Second Skin Part 26

"He's a gunshot victim," I said, pointing at Lucas. "Now, are you going to do your job or am I going to deck you and use the tools myself?"

Pop's face twitched. "Can you pay?"

"Not at the moment," I said. "Think of it as a public service."

We stared at each other, Lucas's soft moans the only sound except for car horns and the catcalls of street-walkers outside. "I need to get my surgical kit from the upstairs," said Pops finally. "And morphine. Gunshots are tricky. If he wriggles all around while I'm hauling a bullet out of him . . . could be nerve damage."

"Go," I said. "And if you call the cops on us, just remember . . . nonhumans don't need guns and blades to make your demise really fast and really, really painful."

Pops let out a squeak and ducked into the front of the store through swinging doors. I sat down on the edge of Lucas's bed. His hand slid over mine and I twitched involuntarily. The skin was cold like he'd been sitting in one of Bart's freezers for a few days, and I tried to pull away, but Lucas held on. "What's wrong?" he muttered thickly.

"You have some G.o.dd.a.m.n nerve asking me what's wrong after you killed a man back there," I hissed.

"No choice," Lucas said, with a surprisingly nonchalant shrug for a guy who'd had two bullets pa.s.s through him in the previous hour. "Besides . . . you don't seem like . . . you'd be bothered."

"Of course I'm bothered!" I shouted, and then wondered why I was. Donal Macleod, in my situation, would probably be dancing the Highland Fling or chowing down on a haggis. He wouldn't be weeping about the grisly death of one Insoli woman who had gotten in his way. I'm bothered!" I shouted, and then wondered why I was. Donal Macleod, in my situation, would probably be dancing the Highland Fling or chowing down on a haggis. He wouldn't be weeping about the grisly death of one Insoli woman who had gotten in his way.

So why was I so bothered that Lucas had killed one Warwolf and almost Donal?

"Why?" he asked me, in echo.

"Because you didn't have to," I said. It came out soft and flat, the way the truth usually sounds-anticlimactic. "You had him, Lucas. You had him and we could have gotten away. But you were going to kill him."

"Yes," said Lucas. "I was." He sat up on his elbows, a little color in his face. "It's my nature. You thought you wouldn't see my monster?" He reached across me and came back with a fresh handful of gauze, pressing it to his own shoulder. "You thought I was just like you?"

I looked at the discarded bandages on the dirty mustard-colored linoleum of the surgery, their blood so red and bright it appeared almost like a flower petal rather than something that had come from a wound. "I made a mistake," I whispered. "I have to find out why the Wendigo are killing weres and I have to find out soon. Lucas, this is all going to come cras.h.i.+ng down because I helped you."

The detached expression chased away from his face, replaced by the warm, understated smile that was familiar. "But you did, and I'm grateful."

"We'll get you fixed up," I said. "Then you can stay low at my house until the police are finished with Donal and that body." The were's screams were still with me, and I s.h.i.+vered, feeling the fog of magick on my exposed skin. Whatever his faults, I severely doubted anyone deserved death in the manner Goonie had met it.

"Then?" Lucas prompted as I went quiet again. I shoved all the fear and sickness that had rushed up at me when Lucas attacked Donal back where it belonged, down below the surface where all police and soldiers and trauma workers keep their natural, human reactions to horror.

"Then I'll take you home," I said. "And we should probably try to forget we ever met each other."

Lucas squeezed my hand harder. "That's going to be rough for me, Luna."

I met his eyes, saw something there that was familiar, to a degree. It was the same l.u.s.t tinged with fascination I saw when Dmitri looked at me, but there was a hesitant, shy cast to Lucas's face.

And if I was any kind of woman, I would stand up, walk out of arm's length, and never get this close to him again.

But he was making it pretty d.a.m.n hard.

I detached my hand from his. "I'm with someone, Lucas."

His gaze went blank. "The smoker's a lucky b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

My lips twitched. "Thanks for saying so." Realizing I hadn't heard any sound from the store for some time, I got up and poked my head through the door. "Hex it. Pops ran out on us."

"I guess you'll just have to do the job," said Lucas. "Don't worry," he added when I let my horrified expression surface. "I have faith in you."

"Great. That makes a whopping one of us." I went behind the counter and found a banged-up medical box, which contained a tray of instruments and a few vials of morphine. I took it, plus a bottle of alcohol and more gauze, back to the surgery. "I don't do this sort of thing a lot."

Lucas filled an old-style syringe and held out a piece of rubber to me. "Tie my arm off."

I did, and he slapped a vein and injected himself with morphine. "Do it fast enough and I'll still be dreaming of pink bunnies and happy leprechauns," he said.

"Bright lady," I cursed. I poured alcohol over a likely pair of tweezers and took the gauze off Lucas's wound. "Hold still. This is where the pain comes," I warned, and doused the bullet hole with alcohol.

