The glitter faded, and the other orbs blinked out into nothing.
But not before I saw the faint red shimmer of sparks in my bedroom. The seeking light had found something else.
Something a lot closer to home.
Chapter Twelve
I walked up from the veranda with Magnolia, wanting someone with me in case the creature from the woods was in my bedroom. Magnolia might not be the toughest wolf in the pack, but she was my friend and the fastest runner I knew. If things went from bad to worse, she could get to help in a hurry.
I expected to be hit by the smell of sulfur the minute I got up the stairs, but there was only the familiar scent of aging wood fr
om the house basking in the sun all day, and the constant aroma of werewolf that was as pervasive as the trees around us.
Maybe I’d imagined it. I paused with her outside my bedroom, peering in through the open doors to see if anything seemed out of the ordinary, but it looked as empty as when I’d left it.
I was losing it.
“Sorry about all that.” I gestured to the woods. “I think the whole thing on the highway has me a bit spooked.”
“Girl, if you weren’t scared, I would think you needed your head examined.” Mags pushed her almost white blonde hair behind her ears and smiled. She was two years older than me but had the face of someone who would always be young, round cheeks and bright eyes. How she had managed to turn out so sweet with a mother as neurotic and power hungry as Amelia, I would never know.
I hugged her, glad for the first time to be back.
She returned the embrace, laughing. “Look, if you want, we can go out there tomorrow when it’s light out and have a look around, maybe see if whatever you thought was out there left anything behind?”
I smiled and nodded but knew I was unlikely to take her up on the offer. But if I did wander out there again, I wasn’t going alone. Coming face-to-face with that monster had damn near scared the shit out of me.
She gave me another hug. “It’s good to have you back.”
“It’s good to be back.”
Neither of us mentioned that the stay wasn’t permanent. I knew Mags would love it if I came home for good, but I wasn’t ready to give up my independence, no matter how flimsy it was. She vanished down the stairs, leaving me alone in front of my bedroom.
As I stepped through the open doors, the long curtains swirled around my ankles, tickling the back of my legs. Nothing here felt out of place or wrong, but I had the vague sensation I wasn’t alone. The bathroom light was on, casting a long, bright column across the room but making it harder for me to see into the darker spaces. I considered shouting for Mags to return, but without the smell of sulfur, I wasn’t particularly afraid of whatever might be in here with me.
“I know you’re in here,” I bluffed. I had no idea what to expect. Maybe the orb had just glitched when I released the spell. Somehow, though, I was still sure it had found something.
“How the hell could you possibly have known I was in here?”
I started. The last thing I’d been expecting was to have someone answer me. I’d figured my monstrous stalker might pop out and terrify me again, not start a conversation. Hearing a human voice threw me completely off-guard. I stumbled backwards, like I might make a break for it, but braced myself against the door instead.
The faint fragrance of motor oil was my first clue. And then Wilder stepped into the light, confirming the theory my brain had only begun to develop.
“Jesus, Wilder. What are you doing here?”
“Ahh, so you didn’t know it was me.” He smiled in a self-satisfied way. “I wondered if you had magical powers or something. I was fairly certain no one saw me come in. I knew you wouldn’t make out my smell. This whole place is werewolf scent-ral.” He emphasized the pun he was making on the last word.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded, trying to keep my voice low so as not to rouse any alarm from the compound. I’d shout in a heartbeat if I thought Wilder posed a danger to me, but right now he was only talking. Perhaps I ought to raise the alarm. After all, hadn’t I learned mere hours earlier that Wilder might have killed someone? Just because I wanted to believe he was innocent didn’t mean he was.
“Whoa, chill.” He took a step back, staying in the light, and held up his hands to show me they were empty.
As if a weapon was what I worried about.
An adult male alpha could demolish me in hand-to-hand combat. If I factored in my magic, I might have a chance, but that implied I’d be able to cast a spell before he was on me.
If I doubted my odds, a human girl wouldn’t have stood a chance.
Obviously my change in attitude towards him wasn’t going unnoticed.