Lycanthropy Files Box Set: Books 1-3 Plus Novella Read online

  “No, I just picked out the wine with the highest alcohol content in the cellar and hoped it would work. It did.”

  “Obviously. Why did he want to shelter me?”

  “He knew how your brain works. He felt that, after the fire, you may not be ready to see what your mind would classify as impossible.”

  “But now he’s dead, and I’m in the middle of something I need to be able to understand.”

  “You may be able to understand it better than anyone.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Your research.”

  “My research?” I felt the cold sweat at the back of my neck and closed my eyes. Glowing eyes in a black face. Fangs. I shook my head to clear the images of the last night at the lab. “What does my research have to do with all this?”

  “CLS.” He rose from the chair. “Excuse me a moment. I have something for you.”

  I sipped the tea, which may have been drugged, but at that point I didn’t care. Before I had been let go from Cabal Industries, I had been studying a pattern of breakouts of Chronic Lycanthropy Syndrome, a new psychological disorder of impulsivity. With the help of a historian, I had been tracing family trees and gathering family medical histories on the victims. The raw data was in the lab, and I had been running analyses that night to see if there were any patterns in the variables.

  Gabriel returned with a box streaked with smoke but still intact. He set it on the coffee table by my tea.

  “What are those?”

  “Some of the records you were working with.”

  “How did you get them?”

  “A friend. I cannot say any more.”

  I cradled my left wrist against my chest and leaned over to the box. It smelled of smoke.

  “Did any of the others…” I couldn’t believe anything had made it through the fire. The image of the lab as it had been the day after, all my data smoldering ash, flashed through my mind. For some reason, whatever had been entered in the computer hadn’t been backed up yet, so I had lost all of it. Or at least I thought I had.

  “This was the only one that survived.”

  I could barely make out the filing code on the side of the box. It was the most recent batch of Arkansas and Tennessee files, copies of medical records from pediatricians’ offices.

  “It was still on a hand truck in the hallway. My assistant hadn’t entered the data yet.”

  “Do you feel like looking at it?”

  I put my head in my hands to stop the wave of dizziness and the memories that rode it. “Not tonight. Do you have any painkillers?”

  “I may. Something that will dull the pain but not upset your stomach?”

  “Perfect.”

  He returned with a little orange pharmacy bottle and spilled out a pill. “This should help.”

  “Thanks.”

  When I rolled over the next morning, I wasn’t so sure I should’ve accepted the pill from Gabriel. The wine must have dulled my judgment. What was I thinking, accepting medication from a stranger, especially one who had deliberately tried to intoxicate me to sleep?

  The clock said ten o’clock. Drat, I was going to miss Louise.

  “Ready, sleepyhead?” Lonna poked her head around the door, which I’d left ajar. If it hadn’t been for the grass stains on my feet, I would’ve thought the whole talking-wolf thing had been a dream. Actually, I was hoping the butler thing wasn’t a dream, aside from the illegal sharing of prescriptions. The sheets needed washing.

  “Gimme a few.” I brushed my teeth and splashed cold water on my face, then grabbed a T-shirt and jeans out of my suitcase. When I looked at myself in the mirror, I couldn’t help but smirk at the resemblance to the first-year graduate student I’d been seven years before down to the “what have I gotten myself into?” look. A purple-black bruise spread almost all the way around my throbbing wrist. No watch for me today.

  Damn. What had I gotten myself into?

  5

  Breakfast, Doctor Fisher?” Gabriel set a bed tray on the gold-colored brass and glass table at the foot of the bed. “You dressed quickly.”

  He showed none of the disheveled look of the previous night. Instead of a butler’s suit, he wore khaki pants and a crisp white Oxford shirt. I approved of the look. Anything more would be too formal for every day.

  “How’s the wrist?”

  I turned the joint in question, and it protested with a stab of pain I felt to my elbow. “Sore.”

  He held out his hand, and I extended my left wrist. He held it like a fragile glass, and I appreciated his cool, gentle fingers.

