Cronin's Key III by N.R. Walker Read Free Book Online Page A

human
life.”
    “ That’s not true,” Alec said. “You respect human life. You
only take what you need to feed. You don’t kill them for
entertainment or sport.”
    Cronin
shrugged one shoulder. “True.”
    “ Why the consciousness for such things now?” Alec asked.
“You’ve lived a long time to only just realize this.”
    Cronin let out a deep breath. “I’ve
never been faced with the possibility of there being something
more.”
    “ And yet, even when you thought all faith was lost, you
still acted with a kindness toward humans.” Alec put his hand to
Cronin’s chest. “That proves what kind of heart you
have.”
    Cronin shrugged again, but before he could speak,
Alec’ s head turned to the
sound of different voices. He heard the mental voices before the
auditory ones. Two men working as a team. One of them was warring
between fight and flight, too scared to do either. And the other
man, the leader of the two, was holding a small child but worried
that the woman’s screams would cause too much attention. Shut her up, shut her
up , he kept saying, out loud
and in his head. The first man finally closed his fist and took a
step toward the stricken woman, who’d been knocked to the
floor.
    “ Be ready to take the
child,” Alec whispered before leaping them both to where the scene
was unfolding. Alec grabbed the two men by the throats before they
could blink, strangling their screams of surprise and
fear.
    Cronin
quickly and carefully took the wailing child from the man’s arms
before he could drop her. The woman on the ground cried out, her
eyes wide with fear, as she scrambled backwards away from them. But
Cronin held out her little girl, no more than eighteen months old,
and gently handed her back to the woman. “Take her. Be safe,”
Cronin said. “These two men will not bother you anymore.” And the
woman scrambled out of the shack, her baby safe in her
arms.
    Alec snarled at the two men. Their feet kicked in mid-air,
their hands were uselessly trying to release Alec’s grip on their
necks. “I know what you wanted to do to the baby,” he snarled at
them , his fangs bared. “You
sick fucks. There’s a special place in hell for people like
you.”
    The men both struggled . One of them tried punching Alec, swiping his fists
blindly at him. It hurt Alec no more than a newborn kitten would,
though Cronin clearly didn’t like the fact the man was hitting him.
He took him from Alec, the man’s arms now swinging even wilder, his
eyes bulging with a new kind of fear.
    Cronin bowed his head to Alec. “Thank
you, my love.”
    “ Any time,” Alec replied.
“I happen to like taking you out for dinner.”
    The man Cronin was holding pissed his
pants. Cronin sighed. “I hate when they do that.”
    “ I hate humans w ho do
unspeakable things to children,” Alec said, turning his attention
back to the struggling man. Alec saw memory after memory in the
man’s mind of the horrific things he’d done. If it were possible
for Alec to vomit, he would have. “I hope whatever meets you on the
other side does to you what you’ve done to them.” The man struggled
some more before Alec twisted his wrist just so and snapped the
man’s neck. He put his teeth to his throat and fed.
    When they were done, before Alec could drop the disgusting human to the muddy
floor, Cronin said, “Hold onto him. There’s something I want to
show you.”
    * * * *
    Alec was surprised when Cronin leapt
them to the savannah plains. The Tanzanian landscape was not what
he was expecting at all. He could see by the color of the horizon
that the sun would be up in about an hour.
    “ I’ve never brought anyone
else here,” Cronin said softly. “Though I’ve been coming here for
many years.”
    “ Why are you just bringing
me here now?” Alec asked. “It’s beautiful.”
    Cronin smiled and dumped the body into
the dirt. “Don’t be alarmed.”
    Alec let the body he was holding fall
to the ground as well. “Don’t be