Kitty Takes a Holiday

But I found something. It wasn't aliens, it wasn't werewolves. On a few sites people talked about a sort of haunting. Not by the dead, but by a kind of evil. It left death and destruction in its wake. It originated in the Native American tribes of the Southwest, particularly the Navajo and Zuni. They talked about witches laying curses that killed entire families, destroyed livelihoods, haunted entire communities. And about skinwalkers: witches who had the power to change themselves into animals. Like lycanthropes. They had red eyes.

Nobody seemed to want to talk about them in detail. Knowing too much about them drew suspicion onto one­self. In some places, a person could be excused for killing someone who was suspected of being a skinwalker. Like lycanthropes, again.

Again I avoided knee-jerk skepticism. In my experi­ence, accusations of evilness often stemmed from the fears of the accuser rather than the real nature of the accused.

What attacked Ben in New Mexico was a werewolf, plain and simple. We had the proof of that in Ben himself. But there'd been two of them.

I grilled Ben about what he knew.

"Not much," he said. "Cormac picked up this contract for the werewolf, but he got down there and found signs that there were two of them. So he called me. I saw some of the sheep they'd killed. Completely ripped open, like the cattle today." He paused, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath. The memory had triggered a reaction, caused his wolf to prick his ears. Ben collected himself and con­tinued. "I only caught a glimpse of it, right before I was attacked. It was a wolf, it looked like a wolf. Something was wrong, Cormac was letting it walk right up to him. He could have shot the thing from ten paces off. I started to shout, then…" He shook his head. Then he was attacked, and that was that. He'd been watching Cormac, and not what came after him.

"Cormac said you saved him. You got a shot off and that broke some kind of spell."

"I don't know. I don't remember it too clearly. Any­thing could have happened, I suppose. I do know there was something messed up going on."

"And now it's moved here. I really hate my life right now."

"Join the club," he said. Then, more thoughtfully, "I grew up on a cattle ranch. Dead cattle—it's serious. Every one of them is a piece of the rancher's income. It's a big business. Marks will go after it until he figures it out."

"Well, as long as he's after me, he isn't going to figure it out." Marks didn't know about Ben; I figured we'd keep it that way. Nobody had to know about Ben.

"You suppose there's a co

I shook my head. "Those were organized. Ritual kill­ings. That today—was just slaughter." Like we needed another curse around here.

I almost wished they were co

That night, we lay sprawled in bed, like a couple of dogs in front of the fireplace. He pillowed his head on my stom­ach, nestling in the space formed by my bent legs. I held one of his hands, while resting the other on his increas­ingly shaggy head of hair. We didn't look at each other, but stared into space, not ready for sleep.

He was still shaken by the day's adventure. Not quite comfortable in his skin. I knew the feeling. I let him talk as much as he wanted.

He said, "It feels like a parasite. Like there's this thing inside me and all it wants to do is suck the life out of me then crawl out of my empty skin."

Now there was a lovely image. "I never looked at it that way. To me it's always kind of felt like this voice, it's looking at everything over my shoulder and it always has an opinion. It's like an evil Jimmy Cricket."

He chuckled. "Jiminy Cricket with claws. I like it."

"It digs into your skin like a kitten with those needley little things." I giggled. Silly was better than scary.

Ben winced. "Ugh, those things are evil. You ever want to see something fun, throw a kitten down somebody's shirt. Watch them squirm trying to avoid getting clawed while not hurting the kitten."

Now I winced. I could almost feel those little claws scratching on my stomach. "You sound like you've done it before."

"Or had it done."

I couldn't help it. I giggled again, because I could see it: him and Cormac as kids, cousins fooling around at the family reunion, and I just knew who would have thrown a kitten down whose shirt. Oh, the humanity.

Wearing a wry smile, he looked at me. His voice turned thoughtful. "I don't think I'd have made it this far without you. Cormac did the right thing, bringing me here."

"That's nice of you to finally admit it."

"When this happened to you, did you get through it alone or did someone help you?"

"Hmm, I had a whole pack. A dozen or so other werewolves, and half of them wanted to help and half of them were worried I'd be competition. But there was someone in the middle of all that. T.J. looked out for me. The first time I Changed, he held me. I tried to be there for you the same way. But T.J.—he was special. He was very Zen about the whole thing most of the time. He used to tell me not to look at the Wolf as the enemy, but to learn to use it as a strength. You take those strengths into your­self and become more than the sum of the parts." Always, this was easier said than done. But I could still hear T.J.'s voice telling me these things. Reminding me.

"Where is he now?"

To think, I had just been about to congratulate myself that I'd spent a whole minute talking about T.J. without cry­ing. I spoke softly, to keep my voice from cracking, because I was supposed to be the strong one. "Dead. I called out the alpha male of our pack, and T.J. swooped in to back me up. We lost. He died protecting me. That's why I had to leave Denver."

"I hear that happens a lot, in werewolf packs."

"Maybe. I don't really know. There's a lot of different kinds of packs out there."

"I'd just as soon keep this one to you and me."

"Afraid of a little healthy competition?" I said wryly.

"Of course. I'd hate to have to share you with anyone."

"Or is it that you'd hate to have to fight to keep me to yourself?"

He shifted so he was looking at me. I looked back, down the length of my body. "You know, I think I would. If I had to." The playful tone went out of his voice.

My whole body flushed. Suddenly we weren't two friends snuggled together for comfort. He was male, I was female, and there were sparks. The weight of him leaning against me sent warm ripples through my gut.

"Is that you talking—you the human, I mean. Or is it the wolf?" I said.

He hesitated, then said, "It's all the same thing, isn't it?"

Helplessly, I nodded.

He moved again, propping himself on an elbow so he leaned over me. Tentatively, he touched the waistband of my sweatpants. I didn't say anything. In fact, I pulled my arms away, tucking my hands under my head, so I wouldn't be tempted to stop him.

He pushed up the hem of my tank top, tugged down on my sweatpants, exposing a stretch of naked skin across my belly. He kissed this, working his way across, gently and carefully, like he wanted to be sure to touch every spot. Warmth flushed along my skin everywhere he touched. He eased the edge of my pants down farther, until he was kiss­ing the curve of my hip, using his tongue, tasting me. My heart was beating hard, my breaths coming deep. I closed my eyes and squirmed with pleasure.

It was all I could do to keep from grabbing him, rip­ping off his clothes, and pulling him into me. He started this, so I let him work, reveling in the focused intensity of his attention. He kept at it until I gasped, a sudden jolt of sensation startling even me.

Then I grabbed him and ripped all his clothes off.

After that, we acted like we were on some kind of honey­moon. We'd start out washing dishes and end up making out over the sink, pawing each other with soapy hands. The bed got a workout. The sofa got a workout. The floor got a workout. The kitchen table—after one attempt we decided it wasn't stable enough to withstand a workout.