. . . and as the carca.s.s shifted Syd suddenly realized that it wasn't a deer at all, it was human, naked and gutted and gleaming on the forest floor. The beast dug deeper, jostling the corpse. Its head flopped and tilted toward him, revealing its face.

"NO!!!" Syd's eyes opened wide, staring blindly up. Nora snapped out of her trance, was back in the room again. She took hold of his face, brought hers close.

"Oh G.o.d," she cried. "Syd!"

"NO!!!" he screamed.

"Syd, listen to me!"

Syd's consciousness reeled as his own eyes stared back at him, dead and caked and opaque. The wolf wrenched and tore a new hunk free, making the cadaver's head bob and nod as if in recognition. . . .

"OH G.o.d STOP IT!!" His voice boomed off the bedroom walls, his arms and legs curling inward, going fetal. "MAKE IT STOP!!"

"Look at it!" Nora told him. "Look in its eyes!"

"I CAN'T . . . I . . . STOP IT!"

"Concentrate, Syd! Make it see you!"

Her voice echoed back to him like a lifeline as the great wolf stopped and withdrew, its snout red and dripping. It turned, revealing a face gone monstrous, distorted: human features stretched over canine skull, a grinning abomination rendered in obscene lupine parody. The wolf licked its chops, and Syd's soul shrieked as he realized . . .

. . . the beast had his face, too.

It stood, regarding him with eyes utterly devoid of conscience or pity. They were predator's eyes, and they fixed him mercilessly as the beast started toward him, growing with every step until all he saw were eyes and teeth and eyes and jaws and bright shiny eyes. . . .

He could hear its breath, smell the fetid stink of it, feel the deep rumbling in its chest as it advanced. And he found himself drowning in those twin shimmering pools of light.

As the wolf took another step.

And was upon him.

Syd came to: his head nestled in Nora's lap, his mouth loosely gaping. He was staring at the ceiling. A track of dried saliva graced his cheek. Nora was stroking the spot just between his eyes, making tiny little circles. Over and over, over and over. Calming. Centering him. Syd gazed at her with infant eyes, his mind filled with questions he didn't even know how to ask.

"Now you know," she said.

His eyes stared a moment longer before fluttering shut. Nora laid his head to her breast, and his mouth found her nipple, settled there. She slumped back, exhausted and drained.

Syd drifted off, leaving Nora to watch over him. Listening to him breathe. Tracing tiny little circles. Over and over. Over and over.

Until, together, they fell into a dark and dreamless sleep.

19.

He awoke hours later, with her nipple still in his mouth. The first stirrings were uncolored by words, or names, or memory, as he emerged from the oblivion that had claimed him. The sky outside was dark, the room steeped in shadow. The moon shone pale and high through the windows. The clock said eleven-eleven. He could not remember quite who he was or even what he was, or what had happened. There was only his need and her presence, quietly entwined.

Syd's lips encircled the swollen rim of the areola, feeling the ripe fullness of her breast. As his tongue touched her nipple, she stirred as well, unconsciously responding.

And every point of contact expanded his map, sent another sensation to remind him that yes, there was that, too, as her belly pressed into his chest and her hands found his back, traced lazy patterns across its breadth. Their bodies shifted position; she drew him closer and he felt his entire nervous system light up, transmitting desire at the speed of thought.

And that was when she moaned, a husky rumble that started in her chest, filling his ears with exquisite sound, sending energy pulsing through his body, recharging and revitalizing him. His hands found her hips and her hips were glorious, her hips were the cradle of all creation, her hips held the heart of the mystery.

And that was when she turned and tipped him on his back, straddling him; as he slipped inside her she leaned forward so that her b.r.e.a.s.t.s dangled before his lips.

"Bite," she whispered.

Her nipple grazed his lips, raked across his incisors. She moaned, picking up the tempo.

"Do it harder," she told him.

Syd obliged, his teeth pulling at the erect flesh. He sucked the point of her breast deep into his mouth; Nora's hair cascaded around his face as her head began to shake from side to side, rocking in counterpoint to her undulating hips.

"Harder," she urged. He did, felt something stirring at the base of his spine. Her head was whipping wildly back and forth now, as she urged him on.

