"Eva," he said fiercely. "I could do nothing but love you after seeing you."
He kissed her, then, and showed her every bit of his heart, too, and she realized there was no point in denial or disbelief. Flynn gave her all of himself and she welcomed him into her arms and her heart and her soul.
It felt like everything.
It felt like forever.
At exactly three a.m., Snake called.
Chapter Ten
Flynn didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing. They’d gotten dressed in silence, and all the while he was furiously thinking of how to stop this. He’d give anything for an idea—any idea—that would get him inside that copper mine without Eva. But Snake had agreed, almost too eagerly, to bring Flynn into the inner circle in exchange for Eva.
Now all that was left was to drive to the mine.
Eva was so pale that each individual freckle stood out like a scar on the porcelain of her face. She shoved her feet into her shoes and stood, looking around as if trying to memorize every inch of the tiny apartment.
As if she knew she’d never return.
“Eva—”
“No. There’s no other way.” She brushed by him in the doorway and ran down the steps.
Flynn was a broken man. How could he allow her to go into danger?
How could he not?
They had a twenty-minute drive to the mine. Surely, please, gods, he could think of something—anything—in twenty minutes. He swallowed hard and then started down the steps after her.
“Flynn,” she said, but her voice sounded wrong. Terrified.
He realized he’d been a fool. They’d been ambushed.
He leapt over the side of the railing and landed just in front of Eva, between her and the threats ranged around them. Monkey, a big guy Flynn didn’t recognize, and Zach were all there, lined up and ready for a fight. Zach leaned back against Flynn’s bike, and Monkey stayed safely out of range, but the big guy rocked back and forth, rhythmically punching one massive fist into the palm of his other hand.
“Snake?” he asked, but he doubted it. This guy didn’t look bright enough to interest Eva. Flynn studied the low-brow face and bulging eyes and reconsidered.
He didn’t look like he was bright enough to tie his own shoes.
“No, I don’t know who that is,” Eva said, her voice shaking.
“I’m Rock, pretty lady,” the thug said, showing them his blackened teeth.
Flynn flicked a contemptuous look at the moron. “As in ‘dumb as a…’?”
It took Rock a minute, but then he snarled and started forward, exactly as Flynn had hoped. Fights were always easier when you divided and conquered.
“Cut it out, Rock,” Monkey ordered. “Safety in numbers. All right, man. Hand over the woman. You’re outnumbered.”
Flynn smiled. It wasn’t a nice smile. Monkey flinched at the sight of it.
“Not a chance, you bunch of losers. I said I’d give her to Snake, and only Snake. We had a deal. I get patched into the Dark Angels, and he gets the woman.” Flynn didn’t have to try to fake the rage in his voice. It was one of the hardest things he’d ever done in his life, calling Eva “the woman” less than an hour after she’d been coming apart in his arms.
He had to save her. How could he even be doing this to her? What kind of monster was he?
But Kyla’s face, contorted in agony, flashed into his mind. They just had to rescue those girls, take down Snake and Narco, and get out alive. Then they’d have the rest of their lives to learn everything about each other. To spend night after night after night in each other’s arms.
He forced his face into an expressionless mask, grabbing Eva too hard by the arm. He shoved her farther behind him. “If you want her, come and get her.”
“Sure about that?” Monkey taunted him. “The odds aren’t good.”
Flynn shrugged. “Yeah, you’re right. You should’ve brought more men.”
With that, the Dark Angels attacked. Monkey and Rock closed on Flynn, and Zach circled behind him to catch Eva, who’d been trying to make a break for it and run to her car.
Flynn thought—he hoped—that Zach really was on his side. If so, Zach was the best one to capture Eva.
Just as the thought entered his mind, she screamed behind him. When he whipped his head to the left to see what was happening, Rock smashed his massive fist into the side of Flynn’s face. Flynn didn’t go down, not all the way, but he staggered back several steps and bounced off the outside wall of the garage.
