Read Edie Spence (Book 5): Bloodshifted for Free Online Page A

were, were already on the wane. And the longer I waited to escape the more cumbersome I’d be as my stomach swelled, and the more dangerous it would become for both of us.
    But how could I escape when Raven would always be able to find me? The only way out was to kill him—but that would bring all his followers and their daytimers after me, and there was no way I could kill all of them at once. I hadn’t even managed to talk myself into killing one just now, when I’d had a good reason to.
    I turned over on my side—facing Celine still, just in case—and brought my fist still holding the hammerhead up to my chin. I wished she hadn’t turned on the light: the image of Lars as he begged for mercy was scarring. Some vampire I’d make, even if I did manage to live that long.
    Did it have to be like this? I didn’t think so, but who knew? I’d always thought daytimers were craven before—but if this was what it was like to be one, what choice did they have? All the nice ones got brained. I frowned in the dark.
    I strongly doubted whoever ruled the roost next would be willing to sleep on the ground, and I was sure Lars was already planning his next attempt, and Celine was probably still willing to help him, and who knew what stake Jackson actually had in things. And that was all before I even dared to guess whatever longer game Raven was playing with Anna.
    I reached out for my shoe and held it like a conch shell to my ear, hoping that the Shadows would be willing to whisper to me. When they’d last talked to me on the life raft, they’d said they wanted to meet my son, so maybe—a moonshot of a maybe—they would be willing to help me out. But either they were gone or my current level of panic was too delicious for them to interrupt.
    That left the man pretending to be Asher in my dreams. Which meant I’d have to sleep again, somehow.
    Fat chance.
    *   *   *
    Eventually I did sleep, but I didn’t dream again, or if I did I didn’t remember it. Celine’s voice pulled me back into the real world.
    “I’m getting up now,” she said, and I heard her slide her curtains back. Without any visual cues, being in our room was like being in an abyss. I had no idea what day or what time it was. It was hard to pretend I was somewhere else, though, when I was still holding on to a hammerhead and a stake. “Did you hear me? Are you going to turn the lights on?”
    I sat up and found the remote where I’d put it, right beside my shoes, and clicked the largest switch. When the lights came on I found her staring down at me out of her bed like a vulture. “What time is it?”
    “Time for some of us to go to work. Assuming I have your permission, of course,” she said, giving me an insincere smile.
    “Sure,” I said. She hopped off her bed, swept some clothing out of her black lacquer wardrobe, and gave me a look before heading out the door. The bell hanging over it jingled merrily.
    I was suddenly glad I’d taken that fast shower yesterday. I picked up my right shoe and tilted it, trying to see into its depths. “Shadows?”
    There was a movement in the toe—something scampered, like a beetle or baby rat.
    “Are you still here?”
    “Are you trying to kill what’s left of us?” the contents of my shoe protested with a hiss, and I quickly tilted it back, moving to block it with my body from the light.
    “Sorry, sorry!” I ducked down, trying to keep an ear out for anyone moving in the hall, or Celine’s return, while cradling the shoe against me to protect it from the light as I cast enough of a shadow to get them to come out and talk. I felt a flood of relief, and then shame—to think that I was so desperate to have a piece of home that I was happy to see the Shadows. “Have you been in there this whole time?”
    “Unfortunately.”
    My eyes narrowed, thinking back to the talk I’d had with them on the raft—and I remembered that they’d escaped the Maraschino ’s sinking by hitching a ride on me.