Technically, it wasn’t Fletcher’s morning to patrol the woods.

Heck, since Jesse had started spending time out there every day, Fletcher didn’t have to patrol at all. But in the years since he’d become partners with Wade, it had become second nature. Every day he had a shift at the station, he ended it with a turn through the woods around Rowan Harbor. Whether it helped the town or not, it made him feel more secure.

He wasn’t with Wade on this day, and he hadn’t just finished a shift.

No, he was running around on four legs because it was three in the morning and he couldn’t sleep. The woods usually made him feel better, so he’d gone for a walk. Unfortunately, nothing was calming his restlessness.

Sometime in the next twelve hours, his boyfriend’s mother and adopted father were arriving in town, and part of the plan for their visit was meeting Fletcher. Conner had known Fletcher’s father for months, and the two of them were quite fond of each other. There wasn’t a valid excuse for Fletcher to avoid meeting Conner’s parents. He just didn’t want to.

Fletcher sighed and sat down, curling up in the middle of the forest floor. He wanted to find a nice cozy little foxhole and hide out until the Masons left. He was sure they were nice people, but meeting them was a permanent step. It felt premature and overwhelming and—

Okay, fine, he was scared. What if they didn’t like him? What if they found out he was a shapeshifter and reacted to the supernatural like Conner’s birth father had, with murderous intent?

He whined aloud.

A rabbit poked its head from behind some new foliage. At first sight of a fox, it reared back and hid behind the leaves, trembling. When Fletcher didn’t move for long enough, it got curious and came out. It hopped over to him, sniffing madly and ready to bolt, but when he didn’t move, it practically climbed on top of him. It found some green shoots that he was half lying on and munched on them while he sat there doing nothing.

He gave another deep sigh, and it froze but immediately started eating again. He wondered if he could become a rabbit. Probably.

On the other hand, he would also probably fall on his face trying to figure out the way they moved. He still couldn’t fly as an owl—the best he’d managed was a controlled glide. Two legs and four were easy enough, but if a creature’s main movement skill wasn’t plain old walking, he struggled.

He had a meeting with Oak that morning for practice shifting, since it was the last time he would be able to sneak away for a few days. Sheriff Green wanted him to take those days off because of Conner’s parents. Everyone he wanted to spend time with wanted him to go away and spend time with the people who made him nervous.

The rabbit finished the meal it had found and moved on, so Fletcher figured he’d been wallowing for long enough. If he was going to say he had patrolled the woods, lying around feeling miserable wouldn’t cut it.

Dragging himself off the ground was a struggle.

A snake slithered out from its den right in front of him, which was odd. He didn’t eat snakes, but they were usually at least as wary of him as rabbits. Not that he ate rabbits either.

This snake seemed to be in a hurry. It hardly took note of him, just slunk right past and kept going. Fletcher searched the tree roots surrounding the small hole but saw nothing out of the ordinary. It was dark, but he didn’t see anything strange about the tree. Just one of the many thousands of ash trees surrounding the town.

Ah well. Not everything had to have a reason.

That was when a soft noise caught his attention. The woods were full of sound, even in the dark of night, but this one was unusual: a crying human.

He followed the noise out to the county road that led to town. There, he found a fancy car that had seen much better days. It was huge, shiny, and black, but it had a deep gouge along one side, and the front passenger window was smashed out. It smelled of constant use, like Fletcher’s own car when it overheated in the summer.

The sound was coming from inside. Given the state of the car, it wasn’t a surprise that the owner was crying. Fletcher figured they must be in dire straits if they were in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning in the remains of that car.

A tiny pale face poked up over the window in the back seat—a serious child with white-blonde hair and enormous eyes like a cartoon character. Fletcher wasn’t a judge of children’s ages, but he’d be shocked if the kid was more than ten. They stared at Fletcher for a moment, then raised a hesitant hand in a wave.

Over his years as a fox, Fletcher had learned that even when people knew he was human, they expected a dog to act like a dog, and people thought of foxes as dogs. He panted and hopped from foot to foot, as though excited to see the child, who gave a tiny smile. They looked over their shoulder, disappeared for a second, then the door popped open and they slid out silently.

From the somber suit and tie he was wearing, Fletcher thought the child was likely a boy. The outfit looked like it had once been expensive, but it was rumpled and stained and smelled like a few days’ continuous wear.

