Chasing Her Tail (6 page)

29

Katie Allen

The thought sobered her, made her wonder what she was doing, thinking about such trivial things. She needed to make a plan.

A plan for what?
she wondered. She decided figuring out how to turn back into a person would be a good start. After that, maybe she could find a way to get rid of this turning-into-a-dog disease for good.

“You
what
?”

At the sight of his nephew’s bloodless lips and wide, stricken eyes, Micah squeezed his eyes shut, clamped his molars together until they squeaked, took a breath and counted to ten. Then he counted to twenty.

He was on fifty-eight when Sam spoke.

“I’m sorry.” The little boy spoke on the inhale in a sort of whispered gasp, a sound that mixed a good chunk of guilt in with the utter horror that had swamped Micah.

“We talked about this,” Micah finally gritted out, totally at a loss with where to start, how to impress upon Sam the magnitude of what he’d done, the complete
wrongness
of it. The shock of finding out was still reverberating through Micah—how was he supposed to explain to a six-year-old? “Over and over. You
know
better!” Micah shut his mouth with a snap, cutting off the torrent of words about a ruined life and the painful reality of consequences when he saw the huge, unblinking eyes glistening with pooled moisture, those white lips shaking with potential tears. Sammy hardly ever cried.

“Shit,” Micah muttered, which just added to his guilt.

“I’m sorry.” The first word was whispered and the second inaudible as the first tears overflowed and trickled down his face.

Micah sat down on the kitchen floor, feeling as if the weight of his own body was too much to support, and slumped against the island counter. Tipping his head back, he stared at nothing and tried to figure out what to do.

Staring at his uncle, Sam’s silent tears turned to sobs and Micah focused on him.

Reaching out an arm, Micah tugged the little boy onto his lap. Sam burrowed into his chest, crying harder.

“It’ll be okay, Sammy,” Micah sighed, rubbing a hand over the boy’s thin, shaking back. “I’ll fix this.” Even as he said it, Micah realized that he had no idea how the fuck to even start.

Huh.

Bridget sat between two of her lilac bushes, totally stumped. What now?

She’d slipped through the woods, darting through the occasional clearing or across a street if she’d been forced. When she’d reached her neighborhood, she’d twisted between houses, moving from hiding place to the next sheltered spot a few feet closer to her own home.

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Title

It had even started being fun, a game of hide-and-seek, and Bridget had tested out her new body. How high could she jump? Over the chain-link fence? No problem. The eight-foot wooden wall, however, had led to an inelegant scramble at the top and a breath-stealing thump of a landing on the other side. Of all her new skills, her favorite part was how she felt like she could run forever.

When she’d reached her own backyard, she’d stared at the house, nonplussed. How was she supposed to get inside? If she changed—if she
could
change—back to human form, she’d be naked. It would be just her luck if one of the neighbors spotted her as she retrieved her spare key from the top of the backdoor ledge, stark naked. She’d retreated to the shelter of the lilac bushes to puzzle out what to do. She wasn’t having much luck with that.

Too bad she hadn’t installed a doggy door. Since Bridget had never had a dog, though, that would have been slightly insane. With a heavy sigh, she lay down with her chin on her paws.

Maybe she should just go for it. It was mid-morning on a weekday, so all the neighbors should be at work or school or yoga-lates class or whatever they did during the day. She’d have to change under the cover of bushes—since who knew how crazy that would look?—dash to the back porch, grope for the key, open the screen door, jam the key in the lock… She sighed again. She’d be seen for sure.

Her gaze move across the yard and stopped on the garden shed in the far corner.

Bridget didn’t keep much in it—her lawnmower, an old bike with two flat tires, a few rakes, shovels, buckets, a tarp—

Her head shot up. A tarp would double as a toga in a pinch, which she was pretty sure she was in right now.

Belly low to the grass, she slunk diagonally across the lawn. An unlatched combination lock held the door closed. Bridget never actually locked the shed. If someone bothered to steal her ancient lawnmower, she’d send up a prayer of thanks for the excuse to buy a new one that could actually cut the grass with one pass and wasn’t held together with wire, duct tape and baling twine.

