Monster Love - MaryJanice Davidson Page 0,19

believe she was gone. He couldn't believe he—who prided himself on possessing at least a modicum of intelligence—had let this happen.

My name is Janet Lupo.

Had done such things, and to such a woman.

I'm not afraid of any man, and I don't lie.

What had he been thinking?

My name is Janet Lupo.

How could he have been so blind?

My name is Janet Lupo.

So stupid and arrogant?

The full moon is eight days away. And when it comes, you're going to get a big fucking surprise.

Oh, if there was a God this was a fine joke indeed. He had finally found the one woman he could spend eternity with…

Your little oak doors won't hold me then.

…and he had kidnapped her and raped her and kept her and ignored her when she spoke the truth.

You'll realize you fucked up, bad.

He'd demanded she admit to being afraid of him, and when she wouldn't, he assumed it was a lie.

You'll know I was telling the truth the whole time, but you couldn't see past your stupid injured male pride.

His stupid injured male pride.

I'll be gone forever, and you'll have the next hundred years to realize what an asshole you were.

He would have cried, but he had no tears.

Chapter Ten

Three days later

Jane rolled over and stretched. Then shrieked in anger as she fell three feet and hit the cement with a smack. She'd curled up on the base of the statue in Park Square, promptly gone to sleep, then forgotten about the drop when she woke up. Why don't I ever remember this shit until it's too late? she thought, rubbing her skinned elbow.

She was pleasantly tired, and would be for the next couple of days. It was always like that when she chased the moon. She also felt very new, almost husked out.

Purified. Whatever.

She stood, and shivered. Step one: find clothes. Spring in Boston was like spring in Siberia.

She marched up to an early-morning commuter, a businessman obviously cutting through the park to get to the subway. He stared at her appreciatively as she approached, but she had eyes only for his cashmere topcoat. "How-" was all he had time for before she belted him in the jaw and mugged him.

She had made her choice as a wolf, and would carry it out as a woman. She didn't have to wake up in the park, naked and alone. Or yesterday, in an alley. Or the night before that, beneath the docks by the harbor—ugh. She didn't think she'd ever get the smell out of her hair.

There were only a hundred safe-houses in Boston, as well as acres and acres of woods owned by pack members. She could have romped there and woken to clean clothes and a hearty breakfast. But as a wolf she had avoided all those places and her kind. The beast knew what she wanted. Now it was time to get it.

Of course, she didn't know where Dick lived, exactly. It's not like she scribbled down the address with her paw on her way out the window. Luckily, there were ways and ways. She might not have a super nose like some of her kind, but the day she couldn't sniff up her own backtrail to a den was the day she'd jump off a fucking bridge.

It didn't take long, but her feet were freezing by the time she got there. Dick lived in a dignified brownstone condo that was probably built the year the Mayflower landed.

She shifted her weight back and forth, stuck her hands in her stolen pockets, and looked up at his window. The glass hadn't been replaced; there was a large piece of cardboard taped into the frame instead. Guess it took time to order that fancy old-fashioned stuff.

Except for the rumble of an early morning delivery truck, the street was quiet.

"'Scuse me. D'you live here?"

She looked. The delivery boy was holding three brimming grocery bags, and looking glum. "Yeah. Why?"

"Well, thank God. 'Cause I've been making deliveries for two weeks, but the last couple days nobody ever takes the food in, and it goes bad or gets swiped, and it's just a waste, is all."

Ah, so that's where all the sumptuous feasts came from! Dick had the food delivered, and cooked the meals for her. Yum. "I was gone for a while," she told him,

"but now I'm back."

"Who are you?"

"I'm the owner's fiancée." She shook her head. It sounded just as weird out loud as it did in her head. "Do I have to sign something?"

"No. He's got an account