A Shock to Your System (Dangerous Creatures #2) (2 page)

Holy fuck. What was happening to him?

Didn't matter. Did. Not. Matter. Jamie
turned and ran back.

Chapter Two

Ethan came awake to his own scream; it was
so damned powerful that the inside of his throat vibrated. The
pain...holy fuck, the pain! It was the worst sort of burning agony
in his leg that just shot mind-numbing pain throughout the rest of
his body. He shifted and struggled to get away from it. More like
spasmed, but he was at least still moving.

Only he wasn't. He couldn't. He couldn't
move more than a few inches. Something heavy that covered his
entire body held him down. A shadow scrambled away from him.
Because of the pain and panic, it took him an eternity to figure
out what it was that held him even though it was right in front of
his face.

The net.

He needed a second for that to sink in. When
it did, he could still hardly believe it. Then he got pissed.

Seriously? The fucking net was on him. His
own net was on him! How the hell—?

Jamie
. That was the only explanation. He had woken up before
Ethan, and now he was here, and something or someone was stabbing
him. Jamie was actually cutting him!

The rage of the thought
came out of him in a roar. “
Jamie
!”

"He's awake! Knock it off before he brings
the whole fucking world down on us!"

That was not Jamie’s voice. The shock
silenced him. He blinked, a lot, trying to clear the dust and dirt
from his eyes.

"We're out in the middle of nowhere. No
one's going to hear him.”

Ethan’s vision cleared, and the shadows
turned into people. People who looked ragged and dirty, like a
shower and change of clothes hadn’t been in their recent
history.

"There are farm houses not too far away from
here. Someone will hear this,” said the boy.

Ethan gritted his teeth through the pain,
but that was about all he could do. He reached down with his hand
to find out what was happening to his leg. Something warm and wet
met his fingers, even though he knew what it was before he brought
his hand back up.

He could smell the blood before he saw the
red on his skin; however, the strange thing about it was that there
didn’t seem to be a weapon. There was no knife sticking out of him,
and none of the people above him had his blood on them either.

In spite of all that, something told him
Jamie hadn’t been the one to cut him and take off. These three
people were responsible for his current state, and that made them
pretty damned dangerous.

"Everyone just calm down. He's awake now so
it doesn't matter," said a woman whom Ethan was going to consider
the leader. She had bright blond hair that was somewhat darkened by
dirt. The shape of her face and lips meant she was likely pretty
under all that grime, but the smell of her made that hard to
visualize.

She got down on her haunches, her skirt
rising a little as she did so, allowing Ethan to see the brown
color of the ballet flats that she wore. Something told him they
used to be white. Her position also gave him the uncomfortable
sight of her plain panties, and the scrapes on her knees and
legs.

All paranormals that were captured and
brought to Head Office wore a certain uniform as a means of
identification. Plain white slippers like the ones on this girl's
feet were part of that dress code.

"This belong to you?" she asked, holding up
the badge that had been strapped to the side of Ethan's belt: the
gold shield with the hawk-in-flight logo on it, along with his
number that proved he was licensed to bring in paranormals.

Fuck my
life
. This woman was an escaped
paranormal, and when she'd found him and noticed his badge, she'd
made him bleed. Ethan’s eyes flickered to the two boys with her. It
was likely they were all illegal paranormals, though he couldn't be
totally sure. The dirty and torn clothing, hints of bruising and
more scrapes, though, made it a near certainty.

He took a calming breath.
“Listen to me, you don't want to do this. You
don’t—
Aaaaaah
!"

The pain was so intense it took over every
brain cell in Ethan’s head. His only response was to scream
everything out of him and even that wasn’t enough. He found himself
rolling and shaking, trying to get away from the invisible claws
that ripped at his skin, tearing him open like his skin was made of
Christmas paper. There was no getting away. The invisible claws,
knives, whatever they were, stayed with him.