Lucas jerked, his hands clenching on the sides of the table, and I nearly lost my tenuous grip on the bullet. "Hold still!" I use hollow-point rounds, so it was still inside his shoulder, and I drew out the crumpled slug and dropped it into the wastebasket.

"You okay?" Lucas giggled. "You're not okay. You're gonna faint. Girly-girl."

"You're high," I returned. "Lightweight."

He just laughed. After I patched Lucas up and dressed the wound, we went out into the street and hailed a cab. The cabs in this part of town always smell like stale beer and exhaust and have drivers whose faces you can't see in the glow of the dashboard light.

I gave the silent driver my cottage's address and he grunted. "Driving there's gonna be hard."

"Oh no," I a.s.sured him. "Grasp the wheel, apply your foot to the gas, and Newtonian physics will do the rest."

"No." He sighed. "Ain't you been watching the television? Freeway's closed. Overpa.s.s fell down. From the quake, and all."

"Take the surface streets," I said. "Charge me whatever. Just get us out of downtown."

"This is exciting," said Lucas as the taxi puttered away in a cloud of smoke. "Never been on the lam before." He s.h.i.+fted so our shoulders, mine sore from tossing the thug and his swathed in bandages, touched. "How about you?"

"Once," I murmured, watching light and shadow blur into one as the cab picked up speed down Watermark Street.

"What happened?" Lucas asked. Morphine made him positively chatty.

"People died," I said, and s.h.i.+fted away from him on the plastic-covered cab seat, looking out my window for the rest of the ride. Self-storage units and off-track betting was the order of the day as the city devolved to urban sprawl and then faded away altogether closer to the coastline. Dilapidated houses, looking more like beached s.h.i.+pwrecks than dwellings, flashed in and out of the cab's headlights. A skeletal rowboat marked the turnoff to my cottage.

"Nice place," said Lucas, stepping out while I paid the cabdriver. "Looks cozy. Nice view. You ever decide to move, I'll take it off your hands."

"Wouldn't your clan have something to say about that?" I asked. The cab briefly painted Lucas and me red with its taillights before it pulled away and turned the corner. I scented the breeze coming off the water, but there were no other weres in the vicinity, Dmitri or someone who might be even more unfriendly. Although if he saw Lucas leaning on me like he was now and hobbling toward the cottage, I didn't know if that would be possible.

"Those people on the state land aren't my clan," Lucas said, with vehemence that surprised me, considering he'd been shot and drugged. "Just my family."

"Same thing," I said with a shrug, turning my key in the lock.

"It's not the same thing at all," Lucas said. "Blood means nothing. Strength is all. Weres aren't capable of understanding that."

"Gee," I said, depositing him ungently on the sofa. "Thanks a bunch, Lucas."

His mouth crimped. "I'm sorry. Shouldn't have said that." He grinned mischievously at me. "I've had a hard day, after all."

"No, me too," I said. "I have this habit of spewing out conversation with no regard for who's hearing it. The doctors think that with a well-placed surgical zipper the problem should subside on its own."

Lucas didn't laugh, just grunted. He propped one foot up on the coffee table and rather than be irritated, as I was when Dmitri put his feet all over my things, I felt myself settle and stop shaking. Lucas seemed a right fit on my sofa.

This was bad.

"Thanks for everything you did today," he said after a bit, when I got the nerve to sit down beside him. This close, I was reminded of what lived under his skin, but I didn't want to move away.

Lucas's monster didn't frighten me. I wanted to be closer to it, to see what it would make him do if we touched.

"No one has ever gone out of their way for me before," he elaborated when I was silent.

"I can't imagine why," I said, making myself move back to Just Friends distance. "It's not like you're that difficult to get along with, when you're human."

Lucas instantly sobered. "I'm not human, Luna. Why do you say these things?"

"I . . . ," I started. Lucas sat up and faced me. His eyes were narrow and had deep lines at the corners I hadn't noticed. They made him look older and rougher than he was.

"Are you so ashamed of being were that you have to try and convince yourself that when you wear human skin, you are are human? Because that's just plain f.u.c.ked up, Luna." He touched my cheek. "You're so much more beautiful than any of them." human? Because that's just plain f.u.c.ked up, Luna." He touched my cheek. "You're so much more beautiful than any of them."

"Stop it," I warned, pus.h.i.+ng his hand away. "I'm not ashamed of anything, Lucas, but in case you hadn't noticed, parading around as a nonhuman doesn't make you real popular in this city. I don't have the luxury of hiding under a tree every time someone takes exception to the fact that three days out of the month, I'm fuzzy."

Lucas dropped his gaze. "This has been the worst day of my life," he said. "Seeing Jason dead . . . getting jumped. I apologize."

"It's fine." I sighed. "I'm sorry I had to insinuate he might have helped to kill four people."

"Weres," said Lucas absently. "Not people."

