BloodMoon (4 page)

“Like what kind of bad news?”

“I’m still doing research on that. Apparently, lycanthropologists are advising all moon-based shifters to forego mating over the lunar tetrad. They warn it will corrupt the natural order.”

“Oh, please. I’ve heard this one before,” I told her. “What’s everyone afraid of, some wolfish antichrist?”

“This time I think you’d better listen, Ash. They’re warning all weres to lock themselves up over the weekend.”

“But why?”

“They’re calling it Blood Moon Fever.”

“Blood Moon Fever, eh? Where’s Ted Nugent when you need him?” I made myself a mental note to take it up with the pack. “Well, at least it’s not the apocalypse.”

“I can send you all the research I’ve done.”

“Since when are you doing research into full lunar eclipses, anyway?” Guess I should have been doing more research of my own. I’d gotten lazy, I know.

“Since my werewolf sister lives across the lawn from my six-year old son.”

“Ouch.”

“Don’t ask if you don’t want to know.”

Then I heard Elle’s voice from the backyard. “Hey Amber! Where’s that beer?”

Sigh. Why does everything in my life have to be so complicated?

“Go where, honey?” I responded as I typed furiously on my latest freelance assignment: writing agenda copy for the Street Witches Convention. Amber got me the gig and I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. Maybe I could turn it into a real piece and sell it to a travel magazine for a Halloween issue.

“We’re going to pick up the new dog from the pound.”

“From the pound?” I turned to my sister who was shifting the contents of her day purse to the Michael Kors bag on her shoulder. “I thought you were only going with certified breeders,” I said.

“Elle wanted a standard poodle and so started looking online at the shelters and rescue organizations. We got a call that there’s a beautiful one in lockup right here in Knightsbridge,” Amber replied.

“So, you haven’t seen it yet,” I said out of the side of my mouth as I chewed on a pencil.

Ashlee that’s disgusting,
she thought at me.

Thank God this Twin Bond 2.0 thing only worked one way. As far as I knew, no unauthorized mind reading. I used the frayed pencil to scratch my ear to see how far she would take it.

She ignored me. “No, but Elle has. And you know what she’s like when she makes up her mind about something, she pretty much digs her heels in until she gets her way.”

“Not like anyone else we know. So she wants a
poodle
? Why not get herself a labradoodle? Better personalities.”

“I don’t need a designer mutt,” Elle said as she made a last check through the house. “Standard poodles have a long, dignified history as hunting dogs. You ought to appreciate that. And besides, you’ll be impressed by this one.”

“Now this, I’ve got to see,” I said and grabbed my fanny pack and threw it around my waist. I know, it’s ultra-nerd-retro, but it’s a lifesaver if I ever have to force a change and still keep my stuff with me.

We stood in the main lobby of the Knightsbridge Animal Shelter waiting to be shown to the dog kennel. The place smelled of all manner of animal feces, hamsters, mangy cats and industrial strength disinfectant. I thought I was going to hack up a furball. Wait, that’s cats, right? But that’s how I felt.

Amber pointed me to the hand sanitizer. I’d already gotten rid of the pencil, but jeez.

“You know the last time we were here…” I began.

“Ugh. Don’t remind me,” Amber said as she flashed Sean Gottlieb’s face at me across the twin bond. Jeanetta Macdonald’s wasn’t far behind.

Jeanetta was the skinwalker, a bruja, a Navajo-trained witch who tried to kill me last year. I suppose you could say her attempt at revenge was justified; I mean, I did accidentally kill her brother Shane during my first MoonFall after I turned sixteen. But she took the personal grudge too far by including Amber and Spanky in her machinations. She’d drugged us and dragged us up into the canyon, and when I awoke she was casting a spell to lock me into my lupine form once and for all.

Spanky broke her circle as she was causing me to shift and I took her down. She was remanded to the Central California Women’s Facility at Chowchilla, where she still resided.

I shivered.

“Let’s get this over with,” Amber said as I watched the gooseflesh that was bothering me cross her own arms. It didn’t seem like she minded the idea of another dog, just didn’t like the process. After a bit of a wait – who thought it would be so busy at this time of the night? – they led us back toward the kennels.

