Page 44 of Heart of Dawn
“We’ll talk about it later,” I said, keeping my steely focus up for the shitstorm ahead.
“Orion…”
He didn’t help my cause, the sound of my mate’s name leaving chinks in my armor. But he also, inadvertently, made a good point.
What about Ori? How did I get to him? What was my plan to get through the Faery gates? I couldn’t just knock and hurl demands to open up. That’d be as useful as a pen without ink.
Shit.
The sounds of the horde were getting dangerously close.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said. “Basil? You good with being carried?”
He sighed but agreed to travel on my back.
Back outside, a light rain began to fall. The woods stirred under the cacophony of marching biters, Dawn’s laughter thunder in the night.
Joe, back on his feet, pointed behind the house. “We go that way.”
I didn’t argue, although I really wanted to circle back to the factory. With the horde almost here, there’d be enough time for me to get to my pack.
Trust them to get to safety,I told myself.
Of course, I believed in every single one of them and their capabilities. But that didn’t do anything to dim my protective instincts. They were my responsibility, under my alpha wings, so to speak.
I followed Joe and Daria around the house into the trees behind it, Basil on my back.
After about half a mile, I picked up a new scent.
A familiar scent that made me wrinkle my nose even more than the death stink of Earth.
I slowed down, my scalp prickling. “Lance.”
The vampires came to a stop, inspecting the trees.
I heard the werelynx move, picked up his position over to my?—
Joe’s head exploded as gunfire cracked through the air. Gore splattered my face along with Daria’s. Joe’s body crumbled into ashes, scattering on the wind.
“He’s dead,” Daria said, as if she didn’t quite believe it. She bent to touch the remaining pile of her friend. “Joseph?”
I spotted a flash to my right, then saw the cruel grin on Lance’s face as he aimed the rifle.
He fired.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
ORION
The hole brought me into a tunnel that shouldn’t be there according to the laws of physics. I ducked, hunch-walking behind Wendy as she led the way, her golden light like a disco ball, tiny beams bouncing off the curved bark around us. She shed glitter by the second, leaving a carpet of sparkles in her wake.
The air warmed up the further we went. A pleasant warmth. Not too hot and much better than the bitterness outside.
“Almost there,” Wendy said.
Thank goodness for that. My spine couldn’t take much more of this position.
After a long curve, the tunnel opened out into a hollow space much bigger than the tree.