Even hanging open, the lock was tricky. She tried to nudge it off with her muzzle but the U-shaped metal bar just knocked against the door. With a low growl of frustration and a growing fear that a neighbor would glance out and spot a large, mottled dog breaking into her garden shed, she grabbed the body of the lock in her mouth, turned her head and twisted it until it slid free.

Dropping the lock, she nosed the latch open and scrabbled at the door until it swung out just enough for her to wedge her muzzle in. With a twist of her head, she opened the door wide enough to slip into the dim shed. The tarp was there, folded and placed neatly on a shelf, and a surge of relief tore through her, so strong it made her legs go wobbly.

Now the hard part.
Bridget closed her eyes and concentrated, trying to repeat what she’d done at the hospital when she’d changed the paw back into her hand. Her bones 31

Katie Allen

began to slide and shift, yanking her muscles with the movement. She’d expected pain but it was surprisingly smooth, only a slightly panicky pull on her muscles, similar to what she felt when she pushed a stretch just an inch too far for comfort.

As the change finished, the final joints clicking as they fell into their proper human places, she gasped, a sound of half relief, half exhilaration. If this had really just occurred, if she hadn’t had the longest, most realistic dream ever, then an amazing thing had just happened—and it had happened to her. Bridget. An ordinary, brown mouse of a schoolteacher whose idea of a wild night was watching a PBS special on African lions.

She, Bridget Grace, had just turned into a dog. In fact, she’d turned into a dog, escaped from an evil doctor, turned back into a human and was now standing naked in her garden shed. At the whole “naked” reminder, she grabbed for the tarp and wrapped it around herself toga style. Only then did she peer out the half-opened door to see if any of the neighbors were watching.

The coast was clear, as far as Bridget could see. Pulling the rough fabric of the tarp more tightly around her body, she glanced down to see if she was completely covered and then dashed for her back porch. Stretching up on her tiptoes, she slid her fingers along the ledge until she felt the spare key. She grabbed for it but her hands were slick with sweat and the key fell, landing soundlessly on the welcome mat.

Grasping a handful of tarp toga, she held the material closed as she bent to retrieve the key. She was almost home free—now was
not
the time to start mooning her neighbors. Straightening, she almost dropped it again as she tried to jam it into the keyhole. Her hands were shaking so badly that the key just bumped against the lock.

Bridget finally took a hard breath in and forced herself to focus.

“Get the key in the lock,” she commanded her hand. “Key in the lock.” The metal tip caught the edge of the keyhole and slid in. As she heard the deadbolt click open, Bridget bit her lip to stop a shout of relief and triumph from escaping. She yanked the key out as she turned the doorknob. The door swung in and Bridget followed, almost falling into the house.

Once inside, she slammed the door and slid down its surface to sit on the floor. She listened to her heart thumping in her ears and concentrated on breathing. When her seat started to go numb from the hard tiles, she shifted a little, taking some of the weight onto her hands for a few seconds. She relaxed her arms and her elbow bumped the smooth lower panel of the door behind her.

“I have to install a doggy door,” she muttered absently. When Bridget realized what she’d said, she started to laugh and couldn’t stop. In mid-gasp, her laughter turned to tears and she sat on the floor and bawled.

Why did it fucking have to be
her
?

Micah was fuming as he drove. Why did it have to be Sam’s teacher, the one who smelled like baking cookies and crayons, who should have just faded, brown and 32

Title

mousy, into the background—an anonymous figure in Sam’s life, eventually merging into the memory of a dozen other teachers?

Instead, Micah had been driven to follow her, to stalk her and hold her and grind against her, to smell her scent—less innocent once they started dancing. Thank God she’d had the good sense to pull away, because he hadn’t. He’d been stupid, mindless with lust. After he left the bar, he’d been half-crazy from frustration but later, much later, he’d realized that it was better this way. He couldn’t have just stopped at one time, one night with her, and once was all he could offer.

If he was so desperate that just the thought of this woman accelerated his heart and pumped excitement through his body, then he was better off sticking to one-night stands with people who didn’t want a second time, who were hardened and jaded, who didn’t even want to tell Micah their names, much less have any emotional connection.

