I was about to bolt back to his room when I realized the noise actually came from the room behind the window I leaned against. I peered through the glass and watched as a doctor used two large defibrillator paddles to shock the chest of a guy lying in the hospital bed. The guy’s body arched and shuddered with the jolt of electricity, but then it collapsed, limp and lifeless on the bed. Something about the guy looked familiar.…

He was young. Maybe my age or a little older…

I concentrated my superhearing beyond the high-pitched alarm so I could hear what was being said by the small army of medical personnel in the room. “I don’t understand it. He was fine last time I checked on him,” one of the nurses said frantically. “His cousin was just here to visit.”

“Clear!” someone else shouted.

I stood and watched in shock—no one noticing me at the window—as the guy in the bed was jolted twice more. His face looked like a bloated mask, but beyond the bruises and bandages, recognition finally clicked in my head.

“It’s been too long. It’s time to call it,” one of the nurses said.

The doctor pulled off his latex gloves and placed them on a metal tray. He looked up at the clock above the bed. “Time of death: eight twenty-three p.m.”

I stumbled away from the window and ran down the hall, down the empty stairwell, and out of the hospital—knowing I’d just watched Pete Bradshaw die.

Chapter Ten

TENDER MERCIES

A FEW MINUTES LATER

By some small miracle, he was outside the hospital. The white wolf lingered in the grove of trees beyond the parking lot. He watched me as I watched him, my eyes locked with his glinting ones in the evening moonlight. Did he know what had happened? Was he here because I needed him? Did he know I had the moonstone now?

I took a step in his direction. He turned and disappeared into the grove. I wanted to shout to him to stay, but I couldn’t draw attention to him in such a public place. I was about to take another step to go after him when April’s red hatchback pulled up in front of me. Slade and Brent waited for me inside. I hadn’t seen Slade since he’d refused to follow me into the fire. I wondered how many hours he and Brent had been sitting out here in the parking lot.

“He wants us to take you home,” Brent said solemnly through the open window.

I tucked the moonstone into the small pocket of my scrub shirt, just over my chest, before approaching the car. After Talbot’s betrayal, I was hesitant to let anyone know I had the stone now.

I slipped into the backseat and could almost taste the dark mood that radiated off the two boys in the front. I gathered that they knew what had happened to Marcos. They’d known him so much better than I had, and I didn’t know what to say. So nobody said anything, and Slade started the car and headed back toward Rose Crest, driving much slower this time.

Their pack mate had died because of me.

Two people I knew had died today, and my dad was in critical condition.

And it’s all your fault, growled the wolf inside my head.

We drove in awkward silence until we pulled into my neighborhood and I noticed something strange. Even though it was after dark, almost all my neighbors were outside of their houses. Some sitting on their porch steps. A few standing in the street. They looked like they were waiting for something. Almost like they didn’t know what to do with themselves until it happened.

I rolled down my tinted window to get a better look, and peered out at the Headrick family, sitting on their porch, just staring out into the night. When Jack Headrick saw me pass by in the backseat of April’s car, he stood and motioned to his wife and kids. Much to my surprise, they started following the car as we drove down the street. Other neighbors followed in a quiet procession.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

Slade seemed to flinch at the sound of my voice breaking the silence.

“They know,” Brent said, speaking for the first time since I’d gotten into the car. “Reports about the explosion have been on the radio all afternoon. I imagine the television, too. Someone must have leaked your dad’s name to the press. They all know what happened to him.”

Slade pulled into the driveway of my house. The long line of people following us suddenly felt like a funeral march. I sat there, unable to get out of the car yet. I wanted to shout at them through the rolled-down window to go away. I didn’t want them here. I didn’t want to see the concern on their faces. Didn’t want to answer their questions. They’d all want news. They’d want to know why my dad had been at that warehouse in the first place. They’d want someone to tell them what they could do for us. They’d want someone to care that they cared.

He’s your father. What right do they have to invade your space, acting like they’d almost lost him, too?

I opened the car door and bolted toward the house, careful not to run unnaturally fast, though. Not with so many people watching. I just wanted to get inside, away from all these people. But as I approached the porch, the front door opened and April stepped through the doorway. She shook like a nervous cocker spaniel, and her puffy face was splotched with red tearstains. So much for keeping this from April. Before I could react, she padded down the porch steps and threw her arms around me in a bear hug so tight it reminded me of my old friend Don Mooney.

“Oh, honey, are you okay?” she asked.

“Yes,” I said, tearing up over the fact that her first question had been about me. “But I just want to go inside. I need to get away from them.”

The moonstone pulsed in my pocket between us as April rubbed her hand up and down my back. It felt so reassuring—the first real hug tonight—that for the first time this evening I didn’t feel quite so alone.

“They’re here because they need to be,” April said.

I turned my head and looked out at the yard. By now, most of the neighborhood had converged on my lawn, although a few people hung back in the street. It reminded me of when Baby James had gone missing, the way practically the whole parish had shown up to help search for one of their own.

I realized then that the wolf in my head had been wrong. My dad belonged to these people, too. He was their pastor—their father, too. They had every right to feel like he belonged to them. They had every right to be concerned. If this were a werewolf pack, Dad would be their alpha.

No, they were more like a flock without their shepherd.