28
“Did Shani go by here?” Father Mulcahy looked at the gun in my hand and nodded. “Is she still in the building?”
“No, she went right out.”
Shit. There was no way to catch her in a chase, not by myself. I’m built for power, not speed. Holding my free hand out, Tiff put the bandolier of grenades in it. “Go find Boothe. Tell him to put word out to every one of his people that Shani is to be stopped, even if she has to be shot. She’s dangerous, so they don’t need to take chances; but if she gets out of the Warren, then she will spoil the trap.” She nodded. “And tell him to get in here ASAP so we can plan our next move.”
Tiff nodded, spun on her heel, and moved quickly out the door. I watched her stride across the room. One leg in front of the other, with a nice up-and-down rhythm that was distracting to say the least. The old Werewolf got up and followed her out, slipping through the door as it shut.
“You seem a bit distracted.”
I turned to see Charlotte stepping up to join us. A man and a woman had taken her place onstage with puppets over their arms. I shrugged. “It happens.”
The door swung open again. Boothe came in speaking low into a walkie-talkie, head cocked to the side. He let go of the button as he came to a stop in front of us. The rubber soles of his boots gave a little squeak as he drew up short. “What the hell is going on? I just gave orders to shoot to kill if Shani resisted being taken in and I am not sure why.”
Charlotte cleared her throat, lifting her chin to indicate the room behind me. I turned to find dozens of wide eyes staring up at us. The two adults were trying to get the kids’ attention, but they were having no luck at all. “Maybe we should take this conversation somewhere else.”
She was right. We were about to discuss killing someone. Even though all these kids were lycanthropes, and while some of them would know bloodshed on a level equal to a third world country when they grew up, they were still kids. The oldest one I could spot looked to be about twelve. If we could keep them from this, then it was our responsibility to do so.
“Follow me,” I said, and began walking back down the hall to the last room on the left.
Marcus flinched as the door swung open. He was sitting on the pool table gingerly touching his broken nose. Blood was drying on his face, becoming darker. His fancy linen shirt, once a clean butter crème, was now tie-dyed with spatters and blotches of blood drying to a dark burgundy. His eye was still swollen shut, although not as much as before, and the purple bruise was fading into a sickly greenish color. His lycanthrope healing was hard at work.
“Where is Sophia? I need to talk to her.” His voice was still chunky through the broken nose.
“No, Simba, you need to shut the hell up or I will kick your ass again.” I walked past him and went to lean on a video game as everybody else came into the room. It was a fighting game of some kind, cartoon kung fu guys battling across the screen. “Everybody here will have questions for you. Answer them, but other than that, keep a button on your cock holster.”
Anger swept the Were-lion’s face like a grass fire, flashing hot and burning out quickly. I could feel the contempt on my face, staring at him until he dropped his eyes again.
The others all stood in a semicircle around us. Charlotte took a step toward Marcus and was stopped by Father Mulcahy’s hand. The priest lit up another cigarette, drawing the flame into the end and smoke into his lungs. With a sharp exhale, a stream of gray-white shot from the corner of his lips. He spoke around the cancer stick.
“So what is going on, son?”
“Shani is a traitor. She’s the one who called Leo and his gang in to kill Sophia’s babies.”
Charlotte held up her hand. “Wait. I thought Leonidas was trying to kill Marcus, and when did Sophia become pregnant?”
“Apparently Leo just wants to kick Marcus’s ass, which having just done so, I can highly recommend.” I looked over at Marcus, waiting for him to take offense, but he just sat there, still touching his nose gingerly. “The reason Leo and his merry men have come to town is because Shani called them and wants them to terminate Sophia’s pregnancy.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Marcus is the father.” I waited for their reactions. Charlotte looked as shocked as I knew she would. As a lycanthrope, she knew that breeding between species was impossible. Boothe’s face got harder as the muscles in his jaw clenched. The priest took another drag on his cigarette. I kept talking. “Sophia told Shani she was pregnant by Marcus’s bodyguard Cash, but truth is it was Marcus who knocked her up.”
Marcus looked up, his hand falling away from his face. Arrogance swept back into his battered features. “It can’t be mine. I am not a dog.”
“What you are is an asshole who takes advantage of young girls. Sophia has never been with anyone else, so that makes you the only suspect.” I stepped up and uncrossed my arms. My voice was low when I spoke, coming up from that dangerous place inside me. “And I know about the end, where she tried to stop sleeping with you and you used your predator powers to ‘persuade’ her.” I leaned in close, letting my size loom over him. “We will be visiting that situation again. There will be a reckoning for that. Mark my words.”
