The Darkest Kiss (Riley Jenson Guardian 6)

"I don't care what she does, as long as we kill her at the end of it." He nodded toward the stairs at the far end of the room. "She gone up that?"

"Smells like it."

"Then let's go."

He led the way, his footsteps echoing across the silence. There was no point in being silent any longer. She knew we were here, and given a cat's hearing had to be as sharp as a wolf's, she would probably hear us regardless of how quiet we were.

We raced up the steps and ended up in a corridor that was long, thin, and even darker than the room below. There were eight doors leading off the corridor, and a larger, double set waiting at the far end.

"This place is a fucking maze," Kade muttered, disgust in his voice. "Though our quarry seems to have run straight toward the door at the end."

"'Seems' being the operative word," I said, not trusting the fact that it was slightly open one little bit. I drew my gaze back to the nearest rooms. "Though infrared isn't bringing up any life-heat close by."

"The bitch is here somewhere, so let's go find her."

He strode forward, seemingly free of the fear that was twisting my stomach. It was weird. I mean, I'd faced things far worse than this bakeneko, and yet I was practically shaking at the thought of confronting her.

Maybe it was simply the knowledge of what she could do.

Being dead was one thing. We all had to go sometime, after all. But being dead and having your soul eaten was another matter entirely. I wasn't at all sure that I believed in reincarnation, but I sure as hell wanted my soul to hang around and find out.

We moved forward as before, checking each room thoroughly before continuing on. Despite my fears, there were no traps waiting in any of them.

But the cat smell was getting stronger.

Which meant we were getting closer.

I stopped at the ajar door and glanced at Kade. He pointed at me, then to the right, and raised five fingers. I nodded and sucked in a breath, releasing it silently as I counted.

At five, we kicked out the doors and ran through - me to the right, Kade to the left.

The room was large and filled with windows, but the light seeping in was yellow and dusky. There were plenty of shadows for a cat to hide in.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw movement. I twisted around and sighted, the whine of the laser cutting through the silence as my finger pressed against it. I released it when I saw that it was something small and furry with a very long tail.

Not a cat. More likely a rat.

I blew out a breath and continued on, keeping to walls and running low. Kade was on the other side, keeping pace with me simply because I wasn't moving at vampire speed. The whine of his laser was a sharp echo of mine.

Again, something moved in the shadow. I swung the laser around, but it was only another rat, scampering along the wall.

Which was odd. We weren't anywhere near the rats to scare them, so if they were running from the cat, why couldn't we damn well see her?

Even under infrared, there was no sign of life other than the rats.

Then it hit me.

The bakeneko could change sizes. Why wouldn't she be able to go smaller than a tabby as well as larger?

I stopped and swung round.

Saw something big and black emerging out of the shadows where the rat had just been.

"Kade! Behind you!"

I fired the laser even as I screamed the warning, but the bakeneko was moving way too fast. She'd consumed a lot of souls, and now she was faster than anything I'd ever seen before.

It didn't matter. I kept hitting the trigger.