Howl of the Wolf by N.J. Walters

quite this good before.
    “I’m going to make you some hot tea.” Tilly was started toward the kitchen when Jessica called out to her.
    “Use the tea leaves in the outside pocket of my bag. It will help.”
    Tilly backtracked and dug out the bag of tea leaves before heading to the kitchen. Sabrina closed her eyes and soaked in the sounds of her friends. Jessica’s voice was low and powerful as she made her way through the apartment again, cleansing and blessing it. She could hear Tilly rummaging around the kitchen, which her friend knew as well as her own, digging out mugs, the teapot and diffuser.
    Her heart slowed and her breathing finally went back to normal. Her clothing clung to her body and she longed for a shower but, for the first time in her life, was afraid to take one, afraid to leave herself naked and vulnerable to whatever was stalking her. She shivered, grabbed one of the throw pillows and clutched it to her chest. How had this happened to her?
    She sensed Jessica standing next to her and opened her eyes. Her friend stared down at her, concern etched on her delicate features as she waved the bundle of sage and sweet grass around her. The aromatic smoke wafted over her and made her feel a little stronger. When she was done, Jessica went back to the table and set the smudge stick carefully inside the seashell.
    Tilly carried a tray from the kitchen and set it on the floor in front of the sofa. “I figured we could all use some of this tea, and I found some oatmeal cookies in your stash.” Sabrina almost always had treats of some kind in her kitchen and she was glad for it now.
    Jessica pulled a pillow from the sofa, dropped it onto the floor and gracefully sank down on it, legs crossed tailor style. “Well, that was a bit more intense than I was expecting.” Jessica took the mug Tilly offered her.
    Sabrina was about to take a sip of tea but paused. “A bit more?” Really, her friend was the master of understatement.
    Tilly drank down half her tea in one swallow before reaching for a cookie. “What exactly was that?”
    Jessica shook her head. “It’s really better not to name it, but we all know what we think it was.” She turned to Sabrina. “You haven’t been fooling around with black magic or voodoo or anything like that, have you? Maybe opened a portal for something nasty to come through?”
    Sabrina shook her head and shoved a lock of hair out of her face, ignoring how lank and damp it was. “You know I’ve had the occasional psychic vision and have excellent intuition, but beyond that, I read the tarot cards, that’s it.” She’d always had an affinity for the cards. Her granny had always said the touch of psychic awareness she had made her a natural with them. “I don’t fool around with anything dark. Granny taught me better than that.”
    “I figured, but I had to ask.” Jessica took another sip of tea and grabbed a cookie. Sabrina wanted one, but her throat was still sore so she settled for drinking the tea, which seemed to be a predominantly lemon with a few other things she couldn’t quite place. Rosehips maybe. Whatever was in the tea, it was good and was soothing her abused throat.
    Tilly pointed at Sabrina. “For whatever reason, this…thing is attracted to you. The question remains, what do we do about it?” She finished her tea and set her mug aside. “The gris-gris and the smudging and salt didn’t seem to do much good.”
    “I don’t know about that.” Jessica took a bite of her cookie, chewed and swallowed. “I think it might have been worse if we hadn’t done that.”
    “Maybe we just pissed it off.” That was the sense that she’d gotten. Whatever had been haunting her dreams had been angry at her attempts to keep it out.
    “I need to do some more research,” Jessica announced. “I’ll check my grandmother’s diary.” Sabrina knew Jessica’s grandmother had also been a witch who’d died a few years ago. Jessica’s mother had done her best to