Wrong Side Of Dead Read Online Free Page A

the bruises and an itchy, healing cheekbone to prove it. We got our hands on Felix, who’d been rogue for two weeks. We were one step closer to knowing who was organizing this and why, but it still felt … incomplete. I mulled on it during the drive back to the Watchtower.
    Carved out of the bones of the abandoned Capital City Mall, situated on the East Side near the Black River, our headquarters was more a small city than a tower of any sort. Individual stores were now rooms with designated uses—weapons storage, a central Operations room,a small infirmary, a gymnasium and training room, as well as converted showers and sleeping quarters. About two hundred humans, Therians, and vampires lived here full-time, including me.
    Its conversion began six weeks ago, after the vampire Families made a deal with the Assembly of Clan Elders. The mall was protected by the vampires, because it had a Sanctuary—a magical hot spot where the power of the Break bled through—and it was offered as a headquarters for their joint efforts in protecting their people.
    Humans were invited to play after Boot Camp was destroyed last month. The Watchtower was run by a Triumvirate—one representative of each of the three races, and all major decisions needed a unanimous vote. Astrid, a were-cat and Marcus’s sister, stood for the Therians, my kind-of friend Isleen for the vampires, and former-Handler Adrian Baylor for the humans.
    Tensions were high and for good reason, but everyone mostly got along. We all had the same goals now: protect the city and protect our people. At all costs.
    Kyle followed a well-worn path through the weedy parking lot toward the interior of the U-shaped mall’s curve, which created a sort of canyon. The entire lot and structure were protected by a barrier spell, which urged anyone outside of it to look away. And that was only the first security measure in place.
    Kyle drove through the illusion of a wall and into a parking lot made of two hollowed-out former restaurants. The lot held an array of vehicles, mostly trucks, vans, and sport utility vehicles of various makes, models, and colors. No sense in being predictable.
    Quince and Kyle hauled Felix out of the back and carried him by the ropes like a trussed-up Christmas tree. He didn’t struggle or protest. Marcus followed, a silent sentinel. Something occurred to me as I shut my door.
    “Hey, did anyone pick up Marcus’s clothes at the rave?” I asked.
    Blank looks. Marcus snuffled, and if a jaguar could act annoyed, he did.
    Kyle chuckled. Therians had to remove their clothing in order to shift. And, likewise, they shifted back to human form completely nude. I’ve learned that most have little issue with nudity—at least, in small groups. But I imagined Marcus had no intention of walking the length of the mall to his sleeping quarters in just his bare skin.
    The parking lot led into a short, tiled corridor, which intersected with the main length of the mall’s interior. The old fountain in the center now held a thriving herb garden—not all the plants meant for spicing food. Left and right, the corridor stretched down about a hundred yards in either direction before sharply turning again. Each end of the mall was capped by an old department store. The structure on the right/east was being converted into larger living quarters. The old store on the left/west would eventually be a training facility, not unlike the obstacle course we ran at Boot Camp.
    Operations was straight ahead, with weapons storage right next door. To the right of weapons was our brand-new jail, complete with restraint cells and an interrogation room. I despised that place more than any other part of the Watchtower, and I avoided it as much as possible. My initial look at the completed design had lasted exactly ninety seconds, and I’d left shaking.
    Three familiar faces emerged from Ops. Astrid Dane was my height, with long, straight black hair and the same exotic looks as her