Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 88025 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 440(@200wpm)___ 352(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88025 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 440(@200wpm)___ 352(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
He was never, ever watching The Wizard of Oz again.
He was starting to second-guess ever going outside again.
But at least it seemed like Calder and Clay had everything under control at the rear of the house. Time to take a peek out the front.
From the living room, he cut across the shiny hardwood floors through the main foyer to the front door that had been left standing open. There were scorch marks across the wood from the initial explosion, but it appeared that Lucien had quickly taken care of that problem.
Hale peered around the door and swore softly under his breath. The front of the house wasn’t looking any better than the back. It was a good thing the building was set several yards away from the road and they had no close neighbors. The wide green space had become a battle scene straight out of the movies. There were bodies everywhere. Some were burned while others were torn apart. Lucien was easy to spot in the mess with his wild flames and floating balls of fire.
Baer was a little harder to spot in the flurry of animals. Birds of every shape and size were dive-bombing anyone who was not a Weaver. There were a couple of bobcats and a few foxes in the mix as well. Oh wait, no. The sleek panther had to be Baer. The enormous cat launched itself across the yard, pink fangs bared in a ferocious snarl as it collided with three pestilents, tackling them to the ground.
Lucien shifted, moving to the left, revealing Grey right next to him. The Soul Weaver stood with his rifle hanging from a strap on his shoulder. One hand was pressed to his temple while the other was extended toward some people in police uniforms. The deadly pestilent leader, John, must have brainwashed cops on his way to the Weaver house.
Hale’s heart pounded in his chest as though it wanted to break out and make a run for safety. He lifted the gun, the sight at the end of the barrel trembling. He swung it from left to right, not quite sure where to aim. What if he hit one of his comrades?
Bullets whizzed through the air close to him with two shots digging into a column not far from his head. He whipped the gun around to spot where two pestilents were running toward him with guns drawn. Hale gasped and backpedaled. He squeezed the trigger, but nothing happened. Shit. The safety.
He fumbled with the little switch, but it was the pounding of feet racing his way from the other end of the porch that caught his attention. A tall man in a suit with raven-black hair and a stern expression was racing to him. Wow. Gorgeous. He was simply gorgeous.
So gorgeous in fact, that it took Hale an extra second to realize the man had a gun in each hand.
Fuck! He was only starting to swing the gun toward the man when he fired off several shots right past Hale. The Air Weaver spun to see the bullets hit their marks in three pestilents, killing them instantly.
The stranger saved him. What the—
“What are you doing out here if you don’t know how to protect yourself?” the gorgeous man shouted.
Hale took a breath to say something, but he wasn’t quite sure what. His brain wasn’t working, and his tongue was all tied up. He was overwhelmed. He generally wasn’t the type of person who got overwhelmed, but that described him in the middle of the bloody chaos.
Which was probably why it was so easy for the man to holster one of the guns, grab his wrist, and pull him back into the house.
Hale stumbled after him, trying to get his brain to process the events happening. The man turned toward the left but only glanced in the dining room before sneering at something and moving to the right. He made the same face when he peered into the library.
“Too many damn windows.” Twisting to face Hale, he jerked his arm as if trying to get his attention, but the stranger had all of Hale’s available brain capacity at this point. “What room doesn’t have a lot of doors or windows?”
Well, there was the downstairs half bath that had no windows, but there was no way he was getting shoved into that room, with or without the sexy man.
“The-the armory has no windows and only two doors,” he stammered at first, but finished, proud that he’d clearly remembered the room.
The stranger blinked, seeming surprised to hear the house had an honest-to-goddess armory, but he recovered fast enough. “Good. Take me there.”
Hale hesitated and sniffed the air. “You’re not a pestilent.”
The man gasped, looking appropriately horrified. “Of course not!” Well, that was a plus for him. Not only was he human, but he also knew what a pestilent was.