by Angie Fox
“Hey,” Rodger said, mistaking my quiet for grief. “I still say he could have made it.”
“They took away his divinity. He went up the mountain as a mortal. No one can survive that.”
“Heroes do it all the time. Maybe he’s coming back.”
“The prophecy said he’d die.”
“But it never said when. He’s mortal now. He could die at the ripe old age of eight hundred. Who knows? There’s still hope, Petra. Have faith.”
I felt the pain of it deep inside. I wanted to believe, but it was so hard. I had no proof.
Still, a glimmer of hope took hold. “If anyone could have made it off that mountain, it would be Galen,” I said, feeling some of the weight of it ease.
Perhaps hope was more of a conscious choice than a feeling.
“He’s a heck of a soldier. He can make it.” Rodger clapped me on the shoulder. “Come on. Let’s go home.”
I dragged my feet. “It’s full of swamp creatures.”
“I thought you were trying to look at the bright side from now on,” Rodger said, nudging me along.
“Okay. Fine. Maybe they taste like chicken.”
Helicopter blades pounded overhead. I hoped it was VIPs instead of wounded.
As we walked, I tried to imagine what the recent battle had meant. It had destroyed one of the last major hell vents and prevented the damnation of countless mortal souls. We had peace for the first time in centuries. I had hope.
And for a brief time, I’d had Galen.
If he’d made it, if he did survive, he’d be sent back to his unit. I might never see him again.
Yet even if I was alone for the rest of my life, I knew I’d stood up for him. I’d let him know I loved him.
“Um, Petra, about going home…” Rodger began.
I about fell over when I saw where he was pointing.
“Rodger!” I gasped as I stared at our hutch, not quite believing my eyes.
A chorus of sea creatures chirped inside. They covered the floor, the cots, the stove. They pushed at the sides of the tent, straining the canvas walls and window netting.
“Look at this,” I demanded as a fat one by the window popped out one, two, three squirming, slimy little dinosaurs.
Rodger cooed. “It’s the miracle of birth!”
“On my cot.” Another one slithered out as we spoke.
“It’s not on your cot,” Rodger said, a bit too academically for my taste. “They’re on top of the other swamp creatures.”
“What are we going to do?” I wasn’t about to go in there.
“Roll down the light-blocking shades,” Rodger said, reaching for the drawstrings on the outside of the hutch.
“Oh yes. Hide them. That’s a great strategy.”
“Just until we know where to put them.”
“How about back in the swamp?” Where they should have stayed.
“You know that won’t work,” Rodger admonished.
I was going to kill him. This time, I was really going to kill him.
“Okay, what now, Sherlock?” I asked once we’d pulled all the shades and locked them down. Marius needed the locks, and, well, we did too.
It sure didn’t cover the squawking.
Which was getting louder with every birth. They were multiplying like maniacal rabbits.
“What are we going to do?” Rodger ran his hands through his hair, making it stand up on the ends. “I was only trying to give them a good home,” he added, walking in a circle, “better than the swamp.”
“Okay, Rodger. What if we borrow Marius’s lair? Maybe build a big fence around it?” It sounded ridiculous even to me. Besides, I knew it was too late for that. The buggers could climb. I’d seen them scaling our walls as I brought down the shades. Rodger had taken them out of their habitat and messed with their mating drive.
Rodger dug his hands in his pockets and cast a guilty look at our place. “I wonder how long until they break out of the tent.”
“Petra?” Galen called.
My heart leapt. Was that really his voice? My breath hitched as time itself seemed to slow down. I held on to the moment as hope swelled inside. I wanted to believe. I needed it with every cell in my body.
I turned and caught sight of him.
“Galen!” I couldn’t believe it. Could scarcely comprehend it. We met halfway around my tent. He was whole and uninjured and, “You’re alive.” I wanted to laugh and cry and scream and ended up doing all three as I hit him with the bear hug of the century.
