Now was our chance. The killer was surrounded. All we had to do was grab him.
We could escape this once and for all!
The lake waters roiled. Light from inside it turned dark, taking on a wine-red hue. Cerri shouted in warning as the waters split.
“Oh, shit,” I muttered.
We’d disturbed the hornet’s nest.
Maddox
This couldn’t be real.
Yet, here I was on all fours with claws that dug into the earth. My wolf growled in warning as it watched a figure rise from Lake Onondaga. She was tall and lithe, but in a way that screamedinhuman. The proportions of her limbs were just a little too long. Her eyes were a little too wide. When she raised a hand, there were extra joints on each finger.
“Who dares disturb my court?” she asked with a smoky voice that boomed over everyone present.
The alien woman took in the scene, from me to the flower covered dragon standing near Addie. I leapt and instinctually placed myself at Addie’s side. Something about this alien woman raised my hackles. Maybe I wasn’t Addie’s servant, but I also wasn’t going to allow anyone else to hurt her.
However, this Alien woman paid no attention to Addie. Instead, she turned her dark glare on Cerri, who was still on the ground, her hair dripping with lake water.
Addie buried her hand in my fur. I leaned into her thigh while we watched the alien woman approach Cerri.
The flower and bone dragon moved of its own accord to stand between the alien woman and Cerri. It gave Cerri time to rise to her feet. Though she was still sopping wet, she rolled her shoulders back in a regal gesture that matched the other woman’s. Now that I looked between the two, I could see similarities in them.
I didn’t think they were related. While one was dark and dangerous, the other was bright and determined. They didn’t share blood, but they did come from the same place. Whatever the alien woman was, Cerri shared in that same lineage.
The alien woman tilted her head. “I thought I wiped out your entire family.”
A stunned silence swept over us all. No one dared breathe.
“Excuse me?” Addie’s voice cracked as it swept over everyone.
The bone and flower dragon stepped towards the alien woman. She lifted an unimpressed hand, perhaps with the intention of dispelling it. A patch of flowers on the beast’s chest withered and crumbled, but Addie laughed.
When Addie stalked up to stand beside her friend, my wolf panicked. I rushed to keep up with her. Though I wanted to place myself between Addie and the alien woman to keep Addie from getting any closer to her, I knew that I couldn’t stand in the middle of this.
My animal instincts were screaming. I needed to learn to decode them soon, or else I would be in a world of trouble. This woman, alien and powerful, wasn’t just anyone. Addie and Cerri were facing off against a larger threat than the killer now.
Wait. The killer.
He was nowhere to be seen. The horrendous rubber rabbit mask and the man beneath it had vanished into thin air. I lifted my nose and sniffed. The scent was faint but there. I could have followed it, but my wolf refused to leave Addie’s side.
This creature inside me was bound to her.