Maybe that was answer enough.
***
“I want you to stay in this room, Anna, do you understand?” My dad frowned down at me. I was sitting in his chair, positioned behind his desk, swiveling from the left to the right. He’d closed the blinds at the door, the better to keep prying eyes off me—and to keep my eyes off the folks on their way to the station.
“You’ve only told me like ten times already, Dad,” I said with a slight roll of my eyes.
“Yeah, and you still haven’t agreed to stay inside.”
But I didn’t want to miss this scene. Dad had gone through the journal. He hadn’t let me see it again—no big surprise there—but he’d gone through the book, made phone calls, and in his words, “dragged some asses” to get this meeting at the station.
Night had fallen. Thanks to my dad, I knew night wasn’t the best time to talk to werewolves, but night was the best time to have a secret meeting in this town. And that’s what my dad was doing. A meeting of wolves.
Rafe had joked that there weren’t werewolf group meetings, but now there would be. My dad was calling out the wolves in Haven.
“There could be a killer among them,” my dad told me, and my gaze dropped to the gun holstered near his waist. I’d bet my college fund that he had silver in that gun. He’d loaded his shotgun with silver, so it only stood to reason he’d armed his handgun with silver bullets, too. “And I don’t want you anywhere in his sights.”
Too late. “He’s already come after me before.” I rubbed my neck. My necklace was chafing a bit. Itching.
My dad’s lips thinned. “He won’t be coming again.”
“And how are you going to find out who the killer is? Get them all together, and then ask the psycho wolf to please step forward?”
He exhaled roughly. “Credit me with some cop sense, would you?”
I stopped swiveling. “Don’t cut me out of this. I want to be there!”
Voices rose from outside the building. The grumpy, annoyed voices of folks who did not want to be coming out at night to meet with the sheriff. They weren’t going to meet at the station, that would have been too obvious. But there was an old, closed-down theater right behind the Sheriff’s station, and I knew all those grumbling voices were headed for that theater.
I wanted to be in that theater, too.
Dad lifted one brow. Crap. I knew that look. “Do I have to handcuff you to my chair?” He asked, voice flat.
He’d do it.
But then, I’d just roll the chair right out of there. I tried a smile. He liked my smiles. “No, I just—”
He moved fast. Should have expected it. He didn’t handcuff me to the chair, though. Instead, he hooked me to the giant filing cabinet to my left. Snick.
“Seriously, Dad? Seriously?” I yanked. The filing cabinet was way bigger than me and weighed a ton. No dragging that with me. But maybe a drawer…
“You’re staying in here.” An order now. “And keep quiet. The less attention we attract from this group, the better.”
So he said.
My dad slipped from the room. I glared after him. Protecting me was sweet, but annoying. He knew how much I wanted in on this part of the action. After everything that had happened, I deserved this. I’d found the journal—the journal that was now locked in his desk drawer. He hadn’t even thanked me for discovering that vital book. I’d found the key to their identities, and now—
I wanted to see the wolves.
I stretched, pointing out with my shoes. My bag was on the floor, just a few feet away, just a few…
The tip of my sneakers brushed the bag.
I smiled. My lock set was still in my purse. Sometimes, it paid to be prepared.
I would have been such a good girl scout.
Chapter Fourteen
I slipped out of the station. Getting past Shirley at the front was too easy. She never even glanced back as I crept from the office. She was too busy checking her social pages on the computer.
I headed out the back door and kept to the shadows as I made my way to the theater. The voices were muted now that everyone was inside, and I could barely hear a thing.
But that was okay. Soon, I’d be seeing plenty.
I pressed against the cold, stone wall of the theater. I rose onto my toes and glanced in the window. There were about a dozen people inside. Men, women. Pacing. Pointing. Looking very, very uncomfortable—
Oh, crap, that was the principal! Mr. Knoxley! He was a wolf? I’d flipped through the book too fast to see his name.
Rafe’s dad was there. Brent’s mom wasn’t. Not a real surprise. She was from out of town, so I hadn’t really thought she’d be cursed. Deputy Jon had taken up a position by my dad’s side, and my dad, well, he looked furious. He had his hands in the air, and I saw his lips move as he barked, “Calm down, everyone.”