“Hello to you, too,” he said, kissing me fiercely.
“You’re back!” He’d survived. I wanted to shout it to the heavens.
“The front was brutal, but as soon as the cease-fire orders came down, it forced Pluto to shut down the immortal gate.”
“I can’t believe you’re here,” I said, inspecting him. His face was painted with camouflage, and he wore a dagger, a rope, and a fully loaded weapons belt.
He shook his head; the corner of his mouth tipped up.
“No one was allowed to die in the battle for fear that casualty numbers would influence the discussion of what to do with the star-crossed lovebirds up there.” He captured me and pulled me close. “The lords of the underworld were forced to heal everyone. Pele was fit to be tied, but my men are safe. We’re all safe.”
Tears clouded my eyes. “Thank God.”
“Thank Dagr,” he said, brushing a heart-stopping kiss over my lips. “With the cease-fire, they’ve released us all back to our previous assignments.”
“You mean?” I could hardly believe it.
“See what happens when you have a little faith?”
“You just love being right,” I said, laughter bubbling from me. But I knew. I understood, even if I couldn’t quite put it into words.
We were rewarded. We were whole. I couldn’t believe I actually had him back.
Except… I wiped my eyes. “I’m so sorry about what happened to you,” I said, running my hands down his arms, his chest, so amazed to have him back unharmed that I had to keep checking.
He was mortal now, in a gods’ army.
“I’m not sorry,” Galen said. “It was worth it. We did it.”
Damn the man. The way he looked at me made me want to celebrate. Large.
I gave in to it and nudged him with my hip. “Want to go mark the occasion?”
His eyes darkened with desire. “Hoo-rah.”
“Don’t mind me,” Rodger said, strolling up to us. He clapped Galen on the arm. “Welcome back, Commander.”
Galen’s hands slid down to my butt. “Thanks for watching out for this one, Rodger.”
Rodger snorted. “You and I both know it’s the other way around.”
I was still thinking up a witty reply—and in my defense it was hard to think with Galen’s hands on my butt—when a jeep rolled up in front of our hutch. I leaned sideways to get a better look. Nobody ever drove around camp, at least not down to the living quarters.
In fact, a small crowd had gathered for that reason. Dozens more poked their heads out of hutches.
Kosta jumped out with a rolled parchment in his hand. He didn’t see us by the swamp. Instead he headed straight for the hutch and banged on our door. “Galen of Delphi in there?”
Merde. He was going to— “Wait!” I hollered as Kosta opened our hutch.
A flood of sea serpents swept out, lifting Kosta right off his feet. He went down under hundreds of little squeaking dinosaurs. They rolled end over end, quickly righting themselves.
Dinosaurs toddled all over the area in front of our hutch, and Kosta sat among them, momentarily speechless.
A great cheer went up from the crowd.
Horace swooped in next to me. “You did it,” he said, banging me in the arm with his fist. “You got Kosta!”
I looked at Rodger, who was just as surprised as me.
Rodger let out a whoop. “We did it! We got Kosta!”
I couldn’t believe it. For all the pla
nning and work and pranks we’d tried, it came down to a bunch of horny swamp monsters.
We could split three weeks off. We’d be free! I could go back to New Orleans. Rodger could see his wife again, his pups. He’d be the one to fix his own pilot light, to mow his own lawn, to be a part of his family.
He’d be home.
I looked up at Galen and it hit me. I was already home.
“You know what?” I nudged Rodger on the arm. “It’s you. You got Kosta. You take the entire pot.”
He’d earned it. He deserved it.
Galen and I had everything we needed right here.
Tears filled Rodger’s eyes. “Thanks, buddy.”
I grinned at him. “Just don’t go making any more pups.”
“Are you kidding? I’m going to do my best and then some.”
The colonel stood, shaking off creatures and trying his darndest to appear annoyed. “I trust that you’ll get these creatures back to the swamp.”
