“Is this true?” he said to Vormus.
“Neither of us have any children.”
According to Manson, Vormus, and Mal, the shifters couldn’t breed with each other, but every once in a while a female shifter would be impregnated by a mortal male. In rare cases the baby could survive. That was the theory behind Smoke and Sid, that they were shifter offspring. The thought of his mother or Sid’s mother being a shifter made him sick. “What do you want, Reginald? Or rather, what does Kane want?”
“Surrender and come with me, willingly, to meet Kane.”
“And if I don’t?”
Reginald held up the phone. “Then your family dies.”
CHAPTER 37
Surrender. It wasn’t ever part of Smoke’s modus operandi. He set the sword on the ground. “I agree, but I want to see everyone out safely first.”
“But. Such a troublesome word. But—just this once—I’ll reward it in good faith.” Reginald gave a sharp whistle. Nestled in the hedges that hugged the building was Swift Venison the were-rat. He slipped out of the bushes wearing nothing but a pair of pants. His fuzzy chest and arms rippled with knots of muscle. He slinked beside Reginald, wringing his pinkish, long-nailed hands. “What is your bidding?”
“Make sure he doesn’t have a weapon on him. Vormus, step aside.”
Vormus complied.
Venison padded over. With eyes like coal orbs, he picked over Smoke’s body, removing the gear belt and, before tossing it aside, snapping on a pair of flex cuffs. “I hate these things.” He secured Smoke’s hands crossed behind his back with the cuffs. He pulled them tight.
Smoke winced.
Venison touched Smoke’s cold ear with his nose. “Uncomfortable, isn’t it?”
Smoke lifted his shoulders.
The were-rat shoved Smoke’s head aside, reached down, and picked up the sword. He brought the edge to Smoke’s throat. “If it were up to me, I’d be done with you. One swing and I’d turn your head into a bloody kickball.”
“That’s enough, Venison,” Reginald warned. “Kane doesn’t want him harmed. Maybe roughed up a bit.”
“Roughed up?” Venison clacked his teeth together really fast. His long whiskers brushed Smoke’s cheek. “Thanks to you, I was stuck in the hole!” He cocked back his elbow and punched Smoke in the gut. The blow lifted Smoke up on his toes.
Smoke groaned. “You hit awfully hard for a rat. A girl rat.”
Venison’s tail coiled around Smoke’s neck and squeezed his face red.
“That’s enough!” Reginald ordered. “Just pat him down and take him to the car. Buckle him into the front seat and keep a gun on his head.” He turned his attention to Vormus. “Go ahead and fetch your friends.”
Chin up and eyes down on Reginald, Vormus floated away with a sneer and vanished into the garage.
Smoke took a seat in the car. The leather squeaked under him.
Venison buckled him in. He kept the gun barrel on Smoke’s temple. “Just give me a reason. Any reason at all. I’d love to blast a tunnel through your head.”
“And I’d still have more between my ears than you do now, rat. Tell me, why’d you choose to be a rat? Was it a natural affection for waste and filth?”
Venison peeked over at Reginald. He was on the phone with his back turned. Venison punched Smoke in the jaw. “Shut up!”
The were-rat walked around the SUV and crawled into the driver’s seat, started the engine, dropped the shifter into drive, and pulled up alongside Reginald, hitching his elbow out the window. “We’ve got them now. Just blow the rest up. Kane won’t be mad. If anything, he’ll be glad.”
“Don’t be an imbecile, Venison. Now turn the car around so she can get a good look at him.”
***
As soon as Vormus entered the room, Sid said, “Where’s Smoke?”
“He’s outside with Reginald.”
“Reginald!” She rushed toward the doors.
Vormus blocked her exit.
She stuck a gun in his face. “Get out of my way!”
“At least let me tell you what to expect.”
“I’ll pass.”
“I insist. Apparently, this building is set for detonation. Reginald holds the trigger. In exchange for your safety and everyone else’s, Smoke agreed to become Kane’s prisoner.”
“No! I’m not letting that happen.”
