Shadow Kissed 03 - Shadowman

together.”
    Don’t think it. Don’t think it. Don’t. Don’t. Don’t.
    â€œHoney, say you love me,” Rose implored. If she was going to be taken away, even for a little while, she’d need to survive on those words.
    Mickey jerked his face into the fat at his chin and took a step back alongside Layla. “I’m ready to go.”
    Don’t think it. Don’t. Don’tdon’tdon’tdon’tdon’tdon’t don’t . . .
    â€œMickey,” Rose sobbed. “You can tell me anything. Tell me you love me.”
    Not that I was the one—don’tdon’t—
    Layla gestured to a man in front of a group of soldiers. “It’s time.”
    â€”who killed you.
    Rose went very still, her hands, good and bad, gripped the bars. She must have heard Mickey wrong. They’d been everything to each other. Shared their secrets. Sure, they’d had some hard times, and there was that once or twice when she’d had to remind him how to treat her, and the occasional messy business he’d cleaned up for her, but . . .
    â€œHoney?” broke from her lips.
    Mickey’s face went red. His lower lids twitched, as his brain said, I put a pillow to your face.
    But now that Rose thought about it . . .
    You thrashed and bucked.
    . . . she couldn’t remember how she’d died.
    Never loved you.
    â€œSay you love me!” Rose screamed.
    â€œShe was even worse when she was human,” he said to Layla. And with that, Mickey Petty turned his back on her and walked from the room. Stenciled to his jumpsuit was State Prisoner. His last thought trailed behind him. Worth every damn year.
    Fury exploded in Rose’s mind.
    Mickey had betrayed her. Mickey had killed her. Mickey had sent her to Hell.
    The burn took her whole body, and she shook, gripping the immovable bars for support. She shrieked when her blood turned to acid in her veins. A rush of searing cold washed through her body, snapping and spinning her cells.
    â€œStay calm,” someone called, but they weren’t talking to her.
    New bone stretched her toughening skin. She threw her head back as the change crunched her features. No more pretty eyes. No more winning smile. The transformation crackled across her other arm, took her belly, her pelvis, her weak leg. Made her strong.
    Worse, Mickey said? She’d show him worse. All of her went bad.
    Layla turned and asked the lead soldier, “Will the cage hold?”
    â€œIt should,” he said. But his mind answered, Thank God Talia and the kids are on their way to New York.
    That was all the hope Rose needed. She launched herself horizontal and kicked a bar with the full force of her altered legs. The bar dented outward.
    â€œShe’s like a lizard hulk!” a soldier shouted.
    Rose jacked her legs at the bar again. It squeaked into an outward triangle, just big enough. Mickey owed her an explanation.
    Rose watched as Layla drew a gun from her waist and fired point-blank. Cold-blooded was what Layla was. Shoot a prisoner in a cage. No honor in that.
    The soldiers followed Layla’s lead. Rose was dinged over and over again, but the only bullet that hurt was the one that pierced her skull. Even that didn’t slow her.
    Rose wrenched the bar out of place. Where is he? She used the bar to bat Layla out of the way.
    Where is that liar?
    She bounded knuckles, feet, knuckles, feet through the door of a wide, open room dominated by a long conference table. Her husband was backed up to a wall, surrounded by soldiers, which she swatted aside while taking a bullet to the eye. Another bullet bounced around her teeth in her mouth.
    Blood made her tongue lazy. Her nose itched from her new foul smell. Rotten. Like her love.
    She snorted like a beast in Mickey’s face. “You did this to me.”
    His jelly chin quivered, but he didn’t tuck it. Took him twelve years to find his spine.
    â€œYou always looked like this,” he said. “Now everyone else can see, too.”
    Rose fought a sob and knew the wetness streaking her face was tears. She could feel the violence gathering around her. Men organizing to kill her, while they thought to protect her murderer. One shouted, “Lie facedown on the floor!”
    The room was thick with their mind chatter. One man seemed in control of them all. Bring her down fast, heart and head , he thought.
    â€œOn the floor, now!”
    Heart. Rose punched