I was back in the office almost before my gang could start arguing.
“So is now when you’re going to drop trou?” Ted asked Paul with a sigh.
“Yep.” Paul started to strip down.
Ben turned and looked at me. “What the hell is he doing? Now is not the time to get naked.”
“Wait for it,” Ted said, checking the gun he wore in his shoulder holster and the one at his ankle.
Then Paul began to change.
There is nothing quite like seeing a werewolf change. Vampires can be subtle. There are times when I have no idea if Alex has his fangs out or not. Of course, the older a vampire gets, the better he gets at shifting in and out of his blood-sucking persona.
A werewolf change is never subtle. Paul was an impressive man in the nude, so there was that to start with. Sophie and Norah were both staring, and I certainly was starting to understand why Meredith was being so persistent. His body was thick with muscle, sturdy and hard. He wasn’t wasting any time tonight, though. As he willed his change to begin, his back arched up to the ceiling, and then he swung forward, his arm already lengthening and claws forming at his fingertips.
Ben started back toward the window. I put my hand on his arm and shook my head. “It’s okay,” I said as quietly as I could.
It wasn’t quiet enough. Paul turned his head and snarled at me even as his jaw lengthened. The growl deepened as skin stretched and bones popped. Sleek fur sprouted from his skin, running from his now very lupine head to the tail that formed at the base of his spine. When the change was finally complete, he sat down on his haunches and lifted his head.
I got right in his face and shook my head before he could howl, sitting back on my heels relieved when he didn’t take my face off with his very impressive set of teeth.
I looked around. Norah’s, Ben’s and Sophie’s faces were ashen. Even Ted looked a little sickened and he’d seen it before. I had no idea if we were going to come through this night alive if my crew was this shaken by a guy who was on our side.
24
I LED THE WAY OUT OF THE OFFICE SO WE COULD TAKE UP OUR positions before the
kiang shi
began to rise at sunset.
It is harder to hide five people and a transformed werewolf in a small space than it is to hide one. My “usual” hiding place in the second-floor balcony clearly could not accommodate the group of us. I managed to tuck Sophie and Ben into one nook. They looked too scared to start necking so I figured it was safe. Norah and Paul went into another, and Ted and I tucked into a third.
“Cozy,” he whispered in my ear.
“Don’t get any ideas,” I warned him.
“It’s kind of hard not to get ideas with you wiggling your butt against me like that,” he observed.
The exact nature of his ideas was getting hard to hide. In fact, it was poking me. “Well, try.”
“There is no try . . .” he started.
“Do not start quoting Yoda at me.”
He shrugged and wrapped his arms around me. “Sorry. It was all I had.”
I leaned against him, trying to ground myself against him, in his humanness and his strength, and settled in to wait.
It didn’t take long.
The scene unfolded much as it had the first time I’d watched the
kiang shi
rise.
Henry arrived, and while he had the priests with him, he had fewer of his own men. Baldy was gone, as were Jimmy and Ponytail. I felt no satisfaction, although I liked our odds better.
A muffled sneeze came from Norah and Paul’s alcove. Great. I thought Norah was only allergic to cats. Could she be allergic to werewolves, too? I mean, dander is dander, right?
I held my breath and watched below to see any reaction. Henry and his men were agitated enough that it didn’t seem to register. I thought I spotted that little twitch in George’s hand, his tell, but he didn’t look around. Maybe it was my imagination. I let my breath out in a slow hiss. Behind me, Ted rested his forehead against the top of my head.
So far so good.
Then the
kiang shi
began to rise. It was party time.
The first
kiang shi
clambered out of his grave, green flesh hanging from his arms and face. The first priest started forward, took a talisman from the stack in the carved box and stuck the yellow paper to the creature’s forehead. Before he was finished, the other priests were heading for their
kiang shi
. They didn’t even hesitate any longer, like they had the first night I’d seen them. They looked thin and pale and it was clear even from this distance that whatever fight they had had in them was long gone.
It took a moment for them to realize that the
kiang shi
were still moving forward despite having the talismans attached to their foreheads. Henry turned to his brother. “Get them under control, George.”
George rang his bell, but it did no good. He began to shrink back against the wall as did the other priests. Henry’s men, however, drew their guns and stood firm. It was go time.
I vaulted over the railing of the second-floor balcony, letting my knees bend as I hit.
One of the henchmen turned, took one look at me and squeezed off a shot. I ducked. It might have been a good idea on his part to try and take me out, but the time it took allowed the first of the
kiang shi
to grab him from behind. I didn’t watch what happened next to him. His agonized screams provided more than enough information.
I heard the thump of Paul landing behind me. Henry’s men began to scream and scatter. Paul herded them back toward the
kiang shi
. They were trapped between Paul’s snapping teeth and the long fingernailed grasp of the
kiang shi
. Another one went down as a snack for the Chinese vampires.
I ran to where the priests had huddled together and started scooping the sticky rice out of my bag. “Stay behind the barrier and try to hold your breath,” I told them.
I turned back to where Henry’s men were dying one by one at the hands of the very
kiang shi
they had used to kill and control so many others.
The priests had sunk down onto the floor into lotus position. How they could meditate in the midst of the killing chaos going on around them was more than I could understand, but each one of them had stilled. If they were breathing at all, I couldn’t detect it.
Finally, Henry was the last one standing. His last man had gone down. He had no one left to hide behind. He turned to make a run for the back of the temple. I leaped in the air, spun and with a side kick to the face, thrust him back into the waiting teeth and arms of the
kiang shi
behind him.
They snapped his left arm first. He sank to the floor, disbelief clear on his face. “Help me!” he screamed.
I didn’t budge.
