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.Jean-Claude moved forward almost gently.And I felt something inside me move with him.It was almost like he held an invisible line to my heart.pulse, blood.My pulse was so fast, I couldn't breathe.What was happening?He was on the snake, hands digging in the flesh just below the mouth.I felt my hands dig into the writhing flesh.My hands digging at bone, snapping it.My hands shoving in almost to the elbow.It was slick, wet, but not warm.Our hands pushed, then pulled, until our shoulders strained with the effort.The head tore away to land across the ring.The head flopped, mouth snapping at empty air.The body still struggled, but it was dying now.I had fallen to the ground beside the wounded woman.The Browning was still in my hand, but it wouldn't have helped me.I could hear again, feel again.My hands weren't covered in blood and gore.They had been Jean-Claude's hands, not mine.Dear God, what was happening to me?I could still feel the blood on my hands.It was an incredibly powerful sensory memory.God!Something touched my shoulder.I whirled, gun nearly shoved into the man's face.It was the man in the grey sweats.He was kneeling beside me, hands in the air, his eyes staring at the gun in my hands."I'm on your side," he said.My pulse was still thumping in my throat.I didn't trust myself to speak, so I just nodded and stopped pointing the gun at him.He took off his sweat jacket."Maybe we can stop some of the blood with this." He wadded the jacket up and shoved it against the wound."She's probably in shock," I said.My voice sounded strange, hollow."You don't look so good yourself."I didn't feel so good either.Jean-Claude had entered my mind, my body.It had been like we were one person.I started to shiver and couldn't stop.Maybe it was shock."I called the police and an ambulance," he said.I stared at him.His face was very strong, high cheekbones, square jaw, but his lips were softer, making it a very sympathetic face.His wavy brown hair fell forward like a curtain around his face.I remembered another man with long brown hair.Another human tied to the vampires.He had died badly, and I hadn't been able to save him.I caught sight of Marguerite on the far side of the ring, watching.Her eyes were wide, her lips half-parted.She was enjoying herself.God.The werewolf pulled back from the snake.The shapeshifter looked like a very classy version of every wolfman that had ever stalked the streets of London, except it was naked and had genitalia between its legs.Movie wolfmen were always smooth, sexless as a Barbie doll.The werewolf's fur was a dark honey color.A blond werewolf? Was it Stephen? If it wasn't, then he had disappeared, and I didn't think Jean-Claude would allow that.A voice yelled, "Everybody freeze"' Across the ring were two patrol cops with their guns out.One of them said, "Jesus Christ!"I put my gun away while they were staring at the dead snake.The body was still twitching, but it was dead.It just takes longer for a reptile's body to know it's dead than most mammals.I felt light and empty as air.Everything had a faintly unreal quality.It wasn't the snake.It was whatever Jean-Claude had done to me.I shook my head, trying to clear it, to think.The cops were here.I had things I needed to do.I fished the little plastic ID card out of my sport bag and clipped it to the collar of my jacket.It identified me as a member of the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team.It was almost as good as a badge."Let's go talk to the cops before they start shooting.""The snake's dead," he said.The wolfman was tearing at the dead thing with a long pointed muzzle, ripping off chunks of meat.I swallowed hard and looked away."They may not think the snake is the only monster in the ring.""Oh." He said it very softly, as if the thought had never occurred to him before.What the hell was he doing with the monsters?I walked towards the police, smiling.Jean-Claude stood there in the middle of the ring, his white shirt so bloody it clung to him like water, outlining the point of one nipple hard against the cloth.Blood was smeared down one side of his face.His arms were crimson to the elbows.The youngest vampire, a woman, had buried her face in the snake's blood.She was scooping the bloody meat into her mouth and sucking on it.The sounds were wet and seemed louder than they should have been."My name's Anita Blake.I work with the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team.I've got ID.""Who's that with you?" The uniform nodded his head in the man's direction.His gun was still pointed vaguely towards the ring.I whispered out of the corner of my mouth, "What is your name?""Richard Zeeman," he said softly.Out loud I said, "Richard Zeeman, just an innocent bystander." That last was probably a lie.How innocent could a man be who woke up in a bed surrounded by vampires and shapeshifters?But the uniform nodded."What about the rest of them?"I glanced where he was staring.It didn't look any better."The manager and some of his people.They waded into the thing to keep it out of the crowd.""But they ain't human, right?" he said."No," I said, "they aren't human.""Jesus H.Christ, the guys back at the station aren't going to believe this one," his partner said.He was probably right.I had been here, and I almost didn't believe it.A giant man-eating cobra.Jesus H.Christ indeed.8I was sitting in a small hallway that served as the performers' entrance to the big tent.The lighting was permanently dim, as if some of the things rolling through wouldn't like a lot of light.Big surprise there.There were no chairs, and I was getting a little tired of sitting on the floor.I'd given a statement first to a uniform, then to a detective.Then RPIT had arrived and the questioning started all over again [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]