Shifter, P.I. (werewolf detective) Read online

  I took notes on everything Angela told me and kept a picture of Brian for his file.

  “Okay, I’ll check out everything you’ve shared with me and talk to you soon.” Sweat ran down my sides and I was ready to strip the damn jacket off right in front of Angela if she didn’t leave soon.

  “Thank you.” Her smile was dazzling. “You have no idea what a relief it is to share my fears with someone, even if they turn out to be groundless. Thank you so much for helping me out, Mr. Plazier.”

  “Rick,” I corrected, returning her smile. It’s been my experience that clients are always effusively grateful at first, less so after you confirm their worst fears. By the time they get my bill, their appreciation is pretty much gone. That’s where Amy and her ability to squeeze blood from a stone comes in.

  “Rick,” she repeated softly, intimately. “Thank you.”

  “Well, Angela, that’s my job.” I tried not to sound too pretentious, as I reached across the desk and shook her perfectly manicured hand once more.

  Angela stood up. She looked puzzled when I didn’t rise to see her out. “Well ... goodbye.” She crossed to the door of my cubicle and walked out into the main office.

  I stared after her shapely ass swaying back and forth and let out a little sigh. Such beauty deserved to be worshipped. I already despised Brian Addington for being such an asshole as to take his beautiful wife for granted. I also hated him in advance for the hours I would spend sitting in my car eating cold pizza or sipping endless cups of coffee at café tables.

  Most of my work consisted of waiting for people to do something, followed by a few exciting moments of shooting tawdry photos. Unlike the depictions of private eyes in TV shows, there really wasn’t a lot of crime-solving involved in my line of work. I’d yet to solve a single murder or case of police corruption.

  The moment the office door closed behind Angela, I stripped off the heavy jacket. I went to the restroom, splashed myself with cool water and checked out last night’s bramble scratches and glass cuts on my arms and torso. The scratches were already healing--one of the few perks of my lycan affliction--but I still doused them with hydrogen peroxide from the medicine chest. It bubbled up white in the jagged lines.

  I rinsed and dried off then padded back to my office. The desk and file cabinets had been purchased at a going-out-of-business sale. They were circa 1960-something, serviceable pieces that would probably outlast my business. The ancient computer took up way too much room and was as slow as molasses. But when I’d finally broken down and purchased a new one the year before, Amy had commandeered it, leaving me with the tired, older model. The only marginally attractive thing in my little office was the potted tree in the corner, but that morning its leaves were drying up and dropping from the heat invading the office.

  I stared at the open window through which tropical July air poured in. Who knew how long it would be before the glass guy showed up? I decided to cut a square of cardboard to keep out the worst of the heat.

  While I was balancing on my office chair, fitting the cardboard to the open window, Amy returned. She walked into my office and the chair I was standing on rolled away from the window on its casters. I pinwheeled my arms to regain balance, jumped off the moving chair and landed lightly on my feet in front of Amy.

  She looked down at my sad, sleeping penis. “Jesus! What happened to the jacket?” She set the shopping bag of clothes and a styrofoam cup of coffee on my desk. “For God’s sake, put your pants on.” She turned with a flip of hair and stalked out of my office.

  I looked in the bag to see what she’d brought me. It was more casual attire than I would have chosen for a day in the office, but I was glad to dress in a comfy T-shirt, jeans and broken down loafers.

  I sipped the coffee as I walked out to Amy’s desk to tell her about our latest client. “Got a new job already this morning. A woman named Angela Addington. She wants her new husband followed.”

  Amy raised her eyebrows. “You interviewed her naked?”

  “Yes, Amy, we were both naked,” I drawled sarcastically. “I wore the jacket and kept my bottom half hidden behind my desk.”

  “Did you remember to ask for half up front? Did she pay with cash, check or credit card? Did you give her a receipt? Does she understand that the rest is due after you’ve signed off on the case?” She fired off questions at the same time as her fingers flew on her computer keyboard. Amy was a multi-tasking marvel.

