“Give me your phone.” He held out his hand. “It’s an emergency.”
She needed her phone. She wasn’t about to give it to this aggressive lunatic. Sharing the cab was clearly a mistake, but she could correct it. She looked out her window to figure out what part of town she was in. Just past the New York Public Library. She had her flashlight; she could grab another cab.
“It’s an emergency, damn it,” Custo insisted.
When she still hesitated, he reached for her.
“Okay, okay.” She recoiled and groped in her pocket. She threw it at him. “Just stay back.”
He fumbled the catch, and she addressed the driver. “I’ll get out here.”
The cab began to slow.
Punching in a number, Custo said, “Not a good idea. The wolf is undoubtedly tracking your movements.”
The wolf. The memory of its dark hulk, eyes glaring, had her heartbeat tripping. Tracking her?
“Never mind,” Annabella said to the driver.
Custo groaned frustration. Ha! He must have gotten voice mail.
“Adam, surprise—it’s Custo. I’m back. Remember that time at the Shelby School when we cut the power to the compound long enough to stop the clocks? Don’t trust anyone at Segue until you speak with me.” Custo paused. “I’m headed now for our New York storage cache. You can reach me at this number, or there shortly.”
His message made her head hurt. What kind of cryptic crapola was that? “Excuse me…? I’d like my phone back.”
Custo handed it back to her, slightly smiling, as if her irritation amused him. “If it rings, answer immediately.”
She wasn’t about to let him boss her. She let her finger linger on the power button. Off. No more calls for the crazy cab moocher.
They turned off the main road and shot down a smaller side street lined with cars already parked for the night. Must be getting close.
She had her own questions, and she only had a few more minutes to get the answers. “That wolf…it’s been stalking me for days. I haven’t slept. I’m so hopped up on caffeine I don’t think I’ll ever sleep again. And I have to be my best for tomorrow night. My best. Can you please tell me what is going on?”
“I have to hear your end of it first to know for sure.” A tremor ran through him, and a muscle in his jaw twitched as he mastered himself.
Maybe he was on drugs. “I just told you my end of it.”
“When it began. How the wolf found you.”
Annabella threw up her hands in frustration. “I don’t know when—” No, wait. She did. “Rehearsal. Last night, when we put the second act together. We’d been rehearsing separately, working on one bit one night, another bit another. This was the first time that we had the full company there.”
“How did it happen?” Passing headlights coasted over his features and accented the golden flecks in his amber-green irises. So pretty, too bad he was…unbalanced and rude.
“I was dancing one of my solos—I thought I had it right. Felt good anyway. I looked up and saw the wolf. Heard him growling at me. I don’t know how he got there or why. I thought I was just super tired and stressed. Is he for real?”
“Very much so,” Custo answered. “You see him only when you are dancing?”
“No. He followed me last night to my bus stop.”
He frowned. “You were alone?”
“Yes.”
“How did you escape him?” His questions kept coming, rapid fire. When was he going to start answering some?
“He’s afraid of light,” she explained, lifting her improvised weapon. “He stays in the shadow.”
Custo frowned and cursed, “Damn it.”
“Are you going to tell me what is going on or not?”
He held his breath, then expelled all his indecision. “The wolf is a creature of Shadow, of that I am certain.”
“A creature of wha—?”
Custo looked down at his hands, fisting and flexing them strangely, as if he’d never seen them before. “He is a creature of Shadow, bound to Shadow, but he crossed into this world with me tonight, you understand?”
Okay, the man was deranged, and she was going crazy right along with him. Crossed from where?
The driver looked in the rearview mirror. “You got an address, mister?”
Custo glanced out the window. “Here is fine.”
The car pulled over to the curb, and Custo opened his door. Panic rolled over Annabella. What now? She couldn’t go off with a stranger. He could be psycho or a murderer, or, or…
Custo climbed out, turned, and grabbed her bag. He dropped it on the sidewalk and reached in to her, his fingers sharply beckoning. “Come on.”
This was so not what her mother intended when she offered to pay for the cab. Annabella shrank back, though her body perversely thrilled all over at the prospect. The man was certifiable, but damn hot anyway. “I don’t even know you.”
He bent to make eye contact. “You know you’re safe with me.”
From wolves, maybe.