Page 14 of Echo (A Monster’s Prey #2)

Constant banging started me awake.

It took a long moment for all the gears in my brain to get moving. I was still sitting against the altar.

I’d passed out after I’d waited for hours for the thing to come down the hall. Eventually, exhaustion won out. The sage candle in my hands was down to nothing, and I was lucky I didn’t spill the hot wax on myself when I jolted. I blew the flame out.

The sound of a fist pounding on wood, refocused my attention to what had woken me up in the first place. I stuck my head out over the salt line, but kept my feet firmly planted inside. My eye scanned the hall for any suspicious movement or shadows.

I listened for any movement or footsteps, but it was impossible to hear over the increasingly loud knocking that sounded like it was from the front door. With a deep breath, I tip-toed down the hall, peeking around the corner to the kitchen, like a teenager trying to avoid their parents.

I let my eyes sweep over the kitchen, before rushing to the doorway to the living room to do the same.The early morning light filtering through the open curtain made it easier to see.

The only sign something was amiss was Mark’s dead body where I left it. The blood stain was mostly dried on the hardwood and that couch was done for.

“Police,” an angry voice on the other door announced.

Yes! I quietly went to where the door was, glancing up the stairwell to make sure no one was watching me.

As my fingers touched the lock, the vivid memory of the thing resembling and sounding like Mark halted me in my tracks. Instead, I pushed aside the blinds of the window.

A uniformed man with a scowl and dark rings around his gray eyes stared back at me. “Open the door.”

Was he real? I whispered, “Is it safe?”

The sunshine gave the unamused officer all its light as if to assure me that he was who I thought he was. “Don’t make me tell you again.”

I flipped the lock and opened the door. “I don’t know if he’s still in the house or outside. I hid, and I lost track of his movements.”

He half pushed past me, flipping on the lights, and his eyes fell to Mark immediately. To be fair, it was a startling pop of color amongst the earthy tones and florals of the room.

I pressed my back to the wall, so nothing could sneak up on me. I’d never been so happy to see a cop before in my life.

“I’m Officer Reed.” Then his critical glare landed on me with the weight of an anvil, and that sense of relief knotted in my stomach. “What happened?”

“I don’t know,” I stuttered, trying to keep my voice low. “I went to bed, and I thought Mark had come upstairs with me. I…”

How did I explain that I thought I was having sex with Mark? He’d never believe me.

“I thought we were together, but when I came downstairs, I found Mark on the couch. That’s when I realized someone else was in the house, and he started chasing me.

“Uh huh.” His eyes fell to Mark again. “So this person brutally slashed up this man and went upstairs to convince you that everything was normal?”

When he said it like that, it sounded insane. “Yes.”

“Why did you come downstairs?” he asked.

“Please clear the house, then question me. I get it, I’m the girlfriend and I’m suspect one, but can we please make sure no one is here with us first?”

“Answer my question, Ma’am.”

Tears filled my eyes, “Is this your first day or something? You are really bad at this.”

“Ma’am.” More authority filled his tone. I studied his fresh, youthful face. This man was right out of the academy.

“Because I was mad at him.”

“So this person supposedly spoke, and you didn’t notice anything amiss?”

More than that, but I didn’t think it would help my case. “No.”

“You’re under arrest.” Officer Reed grabbed the cuffs from his shiny new belt.

I slid away, holding my hand out, knocking some pictures off the wall in the process. “Do what you have to do, but for the love of whatever god you believe in, please check the house.”

I didn’t realize I’d pinned myself to the ancient TV, so when he lurched for me, I had nowhere to escape. He may have been a rookie, but he took me to the ground with no problem, cuffing me like it was what he was born to do.

The dark growling filled the air, raising all the hair on my arms on edge. I hit my forehead into the floorboard. There I was pinched and trapped like a trussed up turkey with my tits pressed uncomfortably to the ground. There was no way I could fight him off.

“Get me up! Help me up!” I cried out.

Instead of doing that, he pulled the gun from his belt. The way his hands shook told me everything I needed to know. This man wasn’t going to save me.

“Please,” I begged. “Get me out of here.”

“This your accomplice?” Officer Reed hissed. His heavy boots thudded as he walked away, making it easy to follow his movements throughout the house.

I waited on baited breath for that thing to appear and finish the job he started. Other than the officer’s steps, all I could hear was Ranger barking, confirming that at least my dog was alive.

“Where is he, huh?” Reed asked me.

“I don’t know!” I yelled, sick of his idiocracy. “You are going to get both of us killed.”

Maybe I should have called a church or something instead. Maybe a mental asylum, it was hard to tell for sure. But this motherfucker was not the help I needed.

“I’m going to put you in my car, and then I’m turning this house upside down to find your friend.”

“I’ll do you one better, take me to jail.” I could get a lawyer and get out. Aurelio would surely help me. But priority one was to get the fuck out of here alive.