  “Nothing broken, just bruised,” was his assessment. “Good thing we got ice on it right away.”

  “Damn, girl, what happened?” Lonna walked into the room. She sniffed the air. “I smell bacon.”

  “Which I’m sure you’ve already had copious amounts of,” I teased.

  I made the quick decision not to tell her about the talking wolves or Leonard. It would make me sound nuts, and I didn’t want to test my own credibility in the eyes of my friend, who thought I was close to going off the deep end anyway.

  “I had a wacky dream and bruised my wrist on the night table.”

  She looked at it more closely. “What were you dreaming?”

  “Don’t remember.”

  “Just bruised,” Gabriel repeated. “I shall set your breakfast on the table downstairs, Doctor Fisher.”

  “Actually, I promised to meet someone for breakfast this morning,” I told him. The clock said ten fifteen. I didn’t want to miss Louise.

  “Should I expect you for lunch?”

  Lonna shook her head. “Dinner, probably.”

  “Around seven, then?”

  “That will be fine.”

  As we wound our way down the mountain in the Jeep, Lonna asked me, “So, what’s up with you and the butler?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He was looking at more than your wrist. And he’s a cutie. Got that Sean Connery accent going on.”

  “Nothing.”

  “It just seemed like you and he had some secret.”

  I leaned over and put my right hand on her shoulder. “He’s not going to take over your job of protecting me, if that’s what you’re worried about. As if I need another guardian angel.”

  Lonna didn’t take her eyes off the road. “Just tell me if it’s too much. I’ll go back to Little Rock.”

  “Yeah, right you will.”

  But from the line between her perfectly arched brows and the slight pout to her lips, I could tell she was worried.

  “I need you here. At least until we know whether this Gabriel guy is legit.” I didn’t tell her the foundation of my suspicions.

  The line cleared. “Good. Then I’ll drop you off at the diner, and I’ll go see the charming Peter Bowman.”

  “Good luck. You may be the one who needs protecting.”

  “I’ve not met a man yet I needed protecting from. Usually it’s the other way around.”

  “You’ve been lucky.” As much as I tried not to think about Robert, there were times like now when I missed our conversations.

  “You’ve got that look again.”

  “Will you just keep your eyes on the road?”

  “And snappish. You were thinking about Robert.”

  Luckily we had reached the diner, and I didn’t have to say exactly what my thoughts had been.

  Instead of being greeted by Louise, I was ignored by a teenage boy with acne across his cheeks. He wiped the counter with sullen slowness.

  “Where’s Louise?” I asked him. I sat down and picked up a laminated menu. A sticky brown coffee ring obscured the weekly list of blue-plate specials.

  The boy didn’t even look up. “Dunno. Got the call to come in this morning because the old lady didn’t show up or call or anything.”

  “Oh.” My heart fell. Louise had been the only one who had spoken with my grandfather and knew what he intended. Besides Gabriel, whom I still didn’t qui
te trust, but even he hadn’t been completely informed.

  The bell above the door jangled, and Sheriff Bud Knowles strode in. In spite of my disappointment over Louise, I had to hide a smile. He had the air of an old Western sheriff walking into the saloon as he scanned the counter and booths for troublemakers. The change jingling in his pockets could have been spurs.

  “Coffee, Terrence Junior.”

  The poor kid fumbled the pad he’d held poised to take my order and scrambled to pour the sheriff a cup of coffee.

  “Mornin’ Doctor Fisher,” he said and tipped his hat. I hoped he mistook my smile as friendly rather than mocking. Could he not see how ridiculous he was?

  “Mornin’, Sheriff. How’s your day going?”

  “Well, aside from Miz Louise’s disappearing.” He cocked his head and narrowed his eyes. “You wouldn’t happen to have seen anything strange on your way into town, would you?”

  “Nope.”

  “Hear anything last night?”

  My cheeks warmed, and I hoped he didn’t see the flush that must have been there. “Nope. Slept straight through.”

