Wrong Side of Dead

Chapter Two

11:35 P.M.

I seriously overestimated my leaping abilities.

We slammed together in an awkward tangle and hit the roof with a dull thud, thrashing and seeking purchase. I slashed with my blade and felt it cut skin and cloth. Warm blood slicked my fingers, making my grip on the knife less certain. Felix clawed with his hands and kicked with his knees, landing blows on my thighs and upper arms. We probably looked like a pair of angry chicks in a catfight, for all the grace either of us was showing.

Pretty sad for a pair of former Hunters.

He snapped at my face with his fangs, and I rewarded him with a head butt that cracked his nose. He howled and reeled back, even as his grip on my arms tightened, fingernails digging into skin. It exposed his throat, but I couldn’t get my hand up. I couldn’t get the blade across his windpipe to put him out of his fucking misery.

I did get my right knee up and between us (not a small feat, considering the leather miniskirt), and used it as a brace to keep him out of biting distance. My knife hand was stuck making shallow stabs at his ribs, but I was not close enough to cause real damage. We were at an awkward impasse that neither one of us was going to win.

Interruption was inevitable. The only question was by his people, or by mine?

It turned out to be both simultaneously. An explosion of activity stole Felix’s attention first, and it loosened his grip on my arms just enough. I shoved my knee against his chest, broke his hold, and rolled away. Someone slammed into me sideways, and we went tumbling across the tarred roof, my arms and legs scraping against what felt like a lifetime’s accumulation of grit. I ended up on top of my attacker, my back to his chest, and slammed my left elbow backward. Bone connected with bone and sent a jolt through my arm from wrist to shoulder.

Plan B. I lifted up my head and crashed it back down. A nose crunched and the person below me—male, from the serious lack of breasts pressing in my shoulders—screeched and shoved. I lunged and came up in a crouch. He tried to scuttle away. I scrambled up behind him and slit his throat. As he slumped to the ground, gurgling out purplish blood, I observed the chaos.

Kismet and Phineas were going two against five with some teenage Halfies about fifteen feet away. Neither of them had drawn guns. So close to the rave and hundreds of innocents, gunshots would be too damned loud. They fought with blades, and with as much skill as any Hunter I’d ever seen. Especially Phin. He moved like liquid, dancing out of arm’s reach, lunging in to draw blood, then back out before the Halfie could bite.

I’d seen him fight before, several times. The very first time, though, he’d been in bi-shift form—still human, but with man-sized osprey wings protruding from his back that made him look like a dark-haired angel. He told me once that his people had been fierce warriors, and he proved it each time he went into battle.

His wings weren’t out this time, but he was no less intense. He caught me watching, and gave me a wink and a grin. Uh-oh.

Phin grabbed a Halfie by the neck and sent him at me like a bowling ball down a lane. I stopped the male Halfie’s progress with the sharp heel of my boot, crouched, and cleanly snapped his neck. He thudded to the roof. Kismet and Phin dispatched the other Halfies with only a bit more effort. The front of Kismet’s dress was ripped, nearly exposing her breasts, and her skin was spattered with Halfie blood. Phin, meanwhile, barely looked disheveled.

He gave me another wicked grin, battle lust shining in his eyes. Eyes that flickered past me, then blinked. In surprise, not in warning. I turned, curious, and nearly burst out laughing.

Marcus had shifted into jaguar form—a big black thing of beauty and power—but that wasn’t what was so funny. He was sitting on top of Felix, front paws pinning down the thrashing man’s shoulders like a giant paperweight. The fact that Felix was struggling to remove the two-hundred-pound immovable object threatened to give me a bad case of the giggles. It was just so ridiculous.

I stared. Marcus yawned. Behind me, Phin laughed.

Kismet appeared by my shoulder. She hadn’t seen Felix since the day he was infected. Her jaw was set, her expression hard. She had mourned him, just as Milo and Tybalt had, but that didn’t mean much when the “dead” person was still alive and being held down by a were-cat.

