Kelley Armstrong - Bitten

"Did you call him yesterday?" Jeremy asked.

"Huh?" I was emptying the dishwasher. My mind was still in bed with Clay.

"Your… friend called before you woke up. You left your cell phone in the front hall."

My brain snapped out of the bedroom. "You answered it?"

"Would you have rather I waited until Clay answered it? You didn't call, did you?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Don't worry, I didn't say anything, so whatever story you're telling him is safe. It seems he was expecting you back today."

"I'll handle it."

"Elena…"

"I said I'd handle it."

I put away the last plate and headed for the door.

I hadn't called Philip because I forgot him. It sounded awful, but it was the plain truth. I loved this man, I knew I did, and that only made it worse. At least if I could say I wasn't in love with… In love? Was I in love with Philip? Damn it, that was such a trite, overworked cop-out. I loved him. There was no "in love."There was "in lust," "infatuated," and "in heat," three ultimately destructive emotions that had nothing to do with real, lasting love. I forgot Philip because that was how I was coping with this mess, splitting my life into two compartments, human and Pack. Philip belonged in the human world and to even think about him while I was in the Pack world somehow tainted what we had. Or at least, that was how I explained the oversight to myself.

As I was about to get my cell phone from the front hall, Clay showed up. Naturally, I couldn't excuse myself and run upstairs with my phone. So I left the phone where it was and went for a walk with Clay. I meant to call Philip when I got back. He'd left a message on my cell phone, but as we got in the door, Jeremy reminded us that we needed to dispose of Cain's body. From there, things got complicated, and in light of what happened that day, I think I could be forgiven if I forgot to call Philip… again.

Back in the good ol' days of lawlessness and circuit judges, the Pack could dump bodies wherever it pleased. As humans became more concerned with dead and missing people, the Pack had to start burying the mutts it killed. Today, with postmortems and computer-linked detective units, and DNA testing, disposing of a body was a full-blown event requiring a good half day of preparation and work. Every member of the Pack had been drilled in the procedures until we could dispose of a body better than the most forensics-savvy human killer.

We drove the Explorer an hour north, avoiding any dumping grounds used in the previous few decades. Another hour was spent navigating down a logging road and 4X4'ing deeper into the forest, then removing and dragging Cain's body to a suitable site where we stripped, washed, and examined it for injuries. The only marks on the body were two splotches under Cain's throat, bruises from Clay's thumbs when he'd snapped Cain's neck. To be safe, Clay excised the bruises with a penknife. Finally, we buried Cain. Then I replaced the sod while Clay rounded up two rocks too heavy to be lifted by a human, and placed them over the grave. We backtracked to the Explorer, covering our trail, then drove to site number two.

Site two was chosen with as much caution as site one, but it was over an hour away. Here we dug a pit, threw in Cain's clothing, ID, and the bags and cloths we'd used for transporting and cleaning his body. These were doused with kerosene and burned, keeping the smoke to a minimum. Once everything was reduced to ashes, Clay buried the remains and we declared the job complete. It wasn't foolproof, but no one would ever look for Zachary Cain. Mutts didn't leave mourners.

We were less than twenty minutes from Stonehaven when blue lights flashed in the rearview mirror. I looked up and down the road, certain the lights were meant for someone else. I knew I wasn't breaking any laws. The dumbest thing you could do after dumping a body is to break a few highway traffic laws making your escape, which is why I was driving instead of Clay. The cruise control was set to two miles over the speed limit-driving exactly on the speed limit always struck me as just as suspicious as speeding. I'd been traveling down a straight highway road for the past thirty miles, with no chance of making an illegal turn or missing a stop sign. I checked for other cars ahead and behind, but we were alone on the road. Clay glanced over his shoulder at the police car.

"Did the speed limit change here?" I asked.

"Speed limit?"

"Never mind. I'm pulling over."

"No big deal. Everything's clean."

I pulled onto the shoulder and hoped the cops would zoom past in pursuit of some emergency ahead. As the police car eased onto the gravel behind me, I swore under my breath.

"Everything's clean," Clay said. "Stop worrying."

One of the officers walked over to the passenger side and tapped on the window. Clay waited long enough to express annoyance, but not so long as to be disrespectful, then hit the button to roll down the window.

"Clayton Danvers?" the officer said.

Clay looked at the man, but said nothing.

The young officer continued, "My partner recognized the vehicle. We were hoping you were in it. Saves us a trip up to your place."

Clay continued to stare at the man.

"Could you step out of the car please, Mr. Danvers?"

Again, Clay hesitated the longest acceptable length of time before opening the door. I took off my seat belt and got out too, staying on my side. Panic nudged my memory for answers. The rear compartment was clean, right? We'd scrubbed our hands and inspected our clothes, right? We'd disposed of all the supplies, right? Check, check, and check. At least, as far as I knew. What if we'd missed something? Was there an overlooked scrap of fabric snagged in the back of the Explorer? Did our clothes smell as strongly of smoke to human noses as they did to mine?

The other officer, a solidly built man in his late thirties, wandered around the Explorer, looking in the back window, then putting his face close to the tinted glass and shielding his eyes so he could see inside.

"Lots of storage space," he said. "How much stuff can you fit in these things?"

"Stuff?" I blinked. "Oh, like baggage? Enough luggage for a week's vacation, I'd guess."

He laughed. "If you pack like my wife, that's saying a lot." He squinted inside. "Sure is nice and clean. You folks don't have kids, do you?" He laughed again and dropped to his knees, checking the tires and the undercarriage. "This is one of those new suburban assault vehicles, isn't it? A four-by-four that's not meant for four-by-four-ing."

"It'll go off-road," I said, struggling to stay calm as he continued to check under the Explorer. "But it's too bulky for serious 4X4'ing. Comes in handy in the middle of a New York winter, though."

"I bet it does." He looked over at Clay. "What's the towing capacity on one of these?"

"No idea," Clay said. He'd been standing to the side, letting me handle the niceties. One of his tricks for keeping his temper under control. Avoid confrontation.

"We've never towed with it," I said.

The older cop kept looking under the Explorer, maybe checking the suspension, maybe looking for something else. I waited as long as I could, then asked, "Was I speeding?"

"We had a tip," the younger officer said. He turned to Clay. "An anonymous tip telling us you know something about Mike Braxton's murder. We need you to come to the station to answer some questions."

Clay's jaw tensed. "You expect me to drop whatever I'm doing-"

He stopped. I didn't say anything, but he knew what I was thinking. Antagonizing the cops wasn't going to help. Taking the defensive might make them back off if they didn't have any reason to arrest him, but it was too risky. Piss them off and they might decide to search the Explorer and Clay himself. Small-town cops have a reputation for not always following proper procedure. Legally, they couldn't force Clay to talk to them, but at least they weren't likely to uncover any evidence of our morning's activities through simple conversation.