I marched over to Kyle. He saw me, opened his mouth, and I backhanded him. The blow knocked him to the ground. “This is your fault. You brought these people here. You knew this place was dangerous.” I pulled him upright and spun him toward the dead beast. “Look! People died because of you. Do you understand that? If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have had to murder her. She was just protecting her children.”

“She tried to kill us!”

I backhanded him again. “She tried to kill you because you broke into her house.”

The workers stood around us, their faces grim. Nobody made any move to help their boss.

I looked at them. “Anything you reclaim here is contaminated. Being here is a crime. Taking anything out of this zone is a crime. You need to know this.”

Kyle stayed down, until I grabbed him by his shirt and pulled him up, his face two inches from mine. “I will ask this only once. What was in the vault under the Blue Heron?”

“What vault?”

“You answer her,” Felipe said. “You tell her everything now.”

“I don’t know what the hell this bitch is talking about.”

“If you don’t answer me, I’ll kill you.” I shook him, my bloody claws staining his shirt with the behemoth’s gore. “What was in the vault?”

“I don’t know!” he screamed. “I don’t know anything about any vault! I swear!”

“Did you have something to do with the murders at the Blue Heron site? Answer me!”

His pupils dilated and he was hanging in my hands, completely limp, paralyzed by fear. He wasn’t lying. People in a state of complete panic freeze or run. Mother Nature turns off their mental faculties, so her favorite children don’t think themselves to death. Kyle was too terrified to formulate a lie. He truly had no idea what I was talking about.

I dropped him and looked at his crew. “He’s all yours. You need to clear out. I’m reporting this site to the first cop I see.”

I found my bow and quiver and walked away. Ascanio jumped off the beast and joined me. His voice was a deep growl, shredded by his teeth. “It. Wash. Aweshome.”

“This was a tragedy.” People came before animals. I knew that, but when you turn into an animal, your perspective is a little different.

“Yesh. But aweshome.”

He was a boy. What did he know?

“Sho, we didn’t learrrn anyshing?”

“That’s not true. We established that Kyle Bell had nothing to do with the murders. We can eliminate him from our suspect pool. Are you hungry?”

“Shhtarrrving.”

“Good. Let’s go find something to eat.”

CHAPTER 5