Wolf for Hire

Chapter Thirty

The park was still. Almost peaceful.

I
was still in my werewolf form, and as with the meal earlier in the
night—when our combined senses had elevated taste into something
transcendent—so too were all my senses now heightened and interwoven.
The world didn't just look or sound different; it felt more immediate,
more present. I didn't have to focus to notice everything around me. It
simply arrived, all at once.

The
deep background hum of the city pressed in from every direction. Cars
whispered along the Mark Clark overpass above, their tires hissing like
serpents against the concrete. Beyond it, the WestRock paper mill loomed
in the dark, rusted and hulking but still present in scent and
sound—pipes ticking, metal groaning faintly, the occasional thump
echoing through the night. The Cooper River carried its own symphony:
distant water lapping against the bank, and somewhere farther upstream,
the long, hollow bellow of a cargo ship's foghorn as it navigated the
channel.

Closer
to us, Virginia Avenue cut a scar through the quiet. Every so often, a
car screamed down it, tires whining as they tore past. The Buckeye
terminal across the way hummed with latent life, the hiss of compressed
air and the low hydraulic chuff of industrial systems powering down for
the night. The marsh beside the park crackled with tiny life—fiddler
crabs bubbling and popping through mud, insects clinging to tall reeds.

The
park itself was calm. Just a sliver of city green tucked between the
industrial seams. Insects thrummed steadily, a familiar chorus of
crickets and cicadas. The only electric light came from a single lamp
above the restroom facility, casting a warm, amber halo across the
parking lot. But the moon did the rest, pale and bright, washing the
world in silver. Everything had the soft contrast of a black-and-white
photo. Shadows long. Colors bleached. But to me, it was clear as day.

And there, at the base of a tree near the fence line, lay the dog.

He
looked peaceful, from a distance. Curled neatly with his head resting
on his paws, as if napping after a long day of exploring the park.

But this picturesque tranquility only endured if you could ignore the smell.

That—more than anything—shattered the illusion.

The
air was rich with smells: oil and ozone drifting down from the
overpass, the brackish sweetness of the Cooper River, the sulfur-laced
industrial tang from the nearby paper mill. Beneath it, the softer
scents of the park—pine bark and damp soil, trampled grass and warm
wood. The story of a city in flux, laid bare through scent alone.

But all of it paled in comparison to the strongest smell of all:

Decay.

And woven through it, sharp and unnatural—

the stench of that foul magic.

I
crouched beside the dog and reached for his collar. The tag read
"Tyson," with a cute little paw print etched on the back. Behind it, a
second tag listed his owner's number, but no name. I recognized the dog.
I'd seen his face pinned to the board at the community center and
posted on the neighborhood Facebook group.

His
body was curled at the base of the tree, tucked in as if he'd laid down
intentionally. I examined the wound: a bullet hole in the abdomen, low
and off-center. Not the kind of shot that would drop a target instantly.
Lethal, sure, but not clean. The angle suggested he'd been close—facing
his shooter, maybe even rearing up when it hit him. It looked like a
shot fired in panic. A defensive shot.

Compared to the precise hits that had dropped Matty and Daisy, this was sloppy.

It wasn't hard for me to speculate this dog was the one who'd wounded the cologned man.

He
was a pit bull—big, burly, full-blooded. The kind of dog whose sheer
presence made people cross the street to avoid them even when muzzled
and leashed. Built like a brick wall with fur. A dog like this could
take a person down without much effort. Especially with supernatural
rage fueling him.

Which
was a shame really. I'd known several such dogs growing up—purebreds
and mixes alike—as my dad, every time we sought to adopt another dog,
could always find a young pit in need of a good home. People practically
gave them away for free. Loyal, goofy, eager to please. Sweet-natured
dogs with better temperaments than most of the yappy little cotton-ball
mongrels people insisted on keeping as indoor pets, if you asked me.

And
yeah, I'd heard the horror stories—headlines about maulings, sudden
attacks, joggers pulled down in broad daylight. A single outburst from a
dog like Tyson could mean a trip to the ER—or worse.

They
were a breed built to bite. Bred to take on creatures many times their
size—bulls, bears, opponents far more imposing than any person. A
Chihuahua might go ballistic at the drop of a hat, but that rat of a dog
wasn't likely to maul anyone—though their spirit may be eager and
willing, their bodies just weren't physically capable. Just a nip at
your ankle, and bite on the wrist, but nothing that was likely to land
someone in surgery.

A
pit didn't need to be mean to be dangerous. That same strength—the one
that made them formidable fighters—also made them risky to own in a
modern world.

Even
the best-trained, most even-tempered dog had a razor-thin margin for
error. And for pits, a single bad moment could mean stitches. It was why
they were a tricky dog to own. Why so many neighborhoods banned them.
Why shelters across the country were full of them. Not because they were
bad dogs. They just didn't fit into a world they weren't bred for.