Amber told us to go on as she stopped at the ladies room. Okay, she
really
didn’t like the process. I bet she wasn’t even going to go back there at all.

I hurried after Elle and JR, past yapping, barking, snapping, tired, old, and sometimes despondent canines that swept waves of emotion over me. I wasn’t going to be able to stay here too long. It was too depressing. A dog needs to be free. Well, as free as they can be, domesticated and all. At least give the poor things nice back yards in which to spend the rest of their days.

A voice spoke into my head.
Hello? Hello? Is anybody there?
The voice was cultured, pitched like a low velvety growl with a lilt.

I looked around for the source, but all I saw were dogs. I’d heard that vampires could sometimes do the mind-speech trick, but nobody looked or smelled like bloodsuckers, at least not that I could see. I suppose there could be witchery going on. I readied myself for some sort of trouble.

Elle and JR had planted themselves in front of a large cage with a big snow-white poodle inside of it. I swear the thing came up to my hip. JR was
ooh
ing and
ahh
ing at the animal and had his hands inside the cage while the dog licked his fingers. Elle was already filling out paperwork with one of the workers. Signing things. No-nonsense, our Elle.

You know it’s quite rude to ignore a fellow when he’s trying to make polite conversation.
The voice came at me once more and, as I looked around again trying to place its source, the poodle in the arms of my nephew was looking straight into my eyes.

Oh shit,
I thought, and then,
whoever heard of a poodle shifter?
That was the next thing to come out of my head.

I heard the sound of a mirror cracking and felt a pain rip through my skull as I froze and stared at the apparently telepathic dog for at least thirty seconds. What the hell?

“Who are you talking to?” Amber asked, thankfully interrupting. Guess she managed to steel herself after all.

“No one.” I shook the moths out of my head and looked at my sister again. She seemed…
off
. “What’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” I said, and then winced at the many-layered meanings in that one sentence.

“Not a ghost, Ashlee. Jeanetta Macdonald.” She bit her lip and I could see the strain and frown lines struggle against the botox in her forehead.

“You had a vision?”

She nodded.

“In the bathroom? Of the pound?”

“Hey, I don’t ask for them and I sure don’t pick the place.”

“So, what did you see?”

“I was fixing my face and tranced out for a moment. When I looked into my eyes, they weren’t my eyes anymore. It was Jeanetta. Just her face. Floating in the bathroom mirror. But I swear she could see me, Ashlee. She got this incredibly gloating look on her face and she began to laugh. Next thing I knew, the mirror shattered.

“Oh, that’s what that was.”

“I beat a hasty retreat before anyone noticed the mess. Now, let’s get the hell out of here.”

That’s my sister for you. Dodge the trouble and the awkwardness of actually reporting it.
Man, do I ever need a clove.

After what I just saw, I just might have one with you,
she twinned, grabbing my arm as we exited the building, leaving JR and Elle to finish up the adoption papers.

The dog’s voice echoed in my head one last time.

Till tomorrow, fair maidens!

Great. More complications.

As we walked to the car I said, “So, what do you think that’s about? Seeing Jeanetta in the mirror, I mean.”

“I have no idea,” Amber said. “But whatever it is, it can’t be good if it’s got her face attached to it.”

“She’s still in jail, right?”

“As far as I know.”

“Maybe you should have Elle check for you. Have ’em put her in solitary or something.”

“You can’t just put people in solitary for nothing, Ashlee.”

“I should have killed her when I had the chance.”

“Ashlee, that’s horrible!”

And she was right, it was. But three days out of the month I’m a total bitch. Guess it showed. Lost in thought, I took a long pull on the cinnamon-sweet tobacco, making a mental note to contact Jackson to ask about poodle shifters and what we should do if my sister brings one home from the pound.
Maybe I should call him right now
, I thought and grabbed for my phone. But before I pulled my contacts up, my sister put a hand on my arm.

Elle and JR came out of the building empty-handed.

“Where’s the dog?” I asked.

“Doctor needs to give him his final shots and sign off on his release. We’ll pick him up tomorrow,” she promised my nephew, who was bouncing around like a jack-in-the-box.

