by Amie Gibbons
What was he doing?
“Sir?” I asked as the zombie man got out of the freezer.
We knew he could move fast cuz he did to grab the box. So why was he all lurchy and slow now?
“Hold tight, Ryder,” Grant said.
“Yes, sir.”
The zombie ran forward and I screamed, stumbling back as he jumped on top of the table between us.
“Sir!” I yelped.
Grant ran up next to me and flung something in the zombie’s face.
He shook his head and snarled.
“Shit. Salt doesn’t work,” Grant said, grabbing my arm and hauling me back.
I pulled out my gun and caught Grant doing the same outta the corner of my eye. He put his gun up and took a deep breath I could hear even over the pounding in my ears.
“Freeze,” Grant said.
The zombie ran at him.
The world exploded in my ears, the gunshot echoing off the hard edges and metal.
I screamed, slammin’ my hands over my ears and knocking myself in the head with my own gun.
“Ow!” I dropped my gun, head hurting too much to worry about it.
Grant walked backwards, still firing. I couldn’t even hear it anymore.
Crap.
He turned long enough to look at me and shout something.
I pulled my hands from my ears.
There was blood on the right one.
“My ears, sir!”
He screamed something at me before going back to shooting at the zombie.
Right. I didn’t have the luxury of being a damsel.
The zombie lunged forward again and Grant skipped back, grabbing a pan off the hanging rack and smacking the zombie across the face with it.
“Ehhhhhhhhhh,” rose from the zombie, loud and high enough for me to hear it.
Grant smacked him again and the zombie grabbed the pan on the downswing, dragging it from Grant’s hands.
Double crap on a cracker.
What could stop this guy?
A gold and red rug flew into the kitchen and I barely had time to say, “Pyro?” before he wrapped around the zombie.
Grant’s hand fell as his jaw dropped and we stared as my flying carpet spun the zombie away.
The zombie growled and lunged and Pyro flapped in his face like a matador’s cape, dodging to the side far more agile than anything with two legs could ever hope to be.
I’d seen my baby outmaneuver a vamp. He could dance with a lousy zombie.
Pyro flew backwards, tassels flying in front of him as dexterous as any fingers, making some kind of sign in the air, ending with a dramatic splaying out of the cords.
The zombie dropped.
Just like that.
“Holy crap,” I said, not able to hear myself.
Chapter three
Pyro flew to me, wrappin’ around me in a soft hug.
“Thanks for the save, baby,” I said, petting him as he pulled back.
He flicked his tassels at me in his clear request for my phone. I nodded and handed it over and he flicked through it with his tassels, pulling up the texting and letting his tassels fly to type out something.
Grant appeared next to me and I jumped. Couldn’t hear him at this point, too deaf from the shootings.
He met my eyes then looked at Pyro.
“I can explain,” I said.
Grant made a face and pointed at his ears. I couldn’t tell if he was annoyed cuz he couldn’t hear me either or cuz I was too loud.
Pyro held up the phone and we both leaned in to read it.
“I stowed away in your luggage. I don’t trust Carvi. You obviously need me so I don’t want to hear the lecture.”
I stuck my tongue out at him and he flapped, wrapping around my shoulders and nuzzling my cheek.
“Thanks for the save, baby. You’re right, we needed you. How did you do that?”
Pyro went back to typing and paused, jerking his top half like someone tilting their chin to direct you.
Something grabbed my shoulder and I turned with a scream just in time for Carvi to get a bloody finger up to my face.
He smiled, holding his hands up and saying something.
I shook my head. “Can’t hear you.”
He nodded and held up one finger, moving it towards me slowly, probably so I wouldn’t freak. He smeared the blood down my ear and in, saying something.
My hearing turned back on like popping my ear and he did the other one, talkin’ in something old, probably Latin, and then smoothed my hair back where I’d whacked myself.
That ear turned back on and the throbbing in my head died.
“Thanks,” I said. “Can you get Grant’s too?”
Carvi did the same to Grant, chanting those strange words again, and Grant held very still, obviously uncomfortable with the Bloody Mary wet willie.
“Thank you,” Grant said as Carvi stepped back.
“Nice timing, by the way,” I said. “Were you really knocked out?”
“Yes, unfortunately,” he said. “Which is why I am so grateful to our flying friend here.”
Carvi stepped up to Pyro and bowed deeply.
“I am in your debt, carpet. What is your name?”
“Pyro,” I said.
Carvi looked at me, surprise flashin’ so fast I may have imagined it.
“You know him?” Carvi asked.
I didn’t say anything.
Grant crossed his arms. “Ryder, you have something you want to tell me?”
“Ummmmmm,” I said.
I looked at Pyro and he shrugged.
“Grant and Carvi,” I said, “meet Pyro. He’s my flying carpet.”
Carvi’s eyebrows flew up in the most genuine expression I think I’d ever seen on his face.
“He’s yours?” Carvi asked.
Grant snapped his fingers. “I knew I recognized him! That’s the rug you’re always moving around your place.”
“Well, I don’t move him,” I said. “He’s asleep during the day.”
Pyro held up my phone and I read it out loud. “Nice to formally meet you, Grant. I’ve heard great things.”