One of the
kiang shi
grabbed his hair, pulling his head back to expose his throat. Another ripped his throat out with its teeth. Henry didn’t scream anymore.
But now came the tricky part.
I turned. Ted was already standing next to me.
“I’ve got this part,” he said. He inhaled deeply, then blew all the air out of his lungs. With talismans in both hands, he raced in.
Dear God, he was fearless. He slapped the first talisman onto the
kiang shi
that was still feasting on Henry Zhang. It froze immediately. The second went on the one that was heading for Paul. A third one was heading toward Ted. If it blindly hit him, would it attack? I had no idea. I screamed his name, and he ducked, slapping a talisman on the forehead of the monster as he did it. Within a few more seconds, he’d slapped the talismans on the foreheads of the last two
kiang shi
as they continued to rip apart Triad members.
That was it. They were all frozen. Ted stood still for a moment, then swayed and fell to his knees, gulping in huge lungfuls of air.
I ran to him. “Are you okay?”
He nodded, breathing in. “Terrific. Never better. Probably psychotic, but other than that, completely hunky dory.”
Paul nudged up next to us and licked Ted’s face. Bracing himself on Paul’s broad shoulder, Ted heaved himself to his feet. He scratched Paul behind the ear. “Thanks, man.”
I turned. The priests were standing up. George looked at me, tears streaming down his face. “Can we come out now? Is it safe?”
I nodded. “For now.”
He went to his brother and cradled what was left of the broken body to him and wept. I’d have to come back and deal with the
kiang shi
. I couldn’t allow them to stay here in the temple or anywhere else, for that matter. They would have to be destroyed, but not today.
George had enough grief to deal with as it was.
I made my way upstairs again, suddenly exhausted.
Sophie and Ben were leaning over the balcony. “We did it!” Sophie hugged me, and Ben high-fived me.
I found Norah crouched in the corner, shaking.
I ran my hands over her body and checked as much as I could with her curled in on herself. “Are you hurt? Did one of them . . . did you get bitten?” I wasn’t sure what would happen to Norah if one of the
kiang shi
had managed to get its venom in her. It had been hard enough for me to fight off, and my immune system was probably a thousand times stronger than Norah’s. I also didn’t see how it could have happened. None of them got past me. I was sure of it.
She pushed my hands away. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know.”
“Didn’t know what?” Before she could answer, I turned my head and yelled for Ted. If Norah had been bitten, Alex needed to start treating her right away. We had to get her out of the temple to him.
“I didn’t know what it would be like. What they would be like. How horrible it would be.” She wrapped her arms around herself.
Ted came up beside us. “Is she all right?”
“I don’t know. I don’t see any marks on her, but I want Alex to check her. Can you get her outside to him?”
He nodded and scooped her up in his arms. She threw her arms around his neck and clung to him. I followed him down the stairs and out the temple to the alleyway where Alex was waiting.
He rushed over to us. “What’s wrong?”
“You need to check her. I’m afraid she’s been bitten. She’s acting strange.”
Ted set Norah down on the ground. Alex knelt down next to her and reached for her. She slapped his hand away. “Don’t touch me. You’re like them, aren’t you? They’re vampires. You’re a vampire. I didn’t know. It wasn’t like in the movies or on TV.”
Alex and I exchanged a glance. “We need to know that you’re physically okay, first, Norah,” Alex said in his soothing doctor voice.
Norah shook her head.
“Hold out your arms,” he said, this time in his vampire voice.
Norah stuck out her arms, but her gaze swung toward me, wild and frightened. I rubbed her back and murmured what I hoped were comforting sounds as Alex gave her the once-over as quickly as he could. I couldn’t help thinking of all the times Norah had undone me with one of her hugs, had opened her arms and heart to me in friendship asking nothing in return, not even the truth. What had I given back to her now?
Alex nodded to me. “She’s okay. Some bumps and bruises, probably from shimmying in the window but no broken skin. There’s no . . . no physical harm.” He stood up and walked away.
I knew the moment the spell of his voice and presence had been broken because Norah collapsed against me and sobbed. I sat and stroked her hair, not knowing what else to do.
Ted crouched down next to us. “We’ve got to get out of here, Melina. Someone’s going to have heard something and called it in.” He looked at Norah. “Is she okay? Can we move her?”
“I think so.” Even if I had to sling her over my shoulder and haul her to the car, we could probably go.
Norah looked up and brushed tears from her face. “You saved us. You did it. How? How did you do it?”
Ted sighed. “See, I used to be on the swim team in high school and we did this exercise where we had to hold . . .”
Norah cut him off by launching herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck and sobbing harder. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”
Well, there was an interesting turn of events. So much for her mistrust of authority figures. Apparently, once they saved your heinie, they weren’t so bad.
I CAN’T IMAGINE WHAT WE LOOKED LIKE AS WE CLIMBED OUT OF the cars and headed back to my apartment. Bloody, bedraggled and, in Norah’s case, tear streaked, we shuffled down the street wordlessly. From half a block away, I could make out a dark form on my porch. Damn. What was coming after us now?
I glanced at Ted and nodded at the shape. He squinted, looked back at me and shrugged, but he shuffled Norah behind him and motioned for Alex to move forward in the group.
Whatever it was, it was ’Cane. I was totally getting the vibe. Paul walked behind Alex and me, sniffing the air. “What is it?” he asked.
“I don’t know yet,” I said. “But it’s waiting for us.”
“Then let’s bring it,” Alex said quietly and inched his lips back enough for me to see his fangs.
“You’re itching for a fight because you got left out of the last one, aren’t you?” I wanted to stop and confront him, but it was better if whatever was waiting on the porch was unaware that we were aware of it.
Paul chuckled. “Every party has a pooper . . .”
“I simply don’t want someone to think our guard is down,” Alex said.
