Feral Pride (22 page)

A poster of Montgomery Scott stares benevolently down on me. If the
Enterprise
were threatened, what would Scotty do?

Peso springs off the smiley-face beanbag to bark rapid-fire warning. My Cat ears recognize the way Jess climbs to my tree house, how she grips the midway branch with both hands and swings one leg up, how she says “oomph” once she reaches the base.

At the tree-house entrance, she asks, “Are you watching?”

“It doesn’t make sense.” Why did I let myself be driven away? I’m no soldier, that’s true. I was scared, but no more than I sensed from Yoshi or Clyde. My new friends need me. “I have to go.”

“Go . . . what?” Jess replies. “We’re going where?”

“Not us,” I reply, powering down my computer. “Me.” I’m caught short by the flash of rejection on her face. It’s worse because I’ve made her feel that way before. By way of apology, I explain, “It’s my fight.”

Peso’s hopping, his tail whipping back and forth. As I brush past her, Jess grabs hold of my arm. “Kayla —”

“They’re at Whispering Pines Resort,” I explain, breaking her grasp. Exiting the tree house, I add, mostly to myself, “I’m an
Acinonyx jubatus sapiens.
I can do this. I’m just as much of a shifter as the rest of them. I can run like a cheetah and —”

“Kayla,
wait
!” Jess calls, as I leap to the grass below. She dangles a set of keys. “We’ll still get there faster in my dad’s car, especially if we turn the flashers and siren on.” She glances down at my Chihuahua. “Should we leave the dog up here?”

I DUCK
, covering Quincie’s body as a tranq gun flies at my face, the stock winging my right shoulder and skidding to a stop across the pavement. “Ow.”

When I raise my head again, I’m surrounded by giant werejavelinas in mid-shift form — snouts, glazed beady eyes, a half dozen of them, male and female, closing in from all sides.

“Hi, guys!” I say, pointing. “The Big Bad Werewolf went thataway.”

That’s the thing about having a mind-control chip shoved into your head. No sense of humor. I throw Quincie’s body over my shoulder, and a Javelina charges out of the shrub cover and stumbles up the pavement. He grunts, rubbing his short tusks together.

I might be able to dodge past them to the trees, but not carrying Quincie. She’d tell me to stay on target, to leave her body here. No way am I going to do that.

The Javelinas turn their thick heads, staring into the darkness behind me, unsteady on their feet. Someone’s coming. With my luck, it’s a stampeding herd of weremoose.

No, it’s a black-and-white cop car, Sheriff Bigheart’s car.

“Yoshi,
jump
!” That’s Kayla voice, coming from the front passenger window.

I spring straight up, not as high as I’d get without Quincie, but high enough to land on the roof of the squad car, and grab hold of the light bar as it crashes into two Javelinas.

“Sorry!” Jess calls. I hear her double-check with Kayla about shifter healing abilities.

“Raise the windows,” I yell, remembering the knockout gas. Superheroic Quincie might’ve wanted to risk it, but Jess is driving a moving vehicle.

“Oh, right,” I hear Kayla mutter.

As the glass goes up, Jess floors it and shouts, “Hang on!”

IT LOOKS LIKE
monsterpalooza in the amphitheater. I take a clawed swipe at the governor. Her mascara’s smeared. She’s sweating through her red suit jacket.

Seth and Boreal asked for drama. They ordered me to put on a show.

I chase Lawson around the arena. My saber teeth snap and salivate.

I can’t stall forever. There’s a gun to Aimee’s head.

With a crack, Lawson’s whip slashes my furry golden brown chest. It’s true what I told my mom. Since finding out I’m a Wild Card, I haven’t taken Possum form. But I haven’t had a chance to master my inner Lion either.

I’ve had to be more careful, if that’s possible. An urban Possum, even a big one, could be written off as an animal. An urban Lion wouldn’t.

Black leather breaks my nose, and blood gushes out. The governor knows her way around a whip. She’s gotten in a few good licks. I knock the Bible from her hand. It flies into one of the architectural columns. I can only imagine how that’s playing on America’s screens.

The whip cuts across my eyes. It splits my right lid. Fresh blood clouds my vision. My claws catch the governor’s arm. I rip her sleeve, catching the skin beneath. Damn it!

“You may kill me, beast!” Lawson clutches her wound. Her voice is magnified by the lapel mic. “But you’ll never destroy my faith or the spirit of the people of Texas.”

It’s just short of a campaign speech. She’s putting on a brave face. She believes Seth’s declaration of war is real. She believes I want to kill her. The whole world must believe it.

“Enough, Leander!” Seth calls. “End this now.”

I can make out Aimee’s frantic voice, rising up, begging me to stop. I can’t. I’m trapped.

I’m . . . I . . . Color and chaos blur. I can’t focus. My inner Lion attacks. Lawson hits the ground. She gasps. The cries of the eager mid-shift crowd sharpen.