Okay, that was gonna leave a mark.
“You can still back down, asshole, but this is your last chance,” Monkey said, dancing around just out of Flynn’s reach and tossing a blade from hand to hand. Who knew if the idiot actually knew how to use one? Better to assume he did.
Eva screamed again, this time from the shadows behind the tiny staircase to her apartment, and the sound galvanized Flynn into action despite the ringing in his skull. Just in time too. Rock pulled a pistol from his side holster and Flynn figured that meant his “last chance” was officially over. He launched himself at Rock, calling to the power of his water magic to propel him forward with superhuman speed. He knocked the gun out of Rock’s hand so hard he heard the man’s wrist bone crack. The gun went flying.
Flynn did a somersault over Rock’s head, hit the ground, and bounced back up into a spinning kick that took the man just under his left ear. That was the end of Rock.
He turned to Monkey, who was aiming a pistol directly at him.
“Enough fun and games,” Monkey snarled. “You’re dead now, and I bet Snake rewards me by letting me have some fun with your woman before he kills her.”
“Yeah, I don’t think so,” said a new voice from behind Flynn. “Down, now.”
It was Jake of course. Somehow he must’ve gotten away from the Dark Angels long enough to follow Monkey to Eva’s place.
Flynn hit the ground, and an ice spear shot through the air exactly where he’d been standing and struck Monkey in the shoulder, causing the pistol shot to go wide. Before he could take aim again, Flynn was up off the ground and on him, smashing his fist into the man’s face with every ounce of power he had. Monkey flew backward through the air about six feet and landed hard, and his gun flew off through the air.
Flynn turned and started for Eva. She was perfectly fine though, standing next to Zach and rubbing her arm where Flynn had grabbed her too hard. He felt an overwhelming wave of shame that nearly knocked him to his knees.
“I’m so sorry,” he said. “I had to put on an act. They wouldn’t believe I was keeping you if I—”
But Eva wasn’t listening. She ran across the distance between them and jumped into his arms. “I thought you were dead. I thought they were going to shoot you, and I would have to watch you die right in front of my eyes. Never, ever do that to me again.”
Flynn held on as tight as he could until Eva raised her head and smiled. “I do still have to breathe, big guy.”
He stopped crushing her in his embrace but kept his arm around her waist and turned to face Zach, who’d claimed to be an undercover operative. Evidently it had been the truth. Jake was securing Monkey and Rock with zip ties and gags, which meant they must have both survived. Too bad.
“Okay, Zach, if that’s really your name, what’s the deal?”
Zach’s eyes narrowed when he heard Flynn’s harsh tone. “Yes,” he said shortly. “Zach is my name. Zachary Ford, Special Agent, FBI, P-Ops division. I’ve been undercover with the Dark Angels for months, and they finally let me into the inner circle today. I think that’s only because they needed more manpower for their nasty rites.” He scanned the group. “Bottom line: I know where the girls are.”
“They’re inside the copper mine,” Eva said. “We told you last night. The copper masks any magic being used, and what better place to hide people than in what’s basically a hole in the ground?”
Zach shot her an admiring glance, and Flynn contemplated the wisdom of
smashing a federal agent into the side of the building.
Maybe later.
“Perhaps you should join my team, Ms. Calandar,” Zach added, “because it took us a while to come to see that one. And, yes, your tip last night helped us find the right place. It’s not the mine in use either. That would be too easy.”
“Of course. It’s one of the old abandoned mines. One that’s played out, or at least people thought it was played out,” Flynn said, groaning. “Do you know where it is?”
“He had help,” an arrogant voice drawled from above their heads.
Flynn looked up to see Griffin materialize from mist and float gently to the ground. When he landed, he was already walking toward them.
“That’s really cool,” Eva said, and Griffin smiled at her.
Flynn hadn’t known the mage knew how to smile that widely. He glared at Griffin and made a growling noise in his throat. Maybe he could do a twofer and smash the FBI agent’s head against the mage’s.
