Read Online Touch of Evil by C. T. Adams, Cathy Clamp - Free Book Online

could imagine his mouth opening wide. Instead of the sharp pain that I was expecting in my neck, I heard a sharp thud and a gasp. I didn't wait to find out if he hit Joe's special collar. I plunged the knife up and back into the bulk of his body. There was no response. His body was just suddenly so much dead weight. I scrambled from beneath him and turned on my knees.
    In death Larry's face was that of an old, weary man: pale and bloodless, eyes vacant. The knife had caught him right in the heart and one of his fangs had broken off.
    The screaming started. Shrieks and moans and thuds sounded in the building above me. I glanced up. It was the wrong thing to do. Monica's eyes shot open and her teeth—sporting brand new needle-sharp fangs—bared. There was panic in her eyes.
    "They're dying! No! It's not time yet." Her expression changed from fear to rage in the blink of an eye. "You've killed them!" I recognized the danger too late. Monica shot forward as far as the chains would allow. She caught my leg in a grip of steel. I kicked at her, but she steadily dragged my body toward her. I
    grabbed at the table, but she just pulled it along with me.
    Her words were a hiss that turned her model features into a monster mask. "You'll pay for this, bitch!"
    Her fangs sunk through my jeans and sock and into my calf. I screamed, long and loud. A mind not my own invaded my head. "You'll be the first of my Herd, Kathleen." Monica's mouth was still filled with my leg, but I could hear her voice as clearly as if she was speaking. "You'll pay. Every day of my life you will pay! Feel my pain. Feel what you have done!"
    A veil ripped open and my mind shuddered
    under the impact of the death throes of the nest. Blinding pain, aching, wrenching sorrow as one by one the dozen voices in my head, in her head, were silenced. There was only emptiness without the hive. There was hollow loneliness, paralyzing fear. I realized that my body was still fighting her without the use of my head. I was kicking, scratching and beating that lovely face. And screaming, I was doing a lot of screaming as she ground her teeth further into my vein, pulled my blood from me as her first meal. I pulled open her jaws with my fingers, but she bit down again, ripping the holes in my leg into bloody gashes. More and more screams echoed in my brain.
    I knew—just suddenly knew—that Larry's death had killed dozens of his Hosts. They hadn't tied to Monica yet. They had died with their master and she was alone.
    I woke screaming, the afghan I keep at the foot of the bed tangled around my feet from my kicking. My breath was coming in gasps, my heart pounding fit to burst my chest. I wasn't sleeping, but memory took over where the dream had left off. My head insisted on replaying that day's events even as I sat completely awake on my bed.
    I managed to get her mouth off of my leg, but she had a grip on my thigh that would end up leaving bruises for weeks, so I continued to beat at her. Monica was fending off my blows with the shackles around her limbs. My mind rang with her
    awareness, her terror. So alone! I fought back, fought for control of my own mind. I had to be free of the voices, of the screams.
    A sudden buzzing: a soothing, melodic chorus of voices joined Monica's. The words came from multiple minds, thousands upon thousands of individuals. You are not alone, young queen. We are here. We are many.
    I felt the unique presences of each of the other nests, responding to the crisis to Monica. Here, then, was the true hive, and I was nothing to them. I was food. I was prey.
    "I am not prey!" I shouted my defiance at the collective. "I am not food! " I wrenched my body free. I grabbed a pool cue, brandishing it like a bat as I spit words of defiance at Monica. "And Dylan is not food! I will kill you here and now if you don't release him!"
    Monica's face contorted in fury. " No! He's mine. He is my only, my only living . . ." I slammed my fists to my