  “I was trapped. I could hardly parade around the office to do paperwork. You’ll have to catch her later for payment.”

  “Crap, Rick!” Amy picked up a handful of the bills in front of her and waved them. “See these? They’re bills. Bills we owe!” She tossed them to her desk one by one. “Electric. Phone. Gas. Plus the expense sheet you turned in for the Wiesel case. These must be paid. You have to learn to collect from the clients if I’m not in the office to do it.”

  I used to hit on Amy when she first came to work for me, but after I got to know her, I wouldn’t dare. She was scary. Her sweet, heart-shaped face and tiny, compact build reminded me of a pretty little cat--a feral one that would claw your hand if you tried to pet her. I’d only tried that once.

  “I’ll do better next time,” I said mildly. I’d learned it was easier to apologize than argue with her. “Thanks for picking up my clothes, by the way. And I already called the glazier. He says he’ll be in later this morning, but you know how that goes.”

  Amy nodded. “What’s the lowdown on the Addington case? Does she think her husband’s cheating?”

  “Maybe. Something’s up with him.”

  “It always is.”

  I could hear her mental addition of ‘Fucking men!’ Amy was a very angry woman.

  Chapter Two

  Amy

  I couldn’t help watching Rick’s ass as he walked away from my desk. God, it was a fine ass and looked just as good in a pair of jeans as it did naked. That morning wasn’t the first time I’d had the chance to make the observation. I’d seen my boss nude more than was probably appropriate for an employee, although always in an innocent context.

  When Rick entered the doorway of his office, he glanced back at me. I quickly turned my eyes to my computer monitor and the spreadsheet that filled the screen. I aimlessly pointed and clicked a couple of times with the mouse to make it look like I was busy. The last thing I wanted was for Rick to think I was checking him out.

  There should be a support group for women who are perpetually attracted to untrustworthy assholes--but that pretty much describes all men, doesn’t it? I could see myself at my first group meeting.

  “Hello, my name is Amy Chang and I’m a recovering Ass-aholic. Actually, I’m not recovering too well. I was used and dumped by one guy, only to develop an impossible crush on my womanizing boss. Let me tell you all about it.”

  * * * *

  I should have realized my ex, Jesse Figuera was a dick when I met him at a Tulane kegger and he dropped the girl he was with to go make out with me. But because he was extremely hot and sexually magnetic and I was young and foolish, I convinced myself we belonged together. It wasn’t as if he was cheating on this other girl since he should have been mine to begin with. I swallowed all the bullshit a twenty-two-year old girl in lust can digest and eagerly lapped up more.

  Jesse and I became passionately involved that school year and lived together that summer in a tiny apartment in the city. New Orleans is a magical place for a young couple in love, especially when one of them has a job, supports the other, gives him unlimited use of her credit cards and is completely understanding when he rolls in at three in the morning with a story about helping a pal move because his bitch girlfriend kicked him out of their apartment.

  By the time September and a new school year started, the magic of a lover’s kiss on the Riverwalk under a starry sky had disappeared and so had Jesse--along with my bank account. He left me our crappy apartment, a mountain of credit card debt, a broken heart and a burning case of chlamyd
ia.

  I was only several months and a couple of classes away from graduating Tulane, but I couldn’t afford to return to school. Bill collectors repossessed my furniture and I lived in an empty apartment, struggling to pay the rent to save myself from homelessness.

  Buzzing in the back of my head like an insistent fly was the option of going home to my parents in Connecticut, but it wasn’t an option I wanted to consider. The shame of facing them would be beyond telling, especially since my mom had tried to warn me about Jesse after my parents visited that summer. When Jesse was late meeting us for dinner and showed up baked, it was kind of a clue. My mom’s smart enough to pick up on things like that. Evidently, I’m not.

  I couldn’t return home a failure and I wouldn’t accept my parents’ offer of a loan to bail me out. With Jesse MIA and creditors circling like vultures, I searched the want ads for a better job. That’s how I met Richard Plazier, P. I., my boss and current flavor of asshole.

