Page 52 of The Shade of Things
Between the abductions and the vampires coming out of the graves, the start of the race was a blur. She barely remembered how she got to the houses, but there’d been an older woman, another player, who’d found the survival packs and was ushering all arrivals inside.
Teresa had left with two men, but when she tweaked her ankle during one of the road shifts, they’d left her behind.
“You dodged a bullet,” Emmett blurted with his usual lack of tact. “Or a strangling.”
Teresa gasped. “Someone’s dead?”
Eli and I glowered at the golem for his insensitivity. Even Laurent growled softly at him. Emmett ducked his head.
Eli placed a hand on the woman’s shoulder. “It’s okay to feel grief and it’s okay to feel scared. Any emotion or none, just shock and numbness right now, is valid. You’ve been put in an unthinkable situation. There’s no playbook for how you’re supposed to feel.”
She nodded shakily. “Who died? Omar or Shriyan?”
“We’ll have to wait until Laurent shifts so he can answer you,” Eli said. “He found them.”
Laurent gave a soft yip as if in agreement.
Teresa scrubbed a trembling hand over her face. “Okay.” She hadn’t seen any other humans since, but she’d figured whoever was left had passed her when she’d gone into the woods. “I hoped that if I couldn’t see the monsters, they couldn’t see me,” she said. “And with my ankle, I was already weakened prey, but I found myself here and had to get away.”
I urged her to have more water. “Vamps and shifters have enhanced hearing and scent,” I said gently. “Sight doesn’t matter.”
“Awesome. Anyway, then I got lost in the woods.” She laughed bitterly. “This place has ruined my favorite musical.”
Oh yeah. She was a theater major. She had only a few years on Sadie, and she was also Chinese Canadian. The girls looked nothing alike but still, I busied myself putting the duct tape in my pack and stifling the urge to bundle her into a hug.
“Into the Woods?” Eli said.
I blinked in surprise.
“What?” he said. “Like I haven’t heard our kid sing that musical five thousand times?”
We exchanged a wistful look. I prayed Sadie hadn’t experienced a panic attack because she was so worried about us. I hated having left her, but looking at Teresa, I didn’t regret it. Much.
Teresa mustered up a weak smile. “Yeah. That’s the one. There’s not much more to tell. I heard a wolf.” She glanced at Laurent standing guard. “Not that one though, right?”
“No,” Eli said. “He’s one of the good guys.”
Laurent gave him an amused look and then thumped his tail.
Look at that. There was hope for them yet.
“Even if his choice in sports sucks,” Eli added.
The wolf growled.
“You couldn’t quit while you were ahead?” I said.
Eli chuckled. “What happened after you heard that other wolf?”
“I climbed the tree,” Teresa continued. “That’s when the eagles showed up and attacked. I hoped that after the graveyard, there wouldn’t be more attacks. It would be puzzles or tests, like getting out of that housing complex.” She looked down at her lap. “But I guess not.” She shook it off. “I managed to fend them off by lighting a small branch and then you all showed up.”
That branch wouldn’t have held them off. I was more convinced that the eagle shifters weren’t supposed to kill her. Not yet, anyway. I craned my neck up to the treetop. “How did you get up there?”
Teresa traced the path with her finger. She’d grabbed a low-hanging branch two trees over, pulling herself up to a higher branch and balancing to the edge where she grabbed a branch on the next tree. She indicated how high she’d climbed and how she’d swung herself across to the tree we’d found her in.
“Holy shit,” Emmett said. “You’re like Wonder Woman.”
“Not quite, but thanks. Never thought parkour would save my life.”
