Dead to the World

and yard. Her steel-colored hair was in a neat roll on the back of her head, and she was in a dull olive suit and low-heeled brown pumps. She looked from Alcide to me and didn’t find what she was seeking. She pushed open the glass storm door.
    “Alcide, how nice to see you,” she lied desperately. This was a woman in deep turmoil.
    Alcide gave her a long look. “We have trouble, Verena.”
    If her daughter was a member of the pack, Verena herself was a werewolf. I looked at the woman curiously, and she seemed like one of the more fortunate friends of my grandmother’s. Verena Rose Yancy was an attractive woman in her late sixties, blessed with a secure income and her own home. I could not imagine this woman down on all fours loping across a field.
    And it was obvious that Verena didn’t give a damn what trouble Alcide had. “Have you seen my daughter?” she asked, and she waited for his answer with terror in her eyes. “She can’t have betrayed the pack.”
    “No,” Alcide said. “But the packmaster sent us to find her. She missed a pack officers’ meeting last night.”
    “She called me from the shop last night. She said she had an unexpected appointment with a stranger who’d called the shop right at closing time.” The woman literally wrung her hands. “I thought maybe she was meeting that witch.”
    “Have you heard from her since?” I said, in the gentlest voice I could manage.
    “I went to bed last night mad at her,” Verena said, looking directly at me for the first time. “I thought she’d decided to spend the night with one of her friends. One of her girl friends,” she explained, looking at me with eyebrows arched, so I’d get her drift. I nodded. “She never would tell me ahead of time, she’d just say, ‘Expect me when you see me,’ or ‘I’ll meet you at the shop tomorrow morning,’ or something.” A shudder rippled through Verena’s slim body. “But she hasn’t come home and I can’t get an answer at the shop.”
    “Was she supposed to open the shop today?” Alcide asked.
    “No, Wednesday’s our closed day, but she always goes in to work on the books and get paperwork out of the way. She always does,” Verena repeated.
    “Why don’t Alcide and I drive over there and check the shop for you?” I said gently. “Maybe she left a note.” This was not a woman you patted on the arm, so I didn’t make that natural gesture, but I did push the glass door shut so she’d understand she had to stay there and she shouldn’t come with us. She understood all too clearly.
    Verena Rose’s Bridal and Formal Shop was located in an old home on a block of similarly converted two-story houses. The building had been renovated and maintained as beautifully as the Yancys’ residence, and I wasn’t surprised it had such cachet. The white-painted brick, the dark green shutters, the glossy black ironwork of the railings on the steps, and the brass details on the door all spoke of elegance and attention to detail. I could see that if you had aspirations to class, this is where you’d come to get your wedding gear.
    Set a little back from the street, with parking behind the store, the building featured one large bay window in front. In this window stood a faceless mannequin wearing a shining brown wig. Her arms were gracefully bent to hold a stunning bouquet. Even from the truck, I could see that the bridal dress, with its long embroidered train, was absolutely spectacular.
    We parked in the driveway without pulling around back, and I jumped out of the pickup. Together we took the brick sidewalk that led from the drive to the front door, and as we got closer, Alcide cursed. For a moment, I imagined some kind of bug infestation had gotten into the store window and landed on the snowy dress. But after that moment, I knew the dark flecks were surely spatters of blood.
    The blood had sprayed onto the white brocade and dried there. It was as if the mannequin had been wounded, and for a crazy second I wondered. I’d seen a lot of impossible things in the past few months.
    “Adabelle,” Alcide said, as if he was praying.
    We were standing at the bottom of the steps leading up to the front porch, staring into the bay window. The CLOSED sign was hanging in the middle of the glass oval inset in the door, and venetian blinds were closed behind it. There were no live brainwaves emanating from that house. I had taken the time to check. I’d discovered, the hard way, that checking was a