Page 100 of Hounded: Ashes to Ashes

“And killed.”

I thought he would nod. That was what Loren did when it was too hard to speak, and I could tell this was hard for Whitney to admit out loud.

“Yes,” he said.

I chewed on my lip, confused by the feelings that crashed together and made my chest ache. Loren and I had lived during difficult times, keeping our relationship under wraps and using labels like “good friends” or “roommates” to avoid scrutiny. It was hard, and it hurt, but overall, we’d been fortunate. We survived it. Others weren’t as lucky.

“Why did you need to tell me that?” I asked, almost wishing he hadn’t.

Whitney sighed. “Because it was wrong. I was wrong to do it and wrong about him. And I’m sorry.”

Last I checked, the bowling alley wasn’t a confessional, and I was no kind of priest. I wasn’t qualified to forgive crimes committed against another man, but it felt important to accept Whitney’s apology anyway, so I nodded.

Loren returned, and he must have sensed something was off because he paused before where I sat and split a glance between Whitney and me. My smile wavered as I stood and set my beer on the low table beside an open pizza box. I was still stooped when Loren grabbed me and hefted me into the air. His arms cinched around my waist as he threw me over his shoulder with my ass up and my legs kicking.

“Lore!” I screeched through a fit of laughter.

He spun around while I grabbed fistfuls of his sweater. I knew he would never drop me, but the way the room inverted and spun made me dizzy enough that I needed to hold onto something.

“You maniac!” I shouted, breathlessly giggling. “Put me down!”

He slid me down his chest until I was slowly righted but still pressed against him in a way that made my entire body heat. My pants were way too tight to hide a boner, so I hurried to wiggle free of him before things got awkward.

Before my feet touched the ground, Loren’s grip tightened. It became quickly uncomfortable as his forearm sank into my middle and drove out a grunt.

“Baby?” I patted his shoulder like a wrestler tapping out of a fight. “Not sure you know your own strength…”

Hedidknow, though, and he was always careful.Always. When his other hand came up and cradled my head, practically crushing it against his pec, I got worried.

“Loren?”

I couldn’t see his face and couldn’t move anything besides my legs, but I glimpsed Whitney in the corner of my vision. He lurched to his feet, causing Abigail, Dottie, and Gunnar to follow suit. In a flash, every one of the hounds reached into the open air, pulling weapons from some pocket in space or time. It was the coolest shit I’d ever seen, then suddenly the most terrifying as I dangled in Loren’s embrace, bloodless and trembling.

“What’s wrong?” I croaked.

Then, I heard the growls.

Indy

Whitney,Dottie, Gunnar, and Abigail clustered around Loren and me. Loren alone was unarmed, too busy holding me like he was adrift in an ocean and I was a buoy keeping him afloat.

I craned my neck toward the bowling alley entrance, every movement a struggle. The open area was cluttered with strange men and women holding swords, knives, crossbows, and battleaxes. Their eyes flashed predator red, and their lips peeled back from blunt, human teeth that managed to be as menacing as any wolf’s incisors.

In their midst, two people stood: a man who had to be pushing seven feet tall with the added inches from his curling horns, and a woman beside him holding a book that could have walked right out of Sully’s arcane library.

“Loren? Lore, baby…” I babbled, gasping from more than the pressure on my lungs.

Images from the Urban Easel flashed through my mind. Art pieces reduced to strips of canvas, splintered frames, blood splatter on every surface… I pressed my hand against Loren’s face, needing him to look at me, tell me I was imagining things,tell me it wasn’t so odd to go bowling when we were wanted. Hunted. Found.

He didn’t look at me, though. He didn’t respond at all until, suddenly, he bolted away from the entrance and the dozen or more hellhounds poised to attack. Away from the protective circle Whitney and the others had formed. He sprinted, having thrown me gracelessly over his shoulder in his rush toward the door in the back corner of the bowling alley. The orange letters on the exit sign above it glowed like a beacon.

The others didn’t follow. I saw them holding the post we’d abandoned. Whitney drew his saber, Abigail clutched a pair of curved daggers, Dottie clenched her fists around her brass knuckles, Gunnar brandished a massive double-edged ax, and Sully… I hadn’t seen her since she went to the front desk.

With the invasion of the small army, the bowling alley’s other inhabitants were in a panic. People shouted and scurried to join Loren and me on our way to the exit.

Why were we leaving?

“Loren, stop!” I shouted. My mouth was near his ear, and I knew the loud noise would bother him, but I wanted the shock factor. I had to get through to him that I meant what I said at the gallery. We needed to make a stand. To fight.

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