The Skin She's In Margo Collins (the false prince series .txt) 📖

outside when an enormous SUV pulled up beside my car.” A faint flush of anger highlighted Shadow’s cheekbones, and her eyes hardened into chips of freezing, blue-white ice at the memory. “It was exactly like the one they had driven in Savannah.”

“From inside the convenience store, I saw Shadow pull her weapon.” Jeremiah gazed at me intently, those liquid brown eyes of his solemn. “You understand, do you not, that to force a Hunter to draw her ax in self-defense is perhaps the most dangerous action a shapeshifter could take?”

I was still too new to the entire shifting world to know anything of the sort—someone had clearly forgotten to fill me in on the importance of Hunters—but I simply made an encouraging noise and nodded for them to continue.

“Despite the public setting, I had to defend myself.” Shadow’s gaze practically dared me to disagree.

“Inside the store, the single employee prepared to call the police. I stopped him.” Jeremiah’s simple statement chilled me—as a counselor, anyway. As a lamia, if I were entirely honest, it didn’t bother me at all. Since I am made up of some of each, I suppose the final tally was somewhere in between.

At any rate, it seemed best to ask.

“Stopped him?” I hoped I wouldn’t have to prod any further for clarification.

The hyena shifter’s slight smile suggested he knew exactly what I was asking. “He was merely restrained.”

I nodded and turned back to Shadow’s part of the story. “And then?”

“I killed the werewolves,” she said simply. Then she ruined the impression of calm precision by adding in tones of irritation, “It was a messy kill. We removed the bodies, but to a location all too nearby. The amount of blood on the asphalt was impossible to clean entirely. And the store clerk is an unfortunate loose end.”

Jeremiah shrugged. “You would not let me add him to the kill.”

“He’s human.” Her tone suggested that was the final word on the topic, as far as she was concerned. From Jeremiah’s expression, I’d guess he didn’t agree.

At this point, my counselor training wouldn’t allow me to let the moment pass. “So let me make sure I have this straight. You two were kidnapped, tortured, and chased out of Savannah. When your kidnappers—or at least a faction of them—caught up with you, you killed them, hid the bodies, cleaned the crime scene, and incapacitated a witness. And yet, Jeremiah is most upset about not having been able to kill the witness, and Shadow is most upset about not having properly disposed of the bodies. Do I have that right?”

The two glanced at each other then turned back to me, nodding. “That’s about it,” said Shadow.

I frowned and tapped one fingernail on the desk in front of me. “You still haven’t said anything about how you ended up here in my office.”

“Two sentences,” Shadow said. “As I battled the werewolves, one of them said, ‘You’re as much a pain in my ass as that lamia bitch. Maybe when we’re done with her kind, we will wipe yours out next.’”

Chapter 13

“WIPE YOUR KIND OUT next?” I repeated.

It was all I could do to resist the instinctual surge of chemicals that statement sent flowing through my body, urging me to shift, to take on the form that would best allow me to decimate my enemies.

I fought down the desire to change into any of the serpent forms I had available to me. “That one comment was enough to send you running to me?”

Another of those communicative glances passed between them. Shadow spoke this time. “We were headed this way, anyway, planning to meet with the rest of Jeremiah’s people. The wolf’s words simply refined our direction.”

My counselor’s façade was beginning to wear thin by this point. But I had faced down more than one patient in the throes of a full-on psychotic break—not to mention a homicidal maniac determined to use me for my breeding qualities, only a few months before. Whatever was going on here, I was sure I could handle it.

Just as soon as I got hold of even a single thread to tug on until I unraveled all the pieces.

“And why would his comments particularly direct you toward me—beyond the obvious fact, of course, that I am the only lamia?”

At this, Shadow stood up straight, like a soldier standing at attention. “We are the same, you and I,” she said.

“Oh?” I forced myself to do nothing more than tilt my head in mild interest.

As I expected, Shadow began enumerating our similarities, answering the question. After all, in the end, people were the same everywhere—shifters and Hunters and humans and all.

“We are both rare among our society. Though the Scyld have never been assumed extinct—”

“The Shield?” I interrupted her.

With a tiny shake of her head, she spelled it for me. “It’s an ancient term for the order of my family. It is, of course, the same word—merely a different language. We seek to protect our people, as you do yours. And now, it seems, we face the same foe.”

I stretched one hand across my forehead, using my fingers to rub my eyes. “Okay. You should be safe here for now. I will bring in the Council members who are on call tonight and see what we can figure out for you.”

I had barely picked up the telephone receiver and held it to my ear—I haven’t even had time to begin dialing—when Shadow’s hand crashed down to hang it up. My startled gaze flew to her face.

“Please don’t,” she said, her quiet tones and direct gaze doing more to convince me than loud words might ever do.

I set the phone receiver back in the cradle gently, then folded my arms over my chest. “What would you have me do instead?” I asked quietly.

“We debated our actions before we arrived,” Jeremiah said, moving up to take his place in the conversation. “That you were not only here but also alone seems especially fortuitous. We would like to request asylum from you.”

I