“It’s too late,” Vormus said. “Your husband made his decision. If he’s not gone yet, he’ll be gone as soon as you get there. I recommend you stay here. Kane won’t kill you, but he’ll backtrack and kill the rest of them.” He eyed the people stirring in their troughs of goo. Many of them were sitting up and talking.
Manson eyed the ceiling. “You don’t want all that blood on your hands.”
Sid took a quick glance back. She shook her head. “No, I’ve got to see him.”
***
Vormus stepped aside.
Sid raced away.
He said to Manson as he eyeballed the ceiling, “Do you really think this entire building is wired to explode?”
“That’s what I would do.”
“Then why aren’t you running?”
“I’m staying with them,” said the man in the child’s body. “There are worse ways to go. But I don’t know what you’re standing around for. Someone needs to protect her.”
***
Sid’s long legs ached with every stride. She’d never felt so tired in her life. She pushed up the incline and passed under the ruined inner garage door, which was propped open with a ladder. The short sprint left her winded as she reached the top of the driveway. Hands on hips and sucking for breath, she saw Reginald standing beside the SUV.
Smoke sat in the passenger seat. He winked at her. “Hi, honey.”
She approached.
“I’m going to advise you not to come any closer, Mrs. Smoke,” Reginald said.
“What’s going on?”
“In exchange for your safety and that of those left in the basement, your dear husband has agreed to come with me. And if he doesn’t come peacefully,” he held up his phone, “boom.”
“You’re a bastard, Reginald!”
“Don’t be upset with me. It’s not my plan, it’s Kane’s. He’s quite the control freak, and I have to tell you, you’ve made him very, very angry. But in the end, he will have what he wants: Smoke.”
“I thought he wanted me,” she said, easing forward. “Take me instead of him.”
“That was the idea in the beginning, but now Kane feels you are tainted. He has a sure thing with Smoke, but there is little to gain with you, seeing how you might only have a few months left to live.”
Sid stiffened. “What are you talking about?”
“Your pregnancy. It is almost certain death for a woman who becomes impregnated by a shifter.” He shrugged. “One would have figured Kane would be more careful about that.”
Skin crawling beneath her suit, she said with curled lips, “You’re lying.”
“I have no reason to lie. Besides, it was your foul copulations that got you into this mess. You should have been more careful.” He opened the back door. “But enjoy today’s small victory while you still live. It was quite a blow.”
“Wait!”
Reginald closed the door.
“John, don’t believe a word he says!”
The SUV moved forward with Smoke’s eyes on hers. The window started to roll up, and Smoke said, “If he’s a boy, name him after me.”
“John!” She ran after the SUV all the way to the gate. The vehicle’s red taillights outdistanced her and disappeared around the first bend in the road. The echo of the engine faded. She held her hand to her abdomen. The moments of her being sick rushed through her head. It all came together, and she knew her instincts were true. She dropped to her knees. “Morning glory, I’m pregnant.”
CHAPTER 38
“Are you okay?’ Vormus asked her.
She glanced up. The shifter with long ghostly whit
e hair floated inches above the ground with a backdrop of black cloudy sky behind him. The wind picked up, blowing his hair. Sid’s chest tightened as she soaked everything in.
“How did Reginald know I was pregnant?”
“Shifters have heightened senses. My guess is he sensed the extra heartbeat.”
“Did you sense it?”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t say anything?”
“I honestly didn’t think you wanted to hear the news from me, did you? Wouldn’t that have spoiled the moment?”
“Not nearly as bad as what Reginald just did. Bastard.” With a grunt, she pushed herself up to her feet. “It can’t be Kane’s baby, can it? It’s been too long since I’ve been with him.”
“Shifters run off a different chemistry. It’s hard to say who fertilized the condemned egg.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Fertilized?”
“No, condemned.” Her eyes followed the road. A void filled her. Smoke was gone. He had made a sacrifice to save her and everyone else. She had a sinking feeling it would be more than just his life. She could still see the window rolling up over his face. His lips were still moving.
Oh crap, he was saying something!