And
yet, despite being bred to fight, they could be so loving. And someone
had loved this one. No one puts a cutesy paw print tag on a pit unless
they really, truly love dogs.

Maybe
he was a rescue. Or maybe his owner was like me—someone who lived alone
and needed protection. I'd considered getting a big dog when I first
moved into an apartment all by myself. But my old lease had that 'No
Pet' policy.

So I'd opted for a gun. And if we were being honest, guns didn't have a great track record in this country either.

It made me angry. Angry that it had come to this.

Tyson
hadn't deserved to die—not like this. He'd had someone who loved him.
Someone who probably went through hell trying to give him a good life. A
dog like that wasn't just a pet. He was a companion. A friend. Family.

And now that family had lost him.

But
I couldn't even blame the cologned man for pulling the trigger. A dog
like Tyson, when compelled into violence, left little room for
alternatives. He was strong—strong enough to hurt someone. Strong enough
to keep going even after he'd been shot.

That
strength was probably the only reason he made it this far. Past the
depot. Through the lots. Across the treeline. Until he found this quiet
patch of grass beneath a tree, where he could finally lie down.

He'd died slowly. Stubbornly. Hours after he'd been shot. Because he was strong. Because he was a fighter.

No. My anger wasn't for the man who shot him. It was for whoever had twisted Tyson into something he was never meant to be.

The
wolf had shut herself off completely, giving me room to move freely and
examine the scene without her instinct getting hijacked. Here, this
close to the source, I didn't just smell the magic—I felt it. Tasted it.
It wasn't a physical thing, not really. It didn't hit the nose or
tongue in any tangible way. It registered in the mind, like the idea of a
scent more than the scent itself. An impression.

It brought back a memory. One from years ago.

I'd
helped my dad and brother clean out the truck after a hunting trip.
They'd field dressed a deer and collected the blood in a five-gallon
bucket. Most of it had been tossed, but no one had rinsed the bucket
out. It had baked in the back of the truck for a full day, soaking up
the summer heat.

When I went to move it, I got a full whiff of it—thick, clotted, old blood that had dried and cracked like paint.

And I'd retched.

That's
what the magic felt like now. Rank, metallic, corrupted. Like dried
blood, long forgotten, gone rancid in the heat. A scent that struck some
deep and visceral chord in me. Something primal.

Yet, once plucked, it elicited no further response. Whatever the mechanism it sought to hijack had rusted away, lost to time.

It
probably had something to do with why it had such an affinity for dogs.
Or maybe why dogs had an affinity for it—a distinction as pointless as
the chicken and the egg. My own magic, if it could be called magic,
seemed to vary by species as well. Strongest with dogs. Decent with
birds and reptiles. Barely there with spiders. Almost nonexistent with
cats—granted, that was based on a single test. One smug, pompous cat.

If
my magic worked that way—had a preferred target—why not this? This
magic that seemed to reach into dogs and pull at the chords that had
once made them beasts.

That
was why, even the lingering trances, had affected the wolf so acutely.
She was basically the optimal target. I was why we'd had to shut her off
entirely. Taking the passenger seat hadn't been enough. She could still
sense the magic from there. Still be influenced by it.

That scared her.

Not
just the involuntary loss of control induced by the magic, but the
voluntary loss of control that shutting herself off would entail.
Letting me take over completely meant surrendering control. With no
oversight. No safeguards.

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It
wasn't that she didn't trust me. Not when we, who knew the others
thoughts, had no means to deceive the other. When we could know the
other implicitly.

I
knew she was a wolf—instinctive, narrow-minded, impulsive. She knew I
was human—clever, manipulative, opportunistic. And also a little
impulsive at times.

And
she knew I had my car back. Knew that I could hop in, floor it, be home
in ten minutes, lock us in the barn, and pretend none of this happened.

She knew that I wasn't above the temptation. Or any temptation really.

But she also knew I had a reason to stay—beyond having trapped myself in a sinking ship fallacy.

This wasn't just about finding Boden anymore.

Tyson's
corpse confirmed it. The magic that twisted him was the same that had
poisoned Daisy and Matty. It wasn't just an affliction—it was a
mechanism of control. A tool. And I was pretty sure I understood how it
worked.

The
curse hadn't forced Tyson into violence directly. It had driven him
into an emotional state—rage. Not a command, but a feeling. A powerful
one.

And I understood why.

Because that's what I would've done.

Though
if it were me, I wouldn't have chosen rage. There were plenty of strong
emotions that left animals vulnerable to suggestion: curiosity, hunger,
excitement, confusion, lust, pride. You didn't have to fight
instinct—you just had to give it a new direction. That was the trick.