  Terrence Junior set a mug of coffee by the sheriff and one for me. I gave him my breakfast order—a biscuit with jam—and fixed my coffee. When I looked up, my gaze met the sheriff’s, who still studied me with suspicious creases under his eyes.

  “Hear you have a butler now.”

  I decided to treat this as I had my dissertation defense—only answer the question, and don’t volunteer anything that might get you in trouble. “Yep.”

  “Did you hire him?”

  “Nope.”

  “Who did, then?”

  “My grandfather.”

  Breakfast appeared, which allowed me to chew as I pondered how to answer the sheriff’s forthcoming questions.

  “Where’s he from?”

  “England.” Okay, Scotland, but it’s not like the sheriff would know the difference.

  “Is he permanent?”

  “Don’t know yet.”

  Sheriff Knowles appeared to become impatient with my lack of elaboration. “Got to find these things out, you know,” he said, switching to a friendly, persuasive tone. “With all that’s been going on around here, we can’t be too careful.”

  “I agree. What do you think happened to Louise?”

  The level of background noise plummeted as people paused to hear the sheriff’s answer. I realized no one asked him questions—they just answered his and tried to get out of his way.

  “Under investigation, young lady.” He put his coffee cup down a little too firmly, and I winced at the sharp sound. “Not that it’s any of your business.”

  “Have a good day, Sheriff. Oh, and thanks for buying my breakfast,” I said as I slid the fiver he put down on the counter over to Terrence Junior. With a wink, I got up and stalked outside, my heart pounding. I felt an odd mix of elation and terror, like the kid who had just gotten away with putting a whoopee cushion on the teacher’s chair.

  “Doctor Fisher?” The deep voice made my heart skip a beat and I felt the rush of adrenaline that precedes panic. I turned slowly to see Leonard Bowman.

  “Mr. Bowman?”

  “Doctor as well, actually.”

  “Oh?”

  Dark circles ringed his eyes, and his hair hung in waves, still damp from his morning shower.

  “Sleep in this morning?”

  He blinked as though he didn’t understand the question. He had nothing of the angry attitude from the night before or two days previously, and now—in the full sunlight—our encounter began to feel more like a dream. Except for my wrist, which throbbed after I had thoughtlessly used that hand to open the diner door.

  His sheepish demeanor didn’t stop me from putting my hands on my hips and giving him my best glare. “Look, do you have something to say to me? Because, quite frankly, I have things to do, and I still need one good hand.”

  Instead of becoming angry, he raised his right hand to his face, placed his thumb and forefinger on his temples and massaged them. “Would you believe I don’t remember much of our encounter last night?”

  “What? Were you drunk? Drunk and trespassing? Or were you high?”

  He put his hand down and looked around. “I have a lot to explain. Can we go somewhere?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Can I buy you lunch?”

  “Can you buy me lunch?” I knew it was stupid, repeating what he said, but this was a different Leonard Bowman than either the cocky young man or the rage-filled one I’d seen early that morning, and I wasn’t sure what to expect.

  “Please?” he begged. “I just put together who you are and what you do for a living. I’ll take a look at your wrist.”

  “What do you mean?”

  He held out his hand, and I slowly put mine in his. Like Gabriel, Leonard’s fingers were cool, but roughened like he had worked hard with them. But when he turned my hand over, it was with the fingers of an expert.

  “I was doing my residency in orthopedics,” he explained, “when I got CLS.”

  My heart skipped a beat. All my better instincts told me to say no, but I couldn’t resist. Plus, that biscuit hadn’t been enough to satisfy my appetite.

  “How about Tabitha’s?”

  The world wasn’t ready for the new breed of genetic disorders. Normally Nature seeks to advance the development of organisms. But Nature is a true lady and can admit her mistakes, one of which is that too much intelligence, opposable thumbs, and a self-centered outlook is a dangerous combination. Where Leonard Bowman fit into all this, I had no idea. But by accepting his lunch invitation, I stepped right back into that world of questions.