When she finished, the pain still took time
to dull. Cold drops of sweat beaded all over his face, neck, back,
and everywhere else on his body, chilling him. Ethan's limbs shook
as he attempted to move. He tried to look down to see exactly what
was being done to him, but all he could see was more blood on his
legs. It soaked through his pants this time on his upper thighs.
The blood bloomed across the denim before coming to a stop.

Holy shit. Maybe she did have claws.

"A hunter just like you got a check for
bringing me in," said the girl. She stared at Ethan with the kind
of wild hatred he'd only ever seen in horror movies. "I'm not
wearing shackles anymore. I'm in control now. So tell me now, and
be honest, does this belong to you?"

The ripping of his flesh started again
before he could answer. He felt the stretch right before the pain
flared to a peak. Ethan flailed as he screamed. He wasn't even able
to form words, and he was sure as hell trying to, just to get her
to stop. It was all just noise coming from his throat. He tried to
stop what was happening, to reach down and yank away whatever it
was that was doing this to him, but there was nothing there and he
was just making it worse. He couldn't help himself.

Finally, it stopped, and Ethan was panting
for breath and pouring sweat as if he'd just finished chasing down
Jamie.

Jamie
. Holy shit. If these people were doing this to him, then
what had they done to Jamie? Where the hell was he? Ethan looked
around himself as best he could, and he didn't see the man
anywhere.

“
I promise you that was
nothing. I didn’t even cut you that much and it’ll get a lot worse
if you don’t start talking.”

"W-what did you do with Jamie?" Ethan asked,
but was then struck dumb by a horrible thought.

Would Jamie team up with paranormals like
this? Just because the man wasn't around didn't mean he wasn't part
of this. Ethan had tried to bring him in, after all, so why
wouldn't Jamie hand him over to these people and leave him to his
fate?

"That guy who ran away before?" asked the
woman, looking over her shoulder at her two male friends. None of
them could be older than twenty. They were as skinny and pale as
she was, and they stared down at Ethan as though he was still a
threat.

"He ran off after putting this net on you.
Stupid idiot just left you here when he should've done what needed
to be done,” she narrowed her eyes at him. “Why would he do that?
He's the one who put you under this net, so unless he's a really
strange kind of sympathizer, I don't see why you should be thinking
about him."

It was kind of morbid, but
Ethan was comforted by the idea that Jamie wasn't so far gone that
he would be willing to hang out with people like this. He
apparently
would
knock out the power of several city blocks and scare a bunch
of civilians, but it seemed that was it.

God, he hoped Jamie never ran into people
like this. It was a good thing this girl didn't believe Jamie to be
a sympathizer to hunters. If she thought that, then she could try
finding him, and she could do to Jamie what she was doing to
Ethan.

Okay. He was trained for this. He could take
this and he was going to do it with a smile on his face if he had
to. He just had to get her talking.

"What's your name?" Ethan asked, staring at
the girl and doing his best to keep his voice level despite the
pain. God, he wanted to curl into a ball.

She frowned at him, clearly suspicious.
“Why?”

“
I want to
know.”

Not that he cared about her stupid name.
Considering what she was doing to him, she was too far-gone to be
saved. If Ethan got out of this alive, he was going to hunt her
down and bring her in. He’d make sure Head Office knew about her
crimes and that she paid for them.

Kidnapping and torturing a hunter didn't
land a paranormal in the labs. It gave them an all-access pass to
some good drugs and the incinerator. There would be no second
chances for her or her friends. She was too dangerous.

"Allison," said the girl, still frowning
down at him. "What's it to you?"

"Do you know what you're doing right now,
Allison?" Ethan asked, shifting uncomfortably as his dull pain
started to really throb in his leg. "You're assaulting a licensed
hunter. That's punishable by death."

"Not if I kill you and hide the body."

