Jesse’s hand tightened around the wrist that now throbbed as a confirmation of Tolya’s words, and remembered the drawing Hope Wolfsong had made that showed Abigail dead. “They will.” She thought about Abigail, who had made soaps and candles and worn old-fashioned dresses and read tarot cards—and who had hidden her real self so well even Jesse hadn’t sensed the truth about her.

“Apparently she can sense if a particular stone will bring a person good luck or bad,” Tolya said. “This is an unusual skill?”

“Yes.” Being able to bring about a run of bad luck would certainly benefit gamblers and swindlers.

Cutie started yapping, craving attention. Or needing something else. “Tolya? I’ll call you back.” Jesse hung up, grabbed Cutie and a leash, and rushed through the back of the store and out the door. She walked the pup for a few minutes, letting Cutie become familiar with the scents and land behind the store.

An excuse, to give herself time to think before she called Tolya.

Had the soaps and candles and long dresses and tarot cards been Abigail’s attempt to reinvent herself and get away from a corrupt life, or had it all been a disguise? Oh, Jesse was sure the girl had had reason to hide, but she also had a feeling that everyone in Prairie Gold had been played—and now she wondered if Abigail had moved to Bennett to try to patch things up with Kelley or to get away from her, an Intuit who sensed people and would no longer accept the disguise at face value? Was giving Tolya this information about the Blackstone Clan just a piece of a game?

She didn’t want to be responsible for the girl being driven out of town, especially if Abigail really was trying to make a fresh start. But if Abigail had a different agenda, what sort of damage could she do in a mixed community where she would find marks for a different kind of con?

Or had she already found some?

In small Intuit communities—and most of their communities were small, given that they were tucked away in the wild country—there was almost no crime beyond occasional mischief and the rare times when an individual snapped without warning and did grievous harm to someone. That didn’t mean all Intuits were good people. It didn’t mean their kind of human didn’t spawn liars and thieves. It just meant that kind of person didn’t prosper in an Intuit community. Couldn’t prosper. But in other communities where you could hide what you were and use your extra sense to do unlawful deeds?

There had been Intuits who had done such things. Maybe the most successful outlaws who had lived a century ago had been Intuits who sensed what to rob and when—and sensed when it was time to retire and become something else. Maybe they got married and raised children and quietly taught their sons and daughters skills that were outside of polite society. And maybe there were some of those progeny even now who knew when to move on and let the marks recover before coming back around, like some kind of outlaw migration.

A family of gamblers and thieves. A clan, Tolya called it. No, she’d never heard of the Blackstones, but she had a very bad feeling about what would happen in Bennett when the next member of that clan showed up.

* * *

* * *

Virgil helped haul boxes into the two vans while he tried to decide if he could justifiably snarl at Deputy Jana for not telling him about the Blackstone humans yesterday when she’d first found out about them. Except he’d known about humans made of black stones days before Jana arrived in Bennett and hadn’t shown her the picture the Hope pup had drawn.

Was he just as wrong for not telling? More wrong? No. Not more wrong.

He snarled and felt his canines lengthen to Wolf size—and watched one of the salvage humans stumble away from the van, dropping a box as the man fled back into the house.

Moments later, Jana rushed out of the house. Of course the wolverine would come rushing out to puff up and snarl.

“What happened?” she demanded. “Larry said something about teeth and is pretty freaked-out.”

Virgil bared his teeth.

Jana almost took a step back, then took a step forward, kicking the box, which, from the sound of it, had been full of breakables that were now broken.

“Oh,” she said. “Well, why did you snarl at Larry?”

“I wasn’t snarling at Larry; I was snarling about you.”

“What did I do?”

That tone was a challenge to his dominance. It really was. If he was certain she was the one who was more wrong, he’d bite her—but he’d use his mostly human teeth. Those wouldn’t hurt her as much, but enough.

And if she bit him in retaliation?

He shoved his box deeper into the van, then swung around her to fetch another one that wasn’t full of broken things. As he passed her, he growled, “You’re confusing the puppy.”

Jana threw her hands in the air. Why? Who knew? It was one of those weird things humans did.

“How?” she yelped. “Why? She’s not even here!”

As he walked into the living room, Virgil heard a box full of broken things being thrown into the van—and he smiled.

* * *

* * *

Jana stood under a cool shower, washing away dirt and sweat. They’d done a lot of good, hard work today, and tomorrow Evan and Kenneth’s family would move out of the hotel and into their new house—where it was less likely that Maddie would be seen by someone who realized what she was and saw nothing but profit.