He ripped me to my feet, not giving one fuck when he popped my shoulder in the process.

“You’re an asshole.” I grit my teeth as he dragged me over the threshold. I’d be sure to wash my own mouth out with soap, for ever considering a cop would help me.

As soon as we were on the porch, a roar echoed off the trees and the shadows moved eerily on the ground.

Every nerve in my body responded. Some parts of me trembled with fear, and one traitorous portion of me felt something else entirely.

I squashed that part the best I could, but if nothing else, the imposter could fuck.

“Wait. He’s out there.”

“It’s a bear. I’m not going on a wild goose hunt so you can escape.”

“You’re making a mistake.” I dug my heels into the porch, but ultimately, accomplished nothing.

My eyes laid on sage growing in patches around the steps, I dropped my weight, leaned backwards, and grabbed a fist full, as I plopped onto the step, then ripped the plant when Reed wrenched me back to my feet.

“You have the survival instincts of a newborn, you know that?” I grunted when my skin pinched around my wrists.

I put up the best fight I could, but eventually he tossed me in the back of his car, making me bonk my head on the door frame and nearly shutting my ankle in the door.

After some maneuvering, I righted myself and noticed the dark shadow slinking over the land like an omen.

It killed any illusion that I was safe in the daytime.

The cop finally showed an ounce of situational awareness and stopped in front of the car. Which was the wrong time.

From inside the car, I could feel the bone-deep chill settling in the air that hadn’t been there a few moments ago. The dark aura that was becoming increasingly familiar was sucking all the oxygen out and making it hard to breathe.

All the other times, the thing must have just been playing with me, because the sudden understanding that the cop was nothing more than prey hit hard in the chest. This man, or whatever it was, had every intention of claiming that young man’s life.

“Run!” I screamed at the top of my lungs.

Something crashed into the windshield, so fast I couldn’t see it, hard enough to shake the vehicle and make the axles groan.

“Reed, report,” an older, deep voice said on the radio up front. “No one goes up to the Rinah property alone. And you’ve been out of training for a week, you must have a supervisor with you in the field. You know that. Report.”

The cracks in the windshield made it impossible to tell what the dark thing on the windshield was, but it was picked up and slammed into the windshield again.

“I mean it, son, don’t do anything stupid.

You aren’t from here, you don’t know what you’re getting into.

Wait for me to get there.” The older voice broke as the force caved in the glass completely and crushed the radio.

I wrangled my cuffed hands under my ass and wriggled them further down, until I managed to get my hands in front of me. As if that would help any.

When glass gave out, I found Officer Reed shaking. His entire face was busted up beyond recognition. The only reason I knew it was him was because of those gray eyes staring at me.

He sobbed as he was ripped off the hood.

Now that I knew what it was, when the length of his body hit the side of the door like a sick baseball bat, I had to resist the urge to throw up.

I plugged my ears, but it didn’t stop the thump against the driver’s side vibrating against the seat, or the shaking as Reed was relentlessly beaten against the car.

Deep breaths, Madison. It’ll be okay.

In what fucking world would things be okay?!

But I repeated the mantra anyway, even though I didn’t believe it.

Because I didn’t know what else to do. I was locked in the back of this car, with bars separating me and the front.

All I could do was what I’d always done, and that was to keep moving forward.

There was a joke in this somewhere that would probably make it easier to stomach, but I couldn’t think of one.

An awful sound of metal screeching made it past my makeshift earplugs, and a fresh wave of cold air hit me like a typhoon. I opened my eyes, that I didn’t realize I’d closed, and found the passenger side door was gone.

“She’s mine,” a horrifying voice bellowed, grating against every sense I had. I barely kept my bladder from emptying itself all over the shitty torn up leather.

A piece of me couldn’t fathom refuting what was being said. Whether that was because of the clenching in my core or the fact he used a grown man as a blunt weapon was up for interpretation.

My fingers clenched around the sage in my hands, unsure of how much it could protect me.

“You can come out, Little Rabbit.”

I couldn’t see him, but I suspected he was standing beside the driver’s door where the crushed glass would hide him.

What a predicament?

Did I stay trapped in the car or move where I could maneuver? Would that even matter?

Considering an entire door was missing, hiding in the car probably wasn’t providing any defense. I scootched to the edge so I could have a clear view of the driver’s side door. My heart pounded and I didn’t dare feel relief when nothing was there, but a smear of wet blood.

The sound of gravel moving under the wheels of a car traveled from the pathway. I leaned against the door frame. Sirens blared in the distance.

If I was suspicious before, now that there was a dead or grievously injured cop involved, I was double fucked.

I slid to my knees onto the gravel, since that was where I was going to end up. I lifted my cuffed hands into the air.

A parade of cars poured from around the curve, and the flashing red and blue lights filled the area.

Leave it to me to make things go from bad to worse.