Deadly Sting

by Jennifer Estep

  I nodded. That sounded exactly like something Clementine would do, given what I’d seen here tonight.

  “So what do you need me to do?” Bria asked.

  “Grab Xavier and get out here,” I said. “Just you two. I don’t want a whole bunch of cops showing up, sirens blaring, and spooking the robbers before I’m ready. Also, track down Jo-Jo. Finn had said that she was on a date with Cooper tonight. I couldn’t tell how badly Phillip was injured, but at the very least, he’s lost a lot of blood, and I want her to be able to heal him just as soon as it’s safe.”

  “I’m waving Xavier over here right now. I’ll call Jo-Jo and tell her to get out there as soon as she can. I’ll text you when Xavier and I are on the island.”

  “Good,” I said. “I’ve disarmed the rune trap on the bridge, but I’d still leave your car on the mainland side and cross on foot. After the two of you are on the island, stay in the gardens and move through them. That should keep you and Xavier away from any giants who might be patrolling the museum perimeter. I’m going inside right now to get Owen away from Clementine and her men. Once I have him, we’ll head to the gardens on the west side of the island. Clementine’s set up some cell-phone jammers inside the museum, so if I miss your text or don’t respond, you and Xavier work your way through the gardens to that part of the island. That’s where we’ll meet.”

  “See you there.” Bria hesitated again. “And, Gin?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Watch your back.”

  The concern in her voice warmed my heart. It always amazed me how far our relationship had come in the months since Bria had returned to Ashland. How we’d gone from suspicion, anger, and mistrust to understanding, acceptance, and respect.

  “Don’t worry, baby sister. I always do.”

  * * *

  I hung up with Bria, silenced my phone and clipped it to my belt, and closed the trunk on the Aston Martin. Then I grabbed the bomb and carefully set it on top of the smooth metal lid so I could study the cluster of wires and figure out which buttons to push to turn the attached cell phone into a timer that would trigger the device.

  While I worked, I also turned up the volume on my stolen walkie-talkie. Clementine had trained her crew well, because there was no unnecessary chatter clogging up the airwaves. Just brief bursts of conversation about the giants moving from one room to the next, stripping all of the art from the floors and walls, and loading it up.

  “The first truck is full,” Dixon said at one point. “We’ll have to open the second one now.”

  “Roger that,” Opal responded. “I’ve got the rest of the jewelry loaded into the other two cases and ready for transport.”

  Once again, I wondered where exactly the giants were stashing the jewelry, but it didn’t really matter. I didn’t care about the gems and what became of them—only what happened to my friends and the rest of the hostages.

  After that . . . silence, as the giants continued with their various tasks. I’d just found the command to program the cell-phone timer when the walkie-talkie crackled again.

  “Anton?” Clementine’s voice filled the air. “You and Hannah back inside the museum yet?”

  I hesitated, debating whether or not to answer her. Anton had been one of the giants I’d killed at the bridge, so it wasn’t like he was going to chime in. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing and tip off Clementine that someone was running around the museum murdering her men, but I still needed a few more minutes of anonymity before I made my presence known.

  “Anton?” Clementine asked again, her voice sharper and more demanding than before.

  From the conversations I’d heard, it didn’t sound like the crew was using complicated code words, so I decided to risk it.

  “Done,” I said, making my voice as deep and manly as possible. “Heading back now.”

  “Good,” she responded. “Grayson is almost through the last of the hinges on the vault. Shouldn’t take him more than another five minutes. So get your ass back up here, help the others load up the rest of the art, and get ready to move out.”

  “Roger that,” I rumbled again.

  I waited a few seconds, but Clementine didn’t respond, and I didn’t hear any other chatter either. It seemed like she’d bought my act, so I turned the volume back down, grabbed the bomb, and left the parking lot.