Syd bit her harder, until he felt like any second he would saw it off and swallow it. A distant part of his mind told him this wasn't right, this must hurt like h.e.l.l. But Nora wasn't complaining. Far from it: her rhythm was ecstatic, frenzied, verging on violence. She rode him furiously, impaling herself again and again as he gnawed her breast, felt unyielding incisor meet resilient tissue and strain it to the breaking point. He loved it. Wanted it.

Wanted more.

Nora cried out. The feeling inside him began to rise: he rose with it, half-sitting now, lunging and snapping, leaving crescent-shaped welts on her chest. A high whining sound came up and out of her, the sound of a psychic fuse being lit. He answered with a fiercely guttural growl, a voice that came wholly of its own volition.

Nora flipped her hair back and away from her face. Her eyes rolled up, showing white. Her lips skinned back. She sucked air and hissed, snapping her pelvis in visceral punctuation, each thrust sending another spike of pleasure into and through him.

He was going to explode. Her torso arched and writhed. She tipped her head back, and Syd saw the open expanse of her throat pulsing inches from his face.

. . . and at that moment he wanted nothing more than to tear into her windpipe and taste the steaming copper spray. It would be so good. It would be the best. Syd rose, his jaws opening wide. . . .

And that was when he hit the wall.

"No," he gasped, and immediately felt something snap inside him. It was like dropping a lug nut onto a buzz saw blade; there was a ping and a chug and suddenly the balance was off, the whole mechanism spinning dangerously out of control.

"No!" Nora cried, her body suddenly out of sync with his. Syd tried to hang on, to keep from being pummeled to death by the wave he'd moments ago ridden the crest of. "Don't stop. . . ."

But the moment was gone; there was no longer any pleasure in the pain. The crescendo faltered, fizzled; her motion turned savage, radically overcompensating. The more she advanced, the more he withdrew. He didn't want to, hated that he couldn't control it.

And Nora . . .

Nora was all over him, crazy with need; Syd withered in response. She kissed and bit and slammed with the desperation of the d.a.m.ned. "Don't stop," she whispered, "don't . . ."

Vainly he rallied, brought his teeth to her neck, torn between l.u.s.t and revulsion. He bit her as hard as he could, but it was feeble now, a toothless imitation. And that just made her crazier, like tossing a rabid dog a rubber bone. He tried again and she twisted away from his mouth, glaring at him. A naked fire burned in her gaze.

"G.o.ddammit!!" she hissed. "Not like that!

"Like this!"

She fell upon him: her hands grabbing his arms and pinning them as her hips hammered his loins and her mouth found his neck and locked on.

Syd heard a snarl and felt a hot slash of pain. He writhed and tried to get out from under her, discovered that he could not, that he was trapped, she was much stronger than she looked, and all the strength he could muster was not enough to pry her off.

The lovemaking turned ugly, as she raced to a climax that he had no part of except as meat. He wondered if this was what it was like to be raped and realized no, this was even more fundamental. This was what it was like to be taken, like a predator takes its prey: helpless, in pain, to be used and consumed. . . .

The thought shriveled him instantly. He deflated, slipped out of her.

And Nora lost her mind.

"G.o.d d.a.m.n!!" she bellowed. She rolled off of him and stood, panting, crackling like a downed power line. Syd grabbed his throat instinctively, half-expecting to feel the gush of his own blood cascading through some great ragged fissure.

"s.h.i.t!" Nora turned, punched the wall. "Why did you stop?" she demanded. "G.o.ddammit, Syd, we were so f.u.c.king close! Couldn't you feel it?"

Syd stared at her, aghast. There was no blood. His throat was still intact. "What are you talking about?" he croaked.

"Why did you stop?"

"I don't know," he blurted. "I . . ."

"You what?"

"I thought I was going to hurt you!"

"HA!" she scoffed. "You couldn't hurt me if your life depended on it!" She began pacing back and forth. "I can't believe what a f.u.c.king p.u.s.s.y you are sometimes," she muttered.

"Hey, f.u.c.k you-"

"Oh, great, now you're tough," she ripped into him. "Now you can get it up. So where were all those b.a.l.l.s five minutes ago, when they could've done some good?"

