Page 16 of A Wolf After My Own Heart
“Shewashere!”Now. Now she’ll admit it.
“Nope. Nobody here but us weirdos. Or would that be we weirdos?” Then, abruptly: “What happened to your arm?”
“My arm?” he repeated. He knew he sounded stupid. Couldn’t help it. Also, she wasn’t supposed to notice. And she wasn’t supposed to be the opposite of rattled. Unrattled. De-rattled?
“Your arm,” she emphasized, as if speaking to the slow and dim-witted, which he clearly was. “You’re obviously a lefty—”
Obviously?
“—but you’re favoring it. And…” She reached for him and his heart stopped. Then it got back to work so hard he was momentarily dizzy as she pulled up his right sleeve, exposing the bandage. “…someone bound this up for you.”
Mama Mac, in fact. His foster mother had gotten an earfulandan eyeful last night. And speaking of, there were telltale signs of fairy bread here and there. The Mama Mac Welcome Wagon had clearly been in full swing.
He wrenched his attention back to her observation. “It’s just a bad sprain.” Truth. Last night, it had been a break. Tomorrow, it’d be a strain. By Friday, it wouldn’t hurt anymore. In two weeks, he’d be back to one-armed pull-ups. Theoretically. Who had time for one-armed pull-ups? And now he wanted fairy bread, dammit!
“Did you get that when you fell down the basement stairs?”
He quirked an eyebrow at her. “Fell?” She grinned, which was so distracting he answered without thinking. “No. That was…”When you nearly ran me over with your ambulance that isn’t an ambulance.“Earlier.” He coughed. That sounded natural, right? Like a tickle in his throat instead of a clumsy attempt to get off the subject of his injury? “Listen, Lila, the reason I’m here…”
“Oh, goody. You’re finally getting to it.”
“…I’m looking for a runaway.” Sally Smalls, werebear (subspeciesHelarctos malayanus), age ten, temporaryparens familia4, last seen leading several IPA employees on a merry chase. Well, one IPA employee. He produced a school picture with Sally scowling at the photog. “I’ve got reason to believe she was here.”
“What, you’re some kind of social worker?”
“No, I’m some kind of an accountant.”Jesus.He really should work on his lying. Or his impulse to give her honest answers. Then, compounding his idiocy, he handed her his card.
She examined it. “You’ve crossed out ‘accountant’ and written in ‘World’s Greatest Detective-slash-Juvenile Advocate.’ And you wrote out ‘slash’ instead of putting in a slash.”
“What? Oh.” He snatched it back. “That’s just the prototype.”
“For IPA, right? Whatever that is.” She paused, but he didn’t elaborate. “Macropi was telling me I should meet someone she thought might be an accountant. Must be you.”
For the first time in his life, Oz was grateful for Mama Mac’s incessant matchmaking. As she bandaged his arm, he had babbled about Lila. A lot. But he didn’t have the nerve to ask Mama the vital question. Probably just as well.Kama-Rupawas a fairy tale.
“So you’re a bum, got it.” Before he could defend himself, she added, “This missing girl, what’s she done?”
“Nothing,” he said. “Her folks passed away a couple of days ago, and she’s having a hard time dealing with it. I’ve been trying to look after her.”
“Is that what you call it?” she asked, so pleasantly it was terrifying. She pointed to his sore arm. “Looking after her?”
Mindful of the gun, he immediately raised his hands. “Hey, I got hurt helping her, not hurting her.”
“Oh, sure. That’s why you kicked in my door. Because you’renotone of the bad guys.”
“Well, I’m not.”Was that a whine? I think that was a whine.“I just want Sally to be saaaaaaafe.”
“Well, she’s not here.” Lila shrugged. “So.”
So, an obvious lie, which he had expected. Except…
“Anything else?” she asked, just on this side of impatience.
She still wasn’t afraid. In fact, he wasn’t getting much of anything off her. Last night hadn’t been a fluke. She was different, and not just because she was Stable, and he wasn’t sure how, and it was intriguing as fuck.
Lock her down before another wolf sniffs her out.
The thought was so sudden and alarming, he started to growl, then loudly cleared his throat to cover.