  The walk from the town square to the restaurant gave me time to think about the first time I’d heard of CLS. And when I first met Robert. It seemed his memory would haunt me as much as my former life as a researcher. I had been twenty-seven, just out of graduate school, and was looking forward to starting my first real job. Robert, the first man I’d seen at Cabal, had been similar to Leo with dark hair, but old enough for his wry sense of humor to trace lines at the corners of his eyes.

  “You the new intern?” He’d come up behind me and startled me so I almost dropped the box of books I carried. He took the load from me without asking, and all I could do was follow, openmouthed, as he led the way.

  “Ah, no, it looks like you’re the new epidemiologist.” The lines crinkled, and I caught my breath at his smile.

  “And you are…”

  “I’m Robert Cannon, a geneticist, and your new boss. I’d shake your hand, but I’m carrying this ridiculously heavy load of books.”

  “Right. I’m Joanna.”

  “Fisher, as I recall. Chuck Landover’s granddaughter.”

  “Yes.” The mention of my grandfather had startled me at the time, but I forgot about it with the rush of information I’d gotten from Robert.

  “So here’s the deal, Fisher,” he said and indicated I was to precede him into a laboratory with computers on one side and a host of genetics equipment—most of which I couldn’t identify yet—on the other. I held the door open and he set my box down on the table next to a computer.

  “Is this my desk?”

  “This is our lab. I’ll show you the office later, but I thought you might like to keep your books at hand, not that you’ll need them much.”

  “Why?”

  “Because we’re dealing with something new here. It’s something we need your help tracing in the population so we can localize the genetic mutation.”

  “What does it do?” I tried to keep my excitement in check. This was just what I’d hoped for—to be on the leading edge of researching new disorders.

  He leaned back and crossed his arms. “Lots of fun stuff. It causes a host of behaviors like fierce loyalty to friends, inability to understand or buy into the culture’s materialistic messages, for starters.”

  “And physically?”

  “Early appearance of secondary se
x characteristics, particularly body hair on the males. But it’s the psych stuff that’s the most fascinating. Basic drives such as hunger, lust and sleep are assessed as extraordinarily high. Somehow these adolescents find each other, bond, and disappear for days at a time, particularly around the full moon.”

  “Around the what? Now I know you’re kidding me.”

  “Ever hear of lycanthropy?”

  I had, but it had been a long time ago and in a different context. “You mean, like in werewolves? Are you serious?”

  “It’s a true disorder. I’ll have to introduce you to Iain McPherson in Scotland; he’s made it his life’s work. But yes, by adulthood, most of the afflicted isolate themselves from their families and all but disappear. Those who stay in society are described as wild loners.”

  “But isn’t that rare?”

  “It was. Until a few years ago.”

  He’d gone on to explain this lycanthropic disorder was relatively rare until the very end of the twentieth century. Previously, one case might occur in a generation and spawn a local legend of werewolves. However, we lived in the era of impulsivity, and disorders such as ADHD skyrocketed.

  CLS, or Chronic Lycanthropy Syndrome, seemed to be the latest step in the evolution of impulsivity disorders, and it soon became the new diagnostic darling of the pediatrician and child psychiatrists’ offices. Children displayed the full range of symptoms by early adolescence, and often those that couldn’t be cured or drugged into submission would just disappear or end up in the correctional system.

  My research centered on finding a common thread. I’d investigated familial patterns, but I felt like there was something missing. Something was making these rare genes express, but why now? Was it some environmental toxin? A virus? Just before the lab had burned, I had acquired boxes of these children’s medical records, particularly from western Tennessee and the Ozark region of Arkansas, where families of Germanic and Scandinavian descent abounded. The Scandinavian culture had the most sophisticated spiritual explanation for werewolves…and the highest incidence of CLS.

  And now, here in the Ozarks, I was face-to-face with an adult CLS sufferer. I sat across from him in the booth pretending to study my menu and bit my lip to keep the questions from flooding off my tongue. How long have you had it? When were you diagnosed? Were you a hyper kid? What illnesses did you have? Do you know anyone else with CLS?