She thought a body was necessary for a
murder charge. Not anymore. He didn’t think she’d believe him if he
told her that. “A body is always found eventually, and the person
responsible is always brought in. You will be caught, and your
friends too. Do you want that for them?"

"He is a hunter," said one of the boys
behind Allison, his lips slightly parted as if in awe. "Holy shit
the badge is real. It's real."

Most paranormals didn't get the chance to
see hunters this close up since they were always hiding and trying
to keep a safe distance. Being so near to a hunter either happened
by accident, or when the paranormals were being grabbed and cuffed.
That was usually where everything ended for them.

Despite being escapees, these kids probably
only ever saw other hunters on the day they were arrested. That was
fuel for Ethan at the moment. He needed these three to think he was
some larger-than-life powerhouse just waiting to break free from
this net and catch them.

"Yeah, I am a hunter, and I'm not going to
be alone out here for much longer. You don't have much time left
before my backup gets here."

"Backup?" one of the boys said, a clear
glimmer of fear in his wide eyes. He even started looking around,
sharply turning his head and body this way and that, as if trying
to spot other hunters hiding in the trees and shrubs just waiting
to spring.

"Shut up," Allison snapped at him. "He's
lying. He was passed out like a log. Didn't even notice it when
that other guy draped the net over him. If he had backup coming
they would've been here by now."

"I haven't checked in for a while. They'll
be checking my tracker. There's one built into every hunter badge,"
Ethan said.

That was a definite lie; there was no
tracker, but they didn't need to know that.

He was under a net, and this paranormal
wanted to kill him. He was officially in hostage negotiation, which
he'd never had to do for himself before, and only once for someone
else. He was going to say whatever needed to be said to make sure
he got out of this alive.

He had to stay calm, non-confrontational,
and make sure that Allison knew she was in charge here. That was
his only chance.

“
These boys are clearly
counting on you, and my friends will come for them if they stay
here. I know you must not want that.”

Both boys squirmed. “Alli, let's just go.
What if they’re really on the way? What if he's telling the
truth?"

"What if he's not?" Allison asked, staring
at Ethan with that cold predatory look in her eyes. "Do you know
what happens to paranormals who go away? They get sent to labs, but
it isn't just to be studied. Take a wild guess what can happen to
little blond-haired, blue-eyed girls when they’re all alone and
surrounded by pigs with too much authority and free time.”

"I'm sorry," Ethan said, and he was. "That
shouldn't have happened to you. Let me help you get the person who
did it. Paranormals still have rights. You can testify and—"

"We have no rights!" Allison yelled, and
then the ripping sensation started up again, this time on his
chest. The pain burned him like liquid fire.

He screamed and grabbed at his chest,
instinctively trying to push away the source of his pain. But just
like before, there was nothing.

"People like you don't give a shit about
us!" Allison snapped. "You want to send me back there so you can
get paid, well fuck you! I'm not going back and you're not going to
send another paranormal to one of those places ever again."

"Allison, stop it," one of the boys said,
and the other one spoke up as well, but Ethan couldn't hear another
word through the pain.

This was the worst way to die. He didn't
want to die like this.

His screaming was amplified inside his head,
and for a split second, he thought his voice had changed, or maybe
he was losing it altogether. He screamed so much that his ears rang
and the hairs on his body stood on end.

The sound nearly dulled out everything else,
but he could still make out a few things. Like how he didn't sound
like himself, or like a human being in general.

It took him a few seconds to realize that
he'd stopped shouting, that it wasn’t his voice he heard. That
sound wasn't coming from him at all. No, that was Allison and her
two friends screaming and yelling.

Ethan gasped for breath, his throat raw like
he’d been scratching it with an old stick. The sweat dripped from
his body and he started to shiver from the cold.

It took Ethan a few seconds more to realize
the pain in his legs and chest was diminishing He wasn't being torn
open anymore. The pain of actually having his skin ripped open had
been agony, but the constant expansion and contraction of his chest
with every breath irritated his wounds even more.