The Highway

Jade limped out of the Sanctuary.

She was wearing the tattered remains of the silk pajamas, stained red. She was barefoot. The rain had started again, cold and clean against her feverish skin.

She didn't run. She walked with a new, predatory gait. The pain in her leg was gone.

She reached the perimeter fence. She didn't look for a gate. She grabbed the chain link and tore it open with her new strength, metal screeching in protest.

She walked onto the highway.

It was a desolate stretch of asphalt cutting through the redwoods. Mist clung to the yellow lines.

Headlights cut through the fog.

A white van slowed down. It had a satellite dish on the roof. *TMZ* was stenciled on the side in dirt. They had found the location. They had been circling for days.

The van stopped twenty feet away. The window rolled down. A man with a camera leaned out, squinting through the rain.

"Holy shit," the man yelled. "It's her! It's Jade!"

He raised the camera. Flashbulbs popped, blinding white explosions in the gray mist.

"Jade! Over here! Give us a smile! Are you okay? Is it true you're in rehab?"

Jade stopped in the middle of the road. The light hit her.

In her old life, she would have covered her face. She would have called security. She would have cried.

But Jade was dead.

The creature standing on the asphalt looked at the camera. She felt the hunger rising in her belly—a deep, cavernous need that raw beef could never fill. She looked at the paparazzo’s neck, pulsing above his camera strap.

She smiled.

Her lips pulled back, revealing gums that were too red and teeth that were too long, too sharp, too animal. Drool mixed with the blood on her chin.

"Jade?" the photographer faltered, lowering the lens. "What the f—"

Jade didn't wait for the question.

She dropped to all fours, her spine snapping into a curve, and launched herself at the van.

The camera fell to the wet pavement, recording only the sound of screaming and the wet tear of flesh as the pop star finally got her wish.