Read Online Out of Body by Stella Cameron - Free Book Online Page A

she told him, with no intention of doing so.
    “Of course. Take your time. You won’t repeat anything I’ve said, will you?”
    She had to lie. “No.”
    He walked away, only to come back with her drink beforeshe could decide on the next step. “Why are you looking for Amber?” he said.
    The only surprise was that he hadn’t asked that very question before. “It’s hard to explain.”
    “Do it anyway.” His voice grew more intense and his lips scarcely moved. “Tell me what you know. You owe me that.”
    “I don’t owe you anything.” Marley expelled a breath through pursed lips. Too often she spoke too fast and before thinking enough. “I’m in a bad spot about this, too.”
    When he closed the fingers of his left hand around her wrist, Marley winced. She wouldn’t allow herself to try pulling away. “That doesn’t feel so good.” She looked pointedly at his hand.
    “If you know anything about what’s happened to her, tell me. Now.” His grip tightened.
    “Loosen up, Danny,” a familiar male voice said, and Danny’s fingers went slack. Pain contorted his face.
    Marley snatched her wrist away and turned on her seat, shifting back in the booth at the same time.
    “You okay, Marley?” Gray Fisher asked, still squeezing a tendon in Danny’s shoulder.

7
    T he longer she slept, the better. Eventually her screams would excite him, but until he was ready, he preferred silence .
    Breathing, sounds of the idle, automatic push and pull of air in unsuspecting human lungs raised bubbles of hysteria in his throat.
    On it went, unaware that it would soon be silenced. Before long, the human woman would begin her final, endless sleep.
    The itching began.
    He opened his mouth wide, inhaled long and slow, to hold back the noise that wanted to erupt. His skin grew thicker and the thickening made his body larger. He felt himself swell, felt his spine grow supple and bend forward. Already he wore the loose, hooded black robe he could adjust to cover him completely, no matter how hulking his form became.
    Power flooded his bulk and he swayed, reveled in the loose, heavy swing of his limbs.
    Fingernails became talons, gradually lengthening, curving, hardening to points as capable of wounding as ice picks.
    Beneath the cracked and crazed hide that was replacing skin, his raw flesh stung. Beautiful pain. Agony inflamed his muscles, his nerves, but his purpose only intensified.
    Until yesterday, it had been more than two years since he fed his need for fresh death. Far too long. Ah, yes, wherehe came from, deep beneath this earth in Embran, they fought and killed for supremacy daily. Only the strongest survived and their number were replenished by the young—those of them considered worthy of a chance to live.
    But it was here, not in Embran that he wished to remain, among the luscious flesh of humans where sex with them increased his power and destroying those he no longer wanted brought him the deepest satisfaction of all.
    His kind were only allowed on earth one-by-one. The Supreme Council feared losing control of the pack if they didn’t keep them together. To earn passage to the surface, a man- or woman-Embran—for the only common element they shared with humans was their sex—the one who got to come had to defeat all who competed for the honor. Some, severely wounded, gave up. Many more ceased to exist.
    He had won the prize thirty years earlier and lived among his beloved victims disguised as one of them—except when he needed to resume his rightful form to perform a kill.
    Warnings had started to surface from below, telling him it was time to return and report what he had found out that might be useful. But he ignored the warnings. It was too soon to give up the wonder of all this.
    The signs were there that he could be weakening and should return home for regeneration, but he was the strongest of them all and he would find a way to restore himself and stay where he was. How unfortunate that he was not a