Dead Heat (Alpha & Omega 4)

A car drove up outside. Joseph, who had taken a step forward, hesitated. He backed up a few feet and went into one of the guest bedrooms that overlooked the parking area. The car wasn’t one of theirs, and it wasn’t one he knew.

He knew the woman who got out of it, though. Why was the owner, she could call herself a principal if she wanted to, of Michael and Mackie’s day care showing up at their door?

The hair on the back of his neck stood up suddenly.

She’s here. The soundless whisper was hot in his ear.

He knew that the feds had the person they thought had hexed Chelsea and killed all those kids. He also knew that Charles hadn’t been convinced.

If he knew his father, and he did, Hosteen would have wolves watching the place. So why hadn’t they stopped her? A fae can look like anyone. Maybe he could look like a woman, like the principal of Mackie’s day care. Instinctive certainty gripped him, and Joseph had learned to pay attention to his instincts. The woman approaching the house was the fae who’d tried to kill his grandchildren.

Charles had told him that this fae had taken down a werewolf—Joseph remembered Archibald Vaughn. He’d been a big, mean, scary old wolf, and this fae had torn him apart. One old Indian wasn’t going to stop him very easily.

There was a phone in the bedroom. He picked up the receiver and dialed Charles’s cell phone. As soon as Charles picked up, he told him what was going on.

The doorbell rang as Charles said, “English. My Navajo was never that good and I’ve hardly spoken it for twenty years.”

Downstairs Maggie got up and went to the door. How well did the fae hear? Were they like his father?

“The fae,” said Joseph in an urgent whisper, “the fae can look like anyone. She’s here.” And then he had to hang up because the door opened.

If she was here for Mackie, she would want to take her away from the ranch. One of the things that living with werewolves had taught him was that just because someone was supernatural didn’t mean that cars didn’t make getaways faster.

He pulled off his boots and ran stocking-footed down the hall to the other end of the house. He slipped out the window, dropped onto the back porch roof, and slid off as far as he could before jumping to the ground, hoping that his rejuvenation would keep him from breaking his knees on the landing. When he was eighteen he’d have thought nothing of making such a drop.

He was almost surprised to land on his feet. He ran to the cars and pulled his knife. He sank the blade into one tire of every car in the lot. Maybe Hosteen’s people would see him. But usually Hosteen didn’t like guards that close to the house. They were probably out by the main road somewhere.

If he’d had a cell phone, he could call his father and alert him. He could have called him from the house instead of Charles. But Charles was closer … and Charles had a better chance of coming out on top. His father was tough, but Charles … was Charles.

It took him less than a minute to disable the cars and the pair of four-wheelers—buying time for Charles to return and save Mackie. The knife had a real sharp edge; Charles had taught him how to sharpen it.

No getaway car. What would the fae do?

Kill Maggie.

His heart clenched and his teeth bared in a silent growl. The fae didn’t need her, didn’t want her, and his Maggie wouldn’t let anyone take Mackie without a fight.

He faced the fact that the fate of the woman he had loved for over half a century was entirely out of his hands. All he could do was go into that house and die beside her.

He’d do that willingly, except for Mackie.

There was nothing he could do to affect Maggie’s fate. Live or die, she would do it without him. He swallowed hard. Maggie would be happy to die if it gave someone a chance to save Mackie.

So.

The fae would come out of the house with Mackie and discover that it could not use the cars to run. If it tried to walk out of here, Hosteen’s wolves would notice that. If they were still alive to notice anything.

The horses … maybe.

There was a truck in the back of the barn. They never left the trucks hitched up overnight, so it would be parked next to the trailer they’d brought Nix back in. Mackie would know that.

Probably the fae could get Mackie to talk.

Another fact, like Maggie’s fate, to absorb and not react to. He had to use his head if Mackie was to be saved.

Instead of running into the house as his heart wanted to do—oh, Maggie—Joseph ran toward the barn as fast as he could. Which was plenty fast. He couldn’t run like one of his beloved horses, or a werewolf, either, but he had run everywhere when he had been a young man.

He stabbed the tire of the truck and then ducked back inside the barn. There were a lot of empty stalls because the barn was where they kept the show horses. The breeding barn was a quarter of a mile down the road, along with the paddocks where the rest of the horses were kept.

He stared at Hephzibah, who stared back at him with wicked eyes. He caught her and saddled her. Then he put her back in her stall and hung her bridle next to the stall door. They did that sometimes with horses they were planning on taking out or showing to clients so that they could move from one horse to another quickly.

The rest of the horses in this part of the barn were yearlings and two-year-olds—none of them trained to ride. He was trying to figure out his next move when he heard Mackie’s screams.

Mackie liked most of the people at the day care. Miss Baird was her current favorite, but she liked Michael’s teacher, Ms. Newman, too. She was predictable and strong—like ánáli Hastiin. When she said something, she followed up on it. She’d told Michael that. Michael didn’t like being away from his family at day care, but Ms. Newman made him feel safe so he didn’t get scared and make them get Mackie for him anymore. He was glad when Ms. Newman brought his class to the horse show so that everybody saw him ride.

Mackie wished that Miss Baird had come to see her ride.

Ms. Edison was scary. She would smile and say nice things, but Mackie didn’t think that her eyes were nice at all. Grown-ups liked her, though, so she seldom said anything about it—except to Max. Max listened to what Mackie said, and even if he disagreed, he didn’t make her feel stupid.

When she had told Max she didn’t like Ms. Edison, Max had said, “Listen to your instincts, pipsqueak. I trust them. She’s not your teacher, right? Okay. If she does something that makes you feel uncomfortable, you make a lot of noise. I mean, really scream. That one you have that makes Hosteen grab his ears. People should come running and when they do, you make them get Mom or your dad or me, right? You don’t shut up until you are happy with the situation.”