Stunned, she closed her eyes, envisioning the scene again. Watching his lips move over and over again in her mind, she mumbled.
“What are you doing?”
“Ssssh!”
She got it. “Get them out!”
“Get who out?”
“The people who were cloned. Oh crap, we have to get them out of there!” With a surge of new strength, she ran for the building, down the ramp, down the stairwell, and into the room.
With a bad limp, Manson was already leading the people outside. He said to Sid, “We’re about to go boom, aren’t we.”
“I’m not taking any chances.” She threw a man’s arm over her shoulder and started leading him up the stairwell, yelling, “Vormus!”
Vormus appeared in the fire exit door. “Yes?”
“Help us get them all clear of the building.”
“Saving mortals isn’t something I’m accustomed to. Be wise and just leave before it’s too late.”
Standing in the garage, she said, “Really? That’s funny, seeing how you aren’t as immortal as you think.” She pointed at the fallen giants with her chin and then shoved the man she was helping into Vormus’s hands. “Everyone dies if we don’t get moving.”
Taking the man by the waist, he said, “I see your point, but I hardly feel threatened.”
The outer garage door dropped—past the one Sid and Smoke had blasted off the motors—sealing them inside. Yellow emergency lights flashed. An alarm sounded over and over with a loud buzzing sound. A computerized female voiced counted down. “Sixty...fifty-nine…fifty-eight…”
Hand to her forehead, Sid said, “It’s like a James Bond nightmare.”
“James who?”
Sid spotted the shipyard container. “In there! Take the people in there!”
She got Ted to safety and then rushed up the steps with two people attached to her hips. It was like carrying sandbags. “Come on!” she said to the shifters. “You have to help me.”
Vormus carried two over his shoulders.
Manson did as well, with a slightly embarrassed shrug at how weak he had tried to seem.
“…Twenty-seven…twenty six…”
Sid got the pair inside and made another run. She passed Manson on the way down. The young boy carried a girl in his arms. “How many more are there?”
“Three.”
She made it into the hallway, where a man and a woman were slumped over. The man was the heavyset Augustus Wilhelm. She took a peek into the lab and didn’t see a third person inside the room.
“Dammit!” Sid hustled over to Wilhelm and the much smaller lady.
It was Rebecca Lang. She looked at Sid with lucid eyes.
Sid’s jaw hung open. “Rebecca, get on my back! Wilhelm, get your sorry ass up those stairs and into the shipping container, or you’re going to die!”
Blinking, he said from a sagging jaw, “Where am I?”
“You’re about fifteen seconds from hell, you sonuvabitch!” She grabbed his arm. “Now get your ass up!”
Rebecca’s lithe arms latched onto Sid’s back. She was saying, “Thank you. Thank you.”
Somehow, Sid made it up the stairs with both of them. She staggered to the container and dropped them inside.
“…nine…eight…seven…”
“I didn’t see a third person down there,” she said to Manson.
“I’ll take care of it.”
“There’s no time!”
From behind, Vormus hauled her inside with a fling that sent her sprawling on top of all the others.
Manson and Vormus closed the container doors together, with Manson saying, “Goodbye, Sid.” The doors shut and sealed. Her world became pitch black. Outside was the sound of the world coming to an end with a repeated ear-jolting BOOM—BOOM—BOOM!
CHAPTER 39
With a grin on his face, Reginald set his phone down on the center console. “All in a day’s work.”
Venison drove, but the were-rat still had a gun in Smoke’s face.
Shifting in his seat, Smoke said, “You killed them, didn’t you.”
“Again, to be clear, I was only following orders.”
Jaws clenching, Smoke replied, “We had a deal.”
“You had a deal with me, but Kane supersedes that.”
“So you’re supposed to be the good guy?”
“On the contrary, I’m glad to see them all go. I’m not a people person. The fewer, the better. But I’m sure your cherished bride survived. I did let her out, you know. My, I just had a thought. I hope she didn’t go back inside.” Reginald leaned forward. He opened the center console and fished out a hard pack of Camel unfiltered cigarettes. He tapped a cig out from the carton and put it between his lips. Reading the pack, he said, “Turkish and domestic blend. I always found that to be a unique selling point. Have you ever been to Turkey, Smoke?”