The day had rung her out. Not just the physical work, and not just the niggle of doubt about some of the details in Abigail Burch’s story, but the gnawing sense of guilt that maybe she was confusing the puppy. She needed to have a firm idea of what she wanted to accomplish with—and for—Rusty and then find out how to do that. And once she figured that out, she had to convince the big bad Wolves to follow her rules when it came to her dog, or poor Rusty would get caught in the middle of mom-and-dad squabbles about how to raise the kid.

Gods. Perish the thought of Virgil in that role. Except … he was the sheriff and that made him the dominant enforcer in the town and that made him the dominant Wolf in the town. Or maybe being the dominant enforcer was the reason he’d been given the job of sheriff. Whatever. The point was that she and Virgil had to agree on how to oversee Rusty’s education.

She was so not looking forward to that discussion. But she didn’t have to think about it for the rest of the day. She would take Rusty for a walk and then some playtime in the backyard. But right now, all she wanted was some food and a glass of beer. Or a large whiskey. Or …

Even under the water, she heard the howls coming from her neighbors down the street.

… a sledgehammer.

She turned off the water, dried off as quickly as she could, and threw on some clothes when she heard Rusty howling in the living room—and heard Buddy the parakeet making a loud scoldy noise that was either the parakeet version of a howl or an objection to the sound Rusty was making.

“Hey, girl,” Jana said as she moved toward the dog.

Rusty looked at Jana, wagged her tail, and howled again—and was answered by Virgil, Kane, and John.

Jana grabbed the leash from the basket near Rusty’s crate and snapped it on the dog’s collar—just in case Rusty tried to go through the screen door to join the Wolves.

“We are here,” Barb said, walking out of the kitchen.

Jana studied her housemate. “And … ?”

“I think that’s the message. We are here. The Wolves in the Lakeside Courtyard would howl at night and my brother said that was the message. Or one of the reasons they howled.”

“Who were they telling?” She didn’t think the humans who lived in Lakeside were that thrilled to know the Others were close enough to be heard.

A howl. A sound so deep Jana felt it vibrate in her bones and freeze her blood. A huge sound.

A second howl. A third. So close the windows rattled.

“Hold her,” Jana said.

Barb rushed forward to grab the leash. “Don’t go out there. Humans shouldn’t go out there.”

“I’m a cop.” She wanted to run into her bedroom and grab her weapon, but she wasn’t dressed like a cop, wasn’t going about official business—and she didn’t think that whatever was outside would notice if she pinned a badge to her T-shirt. It would notice the gun—and kill her for carrying a human weapon.

All right, then. She had faced down a few bullies at the academy with nothing but attitude; she could do it here too.

After checking that Barb had a tight grip on Rusty, Jana slipped outside and walked into the street just as the Wolfgard answered those deep, terrifying howls—and were answered in turn.

How close were those things? What were they? Elders, sure. But what did that mean? They were howling, so … gigantic Wolves? Or something that howled but was even older and more primal than the Wolfgard?

She didn’t know—and understood on a gut level that she couldn’t know and survive. She also understood something else. The humans living in Bennett needed some way to know the boundaries, needed to know where the lines were now drawn that separated streets that were within the jurisdiction of the police and town government from the streets that were in the wild country and were under the jurisdiction of them.

“Virgil?” Jana called softly, hoping her voice wouldn’t carry much beyond the Wolves.

He turned to face her. Kane and John continued to face the direction of the Elder Hills.

“We need to talk about some things tomorrow,” Jana said.

He made a sound she took to be agreement.

She nodded. “Okay, then.” She looked toward the Elder Hills and saw nothing—and wondered if there was an Elder in its true form standing a few yards beyond the boundary, watching her. “Okay.”

Forgoing the walk for the dog’s sake—an excuse Barb didn’t question—Jana and Rusty played in the backyard while Barb put together a simple meal of sandwiches and salad.

Late that evening, as she wrote a short note to Tobias, asking for book recommendations on dog training, she thought about the howling.

We are here. According to Barb, the Wolves meant it as reassurance that they were keeping watch. But the answering howls? We. Are. Here. Should the humans hear that as a reminder or a threat?

* * *

* * *

The door to the private railroad car opened a finger’s length—enough for the barrel of a gun to be aimed at anyone sitting at the card table. But no gun appeared or was fired. Instead, Judd McCall said, “Parlan?”

“Come in.” Parlan placed the derringer on the table and resumed shuffling a deck of cards. He waited while Judd scanned the public side of the room, then fixed on the door that provided entry into what was, most of the time, his private space.

“Any company waiting for you?” Judd asked.

“No.” When the mood struck, he’d pick up a woman and use her well for a day or so, sometimes even letting her travel with him for a while if she had some interesting—and uninhibited—skills. Plenty of the saloon whores had indicated interest in having him for a night instead of some rough-and-tumble man, but he hadn’t reciprocated the interest lately.