Read Carpathian 23 - Dark Storm for Free Online

creature seemed to stalk her mother as well.
    She’d gone four nights without sleep, watching over her mother, and it was beginning
     to show, fraying her nerves so that she found it nearly impossible to tolerate Weston’s
     snide, leering presence. She didn’t want to add to the problems by being ugly to him,
     but she was definitely at that point. The fire blazed bright. Just outside the ring
     of fire, a jaguar coughed. He seemed to follow them, yet when the guides went out
     to check in the morning, they couldn’t find tracks. It was impossible not to be affected
     by that sawing, grunting cough.
    She could hear the slow fluttering of wings over Annabel’s head. Vampire bats landed
     in the trees, brushing the leaves and filling the branches until the tree groaned,
     trying to support the weight of so many. Riley swallowed hard and slowly turned her
     head toward the leaping fire. The porters and guides stared at the tree filled with
     hanging bats. The creatures had gone from interesting to sinister in a matter of seconds
     for the fourth night in a row.
    Pedro, the guide, and Raul and Capa, the two porters from her boat, moved a little
     into the shadows. All three gripped their machetes. The looks on their faces as the
     flickering flames revealed their expressions frightened her. For one heart-stopping
     moment, the men seemed every bit as threatening as the bats. Riley sat up slowly.
     She’d left her boots on, knowing she’d be protecting her mother.
    Annabel slept restlessly, groaning at times. Her mother had always had acute hearing,
     even in her sleep. A cat walking across the floor would wake her, but since entering
     the rain forest, she seemed exhausted and weak. At night she twisted and turned in
     her hammock, sometimes weeping softly, pressing her hands to her head. Even when the
     bats dropped to earth and surrounded her, using their wings to propel them through
     the thick vegetation, Annabel never opened her eyes.
    Riley had prepared her defenses carefully, using torches she could easily light, even
     going so far as to build a small circular fire wall around her mother’s sleeping area.
     As she unhooked her netting, she caught sight of Raul creeping toward her. He was
     staying low and to the shadows, but she could make him out, sliding from one dark
     place to another, stalking prey. Riley glanced over at her sleeping mother. She feared
     Annabel was the porter’s intended prey.
    Heart pounding, tasting fear in her mouth, Riley slipped from her hammock and drew
     her knife. Going up against a machete, especially one wielded by a man who used one
     on a regular basis, was insane, but he was going to have to go through her to get
     to her mother, just as the vampire bats would have to do. And it wouldn’t just be
     her knife, if he came at her mother. Riley picked up a torch and held it to the low
     fire she’d prepared earlier as a defense against the bats.
    She would kill him if she had to. The idea made her sick, but she steeled herself,
     going through each move in her head. Practicing. Bile rose, but she was determined.
     No one— nothing —would harm her mother. She’d made up her mind, and nothing would stop her, not even
     the idea that what she was about to do might be considered premeditated murder.
    Raul inched closer. Riley could smell his sweat. His scent was all “wrong” to her.
     She took a deep breath and let it out, easing toward her mother’s hammock, putting
     her feet carefully in position. She could feel the ground under her, almost rising
     to meet each footfall. She’d never been so aware of the heartbeat of the Earth. Not
     a leaf rustled. No twig snapped. Her feet seemed to know exactly where to step to
     keep from making a sound, to keep from twisting an ankle or falling on the uneven
     ground.
    She positioned herself in front of her mother’s hammock, picking a spot she could
     easily move in to try to keep any attack from her. Movement close to her sent