Fletcher approached, and the boy treated him like he was the nervous one, holding out a single hand, palm up, his smile tentative and hopeful. Approaching wild animals wasn’t behavior he should reinforce in a kid, but he wanted to help these people, whoever they were. So he inched forward, sniffing at the boy’s hand, which smelled like sugar and gas-station bathroom soap. He swallowed his distaste for the flavor of soap and licked the kid’s hand to show how friendly he was.

The boy giggled.

There was a harsh sob from inside the car, and they both looked back.

“It’ll be okay,” the boy whispered to him conspiratorially. “It was hard to get here, and she’s scared and sad, but this is where we’re supposed to be.”

That was an odd thing for a kid to say, even such a serious one. Fletcher cocked his head in the way that said, “I’m a curious dog.”

The boy smiled again but ignored the implicit question. “Can I pet you?”

With no good way to answer, Fletcher shoved his head under the kid’s hand. He wanted to hop up and get a glimpse of the woman who was with the child, but he figured that was a good way to scare the hell out of her. He hoped that she was an adult, and the gouge on the car wasn’t a result of dangerous driving by a preteen.

“She bought a phone at a gas station, but she doesn’t know anyone’s number. She doesn’t think they’d help anyway, since we didn’t help you much.” He gave a sigh, sadness in his eyes that a child his age shouldn’t ever feel, and scratched behind Fletcher’s ears. “I’m Noah. She’s my mom. We ran out of money, and now we’re out of gas, and she’s scared we’re still far from town. Or they won’t want us.”

Fletcher whined and pressed up against the boy, who giggled again.

A woman’s voice came from inside the car. “Noah? Oh no, Noah, where—”

“Out here, Mom,” the boy managed through his giggles. A drawn face appeared in the broken window, eyes widening when she saw Fletcher. The boy looked up at her and smiled. “This is Fletcher. He’s going to help us get into town.”

Fletcher stared up at the kid. What the hell?

The run into town felt like it took years, but the choice had been run into town, or change and be naked in front of a little kid and his already traumatized mother to use their phone. He was confident in skipping that awkwardness.

All he had to do was get to the garage. There was always someone on duty because of the attached gas station. It was about three miles, which couldn’t have taken more than ten minutes as a fox, but the situation felt like an emergency, so every minute was one too many.

The night attendant at the gas station was surprised to see Fletcher, but he didn’t ask any questions. He was a vampire, and antisocial, so he probably didn’t care that much. Fletcher sometimes suspected that vamps were an antisocial lot, and Cassidy was an exception to the rule.

Fletcher ran past him into the station, grabbed the smallest gas can he could see between his teeth, and held it up. The guy didn’t need any more cue than that, just took the can and walked to the pump.

He surprised Fletcher when he—completely non-antisocially—asked, “You need me to take it somewhere too? When it’s full, it’s gonna be heavy to carry in your mouth. You could break a tooth.”

It only took a second of hesitation and eyeing up the can for the guy to wave him off. “Gimme a minute to lock the door and switch off the pumps. Nate won’t care if I close for ten minutes in the middle of the night.”

A few minutes later, they were flying down the road out of town on a motorcycle with an actual sidecar. If Fletcher was being honest, it was pretty awesome. He was beginning to understand why dogs stuck their heads out car windows. The vampire gave a low whistle at the sight of the abused car on the side of the road. “Ouch. Somebody sideswiped them hard.”

The driver’s side door opened as they pulled over. Noah’s mother drew herself out and stood on shaky legs. She looked like she’d come out of an expensive clothing ad, and then been hit by a car. Most of which Fletcher supposed had actually happened.

The vampire—Fletcher thought his name was Michael and felt awful about how much he’d ignored the guy for the last decade—grabbed the can and looked at Fletcher like he needed an introduction, or like Fletcher was in any position to give one.

He shrugged and hopped down from the side car, only giving it one mournful final glance, and trotted over to where the woman stood. He looked around the door at Noah, who was once again safely strapped in, and gave him a little bark.

Noah smiled at him again and turned his face up to his mother. “Mom?”

She shook herself and took a deep breath. “I’m so sorry. I just—I’m not—”

Michael waved her off. “It’s nothing to worry about. Is there someone in town you’d like me to call?”

The woman patted her pocket, where Fletcher presumed she had the phone her son had mentioned. “I don’t know. I’m not sure if he would—or even what his number is. I tried calling the old one once.” She looked lost, staring at the asphalt in front of her shoes and trying to hide the uneven breathing and sniffles left over from crying.

