Page 83 of Forget Me Not

Calvin released a long breath.

Ray wiped his mouth, although with his hands a mess, it probably didn’t do much. “It’s all right,” he said at least, words intelligible though his voice was rough.

The other officer lowered her weapon too. “Turns out the call was in error.” She sent a searching look around the store. The teen boy from the comics room entrance looked directly back at her. His phone was in his hand. It might have been recording.

The girl from the counter was closer too. Both of them were too close. The customers, the ones who hadn’t run outside, were on their phones as well.

“All right?“ Calvin repeated, losing some of his calm.

“We apologize for the misunderstanding,” the first uniform told him, and met Ray’s eyes before holstering his weapon and finally backing away.

“They knew who you were,” Calvin snarled the second they were out of sight. “Badges covered, no name plates.”

“I didn’t call them.” The teenager from the front counter spoke for the first time. “I wouldn’t.”

“Got here too fast,” Ray panted, then extracted his claws from his palm for the second time in a few minutes.

A tiny human hand pressed a handkerchief to the worst of it. Ray winced for the pain and for the rapidly spreading bloodstain on an embroidered handkerchief.

He raised his head. “It’ll ruin it. I’ll heal.”

The ancient human was big dark eyes, long, braided white hair, and a touch of red lipstick. “I know how to get blood out,” Ray was told. “Now, breathe. Slower. You’re breathing too much.”

Calvin kneeled down and put his hand on the back of Ray’s neck. “Breathe, Ray. Just breathe.”

Raywasbreathing too much. He was also still bleeding, which seemed more urgent, but they were telling him to breathe. Calvin pushed down harder, his hand a solid, steady weight. Everything smelled like blood and residual fear. Calvin’s heart was racing despite how level he appeared.

Ray shut his eyes. He felt as if he was shaking. “I don’t know what happened.”

The human above him clucked their tongue and called out in Spanish.

Ray opened his eyes and turned to meet their gaze again although his eyes would be animal. “You aren’t afraid?” The growl had not left his voice.

The human scoffed while accepting the towels the teenage boy brought him. They looked like kitchen towels and they soaked up blood much better than a single handkerchief.

“We’re not afraid of a little wolf. Are we, Mía?”

Ray looked over to find the girl from the front counter smiling at him with a hint of fang.

He would’ve smiled back if he could’ve caught his breath.

“I get panic attacks too,” the girl confided, husky and almost shy.

Ray didn’t have panic attacks. He would have said only humans did. Now he didn’t know.

“Just breathe, Ray,” Calvin ordered, gently now, without removing his hand.

Ray was grateful. He closed his eyes again and breathed.

***

CALVIN HAD a bigger car than Benny, the backseat occupied by reusable grocery bags and a box of books that Calvin had shoved into the trunk so Ray could have more room. Benny was in the front passenger seat on the phone with Cassandra, voice hushed. Calvin was driving. Cal was next to Ray, watching Ray with a stare so intense Ray could feel it even when he closed his eyes.

Calvin looked back at them in the mirror a few times, the only obvious thing to betray that he wasn’t as calm as he was trying to appear. That was likely for Cal’s benefit, or possibly for Ray’s, if Calvin knew how much Cal’s agitated fear was making Ray grip the door handle tighter and tighter with each passing second.

Guns had been pointed at Calvin not half an hour ago. Police officers had pointed guns at Calvin not half an hour ago.

And at Ray.

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