He turned away, not looking at my eyes. Good. One wrong word from him and the desire I had to break his neck would explode. I stepped back, shaking out my hands from where they had been clenched tight. I caught Charlotte from the corner of my eye and looked at her. Her eyes were pinned on Marcus, face harder than flint. Marcus looked at her and reached out a hand.
“Charlotte, please . . .”
“Is it true, Marcus?”
“It’s not like you think.”
“Is. It. True?”
His hands went up toward her, supplicating. “Let me explain . . .”
Charlotte moved toward him. Between one footstep and the next her humanity washed away, leaving her spider-lady form. Long spider legs loomed over her, waving back and forth toward him. Eight unblinking, red eyes pinned Marcus in their gaze. Her voice took on the strange metallic sound as it passed through her Were-spider larynx. “Did you force that girl to sleep with you after she said no?”
Marcus backed up a step. His head dropped. “Yes.”
Charlotte’s right hand was a streak as it flashed across Marcus’s face. His cheek slashed open. Each finger of her hand was a needle-thin claw. Marcus’s blood dripped from each of them, falling to the floor. She turned away, dismissing him. Her humanity swept back in before she completed her turn. She stepped back to us, wiping her hand on her sundress.
Boothe nodded in appreciation. Father Mulcahy placed a comforting hand on her arm. I gave her a big thumbs-up and a wide grin.
“Back to the pressing matter at hand. What do we do if Shani is gone and warns Leonidas of our plan?” Boothe asked.
“Then he won’t come and we posse up and go after them. Until we know they’ve been tipped off, we have to stay ready. Lure them in and take them down. If we have to go on the hunt, it all gets more difficult.” My gaze met his. “Leonidas and his followers are psychotic and they have to be put down. If we have to, we will follow them to the ends of the earth.”
Boothe’s radio squawked and he hit a tiny button on the earpiece he had on. He listened for a second, head down, body turned slightly away. After a moment, he looked up. “I don’t think that will be necessary.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when an explosion rocked the building we were in.
29
People were pushing and shoving, trying to get inside the building and away from the explosion. They were also trying to get to the children, parents willing to push anyone aside to make sure their child was okay. Bodies crammed close, arms flailing, legs pushing. They pressed against us, a river of lycanthropes to swim against.
I shouldered my way through, knocking people aside as I strode forward. Boothe was a few feet away, his head and shoulders above the crowd. He talked on his radio as he moved people aside. Charlotte had shed her human form for the hybrid one. She was swinging through the doorway after crawling up the wall and over the top of the door frame. Father Mulcahy moved in my wake, using Shaolin skills to sidestep around the people who closed the gap behind me.
A thin young man stumbled in front of me, falling to his knees, threatening to be swept under the tide of people behind him. My hand clamped around his arm, it was like a stick in my hand, and hauled him to his feet. He gave me a grateful look before I shoved him on past me. A few more long strides and we broke through, stepping outside the doors and onto the stone patio out front.
To the left, a house was in flames, thick black smoke billowing out of the hole that had been blasted into the side of it.
To the right, the playground and picnic area had thinned out. All that were left were men and women dressed like Boothe in dark clothing. Every one of them had a weapon out and had taken cover behind different apparatuses. Some crouched behind grills, some behind playground equipment. All their guns were pointed in the same direction.
Leonidas stood on the roof of a house on the other side of the playground, holding the still-smoking tube of a rocket launcher. His voice was heavy, rolling out of his throat in a roar, vocal cords stuck between human and lion.
“You thought you could make a stand against the Brotherhood of Marrow and Bone?
This
is what happens when you try.”
Smoke began to billow up from around the Warren as houses caught fire around the perimeter. Smog began to fill the air with a chemical smell like burnt diesel fuel. I knew that smell. It was the smell of napalm.
When the hell did it become fair for lycanthropes to use rocket launchers and napalm?
Boothe began yelling orders and the Were-rabbits began scrambling. I looked over and Boothe had
changed.
He was even taller, black shirt pulled tight against bulges of muscle. His skull was now oval, and his ears had moved up the side of his head, lengthening and morphing. Short silver hair covered his body, and his teeth had become two-inch-long enameled blades surrounded by whiskers. His legs now jointed in two different places and bulged, splitting his pants up the side seams. His eyes were large, round, and blood red as they rolled around, surveying the scene.
A seven-foot-tall Were-rabbit may sound like a joke, but it was a scary sight.
Other Were-rabbits were changing as they ran, muscles thickening, legs stretching. Their steps became strides and their strides turned into leaps as they ran like quicksilver to try and contain the fires. Soon the only ones left in the playground with me were Boothe, Charlotte, Father Mulcahy, Ragnar, and Marcus.