Syd's mouth opened, closed again. That one scored a direct hit, kicked his legs right out from under him. "I'm sorry," he said, looking away. His head w.a.n.ged, a knot of tension blossoming behind his eye sockets. "Everything just got weird all of a sudden. . . ."

"Says who?" she countered. "Did you see me complaining? I wanted you to bite me, Syd. I needed you to."

"You don't understand. . . ." he began.

"What's to understand?" she spat.

"I wanted to kill you!" he exploded. "I swear to G.o.d, Nora, for a second there I was gonna seriously hurt you."

"Good!" she said. "That's what I wanted you to feel."

"What the h.e.l.l for?" Syd was stymied. "I don't want to hurt you, Nora. I don't want to hurt anybody."

"Oh, yeah? What about Karen?"

The remark came from out of nowhere, took him totally off-guard. "What the f.u.c.k are you talking about?!" Syd said defensively. "I don't want to hurt Karen. . . ."

"Yeah, right," Nora gave him a deadly look. "Tell me you don't dream about ripping her smug, lying little face off." She watched his reaction, knew she'd hit a nerve. "And what about whatshisname-" Nora smiled viciously, drew the name out for maximum sarcasm, "-Vauuuughn."

"Shut up."

But Nora wouldn't shut up, and Nora wouldn't back off. "Tell me you don't lay awake nights thinking about him," she continued. "Tell me you don't think about your wife lying there with her legs spread, about the look on her face when he slid his d.i.c.k inside her. . . ."

Syd closed his eyes, trying to contain his mounting rage as Nora methodically twisted the knife. "The one she put in her mouth . . ." She leaned in close, practically whispering in his ear. ". . . the mouth she kissed you with-"

"WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?" he shouted in her face. "WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME??"

"I want to know if you've got what it takes," she said flatly. "And I want to know," she said, "can you let it out?"

"Let what out?" he asked, incredulous.

"Don't be stupid," she answered. "What do you think is going on here, Syd? What do you think happened last night? Do you think this is all an accident?"

"I don't know what you're talking about. . . ." Syd muttered. His head was throbbing now, as if his brain had just grown too big for his skull. He brought a hand to his temples, ma.s.saged them gingerly.

"It's not chance that we met, Syd," she said. "It's fate. I chose you. You've got it in you.

"But you've got to let it out."

"LET WHAT OUT?!".

"Your strength," she said. "Your power. The thing you've kept strapped down your whole G.o.ddam life.

"I want it, Syd. I need it. And if you can't give it to me, then you're no f.u.c.king good to me at all."

The last line hit him like a roundhouse punch; Syd glared at her through the pain. "So what," he muttered sarcastically, "you want me to bite chunks out of you and beat the s.h.i.t out of people on your behalf? Anything else? Do you want me to kill for you, too?"

"If need be," Nora replied. She was dead serious. "I at least want to know that you can." A rueful light shone in her eyes. "I need somebody who can take care of me, Syd, somebody who'll be there when I need him with more than just the best of intentions, not just another well-meaning wimp who can't get it up in the clinches."

The insult was targeted, absolutely intentional. Syd sulked and smoked as she threw on her jeans, then her shirt, then her sweater. Every article of clothing she donned put another layer between them, until finally Syd was alone in his nakedness.

"Well," he said at last, "I guess maybe you need someone else."

"I guess I do," she replied. Her tone was both caustically brutal and threaded with regret. "I guess I do."

Nora's boots were at the foot of the bed; she stepped into them in silence, then turned and scooped her jacket off the chair by the door.

She paused on her way out, and they regarded each other defiantly. Syd stubbornly met her gaze, refusing to give an inch. The look on her face as she turned her back on him was at once haughty and contemptuous and incredibly sad. He listened to the clack of her boot heels and the jingle of keys as she moved across the living room.

There was a moment of silence after she rounded the corner, and his heart leapt, thinking she's coming back! Then he heard the sound of the front door opening and closing behind her.

And she was gone.

"f.u.c.k!!!" he roared, vaulting off the bed. The ashtray tumbled off, spilling its smoldering contents onto the floor as he grabbed his jeans, fumbled into them.

"NORA!!".