Page 16 of Second Shooter

“I don’t really scream.”

“No, you wouldn’t, would you?” Myrtle nodded. “I would love to have my characters half as stoic as you.”

“Characters?”

Keres smiled. “She’s a writer. Very good, actually.”

Persephone smiled. “Armand would argue with some of your logistics.”

“Try it with Mateo.”

Persephone’s eyes went wide. “Oh, right. That is something I hadn’t considered.”

Lyric asked, “Win, do you date?”

“Not often. I just get what I need and get out. Folks forget me after a few minutes or hours. Normal folks. My parents and siblings remember me.”

The rest of the conversation turned to photography and who she admired as artists and who she didn’t like. She smiled. “You are asking if I like Alexi. Well, I don’t mess around with bound betas. He is very firmly linked to his alpha and omega. He’s a nice person, though, and we had fun talking about the images. It made for a nice break.”

Lyric snorted. “He’s been asking about you.”

“Well, he can ask all he likes. I am not getting near dragons.”

Keres stared. “So, you see it all?”

“I guess so. I knew what the Elite were when they found me on the beach with my friends. I saw their ugliness behind the pretty white skin as they laughed and transported me to the Stronghold.”

Keres paled. “When were you there?”

“Thirteen, fourteen years ago. I cracked the foundation of the stone under me and got my ass out to a hospital the moment that they took a break.” She shrugged. “My parents said I was missing for a month, but I think it was more. None of my high school friends remembered me, so I just went to work when I healed. I mean, we moved here, but that was the only uproar.”

They tried to get more details out of her, but Win was done. She was about to start making her way out with polite excuses when she heard a noise. She picked up her phone and heard Cori’s whisper. “There are ten. They stopped the bus.”

Win got up and said, “Start the clock.”

Chapter Four

Lyric was in the car with her. Win couldn’t stop her, as she explained as she made her way out.

Lyric kept a call open with Keres, but Win knew what Wren would say via speaker before she heard it.

“They have put up a barrier. The dark Elite can’t get in.”

Win got to the interstate and floored it, her car blurring as they travelled two hundred kilometres in twenty seconds. “They are using Cori to power their shield. It’s a fun game they play to drain her so she can’t fight.”

“What are you doing?”

“Making my deadline. There are normal students on the bus. They have to glamour every one of them.”

“So, this is what happened to you.”

“Oh, yeah. Not on a bus, but they came in a group. They aren’t playing nice with three-to-one anymore. Cowardly assholes.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I am going to kill them all or send them back to the Stronghold. It depends on my mood.” She grunted as her senses showed her the bus surrounded by Elite. “Hold tight. We are drifting.”

She let the car kick the rear wheels sideways, and her vehicle thudded into Elite after Elite. They swung around and had diverted seven of the ten away from the bus before the car shuddered to a stop.

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