Page 251 of Secret Shifters Next Door

“It’s not a lie, Mariana,” Jared said. “If you ask him, he’ll tell you.”

“No! He’s not cruel. He wouldn’t hurt children.”

It was Jared’s turn to scream. “Think. You lived with that clan. You remember what it was like. They had children. Babies. You blew the whistle on them and led Daddy fucking dearest to their door. He had every one of them killed. Do you remember their faces?”

“Lived with them?” Mariana shook her head. “No, no, that’s not right. I never would have lived with those things.”

That was an outright lie. Things were coming together now, connections were being made. It wasn’t only Antonio whose mind had broken, but Mariana’s as well. She knew she was responsible for all those deaths, but her mind wasn’t letting her remember. She backed away, still shaking her head. She bumped the door, which seemed to flip a switch, and she burst into action. She slid into the driver’s seat and started the car.

Before any of us could react, Mariana gunned the engine and had the car barreling toward Jared. I could see Mariana through the windshield, leaning on the steering wheel, tears in her eyes, a scream of anger blasting out of her open mouth. Tate and Mileswere screaming for Jared to get out of the way. I was frozen in place as the car roared toward him.

He was a shifter, and had the same reflexes as Miles and Tate. I blinked in surprise as Jared leaped up and landed on the hood of the car right as it got to him. He stumbled and fell into the windshield. Spiderweb cracks exploded across the glass, and Jared knelt on the hood as the car rocketed toward the forest even faster. The engine screamed.

“Mariana, stop. Stop, please.” I could barely hear Jared screaming above the sound of the car.

She was racing toward a massive oak tree at the edge of the woods. Jared glanced ahead and saw the tree looming. He screamed for Mariana to stop one last time, then shifted. His wings caught air and lifted him away from the car an instant before it slammed into the tree. The sedan had to have been going almost a hundred miles an hour by the time she crashed. The entire front end was crushed, and the engine looked like it was shoved into the driver’s compartment. Even from this distance, I could see blood on the windshield.

Tate and Miles sprinted to the wreck. I followed behind, walking on numb legs, unable to look away from the red smears dripping down the window. Jared landed and shifted back to his human form. He immediately hit his knees, crying, holding his face in his hands. I stopped twenty feet from the car. Tate and Miles both moved around the car, at first calling Mariana’s name, but they both quickly stopped. Tate turned and put a hand on his head. Miles winced and left the car to walk back toward me.

I zoned out, allowing Miles to lead me back to the truck. He helped me get inside and drove me back to the apartment. I sat in the truck the whole way, replaying those final moments in my head. I could still hear Jared yelling for her to stop. I could hear Mariana screaming in rage. Then the other sounds: the engine,the crash of glass and metal against the immovable wood of the tree.

Miles got me inside and into the shower. He washed me, and then got me out and dried my body, wrapping me in a big fluffy towel. I sat on the bed, still staring off into space. My mind didn’t fully return until he knelt before me as I sat on the bed.

“Celina? Are you okay?”

I nodded, slowly, and looked into his eyes. “Mariana? Is she…you know? Is she gone?”

Miles looked at me for three full seconds before nodding. “She didn’t make it. It…it was quick, though.”

I laid my head on his shoulder and let him wrap me in a hug. The contact was exactly what I needed. Mariana—or Felicity as I’d probably always remember her—hadn’t been a good person. She’d been warped by her father and her own hatred. That still didn’t make it any less tragic. In fact, it made it worse. Without her father’s influence and the loss of her mother, she might have become someone kind and compassionate. While she was pretending, she had shown flashes of the person she could have been. I gave myself a few minutes to mourn for the person I’d briefly considered a friend. Mostly, I grieved for the woman she could have been.

THIRTY-TWO

MILES

I got Celina tucked into bed to sleep off the horrors of the day. Steff and Blayne came over to watch out for her. Once they were there, I jumped back into my truck and drove back to the scene of the accident. Tate and Jared were still there, but surprisingly, no cops or ambulances. I parked almost exactly where I’d left over an hour ago and walked toward them.

They stood about a hundred paces from the wrecked car. I pointed at the smoking wreckage. “Didn’t you guys call the cops?” I asked.

Tate shook his head. “Jared declined.”

“Yeah,” Jared said. “My dad…er, Antonio would be livid. If you think he’s angry now? Watch what happens if his daughter’s death is broadcasted all over the TV and internet. He’ll be pissed enough that she’s dead. If the world knew, he might give up all pretense and send the entire hunter army against you. I called a clean-up crew.”

The way he said it told me he was talking about something much more sinister than Molly Maids. “A clean-up crew?” I asked.

Jared sighed and looked across the clearing at the car holding his adoptive sister’s body. “Yeah. They’re trained to getrid of bodies. They were used in that attack on your old wolf pack.” He barely managed to meet my gaze.

“Black bag guys?” I asked.

Jared nodded. “Basically. They’re people Dad deemed unworthy of combat, but still useful to the cause. There was a crew waiting in the next town over in case things went bad on the hand-off.” Jared again looked toward the crushed sedan. “Well, things did get bad. Just not in the way we’d anticipated.” He lowered his head and wiped at his forehead.

Before Tate or I could ask any more questions, a black cargo van came crunching up the gravel road. Jared walked forward and waved the van on. I leaned in to Tate so I could whisper and not be heard. “Can we trust this kid? What if there’s some damned special-forces team about to jump out of this van?”

Tate shook his head. “Nah, he’s good. It’s the truth. No worries. I can’t guarantee the guys in this van won’t fucking hate us, but the kid’s getting things figured out.”

The van stopped, and the side door slid open. Two guys stepped out, and two more got out of the front. The guy who’d been driving looked pissed and stomped toward me and Tate. “What the hell is this? I thought we were here to clean up some shifter carcasses?”

“No, leave them be. You’re here for Mariana.”

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