“Yeah. I’m just locking the windows.” With my room covered, I moved on to Ethan’s, where I had both windows secured and covered by the time Owen appeared in the doorway, supporting Jace with one arm around his torso.

“’Bout time,” I teased.

“The doctor can only move as fast as the patient.” Owen lowered Jace gently onto Ethan’s bed. “Will you be okay until we get back?”

“Yeah.” Jace nodded. “Just turn on the TV before you go, please.”

Owen pressed the power button on Ethan’s twenty-inch set on his way out the door, already unbuttoning his shirt in preparation to Shift.

I handed Jace the TV remote and gave him a kiss on his stubbly cheek, then trailed Owen into the hall to lock the door behind him.

For the next few minutes, I went from room to room, locking windows and closing curtains. I felt like a fool. If Luiz was strong and fast enough to get past the guys, a few covered windows weren’t going to give him more than a moment’s pause.

Which meant—if he made it this far—the only thing standing between the weakest members of the household and a psychotic jungle stray was…well, me. And I welcomed the opportunity to kick Luiz’s brainwashing, raping, baby-snatching ass. Again.

Chapter Thirty

I saved the guest-room window for last, and for a while I stood watching Manx and my mother, marveling at how comfortable they seemed with each other. Manx wore the lacy white nightgown my mother had dressed her in, which set off her cascade of dark curls. Her right arm was in a cast and a sling, and her left hand held a glass of water. She looked feminine and delicate, and incapable of most of the things we now knew she’d done.

“They take four of us, at first,” she said, staring into her glass. “They already have Ana when they catch me. They keep us apart, but we can see each other through the bars. She was so young….”

I stepped back to listen from the hall, afraid she would stop talking if I came in.

“How young?” my mother asked, and I knew she was thinking of Abby.

“Maybe, quince? Fifteen?”

My mother gasped, and my own eyes closed in horror.

“She cried for her madre. I cried for mine, too,” Manx confessed quietly. “When I lose my tail. Much pain.”

Well, that explains the name, I thought, unwilling to even imagine how she could lose her tail.

“How did you get away from them?” my mother asked.

“Here, let me refil that for you, dear.” Her chair creaked as she stood, and light footsteps trailed across the room toward the master bath.

“Faythe, it’s rude to hover in doorways.”

Well hell. I turned the corner into the bedroom, my cheeks flaming.

Manx watched me lock the window, and she cleared her throat as I was leaving the room. “Faythe? You are welcome to stay.”

I bristled in irritation. Of course I was welcome to stay. It was my house. I plopped down in the armchair opposite the door and watched my mother tend to Manx. The pregnant murderer.

“How did I escape?” Manx asked as water ran in the bathroom. “I fight. I finally know that if I do not fight, I lose this baby, too.”

Mom crossed the room again and handed the glass back to Manx.

“How long ago did you lose the other one?”

“Not one. Dos. Two.”

My mother made a strange strangling sound, likely choking on her own horror. I closed my eyes, trying to imagine how one woman could come out of so much tragedy with her mind intact. Just because I didn’t want my own children yet didn’t mean I couldn’t understand the loss of one. Or two.

“Luiz took two of your babies?” Mom fell into the bedside chair, meeting Manx’s deep gray eyes with emotion far beyond mere sympathy.

“He, and others. They pull my sons from my arms at birth and kil them. One—” her voice broke, her eyes filling with tears at the memory

“—by one. But not this one. I will keep this one, and I will avenge the others.”

“Why kill the babies?” I couldn’t resist asking, my fingers playing along the seam in the arm of my chair. “I thought the whole point of taking women was to make more babies and increase the size of the Pride.”

“Girl babies,” Manx said, her eyes so full of pain that I could hardly stand to look at her. “They have many men. They want only girl babies.”

“Did they get one?”

My mother shot me another angry look, but Manx nodded gravely.

“Last year. From Ana. She feed the baby for dieciséis months. But then they take the child away, because she not make more babies while she make milk. Ana went mad.”

“That’s unspeakable!” my mother cried. It was the worst word she knew. According to my mother, the list of unspeakable acts included everything from terrorism to genocide. And apparently any crime that separated a mother from her children. But in this case, I had to agree.

“Dan Painter said Luiz was calling you.” I stood and approached the bed hesitantly, tired of having to look around my mother to see the tabby. “Where did you get the phone, and how did he get your number?”

My mother scowled at me, but Manx set her glass careful y on the bedside table. The movement made her wince, and she stiffened her injured right arm. “I take phone from the man I kill to escape. Luiz’s number is in the phone. I hear men talking before, so I know where he goes. I cal him. He tells me where he is, and tells me come get him.”