“In light of this new evidence, insofar as I can see, there is no need for a divorce, seeing as the woman who Mr. Budrene was married to is dead—”
A boom like thunder cut Judge Watts off midsentence. The entire courtroom froze. Eyes widened all around us, but nobody moved.
“This is bad, sis,” Tad said.
“Has nothing to do with us,” I whispered back. Okay, the likelihood was high it did have something to do with me. “Just in case, get my papers, would you?”
He nodded and gathered them all, mixing them up horribly.
Maybe the next hero Hera had drummed up to kill me had found us? I tried to swallow and struggled to make it happen. My mouth was as dry as a two-week-old brownie with no frosting.
I cleared my throat. Maybe I could still salvage this. “Your Honor, please, I am still alive. I am still the same woman.”
No one looked at me; everyone’s eyes were trained on the open doors.
A second boom was followed close on the heels by a third that shook the rafters. Plaster fell from the ceiling, and the lights swayed overhead. The crowd cried out, and Barbie was the loudest of them all as she ran back into the courtroom. One of the bailiffs slammed the doors shut behind her. As if that would keep the shaking out.
“Oh my God, Roger. I could have died.” She leapt into his arms, knocking him to the floor.
He let out a grunt as he stumbled and fell under her weight, but I was already looking at the threshold that led to the hallway. The tall framed wooden doors rattled as though something large had walked by. A few weeks ago, I would have said that was not possible. Now I wasn’t so sure.
The doors burst inward and Officer Jensen fell in, his eyes searching the crowd. “Alena?”
“I’m here.”
“It’s Remo; he needs help.”
There was no question. I kicked off my heels and ran toward Jensen. “What’s happening?”
“The rival gang is making a hit on him. They set him up, knowing he would be here without backup. They must have someone here in the human courts keeping them up to date.”
The building shook again, and I grabbed his arm to keep myself steady. “What the hey diddle fiddle are they using? Rocket launchers?”
His eyes widened. “How did you know?”
I groaned. “I didn’t. They sound like a rocket launcher off Tad’s Halo game.”
Officer Jensen shook his head, took my hand, and ran down the hall. “He’s cornered, nobody can get around the rival vamps, there’s too many of them.”
“What makes you think I can?”
He skidded to a stop at a T intersection. “Umm, two-story snake ring a bell?”
“I don’t know that I can take a rocket launcher!” I spit out. “I’m not a fighter, Officer Jensen, in case you’ve forgotten.”
“Oh, we’re way beyond formalities. First name is Ben.” He peeked around the hall. “Okay, you’re up.”
He pulled me hard, and slingshot me around the corner. I squawked as I hit the ground, tumbled once, and ended up flat on my back, my skirt bunched even higher on my thighs. I rolled to my belly and found myself staring at a pair of boots that buckled all the way up to the knees. I slowly lifted myself and my eyes at the same time.
“What have we here?” A deep rumble purred. “Let me guess, this is the new girl, the one we’ve all been hearing about.”
I stared up into a pair of dark eyes partially hidden under a shock of hair almost as dark as my own raven locks. He was all muscle without an ounce of fat on him. His quads looked like they were trying to burst out of his pants like an overfilled muffin tin.
“I doubt anyone has been talking about me,” I said.
“Oh, the green eyes give you away. That and the exquisite beauty. Remo always did have exceptional taste.” He tipped his chin to one side and gave me a sly smile that bared a single fang to me. Without warning, his hands were at the back of my head and he’d pulled me to him for a hard, demanding kiss.
The shock wore off in under a second, and I slammed my hands into his chest as I braced my legs. The blow threw him back at least ten feet. A low murmur rolled, and I looked around. A dozen vampires, by my count, and none were on Remo’s side, if Jensen was right. I stood up and straightened my clothes.
“Remo, are you okay?” I called out.
“Not my best moment.” He groaned, and the enemy vampires smiled as they parted so I could see him. He was trussed up between three vampires, and blood poured from wounds all over his chest and neck. Bite marks. They were draining him.
And that was all it took to wake the snake in me up. To be fair, it wasn’t really a snake, but a Drakaina, but that’s semantics. That side of me was easily riled when it came to blood and wounds on those I cared for.
No matter what I might say to Remo, I did care for him. More than I even wanted to admit to myself.
“I’m ssssorry,” I said, the s drawn out as I prepared to shift. The vampires tipped their heads as a unit, like nothing more than a group of meerkats wondering what was going on.
“Did she just apologize to me?” The one who’d kissed me stood and raised an eyebrow at me. Something about him tugged at my memories. Like I’d seen him before. But I knew I hadn’t.
“No, I’m apologizing to all of you.” I didn’t smile, just breathed in and loosed the tight coils of snake inside of me. Like unlatching a springform pan, it was just that easy to open myself up to the monster I was now.
Shifting from woman to giant snake was fast and painless. Smoke curled around my body, obscuring my vision for a split second before it cleared and I stared down at the vampires, who took a united step back, their eyes widening like children who’d finally seen the bogeyman, and he was as terrifying as their imagination had whispered in the dark.
I knew what they saw. My scales were purple, blue, and silver, glittering and beautiful, even though they were attached to me. A snake over a hundred feet long with a girth of over six feet and a pair of fangs that were anything but subtle. Raised up, I was easily two stories tall. I know all this because Tad had decided we needed exact measurements.
My head brushed against the ceiling, and I opened my mouth, fangs dropping low as I hissed at the gathered vampires. Maybe I could just scare them away, make them run.
“Shoot her.” The vamp in the front snapped his fingers. “Cooked snake for dinner, boys and girls.”
So much for making them just go away. I flicked my tail forward and slammed it through the first row of vampires. The blow sent them through the drywall and then pinned them up against the concrete wall of the courthouse hard enough that the concrete cracked. I dropped them and swept my tail back, catching a few more and clearing them off Remo. He lifted his head, his eyes locking on mine, then flicking behind me.
“Duck.”