Alec stepped from between the cars. He was still pulling a shirt on, so I almost missed it when he froze, his nose wrinkling.
“Do you smell that?” he said to me.
I shook my head.
Alec glanced at Ryerson. “Ry, wait—”
But it was too late. The motel room door was old, the wood splitting at the hinges, and Ryerson didn’t need a werewolf’s strength to overcome it. A firm shoulder to the stress point sent the door flying inward.
Ryerson froze in the doorway, staring into the room. Alec closed the distance quickly and stopped next to him. Even three rooms away, the deep growl that emanated from that room raised the hair along my arms.
“Ainsley?” Ryerson called softly. “Run.”
11
My listening skills could use some work.
At least, that’s what Ryerson’s eye flick said when I joined them at the door. I ignored the exasperation in his glare. I was getting really good at that. The room shook with a deep warning growl, and Ryerson’s frustration with me quickly became the least of our problems.
I peeked around Ryerson’s arm and sucked in a breath. There, in the middle of the room, stood what looked like an oversized Rottweiler.
Looks could be deceiving.
I’d felt the pull of magic in this room from three doors away. It was the reason I’d ignored Ryerson’s instruction to run. A room full of gun-toting bad guys? All theirs. But a magical beast? Well, that’s kind of my wheelhouse now, isn’t it?
Not that I had the first clue what to do about it.
Even if I hadn’t felt the magic emanating from it, the beast was clearly not of this world. Its eyes glowed a deep crimson, and the cloying scent of sulfur wafted from its sleek black fur. It snarled, and long strips of drool slid down its fangs to plop against the carpet, which sizzled and burst into tiny flames.
I squeezed the backpack’s opening closed, silently willing Golem to stay hidden.
Another low, unearthly growl rumbled through the room, rattling the picture frames against the walls and raising the hair along my arms.
I reached for my magic, but it shied away, burrowing deep inside me. It was spent. Awesome. Maybe I should have waited by the ice machine after all.
“I told you to wait,” Alec murmured to Ryerson. He was human again, but gold rimmed his irises as he sized up the demon dog.
“Noted,” Ryerson murmured back drily. “What is it?”
“A hellhound. Technically, a demon. I heard the thief we’re looking for—his name is Bilal, by the way—stole one from a sheik in Iran a few years back. Balphegor, I think was the hound’s name. I didn’t believe the rumor, but, well.” He shrugged.
Well, at least we knew we had the right room.
The demon dog took a threatening step forward and swayed, the red glow in its eyes dulling to a muddy brown.
Alec frowned, his gaze drifting over the beast and landing on its enormous shoulder. “It’s been tranqed. There.”
I’d been too distracted by the glowy eyes and the fangs to notice earlier, but sure enough, three tiny pink plumes stuck out of its left shoulder.
“Any special rules for how to kill it?” Ryerson asked.
“No,” Alec said. “When it’s on this plane, it’s vulnerable to anything that would kill a normal—damn it, Ry!”
But even with three tranq darts in its shoulder, the demon dog saw what Ryerson meant to do. By the time Ryerson fired two shots into the room, the dog had vanished in a thick cloud of foul-smelling smoke. Ryerson’s bullets hit the wall, and the tranq darts fell harmlessly to the floor.
“Did you kill it?” I asked doubtfully.
“I don’t think so.”
“If you had let me finish, you’d know it wouldn’t be that easy. Hellhounds aren’t bound to this plane,” Alec said.
“Is it coming back?” Ryerson asked.
“How the hell would I know?”
“Wait here.” Ryerson eased into the room. Alec rolled his eyes and followed him inside. I was totally content with waiting outside this time while they swept the room.
Ryerson opened the bathroom door, and from the grim look on his face, I knew we’d found Bilal.
“Alec,” he said.
Alec joined him at the door and grimaced. “Yeah, that’s him.”
