For a few frantic seconds I couldn’t spot him. 
With the mass of mid-afternoon shoppers, the chaos of the shop employees still trying to wrangle the escaped magical pets, and the gawkers who had moved in closer to get a peek at the show, it was hard to pick out one fleeing hoodlum in the crowd. 
Oh, there he is! Shoving tables out of the way in his rush to get out of the food court area.
It only took a few running paces for him to glance over his shoulder again and see me there, coming up on him fast.
This time he actually let out a panicked squeak as he turned to run again, ducking straight into another shop.
Unfortunately, the closest store front to him was a potion shop.
Oh my gods, you have got to be freaking kidding me! 
I would love to throw a stunning potion right about now.
Not losing a single step, I groaned and followed him in too.
He didn’t wait to see if I was still tailing him, and instead armed himself with over the counter potions and was ready to fling them at me once I stepped over the threshold of the store. 
I saw the bottle coming, a neon purple blur through the air, and my hand reflexively went to my hip and my deck holster. But I wasn’t a combat witch anymore. There was no “deck”of pre-scribed magic circles on slips of paper about the size of playing cards, that all witches on the force carried. There wasn’t even a holster clipped onto my belt along with all with an array of field potions that I would have been equipped with.
I had nothing.
The first potion bottle smacked into my shoulder and popped with a squeaky soap bubble sound. A puff of purple smoke wafted through the air. I held my breath, and my heart skipped a beat, wondering what concoction he had just dowsed me with. 
I froze for a long beat. And held my breath some more. Aaaaannnnddd.
Huh.
I looked down at my shoulder, some of the frayed threads of my older shirt had been mended, but that’s about it.
Oh, it was a “Ever Style” potion, you add it to your laundry load and it makes your clothes last longer. It won’t do anything major, but it does take care of minor tears, stretched out fabric, stray threads, and lint balls.
I brought my eyes up again, with a smirk.
Ha! Did he think something like that was going to stop the hand of the law?
Too bad, he had already fled deeper into the emporium.
Damn it!
The few seconds I had stopped after being hit with a potion, he had used to stock up on even more ammo. 
Green and blue potion bottles went flying through the air towards me. I swung up my forearm in a blocking motion, summoning my lightweight ethereal shield that I always had primed for emergencies, and of course, nothing happened.
Damn it! How do people even function without magic?!   
I managed to dodge the first potion, but the second landed right in my hair. 
A puff of pale green smoke choked me for a moment, and then . . .
My scalp felt really clean. My hair felt wonderfully refreshed and nicely hydrated with out feeling oily. 
He got me with an Insta-Shower potion?
Damn, I need to know what brand that was, because it was a lot nicer than the one I had been using.
But I didn’t have time to snag the bottle, because the air was filled with even more potions. 
All aimed at me.
One smashed into my stomach and changed my shirt color to blue, which horribly clashed with my tan pants. 
Another hit my arm and erased all my freckles. 
Damn it, I like my freckles! 
And another smacked into my hip, giving my pants leg a cheerful pink flower pattern.
Oh my gods, with the blue shirt and the now flowery tan pants, it looked like a middle schooler had dressed me this morning!
Alright, that’s it, he’s going down!
I snagged an armload of bottles off the shelves too, and started hurling them. Unlike the shoplifter, where half the potions he threw went nowhere, my aim was right on the mark.
In a puff of lavender smoke his hair burst into neon pink spikes. In another puff of puky yellow mist he grew a blond goatee. And in a wisp of blue-green steam his teeth were minty fresh.
Okay, these potions were kind of lame.
Seeing that he was out matched, and the store employees were coming out swinging brooms and mops at us, he bolted for the door again.
After plowing through a couple chairs at the edge of the food court, he made a sharp turn and headed down a staff only hall. I guess he thought he would lose me in the maze like corridors of the staff area of the mall, where all the deliveries, and employees came and went away from the eyes of the paying customers. 
Too bad for him, he didn’t realize that I had been working every freaking job available in this damn mall and knew the staff areas like the back of my hands.
I risked losing sight of him for a split second to take a short cut down a different hall, knowing we would meet up again and I would be much much closer. 
My pounding footsteps made a frantic staccato sound on the thin carpet. 
Please let this work.
And there he was again, just bolting passed the end of the hall, a few paces away.
I’ve got you now!
Just as he zipped passed my path, I managed to snag him with just my fingertips hooked on the edge of his sweatshirt hood that was trailing behind him. 
If I was still on the force, still human, it wouldn't have been enough. The shoplifter would have gotten away. But with the grip strength of a zombie, with only that fingertip hold,  it was as good as a tackle to stop him. His neck got jerked back by his collar and his feet almost flew out from underneath him. 
Yes, you little hoodlum, gotcha! Think you're going to get away with this crap on my watch?  
The beast like snarl register with me a fraction of a second too late. 
In a blur of flesh too quick to see, the young man's face melted from human to wolf. A far more flexible furry neck twisted around. A long black snout turned towards me. There was a flash of big white teeth and a bone cracking, tearing sound. I saw the splash of bright red blood before I felt the pain. 
Oh shit a Were.