She looked up at me, and I held her gaze without blinking. I’d been where she was—about to end the suffering of a loved one because of vampire infection. I didn’t know exactly what she felt, but I could damned well guess. She blinked, then inhaled a deep breath. Let it out. Palmed a blade.

Felix had stopped struggling. As Kismet walked toward him, he twisted his head around to look at her. He offered a sad smile. “Hey, Kis. We had a good couple years, huh?”

She froze. Even with her back to me, I saw muscles tense and could just imagine her expression—ice and anger flashing in wide green eyes. “No,” she said in a voice full of cold fury, “we didn’t. You have his memories and body, but you aren’t Felix. Felix died the moment he was infected.”

“Maybe. Probably. Shit.”

He seemed so sane, so completely in his right mind that my curiosity bubbled over. I closed the distance between me and Kismet. “How did you not go insane from the infection?” I asked before I could censor myself.

His iridescent eyes flickered from her to me. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.” He went on before I could ask for clarification. “I can smell your blood, Evy. It smells so sweet. I want to taste it. That’s really disgusting, right?”

Marcus growled.

“It’s partially impulse control,” Felix said as if he hadn’t even mentioned wanting to taste my blood. “The desire is there, but it doesn’t have to be. I want to hunt and feed, but I don’t do it.”

“You just don’t?” I asked. “Bullshit.”

He shrugged—or at least he tried to shrug. “It’s an addiction, a craving. I was a Hunter, so I know it’s wrong. I know I’m a monster, and I don’t want to be.” He sounded so … resigned. Almost sad. With the shimmering eyes and the fangs, it was pretty damned eerie.

Half-Bloods were abominations. They weren’t controllable, hence the entire reason for our open execution policy. Even if Felix hadn’t run the night he was infected, we couldn’t have risked keeping him alive. You can feed and tame a wild animal, but you live with the constant risk of being turned on and attacked. The kindest thing you can do is set them free—and for Halfies, that means death.

Marcus made a noise not unlike a bored grunt. His bright copper eyes shifted from me to Phin, then down to his trapped prey. He bared long, deadly teeth, silently asking if it was time to end this. Therians were not prone to infection, so he could crush Felix’s throat with those powerful jaws and not risk turning, but I knew that Kismet wouldn’t allow that.

She squatted next to his head.

“Tell Milo and Tybalt I’m sorry,” Felix said.

She nodded, turning the blade in her hand.

“Wait a moment,” Phineas said. He passed me to stand on the other side of Felix, then looked straight down. “Who’s organizing this?”

Felix frowned. “Organizing what?”

“Who sent you here tonight recruiting? Who’s turning young people into half-Bloods?”

His eyes widened like a child caught in a lie, then hardened just as quickly. “You’re going to kill me anyway.”

“Yes.”

“Then I think I’d rather not tell you.”

“Why not?”

He looked away, focusing on one of the big black paws holding him down. I turned it over in my mind for a moment. He seemed stuck, as though he wanted to tell us something but couldn’t. And I could only guess at the reasons. Glimpses of the old Felix kept peeking through, winking at us, while the monster remained in charge. Felix deserved release from that monster, but he did have information we needed. Hell.

“Marcus, can you keep sitting on him for a minute?” I asked. “Phin, Kis, a word?”

They followed me to a safe distance, far enough that with the pulse of the rave beneath us, Felix shouldn’t be able to hear.

“What?” Kismet asked.

“I think we should truss him up and take him back to the Watchtower with us,” I said. Before either could reply, I held up a silencing hand and kept talking. “He’s half-sane, and he knows a lot more than he’s saying about who’s organizing this. That’s valuable information we might be able to get out of him.”

“You trust him?”

“Absolutely not, but I think it’s worth the risk. He’s been out there for two weeks. He knows exactly where the Watchtower is, but we’ve yet to see an open attack, or even spies sniffing around. It’s possible there’s enough of the old Felix inside him to keep him from completely betraying us.”

“You want him interrogated?” Phin said.

“Yes.”

“We cannot offer him freedom in exchange for information.”

“I know that, and I wouldn’t even consider it. But maybe he’ll take something else.”

