by Bella Klaus
“Bugger off,” I muttered.
He pulled himself up the cupboard with his front paws so he stood like Puss in Boots. “Meow?” he asked, curling his tail like a question mark. “Meow!”
“You didn’t finish your actual dinner,” I said with some bite. “Go away.”
Macavity shook his head, letting out a series of plaintive yowls.
I glowered down at the green-eyed menace. “No.”
He sat on his haunches and placed his front paws together, looking like he was praying.
“Alright then.” I cringed as I said the words. How could I let a cat boss me around in my own home? “If you’re still hungry after finishing your salmon, I’ll give you a bit of chicken.”
Macavity bolted across the room, leaped onto the chair, then onto the table, and ate his salmon at a more sedate pace.
What a devious little cat.
I had a few minutes to finish my new meal before Macavity could harass me for more food, so I took the sofa instead of the table. The cat raised his head and stared at me through narrowed eyes, seeming to have worked out that I didn’t trust him around my meals.
No longer in the mood to tell Macavity about my day, I picked up the remote and fired up our favorite movie, Dirty Dancing.
It wasn’t like I saw myself as the main character, plucked out of obscurity by an unfeasibly handsome man with a body that could twist a girl into knots. Dirty Dancing was just a guilty pleasure with an amazing soundtrack and great dance moves.
When Macavity was in a good mood, he’d even allow me to lift him over my head and he’d stretch out his front and back legs.
The Ronettes finished singing Be My Baby, and Macavity jumped down from the table. I glanced at the plates, finding them both devoid of salmon.
“Where do you put all that food?” I shook my head, wondering if I should get him checked out for worms.
Macavity stalked toward me, licking his chops. As he walked across a beam of moonlight streaming in through a chink in the curtains, the cat froze.
“What’s wrong with you now?” I stuffed a large forkful of chicken and potato salad in my mouth.
The cat hissed, jumped back and bolted for the door.
I rose to my feet, leaving my meal on the sofa. “I swear, if this is another trick—”
Macavity fell onto his side, jerking and shuddering and yowling as though scalded. Cold shock barreled through my gut and spread across my insides. I’d finally overfed him and now he was having a fit. My numb fingers scrambled for my smartphone, but I’d left it on the table by the half-eaten plate.
“Please don’t die.” I dashed across the room and picked up the phone.
A low growl reverberated across the room, sounding like it had come from something larger than a domestic cat. Macavity twisted and turned on the wooden floorboards, now twice his normal size and increasing with every passing second.
Panic exploded across my chest, bringing with it enough adrenaline to leap over the convulsing cat and wrench open the door. I’d never seen what happened to a were during the full moon. Their bites were infectious with absolutely no cure.
I bolted down the hallway and tumbled down the stairs with my pulse pounding between my ears, urging me to hurry out of there before I got infected or torn to shreds.
As far as I knew, no were-creatures ever spent their lives as cats outside the full moon, but I wasn’t about to wait around for Macavity to finish his transformation.
Chapter Eight
I dashed down the marble stairs, holding on to the iron banister for balance. The cold barely registered on my bare feet because Macavity’s low growl sent a fresh spike of cold panic through my veins.
The staircase curled down toward the ground floor, now seeming an endless labyrinth of concentric circles. What the hell was I doing? I should have taken the bloody elevator. Should have locked myself in the bathroom and climbed out onto the roof.
At any moment, Macavity would finish his transformation, and the ever-ravenous cat would pounce.
My bare feet stumbled and slapped on the stairs, stinging my soles with every step. I didn’t have my phone, my keys, my pajama bottoms.
Just as I rounded the corner and dashed through the landing of the fourth or fifth floor, a dark figure stepped out from the shadows. It was the man from earlier, who bumped into me on the street. I sprinted toward him, caught in his staring black eyes.
