Night Shifters (4 page)

CHAPTER
2

Kyrie wasn’t sure what she was going to tell Frank. She had some idea he’d already be on simmer from what he would see as her sudden disappearance. In the ten steps between the bathroom and the diner proper, she ran her options through her mind—she could tell him she felt ill. She felt ill enough after the mess in the parking lot and the more specific mess in the bathroom. And the last thing any greasy-spoon owner wanted was to have a sick employee—visibly sick—tending to tables. On the other hand, if she did that, she was going to be some hours short this month. Because there was no way she could come back again tonight. And there was rent to pay.

She didn’t know what she going to say at all until she emerged from the corridor into the yellowish light of the diner and said, “Frank, I need a few minutes, to go to Tom’s.” Which made perfect sense as she said it. A few minutes should suffice to go to Tom’s house, because Tom walked here, and if Tom walked here, he couldn’t live very far away. That meant a couple of minutes would also see him back to his home with no problem at all. And her back here, pretending she’d just dropped by his place.

Frank was attending to the students’ table and had the sort of look on his face that meant he was trying very hard not to explode. Kyrie had worked for him for a year and she’d been a reliable employee, never late, rarely sick, and trustworthy enough to be left alone with the register on occasion. None of which were easy to come by in a college town in Colorado for the late-night shift and considering what Frank was willing to pay.

He looked over his shoulder at Kyrie, and his brows beetled together, nonetheless, and he managed, “What? More minutes?”

“Tom is sick,” she said. “He called me.” Let Frank wonder why and how she’d given Tom her cell-phone number. “He wants me to buy him some stuff at the pharmacy and drop it by. Over-the-counter stuff,” she added, thinking that most of what Tom probably took was not over-the-counter.

Frank looked like he was going to say something like that, for just a moment, but he gave it up. Probably he couldn’t imagine Kyrie buying illegal drugs. And in that he would be right. She got enough lawlessness in her everyday life, enough to hide and disguise, that she did not need any more adrenaline.

So Frank shrugged, which might be taken for agreement, and Kyrie rushed back down the hallway, hoping to find Tom, hoping Tom hadn’t shifted, hoping that for once things would go well. For just this once.

Tom was where she expected him—at the back of the diner, facing the door to the parking lot. He was pale and had started trembling again, and there wasn’t much she could say or do for that. She wondered if he’d killed the man. She didn’t want to think about it. It didn’t matter. If he had, could she blame him? She knew the confusion of mind, the prevalence of the beast-self over every civilized learning, every instinct, even. How could she accuse someone else who’d given in perhaps further?

Of course she could, a deeper voice said, because she didn’t give in. She’d fought her—as she’d thought—hallucinations tooth and nail and she’d held onto a normal life of sorts. No friends, no family, no one who might discover what she’d thought was her hideous madness, but she made her own money, she lived her own life.

She managed a weak smile at Tom by way of reassurance, as she turned the key and opened the door.

She took a deep breath to steel herself against the smell of blood, the light of the moon. She must stay in control. She must.

But she wasn’t ready for the other smell—the hot, musky, and definitely male smell that invaded her nostrils as she stepped onto the parking lot.

Dizziness and her mouth went dry and her whole body started fluttering on the verge of shifting shape, and she told herself no. No. Regained control just in time to see it, at the edge of the parking lot, under one of the lights.

Not it. Him. The smell was clear as a hallelujah chorus in her head. He was at the edge of the parking lot, and he was tawny and huge and muscular.

A lion. He was a lion. Was he a lion like she was a panther and Tom was a dragon, or . . .

Or what? An invader from the vast Colorado savannah outside Goldport? Where lions and zebras chased each other under the hot tropical sun?

She shook her head at her own silliness.

Behind her, Tom drew breath, noisily. “Is it?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“But—” He drew breath again and something—something about the movement of his feet against the asphalt, something about his breathing, perhaps something about his smell (since when could she smell people this way?) made her think he was about to run.

She put out a hand to his arm. “Do not run,” she said. “Walk steadily.”

His arm felt cold and smooth under her hand. Light sprinkling of hair. Very little of it for a male. Perhaps being a dragon . . . She didn’t want to think of that. She didn’t want to think of Tom, muzzle deep in blood.

Which of course meant the lion could smell them. Smell the blood on them. “You mustn’t run,” she said. “We . . . Cats are triggered by motion. If you run he will give chase. Walk slowly and steadily toward my car. The small white one. Come.”

They made their way slowly, steadily, across the parking lot, in the reek of blood. Perhaps the lion wouldn’t be able to smell Tom in the overwhelming smell.

Perhaps they could make it to the car. Perhaps . . . perhaps the moon was made of green cheese and it would rain pea soup tomorrow.

He smelled powerful, musky. She could hear him draw breath, was aware of the touch of paw pads on the asphalt. She felt those movements as if they were her own, her heart accelerating and seeming to beat at her throat, suffocating her.

Paw touching asphalt, and paw touching asphalt, and paw touching asphalt. Measured steps. Not a run. Please don’t let it be a run.

And her movements matched his—slow, measured, trying to appear unconcerned, escorting Tom to the car, guiding him.

Tom walked like a wooden puppet. Was he that terrified of the lion? Didn’t he know in his dragon form he was as big? Bigger? Stronger? Why was he afraid?

