Read Online Micah by Laurell K. Hamilton - Free Book Online Page A

back. It was the best I could do.
    He smiled at me. Again it was that sad, wistful, self-deprecating smile. “The rifle was gone. I don’t remember losing it, but my arms wouldn’t work anymore. I lay there on the ground, with that thing above me, and I wasn’t afraid anymore. Nothing hurt, nothing scared me. It was almost peaceful. After that it’s only snatches. I remember voices, being on a stretcher. I remember being put in a helicopter. I woke up in the hospital with Agent Fox on one side and my dad on the other.”
    I realized then what had sparked the trip down memory lane. “Seeing Fox today brought it back.” Some days I’m just slow.
    He nodded. “It scared me to see him, Anita. I know that sounds stupid, but it did.”
    â€œIt doesn’t sound stupid, and it didn’t show. I mean, even I didn’t pick up on it.”
    â€œI wasn’t afraid in the front of my head, Anita. I was afraid in the back of my head. And then you didn’t like the room, and—”
    I went to him then. I wrapped my arms around him, pressed his face against my chest. He hugged me back, tight, so tight, as if he were holding on to the last solid thing in the universe.
    â€œI love the room. I love you. I’m sorry I was shitty.”
    He spoke with his face still buried against my body, so his words were muffled. “I didn’t survive the attack, Anita. The wereleopard that attacked us ate as much of my uncle and Richie as it could hold, and left. Some hunters found us, and they were both doctors. I was dead, Anita. No heartbeat, no pulse. The doctors got my heart started again, got me breathing again. They patched me up as best they could, and they got me to a clearing so a chopper could get me to a hospital. No one expected me to live.”
    I stroked his hair, still slick and tight in the braid. “But you did,” I whispered.
    He nodded, rubbing his head against the silk shirt and my breasts underneath. Not sexual, but comforting.
    â€œThe wereleopard was a serial killer. He hit only hunters, and only after they’d killed an animal. The FBI put out a warning to hunters after we were attacked. Fox said they put it together as a serial case only a few hours before we were attacked. The first attack had been on a reservation where he was assigned.”
    â€œHe solved it,” I said.
    â€œHe caught the . . . monster. He was there when they killed it.”
    He kept saying it and monster . You didn’t hear that often from shapeshifters—not about other shifters. “I died, was brought back, survived, and healed. Healed so fast. Incredibly fast. Then a month later I was the monster.” His voice was so sad when he said it, so unutterably sad.
    â€œYou’re not a monster,” I said.
    He drew away enough to look up at me. “But a lotof us are, Anita. I joined Merle’s pard, and he was a good leader, but Chimera came and took us over, and Chimera was crazy and cruel.”
    Chimera had been the leader I’d killed to save Micah and his people, and a lot of other people. Chimera had been the only panwere that I’d ever heard of, someone who could turn into a variety of animals. Before I’d seen him I’d have said it was impossible, but I’d seen him, and had to destroy him. He’d been real and powerful, and a very creative sexual sadist.
    I held his face in my hands. “You are a good person, Micah. You are not a monster.”
    â€œI used you when we first met, Anita. I saw you as a way to save my leopards. To rescue us all.”
    â€œI know,” I said. “We talked about it. You asked me what I would have done to save Nathaniel and all the leopards from Chimera. I agreed that I would have done anything, or at least what you did to get me involved. I couldn’t fault you on it.”
    â€œFrom the moment you touched me, the plan changed. You changed it. You changed