Infected: Lesser Evils by Andrea Speed Read Free Book Online

scent, something like ammonia and phosphorus, and it was deeply confusing, almost throwing his lion side off. He felt the muscles boiling beneath his skin, bones crackling like kindling on a fire, the crack of his jaw like gunshots as the joints popped.
    A lighter punch had fractured Oliver’s skull, but showing how tough transformed cats were, the leopard finally regained its feet and started toward him, but he vomited out a roar that was loud enough and angry enough to stun it, make it hesitate. Roan hesitated too, mainly because it smelled so wrong he wanted to put it out of its misery. It wasn’t a sick smell, not exactly… it was more like a smell of poison.
    As he snarled and growled, approaching the cat slowly, his Human side warred with his cat one. Something was wrong with this cat, and it wasn’t rabies, it wasn’t pneumonia, it wasn’t anything that could be explained by smell.
    Smell. That was it; that was the weird thing beyond the ammonia and phosphorus. Perfume. He was smelling perfume, Bijan Wicked to be exact. What the hell…?
    The leopard got up enough strength and courage to lunge again, but he was back in himself enough to kick it, fighting back what he actually wanted to do (which was rip its throat out, put it down like the sick creature it was). He caught it in the torso and sent it flying backward, where it crashed into the window hard enough to shatter the glass, which rained down on it as it hit the floor. It was still snarling, still struggling to get up, ignoring the “Holy shit!” coming from outside, where the bathroom watcher must have gotten a scare. Roan remembered the tranquilizer gun and pulled it out, putting a round in its neck. It was still struggling to get up, now bleeding from its black pad of a nose and from a dozen different glass cuts, and still drooling thick, viscous ribbons. “Stay down,” he snarled, his voice just barely Human, sounding like a cross between James Earl Jones and a trash compactor full of gravel. It was fighting the drugs all the way, but didn’t have the impetus to stand up.
    He heard the door open behind him, smelled the relatively fresher air, and heard Seb say, “I’d ask how you broke a urinal, but I don’t care.”
    “There’s something wrong,” he said, not turning around. His voice was still gravelly, but Human enough. His jaw didn’t feel right, though; he wasn’t sure it had completely morphed back.
    A female voice snorted, and he assumed it was the Latina cop. “No shit, Sherlock.”
    “No, you don’t get it. She’s newly transformed.”
    A pause, the snap of gun holsters. It was Seb who replied, and Roan could almost feel the other cops looking at him, tacitly saying, He’s your freaky friend—you deal with him . “You’re gonna hafta be more explicit with me here, Roan. You saying this was her first transformation?”
    “I’m saying she came in this club a Human.”
    “How is that possible? I mean, it takes about an hour to transform, right? I mean, for most.” Roan heard the unspoken Not for you, you freaky ass bastard, but for everyone who has even a shred of humanity left . “Someone would’ve noticed.”
    “I agree. Someone would have. Maybe the someone who poisoned her.”
    “Poisoned? She’s poisoned?”
    “Run a full tox screen. Better yet, get Doctor Petra Rosenberg in on this.”
    “Who?”
    “My doctor, she’s an expert on infecteds, I’ll give you her number.”
    There was a scoff, and a male voice—not Seb’s—exclaimed, “How the hell does he know this stuff? I mean, we all know he’s one of them, but—”
    “He says something, you can bet on it,” Seb snapped, more impatient than angry. “And if you don’t believe me, ask the Chief. Got it?”
    The boy answered with a cowed, “Yes sir.”
    Roan didn’t know if he looked Human enough or not, and really didn’t care. He hurt, he could taste his own sour blood in his mouth, and this rookie just fucking pissed him off. He glared at him,