Bilal was dead. Neither of them moved to check a pulse, so make that really dead. I decided to take their word for it. Ryerson searched the bathroom for the Grimoire and then turned his attention to the rest of the room, which was already a mess. Drawers hanging half out of the dresser, one corner of the stripped mattress touching the floor, pictures hanging crookedly on the walls. Alec raided Bilal’s suitcase and then muttered something about checking his bike and left the room.
I thought about using my magic to help with the search, but the room was small, and my magic was weak. It wouldn’t take them long to search it, and besides, I doubted I could light a candle right now, much less locate a magical artifact. I needed to recharge.
I needed pizza.
So while Ryerson searched the room and Alec looked outside, I plopped on the bed and rooted through the nightstand drawer for a takeout menu. What? It wasn’t like the delivery guy would ask to see the bathroom. And if he did, I’d tell him it was out of order.
Proud of myself for preparing for all contingencies—like a real spy—I found a thin phone book and flipped through it. It was in Portuguese, but one page was marked with a receipt. I opened to that. Besides food delivery, what would someone mark in a motel room phone book?
Pool installers, from the grainy black-and-white images, apparently.
I removed the bookmark so no one else would be disappointed. Except it wasn’t a bookmark at all. It was a receipt. And it still had that shiny, new receipt sheen. I glanced at the date.
“Um, guys?”
Ryerson glanced up from the drawers he was ripping out of the dresser. I held up the post-office receipt, dated today. “I think Bilal mailed the book.”
Ryerson crossed the room and I handed him the receipt. He swore and shoved it in his pocket then glanced suspiciously at me. “Were you trying to order pizza to a crime scene?”
“You’re the one who suggested I branch out from Chinese food,” I reminded him. A dark shadow passed behind him, and smoke curled through the room. “Um, Ryerson?”
“You know there’s a dead man in the bathroom, right? What if the delivery guy had wanted to use it?”
A deep growl froze him in place. He slowly turned around, following the direction of my gaze to the hellhound standing behind him.
The hellhound looked pissed. Or maybe that was just a hellhound’s resting expression.
“Nice demon dog,” I whispered.
Ryerson’s gun was in his shoulder holster, but he didn’t reach for it. He was fast, but the hellhound was faster.
As if to prove that point, it snarled and lunged.
Ryerson pulled me into his arms, wrapping his body around mine and giving the beast his back. Protecting me.
“No!” I struggled but it was like trying to wrestle steel, and his grip only tightened. There was nothing to do but wait for the ripping and shredding to begin.
But it never did.
Eventually, Ryerson unburied his head from my neck and loosened his arms enough for me to twist and look over his shoulder.
The hellhound sat in the middle of the bed, head cocked, considering us. No, not us. Ryerson.
Alec stood in the doorway, gun aimed at the hellhound and a strange look on his face. He glanced from the hellhound to Ryerson and back again. Then he lowered the gun and leaned against the doorframe.
“What are you doing?” Ryerson snapped. “Shoot it.”
Amusement shone in his eyes. “Now why would you want me to shoot your dog?”
A muscle ticked in Ryerson’s jaw, but his attention remained focused on the hellhound. “What the hell are you talking about now?”
“Hellhounds like having a master.
Someone to protect. This guy’s last master is dead. Hellhounds choose their master, not the other way around.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
“I heard once that they like to protect the protectors.” He nodded at us, and I realized Ryerson’s arms were still wrapped around me.
Ryerson seemed to realize the same thing. He let me go, but not far. Not with a hellhound sitting a few feet away. Although it didn’t look particularly threatening at the moment. It licked its paw and washed its face.
Ryerson looked doubtfully at the beast, who laid its head on its paws and looked up at Ryerson with wide, monster-dog eyes.
It was kind of cute. In a vicious, slobbery, most likely evil sort of way.
“Fair warning,” Alec said. “I’ve also heard they’re kind of flighty.”
Ryerson eased off the bed, pulling me with him. The hellhound tracked us, but it didn’t move as Ryerson edged us toward the door, keeping himself between me and the hellhound. Only once the door was firmly shut, with the hellhound trapped on the other side, did Ryerson finally let me go. Still, he kept a watchful eye on the big picture window, like he expected the hellhound to leap through it.