The man bared his teeth and snarled, raising his hands above his head. Normally, I’d find a sight like him menacing, but I had minutes—if not seconds—before Macavity caught up with me and attacked. His gaze dropped to my bottom half and he gaped. Hadn’t he ever seen a half-naked girl running for her life?
“Get out of my way,” I bellowed.
His lip curled, looking like he was about to say something threatening when Macavity roared.
A heavy thud reverberated through the hallway, making my heart want to leap out of my chest. The bloody cat had finished transforming and was now trying to break down the door.
The man’s gaze turned upward. “What in the name of Tartarus—”
“Run.” I barreled past, letting the loud snarls speak for themselves.
“Wait,” he growled.
Something cool and slimy looped around my wrist, and pulled me into a body that radiated cold power. The man’s arms wrapped around my waist, and more of that slime snaked around my neck, cutting off my air.
I screamed, and a flare of yellow light filled the hallway, making him release me with a moan.
An explosion of crashing wood echoed down the stairwell, wiping away speculations on what just happened. Macavity had broken through my apartment door and was probably ready for fresh meat.
Creepy guys with shadowy powers didn’t matter. If I didn’t put as much distance as possible between me and the transformed cat, I’d either be dead or joining him next month under the full moon.
As though propelled by an invisible force, I glided down the stairs, now taking them three or four at a time. Macavity made a low rumble that filled my veins with ice. Finally, I reached the bottom of the stairs, dashed down the black-and-white-tiled hallway to the front door, and escaped into the night.
Cold wind swirled around my body, chilling the sweat clinging to my bare flesh. The front door slammed behind me, but it was too early to cry out my relief. If Macavity could break out of my apartment, he might be able to break out of the building.
Strong hands caught me around the arms, pulling me into a broad chest. A burst of terror squeezed my heart, tearing a scream from my trembling lips.
“Morata,” murmured a familiar voice.
My head snapped up, and I stared into Valentine’s worried eyes. “There’s a cat—” A breath caught in the back of my throat as the full extent of what I’d just escaped seized my muscles in a full-body tremor. “Werecat.”
A guttural roar echoed from behind the door, sounding deep within the hallway. Valentine ushered me away from the building, through the cars parked around the square, and across the road to where the trees bordered the fenced garden.
My flesh crawled at the prospect of being close to a predator’s hiding place, but it was nothing compared to the way my heart pounded at the prospect of a gigantic werecat.
Valentine pressed a key into my hand. “Take this and get into my car.”
“We should leave together,” I stuttered.
“Someone is out to either kill or capture you.” He closed my fingers around the key. “If I don’t eliminate them now, you’ll be running until they succeed.”
Valentine released my shoulders and stalked across the road. He turned around and met my gaze with flashing red eyes.
“Go,” he barked.
Flinching at the ferocity of his command, I stared down at the key. It was one of those fobs with a button and a logo and no actual metal to stick into a keyhole. I pointed it further down the road and pressed what I hoped was a command to open the door. The indicator lights of
a black Lamborghini flashed on and off, so I jogged to the car and slipped into the cool leather seat.
The sliders on the dashboard were a cross between a recording studio’s MIDI controllers and something out of Star Trek. I couldn’t tell if they were for controlling the car or controlling the stereo.
Valentine had taught me to drive in Aunt Arianna’s Volkswagen Polo. I had no idea how to work this over-engineered dickmobile. I fumbled around the steering wheel for an ignition and snarled. The Lamborghini didn’t even have a key.
“Bloody hell,” I muttered under my breath and peered into the side mirror, watching Valentine at the building’s front door.
One of its panels exploded, and a massive paw swiped at the vampire’s face. I clapped both hands over my mouth to suppress a yelp. In the dim light, I couldn’t see what Macavity had turned into, but I was guessing it was the size of a tiger or a lion.
My fingers trembled across the dashboard, pressing switch after switch until they stumbled over a red button, and the engine roared to life. Now to pull out of the parking space and get the vehicle moving. I took another glance out of the rearview mirror to find a beast as large as a liger leaping toward Valentine.
