Page 40 of Junk Magic

He just waited, as he should, for my decision.

“Your choice, of course,” Cyrus said, sounding diffident. “But as for me . . .” Our eyes met, and he shrugged. “I’d let him go. He isn’t worth the trouble his death would cause, and Sebastian—”

My ears pricked at the clan chieftain’s name. Cyrus bent low, to whisper in my ear. Not that it mattered; right now, I could have heard him from across the room.

“He would probably prefer not to have any more trouble.”

Listen to him! My human half screeched.

The wolf mine was calmer. Blood lust still surged, and outrage, and joy, a strange mix of emotions that the other me didn’t understand. But slowly, my teeth released the man’s jugular, and the flesh around it. Slowly, I pulled back and sat up, the room swaying a bit around me.

I licked my lips, tasting warm copper; somebody cursed; and the man’s brother silently pulled him away.

The strange haze I had been experiencing broke a second later, and I snapped fully back into my human mind. One which saw Jace, still in wolf form, crouched low behind Cyrus; saw a ring of naked humans, many still on all fours, watching me intently; and behind them, the usually bustling lobby filled with war mages, what must have been hundreds of them, all standing silently, all looking at me with sober, accusing eyes.

Chapter Eleven

“What the hell was that?” It was one of my new students, following us out of the door to HQ and into the blazing sun of the parking lot. It was so bright out that I covered my eyes, and so hot that I was surprised the asphalt wasn’t melting. It was like walking into an oven set on high.

“Damn, it’s hot,” Aki said, gasping a little.

“Screw the heat!” Chris said. “I want to know what just happened in—”

“Stuff it,” Sophie said tersely, and to my surprise, he did.

Yeah, I thought again.

Alpha.

No one else said anything, including me. I didn’t know how much they’d seen, and right then, I didn’t care. My stomach was roiling and I felt like throwing up. The taste of blood was strong in my mouth, human blood, and I didn’t have anything to wash it away. I stopped by Hernando’s cart, but he wasn’t there. He was back in the lobby, huddled with the others, talking . . .

About God knew what.

Cyrus reached behind the cart and stuffed a bill into the simple shoebox where Hernando kept his cash, because nobody in their right mind steals from a Were. And then snared me a soda out of an ice chest, something orange with a Mexican name on the side. It was lukewarm, with the Vegas heat making a mockery of anything that wasn’t a deep freeze, but it was welcome.

I took a drink, swished it around my mouth and spat it out. I didn’t look at what splattered on the concrete. I very carefully didn’t look.

“You alright?” Cyrus asked, his voice low.

I didn’t answer. Thought I might throw up. I would have liked to blame the overly sweet soda, but it would have been a lie.

I could remember everything now, as I hadn’t been able to before: the wolf jumping for Jace; the terror in the cub’s eyes; the small body nonetheless squaring up, because Weres don’t die huddled in a ball on the floor, not even children; a roar that shook the rafters, erupting from my throat but not sounding remotely human or even remotely Were; and the attacking wolf falling out of his arc and back into human form, sprawling awkwardly on the floor; and then—

And then I was on him.

I remembered my very human teeth sinking into his flesh, proving that we are predators, too. Remembered him struggling underneath me, unable to rise despite the fact that I wasn’t using magic to hold him down. Remembered when my teeth snapped shut around his jugular, and we both knew it was over.

I might have killed him, I thought blankly. Followed immediately by knowledge that that was a lie, just my human brain trying desperately to soften the truth. The truth was that I would have killed him, if Cyrus hadn’t intervened. I might have shared the kill with Caleb, but I wouldn’t have forgone it for him.

I knew I wouldn’t have.

My body started to shake, and Cyrus repositioned himself between me and the others. “Take them onto the house, would you?” he asked Caleb casually.

“And what are you going to do?” Caleb demanded, his voice containing a thousand questions he didn’t vocalize.

“Get dinner. We’ll bring enough for everyone.”

Caleb looked like he doubted that, but didn’t call him on it. I’d have to satisfy his curiosity eventually, along with that of a lot of other people. In fact, I didn’t know why I wasn’t being arrested right now. And I guessed Jen felt the same, because she tentatively touched my arm, the sunlight gleaming on her blond bob.

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