It should have been Izzy. She’s great at finding solutions. Or Emery. She’s so sweet and good that she could’ve turned this around. He’d probably have fallen in love with her or something, like the lion falling for the lamb. But no, it’s just little old broken and strange Whitney Brooks, so humanity’s doomed. Or who knows? Maybe Xolotl’s right and what he’s doing will help all of humanity. Perhaps he’ll improve the lives of all the people he doesn’t massacre.
I’m just a stupid human, so maybe I just can’t see it.
I actually thought he might kill me when I started calling him stupid. All I’ve learned so far is that making him angry isn’t enough. If I want him to kill me, I’ll have to take it further. I’m thinking of just how far I could press him to get him to kill me when I finally see a sign that says there’s a hotel. Xolotl doesn’t sleep, but all this murder and bloodshed wore me out. I feel like I might pass out any second.
Plus, I need some time away from him to think about how I could somehow die in a way that will hurt him. Perhaps just before the US military attacks I can work something out. They will attack again in the morning, right? Surely.
The real question is whether Leonid and his friends will be with them. That’s what I was most worried about earlier, that my brother-in-law might also be snapped out of existence. How would I ever tell Izzy that I couldn’t stop it? But it was just basic soldiers, no shifters. And then I felt even more awful for being relieved.
Xolotl’s realized where we are. He turns toward me with a strange look on his face. “Will we watch Gilmore Girls?”
I shove the car into park and snap my head toward him. “Why on earth would I do that with you? Hopefully they’ll have two rooms, and I can spend at least a few hours apart from you.”
“I forbid it,” he says. “We will share a room.”
“No.” That was our only option last time, but I need time away from him this time, like fish need water to breathe. “I’ll never do that again. I’d rather die.” And in fact, that’s what I’ll be trying to figure out how to do.
He shoots across the center console of the Tahoe toward me. “Whitney Brooks, you are mine. You seem to have forgotten that, but you’re not my boss. I’m yours. I own you. You will share a room with me, and what’s more, you’ll share a bed with me again.” His face is so close that I can smell him—a strange smell of gun smoke and leather mixed with sage or sandalwood or something like that. I hated it at first, but it’s growing on me. “I liked sharing a bed with you.”
What a strange thing to say—I hate that he’s growing on me. “I will not share anything with you. You can just kill me first.”
He looks at my mouth, then, and the strangest shiver runs through my entire body, from my head right down to my toes. Something inside of me clenches, and I want to lean toward him and press my mouth against his. I want to see how he tastes and whether his mouth is still the same strange mix of sharp and smoky.
But before I can do anything that monumentally stupid, there’s a terrible racket outside. “Where in the world are you, brother?”
Brother? Is the person outside calling for Xolotl? “Brother?” Surely not. “Is someone you know here?”
There’s another crashing sound then, this one even louder. “Where is this? Are we on the top of a mountain?” A sequence of words I don’t understand at all follows. “You have the worst timing, Ta’xet, I swear. Always.”
That’s a name Xolotl said he goes by sometimes, so they must be his brothers, but how are they here? How’d they even find us?
“I saw you talking to your family,” Xolotl mutters. “I never should have called mine, though. It was a mistake. Sorry.”
I’m guessing he hasn’t apologized very often in his life, because why would he? “Who are they?”
“Xolotl!” One of them—the second one—is shrieking. “Get out here now. You can’t summon us and then make us wait.”
“Why did you call them?” I ask.
“You will stay in here.” He frowns. “Don’t move a hair.” He climbs out of the car and shuts the door behind him.
“Wow, you’re using cars?” The first man shakes and a cloud of dirt dissipates around him, kind of like Pigpen, if that dirty little kid was a super hot, chocolate-caramel skinned god with long, curly hair and a white smile. “I’ve wanted to try them, but?—”
“Pluto’s always been a coward.” The other man’s taller, and he looks surlier, too. He’s definitely hairier, but it works for him. His massive arms look like tree trunks. His hair’s short but it’s thick, and it’s straight, falling like perfect curtains around his face. It’s shiny, even in the starlight. “Who’s in there?” He immediately turns toward the Tahoe, staring right at me.
I drop down, ducking below the window line.
“Doesn’t matter.” Xolotl’s voice is even less friendly than usual.
The larger of the two brothers chuckles. “Oh, I think it does, quite a bit in fact. In thousands and thousands of years, I’ve never seen you travel with any human, not even your champion.” I can barely hear him, but he must be talking quite loudly if I can hear him at all.
There’s a strange sound, like a slamming and then grunting, and I pop back up, more curious than I am terrified. Xolotl’s fighting with his beefy, straight-haired brother, punching him repeatedly right in the face, sending his tree-like limbs flailing. They roll around a little, the ground groaning in places as they slam into it.
“Enough!” The curly-haired brother, Pluto maybe, has his hands flung wide.
Both of the other two are suspended in mid-air, glaring at one another.
“Tell us who she is.” Pluto taps his foot. “We can all feel her.”
