up in shock to see Cinnamon pulling a cell phone from her vest. “Nicked it off him just the other day,” she said, grinning, opening the phone and miming a deep, gruff voice. “Hello? Oh helloooo, Dakota! This is Wulfy-wulfy. Oh yeah, I’d love to go to the tat studio and get down your pants. I mean, get inked.”
“Very funny,” I said.
“Yeah, yeah,” she said, fiddling with the phone. “Ok, your number’s in. Gimme that,” she said, taking the coat. She slipped the phone into his jacket pocket. “I don’t see a change of, so he’s gonna slip this back on—either tonight, or tomorrow. You can call him then.”
“I got an even better idea,” I said, fishing a receipt out of my wallet. “Why don’t we leave him a phone and a note just in case he’s got more clothes?”
After that, we hightailed it. We didn’t hear any howling or any running feet, but the tunnels around us were still breathing, and Cinnamon swore she heard something moving in the dark that was neither man nor wolf, so we practically ran down to the landing and shoved off. Once in the water we took it more cautiously, until Cinnamon and I were both certain we were not going to get lost in the maze. When the tunnels started to widen out again and things looked more familiar, I poured a little more effort into the oars, trying to put more distance between us and Wulf’s den.
Cinnamon leaned back in the bow, staring over her shoulder at the large vaulted tunnel that meant we were almost out of the water. “That went… well, I thinks.”
“Thank you,” I said. “And now I’m gonna be a big square and tell you to go back to the werehouse. It isn’t safe.”
“Can’t I stay the night?” she whined. “I don’t wanna run back to the werehouse in the middle of, ‘specially not after I said you would take me for the day.”
I scowled. “Okay,” I said. “But I’ll run you back to the werehouse in the morning, OK? Before anyone adds two and two. I really don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be AWOL. No joke—if you want them to keep letting you come over, you can’t go busting their nuts.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she said. “You just wants to get rid of me—”
“Not yet,” I said, staring at her. “You hungry?”
“Yes,” she said, grinning. “What you gots for me?”
“What is it, near midnight?” I said. “You want breakfast or dinner?”
“Moon’s fat overhead. I wants meat” she said, baring her fangs. They seemed longer, somehow. “Don’t care what it’s called or when it’s’s’posed to be served.”
“You got your fake ID on ya?” I said.
“Like, duh,” she said, grinning. “Don’t leave home withouts—”
“Then let me show you a little place called the Vortex—”
And so we went to the Vortex Bar and Grill at one in the morning, stepping through the huge skull that made its front door into the pop-culture chaos of its crowded, kitschy interior, where I introduced Cinnamon to the joys of a bacon-and-cheese bison burger with sweet potato fries. She screwed up her nose at all the smokers— the only reason a burger joint had an over-18 policy, thanks to Atlanta’s new smoking ban—but chowed down heartily on rare bison while I munched on a Ragin’ Greek turkey-burger-in-pita. Pure heaven.
Cinnamon leaned back again, grinning. “Cain’t I stay tomorrow? I want to see you needle Wulf. He gots pretty skin.”
“Two people tried to take a chunk out of me,” I said, “and somebody actually got Spleen. You may be bulletproof and all—”
“No, I gots it,” she said, suddenly sober. She leaned forward, looking around as if someone might listen in. “Somebody’s really gots it out for him, don’t they?”
“I think so,” I said. “I really think so.”
She glared down at the remnants of her fries. “Fine,” she said. “He hates my guts anyway, ‘cuz I’m a cat. Stupid rogue wolves.”
Cinnamon stayed the night—sleeping on the sofa—and after picking up some Flying Biscuits I rode her back within striking distance of the werehouse and dropped her off. When I got back to the Rogue Unicorn, I found three missed calls and two messages on my phone, all from ‘Calaphase.’ In the first message, Wulf cussed me out—at least I think that’s what he was doing; it was hard to tell over all the snarling. In the second message, he was more… apologetic. After I got settled in the office and had Wulfs flash in