Chapter Eleven

I flew my new charges to my building in a stripped-down station wagon without tires. I put a sleep spell over Marisol before I let the werewolves near the car, because I didn’t want her to freak out. The spell would last until sunrise, and when we arrived at my lair I put her in the capable hands of Maggie and Roz.

The werewolves needed daylight to clear the upper floors, because if we turned the lights on during the night we’d attract zombies for miles like moths to a flame, so the team hung out in the kitchen until then. I let the good Father keep them in line as they dined on mac and cheese.

I retreated into my room and ducked into my bathroom to shed my bloody, torn clothes. My knees buckled and I ended up on my butt in the middle of the tile floor, my head in my bloodstained hands. My heart raced, and my arms tingled with an itchy, prickling sensation, like I was being attacked by invisible fire ants. The air squeezed from my chest and I couldn’t breathe.

“Lizzy? Are you okay?” Angie called from the other side of the door. The crowd in my bedroom probably heard the thud when my well-padded rear hit the floor.

“Sort of. You can come in. Just you.”

Angie entered—alone, as requested—and knelt beside me. “What can I do?”

“I don’t know. I’m sorry.” The tightness in my chest imploded as I cried ugly, racking sobs. I was a monster. Worse, I was a monster who brawled with other monsters. How could I ever consider myself to be relationship material?

“I did say that I wanted to experience your demon,” Angie replied. She rubbed my lower back, careful to avoid the spot where Jimmy had taken a chunk out of me.

“Not like this. You wanted sexy Elizabeth, not serial-killer Elizabeth.”

“She’s not a serial killer.”

I held up my bloody hands. “Maybe Lady Macbeth. Out, damned spot!” I took a steadying breath and fought for composure as the pressure in my chest eased a fraction. “I don’t want you to think I’m a monster. Not you.”

“I don’t. It’s not easy, but…I wanted to pull those guys apart with my bare hands too. I’m glad you’re all right.”

I leaned into her, resting my head on her shoulder. “How are you?”

“Okay. Apparently I’m your second-in-command.” She smiled dryly.

“Seemed a good idea at the time. Does it bother you that I’m white?” I asked.

Angie blinked at the non sequitur. “What? No. Where did that come from?”

“Omar’s dark meat comment. I never thought about it. Well, no, that’s not entirely true. You were right about the white vampire privilege thing. I didn’t think about what other people would think about it. I’m babbling now.” She quirked a thin, dark eyebrow and I blundered on, anxiety still squeezing my chest like a vise. “Like I said, everybody tastes the same as far as blood goes. I understand the sociology of it all as far as race goes, but to a vampire, a human is human. But I don’t want to sound like I’m devaluing your experience. I mean, I’m sure it’s hard to be an African American woman in modern society, especially when you add the difficulties of being a lesbian in a profession that’s traditionally dominated by heterosexual men, and—”

“Stop talking.” Angie kissed me into silence, each touch of her lips dissolving my panic. “It’s okay. It’s all okay. Got it?” She squeezed my shoulder, and I nodded. “Do you need to talk about why you killed those werewolves?”

“I couldn’t let three super-powered sexual predators near our people. Jimmy and his minions would never take no for an answer.”

“Because your master didn’t take no for an answer?”

“He’d laugh if I fought back,” I blurted. I shuddered as though I’d stepped into a sub-zero wind. “He thinks resistance is funny. Until it’s not, and he loses his temper.”

Angie wrapped me in her arms and hugged me. “He sounds like a bastard,” she murmured against my hair.

“He is. I’m sorry about all this. Most people go through their lives never knowing about all this supernatural craziness. Werewolves and vampires and bears, oh my.”

Angie snorted. “There aren’t were-bears, are there?”

“Not that I know of. Just wolves, which are bad enough.”

“Do you trust them?”

“I trust Omar and Naomi. They’re good people. Usually werewolves keep under the radar like vampires do, but they’ve devoted their lives to bettering the community. I respect them for that. Plus, we need them.”

“To do what?”

“Build a brave new world.” I closed my eyes and relaxed into her embrace. Her arms were a warm circle of sanity. “I don’t want civilization to go back to ‘women should be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen’ on my watch.”

“So I shouldn’t ask you to make me a sandwich?” she teased. I drew away and smiled.

“You can ask. Using the words please and thank you would help your odds of success.”

“Of course. My mama raised me right.” Angie’s smile faded as her expression sobered.

“I haven’t checked on your family yet. We can do that after we move the pack in,” I offered. “If anyone asks, tell them about your brother-in-law being an EMT. We need medical professionals.”

“I hope they’re all right.”

“I think their odds are good.” It was a comforting lie. “We’ll find more people, I’m sure of it. The roads and the weather will probably keep most survivors indoors until the worst is over.”

“Is the worst over?” Angie asked.

I sighed. “I hope so. Hey, I need to add you to the security system. I’ll scan your hand in, and you can have your own code. You’ll be in charge of overseeing our werewolf zombie-slaying team. Unless you’d rather put Mike in charge.”

“No, he’s fine with babysitting the civilians. He’s got a bad back.” Angie tilted her head. “My own code, huh? Does this mean we’re going steady?”

“I guess so. Let’s get you set up,” I said. “After I shower. I’m covered in ick.”

The werewolves seemed to have a battle plan. Omar’s beta wolf, Javier Garcia, led their team. Apparently Javier had been a Marine in his pre-werewolf days, and that was encouraging. We needed more people with military and law-enforcement training. Omar had stayed behind at the center to organize the move.

Steve, the werewolf technician, worked with the computer in my office. He was instantly smitten both with my set-up and with Nathalie the computer genius. Together they had the building’s floor plans up in a moment and were best friends with the security system in the next. Based on the building’s entrances, they assigned me spots to stack barricades outside. Elizabeth enjoyed popping the heads off the mobs in the street and crushing their bodies beneath our new makeshift defenses. I was exhausted by the end of the night, my magical batteries spent. I’d need to chug a few blood bags and indulge in some frolic with Angie before heading out again.

Sean studied me as we prepared to climb into my coffin. “Why did you choose to work with the werewolves?”

“Why did you?” I countered.

“The Blakes’ community center is within my territory. It seemed wise to work with them, considering I am not strong enough to fight them. But you could have wiped the werewolves out years ago.”

I wrinkled my nose. “Why? Because they’re different? Seems like a shitty reason to kill someone.”

“Father would say that they are a threat.” Sean shrugged as he hung up his jacket and unbuttoned his collar.

“He thinks everything is a threat. There’s a picture of him next to paranoia in the dictionary.” I slipped my shoes off. “Is that why Philippe was going to leave you to die? Because you’re a threat to him?”

Sean froze. I hadn’t meant it—I was being flippant and snarky more than anything else, but Sean looked as though I’d caught him in a lie. That made no sense. Sean couldn’t be a threat to anyone in our family—Sean was a kitten, and Philippe was a ravenous tiger.

“What? What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Philippe wishes to return you to Tara. Doing so will win him favor with Father. I believe he saw me as a rival, but his reasoning is flawed. I would rather die than return to Tara.”

I nodded in slow agreement. “Yeah, me too. But he can’t force me to go home. That’s part of the agreement that let me leave. No one can make me return. It has to be of my own free will.”

Sean managed a dry smile. “Philippe believes that he will be able to seduce you into agreement. There is a picture of him next to overconfident in the dictionary.”

“Right. Get in.”

We settled into our awkward sleeping arrangement. Elizabeth purred sleepily in Sean’s embrace, and as sleep overtook me I prayed that Angie would be safe during the day.