Fletcher took a step forward and put a paw on one of her shoes. He worried he might mess it up—it looked like it cost more than his monthly salary—but decided that it was worth the try to offer a little comfort anyway.

She sniffled loudly but then lowered herself down to crouch next to him. Somehow, she made the position look graceful. “I’m sorry if this sounds silly, but Noah’s right? You’re . . . a person?”

Fletcher nodded.

She took a deep breath, then another, and nodded. “I’m Stephanie. And I need to talk to someone in charge.”

Fletcher turned back to Michael, who looked to each side like a cornered animal seeking escape. “Um. I don’t have the Mayor’s number. Or anybody on the council except Max, but you don’t want him.”

He huffed a sigh and then tossed his head in what he hoped was a gesture to tell Michael to go ahead with the gas. He slipped past Stephanie and into the car to perch on Noah’s lap. Michael and Stephanie figured things out quickly without his intervention. They put the gas in the car, and she climbed back in as Michael drove off on his motorcycle.

Fletcher wondered if Conner could be convinced to buy a motorcycle with a sidecar.

Slowly, but with surprisingly little trouble, Fletcher led them into town, pointing her toward town hall. It was early, but someone would be in. After the last few months, someone was almost always at town hall. It wasn’t unheard of for the mayor to be working before dawn. The guy worked pretty damn hard.

Sure enough, a few of the inside lights were visible from the street, including one in the mayor’s office. It took Stephanie a moment, and a little help from Noah, to realize Fletcher was telling her to park, but in no time, they were headed for the door.

“Are you sure we should bother someone in town hall?” she asked, even though she’d been the one to ask for someone in charge. Noah hadn’t been kidding about how worried she was. He pressed his side against her leg in what he hoped was a comforting gesture, then hopped up to hit the button to open the door.

If he’d been in his human skin, he wouldn’t have found them by the side of the road to begin with, but it sure would have been convenient right then.

He barked when they walked in. The faster they got the attention of someone with a voice, the better. Maybe the mayor could set the woman at ease. He was good at that.

In a shocking stroke of luck, the mayor and Fletcher’s boss, Sheriff Green, were both there. They came out of the back to see what was going on.

“Lane?” The sheriff asked, brow furrowing in confusion. He looked at Stephanie and Noah. “You folks lost?”

Stephanie bit her lip, but Noah shook his head and piped up. “We had to come. Is Devon here?”

“I’m afraid Mr. Murphy doesn’t work in the building,” the mayor answered, his sharp gaze flitting between Stephanie and Noah for a moment. He nodded to Fletcher. “I’ll give him a call. He can bring extra clothes for you.”

Thank goodness for that. Devon Murphy wasn’t as tall as Fletcher, but it was close enough. Short pants were better than no pants at all.

Fletcher and Noah had to herd Stephanie toward the mayor’s office when she hesitated, but she seemed to relax once they got her into one of the cushy office chairs. Noah squeezed himself in beside her, and Fletcher sat at her feet, almost on top of them, leaning into her legs.

She smiled at him and hesitantly scratched his head. “I feel odd doing this, knowing you’re a person under there.”

The sheriff chuckled at that. “I wouldn’t. Lane’ll take all the attention you’ll give as a fox. Making up for how he doesn’t like to hug people as a person, probably.”

Fletcher was grateful that as a fox, he couldn’t blush. He also didn’t have to lie and deny it to save face. Instead, he bared his teeth at the sheriff in a ridiculous parody of a real snarl, and immediately dropped his head into Stephanie’s lap so she could pet him more.

Devon and Wade arrived less than ten minutes after the mayor called. Devon was carrying a set of sweats that looked like they were branded with the sheriff’s department logo and smelled of Wade. He went to hold them out in Fletcher’s direction and froze. “Steph?”

She sobbed into her hands, but it sounded like relief to Fletcher.

Devon looked like he wanted to toss down the clothes in his arms, but instead, he held them out and knelt in the spot next to Stephanie’s feet. Fletcher took the sweats in his mouth and went into the attached bathroom to change.

Never in his life had he changed, both shift and clothes, so quickly. When he came back, the tableau looked the same. It sounded like Stephanie was apologizing to Devon, and he was making little reassuring noises.

Noah was as ready to move things forward as anyone in the room, and he hopped out of the chair and walked over to Fletcher. “You’re really tall, and you have a beard.”

“Just because I’m a little fox doesn’t make me a little person. And yeah, I do.”

