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I dropped under his leap, but as his body flew over mine he twisted, his arm sweeping down, his thick, cat-like claws slashing through the leather of my jacket and down into flesh. Blood gushed—and pain, unlike anything I’d ever felt before, rolled up my arm and through the rest of me in a heated wave.
All I wanted to do was curl up into a little ball and cry, but girlie reactions like that really weren’t an option.
The other two were almost on me—and they were also changing, becoming something less than human but not quite animal.
I couldn’t stay here.
I might be able to fight, but it was four against one and three of those four weren’t human. Those were odds that would give Aunt Riley reason to pause, and she’d once been a guardian.
Fuck, where was Azriel when I needed him most? Why the hell wasn’t he stepping in to help? Even as the thought crossed my mind, I swiped it aside. He’d warned me he wouldn’t interfere, and I had no doubt he was a man—being—of his word.
But running wasn’t really an option, either. I might be part werewolf, but I couldn’t attain that shape and I didn’t have a wolf’s speed. And two human feet wouldn’t outrun these things, whatever they were. Which meant there was only one thing I could do if I wanted to escape.
Become Aedh.
It wasn’t something I did very often—but then, it wasn’t very often I found myself in a situation like this, either.
I reached into my pocket and wrapped my fingers around my phone and keys, then closed my eyes and reached into that place inside me that wasn’t wolf—that was something far more—calling to the powers that were my Aedh heritage. Maybe it was the fear of the situation, because it surged to life immediately, flaring through me—a blaze of heat and energy that numbed pain and dulled sensation as it invaded every muscle, every cell, breaking them down and tearing them apart, until my flesh no longer existed and I became one with the air. Until I held no substance, no form, and could not be seen or heard or felt by anyone or anything.
Except, perhaps, by another Aedh, but none of these men belonged to that race.
I drifted toward the concrete ceiling, out of their way and yet close enough to hear everything they said.
The two who’d been coming in from either side skidded to a halt, and confusion crossed their half-animal features. One was lion-like, the other some sort of dog, and both of them had bodies that were deformed but powerful.
“What the fuck?” the lion one said, his voice a growl and the words barely understandable. “Where’s she gone?”
The dog-like one lifted his nose and sniffed the air. “Can’t smell her,” he said, his voice no clearer than the other man’s. “She’s gone.”
The man whose neck I’d stabbed walked up at that point, wiping away the blood with one hand. “Well, she obviously has some form of shifting ability, despite what we were told.”
“Doesn’t matter either way,” the panther-like one said. “She’s gone, and the boss is going to be pissed.”
The human glanced at him disdainfully. “Only if some meathead decides to tell him. She has to come back for the bike eventually. All we have to do is wait.”
“She’ll come back with help.”
The human glanced at the lion. “Obviously, but it won’t matter. We’ll just follow her again and wait for another opportunity. And this time, it’ll be less caution and more speed.”
“A gun might be useful,” the panther commented.
“We need to question her about her father first, remember?”
The panther gave him a disdainful look, then lowered his head, sniffing the droplets of blood briefly before his tongue flicked out. He licked it.
Eeeewwww.
“Graham, Mario, keep an eye on the exits in case she comes through before we can grab our car.” He glanced down at the cat. “Frankie, you lick that one more time and I’ll put a boot in your fucking face. Go get the car.”
The cat snarled in reply, but otherwise did what he was told, his skin rippling as he moved until what reached the stairs was human once more—albeit a human with somewhat torn and shredded clothing. The other two did the same as they walked up the ramp toward the exit level.
The human studied my bike long enough to make me uneasy, then spun on his heel and walked after the panther. I followed, an unseen force of en
ergy that crept along the roofline, flinching at the dust that rained through the pieces of me and hoping like hell they didn’t stick to the particles. Re-forming when grimy was never a pleasant experience, and it usually took days for the muck to work its way out of my system.
The human ran up the stairs and out into the street. Frankie—the cat—was half a block away, climbing into a black Toyota SUV. It wasn’t exactly a nondescript car, but I guess that wouldn’t have mattered, because under normal circumstances I wouldn’t have paid it much attention. And at least now that I knew who was driving it, it made an easier target to spot.
I glanced down at the plate, rolling the numbers through my mind to memorize them, then headed for the rear exit. The other two men were standing near an old gray Ute, one casually smoking, the other drinking a can of Pepsi. Like they had all the time in the world and hadn’t just tried to attack me.