I’ll call Jackson when I get home,
I promised myself and, of course, ended up forgetting as we girls got to drinking and telling stories over gin rummy after JR went to bed.

I woke up the next morning with Spanky barking on my bed, Elle standing like a silhouette in the pool house doorway with a mug of
café au lait
in her hand, and a poodle’s snout in my crotch.

“Hey!”

Hello again,
the dog thought at me as he stuck his head under my hand for a scratch.

“
Shift–
” I yelped, pulling my hand away and cradling my knees against me as Spanky barked at the poodle, who sat back on his haunches.

There’s no need for histrionics, young lady. I mean you no harm. Oh, and please don’t tell them I’m not an ordinary canine,
the snowball white gangly prince of dogs continued in my head while I turned my “shifter” into “shit.”

Elle was dressed for a hot day in tan cargo shorts and a periwinkle tee-shirt with an old school baseball cap on her head, Oakland A’s variety. She smirked over her coffee. “I was going to introduce you to Siegfried, but it looks like you’ve already met.”

“Gee, thanks.” I scrambled for something to say as the poodle eyed me balefully and backed up.

Elle turned into the morning sunrise that was glaring its way through the door of the pool house and glinting off the fur of the poodle. I hung out the side window and watched her as she pulled the lawnmower out of the shed, and then a weed eater. “I checked with the warden. You’ll be happy to know that Jeanetta’s still safe and secure in the pokey. Oh, and Will’s here.” She headed around toward the front yard.

“Where’s he at?” I yelled after her.

“Right here, sugar plum.” Will rounded the corner and entered the pool house, growling at Siegfried, who gave him a wide berth as they passed each other in the doorway.

Looks like time for a trim
, I thought as Elle checked the gas and the oil and then revved up the mower, heading out the back gate to the front yard. I went back to the futon I used for a sofa and sat cross-legged in its deep-blue pillowed depths. “Hi, hunky,” I said.

Will threw a bag of donuts from Crave on the burnished table and mumbled something about going to the bathroom. See? Moody as Amber at that time of the month. It was pain enough when our cycles synched; I didn’t think I could take much more of Will adding to the mix.

I got up to open the bag on the dining room table. Okay, with the studio layout of my new residence, I don’t know if you could qualify it as a dining room. The main house may have been new when they bought it, but whoever did the original design on the pool house wanted a cross between a cabin and a cottage feel to it, as if they knew it would one day become an in-law unit.

Bet they never imagined my kind of in-law.

But I just loved the cathedral ceilings and the exposed beams. I had plans to use rope lighting for decoration, but hadn’t gotten to it yet.

Will flushed the toilet, and then hopped onto the couch with me. Spanky jumped up behind him and he ruffled the miniature Schnauzer’s silvery grey muff with both hands and then turned to make kissy noises to me.

“Dude, did you wash your hands?”

“Oh, hi, Amber. Didn’t see you there.”

I slapped him on the chest. “Bastard. You know it’s me. Hands?”

“We’re lycanthropes, Ash! A few microbes won’t bother us, or Spanky for that matter. I mean, he’s germier than either of us!”

I pointed. “Go. Wash. Hands.”

He growled at me this time, but went to do it. “A standard poodle, huh?” he said as he returned.

“Guess so.”

“Not the smartest dogs on the block.”

Yes, well this one obviously isn’t from this block
, I thought. “Poodles aren’t dumb. Just high-maintenance.”

“Elle seems to like high-maintenance types.”

“Good point.”

“Um, Will…did you get a weird vibe from Siegfried?”

“No, should I?”

“I dunno, just…”

“Nothing beyond that of another mutt still trying to learn his place in the pecking order.”

“Talking about him or you?”

Will punched my shoulder gently. “Funny. Why, what did Siegfried do?”

“Besides put his nose in my chonis?”

Will laughed. “That’s my job.”

I smacked him. With my backhand, not my lips. I guess all this smacking was the human version of wolf play-pawing.

“What? It’s not like you’ve never had that happen before,” he continued, and smacked me back.

I tried smacking him again, but he just tickled me into helplessness. Unfortunately, that caused a flashback to my pseudo-brother Whelan cruelly doing the same, which caused me to jerk a knee up into him. He was lucky I missed his jewels.