The boy considered a moment before nodding. “Okay.” He looked over at his crying mother, leaned toward Fletcher, and whispered, “Are we allowed to meet everyone? I want to meet Oak.”

The mayor and sheriff turned to look at the boy with raised eyebrows. Answers were forming in Fletcher’s mind. He wasn’t sure if he was worried his assumptions would turn out to be true, or that they wouldn’t.

He knelt next to Noah and looked him in the eye. “Have you and your mom been sending us letters? About someone who’s trying to hurt us?”

Unable or unwilling to meet Fletcher’s gaze, Noah stared at the carpet and nodded. “We tried. I’m sorry it didn’t help.”

“Didn’t help, my ass,” the sheriff shot back, before giving Noah a guilty glance. “Hel—uh, heck, even if we didn’t get the first one till after the attack, we wouldn’t have known why it happened at all if you hadn’t told us.”

The mayor nodded. “That’s an excellent point. We would have spent months trying to track down where the troll came from, not trying to prepare for another attack.” He looked over at Devon, where Stephanie had pulled him up into the chair and leaned against him. “Maybe you can tell us something about what’s going on, Devon?”

Devon’s eyes rounded, and he swallowed comically loudly. “Right. So. Um.”

“Ex-girlfriend?” Wade guessed, lips quirked up on one side.

The glare Devon shot him was icy, but the joke had served its purpose, since he also loosened up and took a deep breath. “Stephanie is—does anyone remember my mother’s fourth husband?”

Everyone stared at him.

“The pizza guy?” Wade asked, finally.

“The lawyer,” Devon corrected. “Pizza guy was number three. Burt was husband number four, the lawyer. Also, the only one who left her before she left him.”

Stephanie sobbed into his neck, whispering another apology.

“Hey, what happened with them was not your fault. Geez, even if he hadn’t cheated on her, it would have been over. They were already falling apart by the time she hired you.” He looked up at the assembled people again and rolled his eyes. “Steph was, like, eighteen when we met. She got hired in the house as a maid, and Burt took advantage of her.”

“That’s where I came from,” Noah piped up.

Devon had to visibly choke down a laugh before continuing. “There was a messy divorce, and Burt married Steph because she was pregnant.”

Stephanie took a deep breath, pulling herself together and straightening her back. She gave an unladylike snort that somehow suited her and crossed her legs, but didn’t move from Devon’s lap. “He married me to make your mother mad. He slept with me to make your mother mad. I think everything he’s done in the last fifteen years has been about your mother.”

“That’s . . .” Wade waved his hand as though trying to pluck a word out of the air, but finally shook his head. “Weird and creepy.”

Far from seeming offended, Stephanie nodded vehemently. “Sometimes I just wanted to scream that he was married to me now, but—” she swallowed and sighed. “I didn’t want that much attention from him, especially not once we started trying to help you.”

“That sounds understandable,” the mayor agreed. “He’s doing his level best to hurt everyone in a whole town. I can’t imagine you felt safe there.”

She teared up, but instead of falling apart, she sat up straighter and nodded again. “He’s so angry, all the time. He hates everything supernatural. Your town was an easy target, once he realized it existed.”

“Did Devon’s mother tell him about it?” the sheriff asked. He didn’t sound angry, but Fletcher recognized a tension in his shoulders that the laid-back man didn’t often have.

Stephanie cocked her head to one side and thought about it. “No, I don’t think so. He didn’t start planning this until a year ago, and he hasn’t spoken to Eileen in almost a decade. He talks about her all the time, but it didn’t start getting mixed up with supernatural talk until a few years ago, when he took on a new partner at his firm. That man he sent here. Charles?” She shivered and leaned into Devon. “He’s awful. Did he hurt anyone? Noah and I couldn’t tell, we just knew he didn’t come back.”

“He didn’t do anything that couldn’t be fixed,” Wade said. He leaned against the chair back and absently ran a hand through Devon’s already messy red hair. “And he won’t be going back. So your husband connected with Charles, and they bonded over their mutual hatred for the supernatural. And being lawyers, I guess.”

The mayor sighed in exasperation. “You know, just being a lawyer doesn’t make a person bad.”

“Says the lawyer,” the sheriff said with a chuckle, and some of the building tension went out of the room.

“When Charles and your husband got to talking,” Wade continued, ignoring everyone else, “Rowan Harbor came up. Burt connected it to his ex-wife, and they decided to attack the whole town.”

