“Drive!” she managed to croak out, unable to tear her eyes away from the man in the window’s ferocious gaze. She knew about him more by reputation than by sight – she’d only seen him at a distance before, across a room or at the end of a corridor during her time at Hargreaves. But even at a distance, he’d been an intimidating presence – a hulking mass of pure muscle, towering over everyone around him, his grim, expressionless face seeming to be carved from pure granite.
And his eyes were locked directly on to them both.
Trent apparently didn’t need to be told twice to drive, however – he floored the gas pedal and the car tore off, as fast as its engine would allow. Trent rounded the corner of the motel and steered the car toward the driveway, just as the rest of Hargreaves’s goons started pouring back out of their room, headed for their own car.
“They’re going to block us!” Zina shouted, as the headlights from Hargreaves’s car suddenly burst to life, its wheels screeching as it leapt forward, trying to beat Trent to the narrow driveway.
“They’re going totry,” Trent said grimly, as, with an absolutelypainful-sounding grind of the engine, the car jumped forward, clearly straining itself to do what Trent was asking of it. Zina held her breath, waiting for the whole thing to start falling apart around them – but instead it kept going, clipping the front of the Hargreaves car as it tried to cut them off, before Trent managed to swing it around, tires screeching as they took off down the road.
Zina turned to look behind them, still clutching her bag to her chest.
“They won’t take long to follow us,” she gasped out, her heartbeat thumping in her chest.
“Maybe not,” Trent said. “But I told you I knew this area – well, at least I know it a bit better than these guys. If we can get far enough ahead of them, I might be able to throw them off.” He glanced across at her. “But I kind of need you to explain what you injected me with before.”
Zina nodded, swallowing. “I’m sorry – I would have explained if we’d had time. I wouldn’t usually do that without telling someone first, but we needed to get out of there.”
Pulling in a deep breath, Trent shook his head. “I can’t – I can’t feel my kangaroo.”
Zina could hear the slight tremble in his voice as he said it, and she didn’t blame him for being freaked out. Not being able to sense your shifter animal was aweirdthing for any shifter.
It was something they all had to go through, before their first shift – to come face to face with the animal that lived inside them, and know that they could control it and workwithit, rather than letting it take them over.
Zina knew of some shifters who’d transformed into their shifted form before they’d learned to control their animal sides, and then found themselves stuck there, unable to become human again, the animal having completely taken them over.
She knew of others who, unable to find a balance, had made the decision to push their animal side so far down inside themselves that they’d never been able to feel their presence ever again, and had lost their ability to shift along with it, and had to live as a normal human.
It was all just part of being a shifter. But the fact that Trent was here, with his shifter animal with him, meant that he’d already overcome that struggle and found a way to exist peacefully with the animal inside him, just as she had when she’d been young.
To find it suddenly gone, now –
Well, he probably feels about the same asIfelt the first time I took the serum – but I had the benefit of knowing what was going to happen.
“It’s a serum my agency developed,” Zina said, turning to face Trent. “It temporarily suppresses your shifter animal – and Ipromiseit’s only temporary. I’ve taken it before, and my antelope has always come back. I was freaked out the first time too, but it’s been tried and tested. And I only gave you a small dose – your kangaroo will be back in a few hours. But it was the only thing I could think of to get the Bloodhound off our tail, even for a little while. If your shifter animal is suppressed, he can’t track you. You just feel like a normal human.”
Licking his lips, Trent glanced across at her. “It’s temporary? And – you’ve been on it this whole time?”
Zina nodded. “Yeah. Sorry, I didn’t say anything because I… well, I don’t know. I was being too cagey. I should have just been honest with you, and told you what was up. But I knew they’d send the Bloodhound after me, and it was the only way I could slip under his radar.”
Trent shook his head. “No wonder I haven’t been able to figure out whether you’re a shifter or not,” he muttered. “I couldn’t tell. And no wonder then that you –”
He cut himself off suddenly, his mouth snapping shut with an audible click of his teeth.
For a moment, Zina wondered what he’d been about to say, before he shook his head, turning to look at her again.
“Well, I understand why you did it,” he said. “And Ididsay I trusted you. Istilltrust you. And if it was really the only way to throw the Bloodhound off our scent, then I probably would have made the same decision.”
Zina exhaled, long and slow. She hadn’t realized before now just how anxious she’d been that Trent might have decided trusting her was a mistake, thatallof this was a mistake.
“Thank you,” she said, when she could trust her voice not to shake. “It means a lot to me. Especially since I haven’t been as… as open as I could have been.”
“Well, I get why you haven’t been,” Trent said after a moment. “And to be honest, I also should have –”
Whatever Trent might have been going to tell her, he was cut off by the sudden blaze of headlights from behind them.
“Shit,” Trent swore, turning around in his seat. “Is it them?”
“Probably.” Zina turned to look out the back window of the car, but all she could see was headlights in the night. But it was a safe assumption to make that Hargreaves had probably caught up with them, given there was nothing here but a flat, straight expanse of road.