  I worked for Rick only a few days before his southern charm sucked me in. I knew he was trouble, yet I couldn’t control my pulse when he was around. I was surprised Rick didn’t hear it race with those extra-keen senses of his. But I decided I was not going to let myself fall under the spell of another player. The werewolf thing didn’t bother me, although it was a shock when I found out. No, it was the chronic need to bullshit and flirt I couldn’t get past. Rick was a complete horndog. More women went through the revolving door of his love life than shopped Neiman-Marcus the day after Thanksgiving. He wasn’t arrestingly handsome or conventionally good-looking, although he had nice, floppy brown hair and sharp, gray-green eyes. But he exuded an aura like catnip to pussy and would nail any woman who showed the slightest interest. That’s what made Rick another asshole.

  Another asshole to whom I was hopelessly attracted.

  I think my mild workplace crush crossed the line to fixation the night Rick had showed up at my door with a gunshot wound.

  Early one morning, two months after I’d started working for Plazier Investigations, I sat on the couch watching CNN, sipping coffee and composing a carefully worded e-mail to my mom telling her how together my life was now. I heard a scratching at my door, muted the TV and listened. The scratching grew louder. I walked to the door, checked the deadbolt and listened, safe on my side of the solid wood.

  An animal whined outside. Standing on tiptoe, I peered through the peephole. In the pre-dawn light, I could see a shadowy dog-shape sitting on my front step. The animal was big--German Shepherd-sized, but I opened the door anyway. I’ve always been a sucker for stray animals, canine or feline.

  The moment the door opened, the animal pushed past me into the house, knocking me back against the wall.

  “Jesus!” I cried as I realized this was no dog. There was something foreign about the shape--too big for a coyote, its legs long and body rangy. Perhaps it was a wolf escaped from the Audubon Zoo.

  The shaggy, gray beast didn’t seem interested in attacking me, however, and limped into my living room.

  I could’ve escaped out the door and called animal control but instead I trailed after it. “Hey, get out of here. Out! Bad boy.”

  The animal ignored me, favoring its right hind leg as it walked to the center of the room and flopped heavily down on the carpet. The thick fur of its haunch was matted with something wet and dark, which I guessed was blood.

  The canine-thing looked over one shoulder at me. Pointed ears pricked forward and yellow eyes met mine, staring with such focus and intelligence it was eerie. The creature stretched its neck and licked its injured hind leg.

  “It’s just a dog. Has to be,” I muttered as I knelt near the beast’s hindquarters and slowly reached out a hand to touch its leg. My fingers gently probed the matted fur searching for the source of the injury. “What’s wrong, huh?” I crooned. “You need to go to the vet?”

  The animal gazed down its long muzzle at me and whined softly.

  I was afraid to examine further. Fresh blood seeped from the wound and any deeper prodding might make the injured animal snap at me. From the look of its powerful jaws, one bite could take off my hand.

  I sat back on my heels trying to decide what to do next, how to coax the animal into my car and into the vet’s office without a leash. At the same time, I realized how bizarre this situation was, how unusual for an animal to stroll into my house, bleed on my living room carpet and look up at me as though expecting me to fix it. I ran a tongue over my lips and the wolf-thing licked its nose.

  Just then, rays from the rising sun broke through the morning mist and infiltrated my living room window, casting a weak yellow light on the floor. At the same moment, something happened to the reclining beast. A ripple shimmered across its body, not like a breeze blowing through the fur, but more like something moving beneath the surface of its skin. The animal let out a long, low sound, a mix between a whine and a growl, and then its body convulsed, limbs thrashing, head whipping back and forth.

  My first thought was that it was having a seizure until its fur slowly began melting away. The individual hairs seemed to retract back into the pores. Bones cracked and flesh made horrible wet sounds as the animal’s body reconfigured. Forepaws elongated into hands with separate digits while the rear legs straightened and the paws grew longer. Its spine crunched as the number of vertebrae reduced and the tail disappeared completely. The beast’s muzzle receded into its face and the large, pointed ears into its head.

