Bone Crossed

Bone Crossed (Mercy Thompson #4) by Patricia Briggs

For Jordan, whimsical, musical friend of critters furred, scaled, and feathered

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

There are dozens of people who have helped in this endeavor, but I am especially grateful to those who, on a moment’s notice, went through the manuscript with a fine-tooth comb—Mike Briggs, Dave and Katharine Carson, Laurie Martin, Jean Matteaucci, Anne Peters, Kaye Roberson, and Anne Sowards. I also would like to take a moment to thank the people who’ve worked so hard to determine that, yes, you can indeed cast a silver bullet—Mike Briggs, Dr. Kevin Jaansalu, Dr. Kyle Roberson, and Tom Lenz.

1

I STARED AT MY REFLECTION IN THE MIRROR. I WASN’T pretty, but my hair was thick and brushed my shoulders. My skin was darker on my arms and face than it was on the rest of my body, but at least, thanks to my Blackfoot father, I’d never be pasty pale.

There were two stitches Samuel had put in the cut on my chin, and the bruise on my shoulder (not extensive damage considering I’d been fighting something that liked to eat children and had knocked out a werewolf). The dark thread looked from some angles like the legs of a shiny black spider. Aside from that slight damage, there was nothing wrong with my body. Karate and mechanicking kept me in good shape.

My soul was a lot more battered than my body, but I couldn’t see it in the mirror. Hopefully no one else could either. It was that invisible damage that left me afraid to leave the bathroom and face Adam, who waited in my bedroom. Though I knew with absolute certainty that Adam wouldn’t do anything I didn’t want him to do—and had wanted him to do for a long time.

I could ask him to leave. To give me more time. I stared at the woman in the mirror, but all she did was stare back.

I’d killed the man who’d raped me. Was I going to let him have this last victory? Let him destroy me as he’d intended?

“Mercy?” Adam didn’t have to raise his voice. He knew I could hear him.

“Careful,” I told him as I left off mirror-gazing and began pulling on clean underwear and an old T-shirt. “I have an ancient walking stick, and I know how to use it.”

“The walking stick is lying across your bed,” he said.

When I came out of the bathroom, Adam was lying across my bed, too.

He wasn’t tall, but he didn’t need height to add to the impression he made. Wide cheekbones and a full, soft mouth topping a stubborn jaw combined to give him movie-star beauty. When his eyes were open, they were a dark chocolate only a shade lighter than mine. His body was almost as pretty as his face—though I knew he didn’t think of himself that way. He kept himself in shape because he was Alpha and his body was a tool he used to keep his pack safe. He’d been a soldier before he was Changed, and the military training was still there in the way he moved and the way he took charge.

“When Samuel gets back from the hospital, he’s going to spend the rest of the night at my house,” Adam said without opening his eyes. Samuel was my roommate, a doctor, and a lone wolf. Adam’s house was behind mine, with about ten acres between them—three were mine and the rest were Adam’s. “We have time to talk.”

“You look horrible,” I said, not quite truthfully. He did look tired, with dark circles under his eyes, but nothing short of mutilation could make him look terrible. “Don’t they have beds in D.C.?”

He’d had to go to Washington (the capital—we were in the state) this weekend to clean up a little mess that was sort of my fault. Of course if he hadn’t ripped Tim’s corpse into bits on camera, and if the resultant DVD hadn’t landed on a senator’s desk, there wouldn’t have been a problem. So it was partially his fault, too.

Mostly it was Tim’s fault, and whoever had made a copy of the DVD and mailed it off. I’d taken care of Tim. Bran, the head-honcho werewolf above all of the other head-honcho werewolves, was apparently taking care of the other person. Last year, I would have expected to hear about a funeral. This year, with the werewolves barely having admitted their existence to the world, Bran would probably be more circumspect. Whatever that would mean.

Adam opened his eyes and looked at me. In the dimness of the room (he’d only turned on the small light on the little table by my bed), his eyes looked black. There was a bleakness in his face that hadn’t been there before, and I knew it was because of me. Because he hadn’t been able to keep me safe—and people like Adam take that pretty seriously.

Personally, I figured it was up to me to keep me safe. Sometimes it might mean calling in friends, but it was my responsibility. Still, he saw it as a failure.

“So have you made up your mind?” he asked.