by Jess Haines
The two hunters scrambled over the fence, though Tiny had a hard time with his injured arm cradled against his chest. His dark skin was tinged a bit gray, and he was sweating profusely, but I hoped that was from the exertion and not because the zombie had infected him.
The four of us left the other White Hats behind, dashing across the parking lot. If we could get to the main drag, we might be able to flag a cab or catch a bus away from this crazy part of town.
Of course, Gideon had to be waiting for us at the entrance to the lot, hands on his jean-clad hips. His glowing eyes watched us over the lenses of rectangular, greenish sunglasses that should have looked ridiculous, but somehow fit perfectly on the guy. There had to be fifty zombies crowded around him, blocking the way out, waiting for us.
The way this trip had been going so far, why was I even surprised?
Chapter 23
“You two are really starting to get on my nerves,” Gideon said, glaring at Sara and me over the tops of his sunglasses.
That startled a laugh out of me. “We’re getting on your nerves? What the hell are you doing here? Starting the zombie apocalypse?”
Sara gave a slight start, and my gaze flicked over to her. Her brows had shot up, lending her an expression of mixed confusion and recognition.
It only then occurred to me that Gideon’s “fade” spell might have been in effect in that alley outside Thrane’s place. Sara must not have remembered what the necromancer looked like, though I certainly hadn’t forgotten. Maybe that meant the charm on my necklace was working after all. It could cut through illusions and spells that were meant to affect a broad area, but wasn’t powerful enough to resist a direct attack, like his command to make me sleep. Good to know the charm had its limits, though I wished Arnold had said something so I didn’t have to learn through experience.
For his part, Gideon didn’t appear very thrilled with us, either. “What? Of course not!” His lips pressed together, spots of color appearing high on his cheeks. Stalking forward, he stabbed a finger in my direction. “You need to stay the hell away from Clyde. What are you doing here with a bunch of hunters, hmm?” he demanded, waving a hand at Devon and Tiny, then in the direction of the other White Hats fighting in a clump just up the hill.
“She’s a friend,” Devon snarled, leveling a gun at the necromancer’s head.
Gideon was not impressed. He rolled his eyes, waving a hand airily in Devon’s direction. “Oh, please. Spare me the theatrics. Put the gun down.”
“Get out of our way, and I’ll put it down.”
“Mmmm . . . no.”
Gideon’s gaze met Devon’s, and his lips moved as if he were whispering something to the hunter.
Devon lowered the gun. His eyes glazed, his jaw going slack. Gideon was doing something similar to whatever he had done to Sara and me before when he had commanded us to sleep. A black enchant—the worst kind of way to mess with the mind. Stealing away a person’s will.
There wasn’t anything I could do about it. By the time I recognized what the necromancer was doing, he had finished toying with Devon’s mind. Devon was clutching at his temples, the barrel of the gun pointed at the sky. Gideon grinned, pleased with himself, and was now looking at me.
Fuck.
“What did you do to him?” I asked, hating how my voice shook. I wondered if I could get off a shot before Gideon could pull the same trick on me.
“Oh, nothing much. Just kept him from getting any ideas about pulling that trigger when he’s pointing that gun at me. And I won’t hesitate to do the same to you.” The necromancer’s gaze flicked from Devon to me and back, his lips pursing. The hand he had been waving at Devon stilled, then clenched, one finger ticking back and forth between us. “You two . . . ?” One brow cocked in question.
“No,” I said, imitating his earlier stance, hands on my hips. This guy was so obviously full of himself and what he was capable of that it made me briefly regret I hadn’t turned Were. There was no way that I could see to hurt him back for what he had done. The best I could do was to hurl sarcasm at him. “What’s it to you, anyway? We weren’t coming after you or Fabian or Clyde.” Not yet, anyway. Hoped he couldn’t detect the little white lie. “We were going to meet some friends. How the hell did you know where we were?”
