Joy to the Wolves (Red Wolf #1) - Terry Spear Page 0,34

but she was afraid that would catch someone’s attention. Not to mention she’d have to walk across the creaking floorboards to do it. She hoped they’d believe she forgot to turn off the light in the attic, not that she was up there hiding.

At least as a wolf, she could protect herself better. Which was why she called Josh to come to her aid and not 911, when a police officer on duty might have been closer. She finished pulling off her panties and bra. In a flash, she shifted into her wolf.

Hopefully, Josh wouldn’t call other police officers to the site to protect her if she had to fight the intruders in her wolf coat. With any luck, the intruders wouldn’t bother checking the attic.

She heard things crashing downstairs, glass breaking, and she wanted to kill the men!

“I don’t see the boxes down here,” the one man said. “You think they’re upstairs maybe?”

Her skin prickled with fresh awareness. At least she learned one thing: the guy’s comment meant they hadn’t just randomly broken into the shop for stuff to steal. They were looking for something specific. Now, if only they would tell her what they planned to take. The news had reported that the DEA had confiscated over $25,000,000 in cocaine, so she’d hoped anyone else associated with those drugs would realize the boxes were no longer in her shop. Unless there were more to come.

“Yeah, or the house,” the one guy said. “We’ll check here first. We can break into the house when she’s at the shop during the day. At least she has no security cameras anywhere.”

Which irritated Brooke again when she thought of how she wouldn’t get the cameras in any sooner. It would have been great to have gotten a video recording of the guys, though she guessed they would have destroyed her cameras, if she had them.

The two intruders tromped up the stairs. Maybe they wouldn’t go into the attic. Three other rooms and a bathroom were below her on the second floor. Her great-aunt, like her parents, had the estate sale/garage sale/thrift store sale obsession. They told themselves it was because they needed to keep their shops well stocked. Brooke knew deep down it had been more than that. They were treasure hunters, and they figured one of those days, they’d find the treasure of a lifetime. And then? They’d look for another.

She thought about making some noise to warn the men she was here. Maybe she’d spook them, and they’d leave. But she was afraid it was too late for that. There were no guarantees that she could scare them off if they really wanted the item they were searching for.

There was no lock on the attic door from the inside of the room, so she had no way to keep them out. The door was standing wide open, inviting them right in. She suspected if she’d managed to lock it, they would have just kicked in the old door anyway. As a wolf, she moved soundlessly toward two large trunks, one a Victorian leather-covered humpback trunk and the other a wall steamer trunk covered in embossed metal and metal bands to strengthen the frame and add a decorative touch. That one she recognized as a Louis Vuitton trunk, and it still had labels from the ships the traveler sailed on. She quickly reached the trunks and crouched behind them.

You may arrive anytime now, Detective Wilding! She hoped she hadn’t made a mistake in calling him and not just dialing 911.

Brooke prayed he’d get here, sirens blaring, and these men would run off. Maybe he’d catch them. But mostly she hoped they’d leave before she had to deal with them.

She realized the problem she now faced. If she killed the men, what would she do with them? If she only bit them, she might turn them. That was a total no-no. Then she was back to having to kill them.

They were rummaging around in two of the three rooms below her. “Shit,” the one man said. “She’s got so much damn stuff in here. We’ll never find it.”

Good. Though it could be safer for her if they found whatever they were hunting and left. Not that she wanted them to steal from her. What if it was the treasure her parents and her great-aunt and great-uncle had always hoped to find?

“Check the other storage room. I’m going to see what’s up those stairs. The light’s on and the door’s open, unlike earlier