Page 10
“Like I passed out when your tongue did the dirty on my dick back at the Stephanie Hotel an’ I got god powers?”
“Uhm, yeah. Like that.”
“So you think he’s alright? We don’t need to take him to a vampire vet or something?”
He didn’t look bad, but with only the light shining from the stars it was real hard to tell. “Maybe we should see if he’s healed that gunshot wound? It did look bad.”
Zee stopped. “Okay, imma pass him to you.” He dropped Victor’s feet, propping up his limp body on the asphalt. “You grab him, an’ I’ll take a look at his back.”
“Okay.” I widened my stance, and held out my arms—like a trust exercise, but the person who was supposed to trust us was unconscious.
“You got him?” Zee asked, holding Victor under the arms, readying to hand him over.
“Yup. Pass him to me.”
Zee shoved, and Victor dropped like a stone. “Wait!” I lunged, sort of caught his wrist, and jerked Victor up into my arms with his arm flung over my shoulder. His center of gravity shifted, threatening to flop him out of my arms again. I twisted, scooping him around the waist.
“How am I gonna see the hole in his back if you’re dancin’ with him? Hold still.”
“I just . . . need . . .”
Bright high beams blasted out of the gloom, illuminating the three of us in a flood of blinding light. Zee screamed. His wings popped out, and for some bizarre reason he covered his crotch, despite the fact he was wearing clothes.
Light burned to the back of my night-adjusted eyes. I tried to shield them from the glare, and caught sight of a figure behind an open car door. A figure with a gun.
A shot barked.
Zee yelped again, then grabbed my arm and dragged me—with Victor heaved over my shoulder—off the road, down a bank, and into a ditch. Water sloshed around my ankles, slurping at my shoes. Victor slipped from my grip and flopped against the bank. I grabbed him and slung him over my other shoulder. Not easy, considering he’s real tall and I’m not.
“C’mon, run, Kitten!”
“Wait—” I stepped after Zee and dropped, up to my knees in slurpy water. What was this place?
Shouts sailed behind us, chasing us down. Maybe it was Toby’s family come to avenge him or the cops chasing us down or a pitchfork-carrying mob. I really did not want to hang around to find out why they’d shot first instead of asking questions. If we could get some space between us, we could stop and regroup, then once Victor was safe and awake, I’d go back and eat them all. Or not. Depending on whether they were good or bad people.
We waded deeper. Water climbed up my thighs, sloshing from Zee’s splashing ahead.
Finally Zee stopped our retreat, and leaned against some kind of enormous tree with knotted roots that looked like frozen worms reaching down beneath the water’s black surface.
“We’re far enough away, right?” Zee pressed a hand to his chest, panting.
“Uhm, I guess?” Everything around us was black—black water, black trees, black sky. No stars. Nothing.
“A sign back on the road said no swimming alligators, so we’re good,” Zee said, mostly to himself.
“There was a sign about alligators?” I hadn’t seen any sign.
“Yeah, they can’t swim ’cause of their fur.”
“Oh yeah, sure, probably.” Zee had asked me what an alligator was a few days ago, when Toby mentioned Florida had them. The hotel’s reference books had been very clear, and had a whole section about alligators being small furry creatures that ate grains, like mice.
“Furry things can’t swim,” Zee said with confidence, so he must have been right.
“Oh. Okay.” I wasn’t sure why there needed to be a sign telling everyone alligators couldn’t swim. Maybe it was a Florida thing.
We fell quiet . . . and everything else had fallen quiet too. Earlier, it had seemed like there were a million critters chittering out here, but not anymore. The silence was . . . weird. Wasn’t it? Maybe we’d disturbed them. Hopefully they were all very small, cute, and harmless. Like alligators.
“You think we’re safe?” Zee whispered.
