by Karen Chance
Kit could have kissed her. Filthy, misbegotten half breed she might be, but she was a stubborn filthy, misbegotten half breed. As evidenced when she smashed into him, hard enough to knock him to the floor. And by the dozen strikes that hit down like machine gun fire all around his weaving and bobbing head. The last of which --
Punched through the floor.
"It's working!" the Rasta yelled, from by the stairs. "It's working!"
"That was me!" she snarled, ripped her bleeding hand back out of the hole. "You haven't said the damned incantation yet!"
"Oh, right." He looked around. "Hey, have you seen that paper?"
"You don't have it memorized?"
"I don't do magic, okay? I just sell the stuff --"
"Then find it! It was just here!"
"Shit," he said, and started looking around for something. But the bokor didn't seem to like that, and leapt for him, using Kit's agility to all but levitate off the floor. And to cross the small space between one heartbeat and the next and grab for the man using Kit's newly mended broken arm.
Which the dhampir promptly broke again.
"Son of a bitch!" he said, and wasn't sure if it was him or his nemesis.
"No, just a bitch," the girl growled, and threw him through a doorway.
Kit would have been back on his feet in a split second, but the bokor wasn't him. And while he might be controlling a vampire body, he was still thinking -- and reacting -- more like a human. The dhampir wasn't.
Which was how Kit found himself sliding on his back across a slick wood floor before plowing his head into a wall. And then through it, when she grabbed him before the bokor could react and started trying to force him through a nonexistent hole. Repeatedly.
There's a window right there, Kit thought blearily, right before his head and shoulders burst through the solid, old fashioned construction. And out into the open air, leaving him to get splashed in the face by the runoff from the roofline. He thought she might leave it there, using the wall to trap him as she had the rug --
But no.
Because the next moment, he was falling two stories onto a bunch of parked cars. Make that formerly parked, he revised, as the Lincoln whose trunk he'd just landed on gave a surprised lurch. And took off with a screech of the wheels, blasting away from the curb fast enough to almost throw him onto the ground.
Almost, but not quite.
Because the bokor's attention was on the dhampir, who had just jumped onto the roof of another car, taking a shrieking Rasta along with her. While Kit was on a car speeding away from his lady, and any harm he might do her. And he damned well intended to stay that way.
He'd landed butt down, half on the trunk and half on the back window, and there weren't a lot of hand holds. So he made some. He grasped hold of the window openings on both sides of the car, dug his fingers through the metal of the roof, and held on for dear life.
The bokor realized what he was doing about the time that a VW bug came screeching around a corner after them, nicking a lamppost in the process because it was driving on the sidewalk for some reason. And then veering off and skimming a brick wall on the other side. Kit could see the dhampir yelling at the Rasta, who was behind the wheel but clearly didn't know how to drive.
But he knew how to floor it, because they were gaining fast.
And still arguing.
"-- pockets?" Floated back to Kit over the sound of tire squeals.
"I can't . . . and drive!"
"You can't drive anyway!"
"Oh, great, that's what I get . . . helping."
"You haven't helped yet! Now turn out your pockets and find the --"
"You turn them out! I have to watch the --"
They smashed into the back of Kit's car.
The dhampir, who'd started going through the man's jacket, looked up in surprise.
And the next second, she was on the hood of the car, a slender figure rippling with neon and spotted with rain, balancing for a second with vampire-like ease on the wildly swerving vehicle. Before leaping at Kit, stake in one hand and knife in the other, like someone who had done this before. And fast enough that, if he hadn't managed to get his legs up in time, the evening could have ended right there.
As it was, she went flying back into the Bug, hitting hard enough to shatter the front windshield. And to send it swerving even more wildly along the road than before. And then crashing into the Lincoln again, when the Rasta hit the gas instead of the brake.
Throwing her right back onto Kit.
They stared at each other for a second, almost nose to nose, something neither had expected. And then the bokor was throwing her off and trying to stamp her into the space between the cars, so that the Bug would run her over. But that required splitting his attention between Kit and the dhampir, and fighting two opponents at the same time didn't seem to be his forte. Because Kit's hands stayed where they were.
That left him fighting only with Kit's legs, which nonetheless caught the dhampir a savage blow, sending her flying onto the Bug's bumper and then jumping --
And missing, because the car they were in suddenly sped up.
It was raining harder now, which had mostly cleared the streets. That was lucky considering that they were all but flying through the narrow lanes of Old Town, screeching around corners and threatening to turn over. While Kit fought a terrible battle with the bokor for control of his own hands.
The creature finally managed to pry one up despite everything Kit could do to stop him. Only to have to let it go again when he realized what Kit already had: that the little dhampir hadn't missed, after all. She had caught onto their fender and was being dragged along behind the car.
Yes! Kit thought. Yes, you reckless bitch, come get me!
And she was. The next moment, she pushed off from the road and grabbed Kit's right foot. And then his left trouser leg, and then his still tender right thigh, causing him to gasp in pain as she used his body like a ladder to pull herself up. The bokor started flailing his legs around again, but she had a good grip now, and was riding them like a bucking bronco at the fair.
Until the bokor finally realized that he didn't have to figure out how to kill the dhampir; he could simply order his puppet to do it for him.
Kit felt himself automatically dropping into slow-mo, everything going calm and quiet. He could suddenly see individual rain drops sluicing down around him, see the panic in the Rasta's eyes as he stared at them, see the dhampir's stake headed for his chest. And her surprise when it hit metal, because Kit had just moved to the side, not hurrying, taking his time.
Unlike a moment later, when he turned the full force of his speed and fury on her.
* * *
