* * *
“Take these handcuffs off me,”Brie commanded the woman.
When the woman walked over and uncuffed her, Brie rubbed her wrists together. She could have broken the metal off her, but she’d done the right thing by playing this game with the humans. It was over now.
“Where’s my friend?” Brie inquired.
The woman pointed to the hallway she’d seen them lead Asher toward. “In one of the cells.”
“Give me the keys. I’m going to get him. While I’m gone, you’re to turn off all the cameras around this place and find the box you took from my friend. I want that back. I also need my gun and phone, do you understand?”
The woman nodded before turning and walking out of the room. Brie waited until the woman turned the cameras off before leaving the room. She was heading toward the closed metal door behind the front desk when a gunshot reverberated throughout the building.
Brie froze as the sound vibrated the door before her. “Asher,” she breathed as her heart plummeted into her toes.
Everything in her screamed against the possibility of losing him.No!
She was about to throw open the door when the woman ran out from the back with her gun drawn. “No!” Brie commanded. “Go back to what you were doing. I’ll handle this.”
The woman blinked at her before holstering her gun and turning woodenly away. Terror pulsed through Brie as she grabbed the door handle and sprinted into the hallway. One of the officers she’d sent to guard the exits was standing outside an open cell in a shooter’s stance. He aimed into the cell.
“No!” Brie shouted as she ran toward him. “Donotfire.”
She didn’t understand why he was firing into a cell but knew it was Asher’s cell.No, please, no!
She skidded to a halt outside the cell, and her eyes widened at the bloody mess inside. Asher sat on the back of an officer with his hands in the air and blood streaking his shirt and face.
Her heart thundered as she took in the scene. There was so much blood, but he was okay. Her shoulders slumped as her breath came a little easier.
He was okay. The amount of relief encompassing her nearly robbed her breath as she labored to suppress the emotions bombarding her.
“Lower your weapon,” Brie said as she rested her hand on the officer’s arm and pushed it down. “What happened?”
Asher stared at the officer as he rose off the one beneath him with his hands still in the air. When the officer didn’t shoot at him, he lowered his hands and used the back of his arm to wipe away the blood splatters on his face.
“This officer”—he nudged the body by his feet with the tip of his toe—“recognized me from another time and came to say hi.”
Brie glanced at the prone man with all the blood splattered around him. He was a vamp, which was obvious, but she also caught the scent of rot wafting from the creature.
What is going on?
“You know what he is?” Asher asked Brie.
“I do.”
“He’s one of our officers,” the man beside her said.
Oh shit, Brie thought.Asher hadn’t been kidding when he said the Savages were infiltrating towns and creating a much bigger problem than she’d realized. They had to get the stone, clean up this mess, and get out of here before more of them arrived.
“We have to go,” she said.
“We do,” he agreed as he stepped over the body.
“Is he dead?”
“No, I need a weapon, but he’s not waking up again for a little while.”
“Forget everything you saw here,” Brie said to the other officer. “Go outside and don’t let anyone in.”
