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That was two weeks ago.
Another howl jerked her back to the present. A dog in trouble.
Desolation?
She had to do something.
There was nothing she could do. This was something her landlord had to cope with.
The howl came again, long, low and dreadful.
She’d tugged on her pyjama top. Almost defiantly.
Another howl.
She paused, torn.
What if her landlord wasn’t at home? What if he’d left the light on and was gone?
There was a dog out there in trouble.
Not your problem. NYP. NYP. NYP.
She closed her eyes.
Another howl.
She hauled off her pyjamas and tugged on jeans. Designer jeans. She should do something about her clothes.
She should do something about a dog.
Where was a torch?
What if it was a dingo?
She grabbed her mobile phone. Checked reception. Checked she had the emergency services number on speed dial.
There was a heavy metal poker by the fireside. So far she hadn’t lit the fire—or she had once but it had smoked and what did you do about a fire that smoked?
You bought a nice clean electric fire.
Another howl—they were now almost continuous.
Enough.
Poker in one hand, torch in the other, country-girl Nikki—or not—went to see.
The beach beneath the headland was bushland almost to the water’s edge. Gabe strode down the darkened track with ease. He’d lived here all his life—he practically knew each twig. He didn’t need a torch. In moonlight, torchlight stopped you seeing the big picture.
He reached the beach and looked out to the water’s edge. Following the howl.
A huge dog. Skinny. Really skinny. Standing in the shallows, howling with all the misery in the world.
Gabe walked steadily forward, not wanting to startle it, walking as if he was strolling slowly along the beach and hadn’t even noticed the dog.
The dog saw him. It stopped howling and backed further into the water. Obviously terrified.
A wolfhound? A wolfhound mixed with something else. Black and shaggy and desolate.
‘It’s okay.’ He was still twenty yards away. ‘Hey, boy, it’s fine. You going to tell me what’s the matter?’
The dog stilled.
It was seriously big. And seriously skinny. And very, very wet.
Had it come off a boat?
He thought suddenly of Jem, shivering on the beach sixteen years back. Jem, breaking his heart.
This dog was nothing to do with him. This was not another Jem.
He couldn’t leave it, though. Could he entice it up the cliff? If he could get it into his truck he’d take it to Henrietta who ran the local Animal Welfare shelter.
That was the extent of his involvement. Dogs broke your heart almost worse than people.
‘I’m not going to hurt you.’ He should have brought some steak, something to coax him. ‘You want to come home and get a feed? Here, boy?’
The dog backed still further. For whatever reason, this dog didn’t want company. He looked a great galumphing frame of terror.
It’d have to be steak. There was no way he’d catch him without.
‘Stay here,’ he told the dog. ‘Two minutes tops and I’ll be back with supper. You like rump steak?’
The dog was almost haunch-deep in water. Was he dumb or just past acting rationally?
‘Two minutes,’ he promised. ‘Don’t go away.’
The dog was on the beach. As soon as she walked out of the front door she figured it out. The house was on the headland and the howls were echoing straight up.
Should she knock on her landlord’s side of the house?
If he was home he must be hearing this, she thought, and if he’d heard it and done nothing, then no amount of pleading would make a difference. Joe said he helped people. Ha!
He must have heard and decided to ignore it. He was like Joe said, a loner.
Knock and see?
What was worse, the Hound of the Baskervilles or her landlord?
Don’t be stupid. Knock.
She knocked.
Nothing.
She didn’t know whether to be relieved or not.
Another howl.
What next? Ring the police?
What would she say? Excuse me but there’s a dog on the beach. What sort of wimpy statement was that?
She needed to see what was happening.
Cautiously.
There was a narrow track from the house to the beach but she’d only been on it a couple of times. It was a private track, practically overgrown. Where did the track start?
She searched the edge of the overgrown garden with the torch but she couldn’t find it.
So was she going to bush-bash her way down to the cove?
This was nuts. Dangerous nuts.
Only it wasn’t dangerous. There was only about fifty yards of bush-land between the house and the beach. The bush wasn’t so thick she couldn’t push through.
And that howl was doing things to her insides. It sounded like she imagined the Hound of the Baskervilles would sound, howling ghostly anguish over the moors. Or over her beach.
The animal must be stuck in a trap or something.
If it was stuck, what could she do?
Go to the beach, figure what’s wrong and then ring for help.
You can do this. You’re a big girl. A country girl. Or not.
She wanted, suddenly and desperately, to be back home in Sydney. In her lovely life she’d walked away from.
Face that tomorrow, she told herself harshly. For tonight … go fix a howl.
He was striding up the track, moving swiftly. With a slab of meat in his hand he could approach the dog slowly, letting it smell the meat before it smelled him. He’d intended to have the steak for breakfast—he needed a decent meal before heading to sea again—but he could cope with eggs.
Don’t get sucked in.
‘I’m not getting sucked in,’ he told himself. ‘I’m hauling the thing out of the water, feeding it and handing it over to Henrietta. End of story.’
It was dark.
The bush was really thick. Her torch wasn’t strong enough.
She was out of her mind.
The howls stopped.
Why?
The silence made it worse. Where had the howls been coming from? Where were the howls now?
Anything could be in here. Bunyips. Neanderthals. The odd rapist.
She was losing her mind, and she was going home now! She turned, pushed forward, and a branch slapped her forehead with a swish of leaves. She almost screamed. She was absurdly pleased that she didn’t.
But still no howl.
Where was it?
She was going back to the house. There was no way she was going one inch further.
Where was the thing behind the howl?
She shoved her way around the next bush, pushing herself against the thick foliage. Suddenly the foliage gave way and she almost tumbled out onto the track.
Hands grabbed her shoulders—and held.
She screamed and jerked back.
She raised her poker and she hit.
CHAPTER TWO
SHE’D killed him.
He went down like felled timber, crumpling from the knees, pitching sideways onto the leaf-littered track.
She had just enough courage not to run; to shine the torch at what she’d hit.
She’d hit someone—not something. She didn’t believe in werewolves. Therefore …
Sanity returned with terrifying speed. She had it figured almost before she got the torchlight on his face, and what she saw confirmed it.
She whimpered. There seemed no other option.
This was ghastly on so many levels her head felt it might explode.
She’d knocked out her landlord.
The howling started up again just through the trees, and she jumped higher than the first time she’d heard it.
