Page 45 of Shifter's Homecoming

Trent pulled out of the funnel of his vision completely, until he was up above the scene, watching his mate cry over his dead and still body.

“Smokey!” Trent roared into the stillness and the darkness. He would not just accept this.This was not how it happened.

Trent, the other Trent, the Trent who belonged in this world and with this Rowan, he went flying past, headed for his own body.Still alive.

“You’re a stupid fucker!” Trent shouted after him, as they headed in opposite directions.

I know,the other Trent told him inruhi,in his very own voice. Thank you, I will not mess this up.

Trent sensed, rather than saw, the other Trent open his eyes. The other Trent put an arm around Rowan and she cried more, and then they kissed, and he knew their relationship would be repaired, stronger than it had ever been—

And then his connection was broken.

31 - The Portal is HOT

“Kendra?” someone said. “She’ll set him on fire. He can’t shift.”

Reed shuddered. Troy wasn’t really going to have the little fire baby touch him, was he?

Trevor, who’d been standing in the kitchen, yelled for him, thank goodness. Trevor would stop him. Trevor wouldn’t let him do it.

“Wait, Troy, wait for Graeme! He’s on his way back! He’ll be here in a few minutes.”

But Troy was already moving, sprinting across the room, ignoring everyone, including Trevor.

From the back room, an ominous sound came. A single, long beep, then alarms went off, then the sound of males calling to each other. Reed knew that sound. They all knew that sound.

Trevor stopped moving, his face shocked, but Troy didn’t. He ran faster. He hit the back door at a run, sliding it open so hard it bounced out of its track and hung askew. He ran through and hooked a left at the grass, toward Heather.

Trevor and the others spilled out the door behind him, but most just stopped and watched from afar. Reed ran to the door and stuck her head out.

Heather, standing near the back window, saw them coming. They must have told her with that damn telepathy what they wanted. She was shaking her head, curling Kendra away from Troy. Reed couldn’t hear what she was saying, but it was obvious she thought someone was going to hurt someone, probably the baby was going to hurt Troy.

Troy said something to her and she said something to the baby, and the baby’s adorable little face screwed up in concentration under her headful of flame-hair. She looked like she was trying so very hard.

Troy reached out, he took her from Heather, he tucked her almost like a football and he ran back for the house, his face gritted in absolute agony.

Reed didn’t want to see what the baby was doing to him but she couldn’t look away. His shirt caught on fire right away. It burned through and the pieces that were left fell off of him. His chest hair burned. His hands and torso blackened.

Reed couldn’t take it. She backed away and cried into her hands, terrified. Some fucking action hero she was, crying while her boyfriend was burning. Panic tried to get a hold of her and she fought it hard. She got herself under control.

Troy rushed past, heat coming from him like a furnace. People were scattering, but Conri met him at the door.

“Give her to me!” Conri said. “I can handle her heat.”

Reed didn’t think that Troy was going to give her up, but he did, he let her go, and as soon as Conri had her, Troy fell to the ground—no, he was shifting, then he shifted back just as quickly, pulling at his pants that hadn’t even had time to fall completely off of him. He followed Conri down the hall at a dead run and Reed almost sobbed to see his skin normal-colored again. She followed the crowd into the room. The heat was unbearable, the house feeling like an oven already.

She could barely see Trent, the black-furred wolf, lifeless on the bed, wires attached to him, the monitor still holding its one long beep that meant death.

Conri reached him, holding the baby over him, his expression divided, like he didn’t want to do it.

They were all sweating. The dry, unbearable heat seeming to threaten to catch their very clothes on fire.

Conri’s hands were not blackening like Troy’s had. He seemed to be holding them in some sort of state between animal and man. Heat rose from the baby, making the air shimmer and making them all sweat.

“Put her on him,” Troy shouted.

“On him? Are you sure?”

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