Page 31 of Hollow Moon

Campbell kept his voice steady. “Your boyfriend.”

Did that make sense? He had said he wanted information about Knox, but if he didn’t have any information, how could he even find him?

She tried to work her way out of that dead end and couldn’t quite make it.

“What’s his name?” Campbell pressed.

“Mr. Spock.”

Her brother leaped up and slapped her across the face.

Her mouth stung and her eyes watered.

All she could do was stare at the man who had hit her. She’d known him all her life. She’d come to realize he wasn’t a very nice person. But this?

Her tormentor leaned over, shaking her. “His name. What’s his name? What was he doing snooping around? Is he a narc? Are you working with him? Was that why you came up here?”

“Not working with anyone,” she managed to say.

“You bitch.”

As she looked up, she was struck with an idea. “Oh God, no,” she screamed.

“What?”

“A dragon. It’s coming through the door. It’s coming to eat you.”

She cringed back against the wall, hoping she was hanging on to her sanity. Did she see a dragon or was she making that up?

Closing her eyes, she turned her head away.

“Jesus, cut it out,” Campbell shouted.

“I . . . can’t,” she whimpered.

She saw a hand raised to slap her again. The sound of gunfire stopped the attack.

“What?” she croaked.

Feet pounded up the steps. Pulling the gun from the waistband of his pants Campbell whirled toward the door.

When it opened, he fired two rounds at the man in the doorway.

CHAPTER 9

Everything inside Maggie went cold and dead. “Knox. Oh God, Knox,” she screamed. She clambered off the bed, her horrified gaze glued to the figure on the floor, blinking to make her blurred vision come clear.

Through the fuzzy effects of the drug, she finally saw it wasn’t Knox gasping in pain. It was one of the other men who had come to the campsite. The guy with the potbelly.

“Oh Christ, oh Christ,” her brother was saying over and over as he rushed toward the man. “Lane, I’m so sorry.”

He knelt beside the guy, who was bleeding from two wounds—one in his shoulder and one in his arm. Campbell had probably shot to kill, but his aim was way off.

“Lane, are you all right, Lane?”

“You drilled me.”

“I thought you were the other guy. The wolf man.”