“Any ideas who killed your thief?” Ryerson said.
“One,” Alec said. “But you’re not going to like it.”
“Tell me anyway.”
Alec held up the tranq dart. “This isn’t just a tranquilizer. It’s a tracker.”
“So?”
“So I’ve seen them before. When I was on assignment in Russia. They tried to use them on me then. On my wolf form, anyway.”
“You think the Russians killed Bilal?”
“I think the Russians would have orders not to kill something that resembles a supernatural wolf, but to bring him in. The Russians I know are kind of obsessed with werewolves. And I think anyone else would have done what you did and tried to kill it, not sedate it.”
“So you think whoever killed Bilal mistook that demon dog for a werewolf?”
Alec nodded.
“Okay, but why would the Russians want to capture werewolves?”
He shrugged, but there was a stiffness to his shoulders. “It doesn’t matter.”
I opened my mouth to push him on it, but he pushed off the doorframe, suddenly restless, and looked away.
“Come on,” he said. “We should go.”
He clearly didn’t want to talk about it, so I let it go. For now.
Instead of trekking back to the car, Alec suggested we steal one. It was the first thing he and Ryerson had agreed on all day.
While they argued over which car to steal, I found a vending machine. I didn’t have any coins, but I did have a CIA-issued credit card. For emergencies.
I bought six bags of chips and wandered back to the parking lot. Ryerson and Alec spotted me. They both looked relieved, and a little pissed.
“Where did you go?” Ryerson said.
I glanced down at my arms laden with chip bags then back at him. “To get a massage.”
“Don’t wander off, okay?” Alec said. “It’s not safe here.”
Sure, now they agree on something.
In the end, they also agreed on the brown truck with a faded green-and-yellow World Cup bumper sticker, and we piled inside.
“Shouldn’t we leave a note or something?” I said.
“We’re just borrowing it,” Alec said. “We’re also leaving it near a crime scene, so the police will find it quick enough and return it.”
Still. I decided to leave a note with the truck so they’d know where to return it to. And maybe a bag of Doritos. The good, ranch-flavored kind. It was only fair.
Ryerson hotwired the truck, and we drove back to the car without incident. But as we climbed out of the truck’s cab, a hellhound popped its head up from the truck bed, tail wagging and tongue lolling out the side of its mouth.
Ryerson tensed and stared at it. “What the …?”
“Told you it wouldn’t be that easy,” Alec said as he strode past him.
Ryerson whirled on him, one wary eye on the giant dog.
Alec shrugged. “Like I said, it’s not restricted to this plane. It comes and goes when, and where, it pleases.”
Ryerson reached for the stun gun at his waist, which I supposed was an improvement over his real gun. Seemingly unconcerned, the hellhound rolled over and exposed his belly then eyed me like he wanted a tummy rub.
I stepped toward the truck, and Ryerson put a hand on my arm.
“You’re not really going to stun him after someone just tranqed him, are you? He was helpless, unable to protect his last master. Poor guy.”
Ryerson pulled his hand from his waist. I knew it. He was a big soft—
He pulled the stun gun and zapped the hellhound in the shoulder. The hound’s attention had been focused on me and that belly rub, and it hadn’t spared Ryerson so much as a wary glance. It spasmed once and slumped to the truck bed.
Alec shook his head, and I stared at him.
“That was mean,” I said.
“Come on,” he said and walked to the car without so much as a backward glance at the truck.
We drove to the post office. Alec and I waited in the car while Ryerson went inside to scare the postal workers into handing over the package Bilal had sent. Ten minutes later he pushed through the doors and into the parking lot, empty-handed and looking even more pissy than usual.
“They refused to pull the package for him,” Alec guessed.
“It’s already en route,” I predicted.
“Ten bucks?”
“Make it twenty.”
“Pretty confident.”
