Page 25 of Haunted By the Shadow of Death

Her eyes were wide with shock and horror. She might’ve screamed if she could’ve moved her face, but the gray spread too fast. Her body jerked and then she fell over before my brain could fully process what was happening. Had I killed her? I must’ve, but how? I hadn’t even touched her, had I?

I was staring at her body, realizing the room had gone completely silent, as if we were all in a state of shock. I could feel my body shaking.

A scream pierced the silence and everyone seemed to swarm at once, gathering around Zetti and then staring at me.

“What did you do?” a female shifter asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t know,” I mumbled. I took a step back from my crime.

“The rumors were true. She’s a monster,” someone else said, not quite a whisper but almost as if they were too shocked to speak loudly.

I could hear the whispers increasing.

“They were right,” another person said a bit louder.

Where was Charlie? I had to get him out of here. I scanned the room frantically as I felt an arm wrap around my waist. Even if I hadn’t recognized his scent, there was only one person who would be brave enough to touch me right now.

“Magnum, get Charlie out of here. Don’t leave his side,” Kicks said. “Buddie, Rastin, take Piper out of here and back to the cabin and stay there with her.”

“She needs to be killed,” someone said.

“No one is touching her,” Kicks said, then steered me toward the door. “Piper.” His tone was sharp enough to pull me from my panic and draw my eyes to his. His hand was on my face. “Go back to the cabin with Buddie and Rastin. Now.”

I nodded, still feeling numb but knowing he was right. I had to get out of here. One glance at the crowd showed it was about to get out of control.

He gave me a push toward the door, where Buddie and Rastin stood waiting.

They were as speechless as me. Buddie opened the door while he scanned the crowd, looking anxious to get out of there. The two of them flanked me as we got outside, both continuing to scan the area as if we’d be attacked at any moment.

The cold winter breeze on my skin seemed to heighten my awareness and jolt me out of my shock. “I don’t know what happened. I didn’t try to kill her. I didn’t even touch her.”

“Were you upset?” Rastin asked.

“No.”

“It was a mistake,” Buddie said. “Something out of your control.”

He was keeping enough distance between us that there couldn’t be an accidental brushing of hands. I caught a look between the two of them. He was scared of me. They both were.

“Yeah, it was an accident. It’ll be okay,” Rastin added, trying to cover up the horror I’d just seen on his face.

He never told me things were okay. Rastin saying it was going to be okay told me one thing: this was so bad it would never be okay again.

I hadn’t even touched her, but it might not matter. They were all so convinced it was me that it might as well have been.

They were convinced because she’d died the same way I had killed others.

Could it have been me? Was I getting to where I could kill without a touch? And where had Death been? If someone was going to die, I’d hear her steps. The only time I didn’t hear her approach was when I killed them. So had it been me?

We all went silent. None of us spoke again as we walked into the cabin.

The sounds of a game playing came from Charlie’s room. Magnum was in there, distracting him. How much had he seen? Did he even know why’d he’d been rushed out of his birthday?

I walked over to the couch and dropped onto it. I wanted to hide in the bedroom but didn’t have the luxury of being rude to some of the only people who were currently willing to stand by me. For now, anyway. No one, not even me, would fault them if they walked away after this. I’d just killed again, or at least appeared to have.

The only thing that mattered was that Zetti was dead. She hadn’t threatened me. She hadn’t even hated me. She’d given me a present, and I might’ve killed her. I’d thought I had it worked out, that I only killed when I was threatened, but now…

I stood abruptly and then froze as Rastin and Buddie immediately jerked their heads toward me, as if on guard.

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