“I can’t say I have.”
“Well, who knows what your new future might bring.” Reginald offered a cigarette. “Smoke, Smoke? We have a long ride ahead.”
“Funny, but I’ll pass. Those things will kill you, you know.”
“So I’ve heard.” Reginald eased into the backseat. He took a Zippo from his pocket, flicked the top open, and struck up the flame. Lighting his cigarette, he said, “I love tobacco almost as much as I love killing people. It’s so… satisfying.”
Venison coughed. “I think it’s disgusting.” He rolled down his window and checked Reginald in the rearview mirror. “A filthy mortal habit. You should be above that.”
“It’s my way of blending in. Now roll that window back up. It messes up my hair.”
“So where are we going?” Smoke said, adding in a cough to cover the sound of his diamond-dust-peppered fingernails sawing at his flex cuffs. “Is it another secret location buried deep in the heart of DC? Personally, I think it would be cool if it was the White House. I’ve never been.”
“You are being taken to a transformation station. Willing or not, you’re going to be subjected to the change. Kane’s excited to see how the shifter blood in you will respond. You might want to give a little thought to the kind of monster you want to shift into. I’m sure there is some creature out there you identify with.” Reginald stuck the cigarette pack in front of Smoke’s face. “A camel, perhaps? Now that would be different.”
Venison let out a high-pitched chuckle.
Still clawing at his weakening bonds, Smoke said, “How about a doppelganger? Huh? I could be your replacement.”
“No one can replace me.” Reginald blew a stream of yellow smoke out his nose. “I’m the top of the line.”
“There’s always someone better and stronger out there. You just haven’t met them yet.”
“I’m certain whoever it
is, it isn’t you.” Reginald’s eyes drifted to the window.
“Certainly not.” Venison snickered and coughed. The gun barrel wobbled.
Smoke rolled his wrists, snapping his bonds just as they passed over a pothole. They were about a mile from the main highway. “Bumpy ride,” Smoke said to Venison.
“I like the potholes. I pretend they are people.” Venison aimed for a bad patch in the road. The vehicle jostled.
Smoke acted. He knocked the gun aside with one hand and jerked the car wheel with the other. The vehicle sped over the embankment, crashing through the trees. It smacked hard on its side and tumbled side over side, finally smashing hard into an oak tree. Smoke wrenched the gun free from Venison’s hands, undid his seatbelt, and squeezed out of the busted car window.
As soon as he came to his feet, Venison was there, chest heaving. A nasty scrape crossed the bridge of his nose.
“You idiot! I’ll kill you for what you did!”
“Not as long as I have this.” Smoke held up his pistol.
Venison’s rat eyes widened.
Smoke filled him with blue-tipped lead with two shots to the heart and two to the head.
Venison dropped on the spot.
Reginald appeared from the other side of the vehicle with his cigarette bent in his mouth. He was clapping. “Clever. Very clever. Another shifter bites the dust.” He dropped his cigarette on Venison’s face. “Eh, he always was a weak one anyway. A shot through the heart and head is rat poison to the likes of him. But now you’re going to have to deal with me. That little gun of yours won’t work on me.”
Smoke tossed the gun aside. “I won’t need it to take you down.”
Reginald pushed his sleeves up. “Apparently you’ve forgotten the beating I gave you last time.”
“No, I’ve been thinking about it every day.”
CHAPTER 40
“You’re a fool, Smoke. I’ve honed my skills over hundreds of years.” Reginald stepped over some saplings down to the open ground where the hillside bottomed out and train tracks bent through the woods. “This level ground makes for a more suitable arena. I’d rather not fight among the sticks. I’m quite fond of this shirt.” He rubbed the sleeve. “It’s from Italy. I like the Italians. They’re very passionate people.” His face changed into the image of Rocky Balboa. He hunkered down into a boxer’s stance with is lazy eyes fixed on Smoke. “Come on, Apollo. Let’s go.”
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