“Hey, give me that!”He jumped from the unmarked car and strode after her.But she was already more than halfway across the field, her supernatural speed requiring him to break into a jog to keep up.
She paused abruptly a few yards out from the crime scene, pressing one long finger to her lips.“Shhhh.”
Who did she think he was?He knew better than to scare away the ghouls before he had a chance to confirm their presence.He didn’t need her treating him like a child.He caught up to her but couldn’t give her a piece of his mind because something was moving between the trees about a hundred yards ahead.
A pale figure darted in the dim light.Silas sniffed, but the wind was blowing the wrong way.He wasn’t getting anything but dirt, leaves, and Meredith.Fuck, he’d known she’d be a distraction.
As if to deliberately call more attention to herself, she ducked under the yellow tape and crept, holy water in hand, toward the movement.Silas had no choice but to follow.Ghouls could be dangerous, and she might need backup.He swore silently to himself for not being in front.He should be leading the way, not her, but addressing it at this point wouldn’t be prudent.But the closer they got to the form hovering over the crime scene, the more he thought there was something familiar about the silhouette.
And it was too big to be a ghoul.
“Look out!”Silas bounded forward, knocking Meredith to the ground to place his body between her and the threat that loomed above the grave.He drew his gun.“Don’t move!”
Alex, Fireborn Pack nemesis number one, scowled at Silas with unrepentant rage, his dark blond waves catching the moonlight with the quick turn of his head.Skin waxy and pale enough to glow in the dark, he hardly appeared human any longer.In his hands, he gripped a mesh bag full of bones freshly torn from the bodies, judging by the chunks of flesh still adhering to them.
Silas pulled the trigger, unloading three silver bullets toward Alex’s heart.They wouldn’t kill him, but they’d slow him down.
Pulse.The dragon fae amulet around Alex’s neck blinked, and the man disappeared.There was a high-pitched squeal as the bullets passed through where Alex had been and landed in the body of a ghoul who’d been creeping up behind him.
Alex was gone.
“Oww,” Meredith said, sitting up in the tall grass.
Silas glanced back to find her head was bleeding.She must have knocked it on something when he pushed her down.
“Meredith.Shit!”Silas holstered his weapon and jogged to her side.Removing his button-down, he pressed it to the scrape on her head, then cradled the base of her skull with his opposite hand for leverage.“I don’t think it’s deep.”
She fixed him with a harsh glare, and he expected her to tell him to fuck off.But as her dark brown eyes met his, she stopped, lips parted as if she’d forgotten what she was going to say.Silas’s nostrils flared with the scent she was putting off.He closed his eyes.That was arousal.Damn.So he wasn’t the only one experiencing the strange electric tingle at being this close.When he opened his eyes again, she was staring at his T-shirt-covered chest, and her cheeks had flushed a gorgeous shade of pink.
He cleared his throat and removed his hands from her head, handing her the bloody button-down.
“Who the hell was that?”she finally asked.“And where did he go?”
Silas’s shoulders hunched forward as his thoughts shifted to Alex.So close.He’d been so close.“I should have fired sooner.”
“Sure.Why follow protocol?”Meredith asked sarcastically.“Are you going to tell me who it was and why you practically bludgeoned me to shoot at him?”
“Yes,” he said darkly.“But first, do you need a doctor?”
She removed the shirt from her head.The wound had already stopped bleeding.“No.I’m good.It’s just a scrape.”She got to her feet.
“Are you sure?You could have a concussion.”
With a shake of her head, she waved him off.“I’m fine.Tell me who that was.”
“I’ll burn the ghoul’s body,” he said.“You sprinkle the holy water.I’ll explain on the way back to the station.”
Thankfully, she didn’t argue.
As she headed for the border of the crime scene, he decided he owed her an explanation.If she was going to be his partner, she needed to know about the risks.And Alex was one deadly risk.
Meredith wantedto reach across the seat, grab Silas by the throat, and shake the information out of him.Her gut told her the man she’d glimpsed hunched over the grave was Alex, but she needed confirmation.She’d never seen the bastard in real life, and what she’d seen tonight was confusing to say the least.
“Okay, we’re in the car, driving back to the station.Are you going to tell me who that was or am I going to have to force it out of you?”She stared at the side of his head expectantly.
Silas scoffed, raising an eyebrow as he gave her a once-over out of the corner of his eye.“How exactly wouldyouforce it out of me?”
Gritting her teeth, she reached between his legs and squeezed.The car veered wildly.
