Tempting the Fire by Sydney Croft

month.
    “Logan!” Dax’s shout rang out at the same time as the sound of a scream and an inhuman snarl. “It’s Chance … Quick! He’s attacking Shep!”
    Logan sped toward the medical tent, and Sela’s heart nearly busted through her rib cage. That was where he said they’d taken Marlena. Sela ran after him, the sounds coming from the tent scaring the daylights out of her.
    Logan tore open the door and drew up so fast Sela ran into him. “What the fuck is that?” he barked, and Sela wished to God she knew the answer.
    Shep was on the ground, moaning, blood streaming from his mouth, scalp and nose. A naked man stood over him … at least, she thought it was a man. His skin was grayish, textured like a reptile’s, and his teeth … God, they were sharp, fanged.
    Marlena was huddled on a cot, cuffed, her clothes askew, and Sela wondered if this man-creature had attacked her. He watched them with slitted eyes, his entire body coiled inside and ready to strike. An injured animal preparing to defend itself from predators.
    And judging by the way he seized Marlena’s forearm, he was prepared to defend her too.
    Or maybe eat her.
    “Someone get a goddamned tranq!” Logan shouted, and the man-thing snarled. Logan held up his hands and lowered his voice. “Chance. It’s okay. Let the woman go.”
    38

    “Fuck off.”
    Alarm skittered up Sela’s spine at the man’s deadly tone, but Marlena, to her credit, remained calm despite the fact that she was in the grip of something that wasn’t entirely human.
    A man in BDUs and with a stethoscope around his neck eased into the tent, a tranquilizer gun in his hand. Two men behind him carried pistols.
    “Doc,” Logan said quietly, “flank me.”
    Logan gestured to Dax, and in the next instant, Dax grabbed Marlena, and the doctor and Logan shoved Chance onto the cot.
    “Get Shep and the women out of here!” Logan shouted. Chance roared, his struggles knocking Logan and the doctor, whom Dax called Wes, off balance.
    A set of arms circled Sela’s waist as Dax dragged Marlena out of the tent.
    Sela elbowed her attacker in the ribs. He grunted, but his hold tightened, and she felt herself being tugged backward. As hard as she could, she brought her booted foot down on his, and at the same time, she rocked her head and cracked the back of her skull against his mouth and nose.
    “Ow! Fuck!” His agonized curse accompanied a rough slam to the ground and a knee in the back of her neck, another jammed into the small of her back.
    Sela’s breath was ripped from her lungs by the impact, and she gasped like a fish on the bank of a river. Memories of the beating she’d suffered flashed through her head like a movie on fast-forward, but mercifully, the man holding her down made no move to hurt her, and awkwardly, she cranked her head so she could see, past Dax, the struggle between the three men.
    An ungodly, high-pitched screech pierced the air.
    “Oh, Jesus.”
    Sela didn’t know who spoke, but suddenly, Logan flew backward, landing in a heap next to her.
    Wes hit one of the tent poles, cracking it in half. One side of the tent collapsed, and then, standing near the bed where Chance had been, its eyes glowing red and drool dripping from its tiger-long fangs, was a fucking chupacabra.
    They were real. Dear God, they were real.
    THERE WAS A MOMENT OF SILENCE, AND THEN CAME A CLICK
    OF a weapon and the huff of a dart gun. The chupacabra roared, clutching at the dart in its belly.
    The man holding Sela down leaped to his feet, giving her the opportunity to come to hers.
    “Oh, my God,” she breathed. “You’ve got a chupacabra. But how? It was a human. How did it turn—”
    “Fuck if I know,” Logan said, as he eased toward the creature, which had slid to the floor. If he was surprised that she recognized a chupacabra, it didn’t 39

    show.
    It began to writhe, and slowly, its form changed to human again. “What …
    happened …?” Chance panted, clutching at his