Another howl danced across my eardrums, and Abram raced between us. He was on all fours now, growling with bared fangs and raised fur. The two beasts pounced toward each other, claws connecting with bodies midair, slicing gashes into each other as they tumbled back to the ground. They rolled closer to me. A spray of blood—I hoped not Abram’s—splashed onto my hospital gown.
With so much blood streaking and matting their fur, I could not fathom how either of them continued to brawl. Abram swiped at Dalton’s face, his nails slicing through his snout, and Dalton howled. He whacked Abram hard, sending him flying back, then barreled toward me again. His dirty claws tore right through the hospital gown and into my thigh, and I screeched.
Though my mind went numb with terror, my whole body shook from the pain. Dalton raised his paw again. But Abram towered behind him, pulling Dalton back by his beastly shoulder and sending him hurtling through the air.
Oh, Abram. This is a disaster.
Abram’s eyes, even in beast form, looked so human. So anguished. He made a small mewling sound, tilting his head as he looked over my wound. He ripped off a piece of my hospital gown and tied it around the large gash in my thigh, then started to try to lift me.
Before he could get me off the ground, Dalton pounced on his back, wrapping his beast-arms around Abram’s neck and digging claws into his shoulders to hold tight. Abram’s grip on me slipped, and fell back, my head knocking into the car. There was just … so much blood. My stomach lurched, and I squeezed my eyes shut.
Please, God, do something.
A shot rang across my field of vision, nearly striking Abram in the head. Turning to the left, I saw Mr. McKenzie, gun pointed toward the beast. They were waking up—the entire town. And that meant that, once again, the game had changed.
“It’s back!” Dalton screamed. “The monster is back!”
I spun my gaze toward him, only to find Dalton had already morphed back into human form, his clothes hanging in tatters off his body. The devil. He’d created the perfect scene to further incite the mob: a battered detective hero, the bleeding damsel in distress, and the hulking beast waging war on this sleepy peaceful town.
One by one, the people of the town encroached on this tableau, an entire town, readying themselves for the kill.
“Abram …” I murmured, reaching out helplessly toward him.
He pounded his clawed-fists against the ground, getting onto all fours. He looked at me and then shook his head forward, snorting. I knew what he wanted. With what little strength I had remaining, I thrust myself onto his back and grabbed a handful of fur.
Abram took off, driving a path through the terrified townspeople. The muscles in his back flexed as the wind picked up around me. It was almost like flying, moving through Main Street quicker than I had ever gone before. But where were we going? Where could we go? There was no escaping this.
When Abram’s paws hit hard against the pavement to take an all-too-familiar left, I knew where he was headed, even before he descended the staircase—the very one I fell down the day we met.
Abram burst through the locked doors of The Castle and darted down the hall, huffing as he settled in front of the strangely marked door.
He lowered his back, and I climbed off. Chanting and clanging and thundering from the streets poured in now. The mob was legion. And they were coming.
The beast stood and, slowly but surely, morphed back into Abram. His shape returned before my very eyes, naked, muscular, and mouthwatering.
“How are you doing this?” I asked.
“The room,” he said as his voice returned. “This room, it’s letting me do it.”
“How?” I asked, my voice shaking.
A loud crash echoed from down the hall. From here I could just barely make out what it was: someone had thrown a lit bottle through the window. A table caught fire, and it quickly spread to the drapes.
“My God,” I said.
He took my arm gently. “We have to go inside. You’re losing a lot of blood.”
I’d nearly forgotten my own wounds; I’d been staring at Abram, whose body was unmarred, no evidence of his injuries remaining. I hadn’t noticed the blood streaming past the cloth Abram had used to tie off my wound. I was dripping blood all over the floor.
I gasped and stumbled back, about to faint at the sight of all the blood—worse, somehow, coming from my body. A body I knew would not heal itself.
Abram caught me and pulled me against him. “The room will protect us. Get inside.”
But I just stood there, frozen, unable to pull my gaze from the fire. The flames licked up the walls the same as fear burned in my core. Abram pushed the previously unmovable door open and swept me inside.
A soft light—like moonlight—swelled around us, so pale it was nearly blinding. He pushed the door closed behind us and, slowly, my eyes adjusted to the light.
But my mind could not comprehend what I saw.
Chapter 28