Allegiance(87)

Nik took a deep breath and began to talk, picking up the story from his and Robin’s trip to talk to Mark at the Chow House. “Shawn was flirting, you know, wanting to feed from me.” She wanted to fuck him, too, but no point in adding that since it didn’t happen. “She put her hand on mine, and I got a flash of memory from her. Nothing to do with our sabotage at that point, just a flash of her in a restaurant from before she was turned.”

“But you don’t get images from vampires.” Robin sat next to him and was fiddling with the edge of an afghan. “Or you haven’t before.”

“Exactly. That’s what made me think something was off about her. So I agreed to let her feed and went back to her place, hoping to get more images. I didn’t want to bring her in here, where Glory might be, in case things went south.”

Up to that point, his plan had worked like a charm—although he wouldn’t mention how her feeding had aroused him or the fact that he was so hard and aching that he let her jack him off while she finished. “I was getting ready to leave when she hugged me, and that’s when I saw a flash of a coyote and a fire. I knew then she either witnessed it, or she set it.

“I followed her but lost her when she passed the tree line into the woods behind the mill. By the time I found her, she’d shifted, and I ended up wrestling the coyote.” He looked down at his bites and scratches and bruises. “I think she won.”

Mirren had been doodling on a notebook while Nik talked, but now he looked up. “Did you actually see her shift?”

Nik shook his head. “No, but she was there, and then the coyote was there. It didn’t run away, like a real coyote would. She turned and attacked. That plus the images . . . it’s right. I feel it.”

He thought of all the lore Robin had shared about shifters. Only two shifters of the same species could produce healthy shifter children. Shifters couldn’t have kids with shifters of other species or with humans.

The only way to get a hybrid was for a shifter to bite a human multiple times—usually three—and the results were usually freakish. Some shifter had made his own Shawn Frankenstein. “I know it sounds crazy, but I swear my gut tells me it’s true. What I don’t understand is why.”

“I think we’re about to get some answers,” Mirren said, propelling himself from his chair and striding toward the door.

Robin was on her feet as well, and Nik and Glory exchanged exasperated glances. “I don’t hear anything,” Robin muttered.

Neither did Nik, but a few seconds after Mirren opened the front door, Cage strode in hauling Shawn behind him on a leash—in her human form. She was wearing his shirt, or so Nik assumed since she wore a man’s shirt that came almost to her knees and Cage was bare chested. Her arms had been bound behind her with duct tape, and Cage appeared to have fashioned a leash and collar out of the heavy tape as well. He tossed the handle of the leash—the cardboard roll of tape—at Mirren.

“She’s all yours, mate. I’m done.” He collapsed on the other side of Robin. “What a nightmare. She’s a woman, then she’s a bloody jackal, then she’s a woman again. And she fucking bites.”

Yeah, well, Nik knew a thing or two about that. She’d eaten his earlobe.

With no pretense at kindness, Mirren dragged Shawn into the middle of the living room and dropped the makeshift leash. The tape roll swung gently in front of her legs.

The silence was long and uncomfortable. Mirren asked no questions, just sat back down in his chair and stared at her. When he first released her, she’d looked from one of them to the other, a stubborn, defiant gleam in her eye. The longer the silence lasted, the more that gleam died until she finally seemed to realize her position and dropped to her knees.

Nik almost felt sorry for her. Almost.

“Please don’t kill me.” She repeated it, rocking back and forth, looking mostly at the floor but up at Mirren occasionally. Back and forth. Back and forth. And only begging Mirren; the rest of them had ceased to exist. Even the younger vampires had heard stories of the Slayer, Nik supposed. He’d been quite the terror in his day.

Next to him, Cage wrapped his arms around Robin, and she relaxed against him, her hand looking impossibly small resting on his thigh. She looked worried but also content in the moment.

He wanted that for her. Now, if he could just find it for himself. Although at the rate he was going, he might not live long enough to worry about it.

Shawn continued to rock on her knees, but Mirren finally had enough. “I won’t kill you.” His voice was low, and if “deadly” had a sound, Mirren had captured it. “That’ll be Aidan’s decision. He usually takes my advice.”