Page 143 of Let Us Prey
The fully-shifted dragon grabs her in his talons, and he pushes off the ground as his enormous wings propel them into the sky. Delores drops the head, and it bounces off the ground at my feet, causing me to grimace and back away.
So much for being the older, calmer shifters who can talk her down safely.
I watch the two of them soar high into the atmosphere, moonlight glinting off his midnight blue scales as he swoops and dives with her clutched against his chest. She must be fighting him—unsuccessfully—because though he throws his head back in pain, shooting fire across the starry sky, he doesn’t drop her. I consider heading into the Tower so I can get the height needed to join them, but I can’t take my eyes off of the scene unfolding above.
Another column of flames shoots through the air, and twin growls pierce the night as Aubrey lands on the roof of the Tower with a deafening thud. His form changes to a half-shift in a blink, and as I watch from the ground, thewererabbitdoes the same. My lips curve when my old friend yanks our girl closer and kisses the living shit out of her.
Well played.
Shifting back to human form as I walk towards the Tower entrance, I smirk at the raccoon guarding the door. “Have the Captain dispose of that... " I point at the head and then gesture at the trail we followed. “...and the rest immediately. I want nothing we did tonight to be traced back to us.”
The crew member salutes and takes off toward the lake to inform the others, and I step inside my home, wondering what the wolves found on their hunt. Though the danger of her true nature may be abated, Dolly still isn’t safe until we find out more about what happened tonight.
When everything in that circle felt so fucking familiar…
SEVENTY-THREE
Heroes
Cassius
“So… our girlfriend’s a fuckingwererabbit, huh?”
I throw back some of Renard’s best scotch, still too stunned by the night’s events to correct Bash’s use of the words ‘our’ and ‘girlfriend.’
The ‘wererabbit’ is the more important part of that sentence.
“Yes,” I reply, because what else is there to fucking say in a situation like this?
Of course, I always knew there was something different about Delores Drew. Her unexplainedrage,the acute ability to partially shift, the unexpected fangs and claws manifesting on apreyanimal, instead of an apex predator…
Those should have been some pretty major red flags, but I’d simply excused it all away, convinced it had something to do with her upbringing. It’s no secret Council heirs mate strategically—it’s survival of the fittest, after all—so it’s not that crazy to assume D received private tutoring on how to be a scary motherfucker.
I thought it was some nurture vs. nature shit!
“I mean, I’m not gonna lie,” Bash continues, reaching around me to raid the gargoyle’s liquor cabinet while he can. “I didn’t think Cherry could get any hotter, but then—boom!Attack of the fifty foot WEREBABE!”
“Yes,” I nod, unable to disagree with his surprisingly accurate assessment.
The wererabbit was fucking hot.
I’m saved from further drunken confessions by Aubrey landing heavily on the balcony, with Delores supported against his chest. She looks pale and shaken, but at least she’s back to her normal-sized version of hotness.
“Cash… ” she whimpers, and any pretense I had of keeping my distance vanishes.
“You’re okay, baby,” I murmur, as she stumbles toward me. Gathering Delores in my arms, I carry her to the couch, arranging the shuddering girl in my lap with the fluffy blue throw blanket Renard bought for when she visits. The gargoyle in question suddenly appears in the doorway, and I swear I smell blood on him.
What the hell happened out there?
Aubrey collapses into his custom throne, looking more exhausted than I’ve ever seen him. “Did you two find anything in the woods?”
My brother stops nuzzling his cheek against D’s hair to answer the dragon. “Not a trace. Whoever was out there disappeared like a fart in the breeze… if farts smelled like lavender.”
“What did you say?!” Renard squawked, uncharacteristically thrown off by Bash’s crassness.
It’s been a long night for everyone.
I’m dying to know how the others subdued ourwererabbit,but I don’t want to make Delores any more upset than she already is. While she’s shown an impressive amount of grit this school year, despite everything she’s been through, this latest development could be the very thing that finally breaks this beautiful bunny.