“Ryder?” Grant said. “Explain. Now.”
“I, um, got him right after I got my powers.”
“What do you mean, you got him?” Carvi asked.
They both stared at me and I fought to keep my back straight.
Pyro flew up to my side, standing on his bottom tassels and crossing his top ones over him like arms.
I grinned. “He’s protective. Okay, well, um. It started with a vision. I saw him and he was being held, basically a slave, so I had to save him, right?”
“Ryder,” Grant said.
“Right, get to the point. Okay, so I had to save him, I mean, I could tell he was bein’ abused.”
Pyro inched to me and pressed against my side. I didn’t know if he was looking for comfort at the memory of if he was trying to lend me some bravery.
“So I snuck into… the house where he was being held, and got him out of there. They had a tracking device in him and I had to dig it out. I could tell it hurt him but he kept waving at me to keep going. He tossed me on him when it was out, and took off out the window, and he’s been with me ever since.”
“What aren’t you saying?” Grant said, staring me down.
“I don’t want to say, sir.”
“Why?” Carvi asked. “You rescued him.”
“It’s who I rescued him from that might be a problem,” I said.
“I don’t understand.”
“That’s okay.”
“Ryder,” Grant said. “I am not going to arrest you for theft.”
“I would be putting you in a bad position if you knew who, sir. You are technically required to report it. At least until next January… if you get what I mean.”
I grinned so hard it felt like my face was gonna split in two.
Grant took a deep breath as I met his eyes, widening mine.
“No,” G
rant said, face betraying nothing. “You didn’t.”
I smiled harder.
“How did… he get him?” Carvi asked after a moment.
So I guess he got what I was saying too.
“No clue,” I said. “Pyro doesn’t remember much before about ten years ago when he was already in that man’s possession.”
“Wow,” Carvi said. “I… really, I am just so impressed. Was this in Washington?”
“No. Visiting and staying in a hotel. Made it a bit easier. And he was keeping Pyro in a room nearby with no secr… er, security, probably didn’t want security to know about him. Anyway, what do we do with the other walking dead here?”
“What did Pyro do?” Grant asked.
Pyro’s tassels flew over my phone again and I snorted as I read over his, er, shoulder?
“I’m not a potted plant,” it said. “You can talk to me.”
Grant nodded. “How did you do that, Pyro?”
Pyro went back to typing and I shook my head. “That may take a minute. Carvi, how did you magically wake up after the zombie was down?”
“I didn’t. I was out for a moment, then kind of drifting. I got up when the rug flew in or so and then he took care of it so I didn’t have to. He is remarkable.”
I didn’t like the way Carvi eyed up my baby and grinned as he opened his mouth again.
“Don’t. Say. It,” I said in my best Grant impersonation.
“Say what, lea?” Carvi asked, oh so innocently.
“Whatever you were about to say,” I said. “Just don’t. I don’t like that look you’re giving him.”
“What look?”
“The same one you give me when you’re telling me what you could do to me.”
I met his eyes and jerked in a full-on spasm as he burst into my brain.
“Don’t scold me, lea,” he said in my head. “I can and will do things to you that you can’t even imagine. And you’ll like it. I’m getting sick of your tone. Remember who you’re talking to and show me some respect.”
He pulled out and I looked down, wigglin’ more than a basket of puppies. My heart raced and I wanted to curl up on myself as I wiped away the tear that leaked out.
“What the fuck did you just do to my agent?” Grant said, stepping forward with his gun suddenly out.
“How…” I asked.
Carvi lunged forward, yanking the gun from Grant’s hand and grabbing his chin, starin’ into Grant’s eyes.
Cold seeped into my soul as Grant’s face crumbled, mind lost in whatever Carvi wanted to do to it.
You build up a lot of will in two thousand years.
Grant’s arm moved so fast I didn’t see half of it as he cold cocked Carvi right in the chin.
Carvi stumbled back, shock naked on his face.
“How the fuck did you do that?” Carvi asked.
Grant stared him down. “Don’t fuck with my agent, and I won’t fuck with you.”
Fear… actual fear flashed in Carvi’s eyes.
Carvi couldn’t get into his head?
“Sir?” I asked. “What are you?”
“I’m your boss, Ryder. Focus.”
Holy walking pigs in a blanket! He knew! I don’t know how I knew that, but I knew he knew what he was.
How long had he known?
“Right there with ya, lea,” Carvi said. “I now am doubly impressed.”
“He let you in, didn’t he?” I asked.
“Just so he could kick my ass back out,” Carvi said. “And it hurt. Grant, I may have to kill you.”
“I wouldn’t recommend trying,” Grant said. “We need to do something with him.” He nodded at the zombie. “Will he get up again?”
Pyro jerked like he was saying, “Oh, me?” and went back to typing.
He held up the second message. “I don’t know.” Then went back to typing his explanation.
He nodded and handed that over.
“I don’t know how I know, but I have some necromancy magic,” he’d written. “It’s not natural power, just making the right symbols while you think. It gets very convoluted, but all I did here was cut off the power going through him. He’s not a zombie in the walking dead on his own sense. More the walking puppet way. I just ended magic in the area to cut his controller off.”
