I meant to put my screen aside, to give myself a break from drama until the sun rose, but I needed one more thing. So I tapped the screen again, sent a message.
YOU UP? I asked, and waited for a reply.
Lulu’s response was nearly instantaneous. I TOLD YOU, RODNEY. I’M NOT INTERESTED.
HILARIOUS, I messaged. IT’S BEEN A CRAP NIGHT. TELL ME SOMETHING GOOD.
HUMANS RECORD THEMSELVES DOING STUPID THINGS AND UPLOAD THE VIDEOS SO STRANGERS AROUND THE WORLD CAN WATCH THEM.
YES, YOU’VE JUST DESCRIBED THE INTERNET.
HUMANS MAKE NO SENSE.
IT IS A TRUTH UNIVERSALLY ACKNOWLEDGED, I agreed. HOW IS ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE? I wasn’t even brave enough to use a nickname or acronym over text. Because she’d know.
DISPLEASED SHE GOT CAT FOOD INSTEAD OF BLUEFIN TUNA. SHE RIPPED UP ONE OF YOUR SOCKS.
WHY MY SOCK?
BECAUSE I DIDN’T WANT TO USE ONE OF MINE OBVS.
I could fault the sentiment, and the loss of a sock, but not the logic.
YOU OK? she asked. GIVEN THE CRAP NIGHT.
NOT AT THE MOMENT. BUT I THINK I WILL BE.
GOOD, she said. BECAUSE ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE WANTS TO HAVE WORDS WITH YOU WHEN YOU RETURN. IN ADDITION TO THE CAT FOOD, SHE DISAPPROVES OF YOUR FOOTWEAR.
Of course she did. And the sock had nearly been worth the laugh I’d sorely needed.
SIXTEEN
The first time, I woke to heat, and jolted awake, thinking I was back in front of the bonfire, fending off the beasts. But it wasn’t fire, or not exactly.
It was light. Sunlight—a pinpoint ray of gold that slashed across the bed like a knife.
I was half-asleep, barely conscious, but I knew enough of pain and heat to scramble away and out of the literal line of fire. I dropped to the floor, moved into a corner, and, in the darkness, slept again.
* * *
* * *
The second time, I woke in darkness, curled in a ball on the floor at the end of the bed. I rose, wincing at the quick jolt of pain, and found an angry red stripe across my thigh. It would heal, but I’d never forget the sensation. I’d been sliced by katanas, scraped by monster claws. But the searing effect of sunlight was something altogether different.
I rose and walked back to the window, still covered by the exterior shutters, at least as far as I could see from here. But something had happened. Something had damaged one of them, breaking the fortification intended to keep me safe.
And I seriously doubted that was a coincidence.
I got dressed and, given the tenor of things, belted on my sword. The cabin was empty; I walked outside, found Connor staring at the shutter.
He glanced back. “Hey.”
It was cooler today, and he wore his black motorcycle jacket over a shirt, the ensemble completed by jeans and boots. His eyes were shadowed, like he hadn’t slept well or long. And I could still feel the boundary between us, the heaviness of things spoken . . . and not.
“There was sunlight in my room,” I said.
“What?” He looked me over. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. It woke me up, so I moved into the corner.”
“It woke you up,” he repeated slowly, watching me carefully. “Because it burned you.”
“A very small burn,” I said. “Just on my leg, and it’s probably already gone.” I tried for a smile, but it felt odd on my face.
And then I looked at the shutters he’d been scrutinizing, and realized how the light had gotten through. They were warped and gouged around the edges, the metal rippled—like someone had tried to pry them off and expose me to the sunlight. They hadn’t been successful at either, but for the split in the metal that allowed in that single shard of sunlight.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
I looked back at him, guilt and apology warring in his eyes, and tried to lighten the mood. “Why? Did you do this?”
He ignored the joke. “I heard noises outside around two or three o’clock. I went outside to check, startled something coming around the side of the cabin. It ran back toward the road.”
I lifted my brows. “Human, shifter, or creature?”
He pointed at the ground. “You tell me.”
The ground was crossed by a bevy of marks—human or shifter footprints, animal tracks. And I was about to ask Connor to point out what he was seeing, when I realized it wasn’t a group of marks; it was a single mark with several parts. Not like the creature—with its elongated track. Not like a human, or shifter in human form, with its longer and wider pad. But a mix of the two. A long pad, with the indentation of paw pads at the top.
“Half shifter, half creature?” I asked, looking back at him.
“I’m not sure, but I think it didn’t transform completely. The thing I saw—something tall, thin, sparse hair—wasn’t a shifter, and it wasn’t a human. It was gone before I could get a good look.”
“So maybe whatever magic they’re using affects the shifting—changes what they shift into, or how they do it.”
“And it’s not working very well,” he said. “I think it’s supposed to be a hybrid.”
“Aren’t shifters hybrids?”
“No, we’re both man and wolf. Our transition is like flipping a coin—you have the wolf or the human.”
“But the creatures are like both human and wolf at the same time,” I guessed. “Wolves that walk on two legs.”
“And enhanced,” Connor said. “Bigger than both.” He shook his head, looked at me with apology in his eyes. “I didn’t inspect the shutters. I only checked they were still in place. I’m sorry they hurt you. And I’m sorry I allowed it.”
Whatever was between us, I could give him this. “You don’t owe me an apology, and you didn’t allow anything. There was no reason for you to go over the shutters with a microscope. It’s illogical they’d have tried to remove them.”
Guilt shifted to confusion. “What?”
“This is indirect and sloppy. Maybe they think causing me pain will hurt you. They apparently don’t realize vampires aren’t comatose during the day; we sleep. Pain wakes us up. They’d have been a lot more successful attacking me or you away from the resort. Here, the odds are higher they’d be seen or caught.”
Connor blinked, looked back at the shutters. “This was sloppy.”
“Yeah, it was.” But since it plainly wasn’t beyond them, I’d put a blanket over the window tonight, just in case.