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“It doesn’t ood or bad or sucks ass It only matters that we do our jobs to the best of our abilities”

“I don’t think I can kill Bobby Marchand I don’t think he did this,” Newman said

“Then let’s get so on the theft charges for the wicked aunt and uncle to et a stay of execution for Bobby or prove that he’s a great liar and guilty”

“What do you reat-liar part?”

“If these are his footprints, then he woke up next to his uncle’s body and walked in human form from there to his own bedrooh that you and the sheriff carried him ‘unconscious’”—I made air quotes around the last word—“to the jail That’s so”

“I’d swear he was out cold, Blake I’ve seen a few other hue They were out of it You could burn a house down around them, and they wouldn’t wake up to save themselves”

“I know I’ve seen it, too” Inaround with too many powerful shapeshifters Once you reached a certain power level, you didn’t pass out when you went back to human You could be tired, but it wasn’t the coma state that new shapeshifters fell into or, like Bobby, never outgrew It meant he was a seriously low-level cat No wonder he hadn’t wanted to stay hatever leopard group had trained him to control his beast No one wants to be the lowest man or woman on the totem pole

“I don’t think he could fake that,” Newman said

“And I’d swear that his emotions in the jail were real, but if these turn out to be his footprints, then he lied, and he fooled both of us”

“Even if he lied, even if he did this—and I still don’t t

hink he did—I’er”

“Well, that’s honest,” I said

“Have you had to kill someone you knew?”

I nodded “It sucks”

“It sucks That’s the best you can do?”