That Rex Gotta Roar - Julia Mills Page 0,36

whip all this up…” Throwing her arms open wide, she went on, “…then she could’ve zapped herself a new nose and a more appropriate hair color.”

“Seriously, also maybe just a little plump of the lips. They are just too – too …” Our resident model kept the inane and totally inappropriate conversation going, much to my utter surprise that left me speechless.

And, it wasn’t over yet…

“Bloodless and lifeless,” Coll was right there to finish the Mockingbird’s thought. “They just blend in with her already pallid and sallow complexion.”

“You are so right.”

"Anyway, Tank," Colleen finally got back to my Mate. (I have no clue why all of us stood there and said nothing as those two prattled on, but we did. Go figure.) "It's not nice to call a lady's attention to things like bad dye jobs, clothes that don't look good, or makeup that makes them look like the living dead. Don't ever do that with Clem. She's already kinda…"

"Will you shut up! I do not wear makeup or dye my hair, you nutball ninny!" I yelled, once again throwing my thumb over my shoulder. "We do not have time for this shit. Vanessa Viper-Ass Vandermere (I came up with that moniker on the fly, not knowing how on the nose I was about to be.) is ripping up the Veil between Hell and Earth. I did nothing. Tank did nothing. Asshole Vandermere is here because the Portal is here. Remember Mabel telling us that?" I took a quick breath to keep from passing out. "She's calling up the worse, the ugliest, the evilest, the… the… the… oh hell, the frikkin' Demons of the Pit! She's trying…"

“CLEMENTINE COOPER!”

A sound somewhere between a shriek, a squeal, a squawk, and a howl mixed with the screech of nails on a chalkboard and the honking of a Goose with a head cold bellowed my name with so much furious fury that the ground beneath all our little tootsies literally shook as if the Gates of Hell were swinging open. (Yes, I realize that was what was happening, but I couldn’t come up with a better simile.)

Twirling back around to face front, I tried with all my might not to look shocked. Letting the actual level of my freaked-out-ness show would do nothing – absolutely not one damn thing to help keep the fiery ball of fucked-up-ness that was befalling our beloved Swamp at bay. I mean, come on, the levitating body of none other than Vanessa Vandermere was floating not ten feet in front of me. What's a Canary Shifter with the power of her daddy's Psychicness supposed to do?

Acting as calm as I could while my insides shook like a can of paint in one of the mixers at Henry the Hawk's Hardware Store and Emporium, and while my Canary was still snoring, I let go of Tank's hand and took a step forward. (Yes, that damn Cassandra was still asleep. I vowed at that very moment that if I made it out of Vanessa's Hell on Earth alive, I was gonna lock that crackpot Canary in time-out for a month of Sundays. But that discussion was for another time.)

Hands on my hips, a frown on my face, a strand of hair blowing over my top lip like a mustache, I yelled right back. "VANESSA VANDERMERE!" But I added because it needed to be asked, "What the Hell do you think you're doin'? Stop this shit. Get down here and talk to me, woman to woman."

Tapping her long, pointy-tipped, bloodred nail on the sharp point of her knobby chin, that bitch let her head fall to the side as she opened her eyes real wide, trying to look innocent, and sassed me right back, "Ummmm, no. But I will let my Beasties eat you and your friends for dinner. It's been a really long time since they've had fresh meat."

No sooner had she said the words than those Things (Yep! Still calling them that because I have never come up with a better name.) came creeping, crawling, and dragging all kinds of body parts – if that’s what they were - out of the flames.

Heading for us, teeth bared – what was left of what I thought had been teeth at one time or another – their jaws creaked open and snapped shut over and over. As if that wasn't enough, what I guess was their grubby little fingers but looked more like sawed-off bones with rotting meat hanging from them reached