  I snuck through the bushes until I was flush against the museum once more. I hugged the wall and hurried all the way around the building to the same side door I’d first snuck out of. Looking inside through the glass, I saw that the area was still dark. No giants moved in the hallway or adjoining rooms, so I used my stolen key card to open the door and slipped inside. Once again, the small snick sounded as loud as a gong banging in the mausoleum quiet of the museum, but there was nothing I could do to muffle the noise.

  Now it was decision time. Where to plant the bomb? I needed a spot close enough to the vault to get Clementine’s attention but far enough away to give me a chance to grab Owen, figure out what she was after in the vault, and get out before she realized that the blast was just a diversion.

  Near the rotunda, I decided. The giants might have raised one gate so they could come and go from the area, but the hostages had zero chance of escaping with all of the other exits blocked. The bomb should have more than enough power to blow through one of the gates and create an opening.

  I headed in that direction, once again tiptoeing across open doorways where Clementine’s giants were still looting various parts of the museum. Judging from all the tubes, boxes, and crates clustered in the rooms, she’d trained her crew to be quick and efficient. She had tens of millions packed up already, more than enough to fund the most lavish criminal syndicate—or retirement—imaginable. So what was in the vault that was so important that she’d risk sticking around to get it? What score was bigger than what she already had?

  I was going to find out—just as soon as I set off the bomb.

  I made it all the way back to the main hallway that led into the rotunda. It was easy enough to hurry over to one of the side entrances, attach the bomb to the center of the metal gate there, and set the timer on the cell phone for ninety seconds.

  90. I stared at the numbers on the phone, drew in a breath, and then let it out, preparing myself for the bloody battle to come. I was going to do this—I had to do this for Owen, Phillip, Roslyn, Eva, Finn, and everyone else the giants had trapped inside the rotunda. And for everyone Clementine and her men had already hurt and killed tonight—including Jillian.

  Especially Jillian.

  That black, murderous rage rose in me again, coating every part of my heart and soul, freezing my softer emotions, and making me cold, hard, and strong enough to do what was necessary. I leaned forward and hit the Send button on the cell phone. As soon as the timer started, I turned and ran in the opposite direction, not caring who saw or heard me.

  Because there was no stopping the bomb now.

  Or the Spider.

  15

  As I raced toward my destination, I counted off the seconds in my head.

  Ten . . . Reach the end of the rotunda section . . .

  Twenty . . . Start sprinting toward the vault . . .

  Thirty . . . Reach the hallway that leads to the vault . . .

  Forty-five . . . Slow my steps, quick, quick, quiet, quiet now . . .

  Sixty . . . Look for a place to hide out of sight of the vault entrance . . .

  Seventy . . . There, behind that doorway will do, giants have already looted this room . . .

  Eighty . . . Knife in my hand, the spider rune stamped into the hilt pressing against the larger scar on my palm, familiar, comforting . . .

  Ninety . . . Take a breath . . . get ready . . .

  BOOM!

  For a moment, there was just—noise. I couldn’t see the explosion, but I heard it, this great, thunderous roar, like a dragon belching fire, which rocked the whole museum. All around me, the stones screamed as the bomb blasted through the gate and
into them, scorching the marble with heat and smoke and force and fire. I winced and shut the anguished wails out of my mind. I didn’t like destroying stone, especially something as beautiful as the museum’s gray marble, but it was a necessary evil—just like all the other horrible things I planned to do before the night was through.

  More like before the next three minutes were through.

  As soon as the last rumble from the blast faded away, I started counting off the seconds in my head once again.

  Ten . . . twenty . . . thirty . . . forty-five . . .

  The door that led toward the vault area flew open, banging into the wall so hard that it cracked the stone there. Clementine raced out, a gun in one hand and her walkie-talkie in the other. Dixon rushed along behind her, his gun also drawn. Given what I’d seen on the security camera earlier, that meant that there were at least three men still in the vault with Owen, maybe more.

  “What the hell was that?!” Clementine screamed into her walkie-talkie as she ran.