“Such as?”

I glanced at Kismet. “A chance to say good-bye to his friends.” She glared, but I didn’t relent. “Felix told me once about how much it hurt to lose Lucas, because they didn’t get to say good-bye. Maybe we can use that to reason with him.”

Kismet flinched. Almost eighteen months ago, Milo had been Lucas Moore’s replacement in Kismet’s Triad. Lucas and Felix had been best friends, and Lucas’s sudden death from a brain aneurysm had devastated Felix. Hunters lived every day with the risk of dying on any patrol, but no one expects to lose a loved one while he’s watching a baseball game at home in your apartment.

It was kind of a low blow, though, since Kismet and Lucas had been secretly, madly in love for most of his tenure in her Triad.

“That might actually work,” she said. But she looked anything but happy about it.

Goodie. “Phin?”

“I think it’s worth trying.”

“Awesome. Prisoner it is.”

Halfway back, the roof door swung open and Quince stepped out with Kyle Jane, another Therian team member, close behind. They both stopped and surveyed the scene.

“It seems we missed the party,” Quince said.

Marcus couldn’t reasonably sit on Felix in the car, so he stayed put until Phin returned with enough restraints to bind a raging rhinoceros. The end package wasn’t pretty, but everyone seemed satisfied that Felix could neither get loose nor bite anyone on the drive back. He was dumped into the SUV’s rear compartment with jaguar-Marcus and Quince as guards. Kyle drove, with Kismet riding shotgun.

I wasn’t sure if the mission was a success or not. Sure, we prevented other innocent (drunken idiot) bystanders from being infected and potentially executed. I’d kicked a little ass and had the bruises and an itchy, healing cheekbone to prove it. We got our hands on Felix, who’d been rogue for two weeks. We were one step closer to knowing who was organizing this and why, but it still felt … incomplete. I mulled on it during the drive back to the Watchtower.

Carved out of the bones of the abandoned Capital City Mall, situated on the East Side near the Black River, our headquarters was more a small city than a tower of any sort. Individual stores were now rooms with designated uses—weapons storage, a central Operations room, a small infirmary, a gymnasium and training room, as well as converted showers and sleeping quarters. About two hundred humans, Therians, and vampires lived here full-time, including me.

Its conversion began six weeks ago, after the vampire Families made a deal with the Assembly of Clan Elders. The mall was protected by the vampires, because it had a Sanctuary—a magical hot spot where the power of the Break bled through—and it was offered as a headquarters for their joint efforts in protecting their people.

Humans were invited to play after Boot Camp was destroyed last month. The Watchtower was run by a Triumvirate—one representative of each of the three races, and all major decisions needed a unanimous vote. Astrid, a were-cat and Marcus’s sister, stood for the Therians, my kind-of friend Isleen for the vampires, and former-Handler Adrian Baylor for the humans.

Tensions were high and for good reason, but everyone mostly got along. We all had the same goals now: protect the city and protect our people. At all costs.

Kyle followed a well-worn path through the weedy parking lot toward the interior of the U-shaped mall’s curve, which created a sort of canyon. The entire lot and structure were protected by a barrier spell, which urged anyone outside of it to look away. And that was only the first security measure in place.

Kyle drove through the illusion of a wall and into a parking lot made of two hollowed-out former restaurants. The lot held an array of vehicles, mostly trucks, vans, and sport utility vehicles of various makes, models, and colors. No sense in being predictable.

Quince and Kyle hauled Felix out of the back and carried him by the ropes like a trussed-up Christmas tree. He didn’t struggle or protest. Marcus followed, a silent sentinel. Something occurred to me as I shut my door.

“Hey, did anyone pick up Marcus’s clothes at the rave?” I asked.

Blank looks. Marcus snuffled, and if a jaguar could act annoyed, he did.

Kyle chuckled. Therians had to remove their clothing in order to shift. And, likewise, they shifted back to human form completely nude. I’ve learned that most have little issue with nudity—at least, in small groups. But I imagined Marcus had no intention of walking the length of the mall to his sleeping quarters in just his bare skin.

