Red Handed Read Online Free

two rocks. Straightening, I bounced the heavy weights in my hands, preparing to throw them, to fight.
    â€œLeave!” Ryan barked. “This isn’t a game.”
    â€œReally?” I said dryly. I couldn’t help it. I faced the aliens, adding, “You mean I don’t get a prize if I’m still alive in the morning?”
    Ryan cast me a dark glare and I could tell he wanted to shake me. Or kill me himself. But he turned back to the creatures, feet planted on the ground as he fired several more rounds. “Things are about to get ugly.”
    â€œI kind of had a suspicion,” I replied, gripping the rocks more tightly. The fear hadn’t left me, and only seemed to grow.
    â€œYou can still run.”
    Running and hiding sounded good. But I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. That would make me a coward. That would make me no better than my dad, who had abandoned me and Mom when things got tough.
    I’d hated him for that. I wouldn’t turn around and do the same thing.
    Ryan’s gun held the monsters off for a bit, but soon they learned how to dodge the hot, blue streams and leapt toward us, closing in. Almost…there…bile rose in my throat, but I managed to hold steady.
    As Ryan fired, I launched a rock. The gray stone slammed into a wrinkled face, right between glowing red eyes. My rock didn’t stop or even slow the creature down, but only enraged it further. Fear continued to stab at me, sharper than a knife.
    The creature snarled low in its throat and flashed a funnel-like tongue at me. It was so close now, I could see the yellow saliva dripping from its too-large mouth.
    Again Ryan fired, but the beast bounded left, then right, reaching me in the next second and knocking me to the ground. I still had one rock left and used it to smash the monster in the temple.
    Howling, it rolled off me. Ryan used its distraction to his advantage and shot it in the face. It froze, posed exactly as it had been, features contorted in pain, that disgusting yellow saliva half dripping from its chin.
    â€œThanks,” I muttered, pushing myself into a crouch. I couldn’t stand on my own. My arms and legs were too shaky. It had touched me; that thing had touched me, and I felt violated. Enraged and sick.
    Expression bleak, Ryan offered me a helping hand. I took it, and his strong fingers closed around me. My shaking grew worse as he hauled me to my feet. “Good work with the rock.”
    â€œThanks,” I repeated. More human screams—terrified, pain-filled—pierced the darkness. Goose bumps broke over my skin. “What’s happening?”
    Ryan kept one arm extended, firing in a quick half circle, protecting us from invasion for several precious seconds. “The Sybilins are sucking the water out of your friends, drying them out.”
    His words echoed in my mind, surreal, almost foreign. How was that possible?
    How is any of this possible? I thought, incredulous. Sucking the water out of human bodies…I’m not sure I would have believed it if I’d seen it in a movie or read it in a book.
    Aliens were nonviolent, working and going to school side-by-side with humans. Like humans. Right?
    Not these Sybilins, that’s for sure .
    â€œWhere did they come from?” I managed, hand covering my throat.
    â€œDoes it matter?” Ryan returned, dialing his weapon to a hotter setting. I knew it was hotter because I could feel the singe of it, nearly blistering my skin. “Shit!” he gritted out. “This isn’t working. They’re still multiplying.”
    Without another word, he raced forward. When the creatures—the Sybilins—came within striking distance, he cut them with his knife. Yellow liquid spewed from them, thicker than their saliva, dripping on the ground. Ugh. There was a human girl out there fighting, as well, I noticed.
    Allison Stone, I realized a moment later.
    For a moment, I just watched, awed and terrified.