Ravyn's eyes turned an even brighter red before he waved his hand in the air. The bullets stopped dead in the air, hanging there for two heartbeats before they reversed direction and struck the cop.
Susan couldn't breathe as her gaze scanned the carnage of the four men who'd entered her home. Now the only one standing was...
The male stripper.
"Please, please tell me that I'm having an acid flashback."
His eyes faded back to black. "You drop acid?"
All she could do was shake her head no as some foreign coldness invaded every part of her body. This couldn't be real. She couldn't have seen what she'd just seen.
I'm having a psychotic episode.
Maybe they weren't dead. Maybe all of this was still part of the hoax Leo had perpetrated. She took a step toward the blond officer to feel for a pulse... only there was no way to press her fingertips against his carotid since it was no longer intact. It had been ripped out.
And that wasn't makeup. It was real. Disgusting and real. At one time, she'd been on the police beat and seen more than her fair share of dead bodies. This was no hoax. Her male stripper had just killed four men in her house, which would make her an accomplice if she didn't report this.
"We have to go to the police," she said in a strangely serene tone. "Tell them what happened."
He shook his head. "We can't go to the police. They're in on this."
"No, they'll-"
"Susan," he snapped, shaking her lightly. "Look at me."
Even though she wanted to run, she stood her ground and met those spooky black eyes.
"This isn't a game. Didn't you hear what your friend was trying to tell you earlier? There's some serious shit going down here. Now that I know what's going on, I can take care of myself, but you're another matter. We have to get you to a sanctuary before more of them come to find you. Do you understand?"
"But I didn't do anything wrong. I didn't kill them. You did."
"Bobby? Alan? What's going on? You got the woman yet?"
Her breath caught as she heard the officer's radio going off. Were there more of them outside waiting to come in?
"Bobby? Respond. Over?"
Ravyn cursed as he heard heavy footsteps outside. "There's two more men coming up the walkway."
"How do you know?"
Before he could answer, her door was kicked wide open. Ravyn shoved her toward the kitchen before he slung his hands and knocked the two human males down. He took a step forward only to realize that these two were smarter than the others... they had the one weapon that would incapacitate him. A Taser. One shot and the electricity would bounce around his cells, turning him from cat to man and back again without his control. His magick would be haywire and he would be defenseless against them.
As much as he hated it, it was time to retreat. Changing to cat form, he ran after Susan, who was making her way toward the back door.
"We have to get to your car. "
Susan froze as she heard the male voice in her head and saw the small leopard back in her house. "Please tell me I'm having some kind of stress-induced hallucination." It was better than the thought that she had actually lost her mind completely.
But insane or not, she needed to get out of here until she figured out what was going on. Since there was no way to get to her front door without confronting the two newcomers, she grabbed the spare set of car keys from the small hanger inside her back door. She rushed out of her door as bullets sprayed the wall beside her, narrowly missing her.
Too afraid to look back, she ran to the driveway only to realize that they'd blocked her in. Damn. Another shot rang out before the passenger window of her Toyota shattered. Susan crouched down as she made her way around the car, to the driver's side. She didn't dare glance back until she had the door open.
She couldn't see anything until the small leopard came bounding out of the door, headed for her. Before she could move, it leaped into her car and jumped into the backseat.
Deciding not to argue, she got in, slammed the door, then started the engine.
"Duck!"