The priest, the rabbit, and I crouched behind the Comet. Charlotte was on the wall of the building, using the angle of the corner to cover herself. Ragnar lay at the base of the fountain, droplets of water glistening on coarse wolf fur. Marcus stayed in the doorway, out of sight of Leonidas.
Leonidas tossed the spent rocket launcher tube over his shoulder, letting it spin away into the night. He crouched on the peak of the roof. The moonlight and the firelight made him look like the feral beast he was. His dreads had grown out into a mane with his lion-man form and cast his face in shadows; only the glint of his yellow eyes and the gleam of his white teeth shone out. I stretched my arm across the roof of the Comet, black metal still warm under my skin, and pointed one of the Colts at him. The green laser cut across the distance and danced in the center of his silhouette.
He looked down, spotting the dot of death. A thickly muscled arm reached back, dipping below the roofline and out of sight. With effort he dragged someone up, pulling them around in front of himself like a shield. It was a woman, hands behind her back, probably zip-tied like her legs and ankles were. A gag cut across her mouth, keeping her quiet even as Leonidas held her up in one hand by her thick, blond ponytail.
Kat.
Fuck.
I kept the gun pointed but took my finger off the trigger. They were well over a hundred feet away. There was no way in hell I could make that shot around Kat. I looked over at Father Mulcahy. He was standing, tranquilizer rifle pointed at Leonidas. He was stone-still, cheek pressed against the stock, eye squinting into the scope. “I have no shot.” Speaking didn’t change his position one iota.
I yelled out across the playground. “What the hell are you doing? Let her go and I’ll let you walk away.” I was lying. Leonidas was dead, he just didn’t have the sense to lie down, but it was worth a shot.
“If I let her go from up here she will break her pretty little neck.” He stood up, dragging Kat with him. Her eyes were wide with pain, but she didn’t struggle. “But if you insist.” His arm flexed to toss her off the roof like he had the rocket launcher.
“Do it and you are dead right here!” I fired a shot into the roof at his feet, the bullet kicking up chunks of shingle in a spray of black bits. I put the green laser back on him. “She is the only thing keeping you alive right now.”
The lion-man pulled her closer to himself. His free hand came around her body. Black talons began to lightly trace swirls and patterns across Kat’s chest, caressing around her breast and trailing down her stomach.
“I would not throw away a fine morsel like this. Bring me the rhinoceros.” The golden furred hand flexed, ripping open the jumpsuit she wore. Black talons sank slightly into Kat’s skin, drawing her up in an attempt to escape the sudden sharp pain. “I am still holding a grudge from the last time we fought.”
I glanced at Boothe, the earpiece and microphone still clung to his ear, even with the drastic shape change. I hoped Leonidas couldn’t hear when I spoke to Boothe. “Get on the wire and tell George and Lucy to come up from behind us and to stay hidden until they get here. That feline sonuvabitch has something up his sleeve.” He nodded and turned away to use the microphone.
I stood up and walked around the end of the car. The Colt hung loose in my hand, ready to fire, but pointing at the ground as I took slow steps toward the building Leonidas stood on.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come down and finish what we started? I was kicking your ass pretty good last time.”
Thick dreads shook as he threw back his head and laughed, the sound rolling across the playground. “Oh, I plan to finish with you, Deacon Chalk, but I have something special for your rhino friend.” His face drew back into a snarl and he shook Kat. She grunted in pain around clenched teeth. “And you stop right there or we will see if your friend can sprout wings and fly.”
I stopped. Everything in me screamed to open fire and blast him off that roof. I could feel it like the clothing against my skin, pressing against me, smothering me. So I stood and watched, waiting for a slip up on his part.
The seconds stretched into a minute.
The minute stretched into five.
Leonidas crouched, holding my friend hostage, waiting with the endless patience of a predator hunting. I stood listening to the far-off shouts of Boothe’s people trying to stop the fires from consuming the close-knit houses. I breathed in the air that was tinged with oily smoke. My hand opened and closed on the grip of my gun. I shuffled and I fidgeted.
I am not a patient man.
Finally, George and Lucy stepped out from behind the building and began walking up toward the Comet. George was in his gorilla form, still wearing the rags of his white basketball shirt. It was smudged black with soot. Lucy was dressed in a pair of short shorts and a T-shirt with cartoon animals that made her look even younger than she was.
The Were-lion stood up again, dragging Kat back up by her thick hair. She tried to be tough, but a squeal of pain escaped from behind her gag.
“Glad you could make it,” Leonidas called out. “Now the fun can really begin.”
Then he threw Kat off the roof.