Chapter 6

( MINUTES LATER)

SPENCE

" No, no , no." Spence muttered, shaking his head in disbelief as he spoke.

He had to be hallucinating,he just had to be, there was no way in hell he was seeing what he thought he was seeing.

Letting out a short bark of sardonic laughter, he briefly closed his eyes, and instantly realised his mistake, in the split second it took him to pry open his eyelids and the woman was gone.

" Damn it." He groaned, giving himself a hard smack on the head.

He didn't even know if he was cursing because the Foxwick he had been searching for turned out to be the gorgeous woman from last night because she had escaped.

With another heavy groan he shoved the gun back into his pocket and made his way out of the woods.

He had another visit to make to his informant, he decided as he got into his car.

The sly bastard was going to explain why he had neglected to mention the wolf's gender, then he would help him track her down.

Spence and the Foxwick woman needed to have a chitchat.

" Don't matter if she's the most beautiful woman I've ever seen." He muttered to himself, gripping the wheel with more force than was necessary.

She was a Foxwick, and like every other member of her family, she was evil.

He was sure of that.

His subconscious gave a little twinge at that. A twinge he chose to ignore.

EVIE

It took Evie exactly six and a half minutes to realize her folly, six and half minutes she had spent running stark naked.

Turning into the first alley she came to, she couldn't help but hoot with laughter at the thought of what Gina and Lottie and all her other friends would do if they had seen her running stark naked in broad daylight, at full speed no less.

They would probably lace her in a straitjacket and cart her to a psychiatric hospital.

"Your friends are the reason this happened anyway." Her brain chose that moment to remind her, instantly sobering her up.

" Yeah." She said out-loud, smacking her head as.

Too bad she couldn't reach her own backside, she thought she would love to give herself a big old wallop.

" You were supposed to be invisible." She muttered, looking around the alley for possible means of escape.

" Why the hell did you have to go and make friends?" She asked herself, stepping farther into the alley to snatch up the moldy blanket she had just spotted.

She wrinkled her nose at the stench but it didn't stop her from wrapping it around her shoulders.

With enough dirt in her hair and her gaze firmly planted on the sidewalk, no one would suspect foul play. LA was, after all, the home to more than a quarter of the country's homeless population. Evie herself had once been one of them.

Half an hour later, Evie sent out her thanks to the gods as she sneaked into her apartment building.

Good thing she always left an extra key under the potted plant in the hallway.

Dumping the blanket, she stepped under the shower long enough to rinse her hair, before running back into her bedroom, she was soaking wet and dripping water all over the fancy rug she had blown two weeks' wages on as she pulled out her suitcases and duffel bags.

In the past, Evie should have been able to pack and get out of town in under an hour. But she had never lived in the same place for so long before, had never let herself have the luxury of buying stuff she really needed, never had so many things she didn't want to leave behind as she once again prepared to run from her past.

However, she didn't let that deter her as she determined to go around the apartment, dumping anything she thought she might need, not even bothering with any semblance of order.

Ten minutes later, she had dumped all her serviceable clothes and all the knick-knacks she could carry into her bags and managed to keep them shut through some careful maneuvering.

Then she sat on her bed and wrote goodbye notes to Gina and Lottie and Noel.

She had never had to do that before either, but then she had never had any real friends before...except Fuhal.

Thoughts of Fuhal made her heart heavy. He had taken a huge risk helping her get away twelve years ago. How was she sure her uncle and his father,two of the most evil men alive, hadn't had him killed for that?

" No." She said firmly, getting to her feet and stuffing the notes into her purse.

This wasn't the time to think sad thoughts, this was the time to get herself to safety.

She couldn't let this....man, whoever he was capture her. Letting herself get captured after twelve years just couldn't happen, not after everything she had endured.

" I'll drop the notes with Chase at the post office." She decided, slinging the duffel bag over her shoulder and dragging the suitcases behind her as she made for the door.

" Well, at least there's one good thing about running away in the middle of the day, no one's home to see you sneak out." Evie muttered, dragging her bags after her into the hallway.

She didn't bother turning to lock the door as she trudged down the hallway. Anyone who was desperate enough to want any of her stuff was welcome to it, and if they ended up vandalizing the apartment, so be it. The homeowner was a greedy son of a bitch who deserved whatever came for him.

The greedy bastard insisted on racking up her rent every few months because he knew she couldn't get another apartment without a valid ID.

In her opinion, he deserved much more than a vandalized apartment.

" Uh ohh." She muttered, coming to an abrupt stop, five paces from the apartment building's main entrance.

He was standing just inside the building, his hands in his pockets and a gleam in his eyes.

" We meet again, Foxwick." He drawled.