“Shhh,” she hissed.
Earl Huff’s face scrunched into a ruddy fist. At sixty-four, he’d been a cop before Ellie was born, but he never failed to show her the utmost respect. “Sorry, boss.”
“What’s going on?” Ellie asked. “I don’t see a damn thing.”
“She showed up about ten minutes ago. Right after that big thunder crack. Y’all hear it?”
“We heard it,” Peanut said, her voice wheezy from moving so fast. Cal was beside Peanut.
Ellie spun around. “I told you both to stay in the cruiser.”
“You meant it?” Peanut said incredulously. “I thought that was one of them ‘for legal reasons’ orders. Hell, Ellie, we’re not gonna miss the first real call in years.”
Cal nodded, grinning. It made her want to smack him. She wondered if the captain of the LAPD had similar problems with his friends. With a sigh, she turned back to Earl. “Talk to me.”
“After the thunder crack, the rain stopped. Just like that. One minute it was pourin’, and then it wasn’t. Then that amazin’ sun came out. That’s when old Doc Fischer heard a wolf howl.”
Peanut shivered. “It’s like that time on Buffy when she—”
“Keep going, Earl,” Ellie said sharply.
“It was Mrs. Grimm who noticed the girl. I was getting my hair cut—and don’t say ‘What hair?’ ” He turned slowly and pointed. “When she climbed up that there tree, we called you.”
Ellie stared at the tree. She’d seen it every day of her life, had played in it as a kid, stood beside it to smoke bummed menthol cigarettes as a teenager, and gotten her first kiss—from Cal, no less—beneath its green canopy. She didn’t see a damn thing out of the ordinary now. “Is this some kind of joke, Earl?”
“Holy Mother o’ God. Put your glasses on, El.”
Ellie reached into her breast pocket and retrieved the over-the-counter glasses she still didn’t admit to needing. They felt alien and heavy on her face. Squinting through the oval lenses, she stepped forward. “Is that …?”
“Yes,” Peanut said.
There was a child hidden high in the autumn-colored leaves of the maple tree. How could anyone climb that high on rain-slicked branches?
“How do you know it’s a girl?” Cal whispered to Earl.
“All’s I know is it’s wearing a dress and has long hair. I’m makin’ one of them education guesses.”
Ellie took a step forward to see better.
The child was little, probably no more than five or six. Even from this distance, Ellie could see how spindly and thin she was. Her long dark hair was a filthy mat, filled with leaves and debris. Tucked in her arms was a snarling puppy.
Ellie reholstered her gun. “Stay here.” She started forward then stopped and glanced back at Peanut and Cal. “I mean it, you two. Don’t make me shoot you.”
“I’m glue,” Peanut said.
“Superglue,” Cal agreed.
Ellie could hear a flurry of whispering as she strode through the four-way stop. As she neared her destination, she took her glasses off. She hadn’t come to the point where she trusted the world as seen through a lens.
About five feet from the tree she looked up. The child was still there, curled on an impossibly high branch. Definitely a girl. She appeared completely at ease on her perch, with the pup in her arms, but her eyes were wide. She was watching every move. The poor kid was terrified.
And damn if that wasn’t a wolf pup in her arms.
“Hey, little one,” Ellie said in a soothing voice. It was one of the many times she wished she’d had children. A mother’s voice would be good right about now. “What are you doing up there?”
The wolf snarled and bared its teeth.
Ellie’s gaze locked on the child’s. “I won’t hurt you. Honestly.”
There was no response; not the flinch of an eyelash or the movement of a finger.
“Let’s start over. I’m Ellen Barton. Who are you?”
Again, nothing.
“I’m guessing you’re running away from something. Or maybe playing some game. When I was a girl, my sister and I used to play pirates in the woods. And Cinderella. That was my favorite because Julia had to clean the room while I put on pretty dresses for the ball. It’s always best to be the older kid.”
It was like talking to a photograph.
“Why don’t you come on down from there before you fall? I’ll make sure you’re safe.”
Ellie talked for another fifteen minutes or so, saying everything she could think of, then she just ran out of words. Not once had the girl responded or moved. Frankly, it didn’t even appear that she was breathing.
Ellie walked back to Earl and Peanut and Cal.