Page 18 of Prey It Ain't So

I pause my low-toned reading of the chapter about the ingenue arriving at the mysterious magic school to look up. “Mmmmhmm, Baby Girl?”

“Do you really think bad guys will attack while we’re on the train? Like, with their beinghumancars, too?” Her eyes are wide and I know it’s because even though most preds don’t give a red, raring shit about the other species that inhabit the planet, our girl is softer than she wants to appear.

Thinking about it for a moment, I shrug. “I don’t think Fae rebels or magical misfits care about them, so maybe? Our pred enemies might pause at causing a big, nasty clean-up that will enrage the few parts of their government that have knowledge of our existence. It’d be stupid for people like that bitchy counselor or my stupid cousin to do anything—that’s for certain.”

“That’s not a ‘no’. It’s a ‘maybe, but it’d be dumb’, and I dislike that thought.” She shakes her head, leaning back against the wall. “I don’t have any attachment to them, obviously, but I’m not a fan of collateral damage. I think when you stop caring about who else gets hurt in your quest for victory, you invite in a host of other moral quandaries that you will not consider, either.”

This might be a bit high-brow for my taste, but if she wants to talk to me about it, I won’t complain.

“Well, I’m not a genius like the dragon or a philosopher like the Rockman… But collateral damage is hard to avoid once the gears of war turn, you know? I’m not saying that you have toignorewhat lives are worth in the big picture to succeed, but harddecisions are impossible to duck if the other side is less ethical than you.”

She blinks, tilting her head as she stares at me. “Have you been readingThe Art of Waragain?”

I shrug, winking at her playfully. “I’ve been boning up on my ‘wartime strategy’ books now that I focus better, yeah. I didn’t really comprehend the texts I had to read on Bloodstone because I wasn’t as… able to translate them in my head as well as I can now. But itismy job to protect my brother, my mates, and our family, so… I listen to audiobooks sometimes when I’m running around doing my thing.”

“You might be more auditory than you realized,” she says as she squeezes my knee. “I’ve noticed how much easier it is for you to grasp stuff when we’re reading out loud. They probably never tried to teach you in any other way but visual or kinesthetic learning styles, so you struggled even harder.”

“I think you’re right, Baby Girl,” I reply as I rack my brain for memories. “But you aren’t entirely like that, right? You gotta see and do, too, yeah?”

She nods, her face bright as she says, “For music, I have to hear, then see, then do. Other things, I’m more visual. It’s a mixed bag, really, and that’s probably because I taught myself so many things I wasn’t supposed to learn. I sort of made my own curriculum and adjusted when it wasn’t working.”

“They didn’t give you enough credit for so many things, Delores Drew, but your brain is the absolute biggest miss of all. You’re definitely as smart as the Scoville Salamander, and easily as talented as Lord Broody. But all your stupid mother saw wascompetition and it would have been a big fucking tragedy for the world to lose out on what you have to offer.”

Her eyes shimmer and I wag my finger at her. “Now, don’t you cry, woman. We’re not supposed to be drawing attention over here and if you get all weepy, people will notice when we get up because they called for boarding.”

Dolly gives me a watery smile, sniffing a bit, and I wait for her to shake off the huge swell of emotion I felt inside of our bond. “Okay, Crazypants. I’ll get it together if you keep reading me this chapter. I feel a great kinship to this poor girl being sent somewhere that everyone is treating her like crap for reasons outside of her control.”

I snort, my lips curving up knowingly. “I’ll just bet you do, Baby Girl. I’ll just bet you do.”

Tried to Rock’n Roll Me

Delores

By the timethey call for us to board, Fitz and I have delved into my book far enough that I’m disappointed to have to stop. He jumps to his feet while I put my Kindle away, then holds his hand out to help me up. I dust myself off, rolling my eyes when he leers at my hands running over my ass.

“You’re incorrigible, Fitz Khan,” I mumble as I pick up my things. “Absolutely, completely incorrigible.”

He mocks a bow, and I laugh, waiting for the other guys to join us. “Baby Girl, I’ll be anything you want me to be, other than far away.”

Aubrey reaches us just as I kiss the calmed tiger lightly. “You really are a miracle worker, lunchable. Fitzgerald is almost still compared to earlier, just in time for boarding.”

“Hey! It’s not just her,” Fitz says as he socks the dragon in the arm. “I’m very invested in her scrappy heroine finding her power with a bunch of sexy dudes. It’s fascinating.”

My fiery boyfriend turns his head, looking at me with a smirk. “I can’t say I blame you. That soundsveryinteresting indeed.Perhaps we should all read this book while we work on knitting. Does it have audio?”

My eyes widen and I turn bright red as I mutter, “We read it out loud to each other. I like that better than actors.”

Felix joins us, his head tilted. “Are you ready? We need to board. Let’s move. Chess and Renard are bringing up the rear.”

“They’re reading dirty books to one another, Raj. I feel left out; don’t you?” Aubrey waits for Chess and Rennie to catch up, then he moves to the door of the lounge, pulling it open.

“Now I do,” the older twin says with a frown. “But we can discuss how we remedy that once we’re on the train and settled into our cabins. The best we could do was two grand suites on theVenice Simplion, but they’re adjacent to one another, which means the Princess can flit between the two of them.”

The gargoyle grins as he looks at me. “They are quite beautiful,ma petite. This leg of the trip will go overnight until we reach Vienna. Then we will have a short time to explore before we swap for the train to Budapest. It will be smaller since it is regional, but that’s only a couple of hours. We’ll bed down for the evening, then take the longer jaunt to Bucharest.”

I think about the map, picturing the dotted line traveling from point to point like in a cartoon. “So we’d be in Transylvania, then?”

Our group moves out of the lounge, following the confident stride of Felix as he walks up to the boarding area for the supernatural cars. Aubrey answers my question before Rennie can respond. “You don’t have to worry about vampires just because that’s where we’ll head into the mountains.”

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