Kiss of a Dark Moon by Sharie Kohler Page B

a dark rage that he always held in careful check, he surged forward in one lunge.
    Blood filled his vision, boiling through him as he met the lycan in a fierce crash of flesh and bone. Their spitting growls filled the room. His hands wrapped around the other’s neck, determined to wreak his vengeance.
    For himself. For Kit. For lifetimes of past wrongs.
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    Kit sat up and squinted into the darkness, wincing as she brushed a hand against her throbbing lip. She inhaled thinly through her nostrils, struggling against the darkness and an aching head to follow the movements of Rafe and the lycan.
    Rafe.
    She had seen his face briefly, registered the anger in his expression, the fierce glittering in his dark eyes. For a moment they did not even look brown, glinting a cool gray, almost silver. Like the bloodthirsty lycans intent on destroying her. Certainly a play of the light. A trick of her imagination. She had, after all, managed only a glimpse before he shattered the light, plunging them into shadows and death.
    Why had he done that? Lycans possessed excellent vision. They could see him even in the dark. The lack of light could only incapacitate him.
    And yet that single glimpse of him had been enough to reassure her that the only thing he was bent on destroying was her attackers. She didn’t know how he had found her, but she felt only relief that he had.
    In the fleeting second when the door had burst open and Rafe stood on the threshold like some sort of dark angel—his large shape limned in muted crimson light, quivering, vibrating in the glow—her heart had ceased to beat. Silhouetted at the threshold—the ravaged door hanging only by a single stubborn hinge—it crossed her mind that she faced not a dark angel, but a demon emerging from the mouth of hell.
    Then he shot forward in a blur of movement. Impossibly fast. So quick she thought she had imagined it.
    She scrambled to her bare knees on the flat, threadbare carpet, peering into the gloom and trying to follow the two shapes locked in a struggle. They appeared almost as one writhing shape. Her hands moved fast, stretching over the carpet in search of her gun, fighting against the dizziness in her head.
    A low, gurgling sound reached her ears, followed by a sick, crunching sound—bone on bone. Her hands stopped, hovering over the grimy carpet.
    Then the large merged shape broke, fell apart as one body collapsed heavily to the floor, mimicking the drop of her heart.
    She went utterly still, staring at the shape still standing. Rafe? Or the lycan?
    A harsh silence fell.
    Inhaling a deep breath, she fought against the ever-increasing pounding of agony in her head and groped for the bed. Gripping a fistful of the bedspread, she shot a desperate prayer to the night.
    Several more moments passed. The silence, thick and suffocating, played with her sanity. She could not stand one more minute of it. She had to know.
    â€œRafe?” she whispered, her heart beating like a loud drum against her chest as she stared at the figure rising and unfolding to his full height.
    The dark shadow moved toward her, his features indistinguishable. The blood glow of light hummed around him, seeming to echo the ringing in her head.
    She edged back from the bed. The muscles in her arms straining as she dragged herself away, hands clawing the carpet—and her fingers brushed cold steel. Her gun.
    With an excited gasp, she fumbled for the weapon, her movements sluggish, slower than she would like, than she needed them to be. Dammit. She needed speed and a clear head right now.
    A hard hand grabbed her calf, nearly startling her into dropping her weapon.
    A quick glance down at the floor revealed glowing, silver eyes moving toward her.
    â€œShit!”
    She had forgotten about the injured lycan, dismissed him, thinking him as good as dead. Even if he was shot only in the shoulder, the silver should have done its work. He shouldn’t have been able to crawl