Tali swallowed hard. "No," she heard herself say, in a voice that didn't sound at all the calm assurance she told herself it was. As she backed away her heel slipped on the gravel; she lost her balance in time for Teddy to catch her by the elbow.

"Tali?" he asked, steadying her as Jake whined, barked, and strained against his leash in the background. "You alright?"

"Fine!" she replied, casting toward the deputy a smile as thin as the evening's sallow moon. "Just slipped. Stupid rock. Hey, you don' t mind if I talk to this Fallon guy, do you? If he really isn't the killer, I do wanna know what he saw."

"That's for us to be figuring, I'd think."

"Please, Teddy. It's my home. If something's lurking outside, I want to know every detail I can in case it comes back- coyote, wolf, or human."

Teddy watched her a moment longer, so she kicked at the ground for emphasis, then Russ was calling and he sidled back up the porch to join the sheriff and Molly.

"You saw it," hissed the man in the cruiser. His eyes were bright even in the dull light. Tali wasn't sure why, but it lifted the hair on the back of her neck and arms. Yet she was slow to walk away, so slow, in fact, she heard him call softly after her. "I know you saw it."

Tali turned, caught herself making a tight fist in one hand. She wasn't even sure why she was angry (Dante was safe so she should be feeling relieved about now), but she was, and it dripped from her voice in a sharp, "Because you're the wolf?"

 "No," he said, making a face as if she'd just called him a unicorn. "I'm quite clearly a man."

"Which falls in line with what I saw," she replied, and realized she herself was whispering fast now. "A cosplay killer."

His head dogged to one side. "A what?"

"Folks wearing better costumes than kids on Halloween. It isn't important. Look, I called this in like the responsible adult I am."

"Cops are dangerous," he replied. "You would've been better off not calling."

Tali leaned away from the window. "Why? 'Cause I'm black? I'm supposed to let myself get murdered 'cause I'm supposed to be scared of the cops?" She thrust out her hand to indicate Russ and Teddy. "These are the good guys. Russ and his wife took Dante in when I was in custody for defending myself from my piece of shit husband. Teddy checks on Molly regularly. If she much as even trips on the carpet he'll be there next day tacking it down. I trust them with my life. They are good for this town, good to me. More than we deserve some days."

"Sorry," he said in a voice she could tell was intended to appease. "But you don't know their friends. It's not a race case. Werewolves are-"

"Don't call it that!"

"It's true."

Tali felt uncomfortable in the pit of her stomach. With a glance over her shoulder to confirm others weren't looking, she aimed her gun at the man. It didn't make her feel better but it made her look tough and she liked giving off that appearance. "Who are you?" she asked in a low voice. "What'd you do that you don't want the boys in blue reading into?"

"Nothing! I'm just a -" 

The weapon made a satisfying 'click' as the hammer rolled back. Tali rather enjoyed the badassery of the effect. "I put a bullet in my boy's daddy," she said without missing a beat. Fallon didn't need a sob story and she didn't want to tell one. "I ain't got no qualms about putting one in a stranger's ass. Like I said, this is my home, and these are good men. My friends."

"Look," the guy said.  "We both know you won't shoot, same as we both know you saw a werewolf."

His accent jumped into lively brogue with such glib smoothness Tali forgot to deny it. "Wolf," she said after a second spent tucking her gun away and yelling at Jake to be quiet. Dogs. Perfect listeners except the one moment you're surrounded by people who've been told he's such a good listener.

"Riddle me this, Tali. Tali, that's you're name? Lovely. Why would your beloved Russ call in help for a wolf?"

"I was distracted. I meant," she said hotly. "I meant a killer dressed as a wolf. It's perfectly reasonably to call the sheriff tracking a serial killer if you suspect the madman's in your area."

Fallon chewed his lip. "Was it Gannon?"

"He didn't say."

"Look, Tali. Might I call you that? Thanks. . . You saw a werewolf. That's not even what you should be scared of."