“Girlfriend, do not try me. You have no idea what kind of headache I have from raising enough zombies to make a bridge across the LA River and block the freeway, then simultaneously hold off police, a pissed off werewolf, and a bunch of vigilante hunters with far too high an opinion of their fighting abilities. Not to mention while holding a rational conversation with you. Cut the crap and give me the skinny. Why are you headed into town, and what the hell are you doing with a bunch of White Hats?”
A pained noise made me look over at Tiny. He had fallen to one knee, still clutching at his injured arm with his good one. Devon and Sara both rushed over to his side. The necromancer didn’t try to stop them, but the zombies started inching forward. We had to get out of there.
“Please,” I said, the words spilling out in a rush as I gestured frantically at Tiny who was now flat on his back, “we don’t care what you and Fabian are up to. You want to kill Clyde? By all means, be my guest. Just let us go so we can take my friend to the hospital. I swear, we’re just friends. I originally met them in New York. They helped me and Alec Royce out when another vampire tried to take over—”
“Max Carlyle?”
“Yes, him. He was attacking a bunch of the vampires in the city, and these guys helped us out. Royce sent Sara and me here to lie low with Clyde while he sorts out a mess I made back home. It’s my fault we’re here, not the White Hats’. Fabian said you guys were going to do something awful to Clyde, so we thought we’d be safer with the White Hats. That’s all. Okay?”
Gideon considered this, one hand stroking his chin as he regarded me. The intense glow in his eyes faded a little. “Fabian informed me that you two had run off. He thought you were getting reinforcements to stop us. Stay out of our business, capiche?”
“Yeah, whatever—can we go now?”
He shook his head, stalking forward. Some of the zombies inched closer, though for the most part they hung back, still blocking the way out of the lot.
Gideon—unnecessarily, I might add—made sure he took a path that gave him a reason to give me a little shove on the shoulder, then bent to slide one hand in a very provocative way up Devon’s back. “Out of the way, lover boy.”
The hunter wasn’t expecting the touch and fell on his side, scrambling away on hands and knees, before he remembered his gun and held it at the necromancer with both trembling hands. His finger tightened on the trigger, but not enough for the gun to go off. He cursed, the muscles and tendons in his arms and hands standing out in stark relief as he fought the mental suggestion preventing him from shooting.
All Sara did was lean back, but she didn’t leave Tiny’s side.
Tiny had closed his eyes, one huge hand engulfing Sara’s. She glared over Tiny’s prone form at Gideon, who wasn’t paying any of us much mind, muttering to himself as he examined the bite marks.
The glow in the necromancer’s eyes brightened before he shut them, resting both of his hands on Tiny’s injured arm. He didn’t say or do anything that I could see to cast his spell, but the bite marks were knitting themselves shut, and color was coming back to Tiny’s normally dark skin. His breathing evened out; his eyelids were fluttering.
Of all the things I was expecting the necromancer might do, healing Tiny’s injury was one of the last on the list.
Blowing out a breath as the last of the gray tinge left his patient’s skin, Gideon withdrew, falling back a bit ungracefully on his ass. A couple of the zombies fell over, completely still.
Tiny groaned, one hand lifting to his forehead, though he remained on his back. “What the hell happened?”
“You had a close call,” Gideon replied. He lifted his glasses and rubbed under his eyes, making no effort to hide the
strain in his voice. “And now I’m exhausted. Perfect.”
Devon still hadn’t lowered his gun. One hand fumbled at Tiny’s shoulder, then pulled him away from where Gideon was seated. The mage watched with dull interest for a moment, then turned his attention on Sara.
“You might want to do something about those runes, sweets.”
She paled, withdrawing to cross her arms, fingertips curling around her forearms. “What? How . . . how did you know?”
“How did you think I found you? Makes it easy for anyone like me to tap in and take a taste. You’re lucky I have some scruples, unlike whoever branded you.”
My brows furrowed, and I took a step forward to put my hand on Sara’s shoulder. She looked like she was about to be sick; her breathing sped up to the point I was concerned she might hyperventilate. “Hey, someone want to hit me with a clue-bat over here? What the hell are you two talking about?”
