Page 74 of The Tracker's Dawn: Sunderverse
“They’ll be fine. They know how to take care of themselves.”
We reached the corner and stopped to glance both ways. The streets were deserted, no cars in sight, and only the sound of a train rolling slowly down its tracks could be heard.
“I’m still not used to seeing Rosalina with all those weapons,” I said. “It worries me.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. She’s changed a lot, and I fear she’s becoming someone else, someone she was never meant to be.” It was the first time I voiced my fears to anyone.
“You think it’s your fault.”
My head snapped in his direction. How had he deduced that so quickly?
“Toni, you can’t expect to be part of someone’s life and not have an effect on it.”
I blinked at that.
“Everyone you meet will teach you something. Good or bad. Right or wrong. Some people teach you to love, others to hate. There are those who open your eyes to cruelty and the many levels of evil. Many push you away with their simple presence, while others attract you like magnets. And when you have collided with someone who becomes a fixture in your life, they’re almost guaranteed to throw you off your axis. So yes, youhaveplayed a part in changing who she is, but have you considered the part she has played in changing you? And do you think she should feel guilty about that?”
“She has only changed me for the better?”
“And why are you so sure you haven’t done the same for her?”
My head started spinning as I tried to process that concept. “Has she said anything to you? Is that what she thinks?”
Damien shrugged. “She has not. Perhaps, you should talk openly to her about your worries. Personally, I think it’s damn sexy.”
What?!
I opened my mouth to say something, but he put a finger to his lips. We had reached Frost Avenue, and we were standing across from the warehouse.
He checked his watch. In the distance, I heard a car engine. It got louder and louder, then tires screeched, and Eric came around the opposite corner, the van going at full speed. He headed straight for the warehouse.
The van climbed the sidewalk, bucking wildly as the tires hit the curb. When he was only a few feet away from the building’s main door, the driver’s side door sprang open, and Eric jumped out. He shifted in midair. His tawny wolf hit the ground running. Patrick and Ben jumped out of the back, just seconds before the van crashed. They landed almost as gracefully as Eric, despite the fact that they were in their human forms. The sound of crunching metal filled the night as the van rammed through the front door.
I reminded myself that Rosalina had been dropped off so she could take a sniper position in the building across from the warehouse.
Almost immediately, a second door burst open and a couple of confused-looking men came out. They blinked at the scene and spent a moment taking it all in. Once they added two and two together, their bodies shifted, muscles expanding and bones elongating. Their clothes fell to the ground in tatters as sinew ridden with black, bulging veins tripled in size. The beasts lifted their short snouts skyward, roared their displeasure, and bounded toward Eric and the others.
Patrick and Ben pulled out their guns and started unloading wolfsbane bullets on the pair. The smaller hybrid zigzagged out of the way, leaping forward, avoiding injury, his front limbs barely touching the ground as he hurdled forward like a freight train.
The second one was much bigger and slower. A couple of bullets hit him, but they barely slowed him down. Eric ran between Patrick and Eric, lunging toward the hybrids to serve as a distraction. About six more men came out of the warehouse and wasted no time shifting. My skin itched to do the same. Red wanted to leap forward to help Eric, but that was not the plan.
Shots rang from above, and two of the new hybrids thudded to the ground. The others slowed, giving Eric, Patrick, and Ben time to regroup. Rosalina was at it with her rifle already, and she was a damn good shot.
Damien put a hand up in the air, holding five fingers up. Mouthing down the seconds, he started lowering his fingers. I pulled out my handgun and held it by my side.
Five, four, three, two, one.
He stepped into the street with a confident air and began walking toward the warehouse. I stayed frozen for a beat but quickly joined him. I glanced around, searching for the others, but of course, I couldn’t see them. They were concealed under Damien’s spell, just like we were.
Thepop, pop, popof bullets echoed through the night as Rosalina, Patrick, and Ben unloaded full magazines into the hybrids’ misshapen bodies. They had retreated a few yards to put some distance between them and the monsters. Eric continued to run in the periphery of the creatures, weaving in and out to distract them.
Damien and I reached the side of the building without notice, just as we’d hoped. The mage was concealing our scent and any sounds our steps would produce. There was no door for us to enter through on this side, which was the reason Damien was with me. The others didn’t need a mage. They would have doors to burst through.
With an elegant flourish, Damien weaved his hands and pointed them at the wall. A blast of energy sprang from his fingers. There was a crack and an explosion of light that his concealment spell made sure to obscure. A hole just wide enough for us to squeeze through formed as the corrugated metal wall melted away.
Damien turned to me. “I would say ladies first, but in this instance, that wouldn’t be gentleman-like.”