“Yes,” I lied. I wasn’t going to push it when Kosta had dinosaur afterbirth on his forehead.
We’d figure out something.
The colonel strolled up to us, parchment in hand. “This is for you,” he said, handing it to Galen.
Galen stood at attention as he accepted it. Then, with a glance at me, he cracked open the seal and the letter unfolded.
“What is it?” I strained to see. Maybe the gods changed their minds about his demigod status.
“It’s a commendation,” he said, reading, “for saving Dagr.”
“But you’re still mortal,” I said, taking in the flowery praise of the gods, trying not to let the disappointment seep into my voice.
“Thank you, Colonel Kosta,” he said, rerolling the letter.
The colonel stood his ground in front of us. “You never know what can happen, Commander. Bravery is rewarded in this army.”
I’d had enough heroics to last me for the rest of the war. “Let’s hope we don’t have to find out.” We’d succeeded in stopping the war for at least a while. We’d saved lives. We’d made a difference.
Maybe now I could get to work on that anesthetic for immortals. I could probably talk Jeffe into taking a break from his Trivial Pursuit contest to give me some samples from his claws.
“Okay then.” Kosta gave one last withering look to our hutch, which had taken on a definite lean to the left. “I want you to clean this up before you submit your leave paperwork,” he said to Rodger.
“Yes, sir,” my roommate said with glee.
I couldn’t help but smile.
“And you.” He pointed to Galen. “HQ paperwork is a mess. You’re still here indefinitely.”
I loved the army.
“Too bad Rodger won’t be around the first time we take the car out,” Galen said, watching Kosta strut away.
“What car?” Kosta would never let us touch his car. We’d tried.
“Didn’t you hear?” Galen asked. “Nurse Hume won a silver Camaro.”
My mouth dropped open. “Not the Dr Pepper sweepstakes.”
“What?” Galen asked, too amused for his own good. “You doubted?”
I shook my head. “Never again.”
“Come on,” Galen said, reaching down for a dinosaur. “I’ll help you get this sorted out.”
“And after that,” I said, walking my fingers up his arm.
He flashed me a wolfish smile. “Well, I do expect to be rewarded.”
I nudged my hip against his leg. “Pushy, aren’t you?”
“Always.” He wrapped his free arm around me and nipped my ear.
Oh, this was going to be fun. “Luckily for you, I find that endearing.”
“I promise it will be worth your while,” he whispered against my ear.
“All right, soldier. You’re on.”
* * *
Note from Angie Fox:
If I could hug you right now, I would. Thank you so much for coming with me on this crazy adventure. I was trying to explain to my husband the other night just what this book is about—part romantic comedy, part urban fantasy, part love letter to the friends who get you through crazy times. I felt every bit of it as I wrote this book.
You might have seen in the bookstore blurb that a different version of this book was originally published in 2012. I wrote that version for a publisher who was wonderful to me, yet had a different vision of who I am as a writer and what the book should be. This book in your hands represents how I always wanted it to be. So thank you for supporting that and believing in me. You are the reason I am able to write books from the heart.
The next book in this series, The Transylvania Twist, follows Petra, Galen, and the gang as they navigate the cease fire and discover what could be a brand new threat. It releases on January 26, 2021.
If you'd like an email when each new book releases, sign up for my newsletter. I don’t send them often, but when I do, it’s always something good. Also, follow me on BookBub and you’ll always get an email for special sales.
Thanks for reading!
Angie
* * *
Don’t miss the next
installment of The Monster MASH trilogy
The Transylvania Twist
coming January 26, 2021
A shaky truce. A pregnant Medusa. And a dedicated doctor who keeps legends alive.
* * *
Even during a truce, I have my hands full as a MASH surgeon to an army of warring gods—especially when Medusa herself turns up pregnant. I frankly have no idea what to expect when a Gorgon’s expecting, but I have an even bigger problem when my presumed-dead former-fiancé sneaks into my tent with enough emotional baggage to fill a tank.
