Page 30 of Her Psycho Beasts

My phone vibrates where I’ve hidden it inside my bra, and I hiss at my friends to cover me from the security cameras we’ve located on the wall opposite us.

When I see who it is, my stomach leaps.

“Lyle?” I whisper.

All the grumbles in our cell go quiet to listen in.

“Angel?” comes an angry voice. “Why have you barred me out of your mind?”

He must’ve been trying to communicate with me, but locked in obsidian, any telepathic communications would be blocked.

“Help us, Mr Pardalia!” one of the felines from the back of cell shrieks. “Help us—” someone quite obviously slaps a hand over his mouth and there’s a brief shoving and tugging. My ass gets painfully pressed into the bars, and I grimace.

“Not on purpose,” I whisper quickly. “It’s just Dolores being…well, Dolores. He’s—” I’m suddenly aware of the fact that Scythe has specifically ordered me to keep Lyle calm. And telling him I’ve been locked up doesn’t equal a calm lion.

“He’swhat?” Danger drips from his voice and I can’t pretend it doesn’t make my anima preen to hear him protective like this.

“It’s just a cute little punishment he’s given the whole class.” I try and sound bubbly, frantically gesturing to Connor and Minnie to back me up. “Not me specifically. But we’re in obsidian, so I can’t chat right now.”

“Yeah, we’re having a good time, actually!” Connor does a great fake laugh. “Don’t worry about it, Mr Pardalia.”

“I’m drawing pictures,” Stacey says helpfully, shoving her foot through the bars to make patterns on the dirt floor. “It’s so cool down here.”

“Downwhere?” Lyle’s animus has that gravelly voice that makes goosebumps erupt all over me.

“Nowhere!” I say quickly. “Gotta go, there’s cameras.”

I hang up on him.

Raquel pats me on the back.

“Adorable,” Stacey sighs, wistfully. “He might be angry enough to blast us out of here.”

“Why didn’t you ask him to bail us out?” a male voice asks angrily.

Yeti lets out a low growl. “He can’t, you idiot. Shut the fuck up before I come over there.”

I grumble. “I really didn’t want him to get into anymoretrouble on my account. He’s not deputy headmaster anymore because of me.”

“Well, someone’s gotta put Dolores in his place,” Minnie says, resting the back of her head on Yeti’s chest. “This is going to get out of hand, I can just tell.”

“I’d offer to shift into a mouse,” I say, “and steal some keys, but they’d just lock me right back up.”

“Can you really do a mouse, Lia?” Yeti asks.

A flash from the side of my eye tells me Xander is shifting around wherever he’s pressed against the cell wall. Though his eyes are dark and hollow, his mating mark glows with that ephemeral celestial light that does nothing but draw me in.

“Yeah,” I say nonchalantly. “I’ve done a possum too.” Just for fun when I was a kid. It had snuck into my cottage in my early days in there, when I’d forgotten to shut the kitchen window one night. I’d found him hunched over my left over two-minute noodles when I’d gone to investigate the noise, butter-knife raised. He wasn’t even scared of me, so that’s when I gave him a shove to send him tumbling out the window. I have to touch the creature to be able to shift into them.

“Why the hell would you shift into useless animals?” Rowan, a hyena standing behind Yeti, asks. “If it was me, I’d choose something cool, like an elephant. Or an echidna.”

I’ve never touched an elephant before, so I can’t do that. But the insane sense of smell would be useful. I’d be even better at hunting than a wolf.

We’ve stood in our cages for almost exactly three hours before the metal grate at the entrance slides open and Damien prances in with a line of guards. Everyone goes still, on high alert, and Yeti’s arms tighten possessively around Minnie.

Damien’s white glasses flash in the dim light. “Students,” he announces haughtily, “do you feel like you’ve learned your lesson?”

No one replies and I pass Stacey a dark look.

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