Moon Child (The Year of the Wolf #2) - Serena Akeroyd Page 0,21

didn’t matter worth a damn.

I’d wake up and probably learn that this was all a dream. That there wasn’t a hyena on my front stoop, and that Sabina was still dead.

Only, this was real. I knew it. And that was why it was even more tempting to just drift out of this world and into the Sandman’s.

“We’re sending enforcers to get you, Lara. You must stay awake for them to come and pick you up.”

My eyes flared wide at that. “Huh? Why? What’s happening?”

“I need you to come to my home, sweetness. I need you here. I need your help.”

I blinked at that, feeling a little dazed because I’d expected to be dead by now, not to have to travel a few thousand miles to wherever she was.

“I’m confused,” I rumbled. “What kind of help?”

She gulped. “Do you still see spirits?”

I tensed, totally taken aback by that question. In all honesty, I’d only ever told her once, and I’d thought she’d forgotten. Everyone else just thought I saw and felt other people’s feelings, and while that wasn’t a lie, it was only a fragment of the truth too.

I saw so much more.

“I thought you forgot about that.”

“You wished I had. I never forgot, I just did my best to try to make things better.”

“Until you died.”

The bitterness surprised me, but it didn’t surprise her. She sighed. “I’m sorry about that, sweetness.”

“I missed you,” I whispered, miserable to the last. Like thirteen years hadn’t passed, as if it was yesterday.

“I missed you too,” she replied, her voice a soft hush. “Every day. But I was in danger, Lara. You know that.”

I did. I had.

My jaw still tensed. “We all were in danger. You couldn’t have called? Told me you weren’t dead?”

Before I could say another word, the phone was snatched from her. I heard a little tussle, and then there was a sharp voice in my ear, one that had me jerking upright with irritation. “I understand this is a family reunion that’s long in the making, but for whatever reason, you were being attacked by a…”

When the man’s voice wore off, like he had no idea what had attacked me, I plunked in, “A hyena.”

When the guy muttered, “A hyena?” I heard it trigger a short burst of conversation on the other side.

My brow furrowed though, because there were three distinct voices on the end of the line, and my sister was there too. It was, I registered, nearly two AM, so what was she doing with three guys at this time of the night?

Before I could get bogged down with questions, Sabina muttered, “It was a shifter.”

“How did you know that?”

“I told her,” I muttered.

But Sabina replied, “I saw it in my dreams.”

My mouth gaped at that, because whatever I expected her to say, it wasn’t that. I gawped at nothing, at the body on my stoop, and whispered, “Did you inherit Great-Nanny’s gift?”

She gulped. “I don’t know. I really don’t, Lara. I have no idea what’s going on, I just know that I need you here.”

“Why?”

“There’s a boy. He’s, well, strange.”

I didn’t need to look at her to know she’d be frowning, her mouth working as she stared at nothing. I knew her well. Okay, I’d known her well. So well. We’d been best friends, and it hadn’t been because we had no choice either.

We’d always been close, in a way that I never had been with Jana.

But then, Jana had been like our father—cruel and hard. I had to think that was because she spent a lot of time with him, working on bets to sustain his habit. Sabina and I had taken after our mother, and that was why we had targets painted on our foreheads where our father was concerned. Of course, the weirdest thing of all was I knew Sabina was his favorite because she looked like Mom, but that hadn’t stopped him hurting her.

I rubbed my bottom lip, aware that my fingers were grubby from how badly my hands had been sweating. But that was the least of my problems. The absolute least.

Sighing, shoulders slouching as I slumped against the nearest wall and kept my eyes on the hyena lest the damn thing wake up, I muttered, “What kind of strange?”

“I-I just think he needs your help.”

I wasn’t about to cut her any slack though. “Don’t bullshit me, Sabina. What makes you think that?”

“I can sense something inside him. I didn’t know what it was, still don’t, to be honest, and I could