"Whatever," I said. "I'm just glad we got to the fifth before they s.n.a.t.c.hed her."

"She's under your protection?" Lucas drawled. "That's sweet."

"Not that she really wants to be," I said. "She hates me. I'm unworthy, you know, plus I'm sort of the evil ex-girlfriend of the man who bit her."

Lucas moved a ribbon of hair away from my eyes. "That I can see. I wouldn't want to make you mad."

"Lucas." I sighed for the third time, grasping his wrist. He rotated it and squeezed my fingers between his.

"Can I just be close to you for a bit? I need it . . ."

"Technically, Bryson's protecting Carla . . . ," I babbled. "He's this guy who wears stinky cologne and horrible polyblend suits and drives a . . ."

Lucas pressed his lips against mine, soft and fast as if he'd closed his hand over my mouth. "Shut up, Luna."

I did. And he kissed me again.

To be fair, I only let it last for about ten seconds before I started trying to push him away again, but that was enough. Lucas was very gentle, cool, and sweet, and he fired every one of the instincts that the were had, the ones that overrode my human sense a lot more often than I'd like.

"I can't, can't," I whispered frantically against his mouth. "Please understand . . . I won't do this to Dmitri . . ."

Lucas breathed out, his free hand on my neck. "You're so G.o.dd.a.m.n good and pure, Luna. I'd think it was an act if you weren't so earnest." He closed his eyes for a second. "Still, all good things must come to an end."

"What?" I said with a dumb-blonde blink. Lucas smiled, showing just the tips of his teeth.

"I'm still hungry." His teeth struck at my neck, close to the spot where my scars rode, and I screamed, shoving him in earnest.

"Why fight?" Lucas said, pinning my arms to my sides. "You know that sooner or later someone is going to put it in you."

"Get off off me, you f.u.c.king psychopath!" I snarled, and twisted one hand free. I dug my thumb into his bullet wound, hard. me, you f.u.c.king psychopath!" I snarled, and twisted one hand free. I dug my thumb into his bullet wound, hard.

Lucas howled, the sound from the forest. Somewhere in the cottage, gla.s.s shattered and I went momentarily deaf.

We split apart, panting, me with a sc.r.a.ped neck and Lucas with a newly bleeding shoulder. "Luna?" he said in confusion, backing away from me. Understandable, because I was heading for my gun in the desk drawer by the entry. "Luna, what happened . . ." He looked at his shoulder in surprise. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry . . ."

I yanked open the drawer and got a clip, too angry to care.

"This is all wrong . . ." Lucas got his hand on the doork.n.o.b. "Luna, you have to believe me that I'm sorry. I'm leaving. I'll . . . we'll talk later." He ran out of the cottage, the screen door flapping.

I was still sitting on the sofa with my gun when Sunny pulled up. She stopped in the doorway, eyebrow sliding up. "Is this a bad time?"

"No." I sighed, sticking the Glock in my waistband. "Just wondering if I'll ever understand men. Or if they'll get less psycho."

"Not likely," said Sunny. "I came to see if you wanted to go to a late-late dinner. Grandma's playing poker at the Indian casino. G.o.ds know when she'll be back."

"I already tried supper," I muttered. "Got attacked by a bunch of p.i.s.sy weres. No closer to finding out why the Wendigo are playing executioner. Made out with Lucas. Think I may have broken something when I got thrown into that trash can."

"Wait, wait, wait." Sunny came in and threw her purse down, sitting on the footstool across from me. "Go back to that third thing."

"Made out with Lucas? Believe me, that's the least of it right now."

"The Wendigo. The one who might have ties to the killings. The sworn enemy of all things werewolf. You were snogging him?"

I pressed my hands over my face, flopping over on the sofa. "I screwed up big-time, Sunny."

"Yeah, you did," she said. "And now you have to figure out how you're going to fix it."

"Get a fake pa.s.sport and move to Turkmenistan?"

"You could close your case, for starters," she said, crossing her arms. "Did Lucas know anything?"

"Nothing useful," he said. "He doesn't believe in Wendigo magick, which is exactly the thing I need to find the shaman . . ." I stared at Sunny through my fingers. "I have to get downtown. I know how we can find the guy. Girl. Thing. Whatever."

Sunny gave me an approving nod. "Better already. My car's outside."

After we swung by the cottage and got the charm, we drove to the Twenty-fourth to find Bryson. His desk was empty.

"d.a.m.n it," I muttered. "Come on, Sunny. Let's get out of here before somebody yells at us."

"I think they might do worse than that," she said, pointing behind me. I turned my head, already knowing what I'd see. Captain Morgan appeared through the general come-and-go of detectives and uniforms, arms crossed over her periwinkle suit jacket and its Nocturne City Boosters pin. She had a look on her face that might lead to saying We are not amused We are not amused in a prissy accent. in a prissy accent.

I secreted the charm in my pocket and spun around. "Hey there, Captain Morgan."