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The wolf’s ears perked up, then yelped as I injected him in his hindquarter. Either it would save him, or it would kill him. Regardless of the outcome, his misery would be over.

“How long is it supposed to take?” Langston asked after five minutes.

“No idea,” I said.

“The injection that turned him into a wolf was almost instantaneous,” Trent said. “Maybe it was only water. Was Dallas fucking with you ag?—”

The wolf howled, then fell to his side and began to seize.

“Oh, damn,” Langston said. “It’s happening.”

Crossing my fingers, I stared on as Gabe thrashed and howled. When I thought there was no way he could take any more, his body began to twist and elongate.

Moments later, a human man lay on the concrete floor, panting like he’d finished running an Olympic sprint. Still clothed in what he wore when he was attacked, he lifted his head to look at us as he pushed himself up.

“What happened? Where am I?” he asked, his voice harsh and croaky from lack of use.

“You don’t remember?” Langston asked.

“Remember what?” He clutched his stomach. “Jesus Christ, I’m hungry.”

“Get him something to eat,” I said.

Langston hustled inside, returning with a bottle of water and a couple granola bars while I called Chief Milbanks.

“This better be good. I’ve got a lot on my plate,” Milbanks said.

“Chief.” I did my best to keep my voice calm. “We healed Gabe Kolchak. We turned him back into a human. We’re about to take him to the hospital.”

A long pause, and when he spoke again, it was slowly, as though he was trying to understand a foreign language.

“You healed him. Are you serious?”

“Yes. I don’t have time to explain. Just meet us at the county hospital in fifteen minutes.”

Hanging up on him, I returned to the garage and helped the others get Gabe into a truck. Milbanks called me twice on the way to the hospital, but I ignored him.

Milbanks was waiting for us when we arrived, which was a good thing. He’d mobilized the ER staff. A gurney was waiting for us outside, along with a team of doctors and nurses. Within seconds of pulling up, Gabe vanished into the hospital along with the medical staff and Milbanks.

“Damn, that was fast,” Trent remarked as we walked into the ER to wait.

I wanted to text Avery about what had happened, but she’d want a full retelling and assurances that Gabe would be all right. I’d wait until we knew more before getting her hopes up. The last thing I wanted was for her to think he was out of the woods, only for him to die later.

Twenty minutes later, Milbanks returned to the waiting room, looking satisfied.

“He’s got traumatic amnesia. The very last thing he remembers is crossing the street and being stabbed. After that?” Milbanks swept his hand over the top of his own head. “Nothing. All gone.”

“Is he healthy?” I asked. “Any complications?”

“None that they can tell. They’ll hold him for twenty-four hours, but other than some malnutrition and dehydration, he’s healthy as a horse.”

“Hell, yes,” Trent muttered, pumping a fist in the air.

“Cole, do you have more of whatever you used to help him?” Milbanks asked.

I nodded, pulling the other vial from my pocket and shaking it. “Enough for one more. I think you’ve got a guest at the station you’d like to get rid of?”

“I’ll call the station and have a couple guys bring our other wolf down,” he said, clapping a hand on my shoulder. “I don’t know where you got that medicine, but I’m glad you did. Two men owe their lives to you. I’ll give it to the doctors. Maybe they can make more of it in their labs somewhere.”

I handed the vial over, the weight of the world lifting off my shoulders.

“I’m gonna give this to the attending physician and then call Mr. Kolchak’s wife,” Milbanks said. “I think she’ll be happy to know her husband is a healthy human again.”

“That was awesome,” Trent said with a big, goofy grin. “Like we were on one of those medical dramas or something.”

“Yeah, very cool,” Langston said dryly. “Look, I’m not starving like Kolchak was, but I’m hungry. You guys wanna grab something to eat at the hospital cafeteria before the next wolf gets here?”

“I’m down,” Trent said.

“You guys go on,” I said. “I need to catch my breath and tell Avery what’s going on.”

I stepped outside and sat on a bench beside the door, trying to make sense of the day. Lowering my head, I pulled my phone out and scrolled down to Avery’s number.

A woman walked past, heels clicking on the concrete as she did. I glanced up at the athletic legs that ended in black two-inch heels. She crossed directly in front of me and dropped a piece of folded paper on the ground in front of my feet.

I frowned down at the paper. It was taped shut.

“The fuck?” I muttered.

I picked it up. The woman was striding away quickly toward a car on the curb.

“Ma’am?” I called. “Ma’am, you dropped something.”

Either she didn’t hear me, or she was ignoring me. She opened the passenger side door and got in.

“Ma’am!” I shouted. “Wait!” The car pulled away. “Shit.”

I turned the piece of paper over in my hands and froze at the word typed on it.

Cole.

“What the hell?” I whispered, tearing the tape off and smoothing the paper out.

Two typed lines stared up at me from the paper:

Tomorrow night. Midnight. Be ready to fight for your son.

He says you owe him another game of HORSE.

Below that was an address I wouldn’t have known before the last few weeks. Kyle’s mansion.

Another game of HORSE? My mind drifted back to the day Ashton and I had hung out at the basketball court. We’d played HORSE that day. No one could have known that. As far as I knew, he hadn’t even told Avery. This was from someone Ashton trusted. My heart raced.

“Oh my God.”

I ran inside to find Langston and Trent.