Joshua moved toward us and stood in line next to Angel.
A thought occurred to me. Johnson hadn’t injected the pups yet. Why? If the contagion would spread from the pups through the air, it would get to us. That eliminated us as a threat. So it was probably not an airborne virus.
There had to be a reason, or more than one. Johnson wasn’t confident that the virus he’d developed wouldn’t spread to humans; the virus wouldn’t carry from paranorm to paranorm fast enough to stop us from killing him; the virus wasn’t contagious and wouldn’t carry at all from the paranorm he injected it with; or the serum didn’t work at all and he was bluffing.
We couldn’t take any chances on any of the possibilities. All we could do was assume that Johnson had what he needed and was buying time. He wanted to disperse the virus as well as get safely away from us before we could tear him to shreds. He might even be concerned about being exposed to the toxins.
Tension rippled from the Weres and my team and I could taste it in the air along with something foul and bitter. My sense of smell had almost fully returned and I could smell fear from the pups, children, even the junior scientists. The others didn’t look afraid at all.
They should have.
I blinked as something caught my eye, but I didn’t turn my gaze to look at it. A white mouse crouched in shadows cast by the cages. The mouse began to edge silently alongside the cages, working his way past Johnson, the other scientists, and Sanderson.
Ice.
Had to be. He was alive. I hadn’t realized he could shift into such a tiny form. But I knew it was him. No doubt in my mind.
Ice moved, keeping to the shadows until there were no more for him to hide in. He had to scamper into the lighted areas. He passed under tables and other equipment when he could. I mentally crossed my fingers in the human gesture I’d have used if I dared to really move.
“What now?” I said to Johnson. Had to keep him talking. Had to keep him talking. “Every one of us will make sure you suffer in the same way you tortured the Werewolves. You will be mutilated and flayed like the Weres you captured and murdered.”
No fear in Johnson’s gaze, only confidence. “You will be dead before you reach me.”
Then why hadn’t he injected the pups already? I didn’t want to ask.
A roar, the loud, terrible scream of a furious jaguar filled the laboratory, the sound coming from behind the scientists and techs.
The screaming roar startled the scientists and techs so much that they didn’t know how to react. Didn’t have time to react.
A huge white jaguar bounded onto the laboratory table, plowing into empty glass beakers and sending them flying across the laminate floor. The crash of shattered glass meshed with the big cat’s roar.
The moment Ice appeared, Johnson and the four other scientists jerked their attention to him. Stark, immediate terror was on each of their faces.
At the same time Ice bounded onto the table, Beketov and his three remaining Weres shifted. In nothing more than an instant they were leaping, then attacked.
Ice grabbed one junior scientist by the neck, sinking his fangs into the man’s jugular and shaking him like he was as light as a flag snapping in the wind.
One of the techs behind Johnson started to point his gun at Beketov. I ripped Storm from my belt and flung it before the man leveled his gun on the alpha Were.
The buckler sliced through the man’s neck, beheading him. The tech’s body collapsed to the floor. His head rolled away. My buckler made a small arc and returned to my grasp.
A Were had his jaws clamped on a junior scientist’s neck.
Syringes toppled to the floor, still filled with green liquid. Two pups bolted away from the scientists as Ice and the Were released the dead men. The pups hid in a corner.
Shots zinged through the air from the living techs.
Olivia and Adam dove for the pile of weapons and grabbed a handgun. Each shot a tech, dropping him. Blood spotted Olivia’s arm through her bandage, but she acted like nothing had happened to her.
Angel’s whip cracked in the air, encircling another scientist’s neck. She dragged the man toward her in a fast motion, then gutted him with a dagger she must have had hidden.
I didn’t know how Joshua could have gotten to his flail so quickly, but he wielded it with ease and the spiked iron ball collided with one tech’s head and smashed it in. The power in Joshua’s swing sent the tech flying across the room.
