She sighed. “Do you have a plan?”

I frowned and shrugged. “Not really. Ernie is going to try and find out what he can, but you know him. He could get sucked into helping Hercules by accident. Or on purpose, depending on how he’s feeling that day.” I snorted and shook my head.

She laughed softly, and I slung an arm over her shoulder. She leaned into me. “I never wanted to be a monster. I just didn’t want to die, you know? And now it looks like that might happen anyway.”

Damn, they might have been my own words. “I know. But now we are what we are. We can do this, Sandy. I have to believe we didn’t come this far just to give up.”

“Beth—” She said her best friend’s name and then choked up. I hugged her a little tighter. “Beth made a choice, and didn’t want to believe that Theseus was using her. She wanted to belong too much; she wanted to be loved no matter the cost.”

I sighed. “I wish we’d been able to get through to her before . . .”

“Yeah, me too,” Sandy whispered. “I was so afraid to lose her friendship I didn’t want to tell her that I thought you were right. No, I knew you were right.”

We held on to each other, two monsters in the night afraid of all that could come and get us.

The door to house number thirteen opened, and I looked up at Tad. His face was tight with suppressed emotion. “She’s going to keep in touch as much as she can.”

I nodded and chose not to point out that he was repeating information.

We piled into the Charger, and I headed back toward the Wall. At the main gate, the SDMP slowed me down with a wave of their hands.

“You can’t leave,” the officer said as he leaned in the window of my car, his breath smelling remarkably like doggie biscuits. Seeing as the majority of the SDMP were werewolves, I wasn’t terribly surprised at the unpleasant smell.

I cringed. “I don’t have a chip implant, none of us do, and you aren’t going to stop us from actually going across.” I weighted my words with the strength of the siren in me before I ever thought better of it, almost as if I did it on instinct.

He blinked and shook his head twice, going so far as to tap it. “Wait, I’ve been warned about you.”

I grimaced. “I live on both sides of the Wall, fool.” I said it and realized it was true.

“No, you don’t understand. It’s not just us.” He leaned back in, his eyes crinkling with consternation. “The Aegrus virus has exploded. The humans are falling in greater numbers than before, and some of them . . . are important people. They’ve declared that there will be no crossover for anyone.”

Tad leaned over. “What do you mean by ‘exploded’?”

The SDMP member gripped the edge of my car, and I had to keep my mouth shut tight to avoid telling him not to scratch the paint. There were other things more important than my car at the moment.

“I mean that we have a full-on pandemic, and it’s spreading faster than anyone could have thought possible. It’s ripping through the country; the hospitals can’t keep up.”

Broken hickory sticks, that was not good news, not in any way, shape, or form. But why, oh why, would the virus suddenly ramp up? For years it had just plugged along—deadly, but the hospital facilities had been able to keep it in check.

“We are all healthy,” I said, “and we are going through. Talk to Smithy if you have a problem with it.”

“Smithy isn’t on the force anymore.”

I knew that, but I had been hoping the officer didn’t. I glanced at Tad and caught Sandy’s eye. They both gave me a subtle nod. I hit the gas and sped past the officer, the engine roaring and the sensation flying through me. My body’s sensitivity to vibrations made me feel like I was a part of the car.

“Where are we going?” Tad asked.

I thought for only a moment before answering. “Zeus’s house,” I said. If anyone would know why the Aegrus virus had suddenly exploded, it would be the god of thunder and lightning. He might be a dick from time to time, but the reality was he knew things. And I was going to make him spill the beans. One way or another.

CHAPTER 6

The major flaw with my plan was pretty obvious even to me. We got to Zeus’s mansion on Olympic Drive, and we were let in through the main gates. So far so good.

But as my luck would have it, he wasn’t there. I slammed my car door shut and stared at Narcissus, the youth’s ethereal beauty no longer capturing me. “Who is here, then? If Zeus isn’t, are there any other members of the pantheon hanging out at the pool?” Despite the cold chill of February, the pool in the back of the house was a balmy oasis that, from what I understood, was never short of attendants.

He swallowed hard, and I caught a look of my reflection in his eyes. A tall, fierce woman with eyes that glittered with suppressed anger. He was afraid of me, and I didn’t feel one single ounce of bad. Which probably was a bad thing in and of itself. Oh, what did it matter? According to my mother, I was going to hell as it was, so why not go down in a blaze of glory?

“There are a few goddesses at the pool, yes,” he said softly, just above a whisper.

I took off, my stride long, which forced Tad and Sandy to hurry in order to keep up. “What if it’s Hera?” Tad asked.

“Or Aphrodite?” pointed out Sandy.

I kept moving. “Then I will deal with them.” I almost didn’t recognize my own voice. It had to be the Drakaina in me. She was making me stronger than I’d ever hoped. Or maybe, just maybe, I was finding my own voice.