Prey
, my Lion thinks. No,
enemy.
His jaws close over its lips, nose. Locks its mouth shut. His saber teeth puncture burnt, bitter flesh.

The Possum inside plays dead. The boy inside collapses.

I
reject the foul-tasting meat. I throw back my mane. Raise my misshapen forearms and paws in victory. I roar,
only
Lion now.

I LOWER MYSELF
from the roof of the squad car and rub my aching shoulder. “You’re saying Clyde might’ve already killed Lawson?” It makes no sense. Leander’s car is parked in the circle drive ahead of us. The rear bumper is missing. We are running a couple of minutes late.

That could’ve made all the difference.

I lay Quincie’s body in the backseat, and the glow coming from her holster catches my eye. Baffled, I glance up at the streetlights bordering the circle drive in front of the hotel’s main entrance. Then I lean in, seeking the source of the reflection.

Kayla and Jess are still talking, but it’s as if from a distance. I hear the word
hurry.
I don’t mean to ignore them, but I can’t look away from the Light. I rush to the other side of the car to reach it. Slipping off my breath mask, I open the other rear door. What is this?

I slip one hand beneath Quincie’s shoulder to raise her slightly, and my other closes around a metal grip. I draw the weapon, a sword, and hold it up. Gleaming gold, the hilt fashioned to look like wings. I’d swear it’s handcrafted, priceless. “You think we should —?”

“Yes,” Kayla replies as Jess comes around from the trunk with a gray blanket to position over Quincie’s body. Kayla adds, “
Now
, Yoshi.”

The sword’s magnificence is almost mesmerizing. Kieren said “no weapon of this earth” could kill the demon. If not this earth, where did it come from? “Because?”

Kayla looks like she’s about to leave without me. “When you’re off to battle hell spawn and you come across a glowing sword, you take it. You’d know these things if you read fantasy or went to church. Jess?”

“Sorry, sweetie. I’m a big fat no on stealing from dead people. Big. Fat. No. On the other hand, I’m not her. This Quincie girl might be disappointed if you didn’t finish the job she died trying to do. It’s your call, Yoshi. She’s your partner on this mission. What do you think?”

Me? I’m a part-time antiques salesclerk, marginal high-school student, and Grams’s target practice. Werecat, sure. Devastatingly good-looking. But you could say the last of Kayla, too. On the other hand, I’m betting the sword is one of the secrets Quincie mentioned, and I’m the one she chose to trust with it.

As the girls cover Quincie’s body, I set the sword on the roof of the car. I draw and, unleashing the safety, give my tranq gun to Kayla and my Taser gun to Jess. “Whoever the retrieval teams can spare should be on their way. Jess, can you —?”

“I’ll wait here for them.” Jess pulls out her phone. “In the meantime, this is still my daddy’s jurisdiction. I’ve got to let him know what’s happening . . . before he misses the car.”

Kayla and I take off running, across the manicured grass around the hotel, past swaths of wildflowers, to the amphitheater. She pulls ahead at the horse and donkey corral.

Her speed — it’s breathtaking. She reaches the amphitheater before I do.

DUCKING BEHIND
a heavy canvas arch, I can’t see past the frenzied mid-shift crowd.

I leap for the nearest metal rafter, scanning for Clyde. There, center stage! He’s cut up badly. His face is a bloody mess. He’s staring at his hands as if he doesn’t know what they are.

Is that woman sprawled next to him the governor? Is she
dead
? I aim the tranquilizer gun.

Aimee is close enough to a mic for it to pick up her voice. “It’s too risky to wait any longer. You’re all off camera. Leave now and there’ll be no proof you were ever here.”

I fire. The dart strikes Clyde’s hip. Arching his back, he growls in surprise.

Seth’s head rises, and he meets my eyes. “Guards!”

Before the yetis can get me in their sights, I drop into a crouch, vault down the center aisle. I’m a blur against the noisy crowd. “Clyde!” I shout. “Clyde, stop!”

“It’s all about to come crashing down.” Aimee’s voice again. “Daemon Island all over again. Let Seth take the blame.”

As I pass, the female yeti — Crystal — draws a revolver from her baby’s sling and points it at the male who’s running the tech. “Move away from the controls!” Then she waves away the henchman holding Aimee at gunpoint. “Retreat to the helipad. Guards, retreat!”

“Clyde!” I yell, approaching. He doesn’t seem to recognize his name. “What’re you —?”

His first blow knocks the tranq gun out of my hands. Then his Lion claws tear the bottom of my shirt, raking across my stomach. I gasp. I’m cut, bleeding, springing back on reflex to avoid being hurt worse. Oh, boy . . . I don’t think Clyde’s in there anymore.

“Give that gun to me!” the male yeti shouts. “You’re hysterical. Your hormones —”

“So help me, Boreal, if you explain my hormones to me one more time, I will shoot you!”

Seth whips his head in her direction. “You are nothing, Crystal.
Nothing.
You’re only here because your thickheaded mate —” She fires, shearing off one of the demon’s horns.