Gideon smirked, reaching over Tiny to snag one of Sara’s arms and pull it out straight. She didn’t resist, though she made a little sound in her throat like a wounded puppy. One hand held her wrist while the other tugged on the cuff of her sleeve, pulling it up to reveal the inside of her forearm.
My eyes bugged. I had to sit down, my palms scraping on the concrete and the gun digging into my hip.
Why the hell hadn’t she told me about the scars from marks that had been obviously, deliberately carved into her? They were an angry red against her otherwise pale skin, not the smooth, shiny gleam of normal scar tissue. Like there was blood pooled just under the surface, making them appear even more unnatural.
“Someone’s been naughty. This is the darkest of the dark stuff, my dear. Believe me, I should know. Care to tell me how it happened?”
Sara didn’t answer, tears pooling in her eyes. She yanked her arm out of his grip and cradled it to her chest, pulling her sleeve back down and ducking her head. I leaned over to pull her into a hug, though I was so tempted to throttle her to get answers out of her about how it had happened and why she had hidden something so important from me that I was shaking almost as badly as she was.
Gideon slowly rose to his feet, though he staggered before catching his balance. A couple more of the zombies fell where they stood—leading me to believe he was even more exhausted than he had let on.
His smile aimed at Sara was dark and sly, disarmingly charming. “I don’t suppose you’d let me take a bit to freshen up, would you? Just a smidge?”
“Stay away from me!”
She practically hollered her demand, though it was muffled against my chest since she refused to look at the guy. My grip on her tightened, and I turned a death glare on him.
“I bet whoever did it made it hurt. Made you think you were dying. Right?”
“Stop it! Can’t you see you’re upsetting her?” I snapped at him.
“Did he or she make it feel like you were turning inside out? Like every scrap of energy was being burned out of your blood with every breath you took?” His voice lowered to a seductive whisper. “Like he or she was inside you, feeling it all, knowing everything about you—leaving no part of you untouched?”
Sara shoved back from me, her hands on my shoulders, twisting to look up at Gideon. His lips twitched, curving into a self-satisfied smirk as she screamed at him.
“Yes! Yes, you fucking asshole! He carved me up and burned me out, and now I can’t fucking stand it because I will never be able to forget what it was like having him in my head and everywhere else! It’s like he never left, you insensitive prick!”
“There, that’s good. Savor that anger. Don’t you feel better already?”
She twisted away from me, putting her head in her hands and not answering him. He reached out to touch her shoulder—I thought maybe to comfort her, showing just how damned naive I can be—but the scream that came from her and brief flash of light from the runes even through the fabric of her sleeves made it clear that wasn’t it.
I’d never heard her make a sound like that before. It curdled my blood, shocking me so badly I nearly screamed myself.
Tiny and Devon both shot to their feet, I hoped to defend her, but Tiny couldn’t keep his balance. Devon had to catch Tiny before he collapsed.
As he pulled away, Gideon looked much better—but Sara was now choking for every breath, the angry flush in her cheeks having faded until she was ghostly pale. Straightening his cuffs, Gideon turned that dazzling smile on me as I gaped up at him, grabbing at Sara so she wouldn’t fall over.
“Sorry, lovey. Needed to get her revved up before I took a taste. She was looking a bit too peaked to be much use. Give her a couple days of bed rest, and she’ll be good as new.”
I pulled her limp form into my lap, still staring up at the necromancer, unable to believe this vicious turnaround. She felt so cold, like all the warmth and life had been drained out of her by that brief touch.
Gideon spread his arms and breathed deep, like he was totally invigorated. I don’t know how he could stand to breathe in that stink—not with the zombies so close—but he soon turned his attention and that sunny smile back to me, like nothing at all had happened.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, things to do and all that. Speaking of . . .”
