I shut Alex’s bedroom door, enclosing the mess. It wasn’t important. The bathroom door was shut, water running on the other side. Joseph stood at his end of the sofa, still as stone, watching.
“Joseph, Leo will be staying at a motel tonight.”
A curt nod, then he returned to his seated position, still stiff and wary. He probably wouldn’t relax until Leo was out the door.
I flopped down in the upholstered chair near the sofa. Too hard. Fingers of pain squeezed my belly, and I groaned. Let my head fall back against the cushion and closed my eyes. Just a little break. Most of the sleep I’d gotten lately came from being knocked unconscious. Twelve hours ago, I’d joked with Wyatt about finding a motel and sleeping for a week.
That option no longer existed. A few minutes to collect myself while Leo cleaned his face was all I would get.
I snapped awake in a dark apartment. Orange lamplight filtered in from cracks around the plastic-covered windows, giving me enough to see. Joseph was asleep on the couch, stretched out flat on his back, tense even while unconscious. Aurora was still curled up in her floor nest, as relaxed in slumber as her grandfather was alert.
My neck ached from the awkward position. I stretched as I stood. An angry beep came from my back pocket. One missed call on the cell phone. I stared, perplexed that I’d managed to sleep through it. More so when I saw the time on the phone’s display: after midnight.
Shit. How the hell had I fallen asleep for five hours?
I checked Alex’s room to verify Leo was gone (he was) and then closed myself into my room. I started to dial in for the voice mail and stopped. No password. All I could do was check the caller I.D.—the hospital. My heart thudded. I hadn’t spoken to Wyatt since early in the afternoon. He had to be worried. I hit Redial.
Halfway through the second ring, someone picked up and said, “Truman.”
I couldn’t stop my smile at the sound of his voice. “Hey.”
“Hey, yourself. I called you two hours ago.” Concern, more than anger, colored his words. “I haven’t heard from you since this afternoon. You okay?”
“Didn’t Isleen call you?”
“Yeah, which surprised the hell out of me. She just wasn’t very specific.”
I sat on the bed and slid back until I was leaning against the wall. “Sorry, I fell asleep. It’s been a weird day.”
“How’d the conversation with Jenner go?”
He sounded eager for information, to feel included and necessary to my investigation, but I didn’t want to go into specifics over the phone. I trusted him; I didn’t trust someone not to have bugged him. “I’ll tell you in a few hours when I come over.”
“It’s a little late for visiting hours.”
I laughed, then quieted, remembering my guests in the other room. Softly, I said, “Like that’s ever stopped me. Things got a lot more complicated today, and I don’t think I can …” A gentle snuffling sound caught my attention. I pulled the phone away and listened. It didn’t repeat.
“Evy? You there?” Wyatt’s voice was tinny, far away.
The apartment floor creaked outside my door. My heart sped up. Every sense came on high alert. Wyatt’s distant voice continued talking, so I shoved the phone under a pillow. And listened. The creak repeated, as did the snuffling, both of them closer.
Mouth dry, I slid to the end of the bed and stood. Soft carpet cushioned my steps. All the knives were in the kitchen. I mentally scanned the bedroom. In the top drawer of the jewelry box, I found a metal fingernail file. It was small and blunt, but it was all I had by way of a weapon.
I took three quick steps toward the door, listening. If it was Aurora up and in search of the bathroom, I didn’t want to burst out there and scare her into labor. No lights shone beneath the door; surely she or Joseph would have turned one on. Caution kept me still, while instinct screamed at me to run. Get away from the unknown and ominous threat until I could identify it and form a plan of engagement.
Like that was going to happen with my two charges out there.
Heart slamming against my rib cage, I reached my left hand toward the doorknob. My fingers barely brushed the copper. Something on the other side growled, furious and feline. The floor creaked as a great weight shifted. I scrambled backward, barely missing the door’s edge as it slammed open, the lock and knob splintering out of the frame.
I banged my hip on the edge of the desk and came to a full stop. In the dim orange light cast by street- lamps, a black jaguar padded into the room. Ears flat, it hissed, flashing white teeth the size of my thumb and a pink tongue as large as my hand. Its copper eyes were fixed on me, hunger and fury dancing in them.
Words strangled in my throat; I couldn’t even scream. Shadows moved in the living room. Voices spoke words I couldn’t hear. The apartment door opened.
No. “Aurora!” I shouted. “Joseph!”
The jaguar shrieked—a raucous cry to wake the dead. It reverberated in my chest and set my teeth on edge. I winced, flexing my grip on the nail file. The pathetic weapon would probably tickle such a big, all-muscle animal. No, not animal—Therian.
“I’m protecting them,” I said.
The animal made a face, and if I hadn’t known better, I’d have sworn it snorted at me. A shadow moved just outside the door, and a female figure stepped into a narrow pool of light. My stomach dropped.
“We protect our own,” Belle said. Gone was the simple waitress uniform, replaced with … nothing. She was completely naked, which was almost as unsettling as the jaguar next to her. “We don’t need Sapes messing with Clan business.”
I glared, my temper boiling. “Phineas came to me—”
“He is a fool to trust you.
“How—?”
She tugged her earlobe. Therian hearing—duh. She overheard us in the diner. She knew what Phin had told me about the bi-shifters.
Heat flushed my cheeks. Had that been Phin’s plan all along? Was all this just another goddamn setup? One more person picking me as their pawn of choice? My clenched fists ached. Tiny tremors tore up and down my spine, fueled by rage. The power of the Break snap-crackled, and I kept the kitchen in the back of my mind.
“What about Michael Jenner?” I asked, struggling to not fly at her.
Belle’s nostrils flared. “What about him?”
“He’s going to the Assembly on my behalf. We believe the other Clans are in danger from the same people who killed the Coni and Stri. I’m trying to find out who they are. I promised Phin I would.” His name was a bad taste in my mouth.
“And if they are human?”
“I don’t give a flying fuck if they’re human, faerie, goblin, or God; they will be punished.”
She stepped closer, one hand resting on the jaguar’s back. Her copper eyes flashed in the streetlight, mirrored like a predatory cat. “You lie. I know of no one who will choose another race above their own.”
“A criminal is a criminal.”
“Bullshit.”
“You’d defy the Assembly?”
“The Assembly hasn’t ruled on anything yet, human, and I’m going to save them the trouble.”
She moved in front of the jaguar and bent at the waist. Black and brown hair sprouted on once smooth skin. Her face flattened, broadened. In only seconds, she transformed into a tiger larger than the jaguar already holding court in my bedroom.
Belle the Tiger hissed and reared back, ready to pounce.
“Here, kitty, kitty,” I said.
She leapt. I latched on to the Break and let it pull me apart. I was sure I felt Belle as she landed where I had just been standing. I visualized the kitchen. Shifted. And slammed into something electric. Blue light fritzed my