Bridget Grace was a world away from people like that—people like
him
.

“Fuck!” He cracked the steering wheel with his palm and then swore again, shaking his stinging hand. Of all the people Sammy could have bitten, it had to be her.

As he turned onto Spring Street, just a few blocks from Bridget’s house, Micah forced himself to take a breath and calm down. It wasn’t her fault. She couldn’t have known that being kind to one of her students would make him want to keep her, or that ten minutes with her would make that little boy’s uncle feel exactly the same way.

Bridget Grace had not asked for any of this but that didn’t change what had happened.

It was impossible to go back now.

After the tears finally stopped, Bridget sat on the floor for a long time, too exhausted and overwhelmed to think about anything. When she finally refocused on the present, her lower half was numb. Pushing to her feet and letting the tarp fall around her, Bridget groaned, feeling her joints pop and complain about the long stint on the tile floor.

When she was standing, Bridget paused, not sure what she should do next. What did this whole thing mean? Could she continue being a teacher, continue with her normal, average life except for the occasional switch into dog-dom? What if she changed in front of her students? She shuddered at the thought. That would lead to a few parent-teacher conferences, not to mention some major therapy for the kids.

Maybe this had been a one-time-only event, some crazy, rare flu bug that would never cause problems again. Even as the thought occurred to her, Bridget dismissed it.

She could feel the difference in her body, as if the animal lived inside her, curled and sleepy for now but definitely still there, waiting.

As if on cue, her stomach growled. Bridget realized she was hungry, starving actually. Kicking the fallen tarp out of her way, she headed for the kitchen and dug through the refrigerator, pulling out makings for a turkey sandwich. What she really wanted was a hamburger—a double. Bridget’s mouth watered at the thought and surprise stilled her hand for a second before she recovered and pulled out a couple 33

Katie Allen

slices of bread. A hamburger? When had she ever craved red meat, much less a fast-food burger?

Shrugging, she focused on putting her sandwich together. It must be some kind of dog thing. Bridget supposed she’d be buying up the meat department pretty soon.

Visions of steaks and ribs and roasts danced in her head and she took a huge bite of her sandwich.

At the thought of all that wonderful, wonderful meat, she paused. Micah and Sam’s cart had been stacked with meat.

Bridget swallowed, the lump of sandwich that still needed more chewing going down hard. The puppy—she’d started feeling sick right after it had bitten her. Sam had been out of the room the entire time.

Her sandwich dropped from cold hands as pieces began to click together in her brain. Had Sam caused this? He was such a sweet boy though—why would he have done that? His uncle, on the other hand, could not be called sweet. That whole thing at the bar had been so strange, for him to have singled her out in such a way, for him to have been so obviously attracted to her… Plus the cold way he’d acted at the grocery store—what had caused such a change?

“Maybe he’d been in heat,” she muttered and then choked on a laugh. She relaxed enough to take another bite of her sandwich. This was all supposition based on the items in a grocery cart. She’d have to talk to them, find out if they knew anything about this whole canine addition to her body.

She’d also do some research. As soon as she finished her sandwich, she’d fire up her laptop and do some Google searches. At the thought of how many hits she would get at the term “werewolf”, Bridget groaned around her latest bite of sandwich.

As she shoved the last bit of food in her mouth, she realized with some amazement that she’d really like to make another. This dog thing was making her hungry. Reaching for the bread, she froze at the sound of the doorbell.

Bridget was suddenly very aware that she was still naked. In order to get to her bedroom, she had to cross the hallway, which could be clearly seen through the small, decorative window set in the front door.

“Oh for Pete’s sake!” How many times could she be trapped naked somewhere?

She assumed that it was one of her neighbors at the door—most likely retired Mr. Lee.

He’d probably seen a dog breaking into her garden shed. At the thought, she muffled a snort of laughter.

Crouching low, even though there was in no danger of being seen as long as she stayed on this side of the hallway, she scurried into the dining room, which had windows that faced the street. Peering in the crack between the plantation blinds and the window frame, she saw a maroon sedan she didn’t recognize parked by the curb.