“I’ve never been called a nice werewolf before.”
“Never?”
Alexx watched Raoul flush, then turn his back, as he put the finishing touches to his wardrobe. Once everything was tucked into place, he turned about again. “How do you propose to do this
research? As you’ve no doubt figured out, Charisma is not the place for that.”
Alexx had come to much the same conclusion himself. He wasn’t sure he wanted to hazard trying to get in a second time, anyway. Once was harrowing enough. At least until it was time for the Lupercalia Ball. He’d cross that bridge when he was closer to it. “Well, there’s always the
Chronicle
files—he said I could have full access to those. And the Internet. And the other members of the pack…” Ticking off on his fingers as he named them, he looked up at the sound of a growl.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Raoul pulled his belt tight, threading it through the loops.
“Why not?”
“Come on, let’s go. Even Ivan has a limit to his patience.” He scooped the sheet from the floor, tossed it inside his bedroom door, and closed it again. “Have you ever been to the police station?”
“No, not yet, but I’ve seen it. I hope to spend a lot of time there when I’m a reporter.”
“Hmmph.” Raoul’s grunt was noncommittal.
As Alexx followed him out of the cabin and back to the car, he belatedly realized that he’d never explained why it wasn’t a good idea to communicate with others in his pack. This didn’t seem the time to ask about it.
When Alexx pulled the car back onto the road, he saw Ivan waiting in the police car. The officer was slumped over the wheel, but straightened up when he saw them, starting his engine. Alexx waited until he was ready before heading back toward Crescent Bay, following Raoul’s directions.
“So you commute from out here to Charisma every day?”
“No.”
That was rather terse.
“Do you have another place in town?”
“Yes.”
Alexx didn’t feel emboldened to continue with that subject, although he was curious on so many counts, so he tried another tack. “Do you think you could introduce me to other members of your family? By the way, do you prefer family or pack?” He was trying to be politically correct and not piss Raoul off at the same time.
“I prefer you to drive is what I prefer.” Raoul leaned back against the passenger seat and closed his eyes, volunteering neither explanation nor conversation. It was a silent trip back to Crescent Bay.
Raoul swept into the police station, Alexx clinging to his side like a tenacious Chihuahua, Ivan a close step behind them. He was acquainted with every member of the Crescent Bay police force personally, having dealt with most of them at one time or another, either in official or unofficial capacity, or both. He was liked by most of them, although there were a few who thought he was too spoiled and rich for his own good, and that at his age he was too old to be playing the part of juvenile delinquent. But even those few didn’t grumble too loudly in a town where the Marchands were the leading citizens, and Raoul was the heir apparent to the Marchand empire.
“Frankly, I don’t know how long this will take,” he told Alexx.
“Maybe you should just go.” He wouldn’t blame the young
reporter for wandering off in pursuit of other avenues of information for his story, rather than wait for an indeterminate period of time. That sounded boring, even to him. But Alexx shook his head and refused to budge.
“That’s okay. I’ll wait as long as it takes.” Alexx planted himself in a green plastic chair next to a large potted fern in the waiting area. He picked up a magazine from the chair next to his, crossed his legs, and settled in for the long haul.
Raoul shook his head, but he didn’t waste his breath in arguing with the stubborn young man.
“C’mon.” Ivan gave him a friendly shove. “Business before pleasure.”
Raoul scowled but he held his tongue and followed the other man through the station, not bothering to correct the policeman’s mistaken impression of their relationship.
Raoul realized he was being accorded special treatment when rather than being led, handcuffed, into an impersonal police interrogation room, he was cordially ushered, sans wrist bracelets, into the office of the chief of police himself. Not surprising. He’d known Chief Jon Drummond his whole life—he was Raoul’s godfather.
Ivan accompanied Raoul as far as the office door and waited for him to enter the room. Then, at a nod from the chief, he left the two men to it.
At one time, the chief had been quarterback for the local football team, the Crescent Bay Buccaneers. Some of the records he’d set were yet unbroken, but those days were long behind him.
After marrying the head chef at Petit Croissant, Philippe Marchand’s well-known fine-dining restaurant, he’d gained a few pounds, but he’d retained his no-nonsense attitude, tempered with
a broad sense of justice.
Standing at Raoul’s entrance, he waved his prisoner into a chair on the other side of his desk before settling in his own. He regarded Raoul for a long moment before he spoke. “I don’t like this any better than you do, Raoul, trust me.”
Raoul snorted inelegantly. “But you’re not the one that’s been hauled in here at a god-awful hour of the morning for some utter nonsense, Jon, now are you?”
“If it was nonsense, you wouldn’t be here, and you know it.
Look, you know your father and I go way back. We’ve been best friends forever. And I’ve always considered you like a son to me.”
Raoul narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “You didn’t call him, did you?”
“No, I didn’t. And I won’t, unless you want me to.” He gave Raoul a look, one that he chose to ignore.
“Good.” Raoul leaned back, crossing his long legs. He donned a mask of indifference, displaying complete unconcern at the ridiculous charges that were being leveled against him. “Ask me what you want to know.” He waved a diffident hand. “Let’s make this short, if we can. I have a business to run, and things to do.”
“I know you do. I promise I don’t want to keep you here any longer than I have to.” The chief leaned forward, focusing on Raoul. “All right, let me get right to the point. Where were you last night and what were you doing?”
“You know what last night was. So you know what I was doing.”
“I know, but I need to ask you so please just tell me, for the record, if you don’t mind?”
“Are you recording this?” Raoul shot him a suspicious glance, his stomach knotting for no apparent reason.
