Page 5 of Wolf Bane (Marked #3)

Chapter Two

B y Thursday, my sore throat had gone from well that’s annoying to I’d like to just die now please . It wasn’t painful, not really, but it lingered and everything tasted weirdly of pennies. Reba eyed my mask and gloves as I reviewed the first patient file for the morning.

“You know, you could call Doc Sellers from Mettings to come in and cover. He’s only a year into retirement. I bet things haven’t changed that much since he stepped down from his practice.”

“Sellers didn’t retire, he was forced out because he was prescribing himself opiates,” I muttered, not bothering to glance up as the door chimed, admitting my first patient.

“And I’m good. Just a little scratchy. Blood work came back clear, throat culture was good.

Probably just allergies. This is a new build and all, so likely just construction dust or something.

” Or maybe a werewolf plague. Because why not.

That would be par for the course at this point.

Reba pursed her lips, giving me her patented bullshit glare. “Maybe it’s peanuts,” she added, raising a brow. “Or maybe it’s an allergy to telling the truth?”

“Or ragweed,” I suggested cheerfully. “Send Mrs. Gibbons to room one when she’s signed in.

It wasn’t ragweed. I’d been tracking my symptoms since I woke up with the sore throat on Wednesday and it definitely wasn’t ragweed.

Low grade fever, dull aching joints, the sore throat, above-normal levels of tiredness…

and negative for everything I could test myself for.

Reba suggested stress, and in my heart of hearts I knew she could be right.

But with everything that had gone down in the past year and a half…

My brain couldn’t accept it as a possibility.

It had to be the worst-case scenario, the damn thing insisted. Because that’s how my luck went.

So far, the only patients who’d come in with anything similar were the Clemens kids.

My morning patients were a handful of humans with general complaints, a few vaccine visits since the nearest vaccine clinic was over an hour away, and one physical for a kiddo whose mom was worried they hadn’t started showing signs of shifting yet.

I’d had to refer to the notes provided by Ethan and Tyler for that one; as someone who’d had no idea what constituted normal werewolf puberty, making sure I had at least some sort of resource was saving my bacon with the younger patients.

Assuring them that thirteen wasn’t delayed shifting in most werewolves, they’d agreed to come back in six months for some bloodwork if nothing had changed and we could go from there.

If you’re not presenting with an increased urge to chase things and turn into a large wolf by the time you’re fourteen, let’s talk was never something I’d thought I’d say as a doctor.

I was able to take a breather after they left, honestly needing a few minutes in my office to wonder what the hell I was doing, but there was no rest for quasi-werewolf doctors, apparently.

“Walk-in patient,” Reba said as she knocked, opening my office door at the same time. “It’s a doozy. You sure you’re okay?”

I nodded, glad she couldn’t see my grimace behind my mask. “Just tired. Late night.”

“That’s right, Ethan’s still out of town, isn’t he?” she tsked sadly. “Well, long distance is always difficult at first.”

I made a noncommittal sound— difficult wasn’t the right word for it, but I couldn’t think of a better one.

The distance itself sucked, sure, but the layers of secrecy and the fact he seemed like an entirely different man some days didn’t help in the slightest. He’d texted twice since our call Tuesday night, once a brief Coming home Thursday and then, sometime last night after I’d gone to bed, a quick update to let me know that might not be happening and he’d let me know.

At least he’d remembered to put a heart emoji on that one, I thought grumpily.

“Room one,” I reminded Reba, eager to get out from under her sympathetic gaze.

Reba was one of my closest friends, but sometimes her concern for me was overwhelming.

Maybe it’s some introvert thing or my mommy issues are deeper than I want to examine, but Reba being worried for me made me want to just hide under my desk some days.

Which, okay, yeah, I probably should talk to someone about that.

Reba was still giving me pointed, worried glances when she led Kayley Hale back to room one. “This one might be out of our wheelhouse,” Reba said nervously.

Kayley, a tall and rawboned young woman of twenty-two, held up her left hand.

Her left hand which clutched a wad of blood-soaked paper towels and a melting ice pack.

“The little shit bit me,” she muttered, marching to the exam table. “Just took a chunk right out of my hand!”

“ Who bit you?” I hurried to the cabinets over the room’s sink and started pulling down the supplies for cleaning and suturing a wound. “Kayley, what insurance do you have? You’ll need x-rays to make sure there’s nothing like bone chips or something in there, but I’m going to clean you up, okay?”