I flashed him a smile, and then Ryerson slid into the driver’s seat.
“It’s en route,” he said. “They wouldn’t tell me where it’s headed. Why are you smiling about that?”
I stuck my hand over the back seat. “Pay up.”
Alec grinned and rooted around in his pants. Er, Ryerson’s pants. Which made it Ryerson’s money. I shook my head. “You can owe me.”
“How about I buy you dinner instead?” Alec said, flashing that dimple, and my heart did a weird pirouette into my throat.
If I hadn’t been sitting next to him, I wouldn’t have noticed the way Ryerson’s hands tightened over the steering wheel, flexing against the cracked leather.
“Why don’t we find the book first,” I said carefully.
“I’ll call the office,” Ryerson said. “See what they’ve dug up on Bilal’s known associates and employment history, and whether they can hack the post office’s database to find out … what?”
Ryerson cast an irritated glance at the rearview mirror, where Alec was looking much too pleased with himself.
“I know where he sent the book,” he said.
Ryerson waited, a muscle ticking in his jaw.
“Well?” I finally said, exasperated. “Where did he send it?”
Alec shook his head and nodded at Ryerson. “If I tell you, he’ll just try to arrest me and go after the book without me.”
“He wouldn’t …”
I glanced at Ryerson and trailed off. Not only did that sound exactly like something he would do, but he didn’t deny it.
“He’s been planning my arrest for a while now. He’s just waiting for me to stop being useful.” Alec said it conversationally, but there was a tic in his jaw.
“You’re not so useful now,” Ryerson muttered.
“I told you, he’s a company man. Always will be.” He looked at Ryerson as he said it, and Ryerson’s eyes narrowed.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” he snapped.
Alec shrugged, but it was stiff. Bitter. “It means you put the Company first, above everything else. No matter what.”
“As opposed to what? You, who put your own self-interest above everything?”
A rare flash of anger crossed Alec’s features and he leaned forward, straining against the safety belt. “You have no idea what I’ve been th
rough. When the Company gave you its version of what happened, you just believed them. You never bothered to ask questions. To ask me what happened. You just blindly believed everything they told you. It’s what you’re best at.”
Ryerson’s eyes flashed and the car jerked as he veered it onto the shoulder, threw it in park, and turned in his seat.
“So explain it to me then. What did the Company do to you that made you kill those five agents?”
“For fuck’s sake, Ry. That’s exactly what I’m talking about. I didn’t kill them! It was a setup.”
Ryerson snorted, and Alec’s eyes burned gold. He was on edge, close to turning. Ryerson didn’t back down. In fact, he looked like he welcomed a fight with an angry werewolf inside his cramped SUV.
This is finally getting interesting, said a voice. The same voice I had heard in the hallway outside Isadora’s.
My hallucination was back.
It made me crabby.
“Enough,” I snapped. “Both of you.”
I glared at each of them in turn, and surprisingly, they seemed to listen. The gold around Alec’s irises faded to a pale yellow. Good enough.
I swung my glare to Ryerson, but he wasn’t looking at me. Well, not at my face, anyway. He was tense, wary, and his attention was focused on my hands. I glanced down, surprised to find them glowing blue. I didn’t remember calling my magic, but clearly, I must have.
With effort, I focused on drawing my magic back into me. When I opened my eyes again, both of them were watching me warily. Like I was the most dangerous one in this car.
Right.
But as long as I had their attention, I might as well use it.
“This is what’s going to happen. We all want the book. Ryerson wants it because the CIA doesn’t want the bad guys to have it. Alec wants it because it might contain a cure for the werewolf curse. He also knows where the book is, or at least he thinks he does. What?” I said when Alec gave me a look. “I know this is hard to accept, but there’s a chance you’re wrong about Ryerson.”
A smile tugged at Ryerson’s lips. Apparently all it took to earn one was putting Alec in his place. They were both impossible.
“Actually, that look I gave you was because you told Ryerson why I want the Grimoire. Spies aren’t usually so honest.”
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