“No. I probably should, just to cover my ass, but if I wanted to do that, you’d be in interrogation and not in my office. I will, if it comes to it, but I’d rather you just level with me.”
“Level with you? I haven’t done anything. What are you implying?”
“I didn’t mean it like that.” The chief held up his hand as a disclaimer. “I just meant that whatever the truth is, that’s what I want to know. Starting with where you were and what you were doing last night at approximately three A.M.”
“You know last night was the full moon. You know what happens on the full moon. At least you should. You’ve seen it all your life.” Raoul arched cynical eyebrows at his godfather. “As for me, you’ve known what I am ever since I hit puberty. Same as every other member of my family. Same as my father before me.”
“I realize that, Raoul, but I still have to ask. I can’t show you favoritism because I’m your godfather and because I used to change your diapers.”
Raoul grimaced. “I could have done without that visual, thank you.”
Chief Drummond managed a small chuckle before growing serious once again. “So where were you before moonrise?”
“At Charisma. Same as usual.”
“What were you doing there?”
“Nothing special. I had books to look over, inventory, the usual.”
“Were you alone all night?”
“Of course not. The club was very busy. Same as it is every night, but especially so on the night of the full moon.”
“And you weren’t with anyone?”
“Really, Jon, you want to know about my sex life now?”
Raoul’s clipped laugh almost sounded like a bark.
“I don’t need details. I just want to know if at any time during the night you had sex with anyone? Maybe in your office? A yes or no will suffice, trust me.”
Raoul scowled, templing his fingers before him. “You obviously know I did, or you wouldn’t ask. Yes, I picked up someone at the bar. Is that what you wanted to hear? I took him upstairs and I had carnal knowledge of him. Would you care to know what positions we used? What brand of condom?”
A slight flush assuaged the chief’s face, but he held his ground.
“Raoul, I’m not asking because I give a big damn who you sleep with, but because it’s my job. What was the man’s name?”
Raoul shrugged. “I don’t remember. And I’ll never see him again, so it doesn’t matter. It was over before moonrise and then I sent him packing.” His eyes met his godfather’s, and for a brief moment he thought he saw a hint of something—pity, empathy, he couldn’t be sure. Then it passed.
“Okay, let’s move on to moonrise. Were you still in your office then?”
“No, I don’t stay at the club during the full moon. I left before the change occurred.”
“So you went from having sex to the change? Nothing in between?”
“No. Well, just a little matter downstairs, but I took care of it quickly and then I left.”
“What was the little matter?”
“Just a question about an ID. About whether it was real or not.
They called me down to ask me about it and to verify a man’s story that he actually knew me. That’s when I told the guy in my office to leave, when I got the phone call from Francesco. I went
downstairs, and I checked it out, and it was no big deal so I told them to deal with it and I left.”
“Okay, so you checked on the ID and then you left. Where did you go? Did you join your father and rest of the family? Or maybe some of the others? You do that sometimes, don’t you?”
“You know that I do.” Raoul tried to suppress a quick yawn, but it escaped nonetheless. He shifted in his chair. “But not very often and not last night. I waited too long to leave the club so I had no choice but to go to the woods behind Charisma.”
“No one else goes there, do they? Just you?”
“Just me. Everyone else knows better.”
“Even your father?”
“He’s the one that gave me that freedom, so yes.” Raoul shrugged again.
“So, once you changed, you were alone in the woods? All night?”
With a growing awareness, Raoul began to see where this line of questioning was heading, and he didn’t much care for it.
“You’re asking me if I had an alibi, some way of accounting for my time around three A.M., aren’t you?” he asked softly. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled uneasily.
“Well, basically, yes.”
“Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I do have an alibi. I was not alone all night.”
The look on his godfather’s face was priceless. “You… I mean you had…another member of the family with you? I thought that the woods were strictly forbidden, even to them?”
“You understand correctly, and no, not another wolf.”
“Then who?”
“A young man. He was chased into the woods by some asshole.
Unfortunately
for
the
asshole,
I
happened
along
and…interfered…with his plans.”
“Interesting. In other words, you saved the young man from being beaten? Or worse?”
Raoul nodded.
“What time was that?”
“Seriously, Jon? You’ve met the wolf—do you think he wears a watch? How do you expect me to know what time it was?”
“In this case, it would be very helpful, Raoul. What about the young man? Can he corroborate your story? Do you know
his
name, by any chance? Maybe he can tell us what time it was?”
“Maybe he can, why don’t you ask him?”
The chief looked rather surprised at his suggestion. “Okay, I will. Give me his phone number and I’ll give him a call. We’ll bring him in and see if he’ll verify your story.”
“You can do better than that, Jon. He’s sitting in your station now, waiting for me to be done here.”
Jon’s graying eyebrows arched so high they appeared in danger of disappearing into the chief’s hairline. “He’s out there now?
Waiting for you? Who is this young man, and why’s he here with you? Are you and he… I mean…that is…”
“Get your mind out of the gutter,” Raoul growled. “Why don’t you call him in here and listen to his story before you condescend to making hasty judgments?”
“Fine, fine, don’t get ruffled. I should have known better, I was just hoping… Never mind, scratch that.” He pressed a button on his phone. A moment later, a uniformed policeman appeared.
“Yes, chief?”
“There’s a young man out in the waiting room. What’s his name?” He looked at Raoul.
“Alexx.”
“What’s he look like?”
“Red hair, blue eyes.”
He relayed the information over the phone, adding, “Officer, would you escort Alexx back here?”
“Right away, chief.”
The two men sat back, regarding one another with careful eyes, as they waited for Raoul’s alibi to appear.
*