Page 46 of Total Eclipse of the Moon
"Roman? No. He doesn’t keep a consistent line. I might have…" He scrolled. "I’ve got one for Flynn. That’s the middle brother. The one who’s a year older than Shane. Who knows if the number is still active or if he’ll answer? They change cell phones every other day it seems."
"Dial and hand me the phone." She held out her hand.
"I’m pretty sure they won’t want to talk to you."
"Do it!" She yelled. Biting pain scratched through the left side of her face. She cradled her head, expecting to see blood, but there was nothing.Kill the thing, Shane. I can’t take this.
Eyebrows raised he handed her the phone. "It’s ringing. This is a bad idea."
She grabbed the phone.Come on. Come on. Answer.
On the twelfth ring he answered, "Who’s this?"
"Is this Flynn?"
"Who’re you?"
"This is Madeline."
"Who?"
She sucked in a breath when the pain from the original injury tripled. On her next exhale she said quickly, "The witch who cursed you a zillion years ago."
"Why are you phoning me? If you hurt Shane, I swear—"
"I don’t know if he’s okay," she interrupted. "I’m in Russia with him and the vampire. Funny couple they make, by the way. Are you guys getting your ass kicked by something right now?"
"No."
Crap, this was Shane's pain. "Can Shane handle a necromancer on his own? Because itfeelslike he’s getting his ass kicked. And you know what I mean when I sayfeel,don’t you? The boomerang spell makes me feel everything you guys experience."
"Uhhh…"
Madeline released an aggravated sigh. "Do you think he’s going to try to convert that evil asshole’s soul before he does his job and gets rid of it? Is he going to reason with it? Does he know to check for minions and how to counteract its spells?"
"Maybe," Flynn hedged. "I’ve never seen him kill one by himself. We usually worked together before he disappeared. He’s okay at magic, but that’s usually Roman’s department. Shane’s thing, aside from driving us crazy with ethics, is blowing shit up."
"He likes explosives? I didn’t know that." She shook her head to keep herself on track. "If you’re stuck cursed for the rest of eternity it’s because I’m going to try to save your dumbass brother’s honorable life." She hung up and slid the phone across the armrest between the seats. "I’m going in. He’s getting his ass kicked."
"Oh, no, you don’t."
The moment she got out, Antonio was there with a hand on her arm. "Get back in the car."
"Let go." She stared at the offending appendage. "I don’t want to hurt you."
"He ordered us to stay. That means he can handle it."
"Does it?" She focused on breathing past the pain she knew intuitively wasn’t hers but felt too real. "Or does it mean he doesn’t want us hurt when he knows he can’t handle this?" She sucked in air at a sudden strike to her chest and wheezed out, "Because he’s Shane."
She cried out and put a hand on her left thigh. "This is his pain. It’s bad." She fell back against the car, having trouble moving air.Breathe. Breathe."He’s in trouble."
"Youfeelit? Impossible."
"It’s complicated, like I said before. It involves a boomerang spell somebody close to one of his brothers put on me to feel all their pain when they get hurt."
His eyebrows drew inward. "We go in and peek. If he has it handled, we leave." He removed his hand from her and stalked toward the building. As he drew closer to the building he slowed. Inside, with a hand over his nose he said, "Oh, Dios.I might gag." He threw a hand against a wall and bent over with a hand over his mouth. "That’s a hand…" He waved at the floor. "Over there. Something bit off the fingertips. ¡Que asco!" That’s disgusting.
The rancid smell of aged death permeated everything. Black slime covered the hallway walls and floor. Blood. And body parts. To have that much gore meant many humans had been slaughtered. She suspected this muck reflected all that was left of those who had occupied the building.