He turned and gestured at the zombies that had fallen. They started clambering back to their feet, and he headed toward them, giving us a little finger wave over his shoulder without looking back. By the time I thought to reach for my gun again, he was already surrounded by a protective wall of zombies, his voice fading fast.
“Remember, stay away from Clyde. If you ask nice, when I’m done dealing with him maybe I’ll get rid of those pesky blood runes. Ta, ladies!”
Chapter 24
“Christ. We are fucked.”
I looked over the top of Sara’s head at Devon, who was still holding Tiny up by bracing his legs and offering a shoulder to lean on. He must have been stronger than he looked to support the big guy like that.
Then I saw the slight tremble at his knees. I was afraid to let go of Sara, but I was even more afraid that Tiny might fall down and squash Devon if I didn’t help. Carefully setting her down, I got to my feet and rushed over to get under Tiny’s other arm. He shifted his weight a little so Devon wasn’t completely supporting him. Good lord, the guy was heavy!
“We’re not fucked,” I said between pants. “We’re in a bad place, yeah, but we have one less vampire and one less necromancer after our butts. This is a good thing.”
“Shia, we can’t leave that thing running around loose on the streets. Look what he’s done!”
I didn’t bother to argue the point. “Where are we going to go? We can’t carry Sara and Tiny out of here.” From the sounds of fighting and gunshots still coming from the freeway, we couldn’t go back to the car, either. People were starting to gather in the doorway of the office building, too. “I don’t see any cabs. . . .”
“Uh. This isn’t like New York,” Tiny said. “You have to call for cabs to come to you. Here, let me sit—”
The sudden shift in his weight nearly sent all three of us to our knees. Devon and I both had to do some fancy footwork to prevent a spectacular face-plant. Together we eased Tiny to the ground until the three of us were seated and breathing like we’d run a marathon.
“Thanks. Give me a few minutes to catch my breath, then we can get out of here.”
Sara was stirring. I inched closer to her, checking her forehead and her pulse—not that there would be much I could do for her at this point, but it made me feel like I wasn’t completely helpless. She was still a bit chilled, but not as bad as she had been when Gideon first stole . . . whatever it was he had taken from her. Ruminating on whether it was her life force, or part of her soul, or what, was going to be eating at me for a good long while.
What had happened to her? How could Gideon feed off her energy like that?
I wracked my brain, trying to think of when or how it might have happened. I didn’t want to think Arnold could have been
responsible for it, but it was clearly magework.
Then it hit me.
Sara had always been more elegant in her manner of dress than I was. When we were working, she had always worn long-sleeved blouses for as long as I’d known her. She wore T-shirts and jeans now and again, sure, but the long sleeves hadn’t become a part of her after-work ensemble until after I became contracted to Royce.
After the battle with the sorcerer. David Borowsky had kidnapped Sara for the better portion of a day—a period of time she never talked about. Not even with me.
The kid dealt in the worst kind of blood magic, summoning demons and who knew what else. It was not a far stretch of the imagination to think that he might have been using his skills in the dark arts to do something to hurt Sara. And considering how strong she was, how much she hated being told what to do or how to do it by anyone, being under some magical being’s control wouldn’t have been any picnic for her.
I knew. I’d experienced what it was like being a puppet to Max and to Royce. It was one of the most frightening things that had ever happened to me. Even knowing Royce had no intention of hurting me and wouldn’t do anything to abuse the power he held over me, those few days of having no conscious choice in when or how I answered to him had been a special kind of hell to live through.
It had been more terrifying than answering to Max—at least I had known what the crazy-ass douche-canoe wanted from me. To use and discard me, just a pawn in his games to take whatever Royce cared about from him.
Royce was still in many ways a mystery to me. A puzzle I wouldn’t be able to solve until I returned to New York.
As for Sara, I couldn’t imagine how much scarier it must have been to have something so incorporeal as your energy sucked away instead of something physical, like blood. Being bitten by vampires was already enough to give me the heebie-jeebies. Having my soul sucked out with no more than a touch was a thought too horrid to bear.