“What?” I cried.
The streetlights illuminated an orange form with a dense pattern of black spots, looking like a larger, more muscular version of Macavity’s domestic cat form. Except that now, the creature was frozen in midair.
Valentine twisted his raised hand and spun the huge cat in the air. With a roar, the monster tried swiping at Valentine’s face, but he was too fast. Every muscle in my body froze. What the hell was that vampire doing to the big cat?
I couldn’t even call that thing a leopard because they were supposed to be no longer than five-three. This thing seemed longer than Valentine’s six-two frame and was supernatural, meaning it could match the strength of a vampire.
A cry caught in my throat, and I clutched at my chest. Valentine didn’t move things often with his mind. What if his control slipped? He’d get mauled. And all I could do was sit like a damsel in a distressed t-shirt in a soon-to-be-opened-like-a-can-of-corned-beef sports car.
The next time I dared to look out of the window, Valentine floated an unmoving Macavity through the front doors. My throat dried. He’d won?
I turned off the car and opened the door, trying to piece the events of the evening together. Macavity, the ravenous stray cat who had slept on my bed for several full moons, had chosen tonight to transform. Why? Because it was also Samhain?
Cool wind blew down the square, and shadows cast by the nearby trees shifted. I stared into the garden for signs of movement or for the feel of the unstable, angry energy of Mr. Masood, but the only supernaturals I could feel came from my building. Just the sharp, feral magic of a newly transformed Macavity and the seductive, smoky power of a vampire.
I bit down on my lip. Werewolves and werecats were difficult to kill. As a vampire king, Valentine had to know this. Perhaps he was keeping Macavity hostage until the full moon ended for an interrogation. I had to find out what was happening upstairs and tell him not to waste his time. Macavity would only transform back into a cat.
My building’s front door was a mass of broken pieces, hanging off a single hinge. I eased my way through the gap in the doorframe, crept over splintered wood, and continued to the stairs.
“Miss Griffin?” trilled a haughty voice from behind.
My heart stuttered. I whirled around with my hand on my chest to lock gazes with Mrs. Howard, the old lady who lived downstairs. She wore a brown, fur-lined housecoat that looked like something out of the 1950’s.
“Yes?” I replied.
“Will you tell whoever keeps playing their DVDs to be more considerate to their neighbors? I heard that racket through my doors.”
She stared at me through glazed eyes, indicating she’d recently been mesmerized and likely ordered to tell everyone that the noise they heard was just a movie.
“Alright, Mrs. Howard. I’ll do that,” I murmured.
“And tell that gentleman I met in the hallway that dogs, no matter their pedigree, are not permitted in this building!”
“Right.” I bounded up the stairs in case Valentine had ordered the old lady to say something else.
Not everyone in our building lived here full-time. Many were politicians and high-level executives who rented a pied-à-terre to cut down on a daily commute and returned to their country homes on the weekend. For example, the man downstairs flew in from Scotland so he could represent his constituency in the Houses of Parliament.
Thankfully, it was a Friday night, and the few of us who stayed the weekends were probably out having fun. I continued up the staircase, passing flickering wall lights that Macavity had probably smashed on the way down. On the third floor, something warm dripped onto my fingers.
I snatched my hand away from the banister and glanced up. Dark liquid drizzled from the fourth floor, looking disconcertingly like blood. My heart spasmed, and shards of terror splintered my insides.
This had to be Macavity’s doing. Supernatural vampires didn’t thirst for the liquid and only required a trace amount to maintain their iron levels.
My pulse pounded between my ears and an iron ball of dread rolled around my belly as I made my slow ascent up the stairs. Who had Macavity attacked and were they still alive? I swallowed several times around a dry throat, hoping that the blood just came from a flesh wound.
A ragged breath escaped my lips. I wished I’d listened to Valentine and driven across the river to Beatrice’s or even around the corner and stayed the night on one of the shop’s treatment tables. It was too late now. Now, I would have to witness the extent of Macavity’s rampage and possibly his death.