But her rational self understood. He was afraid because he was in human form. And every human at the back of his mind feared the large felines who lurked in the shadows and who could eat him in two bites.

Kyrie herself was sweating and cold by degrees, and felt as if her legs were made of water, as she concentrated on following the beast’s movements by sound.

They hit the moonlight, out of the shadow of the diner and into the fully illuminated parking lot. The heat of it felt like fire playing over Kyrie’s skin and she kept her head lowered. She took deep breaths. Her heartbeat echoed some old jungle rhythm but she told herself she would not, she would not, she could not shift.

And the smell of him—of the lion—enveloped her, stronger than ever. Her senses, sharpened from wanting to transform, gave her data about him that a mere nose should not be able to gather. That he was young. That he was healthy. That he was virile.

She pulled Tom forward, and the lion followed them at a distance—step, step, step, unhurried, unafraid. She prayed he wouldn’t start running. She prayed he wouldn’t leap. And inside, deep inside, she felt as if he was toying with her. Playing. Like a cat with a mouse.

She was not a mouse.

Sweat formed on her scalp, dripped toward her eyes, made her blink. The car loomed in front of her, white and looking much bigger than it usually did. Looking like safety.

Kyrie pushed her key-fob button to unlock it, and felt as if her fingers slipped on the smooth plastic, as though she had claws and unwieldy paws.

No. She must not. She must remain human. She must.

Breathing deeply and only managing to inhale more unabashed male musk, she shoved Tom, slightly, and said, “Go around to the passenger side. Get in.”

Go, give him a divided target. Go, but for the love of all that’s holy, don’t stop. Don’t stop. Don’t let him catch you.
She didn’t know which she feared most. The idea of being attacked or the idea of seeing Tom attacked, of seeing Tom torn to pieces. Of shifting. Of joining in.

She shuddered as her too-clumsy fingers struggled with the car handle. She saw Tom open the door on the other side. Get in. She struggled with the handle.

And the lion was twenty steps away, crouching in the full light of the moon, augmented by the light of a parking-lot lamp above her. He was crouching, front down low and hindquarters high.

Hindquarters trembling. Legs bunching.

Jump. He was going to—

He jumped, clearing the space between them, and she leaned hard against her car, her heart hammering in her chest, her body divided and dividing her mind. Her human body, her human mind, wanted to scream, to hide. Her human body knew that the huge body would hit her, claws would rend her. That she was about to die.

But her other mind . . . Her other mind practically died in the ecstatic smell of healthy young male. Her other mind thought the lion knew her, guessed her, smelled her for an equal. That the lion wanted— Not to eat her.

She realized she’d closed her eyes, when she felt him landing near her—landing with all four paws on the asphalt. Not on her, but so close to her she felt the breeze of his falling, and smelled him, smelled him hot and strong and oh, so impossibly male.

She felt her body spasm, wish to shift. She fought it. She struggled to stay herself.

Through half-open eyes, she saw a lion’s face turned toward her, its golden eyes glowing, its whole expression betraying . . . smugness?

Then it opened its mouth, the fangs glowing in the light and a soft growl started at the back of its throat. She didn’t know if it was threatening her or . . .

Something to the growl—something to the sound crept along her nerves like a tingle on the verge of aching. If she stayed— If she stayed . . .

The car door opened, shoving her. She leapt aside, to avoid being pushed into the lion. A hand reached out of the car, dragged her. She fell onto her seat. Blinked. Tom. Tom had pulled her into the car.

“Drive,” Tom said. “Drive.”

He reached across her, as he spoke and slammed the door. From outside, the lion made a rumbling sound that might have been amusement.

She didn’t remember turning the ignition. She didn’t remember stepping on the gas. But she realized she was driving down Fairfax. Tall, silent apartment houses succeeded each other on either side of the road, lighted by sporadic white pools of light from the street lamps.

“Where do you live?” she managed, glancing at Tom. Part of her wanted to tell him she hadn’t been afraid, she hadn’t been . . .

But she wasn’t even sure she could explain what she’d been. She had been afraid. That was a huge beast. But also, at some level, she was afraid she would end up shifting, cavorting with him. Over a half-devoured human carcass.

“Two blocks down,” Tom said, and swallowed, as if he’d had the same thought at the same time. “Audubon apartments. On the left.”

She remembered the place. Not one of the graceful Victorian remnants, but half a dozen rectangular red-brick boxes sharing a parking lot. During the day there were any number of kids playing in the parking lot, and usually one or two men working on cars or drinking beer.

Now, in the dark of night, it was silent and ill lit. As she pulled into the parking lot, Tom asked, “It was one of us, wasn’t it?”

“Pardon?” she said. She knew what he meant. She knew all too well. He was asking if the lion was like them. If the lion too had a human form and one not so human. But Kyrie had managed until very recently to convince herself she only had one form and that everything else was hallucination. Mental illness.

Now this whole thing felt like mental illness. She parked the car, turned the engine off.

“You know . . .” Tom said. His blue eyes were earnest, and he plucked at her sleeve like a little kid seeking reassurance. “You know, a shapeshifter. Like us.”

She shrugged. “Seems unlikely it escaped from a zoo,” she said. “Someone would have given the alarm, wouldn’t they?”

Tom nodded, as if considering this. “What . . . what did it want?”

Kyrie shrugged. She wanted to say
he
wanted everything but all she had to go on was the smell. And she didn’t wish to discuss her response to the smell with Tom.