The parking lot led into a short, tiled corridor, which intersected with the main length of the mall’s interior. The old fountain in the center now held a thriving herb garden—not all the plants meant for spicing food. Left and right, the corridor stretched down about a hundred yards in either direction before sharply turning again. Each end of the mall was capped by an old department store. The structure on the right/east was being converted into larger living quarters. The old store on the left/west would eventually be a training facility, not unlike the obstacle course we ran at Boot Camp.

Operations was straight ahead, with weapons storage right next door. To the right of weapons was our brand-new jail, complete with restraint cells and an interrogation room. I despised that place more than any other part of the Watchtower, and I avoided it as much as possible. My initial look at the completed design had lasted exactly ninety seconds, and I’d left shaking.

Three familiar faces emerged from Ops. Astrid Dane was my height, with long, straight black hair and the same exotic looks as her brother, Marcus. She led the charge, hands balled into fists, clearly unhappy with our gift. Behind her trailed Milo Gant and Wyatt Truman, both studies in shock. Rightfully so, I guess. We hadn’t left with the intention of bringing home a prisoner. It just worked out that way.

My heart went out to Milo for the horror he must have felt at the sight of someone he’d once loved so much reduced to so little. Milo had been there with me the night Felix was infected. He’d been shot in the abdomen and hadn’t actually seen it happen, but that had only added to his guilt. Neither of us had been able to save Felix.

“Hey,” Kismet said. “Did Dr. Vansis say you could be up and around like this?” When it came to her former Hunters, she was a mother hen to the end.

“Yeah, as long as I don’t overdo it and pull my stitches,” Milo replied. His voice was rough, weighed down with emotion. He met my gaze, and I couldn’t even muster a supportive smile for the young man who’d once tried to kill me and who I now counted as one of my best friends.

“I take it that has information,” Astrid said, pointing at Felix.

Back to business. Curiosity was drawing a small crowd that wisely kept its distance.

“He knows who’s creating and organizing the Halfies, and why,” Phineas said.

“Is it sane?”

“Mostly, yes. And self-aware.”

“And it tells us in exchange for what?”

“Good-byes to old friends before he’s executed.”

Astrid glanced at Milo, who looked slightly ill—whether at the idea of talking to Felix or the mention of his execution, I didn’t know. But my money was on the latter. She turned back to our little group. “Who’s responsible?” If he gets loose and bites someone dangled at the end of the question.

“I am,” Kismet and I said in stereo.

Behind Astrid, Wyatt frowned, eyebrows furrowing. The silent disapproval irritated me, just as most of our interactions over the last few weeks had irritated me. Irrationally, maybe, but not entirely my fault. He was in the room, yelling right back, during the argument two weeks ago that fractured us down the middle.

“Fine,” Astrid said. “Lock him up. We’ll debrief in the conference room in fifteen minutes, then see what the prisoner has to say.” She eyeballed everyone in our little cluster, nostrils flaring. “Who’s bleeding?”

I touched my cheek. The cut had already scabbed over, the blood around it drying to a flaky mess on my skin.

“I am,” Phin said.

“What?” I rounded on him, planting both hands on my hips, all of my irritation firmly directed at him now. I couldn’t see any wounds, but with his black clothes that meant nothing. “How?”

“The scuffle on the roof. One of the half-Bloods had a switchblade. It isn’t deep.” From his tone of voice, you’d think it was just a mosquito bite. And considering that two months ago he’d been kidnapped and cut open while fully conscious, a minor stab wound probably didn’t seem very important. But it still made me want to slap him.

“Get it treated,” Astrid said.

“But—”

“Stone, make sure he gets it looked at.”

I opened my mouth to argue, then clamped it shut. It didn’t matter that my feet hurt from those fucking boots, or that I desperately wanted to shower blood and bits of roof grit off my skin and maybe put on some real clothes. Astrid wasn’t a large woman, but her word was law. Especially in that impatient voice.

“Fine,” I said.