Ice took care of the remaining junior scientist with another clamp of his jaws.
During all of the fighting, I grabbed one of my daggers and went after Sanderson.
I felt the dangerous white flash in my eyes. I jumped and forward-flipped twice, landing two feet from the huge man. His furious gaze met mine as he pointed the barrel of his gun at my chest.
Too fast for him to see, I swung my dragon-claw dagger—
And sliced off his gun hand.
Sanderson shrieked. In shock he held up his stump. I drove my dagger straight into the huge man’s heart.
Surprise was still in his wide, glassy eyes as I jerked my dagger out of his chest. His body toppled onto a broken glass beaker and I whirled to fight the next opponent.
Through the blood rushing in my ears I realized the room had gone completely silent.
Everyone on my team and Beketov’s was staring in the same direction.
Horror grabbed my chest.
Beketov had shifted—
Into his full-moon Were form.
He was facing a terrified Johnson, who had plastered himself against a wall. Beketov’s son and the syringe were no longer in the scientist’s hands.
The misshapen and horrifying creature that had been Beketov stared at Johnson. The eight-foot-tall creature’s ribcage expanded and retracted like bellows pumping within him. Its breaths were heavy, frightening.
Its body was pale, its veins showing through the opaque skin. Tufts of bronze hair crowned its head and patches had sprouted along its spine to its almost hairless tail that whipped back and forth. A ball of hair crowned the end of its tail.
The creature’s face was misshapen—part wolf, part human. It bared its yellow teeth that glistened with saliva. Spittle dripped onto the floor near its huge, clawed feet. The creature raised its arms, long, clawed fingers near Johnson’s throat.
A wet spot appeared at Johnson’s crotch and pee trickled from the cuff of his slacks.
Johnson shrank away from what had been Beketov and now was something else entirely. Johnson’s stutter was not much above a whisper. “A-abom-abomina-tion.”
The creature’s claws whipped out and shredded Johnson’s face. Blood flew and splattered the floor. I caught my breath and watched as the huge creature flayed the scientist from his chest to his legs.
Johnson screamed the entire time. No coherent words came from his mouth, only cries filled with what must have been excruciating pain.
When Johnson had been flayed completely, like the Weres the scientist had mutilated, the creature stopped and stared at Johnson.
The creature drove its clawed hand into the left side of Johnson’s chest. When it jerked its hand out, the scientist’s heart pulsed once, twice, before the creature ate it.
A brief expression of shock crossed Johnson’s face. It remained in his eyes as his body slid to the floor and lay there silent. Unmoving.
We were all still and it felt like we held our breaths as one.
That shouldn’t have been possible. Beketov shifting to his complete full-moon Were form during the day.
Beketov wouldn’t know who he was. He would turn on us and try to tear us all apart. We would have to stop him some way. Somehow.
The creature turned and its large, tawny eyes took in all of us in one sweep. Surprising intelligence was in those eyes.
“No!” I shouted as the bronze-haired pup bounded toward the creature. It might not recognize its own son.
The creature bent down, swept the pup into his arms as terror ripped through me.
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I stepped forward, then stopped.
The creature was shifting.
Loud pops and crackles sounded in the room. The creature shuddered as it transformed and it held the pup tight.
In moments Beketov was in the creature’s place. Naked and exhausted, the alpha Were crouched on the floor.
Holding his son like he would never let go.
TWENTY-TWO
After I racked the balls, I chalked my cue stick. I took an easy stance, sighted the eight ball, and broke the balls. Like I’d planned, I sank the solid red three and solid orange five. The balls spread across the table in a perfect set-up for my next shot.
Adam stood nearby, intent on looking over the paranorms in the Pit. It was the first time he’d been allowed to come to the Pit and by the expression on his face, the way he studied the room, I knew he was in cop mode, getting a handle on what was a completely alien experience to him.
I moved along the side of the table and angled my cue to drop the solid two.
