Page 74 of The Mating Frenzy
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So,I’m a werewolf. No, they call it Lupine. And I have a lover. And what alover!
Ella sat in a chair by the window, hooking her arms around her knees. Memories of Kieran’s lovemaking sang through her slightly sore body. She felt well-loved, and tired from his ardentattention.
If that was his normal style of sex, she wondered how frantic and furious a mating frenzy would makehim.
Reassured that she could now shift and defend herself with fangs and claws, Kieran had left to patrol the beach. Darcy was investigating the area around the hotel where Xavier had stayed. They’d left her here with the digital files of the one scroll she sensed would provideanswers.
In the house, she sat at the window overlooking the highway outside. Australian pines, their needles feathery, waved in the slight breeze. Thicker Norfolk pines flanked them. A squat concrete building with a sign out front reading MEDICAL CENTER stared at her from across thestreet.
This world was so familiar to her, and yet with Kieran’s entrance into her life and the knowledge of the unknown, she knew all could bedeceptive.
Now that she knew she was truly a shifter, Ella felt her eyes opened to the hidden truth lurking beneath the humanworld.
An innocent-looking couple on the beach could turn into demons, jaws opened wide to devour the unwary. Drivers passing back and forth on the road could be families on their way home from the beach or spies for the Dark Lord, searching for her andKieran.
A medical building could house a doctor or nurse ready to render assistance to the injured, or demons hungering to prey on the weak andfrail.
Ella’s gaze sharpened as she studied a lone gray Caravan parked in the lot across the street. The medical center was closed on weekends. Kieran had made it a point to scout out all the buildings surroundingthem.
Why was a van parked there? Was it simply a place to park across from the beach? Or somethingelse?
She looked out the window at the clear blue sky, the white puffs of clouds stretching out onto the horizon. Each moment’s delay meant her mother disappeared a littlemore.
She needed to find the crystal, claim her powers and returnhome.
A tingling filled her fingertips. Ella used to ignore it, but now, she did not. Something was notright.
She left the armchair and searched the living room for the binoculars Kieran had insisted on packing. It comforted her to know he constantly guarded her, ensuring hersafety.
His protective streak moved her. No one, not even her foster mother, had been this concerned with herwelfare.
Ella found the glasses, and returned to the armchair. She lifted them to her face and peered at thevehicle.
A lone occupant sat inside. He, or she, was turned away, so she could not see the face. Probably a lost driver, searching his cell for GPS instructions. Sillyher.
And then, just as she chided herself for being foolish and imaginative, something made her look again. See with your true eyes, Kieran had told her.Not the eyes of a human, but your animal. Those eyes will penetrate the fog of magick and reveal an Other’s truenature.
The person inside the van turnedaround.
She saw hisface.
It changed. Gray, with two large nostrils, and an ordinary mouth. Until it opened it, and it stretched downward, the jaw elongating like a snake about to swallow amouse.
Oh, dear heavens, it was doing exactly that. A wriggling white object, a mouse, probably, fought as the creature lowered it to its massive jaws. It gulped it down whole and swallowed, a large lump appearing in itsthroat.
“Dinner is served,” she whispered, and the binoculars fell to thecarpet.
Ella drew back, lest the creature see her and decide she’d make a tastier snack. But then her wolf emerged, growling. Claws emerged from her fingertips. She boldly stared at the van, and narrowed hereyes.
Let him try to get near and she’d turn him into a wolfsnack.
Then, as if the driver sensed someone watched him, he started up the van and sped out of the parking lot. Minutes later, Kieran strode through the door. He saw her, and immediately went over toher.
“What is wrong,Ella?”
Kieran’s deep voice soothed her jangled nerves. She rubbed the gooseflesh dotting her bare arms. “Watching the show across the street gave me the creeps.” Ella held up her hand, showing the claws. “I think my wolf was creeped out aswell.”