“So someone did do this?” I asked.
Pyro nodded.
“Why didn’t you do something, Grant?” Carvi asked, the snark sharp enough to cut water.
“I did,” Grant said. “I shot him, and hit him with a pan.”
“Not what I meant.”
“I know what you meant.”
The stared each other down and I found myself grabbing a handful of Pyro.
He typed out, “Mental war?”
“I can’t tell, but my brain is about to pop outta my sinuses if they keep this up.” I rubbed the middle of my forehead and cracked my neck, tryin’ to break up the tension.
“Guys!” I said. “Oops, little loud. Sorry. But you’re hurting my brain. Can you please just power down?”
Carvi nodded and broke eye contact first. “My apologies.”
The world still felt tight and my belly clenched. “Grant? Sir? You’re hurting my head.”
“Sorry, Ariana.” He shook his head. “I don’t know how it works. I don’t know what I am. Are you happy?”
“No, sir.”
“Why not?”
I licked my lips. “Because I think you’re lying.”
He turned that look on me.
I looked down, holding up my hands. “Sir!”
He took a deep breath that moved his massive chest. “Ryder. I do not know what I am. Got it?”
“Yes, sir.”
Yeah, he was lyin’.
Beep beep booooooda beep, Carvi’s phone sang, making all of us jump and Pyro take to the air.
“Shit!” Grant said as Carvi pulled out his phone.
“Ditto,” I said.
“Yes?” Carvi said.
He nodded along for a few moments then turned off the phone and held it up. “Gather round, kitties. We have a video.”
“Geez,” I said. “I forgot about that.”
We got close to Carvi and he smiled as he put an arm around my shoulder, giving it a squeeze.
I looked up at him.
“I’m sorry I lost my temper,” he said silently. “I didn’t like you talking to me like…”
“Like I was the boss of you?” I asked out loud.
Grant looked at us.
Carvi nodded and I met his eyes again. “Yes. You have been a little disrespectful and I kind of snapped. I think part of it is proximity to your Grant.”
“What is he?” I thought at Carvi.
He creased his forehead. “Did you just try to think at me?”
I nodded.
“Ah. It was like a whisper. Were you asking about Grant?”
I nodded again.
“I don’t know. But power like that, it’s big. And he’s definitely human, so that means whatever mixed with his family was massively powerful to leave that much power in someone with so little of its blood. We’re talking god level powers.”
I broke contact and looked at Grant.
“Stop talking about me,” he said.
I blinked quickly and he gave me his patented out of patience look.
“I can’t read your mind, Ryder,” Grant said. “With your face, I don’t need to.”
He reached over Carvi and hit play on the video.
We fast forwarded to about the time Enrique said he was in the freezer last before the body appeared.
Sure enough, he walked on camera, went in, came out with a chunk of frozen something, and walked back out of the shot.
“Here we go,” I said.
And we watched, and watched, and nothing.
“I don’t get it,” I said as Enrique came back on, opened the freezer door, and stumbled back.
There was no sound, but you could tell from the way his mouth was open a
nd movin’ that he was screaming as he ran away.
The door swung closed behind him but I caught a flash of the body.
“Magic,” Carvi said with a sigh. “I wasn’t really expecting this to show us anything.”
“So we have to start getting down into the magic stuff,” I said.
“We have to get him someplace safe first,” Carvi said. “He’s dead. I can smell it. He will start rotting soon.”
“We put him in your friend’s morgue, what’s to stop him from getting back up?” I asked.
Carvi turned to Pyro. “Would you mind playing watch dog for us? It will be boring, but you’re the only one who knows the magic to stop him, at least off the top of my head.”
Wow, a genuine request from Carvi. He was even speaking… I don’t know, respectfully.
Weird considering the screw me look he was shootin’ at my poor rug earlier.
Maybe I was mistaking that look for lust when it was just interest.
Maybe.
Pyro typed out, “I can, but I’m dead during the day. If the necromancer grabs him then, he could walk right out.”
“Good point,” Carvi said. “Go with them tonight and I’ll find a person to take your place in the morning?”
Pyro nodded.
“Thank you.”
“Do you have your cell phone, baby?” I asked. “I’ll give Carvi your number and he can text you when he finds someone?”
He nodded, typing, “Yeah, in the limo.”
“Wait, when were you in the limo?”
I swear his threads tightened into a grin as he typed.
“I got in before you guys did, flew in while the limo driver was waiting for Carvi to go up and get you. I was folded up under the back seat the whole time.”
“You little spy!” I pulled him into a hug and he wrapped around me. “I love you, baby. Thanks for the rescue.” We separated and he nodded. “Stay safe?”
He bobbed his top third in his nod again.
“We have to get back to the party,” Carvi said. “This long is explainable by a romp, but any longer and I’ll be a rude host.”
“Ummmm.” I gestured down at my dress. The front was covered with the frosted dust stuff that always seemed to be on the floors of huge, industrial freezers from me kneeling, and blood stained one sleeve from my ear dripping.
Carvi brushed at the front, knocking the dusty stuff off.
Pyro jumped in to help him and I grinned at Grant.