Kayley held out her hand for me. The wound was… well, it was gross. There’s no other word for gaping bite wounds.

Gross.

“One of the fivers just chomped down on me during story time,” she said, her pale features slowly going gray as I gently removed the paper towels and ice pack. “She wouldn’t let go, either. It was like my mom’s freakin’ Yorkipoo when you give it a pig’s ear.”

The wound was ragged, torn more than punctured. I’d seen a few bites in my time, human, animal, and were. This was nothing like any other human bite I’d ever seen. “Walk me through this, Kayley.”

She sighed, seemingly unaffected by the fact her hand was looking grim. “I work half-days at Miss Tilly’s Kids. That daycare on Mortree? You know, in the green house?”

“I’ll take your word for it,” I murmured, carefully wiping blood away from the edges of the wound. I’d need to tell Reba to get the referral sent to a plastic surgeon to minimize the scarring, and a specialist to check for possible nerve and muscle damage. It was that deep.

“Doree-Jane reminded me that I’d told Melly she couldn’t climb on the monkey bars, those were for the big kids and Doree-Jane figures Melly was mad at me for that and, well…” She nodded to her hand with a significant raise of her brows. “Kids, man. What the hell.”

“Wait. Melly? Melly Clemens?” I sat back, my leg giving a ghost throb of pain where the kid had bitten me. “Did anyone notify her parents?”

“I don’t have bugs or something.” Kayley sniffed. “I’m negative for everything. Get tested like biannually or whatever.” She started to pull her hand back, but I had a firm grip on her wrist. “Hey!”

“Human mouths are filthy,” I said briskly.

“Let me clean this out and get some butterfly bandages, but Reba’s going to give you a referral for x-rays over at the imaging center in Terrebiene.

It’s open till seven and they’ll be able to get you in if you head right over.

She’ll stay on their necks to make sure it’s in the system before you get there. Um, so, does Melly bite a lot?”

Kayley relaxed a little, shaking her head enough to make her dark ponytail swing. “She’s usually a pretty good kid. Kinda wild sometimes but, you know, six-year-olds,” she added with a shrug.

I thought of Mariska. “I don’t know many six-year-olds but the kids I do know… that tracks,” I murmured, dabbing her wound clean. “Do any of the other kids bite?”

Kayley shook her head again. “It was weird. This week, she’s been just real… I don’t know. Feral or something.”

“Feral?” I glanced up. “Interesting choice of words there.”

She huffed. “Little brat growled at me at snack time when I wouldn’t let her have more juice—she’d had three boxes already—and then the biting!”

Right. Definitely calling Vinnie Clemens as soon as Kayley was cleaned up and out the door. “Any other kids acting up like this? Her brother maybe?”

“Jay? Nah. He’s a sweetie. Sleeping all the time lately, but it’s common for his age group. Growth spurts,” she added with a shrug that nearly yanked my needle loose.

She rambled on a bit more about the kids in her care, watching me clean her wound avidly while she filled me on all the pertinent daycare gossip.

“I dunno.” She sighed as I applied the final dressing. “It was just so weird. The kids are usually real sweethearts, you know? But between the crud going around and now this, it makes me think I made a bad career choice.” She sighed again and eyed her hand. “Is it weird I can’t feel my fingers?”

I ushered her to the front desk and made sure she had a paper copy of the scrip Reba was sending over to the drugstore in town, and her sister, who’d driven her, swore she’d take Kayley to her appointment with the specialist the second it was made.

“I’ll clean up one. There’s a patient waiting in two for you,” Reba murmured as Kayley and her sister headed to the parking lot. “Debbie Harris again.”

I groaned, that burgeoning headache becoming full-fledged with flashing neon lights and showgirls to herald its new, long-term residency behind my right eye. “What’s it this time? Bubonic plague? Cotard’s delusion?”

Reba smiled sweetly. “Oh, better. This time, she’s sure she has Morgellons disease.” She held up a hand, stopping me before I could say a word. “I’ve already printed out the pamphlet about delusional parasitosis and I’ll get the referral form ready for the psych practice in Lemmington.”

“I love you.”

“Remember that when I bring in the new peanut brittle flavor tomorrow.”

* * *

The house was quiet when I got home. No Ethan, and Mal and Mariska were out at some scout thing Mariska had gotten head over heels into. An all-shifter troop, one that didn’t mind Mal’s other ness, compared to their own.