  Crackles and hisses burped back to her, but I couldn’t make out the sounds or what the other giants were saying. It was all just background noise anyway. The only thing that mattered right now was reaching Owen and getting him to safety.

  I waited until the two giants had disappeared down the hallway, then grabbed a second knife and sprinted for the open door. It led into a short hallway that opened up into an enormous chamber, with the vault sitting at the very back of that room. I raced forward, not even bothering to be quiet or cautious. The time for that was long over, along with hiding in the shadows.

  Too bad the giants were waiting for me.

  There were three of them in the chamber, just as I’d seen earlier through the security-camera feed. All three had their guns drawn and were facing the door, forming a solid line of mass, muscle, and malice. For a moment, my gaze flicked past the giants to Owen, but I couldn’t see him clearly, so all I got was the sense that he was standing behind them, nothing more. One of the giants stood at more of an angle to the door than the others, his weapon trained on Owen instead of me. Still, the sight lifted my heart, because if Owen was still standing, then he was still breathing, still alive—which meant that I still had a chance to save him.

  As soon as they saw me running toward them, two of the giants lifted their guns and fired. Not able to avoid getting hit, I reached for my Stone magic and used it to harden my skin.

  Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!

  Bullets zipped through the air all around me, and the stench of gunpowder mixed with the haze of smoke and fumes from the elemental Fire and the welders’ torches that had been used on the vault. A couple of the bullets hit my chest and bounced off, adding more holes to my already ruined dress, not to mention ugly black spider-web cracks to the walls.

  I threw myself forward onto the giant on the far right, since he was holding a gun in one hand and a ball of elemental Fire in the other.

  My knives punched into his chest in a quick one-two combination. The giant screamed, rammed his gun against my chest, and pulled the trigger, but the bullet hit my hardened skin and bounced off like all the others had. With his other hand, he shoved the ball of Fire into my chest, but I stepped forward and plastered my body to his, smothering the flames before they could do much more than singe my dress.

  I stepped to one side so that the giant was between me and his friends, pulled my knives free, and then plunged them back into his chest once more in that same brutal one-two combo, like a boxer working his opponent on the ropes. Only instead of going in for another quick jab, I yanked the knives out a second time and sliced one of the blades across his throat.

  I’d just repositioned the knives in my hands when the giant in the middle cursed and shoved his dying comrade out of the way. He dropped his gun, realizing that it wouldn’t do him any good, and slammed into me, driving me across the chamber and into the far wall, right next to a table filled with art supplies. The force of the blow ripped my knives out of my hands and forced the air from my lungs with an evil hiss. My head snapped back against the marble, and I blinked and blinked, trying to fight off the sudden daze. My hold on my magic slipped, and my skin reverted to its normal soft texture. The giant noticed and grinned, drawing his fist back for a killing blow.

  Desperate, I reached down, searching for something, anything, that I could use to fend off the giant. My hand closed around a handle on a small bucket of paint. I brought it up and slammed it into the side of the giant’s face. Scarlet paint erupted out of the bucket and splattered all over him. The giant grunted and shook his head, trying to clear the fog from his mind and the paint out of his eyes.

  I tossed the bucket aside and reached down again. This time, my hand closed around a paintbrush with a thick handle. I snapped the brush down at an angle on the edge of the table, causing the wood to crack on a diagonal and giving me a sharp point to work with instead of just a blunt block of wood.

  The giant reached for me again, and I buried the daggerlike tip of the paintbrush in his throat. The wood wasn’t nearly as sharp as one of my knives, but I kept sawing it in deeper and deeper, and the giant quickly started backing away from me instead of surging forward.

  I didn’t let him.

  I held on to the end of the paintbrush and followed him, still twisting the wooden point into his body. When his legs finally started to buckle, I ripped the wood out of his throat and drove the point through his right eye, causing him to topple to one side.

  He was dead before he hit the floor, but I was already moving, moving, moving toward the third and final man.

