia isn’t related—”
“Dakota,” he said. “Presidents and gangsters have multiple assassins gunning for them, but even they don’t get four attacks a week this side of Pakistan. Transomnia, the Masquerade shooter, Spleen and that business with Wulf, they’re all connected to you—”
“Business with Wulf?” I said.
“At the hospital,” Philip said. “Whoever ratted him to the hospital staff didn’t say Wulf was ‘bothering them’—they said, Call the police, that maniac tried to gut me with a knife!”
“Holy crap,” I said. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“The interviewing officer didn’t tell me,” Philip said. “I just found their exact words going over the transcripts. Whoever said that didn’t want him run off—they wanted him arrested, maybe even shot and killed. That’s a premeditated attack in my book.”
“Jeez,” I said. But I didn’t want to admit he was right. I was a skeptic. I didn’t believe in all that conspiracy crap. “But, still… are you sure you’re not being too paranoid—”
“With one dead, two hospitalized, and one man terrorized into going on the run?” Philip said. “You can never be too paranoid with that kind of shit piling up in just six days. Never.”
I just sat there, stunned. I wanted to deny it, to tell him he was a conspiracy nut, but he was a very genuine man in black with his own shiny black helicopter, and the body count was stacking up. His words left me feeling I was sinking into murky water, getting deeper all the time, able