“Apparently Melli and Liosh ran into the guy who, uh, hurt her in high school and Liosh went after him. Somebody called the police and now it’s a big mess.”
He nodded, his golden eyes glowing.
“Not surprising. Liosh probably went into Rage when he saw the bastard who hurt his female.”
Jodi nodded distractedly and went back to her sister.
“Take a deep breath,” she told Melli. “I’m sure he didn’t really kill him. Everyone is probably over-reacting.”
“Amanda Brannigan is here telling the police that he killed Jason on purpose,” Melli sobbed. “I can’t get them to listen to me when I tell them he was trying to…to hurt me again. And Liosh had blood all o-over h-his f-face!”
She was dissolving into incoherence again and Jodi knew she had to get some information fast.
“Where are you?” she demanded. “I’m coming to get you right now.” She looked at the big Kindred, who nodded grimly. “And Vorn will go after Liosh. Everything is going to be all right—you’ll see, Melli. I promise.”
As soon as she hung up, James started talking.
“Darling, what is going on?” he demanded. “What was your little sister blathering on about? And where do you think you’re going?” he added, frowning as Jodi grabbed her purse and keys. “I believe we were in the middle of a very serious discussion!”
“It’ll have to wait, James,” Jodi snapped. She looked at Vorn. “We’d better take separate vehicles. I need to get Melli and it sounds like Liosh got taken to the police station.”
He nodded grimly.
“Where are we going?”
Jodi gave him the address and then ran to her car, leaving James to stand there gaping.
But as she and Vorn raced to their respective vehicles, neither one of them noticed the shadowed figure hiding around the side of the duplex or heard the soft hissing whisper as a forked tongue flickered out to taste the air.
Thirty-Eight
“I can’t believe this. I can’t believe the police wouldn’t let Liosh go! Now he’s going to go to prison forever and it’s all my fault!” Melli slumped on her big sister’s couch and put her head in her hands.
“Honey, no! It’s not your fault at all!” Jodi put an arm around her shoulders and squeezed reassuringly. “And nobody is taking Liosh to prison. You know the Kindred have diplomatic immunity! Also, they passed that law a while back saying they couldn’t be prosecuted for hurting a man who was attacking their mate.”
“But I’m not Liosh’s mate—not yet!” Melli protested. “And they wouldn’t even believe Jason Sykes was attacking me—thanks to Amanda Brannigan.” She curled her hands into fists. “When I think that she was the one who set him on me in the first place! And then she was telling the police lies about how she and Jason were just talking and all of a sudden Liosh came out of nowhere and attacked him! That isn’t what happened at all!”
“She’s a piece of work, all right,” Jodi said grimly. “But you know that you and I both testified that Sykes was attacking you and that he’d done it before and Liosh told them the same thing once he, er, calmed down.” She cleared her throat, obviously trying not to think of the big Kindred all covered in Jason’s blood. “So it’s three against one.”
“But Amanda is so good at lying and making everyone believe it!” Melli exclaimed. “It was like that in high school too—the minute she started a rumor everybody took it as the gospel truth. She already had half the policemen convinced before we even made a statement!”
“You have to try and relax,” Jodi told her firmly. “Vorn is calling that lawyer from the Mother Ship—the one who helped get the law passed that Kindred couldn’t be sued or prosecuted for protecting their females in the first place. She’s going to come down here and get Liosh set free—you’ll see.”
“I hope so.” Melli shook her head, her eyes still blurred with tears.
Everything had happened so fast and no matter what Jodi said, she was sure it was her fault. She never should have believed Amanda’s fake tale of woe about wanting to make amends. And she certainly never should have followed her off into a dark part of the campus. But how could she have possibly known that the other girl would have such a horrible surprise in store? Who could have guessed that Amanda had been behind the attack that had happened in high school the whole time?
Not that Jason wasn’t also to blame—he was a horrible person. Well, had been a horrible person, Melli amended to herself. There was no way he had survived what Liosh had done to him. From what she had seen when the police dragged the big Kindred off him—and it had taken seven of them to do it—Jason was officially gonesville.
Of course he deserved it, but the killing had been savage. Melli was still having a hard time wrapping her mind around the idea that the gentle, tender Liosh, who was always so careful not to hurt her in any way, had turned into a brutal killing machine and ripped another man’s throat out with his teeth. Well, technically with his fangs, but still…
But Vorn had explained, at the police station, that Liosh had gone into Rage—a state of berserker fury that came over Kindred warriors when they saw their females being threatened. According to Vorn, something would have been wrong if Liosh didn’t go into Rage when he saw Melli being attacked—it was just another proof that he loved her and intended to take her for his bride.
Melli was glad the Beast Kindred had explained everything to her but it didn’t seem to matter how many times he explained to the police, they just weren’t listening.
“Let’s hope the lawyer from the Mother Ship will help,” she said dully. But what if she couldn’t? What if the police still refused to
