We rolled and jockeyed for position, thighs clamping, fingers fisted then clawed. “Why the hell are you doing this?” I managed to huff.
Feng tightened the strongest thigh muscles I would ever know and rolled herself on top of me. Her cheeks were flushed with effort, and tiny white bubbles were forming at the corners of her mouth. “You killed her. You fucking killed her. You killed them all, you fucking bitch!”
“I didn’t kill anyone,” I howled. “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”
Feng’s fist connected with a bone-crunching strike. My whole skeleton started to throb, my eyes started to water. “Your fucking wolf! Your fucking wolf tore my sister apart. He ripped the shit out of everyone at the restaurant. Fucking animal!”
Feng’s militant struggle slowed insignificantly and a single tear cut through the blood on her cheek. By the time it drizzled to her chin, her eyes were flaming again, her jaw set.
“He didn’t,” I breathed. “He didn’t. He’s been chained up.”
I knew that Sampson had been chained up for just a few minutes. My hands were still cold from clamping the metal around his wrists. I knew that werewolves possessed a lot of nonhuman abilities, but super speed wasn’t one of them. He could have been responsible. There would have been time—plenty of time.
But I kept trying to convince myself otherwise.
But Feng’s maniacal expression remained unchanged. She reached behind her back and my breath caught when I saw the knife.
Mother-of-pearl handle. Glistening, razor-sharp blade. No match for a bass knife, had I even had it. My arms instinctively mashed against the wall, the one handcuff still locked around my wrist banging against the ancient tiles, a battle cry for the end of my life. I curled into myself as the blade came down, nicking the shoulder of my flimsy tank top, making an easy, clean slice through my skin. I used Feng’s technique and threw my entire body toward her, palms shoving at her chest, her face, whatever I could make contact with. The second she began to topple, I rolled.
“That . . . wasn’t . . . him,” I panted as I crawled toward the door.
The vestibule door swung open, raking across my knuckles, and I looked up.
“Alex?”
I saw him lean down, felt his arms dig under my shoulders and pull me to standing. He slammed the door hard before Feng could get to us and she pounded frantically, her hand shooting out the hole that she had made with the rock and going after the lock. I stared down at her flailing hand as it was shredded by the broken glass. Velvety blue-red blood bubbled up from her knuckles and trickled over her fingers. All I could think of when I saw her ruined hand was raw meat.
But Alex wasn’t distracted. He grabbed her hand and yanked her hard enough to smack against the door, then clamped a cuff on her, fixing the other one to the opposite door handle. Feng struggled.
“That’s only going to give us a few minutes.”
“But Nina and Vlad—”
“Can have a fresh meal,” Alex finished. He grabbed my arm and shoved me into his car, flipping the lights to “spastic” and pushing the gas to the floor once he got in.
“You came to save me?” I asked, brushing away a trickle of blood as it ran over my eyelid.
The muscle in Alex’s jaw jumped and I saw his fists tighten on the steering wheel until his knuckles went white. “I was just coming by to tell you about the massacre at the Du place. You weren’t answering your phone, which usually means you’re in a pizza coma or a life-and-death situation.” There was no humor in his voice and his expression remained hard, fixed.
“Are we going there? To the Du place, I mean.”
Alex didn’t answer me, but when he squealed the car on a right-hand turn, I knew.
I was chewing on my thumbnail the whole ride through the city, thinking about Feng chained at the front door—though knowing she had probably already broken out—and Mr. Sampson chained in the basement. I prayed that the rage and fury that were etched on Feng’s face would mean that the second she had freed herself, she would come after us, rather than deciding to go snoop around my building.
“What are you so nervous about?” Alex asked, eyes still focused on the windshield.
“I just got attacked by a crazed werewolf hunter, Alex, and we’re apparently headed to the scene of a bloodbath.”
“So you’re not concerned that the person responsible for said bloodbath is now running loose in the city?”
“Sampson didn’t do this, Alex.”
“And why should I believe that, Lawson? Suddenly you’re telling me the truth?”
I pressed my eyes shut. “Please understand, Alex.”
My plea hung on the uncomfortable silence in the car until we slowed at the mouth of Grant’s Gate. “I know Sampson had nothing to do with this because he’s chained up.” I watched Alex’s profile, his hard jaw and set, determined eyes. “I chained him up in the basement.”
“When?”
“Just before—just before—” I sucked in a shaky breath. “Just before Feng got me.”