* * *
He’s been fighting for the other side, which technically makes him my enemy, and now he needs me and the power I’ve kept secret for so long: I can see the dead. It’s a blessing and a curse. Literally. Because the gods will smite me in a second if they suspect.
* * *
But the other side is developing a terrible new weapon, and the only person who can stop the carnage was just murdered in a covert lab behind enemy lines. So I have no choice but to pull on my combat boots and go AWOL with my ex and a moody berserker to confront a ghost with a terrible secret.
* * *
Too bad uncovering the truth could make me enemy #1…
Enjoy a sneak peek at
The Transylvania Twist
Book 2 in The Monster MASH trilogy
Medusa, serpent goddess, executioner of men, scourge of Kisthene’s plain, stabbed a clawed finger in my direction. “Tell me the truth, human,” she hissed. “No more lies.”
I straightened my spine and fought the urge to rub my temples in a most unprofessional way.
Why did the gods have to be so dramatic?
Medusa coiled on the examination table in front of me, wearing a light blue open-backed gown. She stared at me, her eyes glowing red as her clawed hands shredded the white sanitary paper.
“I am outcast,” she said in a gravelly voice. Her rattlesnake’s tail swished, nearly taking out my freestanding EKG unit. “I am the damned,” she declared, face twisted with fury. I held on to my clipboard as the examination tent vibrated with her power. “I am the destroyer!”
I nodded. Some patients took longer than others to adjust, but it didn’t change the fact. “You’re also pregnant.”
“Impossible,” she spat, even though we both knew that wasn’t true.
I made a few notes in my chart while she threw her head back and let out a screech that shook the tent.
Ouch. I tried not to wince.
In my professional opinion, screaming often did help.
“Doctor,” she hissed, smoke curling from her nose. For a moment, she was unable to form the question. Her perfectly sculpted brows knit as she brushed a hand through the wild mane of snakes on her head. “How?”
I gave her my most reassuring smile. “The old-fashioned way, I assume.”
She should
know. The Gorgon was nearly three thousand years old. And from what I’d seen of the ancient Greeks, they certainly knew how to party.
She drew her hands slowly, almost reverently, down her green-scaled torso to the perfectly flat stomach under her examination gown. “I’m cursed,” she hissed. “I’m barren. My body is poison!”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself.” Sure, my fingers went a bit numb when I was checking her blood pressure, but all in all she was far less dangerous than the ancient Norse dragon in need of an enema this morning.
That had taken us two doctors, three orderlies, a set of ambulance drivers, and Jeffe the guard sphinx. Although to be frank, all Jeffe did was warn us not to set the motor pool on fire.
I whipped out form 3871-K, which was actually a little slide wheel designed to help me calculate the Gorgon pregnancy cycle. “I’d estimate you’re fifty-three days along, which is seven weeks and three days pregnant. Your gestation time is slightly shorter than the average human, longer than the average goddess.” I slipped the chart back into the pocket of my white coat. “Still, I don’t think we need to see you again until the end of your first trimester.”
I opened a drawer in the medical cart next to the examination table where we kept basics, including samples of prenatal vitamins. “Because you’re over thirty-five years old,” I said, handing her a pack, “we’ll want to do an ultrasound at your next appointment, along with a few other routine tests.”
The pale skin on her neck and arms flushed as she took it all in. She growled low. “My parents are going to kill me.”
Well, I couldn’t offer her any advice on ancient marine deities. Besides, the grin tickling at the sides of her mouth told me more than I needed to know. Once she recovered from the surprise, she’d be tickled pink. Or at least a light green.
“It’s just that”—her gaze wandered as she nibbled on a talon—“I haven’t talked to my mother since I turned her lover to stone.”
“About that,” I said, setting her chart on top of the medical cart. “You’re going to want to try to control your temper. Stress isn’t good for the baby.”