My sense of smell had fully returned over the past couple of days. Even over all of the other smells in the nightclub, I breathed in Adam’s scent of leather, coffee, and man, and I let it fill me.
No one ever beat me at pool, but if I continued to let Adam’s presence distract me, my record would be broken.
I took my shot. The ball banked off the side, crossed the felt-covered table at an angle and sank the two. I smiled.
A hand touched my arm. I glanced up to see Olivia and Nadia. “Rodán is ready for you.” Nadia’s red hair swung around her face when she glanced at Adam, then looked back at me. “He said you’ll need to leave your human detective.”
I opened my mouth to protest. I couldn’t leave Adam alone with all of these paranorms.
Olivia gave a devilish grin. “I’ll keep an eye on lover boy.”
Her white bandages showed on her arm beneath the sleeve of her T-shirt. I read her shirt and I grinned, too. Her shirt reminded me that my Persian cat had shredded every bra and panty I hadn’t taken with me. Would serve Kali right if she could read.
I love cats, but I can’t eat a whole one.
Adam turned to me and I tipped my face up and kissed him. “I’ll be back in a few.”
Before Adam could ask any questions, I handed him my cue stick and left. Rodán was a little bit of a sore spot with him.
I made my way through the club to the mist-shrouded entryway to Rodán’s “dungeon.” Only those welcome could pass through the mist. Someone not welcome might break his nose on what would feel like solid concrete. It smelled almost like the forest we’d just spent time in. The mist had the clean scent of rain and the rich smell of loam.
When I got to the dungeon door, I placed my hand on the pad by the door and the colors swirled until they matched my eyes—with the addition of a white flash just for me. The door swung open and Rodán was waiting for me.
“Nyx.” He gave me a soft kiss, just a friend’s kiss. “Come.”
He led me through the warm candlelit room that smelled of firethorn and had the largest bed I’d ever seen where he frequently “entertained.” It was empty now, and I found myself glad, although I really didn’t know why.
We went down stone steps to his den, entering the coolness of the smooth earthen walls, and I breathed in the scent of wisteria.
He sat at the opposite side of his large Dryad-wood desk that was clean of any papers, unlike mine and Olivia’s. I took one of the chairs in front of his desk.
Rodán leaned back in his chair. “Fill me in on everything.”
I explained all that had happened from the time we arrived in the Werewolf camp, to our experience in the NORAD facility, and to the death of the scientist and the clean up by the Paranormal Task Force.
Rodán studied me with his intent green eyes as I spoke. He said nothing, just listened as I explained it all. I told him of the amazing parts Joshua, Angel, and Ice had played as well as the other members of my team.
When I was finished telling him about the rescue, I said, “Jeanie was the Soothsayer who froze the scene.” I brushed my blue hair over my shoulder. “Between her and the PTF, everything was under control.”
“The Weres returned to and moved their camp in time,” Rodán said more as a statement.
“The pack was safely away from civilization before the full moon.” I rubbed my palms on my leather pants. “My whole team, as well as Adam, made sure of that.” I frowned. “I have a question.”
He nodded for me to continue.
“How did Beketov change during the day and control that change?” I shook my head. “That should have been impossible.”
“Dmitri Beketov is a very old alpha,” Rodán said. “And he has special talents. That is one of them.”
“Thank the Goddess he had the control.” I furrowed my brows as I thought of the danger we all could have been in. “We would have had to contain him in some way otherwise.” Or kill him, I added silently to myself.
Rodán simply nodded, but not really in agreement, more in acknowledgment of what I was telling him.
“That’s pretty much all there is to tell.” I shifted in my chair as I realized there was something in his eyes I hadn’t noticed before.
I leaned forward, a bad, bad feeling in my gut. “What is it, Rodán?”
“The Great Guardian intimated a storm is brewing,” Rodán said. “Her words…‘Blood stains the paranorm world if those who care for it no longer care.’”