I'd
used it before, with Sandy's dogs. I didn't bark orders—I redirected
their emotions. Got them excited and turned that excitement into
momentum, got them to follow me into the yard, just as the wolf got them
to follow her into the woods and to dog-pile JT. I'd done the same with
the wolf, luring her with hunger or lulling her to sleep with fatigue.
Even when she was at her most obstinate, I didn't break her will. I just
adjusted her aim.

That's what this was. That's what someone had done with these dogs.

They hadn't given orders. They'd instilled rage.

And once the dogs were brimming with it, they gave that rage a target.

Whoever
had cursed them hadn't sent them into a frenzy for chaos' sake—they'd
weaponized them. Directed them. Created mobile, emotional bombs, able to
slip in anywhere, spread the curse further, wreak havoc, and disappear.
No evidence left behind but blood, paw prints, and teeth marks.

The cologned man hadn't been caught in a freak incident. He'd been targeted.

Which meant someone had sent them after him.

And that someone? They could do the same thing I could.

Sure,
JT could compel animals, sure—but not like this. He couldn't feel them.
Couldn't reach inside them. Couldn't stir their thoughts or plant his
own.

But whoever had done this could.

And that begged the question—how?

My ability came with my lycanthropy. I hadn't been born with it. It was something done to me.

So how had they gotten theirs?

Could they be like me?

A werewolf?

It
was a far-flung and far-fetched idea. That I would just stumble across
another like me so happenstance. But the idea wasn't without merit.

I
thought about Nevermore's theory. About my tattoo and the spellwork to
hide it. Someone had done this to me. And if they did it to me, they
could've done it to others.

And
a curse that spread from animal to animal, inflicting a mindless rage,
was pretty damn similar to some renditions of lycanthropy.

As well as zombies.

But that's besides the point.

I
had to find this puppeteer. Not just to stop them, but to find answers.
Answers about what had happened to me. If there was even a slim chance that our abilities were connected, I had to know.

Even
before I'd examined Tyson, the idea had been forming in the back of my
mind. The wolf had felt it—sensed my priorities shifting—and that's why
she gave me space. No conditions. No negotiations. Just a quiet
concession.

Because she knew.

Our goals were aligned now.

Now I too was on the hunt.

She
wanted to find Boden. To do that she needed to find the cologned man.
And the best way to do that was to beat him to his target.

My target.

When
I was done examining Tyson, I backed away and called to the wolf. She
stirred, reawakened, and I relegated myself to the passenger seat so
that she may take the wheel. I shared what I'd learned with her to get
her up to speed as she returned us to full wolf form. Together, we began
canvassing the park, searching for signs of where Tyson might've gone
before he died.

A
part of me hoped he'd been trying to return to his puppeteer, to the
source of the magic. It was a thin hope, but better than none. Because
if he'd just wandered off aimlessly after being shot, then our search
was liable to turn into a wild goose chase, and we'd be forced to start
scoping out other nearby depots one by one until we found another lead.

The idea of spending the rest of the night scouring the more than two
dozen other storage depots just in the nearby vicinity—even with my
car—wasn't exactly appealing.

But, fortunately, we found what we were looking for.

More paw prints and the scent of other dogs.

Dog that bore the telltale stench of that foul magic.

More curse-bearers.

They'd passed through here recently, headed out into the city.

Had they been sent out to assault the cologned man again?

No,
that seemed unlikely. My intuition told me that it was still too early
for him to have made a move yet. It wasn't quite midnight, and it had
been closer to two or three in the morning when the man had gotten in
trouble last night.

If I had to guess, these dogs had been sent out preemptively in preparations to gather more forces.

A recruitment campaign.

Following them would be pointless. They could be anywhere by now.

Better to follow the trail they'd left behind and figure out where they came from. Follow the strings back to the puppeteer.

The
trail led us to the marsh, where it met the remnants of an old rail
bed. Most of the tracks and pilings were gone, but the raised foundation
remained, a crumbling spine of gravel and dirt stretching through the
wetlands. We followed it as it passed beneath the Mark Clark overpass,
the rumble of engines echoing overhead like distant thunder.

And at the end of the tracks: the WestRock paper mill.

The
WestRock paper mill rose ahead, sprawling and silent—but far from
unnoticeable. Towering concrete smokestacks pierced the night sky,
silhouetted against the clouds. The main buildings, tall and blocky,
were painted a weathered baby blue, while the adjoining refineries
gleamed white beneath the orange-yellow glare of sodium floodlights.
Steam billowed from countless release valves and tangled pipes, the hiss
and churn of pressure echoing faintly across the marsh. Toward the
southern end of the site, wide circular retention ponds shimmered in the
darkness, collecting runoff like stagnant mirrors rimmed with algae and
iron stains.

I
remembered this place from childhood—not from visits, but from the
smell. When the wind blew the wrong way, everyone within twenty miles
downwind caught a lungful of it. A sulfurous stench, the fumes that
smelled like pluff mud but sharper, refined. An odor that bored its way
into your subconscious such that you never forgot it.