  The whole transmogrification took only a couple of minutes but it looked and sounded agonizing. The creature twisted in pain during the transformation and the half-formed man groaned pitifully.

  I covered my mouth with one hand, holding back a scream. Yet, oddly, I didn’t feel any real fear. I was transfixed and horrified, but not fearful for my safety as I crouched there watching the wolf-creature turn into my boss.

  After the change was complete, there was a long moment of resounding silence in the living room. Rick’s naked body was hairless but for the thatch at his groin and a light fur over his chest, arms and legs. The wound on his thigh had stopped bleeding, but his thrashing during the change had smeared blood all over the carpet.

  I crept across the floor, leaned down and touched his shoulder.

  Long eyelashes fluttered and his gray-green eyes opened to stare into mine. “What the hell?”

  “You’re injured. You need to go to the emergency room.” Somehow it seemed easier not to acknowledge what I’d witnessed.

  Rick lifted his head off the carpet and looked down at his leg. “No hospital. I’ve been shot. There’d be questions and police. Can you just bandage it for me?”

  “I don’t have any medical experience. You could bleed to death.”

  “Naw. I’ll be fine. It’s healing already. Just do me a favor and patch me up.”

  “What about the bullet? If it’s still in there...”

  “It only nicked me, I think. Please, Amy. Help me.”

  That was probably the moment my attraction to him turned into full-on desire. I’m a sucker for a man in crisis. Thus my membership in WWFFAA, Women Who Fall For Assholes Anonymous.

  “All right. Just a minute.” I went to the bathroom and found gauze, peroxide and antibiotic ointment. I dampened a washcloth and grabbed a few bath towels, all the while reliving the earth-shattering change I’d just witnessed. My inner voice wondered why it didn’t faze me that my boss appeared to be a werewolf. I didn’t have an answer for it.

  In the living room, I knelt by Rick’s side, threw a towel over his groin for modesty’s sake and sponged clean the skin around the hole in his upper thigh. No fresh blood oozed from the wound. He was right; it already seemed to be healing. I glanced at his face. His eyes were closed and he winced as I dabbed. You’d think with the astonishing proof of the paranormal I’d seen Rick’s nudity would be the last thing on my mind. You’d be wrong.

  Although, I’d found the man charming since my initial job interview, I’d shut down his come-ons in the mo
nths I’d been working for him. It wasn’t all that hard to resist his laughing eyes, roguish grin and soft Cajun drawl. All I had to do was remember Jesse, another charismatic southerner, and Rick’s flirting made me want to puke. But that morning, with Rick naked and vulnerable on my living room floor, it was as if the world had tilted and I saw him in a new light.

  His light brown hair needed a trim. It stuck up wildly in all directions, making me want to brush my fingers through it to straighten it. His face was pale from fatigue. Long eyelashes rested on his cheeks. What would they feel like fluttering against my skin? He had strong cheekbones and jaw and a too-wide mouth with very soft looking lips. His jaw clenched as I swabbed around his wound, and my stomach clenched, too.

  I wouldn’t have guessed there was so much muscle concealed under the wrinkled Oxford shirts and loosened ties he wore to work every day. My gaze glided from his hard chest to the his taut stomach and followed the trail of hair leading from his navel to the green towel at his waist. I hadn’t gotten a good look at his tackle before I covered it and wished I could move the towel away catch another glimpse of his cock.

  Rick’s eyes opened and I jerked my gaze away from his groin.

  “Wrap the gauze around my thigh. Make it tight.”

  “Yes, boss,” I drawled. I picked up the roll of gauze and tried to figure out how to wind it around his leg without passing my hand right next to his balls. There wasn’t one, so I gritted my teeth and began bandaging. Rick’s skin was hot. Every time I passed the roll of gauze under his thigh I brushed against his bits with my knuckles. An embarrassing frisson of lust shuddered through me.

  “Thanks,” he said as I fastened the bandaging and began to put my supplies away. “Do you mind if I crash here for a while? You can open the office and take calls. I’ll be in a little later.” Just like that. As if nothing unusual had happened.