“That’s one hell of a coincidence,” Sheriff Green said, looking at Wade speculatively. “You think there’s something else to it?”

Wade nodded. “The town’s been here for a hundred years, and we’ve never had any serious problems. Now, over a space of six months, it’s one attack after another. Something is drawing them here.”

Devon and Fletcher shared a look.

The thorn is in Rowan Harbor, and it shines like a beacon.

Those were the last words they had heard from the mastermind of the first attacks, before he’d been taken away by an international group of witches to face trial for his crimes.

Fletcher didn’t know what “the thorn” was, but if it was shining like a beacon, it seemed like a reasonable assumption that it was drawing the trouble they had been dealing with. Fletcher didn’t know if he was supposed to share that with the mayor and sheriff, though, or what good it would do if he did. Whatever it was, he’d like to find it and get rid of it.

“You don’t think he’s the source of this mess?” The mayor asked. He had deep dark circles under his eyes. He’d been working sixty or seventy hour weeks since the troll attack in February, and it was starting to show.

Wade shook his head.

The mayor’s shoulders sagged and he sighed like someone had dropped a weight on his back.

Fletcher bit his lip and lifted one eyebrow at Devon.

For a moment, Devon held his gaze, uncertainty in his eyes, then he nodded and turned back to the others. “Wade’s right, he’s not. It’s been brought to the council’s attention, but we don’t have much more than speculation yet. For now, we need to focus on the threat we can see. Burt.” He blinked and shook his head as if to clear his vision. “I never thought I’d hear myself say that.”

“This is going to take a while to talk through,” Wade said, gripping Devon’s shoulders tight. “Maybe someone should take Noah out for breakfast? The Half Moon should be opening soon, and it’s probably been a while since he’s eaten.”

The look Noah gave said he knew what Wade was up to, trying to get rid of the kid so they could have adult conversations about his father, the threat the man posed, and who knew what else, but he shrugged and looked up at Fletcher. “Can I have hot chocolate?”

Fletcher guessed that meant he was nominated. He looked at Stephanie. “Only if you don’t mind, but it would be fine with me.”

Noah gave her the beseeching look of a kid asking for something he didn’t think he was going to get, but she didn’t even argue.

“You’ll be with him the whole time?” she asked Fletcher.

He’d have been worried she was willing to let her son go with someone she didn’t know, but she seemed to trust Devon implicitly, which made a weird kind of sense. He wondered if they were close to the same age, which was a whole other can of worms Fletcher didn’t want to open. Wasn’t she kind of Devon’s stepmother?

“I promise I won’t leave him alone for a minute.”

She nodded her assent. “You do everything he tells you to, okay sweetie?” She looked from Noah to Fletcher. “It was, um, Lane?”

“Fletcher Lane,” he said, holding his hand out to Noah, who took it without hesitation. He looked at her, Wade, and then Devon. “Should we bring back food?”

“We’ll go over to the bakery for something when we’re done here,” Wade told him, then held out the keys to their cruiser. “And we’ll meet you at the shop when we’re all done.”

Noah was practically buzzing with energy, lifting himself up onto his toes and coming back down over and over. “Can I have pancakes? Or waffles?”

Fletcher looked at Stephanie, who gave him a smile and tiny nod. “Sure, kiddo. I think they have chocolate chip pancakes if you want.”

Noah looked like he was going to keel over in sheer ecstasy, so Fletcher figured it was time for the kid to eat. He liked pancakes as much as the next guy, but no one should be quite that excited about them.

“Okay,” the kid announced with finality. “We’ll see you later everybody. Me and Fletcher are going to have pancakes.” His mother quirked an eyebrow at him, and he sighed. “Fletcher and I are going to have pancakes.”

She pulled him to her for a tight hug, kissed the top of his head, and whispered for him to be good, then looked up at Fletcher for a few seconds that felt like an eternity. He should have taken the look as a warning, but he was stunned when she hopped out of Devon’s lap and threw her arms around him. “Thank you. I don’t know why you were out there, but I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t been. Thank you so much.”

That explained why she had decided to trust him. He’d been at the right place at the right time and offered his help. He’d figured it was just the thing to do, but he forgot how people were sometimes. Stopping to help strangers by the side of the road might be unusual, depending on where she was from.

Noah tugged on his hand impatiently while muttering something about being hungry, so Fletcher gave Stephanie a light hug in return, then pulled away to head out for breakfast.