Which
was ironic, really, given the mill only employed about 500 people. A
facility that inconvenienced nearly the entire city for decades managed
to employ fewer people than a Costco.

Its
main products were containerboard and kraft paper under brand names
like DuraSorb and KraftPak. Useful, albeit it not glamorous—industrial
staples that kept the city's shipping lines fed. But even that wasn't
enough to save it.

As
Charleston's economy leaned harder into tourism, pressure to shutter
the mill grew. Gentrification crept outward from Daniel Island and Mount
Pleasant, bringing new homeowners and real estate interests who didn't
want suburbs that smelled of rotten eggs. Once the new Cooper River
Bridge opened, connecting the city with a new main artery, the calls to
clean up Charleston's air became harder to ignore.

In
May, WestRock finally caved, announcing the mill's closure. The
Charleston Port Authority bought the land outright, announcing plans to
expand the North Charleston Port Terminal, and the efforts to start
decommissioning the mill would begin by the end of August. One unit at a
time, the facility was being taken offline.

But decommissioned didn't mean abandoned.

The
chemical refineries, warehouses, and port access still worked. The
infrastructure was still valuable and profits could be made in the time
left. But the major paper producing capabilities were offline. So the
mill no longer produced its signature olfactory experience.

Beyond
the paper mill lay the North Charleston Port Terminal—Charleston's
third largest port and the logistical backbone of its economy. Five
towering Panamax ship-to-shore cranes rose into the night, their arms
illuminated by countless white lights, while steady red beacons pulsed
at the tops of the central support towers—cautionary markers for any
low-flying helicopter or careless pilot. Ships the size of apartment
complexes were moored along the terminal's edge, their deck lights
glowing softly against the water, reflected in long golden streaks.
Hundreds—maybe thousands—of shipping containers stood in orderly stacks,
painted in sun-bleached reds, blues, and greens. Toy blocks for giants,
organized into a silent, steel city.

And just beyond its west perimeter, the CSX rail line came to an end.

That was the piece I'd been missing.

The
cologned man—he'd been following the rail line. Hitting depots, one
after the next. And if I connected those dots on a map, they'd form a
line. Pointing straight here.

He hadn't just been searching at random.

He'd been closing in.

No wonder he got attacked when he did.

He'd made it to the puppeteer's doorstep.

Whatever he was trying to hide, it had to be in there. Somewhere in the northern terminal.

We
kept tracking the scent, looping around the edge of the mill. The trail
led us to a squat utility building tucked between two fenced-in supply
yards. The door's lock hung uselessly from the latch, clearly busted.
The wolf inspected it cautiously, then nudged it open with her snout.

Inside
was nothing but an empty vehicle bay. A concrete floor, a
grease-stained drain, and the faint scent of coolant. It looked like the
kind of place meant to house a single maintenance vehicle—maybe a small
truck used to service equipment across the mill site.

The
wolf slipped in first, nose low to the ground, sweeping from one side
to the other. There were faint traces of the dogs—Tyson's curse-bearing
kin. The path had led here, but this wasn't where they came from. Just a
pass-through. A waypoint. The magic lingered in the air like stale
cigarette smoke, but only just. They hadn't stayed long.

Perhaps,
the dogs had been dropped off here by car or van, quickly prepped, then
released. It seemed a little far-fetched. If the puppeteer had used a
vehicle, why not just let them out on the side of the road. It wasn't
like using the bay would have hidden anything, not with all the cameras
all over the place.

Perhaps there was something I was still missing.

I
scanned the walls, sniffed the air for anything unusual. The scents of a
few people lingered—likely workers. None of them stood out.

The wolf huffed and padded out. No answers here. No Coy. No Boden. No cologned man.

We pushed onward toward the western perimeter, sweeping the edge for any new sign, any scent that might redirect us.

Nothing.

Maybe
they weren't here yet. Maybe the man was licking his wounds after last
night's run-in. Or maybe he was checking another depot nearby.

As
for the one controlling the dogs? I had no clue where they could be
now. I'd been banking that the dogs' trail would lead me to them. Did
they need to be somewhere close to the dogs to issue commands? Or could
they direct them from a distance?

If
I could find one of the cursed dogs, I could potentially probe its
thoughts for answers. But I'd have to find one of them first.

I could follow the trail in the other direction, but trying to chase one of them down would take forever.

Unless...

What if I called them to me?

With the wolf, and the moon this full, I could project my thoughts, my command much farther. Louder. Stronger.

Strong enough to reach damn near every dog in the city.

That would certainly throw a wrench into the cologned man and puppeteer's plans—a wolf jumping into their game of cat and mouse.

If that didn't force our prey to come crawling out of whatever hole they were hiding in, I didn't know what would.