Despite the fact that chills prickled my spine, I wanted to roll my eyes. “I hate the GG’s riddles.”
“Nyx,” Rodán said in a warning tone.
I settled back in my chair. “Bring it on.”
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VAMPIRES NOT
INVITED
Coming soon from St. Martin’s Paperbacks!
A Master Vampire living in the penthouse of the elite Hudson Hotel by Central Park.
Could things get any stranger?
Of course they could. This was New York City.
Arriving in the Vampire’s personal elevator wasn’t an option. Olivia, Angel, and Joshua were with me in the stairwell, taking the long way to get to Volod’s lair.
Earlier today Joshua and I had continued “talking” with other Sprites. Even using bits of the information from Negel, we hadn’t been able to get any Sprite to talk.
A couple of the creepy beings had looked shocked, if not scared, when they heard the Vampire’s name, but still no one said anything. We’d been lucky with Negel.
Joshua’s flail rocked at his side as we jogged the twenty-four flights of stairs to the penthouse of the Hudson. Shadow Shifters are as silent as Elves and Fae when they move, even when they’re in human form.
I pushed long strands of my blue hair over my shoulder as I glanced behind me at Angel. She was incredibly quiet for a Doppler as she followed. Like me, she wore a form-fitting black leather fighting suit—only hers showed even more skin than mine did, which meant hers showed a lot of flesh.
The barbs on the whip at Angel’s side had a dull look to them that didn’t begin to betray their deadly knife-edged sharpness. Her beautiful features were set, a determined spark to her diamond-bright blue eyes, her blond corkscrew curls spilling over her shoulders like pale serpents.
Angel was a squirrel in Doppler form and as a human looked like a cover girl for a cheerleader magazine. A former Harvard graduate and NASA intern, Angel was one of the toughest Trackers I knew. She’d saved my butt more than once during the Werewolf op. Just goes to show you can’t judge a Doppler by her human appearance or her animal form.
Olivia took up the rear. I winced every time I heard one of
her shoes make a whisper of a sound. A former NYPD cop, she was pretty quiet for a human. But some beings have super-incredible hearing, and I just hoped the Vampire’s hearing wasn’t that good that they’d hear the slight sounds of Olivia’s running shoes.
“Fourteenth floor and ten to go.” I looked at the number on the door as we made it from twelve to the next landing. “The fact that some hotels don’t have a thirteenth floor has got to be one of the silliest superstitions humans have.”
“Humans have lots of silly superstitions.” Angel’s voice was deceptively innocent and sweet and I glanced at her again. “And Brownies looooove to play up to them.”
I grinned as we hit another landing. “If they knew that Brownies are behind just about every superstition or haunting, then humans would really flip.”
Brownies are Fae, and some of the most devious creatures known to paranorm kind. I dislike them as much as I dislike Sprites. But they can be amusing at times—when they aren’t being malicious.
“Not all humans believe in that crap.” Olivia might not be what anyone would consider slender, but she was in such great shape she wasn’t breathing hard. “Don’t even go there.”
“Keep your traps shut,” Joshua grumbled. Angel flipped him off. I grinned. “The bastards may have lookouts.”
Joshua stopped on landing twenty and I came just short of running into him. I took his flail automatically as he handed it to me. The full weight of it caught me by surprise and I almost dropped it. Thank goodness I’m Drow and not simply human, because the thing was so heavy that I wouldn’t have had the strength to hold it otherwise.
“Going ahead to scout.” Joshua shifted—sort of melted away—and then I watched as a large shadow drifted up the stairs. Sometimes he blended with the stairwell shadows, sometimes not. And then he was gone.
Angel reached my side and gave me her whip. “Ouch,” I said as one of its barbs dug into my palm, and blood formed where the small cut was.
“Sorry, Nyx,” she said just before she transformed into a blond squirrel, jumped onto the railing and darted along it to cover the last few flights.
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