Fair Game

when he was in wolf form. Brother Wolf was not torn; he knew that they could protect her from anything—but his wolf was like that: confident. Charles was not so sanguine.
    The taint of the ghosts he carried was beginning to wear on him. One day soon Anna would look into his eyes and see the evil within him. He wished he could have stayed in his wolf shape, but talking to Anna without opening the bond between them was too difficult. And he couldn’t open the bond for fear that the ghosts might use it to get to Anna. There were stories about that, about ghosts that killed all of the people close to the man who carried them.
    It was easier to be wolf than human because their evil could not touch Brother Wolf. The wolf felt no guilt, because guilt was a human emotion.
    Anna touched his shoulder. Charles didn’t turn to his mate, because he couldn’t face her while he was thinking of the evil he carried inside of him. Instead he looked over the starboard side of the bow and outon the water where the sun was setting in streaks of azure, silver, and faint gold. “It’ll be dark before we get out on the harbor.”
    Anna made a sound of agreement. “I know this is not the time, but, watching you brood over here, it occurs to me that you have evidently forgotten something and I think I’d better remind you. I should have reminded you this morning.”
    He did turn to her then. Like him, she was staring off into the distance, her shoulder brushing his like the wings of a butterfly.
    “What’s that?”
    “You are mine.” She didn’t look at him but her hand closed possessively over his on the rail of the boat. Her voice was soft and without emphasis; not even werewolf ears would have heard her ten feet away. “Your ghosts cannot have you, Charles. So exorcize them before I have to.” The last was a clear order, sharp as a shard of ice.
    Brother Wolf grunted in satisfaction. He liked it when their mate got possessive and asserted her rights over him. So did Charles.
    “Go ahead and smirk,” she said, seriously, though her body was relaxed against him. “Just keep it in mind. Maybe you don’t have to fight all of your battles alone.”
    “I’ll remember your words,” he told her with returned seriousness, though he pictured Anna taking her grandmother’s rolling pin after the ghosts who haunted him, and it made him want to…smirk again.
    “That’s better,” she told him smugly. “No more brooding.”
    And she was right.
    The boat swayed a bit as both Isaac and Malcolm moved suddenly and there was a zing of expectation in the air.
    “About time you got here, woman,” Isaac called out in tones of real affection.
    Startled, Charles looked over to see a woman walking down the pier to where their boat was docked. She was taller than average, tallerthan Isaac, who had vaulted up off the boat to trot down the pier to greet her. He kissed her, leaning into it, lingering.
    “He’s sleeping with the witch he told us was too devious to be trusted to gather information from Jacob’s body?” said Anna, sounding disgruntled.
    Charles laughed and pulled her closer so he could put his chin on top of her head. “Gutsy,” he said. “But he’s forgotten the first rule of the men’s locker room.”
    “What’s that?”
    “Don’t stick your…” He didn’t need to be crude, so he corrected himself. “Don’t screw with crazy, no matter how pretty it is.”
    She snorted. “You don’t know her.”
    “I know witches,” he said. “They are all crazy.”
    “What about Moira?”
    Moira was the white witch who was on the Emerald City Pack’s payroll. Anna had met her a couple of years ago and they had become fast friends.
    “Except for the blind ones,” Charles allowed.
    They watched as Isaac introduced his witch to the FBI agents as Hally Smith. She wasn’t beautiful, but she was striking with dark coloring, a long, elegant nose, and a wide, generous mouth.
    Isaac helped her down into the boat. To Charles, she stank of black magic as she neared and he wondered how Isaac stood it. Moira, Anna’s friend, was a white witch. She generally smelled of the herbs, spices, and magic of her gift. Hally reeked of death, old blood, and ghosts.
    The witch looked at Charles as if she could read his mind, which he knew damned well she couldn’t.
    “Well,” she said in a low, husky voice. “I’ve heard so much about you, Charles—”
    Isaac made a noise in his throat and she smiled.
    “Charles
Smith
. Look, we