Anna left him vulnerable.
She'd said she was fine, and she meant it. He'd heard the stress of survival in her voice, but she was safe for now. And Tom would need calm to deal with his wounds, not some adrenaline-jacked wolf who wasn't one of his pack. But even at a slow, steady pace, Brother Wolf fought against his control, growing more upset, not less.
And the human half wasn't far behind. Someone had tried to hurt his Anna, and he hadn't been there to prevent it.
A young man walking in the other direction jerked his head to stare at Charles-and quickly dropped his gaze when his eyes met Charles's. Only then did Charles realize he was growling softly.
He stopped, sucked in a deep breath-and hesitated as the air he'd taken told him something... unusual. Something missing. Something like the usual concentration of city smells.
He stood on a wide swath of pavement that was as clean as it had been the day it was poured. No visible garbage wasn't really strange, not in Seattle, where the rain washed the sidewalks on a regular basis. But no garbage, no scent, no anything, that was odd. Odd enough to allow him to hold off the frantic need to find Anna and assure himself she was fine, if only for just long enough to think.
Tom's witch had dealt with the blood trail, she'd said, and he was willing to bet that he was looking at the results: a wobbling stretch of walk two shades whiter than the cement around it. It was still a trail for anyone who wanted to follow it-though he supposed a blind woman couldn't know that. And it was a lot better than the blood that would have sent a slew of human police to the hotel.
He could follow it to the hotel-or he could go hunting. He stood very still and consulted Brother Wolf. Then they turned away from the hotel.
Yes, said Brother Wolf, at one with his human half.
Blood and flesh would be welcome. Anna waited for them. She'd be safe with Angus in a few minutes. Angus had taken his car to the hotel.
So there was time to feed. To rid them both, him and Brother Wolf, of the anger so they could regain their balance.
It wasn't long, only a few blocks, until the unnaturally whitened sidewalk returned to its normally dirty state. Despite the rain, Anna's scent lingered in the air.
It was full dark, though the hour wasn't late-a little after six, he thought. It had been twenty minutes since Anna had drawn upon his power, fifteen since he talked to her. The shadows wouldn't have been so dark then, but still dark enough for a lot of the nastier things to come hunting.
He stepped back into the clean space and looked around. A blackened bit of cloth, wet and dirty, a plastic bag that spilled two pairs of women's shoes with another shoe, hot pink and scorched, several feet away. A little casting about on the edges of the witch's spells-and he smelled vampire.
Vampires in Seattle attacking wolves. He considered it-and clenched his fists at the thought of his Anna going up against bloodsuckers.
The cloth smelled of nothing. The lone pink shoe hadn't been so thoroughly caught in the witch's cleaning spell. When lifted to his nose, it smelled faintly of burning flesh and vampire.
The other four shoes were new and smelled of leather, dye, and, lightly, of Anna. One pair was low-heeled pumps and the other red leather and high-heeled, the kind women wore for men.
Charles could care less about shoes-and he suspected he wasn't alone among men in his feelings. Shoe, no shoe, he didn't care. Naked was good, though over the past couple of weeks he was beginning to think that dressed in his clothes was a decent second best.
Even smiling at the thought of Anna in his sweater, he didn't slow down his hunt. He tracked the edge of the witch's spell until he found the trail the vampires had left-not difficult, as at least one of them was bleeding badly. He let his nose go to work, then he had no smile left in him.
A vampire, he'd thought, or possibly two. His nose now told him there had been more than that. He caught six individual scents. Six vampires who'd been after his Anna.
And he wondered if she'd been as honest as he thought when she told him she was all right. The pink shoe broke in his hand, and he dropped it. He was growling again as he followed the vampires to a parking garage-space number forty-six.
Four minutes, and a little intimidation-not difficult, the way he was feeling-and he found that the space had been paid for six months but occupied only now and then.
No way to tell if the vampires were connected to the person who rented the space or if they'd just found an empty space to use. He was inclined to suspect the latter. They weren't planning on being there long, and the cars were checked every two hours.
"Yeah," the man-not much older than a boy, really-said. He wasn't looking at Charles now, and not doing so had allowed him to calm down a little. "Someone came boiling out of here like they were fit to be tied. I remember it because it was a minivan, a blue Dodge-not the kind of vehicle you roar out of town in. I didn't notice it coming in, but I did the vehicle check when I started work tonight. I don't remember a minivan except Mrs. Sullivan's parked in here when I did it."
Charles wasn't concerned about that. Mind tricks that work on humans were among the most common gifts of the vampires. If they'd told the attendant not to remember, he wouldn't have.
"Tell me about the minivan."
"Three men and a woman. They all looked like FBI, you know? Expensive and conservative." The man looked up at Charles. "Are you a cop or something? Shouldn't you show me some ID?"
"Or something," murmured Charles, and the attendant paled and looked away again. Gently, Charles thanked the man for the information and left.
He could have gotten their faces from the cameras, but there was no need to traumatize the young man further-he had their scent, and he would not forget. If not today, then eventually he would run into them-the world was not that large to a man who lived forever. When he found them at last, he would remember this night to them.
When he reached the place where the attack had occurred, he stopped and put Anna's new shoes in the plastic bag and took them with him. There had been no blood, no meat at the end of this hunt-and Brother Wolf was not satisfied. Not in the least.
By the time he made it to the hotel, he'd gotten a semblance of control. It would have to do.
ANGUS was sitting on the floor in front of their room, reading a newspaper. He didn't look like much of a guardian, but there were few other wolves Charles would rather have guarding his mate's door. There wasn't much that would be able to get past the old wolf who ruled Seattle.
"Something interesting in the paper?" Charles asked politely.
"Not really, no." Angus folded the paper back into its original shape with economical precision, then got to his feet. He kept his face averted and down. Not slow on the uptake, was the Alpha of the Emerald City Pack. Charles might have his game face on-but any wolf worth his salt would smell the frustration of a failed hunt on him from twenty feet out.