Yeah. The creature had every reason to laugh.
The Anubis’s claws sank into the tile as it tensed, drew closer to the floor, then launched into the air fast enough to blur.
Light in the room brightened, sound rushed in, the scents of earth, fall air, mixed with the salt from the aquarium. None of it compared to the heady scent of the Anubis, but instead of fertile ground with that sweet undertone Reese expected, there was human sweat.
Reese sidestepped and swung the cleaver, catching the creature just under the jaw, and he followed the movement with the weight of his body, putting every pound he had into the force of his swing. The blade swept through Anubis’s fur, flesh, and met the bone at the base of its spine. Crimson fanned over the floor, soaking Reese’s T-shirt and splashing over his thighs.
Friction dragged against the blade. Then it emerged from the other side of the creature’s neck.
The head fell away, and its body completed the arch, striking the kitchen window, catching on the frame, leaving its hind legs in the sink and the front half of its body outside.
Reese’s heart slammed into his chest, and his breath wheezed out.
The Anubis remained still, and blood ran down the wall into the sink.
In the lab, the ichor would purge when the subject died.
But there was no light sucking darkness among the red, and even the Anubis created with the VrK had shown signs of the ichor. Not much, but it was there.
Reese dropped the cleaver and rushed into the living room. He grabbed his keys, but his wallet had been on the coffee table. He found it under a pile of splinters.
Cell phone. He needed his cell phone.
He’d had it a few moments ago. Where was it now?
It lay beside the couch.
He snatched it up and made a run for his car.
Recent rainfall left droplets of moonlight sliding down the paint. Reese fumbled for his keys, metal slipping through his blood-soaked fingers as he searched for the FOB. He found it and mashed random spots with his thumb. The door locks thumped, and he got in. It took both hands to keep the keys still enough to insert the right one into the ignition.
The engine sputtered to life, and Reese backed out into the road. There would be more. There were always more.
He checked the rearview.
Porchlights clicked on across the road from his house. People stepped out on their lawns.
“Go back inside. Please, please, just—” He didn’t even want to think what would happen to his neighbors if an Anubis attacked them.
The road was empty except for a few cars parked against the curb.
Nothing moved in the shadows.
Yet Reese’s heart continued to try to claw out of his chest.
He stepped on the gas, blowing through a stop sign at the entrance to his subdivision. It was perfectly normal for the road to be desolate late at night. But what if it was because the Anubis had killed everyone else?
The blood coating Reese’s palms glued them to the steering wheel.
He’d seen what the Anubis were capable of. He’d counted the bodies they’d left behind. He’d walked through the destruction they’d wreaked. They were creatures who did not know mercy and lived for violence. They weren’t just killers; they were destroyers even armed men didn’t stand a chance against.
Yet Reese killed one with a fucking meat cleaver?
How was that possible when it wasn’t even a fantasy?
The scars on his shoulder answered with a throb. Later. He’d think about how later. Now he just needed to survive. That meant he’d need help.
Reese pulled up his contact list while trying to watch the road. Blood smeared with the movement of his thumb, blocking out the names. He wiped the phone on his shirt, painting the entire screen.