and grabbed Charity’s throat, cutting off her air supply and pulling. Her shoulders hit the window frame. A fierce snarl in the distance cut off in a wet whine.
Dread pierced Charity. She pushed Sam with her palms and then her power, the concussion of air forcing out the rest of the glass in the window and the frame with it. Plaster and paint ripped away with the vamp, though its claws scraped Charity’s neck.
Charity got a glimpse of a bloodied wolf lying in a heap. Vlad stared at her from across the invisible divide, his face a terrifying mask of violence.
Without thinking, she fled, sprinting to Devon’s bedroom in the back of the house. She slammed the door, locked it, then paused, not sure what to do next. She didn’t have long to decide. A moment later, the door thudded. And again. As if a heavy body were slamming into it.
With a loud crack and the splintering of wood, the door burst inward. Samantha stood in the frame, nude and in her human form. Rage marred her beautiful features. “My master is counting on me. Come quietly so I don’t have to hurt you.”
“Samantha, it’s me! We’re friends. Don’t you remember your human side?”
“Friends? Is that why you have a gun?” Fangs elongated from black gums. She was changing again.
Arms shaking, Charity raised the weapon and aimed. Samantha hissed, moving one second before Charity pulled the trigger. The deafening shot blasted. Sam jerked back, a puncture to the left of her heart. She shifted from beautiful to ghoulish, and she grinned, a ghastly sight.
“Missed me, missed me,” she said softly, her horrible singsong sending shivers down Charity’s spine.
Sobbing, Charity opened fire. Bullets punched into her former friend. But the vamp kept moving, too fast, the heart hard to hit, even from this close.
Samantha sprang forward and backhanded her. She crashed into the closet doors, her head thumping the glass hard enough that it cracked and spider-webbed. Charity jumped up and then twisted as claws tore through the air. Searing pain bit her shoulder.
She snatched a knife off the nightstand and dodged another claw strike. Not thinking, just reacting, Charity surged forward and slashed downward. The blade burrowed into Samantha’s chest.
Samantha’s expression melted from rage to shock. She staggered backward and her hands drifted up. Her appearance shifted back to human.
“Charity, what did you do?” Samantha asked, her tone achingly familiar. This was the Sam who’d gotten Charity out of the dorms. The one who’d told her friends that Charity could hang around whenever she wanted to. It hadn’t been a great friendship, or an equal one, but it had mattered to Charity.
“I…” Charity sobbed, not knowing what to say. She stared in horror as her friend’s expression sank into a look of hurt.
“Charity, why? I was always good to you.”
“I’m sorry, Sam!” Charity cried, stumbling backward against the wall.
Samantha’s beautiful face twisted into the visage of a howling, rage-filled monster. The creature she’d become turned, tearing at its ruined chest. Its cries of pain tore at Charity’s heart.
Suddenly the vamp was ripped away, the black sludge oozing from its chest cavity dripping all over the wood floor. Devon’s handsome face filled her vision.
“Charity, are you okay? Are you hurt?”
“I killed her. I killed Samantha.” She sobbed, sickened by what she’d done. By what she’d had to do.
Devon clutched Charity’s shoulders, looking hard at the claw marks from the creature Sam had become, before looking down her front and then turning her. He was checking for the severity of her injuries.
“The elder is outside. He…he killed a gray wolf…” Charity forced back the sobs, praying a new friend hadn’t died tonight along with an old one.
“I know. It was Sarge. Roger must have sent him to watch you. No one wolf, besides maybe Roger, is a match for Vlad. Sarge gave it everything he had, but…”
“How’d you get in?”
Devon scooped her up and carried her out of the room. She squeezed her eyes shut so she didn’t have to see Samantha’s ghoulish remains.
Once in her room, he sat with her on the bed, cradling her to his chest. It was only then his nudity soaked into her awareness.
“I left the Range Rover and ran around,” he said before she could guess the answer. “The elder was standing in the middle of the driveway. I didn’t want to risk pushing him through the ward with my car—if that would even work. He was too focused on you to notice my drive-by.”