Overwinter

3: the wolf with hands

'I saw a werewolf.'

Tali rehearsed the words in her head. Her cellphone shook against her ear. The other shaking hand massaged Jake. The lab perched on his claws as if he were ready to leap through the glass slider at the next passing shadow. His ears were alert and stubbornly fixed beneath her palms. His eyes roved empty shadows across the lighted deck.

Russ's voicemail kicked in. Tali dialed him back again. The phone rang once, twice, then this time a sleep-laced, groggy tone answered.

"Russ," she began in a hurried whisper. Her eyes darted from the gun on the desk beside her to Jake to the bleak outdoors. "Someone"—or something, she thought even as she willed those monstrous hands not to be true—"is outside my house. Jake scared him off, but Dante's at Molly's for the night; put him there because of the damn broken slider. I'm worried about him and the others, but going out doesn't seem smart."

My son, my darling flesh and blood, is just a couple yards across a parking lot, probably cozy under a blanket eating overly buttered popcorn with Molly, she decided. Safe and sound. "You can stay up 'til your mom's home," Molly had probably told the anxious boy. Yes, she was saying that and he was safe and sound. But Tali felt overwhelmed by a desire to protect him. She needed to see him, make sure he was safe. She stared hard at the front door, wanting so much to fling herself out there and run to him, but every muscle in her body turned stiff and rigid at the mere thought of opening the door to the night.

She heard a groan from Russ's wife as the sheriff rolled out of bed. "Who'd ya see?" he asked, voice immediately transitioning to one of acute listening and focus. She hadn't heard that sharpened tone since one of the Bette twins had fallen through the pond ice last winter.

Here, Tali faltered. What do you say when you've glimpsed a creature of folklore and fairytale? How do you keep from sounding crazy?

Jake scrambled onto his feet so fast her heart skipped a beat. The dog stood still, listening in slight shifts of his head, following a sound undetected by her own straining ears. Following a sound that seemed to walk along the far wall.

"Tali?" Concern flooded the voice on the line. She heard Russ wake his wife.

"Jake hears something," she whispered, as though a hushed tone would hide her in this illuminated office of smashed pottery. "We saw...I saw a, uhm, a werewolf I think. Guy in a costume I'm guessing, but it looked so realistic. Whoever designed it should give a few pointers to the designer of Wulver high's mascot." She laughed, a high falsetto that made Jake briefly turn.

"Tali?" Russ said after a moment. "I want you to call Molly and let her know about this. Make sure she doesn't open the door to anyone. You either."

Tali's heart squeezed. "You know him," she said with a mother's instinct. "Jesus, Mary and Joseph, you know him, don't you?"

"Of him," Russ said carefully. "Stay calm, Tali."

"Molly can't protect Dante. Can't protect herself or the renters," she was saying, stretching for the gun. Goosebumps ran down her arm. She'd have to do it herself.

"If he's after you, he's not after them," Russ said in a relaxed tone nearly lost on the woman. "Listen to me, you'll be fine. Dante'll be fine. You can't go out there. I don't want to scare you, dear, you know that. But this isn't some chickenshit freshman prank. There's a killer stalking the northeast woods. Been in New Hampshire most recently. Dresses the way you described. Law enforcement's been doing a tight job, keeping it off the news. Teddy's on the way. He's just down the road for a coyote incident. I'll be over soon. Have to make a phone call to another guy whose spent a long time trying to track this bastard down."