Page 20 of Silver Claw

Joe leaned up. “You’re family, Bub. And you’ll protect Kait with your shapeshifter. She needs us.”

I wanted to deny his words. I wanted to say something sharp and tell him I was still just as strong and that I didn’t need anybody to protect me.

But I didn’t.

Sam pulled out his phone, more cheerful than he’d been five minutes earlier. “I’m going to look into this magic-killing bitch.” He glanced away from his screen, something close to hope in his stare. “She’s not blonde, by any chance?”

From the back seat, Joe snorted.

When I parked on the street in front of the first house I was to clean, none of us said anything as we got out of the car. My heart was heavy. Instead of getting more used to and accepting of my loss, it just kept hitting me harder.

Sam and I didn’t usually hug each other, but I didn’t think anything of it when he hurried around the front of the car and pulled me into his arms.

But then he lowered his nose to the side of my neck, held me in a crushing grip, and inhaled. Then he licked my skin, and as I was in the process of shoving him away, I felt his teeth as henippedme.

“Sam,” I cried, my fingers to my throat. “I know you’re upset, but that’s a step too far, buddy.”

Joe wedged himself between us, looking as confused as I felt. “What’d he do?”

“He licked me,” I said. “And he…I think hebitme.”

Joe growled and turned on the shapeshifter, who backed up a couple of steps, his hands up, smiling. “Hang on, hang on,” he said. Then he sobered, but there was a sparkle in his eyes. “Kait, I can’t tell you how sorry I am that some asshole sucked out your magic. But you’re still a shapeshifter. There’s no way she could steal that part of you. It’s you, just as your wolf is you. I tasted it. I got its scent.”

I shook my head. “You’re wrong. It’s gone.”

He sighed. “It’s not some bit of magic floating around inside you, waiting to slip out through a cut or come to a siphoner’s call.”

I wasn’t convinced. Not even a little bit.

He was in denial. The only shapeshifter he’d ever known, and one he could trust—and Sam had never trusted anyone in his entire life—was dead. That wasn’t something he could just accept.

He nudged Joe out of the way, and Joe moved, though he didn’t move far. Sam took my shoulders, but gently, and his stare was earnest, open, and completely sure. “You couldn’t feel it your whole life,” he reminded me, “and it’s pretty new to you. It’s understandable that you might think—”

“I tried to shift into her,” I told him. “I tried. I couldn’t do it.” I shook my head, my heart fluttering, wanting to believe him but nearly certain he didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. “It’s what siphoners do, Sam.”

“Siphoners steal magic to regulate your power. That’sallthey do. If you couldn’t shift into her, it’s because siphoners can’t be shifted into.”

If he was right…

“Try,” he urged. “Right now. Just try.”

“On the street in under about a million lights and cameras?” Joe moved to shield me, as though I was shifting right then and there and the humans might see. Joe was becoming a tad overprotective, and he and I were going to have to have a talk about that.

But I wasn’t going to try shifting in the street. “I’ll try when I get home,” I said, and I was a little breathless, a little hopeful.

I was alotdoubtful.

If I still had my ability to shapeshift, that made the siphoner’s invasion just a little less horrifying. It made her seem less powerful.

And it would take away my deep, secret fear that she might somehow kill my wolf. A person didn’t spend the biggest part of her life as a hobbled wolf without some intense mental issues.

I needed to know without a doubt that my wolf could never again be taken from me, and I needed to not be afraid of Anika Draper.

Because I did not doubt for one second that the siphoner and I would fight again.

Chapter Eight

I could barely focus on the housecleaning because my head was so full of what-ifs. If I couldn’t have my magic, I wanted my shapeshifter. It made me feel less weak, even if I couldn’t use it to hurt Anika Draper.