The infirmary was to the left of Operations, about halfway down the length of the mall. Why so far down? It never made sense to me, but I didn’t design the place. Maybe because it was closer to the training rooms, where injuries tended to happen on a regular basis. I still felt ridiculous, click-clacking my way down the hall.

Partway there, I grabbed Phin’s arm. “Hold on for a second.” I balanced on my left foot and yanked down the zipper on the right boot. Cool air hit my legs, and I peeled the offending leather away from sweaty, red-marked skin. My ankle protested being bent back to its normal angle, and again when I put my weight on it. Blissful pain. I moaned.

Phin made a sound somewhere between a snort and a laugh. “Better?”

“Almost.” My left leg soon joined my right in boot freedom. I let go of Phin, then threw the offending objects against the nearest wall. They hit the floor with a clattering thud. I bounced on the balls of my feet, stretching my calf muscles, smoothing out the aches. “Yeah, much better.”

“You’re going to leave them there?”

I eyed the boots. “I borrowed the damned things for this rave. If someone wants them, they’re welcome to them. Knee-high leather boots with three-inch heels are torture devices.”

He chuckled and continued walking. I padded behind, the ceramic tile floor cool on my bare feet. A familiar buzz of power tickled over my skin as we passed the Sanctuary. A vampire was always standing guard at the hall entrance leading down to what had once been a set of the mall’s public bathrooms. The women’s restroom was the last place anyone would think to find a Sanctuary. Its location had certainly surprised the hell out of me.

The infirmary was a few stores down, in what I’m told was once an electronics outlet. Not that it mattered much, since the entire thing was gutted, outfitted with an emergency surgical suite (not that we had a surgeon yet, but it was on the To Do list), a fully stocked closet of supplies, an exam room, and four private patient rooms. The adjacent store was under construction as an expansion. We were in a pretty dangerous and injury-prone line of work, after all.

The infirmary wasn’t a doctor’s office, so there was no waiting room. Just a desk, some filing cabinets, and the curtained exam room. All of our Boot Camp medical staff had been slaughtered last month. The Assembly brought in an Ursia (were-grizzly bear) physician they trusted, and who was familiar with human, Therian, and vampire anatomy. Dr. Reid Vansis was good, and he knew it. He also had the grumpy personality of most Ursia I’d met, which made him someone I preferred to avoid. But he’d saved Milo’s life when he was shot, and I respected him for it.

But Vansis also wasn’t in. As the only doctor in residence, he had a large whiteboard on the wall behind his desk where he wrote his location when he wasn’t in the office. In large black letters he’d scrawled “SLEEPING.” Which meant we were not to disturb him except for emergencies. Which this clearly wasn’t.

Terrific.

“Take off your shirt,” I said.

Phin yanked the hem of his shirt out of his jeans and up over his shoulders, and whipped it off in one smooth motion. He wasn’t fast enough to hide his wince, though. A long, pale line divided his chest from sternum to belly button—a terrible reminder of the hell he’d been through because of me.

“Turn around,” I said.

He did, presenting a lean, perfectly muscled back. Hiding just above the waist of his jeans was a four-inch gash, still oozing blood. This close, I could see the dark, damp patch where the blood had soaked into his pants. I could also see more meat than I was comfortable with.

“Damn, Phin, that might need stitches.”

“It does?” He twisted his torso in a vain attempt to see his own lower back, and only managed to make the wound gape wider. He hissed, then quit trying to see it and felt around with his fingers. “It’ll heal, Evy. Use those butterfly bandages to keep it together until it can mend.”

I eyeballed the gash. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

Therians healed faster than the average human, but it would still be several days before that wound was completely gone. And it would likely scar. Small lines and imperfections dotted his back and shoulders—scars I never had the guts to ask about. I still didn’t.

We moved our little production into the curtained exam area and assembled a tray of useful items—bandages, medical tape, alcohol, gauze, scissors. He turned, once again presenting his back. I wetted some gauze with the alcohol and paused to assess the playing field. This wasn’t going to work.

“Okay, Phin,” I said, “I need you to drop your pants.”

“I—pardon me?”