Grace and Monica lay on the bed together, face to face. Both of them were clothed, Grace in a yellow dress, Monica in a nightgown. Monica’s eyes were wide open with terror and her mouth hung open wide, too. A long, pinkish appendage, that ghastly tongue, extended from Grace’s mouth and snaked deep into Monica’s throat. The tongue throbbed in a sinuous, slow rhythm, tiny beads of a glowing crimson substance traveling along that alien feeding tube, out of Monica and into her mother.

She’s feeding on her, sucking the life out of her, Troy thought.

As he watched, his hand limp on the gun, Grace drew that monstrous tongue out of her child with a wet, slurping sound. Monica started gagging.

Sitting up in the bed, Grace smiled at them.

“Welcome, boys,” she said in a low purr. “Here for a ménage a trois? You’ll have to wait until I’m done eating.”

Sullivan had a Glock. He aimed the pistol at Grace with the practiced ease of an ex-cop. Troy raised his gun again, too, though his arms shook.

“Step away from the bed, ma’am,” Sullivan said. “Hands in the air.”

“Or you’ll do what?” she asked.

Immediately after she spoke the last word, her tongue darted from her mouth like a striking cobra. The tip of it lashed against Sullivan’s left hand. He screamed and dropped to his knees, clamping his good hand over his injured one, freshets of blood leaking between his fingers.

Troy fired the gun. He was less than ten feet away from Grace, and he aimed for center mass as he’d been taught.

But he missed. Grace quick-crawled like a spider away from the bed, and she moved faster than he’d ever seen anyone move. The round hammered into the drywall behind the bed, chips spraying. Grace scrambled to the balcony doors. Troy fired at her again, and again. The glass door shattered. Grace shrieked as one of his rounds hit her. He shot at her again, but she lunged through the broken doors and onto the balcony. He ran after her, stumbling over furniture.

She was gone by the time he got outside. Bright red drops of blood stained the wrought iron balcony railing.

He slammed his fist against the railing, went back inside.

“Got a first aid kit, Doc?” Sullivan had gotten up, both of his hands drenched in blood. He grimaced.

“Look in the bathroom,” Troy said.

On the bed, Monica was trying to get up. It seemed unbelievable, but she actually looked older than she had when he’d left that morning, and he wondered that if he and Sullivan hadn’t arrived when they did, if it would have been the end for her.

The thought chilled him.

He braced his arm behind her back and helped her sit up. Her nightgown was cold with sweat, and her body trembled against his.