In Lakeside, lightning struck any moving vehicle with uncanny precision while rain rushing in house gutters roared like Talulah Falls. Streets became swift-flowing rivers. Roofs leaked. Basements took in water. And everyone prayed to the gods and their personal guardian spirits that the rain would stop before the creeks overflowed their banks too far.

Then a fierce north wind blew the rain south, and a dense fog covered the city of Lakeside with an odd silence.

And then they entered Lakeside to roam the streets for prey, and the worst of them walked on two legs.

•••

Douglas Burke grabbed Louis Gresh the moment the rain lightened to drizzle and that damn fog covered the city.

“Take your men and hold the back door,” Burke said with quiet urgency. “Keep it locked. Keep everyone in, and I do mean everyone.”

“Storm’s over,” Gresh protested. “We should get out there now.”

“Louis, the storm hasn’t started yet.” The men were restless, coiled to get out there and help. Gods above and below! Did his men think he felt any different? But if they went out too soon, they would be among the victims instead of being the rescuers.

“Hold that door¸ Commander.”

Louis studied Burke’s face, then nodded and went off to set up a barricade at the station’s back door.

Satisfied that Gresh would stand with him, Burke hurried into his office. He wasn’t sure if Police Commissioner Kurt Wallace had landed at the Chestnut Street station by chance when the storm hit or if the man had thought hiding among officers who had been labeled Wolf lovers would keep him safe. But Wallace was still a vocal HFL supporter, and having him here at the same time as Nathan Wolfgard was creating a dangerous kind of uneasiness among some of the civilians and cops who weren’t quite convinced that the HFL movement was about to become as extinct as the dinosaurs.

After checking to make sure a round was chambered in his service weapon, Burke took two more loaded magazines from a desk drawer and slipped them in his suit coat pocket.

As he strode for the door, he stopped and turned around. “Nathan?” The Wolf had spent the past couple of hours in here—and forced the station’s chief to host Wallace in order to keep the two apart. Now the visitor’s chair held the clothes that Nathan had worn, but there was no sign of the Wolf.

Hoping Nathan wasn’t in danger inside the station—or about to attack anyone he considered an enemy—Burke strode through the building, pushing past a group of people heading for the station’s front door. He locked the door, stood in front of it, and drew his weapon.

“No one is leaving yet,” he said in a voice that allowed no discussion or challenge—at least not until the chief or Wallace confronted him.