Heartsong (Green Creek 3)

“Maybe a little more,” I countered. “I found these lights in the attic of the house. They blink. I’m going to hang them around the front.”

“No.”

“Gordo. So sad. So alone.”

“Ox!” he yelled. “Do your Alpha thing and make him stop!”

“Can’t!” Ox called back. “I promised myself to never use my power for evil!”

I grinned at Gordo. “See? You lose. And while I’m at it, I want to talk to you about the office Christmas party we’re going to have.”

“The office what?”

“We’ll—”

And it hit us.

Glass shattering in our chests.

Gordo grimaced, the raven folding its wings, the roses shriveling.

I gasped, bending over the desk, claws digging into the wood.

Rico snarled even as Bambi asked him what was wrong.

“What the fuck?” I muttered. “What the hell was that?” I blinked rapidly, trying to understand the wave of blue that washed over me.

Ox burst through the doorway, eyes red and violet. The others were close behind him.

“Home,” he growled. “We have to get home. Something’s wrong.”

Kelly pulled in front of us as we were leaving the garage, the bar on top of his cruiser lit up, siren wailing. Ox was on the phone with Joe as Gordo drove, the others in a truck behind us. Ox was saying, “You felt it, he wouldn’t, no, please tell me he wouldn’t, is he—”

The snow was falling harder by the time we reached the house at the end of the lane.

Kelly had barely put the car in park before he jumped out and ran toward the house, the rest of us on his heels.

We followed the sound of a breaking heart to the office.

Elizabeth Bennett stood in front of her husband’s old desk, hand over her mouth, eyes wet. In her other hand was a piece of paper.

She looked up at us as Joe roared and punched a hole in the wall. Mark was looking off into nothing, his mouth in a thin line.

“What is it?” Kelly demanded. “Where’s Carter, why can’t I feel him, what happened, what happened, what—”

She dropped her hand. She whispered, “He’s gone.”

Joe slumped against the wall, sliding down to the floor, face in his hands.

“No,” Kelly said, stepping forward. “No, he wouldn’t, he wouldn’t leave, he wouldn’t do that to me, he wouldn’t—”

Elizabeth held up the paper in her hand.

Kelly didn’t take it, a haunted look on his face.

Ox moved around him. He took the paper from Elizabeth even as Jessie burst into the house, breathless. “What happened?” she asked as she pushed her way into the office. “Is something coming? Are we under attack?”

“It’s Carter,” Rico muttered, rubbing the back of his neck. “He left.”