W\\CKED

Over the ledge - !

[Sanny]

Where the door used to be, a hooded figure now stood. His jacket, slick and red, was sewn up along one sleeve, the eye of fire still woven into it near the shoulder.

Hoodie Guy. His head turned toward Juliet. She clung to Dae, oblivious to anyone else's existence. Dae's demeanor shifted. Something in the dark recesses of that hood made him cower.

"Don't look," he murmured as he pressed J's face against his chest. Her eyes lowered obediently.

Gun flashed by me, flinging himself at the intruder, who slammed him against the nearest wall. The other band mates were right behind Gun, using the same tactic: brute force over actual strategy.

The intruder responded by breaking limbs and flinging bodies in exceedingly acrobatic ways my brain wasn't entirely willing to process. I thought of Juliet's murdered bodyguard, the inhuman strength it must have taken to rip his head off his shoulders. Suddenly, I was more afraid of this stranger than the vampire he was trying to reach.

Dae and Juliet ran toward the now unguarded exit. I bolted to my feet. A hand grabbed my ankle; I fell to the carpet, my shoulder getting the brunt of the blow.

Kaydrien Singh lay only inches away, his cold fingers pressing into my skin. There was no awareness in his glazed eyes.

"Kay, let go," I gasped.

The fingers squeezed harder. I scrambled to peel them off as pain shot through my leg. When that didn't work, I pleaded with him. "Kay, you're hurting me."

His chest was still, breath absent from his lips. Was he dead? Was it even him who was moving those stiff limbs? I couldn't think that. I told myself he was alive, that all I had to do was rescue Juliet and get Kay to a hospital and tomorrow, everything would be back to how it was before...

Before the existence of vampires.

"I'm sorry he did that to you, Kay. Please let go. I'll come back for you!"

He began to twist my ankle. The movement was slow, but it still shot agony through my leg. I screamed and begged him in a blur of words to letgoletgopleasekayletgo!

A gloved hand reached down and peeled Kay's fingers off my bruised flesh. Hoodie Guy rolled Kay onto his back, then folded his arms across his chest. "No more." His voice was gentle. He reached out and closed Kaydrien's eyes.

I teetered to my feet. I had to go after Juliet. I limped on my bruised ankle, doing my best not to look at the mangled bodies strewn across the carpet. Why isn't there any blood?

The stranger swept me into his arms.

"Put me down!" I cried.

"I'm here to protect you and your friends."

"You the one who texted me?"

"I'm the one who was sent to help you." The hood lifted up toward the ceiling. "They're heading for the roof." He ran to the stairs at the end of the hall. His feet took three steps at a time until we reached the roof. He set me down as we emerged into the manufactured starlight of the city at night.

Dae stood on the roof ledge, Juliet in his arms. As I shouted her name, Dae tilted his body forward and they both plunged over the side.

I ran, terrified of what I would see when I looked down at the pavement so far below. But as I pulled myself onto the ledge, a rush of air knocked me back. 

Dae rose into sight, kept aloft by the sweep of wings jutting out of his back. Juliet clung to him, seemingly oblivious to the fact that the only thing between her and death was the reliability of a monster's embrace.

Wait—wings? Where did those come from? Leathery, bare of feathers, the color of skin: similar to the wings of a bat.

Hoodie Guy jumped onto the ledge.

Dae careened in a circle, soaring upward.

Hoodie Guy leapt after him. As his feet left the concrete, he unleashed a feral cry both thrilling and terrifying. Golden brown wings burst from his back, ripping through his red jacket and uncoiling to a combined span easily fifteen feet wide. As his wings caught a current, he jerked forward with a speed twice Dae's own, rapidly decreasing the distance between them.

The receding figure of Dae dipped down, arched, and soared back toward the club. The gap between the two figures widened as the stranger was forced to make a much wider turn to follow. But again, it was as if he caught a current Dae had not, and in seconds he was on Dae's back, the pair of them whorling through the air as they struggled for dominance.

It was then that Dae dropped Juliet.