Shelly Laurenston: Shelly Laurenston

“Okay, Neece. Talk to me.” Neecy turned around to find Janelle sitting next to her. “Arri Chang.”

“What about her?”

“Explain to me again why I’m wasting my time trying to train that pipsqueak?”

“Because I told you to.”

If Janelle were lucky, she may become second in command one day. But she’d never lead the Crows. Not because she asked questions, but because she asked them like she already knew the right answer. Skuld hated that.

“Give me a break, Neece. She’s terrified of me and she couldn’t fight her way out of a paper bag.”

“She’s not terrified of you.”

“She hides from me. When I do finally track her down and take her to the training room, she cowers.” Janelle sighed, her blond curls falling in her face.

“It’s starting to give me a complex. I feel like this giant ogre.”

Janelle wasn’t quite as tall as Neecy, but she was bigger and stronger. She was a lot of woman and Neecy knew it made her self-‐conscious.

“You’re not a giant ogre. She’s just new.”

“She’s been with us for two years now.”

Neecy winced. Janelle was right, and she didn’t even know the whole story yet.

Things were about to get much stranger because of Arri. That, however, was not a discussion to have during a Crow party.

“Look, I’m not talking about this tonight. Now you can sit here and freak out…”

Neecy slid off her stool. “Or you can try and live in that fantasy world of yours were you out dance me.”

Janelle stood up slowly. “I know you didn’t just issue a direct challenge…to me.”

“Bring it on, baby.” Neecy could always hold her own on a dance floor, but Janelle used to street dance for money before Skuld took her. In fact, in some old rap and reggae videos, you could see Janelle in the background. Sometimes the only white girl in the entire video. Still, it was fun to fuck with her on it.

“Oh, that’s it, Lawrence. You’re ass is mine.”

Katie sauntered up, a drink with an umbrella in it gripped in her hand. “What’s going on?”

“Neece just challenged me.”

“What?” Katie suddenly scrambled up onto the bar to the deep annoyance of the Shifters.

“Hey!” Her loud voice reached the DJ across the room. The music immediately cut out. “We have a challenge, ladies!”

Neecy shook her head as the Crows cheered and opened up a space on the dance floor for her and Janelle.

Stepping away from her, Janelle turned and walked backward to the dance floor.

She gestured for Neecy to follow with both her hands.

“Come on, bitch. You’re talking shit. Let’s see what you really got.”

Rolling her eyes, Neecy followed. Honestly, the shit she endured in order to distract her team from the potential nightmare of Arri Chang.

Derrick hated working Crow parties. These bitches creeped him out. They creeped out all the Shifters. These women died and some goddess brought them back. And she brought them back…altered.

Shifters were born the way they were. So were the freaky Ravens. Although the Ravens couldn’t shift into shit, they did have those stupid wings.

The Crows, however, woke up from dying, and suddenly they had wings. They weren’t immortal or the undead. They were just a bunch of broads with wings, enhanced strength and immune systems, and a really unhealthy bloodlust. Like Shifters, the Crows were still human…sort of. They could breed, get old, and die.

But none of that made them right.

Still, the tips were good and some of them weren’t too bad to look at.

One of the cuter ones waved a twenty in his face. “Another one of these.” She held up the bottle of pricey imported beer. Derrick went to grab one from the fridge behind the bar, but found it empty. Less than five minutes ago, he had at least thirty bottles in there because the Crows really liked it.

He sniffed the air, but all he smelled were humans. Another reason Shifters didn’t like the Crows and the Ravens. They didn’t smell any different than normal humans. They simply smelled like humans who slept on down pillows.

He looked out over the dance floor, but the Crows were still grooving to another disco favorite. Then his eyes caught movement and Derrick’s head snapped up.

That’s where he spotted them, on the balcony that ringed the dance floor. The Ravens, their purple-‐black wings shimmering in the club’s strobe lights. Nearly all of them held one of the missing beers and silently watched the Crows. How they got past him, he’d never know.

And, to be honest, he never wanted to know.

“I do love watching women dance.” In surprise, Yager and Tye looked at Mike who stood between them. It was such a nice, clean thing for him to say. “It makes their tits shake.”

Rolling their eyes, Yager and Tye looked back at the dancing females.

Yup. Yager liked watching Neecy dance. He also liked how she acted when alone with the Gathering. She actually smiled and laughed. She let herself go with her sisters. He wanted to see that side of her himself. He wanted her to smile at him the way she smiled at her friends.

“So are we going to go down there and dance with ‘em? Or just sit here and watch like a bunch of stalkers?” Mike asked.

Tye shrugged. “I like watching.”

“Yeah. He’s got a thing for that big girl,” Mike offered.

Yager raised an eyebrow in surprise. “Which girl?”

Mike answered for Tye. “My fellow hoodrat, Janelle.” As long as it wasn’t Neecy, Yager really didn’t give a shit.

“I find her…interesting.” Tye didn’t say much, and often what he did say sounded innocuous. But Yager knew the man long enough to know “interesting” was simply another way to say “a piece of ass I can’t wait to hit.”

“I understand that. Especially after seeing her dance. She’s amazing.”

“Yeah. Dancing. Whatever.”

Mike sighed. “I don’t get you two. There are much better looking women out there. And if not better looking, then definitely less mean. I saw Janelle rip out a man’s heart once…and that didn’t seem to bother her.”

Mike put his arms around both men. “Gentleman, you guys should hang with me some night. I’d get you hooked up with some very hot and extremely accommodating super models.”

Even though Mike was about six-‐two, both Yager and Tye still towered over him as they towered over pretty much everybody. They looked at each other, smiled, and slammed the man with their wings, flipping him over the balcony. The Crows, like the birds whose wings they possessed, sensed him and quickly moved out of the way as Mike hit the floor. The women looked down at him and then their eyes drifted up.

For several long seconds, they merely stared at the Ravens who merely stared back. After they got bored with that, they went back to dancing.

Well, all went back to dancing except Neecy. She stared up at Yager, her hands on her hips. He smiled down at her and winked.

Rolling her eyes in exasperation, she strode off the dance floor.

“All right. Which one of you dumb bitches invited the Ravens tonight?”

Janelle, Connie and Katie looked at each other and shrugged.

“I asked you a question.”

“We didn’t invite anybody.”

“Did you tell someone to invite them?”

Their responding smirks said it all. Calmly, “And this is why you bitches piss me off.”

Katie held up her hands in mock fear. “Geez, Neece. Control the rage!”

Connie laughed as Janelle shrugged. “So the Ravens are here? It’s always a good idea to keep them on our side.”

“Which isn’t easy when you keep trying to kill their leader,” Connie muttered.