  “You bitch!” he growled.

  The last man had a gun too, which he immediately turned in my direction. But the giant had forgotten that Owen was also still in the vault—and holding a burning welder’s torch. Owen reached up, grabbed the giant’s shoulder, and shoved the concentrated flame into the back of the giant’s head. His hair went up in a whoosh of smoke, and the acrid smell of charred flesh flooded the vault. The giant forgot all about shooting me. Instead, he screamed and batted at Owen, trying to push him away. I grabbed my knives from the floor, and a blade to the giant’s heart ended his struggles and misery.

  I stood there, a knife in either hand, breathing hard and trying to suck down as much oxygen as I could and push away the dull, pulsing pain of the fight. Owen slowly lowered the torch and turned it off.

  We stared at each other, blood everywhere, three dead giants at our feet, the air hot, thick, and caustic with the stench of melted metal, burnt hair, and singed skin. Not exactly a romantic reunion, but I’d take what I could get, especially since we’d both survived the fight.

  “Gin?” Owen whispered, his face white and tight with shock. “Is that really you?”

  I grinned. “Isn’t all the blood a dead giveaway?”

  “But I thought . . . in the rotunda . . . the body . . .” His voice trailed off, as if the words choked him.

  I shook my head.

  He looked at my ruined dress, and understanding flashed in his violet eyes. I kept staring at him, wondering what he was thinking, what he was feeling now that he knew I was still alive.

  Without a word, Owen stepped forward, dragged me into his arms, bloody knives and all, and crushed his mouth to mine.

  16

  I sighed, welcoming the sensation, welcoming the embrace, welcoming him.

  For a moment, our bodies melded together, even as our tongues dueled back and forth in a hot, furious kiss. His fingers pressed into my back, and I stepped even closer to him, desperate for more, aching for every single part of me to be touching him. Owen’s mouth slid off mine, and he buried his lips in my hair, his arms tightening around me even more, even as we both trembled and tried to catch our breath.

  I closed my eyes, brought my hands up to his muscled back, and returned his hug, careful not to cut him with my knives. Then I just enjoyed the moment—the solid strength of his arms circling me again, the warmth of his skin pressing into mine, the hot whisper of his
breath in my hair. I drank it all in, imprinting it on my mind, holding it close to my heart, and savoring every last second of it.

  Then I dropped my arms and slowly pulled away from him, because we weren’t safe yet, and the danger was far from over.

  “How are you?” I asked. “Did they hurt you?”

  Owen shook his head. “No. They just wanted me to open the vault, which I finally managed to do, right before that explosion ripped through the air. Your handiwork?”

  I grinned again. “Of course.”

  Owen grinned back at me. Once again I savored the moment, then headed over to the vault door. Except for the wheel and hinges, which both had a smushed, melted look to them, the once-sturdy door was still intact—it just wasn’t standing in front of the vault anymore. The door had been moved to one side, creating a five-foot-wide opening into the vault.

  Owen noticed me staring at the door. “Once the giants and I got through the lock and hinges, Clementine picked up the door and lifted it out of the way all by herself. It was impressive. I had no idea she was that strong.”

  He was right. It was impressive—and worrisome. Because Clementine being that strong meant that I’d have to be even stronger to kill her. And I simply wasn’t. Not now.

  Oh, I was a powerful elemental, but I’d already used up part of my magic fighting her crew. I had some power stored in the spider rune ring on my index finger and the knives I was carrying, but I didn’t know if it would be enough. Now I was starting to wonder if the power, magic, and energy I’d already expended would mean the difference between Clementine dying—or me.

  Owen sighed and slumped against the side of the vault. For the first time, I noticed the sweat and soot on his face, the tired slant of his mouth, the slight sag of his shoulders. Sparks from the torches had landed on his tuxedo, leaving holes in his jacket, shirt, and pants, and his black hair was plastered to his forehead. Still, I thought he’d never looked more handsome or appealing.