THE PERFECT TEN (Boxed Set)

could tell he moved like someone capable of defending himself.
    I turned and eased cautiously toward the whimpering sound. When I reached the tree line, I crouched low, waving the other two down, making sure they hugged the multi-colored foliage enough to avoid being blatantly visible to anything in the grass clearing.
    And there she was in a patch of packed-down earth. A small girl. Maybe five or six years old, curled on her side into a fetal position, hiccupping air like someone who’d cried out every last ounce of emotion.
    She looked so tiny and alone out there.
    But the flower that attacked Tony had been the vulnerable-looking bait of a carnivorous plant and this place was riddled with danger.
    The child was dead center in the clearing of the odd-colored grasses mixed with patches of bare ground. She wore a silvery dress, gold jewelry, sparkly shoes and her hair was braided and curled as if she’d been dressed for a party. Why didn’t she look like us–ragged from running for our lives?
    Had a pod dropped her here, too, or was she just lost? 
    Tony whispered in my ear as he squatted up against me. “There’s no pod. We in the same spot where we arrived earlier?”
    I shared the disappointment in his voice, since I couldn’t deny hoping the appearance of a child meant adults would be nearby and show us the way home. But Tony was being calm so I answered him by pointing to where we’d clearly beaten down the grass while running from the bats earlier. The trail started from a flat area of grass, roughly conical in shape where the pod had been recently.
    So the grass did not grow back out there the way the jungle had?
    Gabby flanked me on the other side. “So what’s the plan?”
    A battle raged inside me, a tug-of-war between my drive to protect an innocent and the strong sense that I was right to be wary. “I’ll go get the girl. You two sit tight.”
    “What if the pod comes back while you’re there?” Tony asked. “We should all go so we can be together if that happens.”
    Gabby wasn’t agreeing or arguing, but I knew from her response to the child’s cry that she’d go along with anything that would allow her to help with the... kid .
    I shook my head. “Based on how that metal thing brought us here and left, we’ll have plenty of time for you to reach it if it shows up. I need you to watch my back. I can’t explain why, but I have a feeling this is some kind of a snare. If something happens to me, I don’t want you caught out there, too.”
    A sudden thrumming started. The vibration came from below ground. The pod? Or something else?
    I fought to keep my balance. What the–?
    Gabby floundered where she knelt beside me, her arms flapping to keep her balance. Tony cursed and growled. 
    The earth movement shifted from a tremor through the ground to an eruption of rocks and dirt out in the open space. Something alive emerged from beneath the surface on the other side of the child, near the dark jungle where it bordered the far side of the grassy clearing.
    Like a giant crocodile on steroids, the creature’s head with a long snout burst out of the ground. Huge eyes stuck off each side of its head. The body kept coming. It used multiple arms to drag itself up. Had to be twelve, maybe fifteen, feet tall when it stood upright on two feet the size of giant palm leaves, but with talons. Thick hide covered in scales and a wide mouth full of pointed teeth. It let out a wild screech. A metal-tearing-against-metal roar.
    Tony sat up on his knees, eyes bulging. “ What the freak is that? ”
    Color drained from Gabby’s face. She stared open-mouthed at the beast emerging from beneath the ground then squeezed out a whisper. “The child.”
    A trap. I hated being right.
    Just as much as I hated what I had to do next.

CHAPTER 10
     
    I wanted no argument and made that clear with my tone. “I’ll go. You two stay here.”  When Tony stood, I shook my head. “If I don’t reach the little girl, you won’t either, so don’t follow me.”
    When Tony opened his mouth to argue, I gave a pointed look at Gabby whose attention remained locked on the kid.
    He caught my meaning to watch out for her, but clearly struggled to make the right choice. At the blowhard’s core, he was male and had probably been raised to protect females, but based on what had happened with that deadly vine, we both knew I had the best shot at saving that child. Even Tony had to admit that I was far faster than either of