The Curse (47 page)
Authors: Sherrilyn Kenyon,Dianna Love
Evalle told him everything, finishing with, “I don’t think there’s a threat to national security.”
“No, we dodged a bullet with this one.”
Their helicopter pilot called over to Tzader who walked toward the chopper that sat in perfect view, now that a fifty foot section of the wrought iron fence had been flattened for access. Casper followed Tzader to where another helicopter full of VIPER agents was just touching down.
Relieved to see her team safe, Evalle turned to look at the beautiful old home, now a pile of ruins.
A movement at the bottom of the rubble caught her attention.
Something small crawled out through an opening where the base of the porch met the house. She started to point it out to the others, but they were physically spent. She could handle one of Sar’s creatures weakened by the fire and out here where she knew her kinetics worked just fine. Walking toward the house to determine what was trying to escape, she grimaced at the heat rolling off the burning pile.
Easing closer, she realized the little thing dragging itself away from the fire-engulfed structure had bat-like wings. The two-foot tall creature had survived?
She reminded herself that Sar’s goal had been to create dangerous killing machines, but when this creature raised terrified orange eyes to meet hers, her conscience argued that this one had been marked as a failure.
Intense heat baking her skin forced her to wait as the creature put his head down and kept crawling toward her.
When it was within a few feet, she squatted down, ready to react at any hint of danger, but all she felt coming off the little critter was fear. Her empathic flashes were stronger and more frequent when her emotions were stirred up, like right now.
Sometimes you had to trust your gut.
One of the men yelled, “Something’s escaping!”
That’s when the little creature looked up, eyes rounding in terror. It started shaking.
Footsteps pounded toward her from behind. Evalle stood up and swung around, putting herself between the little creature and the VIPER agents.
One of the agents she didn’t recognize lifted his hands to attack but halted, face in shock when he saw Evalle obviously standing between him and the creature. He yelled, “Get that crazy Alterant out of the way!”
Evalle put her hands on her hips. “Touch this little guy and I’ll hurt you.”
The critter crawled into her peripheral vision and tucked up close to her legs, then did the most amazing thing.
He hooked his arm around her leg and looked up at her as if she was an angel there to save him.
She was no angel, but he was safe next to her. Tzader came charging up with Quinn, but Tzader was the one who said, “Have you lost your mind? That … that gargoyle looking thing could kill you.”
It was a good description, really. He—if this critter was a he—did look like a gargoyle.
She could feel the poor thing against her leg, trembling hard as a leaf in a hurricane. Then he patted her leg, as if trying to convey that he was no threat. Crossing her arms, she shook her head. “He’s not going to hurt me.”
Quinn argued, “Based upon
what
evidence, considering the things we just fought in that place?”
“Just because the rest of them were killing machines doesn’t mean he is. His door had a notation that marked him as food because he failed a kill test. I don’t think Sar would have destroyed him if he had any hope of being dangerous.”
There was only one way to convince everyone not to kill this poor thing.
Taking a breath she hoped wouldn’t be her last considering the smoke that floated from his snout, Evalle reached down and hoisted the heavy little critter up into her arms.
Tzader and Quinn both shouted, “Don’t!” and now stared at her as if she needed to be put in a straight jacket.
The gargoyle had tucked his wings around his body, but when she picked him up he lifted his head to watch her with worried eyes the whole time. He smelled sooty and stinky, but what could you expect from something that had been kept locked in a hole and climbed out of a fire? He’d clean up just fine.
She smiled at him, but her words were for Tzader and Quinn. “He just needs some TLC.”
That set off Quinn. “Oh, good Goddess, you have to be joking. It has probably never been out of a cage. You don’t know what it will do.”
At that moment, her little critter smiled, exposing two small fangs.
She knew in her heart she was right to protect him. “I had never been outside of a cage until I was eighteen, and the Beladors didn’t know what I would do when that Druid brought me in.”
One look at Quinn and Tzader’s faces and she knew they both understood what she was saying. A lot of people would have destroyed her if they’d known she was an Alterant from the beginning. “I’m keeping him.”
The pair of growling sighs that followed told her she’d won the battle. She didn’t know if this little gargoyle creature could comprehend what she was saying, but he understood when someone would not hurt him and dropped his head down on her shoulder with a gurgle of what sounded to her like happiness.
Tzader shifted around and waved off the team then turned back to Evalle. “There’s no way the pilots will let you on the helicopter with that.”
“Great news, because there’s no way I’m climbing back on either one of those freaking machines.” She grinned as Quinn muttered something and flipped open his cell phone, no doubt calling a driver for her.
For once, she’d let Quinn spoil her with a driver and car because she had to get her new baby home in as calm and gentle a way as possible. She felt four fingers patting her shoulder, content. “We’re going to have to come up with a name for you, little guy. Something suitable for a phoenix that fought its way out of the flames of hell.”
SHERRILYN KENYON
is the #1
New York Times
bestselling author of several series, including the Bureau of American Defense novels
Born to Be BAD, BAD Attitude, Phantom in the Night, Whispered Lies,
and
Silent Truth,
and the enticing new Belador series, including
Blood Trinity
and
Alterant.
Both series are available from Pocket Books. There are more than twenty-five million copies of Sherrilyn’s books in print in over thirty countries. She lives with her family near Nashville, Tennessee. Visit her website at
www.SherrilynKenyon.com
.
DIANNA LOVE
is the RITA Award—winning,
New York Times
bestselling coauthor of
Phantom in the Night, Whispered Lies, Silent Truth, Blood Trinity,
and
Alterant.
She is a national speaker who started thinking up stories while working more than one hundred feet in the air, creating unusual marketing projects for Fortune 500 companies. When not plotting out her latest action-adventure, she travels the country on a motorcycle to meet fans and research new locations. She and her husband live near Atlanta, Georgia. Visit her website at
www.AuthorDiannaLove.com
.
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Also by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love
Alterant
Blood Trinity
Phantom in the Night
Silent Truth
Whispered Lies
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2012 by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
First Pocket Books paperback edition October 2012
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ISBN 978-1-4516-7198-8
ISBN 978-1-4516-7200-8 (ebook)
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