“Can you break it?” I asked.

He wiped off his bloody hands, then grabbed the knob. I tried to get a better look at him to see how badly he’d been beaten, but it was too dark, and I could see only smears of blood everywhere—on his face, his hands, his sweatshirt.

He yanked the door open. We went inside, circled around a bit, then came back out.

“Now we’ll follow the path we came on,” I said. “Along the top of the curb. Backtrack.”

When we reached the puddle, I stopped. “We’re going to cut through.”

Derek nodded. “So he’ll reach this, keep following our trail and think we’re somewhere in that apartment, not realizing we doubled back on our tracks. Smart.”

Wading ankle deep through frigid water seemed to knock away the last of Derek’s shock. Once we reached the other side, he took over and got us downwind so Liam couldn’t smell us. Then he hustled me into a coffee shop. There were only a handful of people inside, all clustered at the counter, chatting with the server. No one even looked up as we made a beeline for the bathroom.

Derek scooted me into the men’s room and locked the door. He hoisted me onto the counter before I could protest, then scrubbed his hands well, sleeves pushed to his elbows, like he was preparing for surgery.

“Uh, Derek…?”

He wet a paper towel, and took my chin, lifting and wiping my face.

“Derek? I’m not hurt.”

“You’re covered in blood.”

“But it’s not mine. Honest. It’s from—”

“The werewolf. I know.” He picked up my hand and started cleaning it. “That’s why I have to get it off.”

“Derek?” I leaned down, trying to see his face. “Are you okay?”

He kept scrubbing. “There are two ways to become a werewolf. Either you’re born one or you get bitten by one. If you get the saliva in your bloodstream, it’s like a virus.”

“Blood, too?”

“Dad says no, it’s just saliva. But he could be wrong, and you’ve got cuts and scrapes and blood all over.”

I had a few cuts and scrapes, and I was only flecked with blood, but I kept my mouth shut and let him clean.

As he did, I tried to check out how badly he was hurt. His scraped cheeks were pitted with gravel. His nose was bloodied. Broken? One eye was already darkening. Was that blood in the corner? His lip was cut and swollen. Were any teeth loose? Missing?

“Stop fidgeting, Chloe.”

I couldn’t help it. His injuries obviously needed more attention than mine, but there was no sense saying anything until he was done.

Finally, when he seemed to have scrubbed off every fleck of blood—and a few layers of skin—I said, “Okay, now on to you.”

“Take off your jacket and sweatshirt.”

“Derek, I’m clean. Trust me, I’ve never been this clean.”

“You’ve got blood on your cuffs.”

As I took off the jacket, the zipper snagged my necklace.

“It’s caught—” I began.

Derek gave the jacket a tug…and the chain snapped, the pendant dropping. He swore and grabbed it before it hit the floor.

“—on my necklace.”

He swore some more, then said, “I’m sorry.”

“The girl in the alley grabbed it,” I lied. “The clasp was probably weak. No biggie.”

He looked down at the pendant in his hand. “Wasn’t this red before?”

I hadn’t taken a good look at it for a couple of days—no mirrors and the pendant had been under my shirt. I’d thought the color seemed different before, but it had changed even more now, almost blue.

“I—I think it’s some kind of talisman,” I said. “My mom gave it to me, to ward off bogeymen—ghosts, I guess.”

“Huh.” He stared at it, then shook his head and handed it back. “Better keep it on you then.”

I stuffed it into my pocket, down at the bottom where it would be safe. Then I took off my sweatshirt and pushed up my sleeves. No blood had seeped through, but he still made me wash my forearms.

“Okay, now can we take care of the guy who was actually in the fight? There’s a lot of blood. It seems to be mostly from your nose.”

“It is.”

“You got hit in the chest a few times. How are your ribs?”

“Maybe bruised. Nothing critical.”

“Shirt off.”

He sighed, like now I was the one fussing too much.

“If you want me to leave, so you can look after it yourself…”

“Nah.”

He pulled off his sweatshirt and folded it on the counter. There wasn’t any blood below his collar, where it had dripped from his nose and lip. I guess that’s to be expected when you’re fighting with fists, not weapons. He said his ribs on the right were sore to the touch but, to be honest, I wouldn’t know bruised from broken. He was breathing fine, and that was the main thing.

“Okay, your nose. Is it broken? Does it hurt?”

“Even if it was broken, there’s nothing you can do.”

“Let me check your eyes.”

He grumbled, but didn’t resist. The bloodshot corner was already clearing, and I couldn’t see any cuts. He’d have a shiner, though. When I told him that, he just grunted. I wet a fresh paper towel.

“You have dirt in your cheek. Let me—”

“No.”

He caught my hand before I could touch his face. He took the cloth and leaned over the counter to wipe the dirt out himself. I tried not to wince as I watched. The gravel had gouged his cheek badly.

“You’re going to need to get that checked out.”

“Yeah.” He looked at himself in the mirror, his expression unreadable, until he noticed me watching, then turned away and stepped back from the mirror. I handed him another wet paper towel and he cleaned his neck and collar, freckled with dried blood.

“Still got that deodorant?” he asked.

I retrieved it from my jacket pocket and set it on the counter. He kept washing.

“In the playground,” I said, “when you were negotiating, you weren’t serious, right? About going with them? It was a trick.”

Silence stretched for way too long.

“Derek?”

He didn’t look up, just reached over and got a fresh towel, his gaze averted.

“Did you hear anything they said?” I asked.

“About what?” His gaze still on the towel, he folded it carefully before throwing it into the trash. “Hunting humans for sport? Eating them?” The bitterness in his voice cut through me. “Yeah, I caught that part.”

“That doesn’t have anything to do with you.”

He lifted his eyes, gaze shuttered. “No?”

“Not unless being a werewolf transforms you into a wolf and a redneck moron.”

He shrugged and ripped off more paper towels.

“Do you want to hunt humans, Derek?”

“No.”

“Do you think about it?”

“No.”

“How about eating them? Do you think about that?”

He shot me a look of disgust. “Of course not.”

“Do you even dream about killing people?”

He shook his head. “Just deer, rabbits.” When I frowned, he went on. “For the last few years I’ve been dreaming of being a wolf. Running in the forest. Hunting deer and rabbits.”

“Right. Like a wolf, not a man-eating monster.”

He wet the paper towel.

“So why would you ever let these guys take you to—” I stopped. “The Pack. Is that what you wanted? Tell them you’ll go, and after they release me, tell the Pack the truth and use that as a…an introduction? Meet them? Be with your own kind?”

“No. That doesn’t matter to me. Dad says it does to other werewolves. It mattered to the other boys—they hated anyone who wasn’t one of us. Me? I don’t care. The only reason I’d want to meet a werewolf would be the same reason you’d want to meet a necromancer. To talk, get tips, training, whatever. Preferably from one who doesn’t think hunting humans makes good sport.”

“Like this Pack. They kill man-eaters and they don’t seem that thrilled about man hunters. Is that what you thought? You could go to them and they’d help you? When I asked if you were listening to those two goons, that’s the part I meant—about the Pack. What they’d do to you. Killing werewolves with chain saws and stuff.”