I reached the fourth-floor landing and rounded the corner to find three fingers lying in a pool of blood. A single black shoe lay a few feet away from the dark liquid, but apart from that, there was nothing—no footsteps or smudges or smears—nothing to indicate that the person had survived and had managed to escape.
Shuddering at the thought of walking through someone’s blood, I backed down the stairs and took the elevator up to the seventh floor. The clanky car climbed the levels, making me twitch with each crank of the old-fashioned elevator. Eventually, the doors creaked open, and I continued through to my apartment’s smashed-in door.
Inside, I heard Patrick Swayze shouting at Jennifer Grey to hold the position. Just as she screamed and fell into the water with a splash, I held my breath and stepped inside, hoping that Macavity hadn’t awoken and overpowered Valentine.
The sofa bed lay unfolded with Valentine sitting on the end engrossed in Dirty Dancing. Next to him sat a gigantic but conscious leopard with his spotted tail curled like a question mark.
They looked more like old friends than a pair of supernatural monsters who’d just engaged in a bitter fight.
My mouth dropped open. “What’s going on?”
Macavity turned around and shot me the same narrow-eyed glower he used whenever I interrupted his fun. I reared back, trying to process the scene unfolding on my sofa bed.
Valentine twisted around, holding what was left of my chicken. “Did you see the dead assassin?”
“What do you mean—” A memory tumbled into the front of my mind. That strange man I’d bumped into earlier this morning appearing on the fourth-floor landing. Macavity dashing to the door, looking suspicious.
What if Macavity hadn’t been trying to scam me out of extra salmon but had sensed an intruder? What if the reason he’d eaten so much was to power his transformation?
I glanced from the vampire to the giant cat. “What’s happening?”
Valentine picked up a broken collar. “Macavity needs to borrow a slimline belt.”
A hysterical laugh bubbled from my throat. “My cat’s just turned into a monstrous leopard, and you’re worried about the state of his accessories?”
Macavity hissed, but the sound just sent shards of irritation
across my skin. The cat just killed a man and wanted me to stop spoiling his enjoyment of the movie?
Valentine rose from the bed and walked across the room, fixing me with eyes that were now a deep violet. Heat bloomed across my skin. He used to gaze at me like that before we kissed, before he would spiral me into a whirlwind of desire with lips that never failed to deliver pleasure.
The pulse between my ears thudded hard enough to drown out the movie. This wasn’t happening. I wouldn’t melt at the sight of this wretched vampire, wouldn’t let him charm me into staying quiet.
I didn’t spend the past three years working hard to overcome a crushing heartbreak just to let myself get hurt. I stepped back, hitting my shoulder against the doorframe.
“Now do you believe me that your life is in danger?” Valentine’s deep voice curled around my senses like hookah smoke. He cupped my cheek, the warmth of his palm adding to the heat of my skin.
My heart lurched into my dry throat, and my eyes longed to flutter shut and savor his touch. I rolled his question around in my mind, savoring the nuances of his words.
“There was a man on the fourth-floor landing earlier,” I murmured.
Valentine frowned. “I had people watching the back of the building.”
I raised a shoulder. “He stepped out of shadows and grabbed me.”
His gaze swept down my baggy t-shirt and bare legs. “Did he hurt you?”
“He didn’t get a chance. Macavity’s roar distracted him and I ran.” At least that was what I remembered. Adrenaline still coursed through my veins, making everything seem fuzzy.
He was probably a shadow mage. I sensed their energy as devoid of heat, bending and stretching and fading the way shadows do in changing light.
“Now do you believe there’s an assassin?” Valentine asked, his eyes softening.
Something inside me flipped at the way he looked at me, but I lowered my lashes. Being a shadow mage didn’t mean the man had come to kill me. I was a nobody with no power, missed by no one. What if Valentine had hired him to attack me in the hallway?