"And what should I be crying in a corner over?"

"What I'm hunting," he said.

Teddy and Russ both came back around now; Russ stopped to wrap Tali up in a bear hug. "You alright?" he asked her, and nodded back toward Fallon. "You, sir, may be telling the truth, but we'd still like you to come down to the station and give some testimony as to what you saw, make sure things check out. Get you set up at the nearest urgent care for your injuries to be looked after. Might look superficial, but I'm guessing rabies." He spat. "Too many animals acting strange these days, wouldn't you agree, Tali?"

Teddy announced they were bringing in some state troopers to watch the roads and search the woods. He personally would be back to watch the inn and Tali's house. Word had gotten round Molly's of the serial killer. About half the guests skipped town; the others, idiots the lot of them by her standards, stayed with Molly.  Tali, feeling sick without throwing up, retrieved Dante and Jake. Under Teddy's supervision she packed enough to get them through the next two days back at Russ' house. As she was checking Dante's buckle, a trooper called in to report a large animal sighting off Supple Creek Bridge.

"You alright?" Teddy said, the sound of dispatch a static frenzy.

Tali let Jake into the backseat next to Dante, shut the car door, then stepped around to the driver's side. "We'll manage," she said, and the smile was actually genuine. "Thanks so much, Teddy. We're so glad to have you looking out for us." And dshe gave him a little kiss on the cheek. The young man blushed, mumbled something he probably thought was cool, and hopped in the cruiser. Tali leaned on her open door a moment, then started to hop in.

In the resounding quiet there was a loud squeal and a wooden thunk that sounded like an old window being forced open. 

Tali hesitated. It was a familiar sound. 

It was a sound followed by a faint pattering of several small somethings hitting the ground.

"Shit, Molly," she said, resting her head on the steering wheel. She slid out of the car, pressed the lock once to stay quiet, and slipped around the edge of Molly's house, past the dead hydrangeas and blushing piles of autumn mums. She was going to catch her in the act, going to point at the broken eggs and lift her gun towards the woods and scold her that after all this strange shit she's still feeding the bears?

There was a sweet smell blowing over damp leaves. Tali could almost see Molly there in one of her floral printed nightdresses, perched on an old stool, beside a loaf of bread, making peanut butter sandwiches. She'd even let Dante throw them out a few years ago, back before Tali wasn't a single mom and less concerned about the creatures of the night.

Sure enough, sandwich after sandwich appeared, tossed by a pail hand with red painted fingernails. Eight, total, and then the window jerked shut and world went still and the light turned off. Tali prepared herself to march across the yard underneath the bright lights of the motion detector to grab a piece of evidence, when she remembered the car holding Dante and Jake, and that there might actually be a bear on its way. 

She turned, had just made it to the corner when the light flashed on. Tali knew she shouldn't look but there hadn't been the noisy crashing of a bear through the woods; had to be something small, like a skunk or opossum. She braced her hands on the cool siding and slowly, cautiously, looked.

There at the edge of the light stood a shadow tall and gaunt like the trees themselves. The air around it seemed to twitch and pulse like black static. She could see it but she couldn't see it- saw that it was human in shape but not human at all. And then all she saw was a long clawed hand stretching into the light to pick up a sandwich. Tali had stood, half illuminated on the edge of the bed and breakfast watching the thing emerge. Her knees gave out. She collapsed into the safety of her own darkness as the gaunt creature moved from Molly's yard to her own. It disappeared from view in an instant, but she heard, very clearly she heard the slosh of water and rasp of dirt as it pulled Jake's pool out from under the deck. It sounded, and she couldn't be certain because she couldn't move her legs to see or flee, it sounded as if it might have been drinking.

Jake started barking, muffled but audible.

The sound of water stilled to a gentle lap against plastic. It would find them, Tali realized. It was coming out one side of her house or the other and the car with Dante and Jake seemed a million miles away.