He’d let Jake live. Jake was helpful.
“When are we going?” Everybody looked at Eva, who’d asked the question in a quiet but steady voice. “We know where they are. You have me. Zach’s on the inside. It’s time to go get those girls.”
Flynn thought he’d never been more in awe of any person—man or woman—ever in his life than he was of Eva and her incredible courage.
“We go now,” Zach said, his face grim. “They’re planning to start some of what they call the ‘lesser sacrifices’ an hour from now. They’ve kept the girls safe and sequestered until now. Innocents always make the best sacrifices, don’t you know?” He turned his head and spit on the ground as if trying to get a foul taste out of his mouth.
Considering the fact that the agent had been undercover with the Dark Angels for more than half a year, Flynn didn’t doubt it.
“The sooner we get there, the sooner we get them out before they’re harmed. Narco promised he’d let some of his minions have some fun,” Jake said, looking sick.
Flynn glanced at the thugs on the ground. “First, I propose we get rid of these two. And then, Zach, you can say you asked Jake to come along for backup just in case, and it was a good thing because I shot Rock and Monkey and they’re dead. You get all the credit for bringing us in. I have a feeling that, at this point, Snake will be happy to sacrifice me too.”
“My team will pick up these two,” Zach said. “They’re on the way. And yes, I agree that’s the best plan now.”
“But it’s a different plan,” Eva said staring at Flynn. “You’ll have to be in restraints. How can you fight? How can you help those girls?”
Jake smiled at her and pulled a pair of handcuffs out of one of the many pockets on the inside of his ratty-looking trench coat. “Special cuffs,” he said, grinning. “Watch.”
He snapped one of the cuffs on Flynn’s left wrist and then gave the chain a quick yank. The cuff, which was made of solid steel and looked extremely sturdy, snapped right open.
Zach’s eyes narrowed. “Where did you get those? Those would even fool me, and I’ve been at this for a long time.”
“I have my ways,” Jake said.
“Let’s talk about handcuffs later. Let’s go get those girls right now,” Eva said impatiently. “I’m not sure how much longer I can be brave.”
Chapter Eleven
In the end, it was much easier to get inside the mine than Eva would have ever believed. Apparently, a huge part of any Dark Angel celebration involved barrels and barrels of demon rum, a beverage guaranteed to cause unconsciousness, liver failure, and blindness in humans, and that was only in the lucky ones.
Guards were scattered around like dying roaches when they drove up at four a.m. The last man standing waved them in, not bothering to check for ID.
“Who’d be damn fool enough to crash a demon party?” the man asked jovially.
“Who indeed?” Griffin said when he materialized inside the dark mine and joined their group.
“We won’t get the girls without a fight,” Zach warned them. “Don’t be fooled by how easy it is to get in. Getting out is going to be the battle. And the actual demons aren’t affected like this by their own rum.”
They headed steadily down, and down, and down, until they reached a vast open area that contained a giant pit filled with fire, exactly in the center of an enormous inlaid copper circle. Inside the circle, twenty nightgown-clad girls huddled together, terror and shock stark in their faces. They were surrounded by row after row of minor demons, the firelight playing on the deep liquid-vinyl red-and-black texture of their skin. Fangs and tusks abounded; demons with giant drooling mouths stood next to demons with huge, bulbous eyes. Long, whip like tails next to razor-sharp tusks. So many of them. So very many that Eva could feel the pressure of their heartbeats in her bones.
“It’s too late,” Zach groaned. “They’re already in the circle. None of us can breach it; our magic isn’t strong enough.”
“Watch out!” Jake pulled a pair of daggers and headed into the fray when a demon who wasn’t in the circle started running toward them, claws out.
“I see Narco,” Griffin shouted at them, already halfway across the mine toward the sorcerer. The two met in a crash of light and sound, hurling magic at each other too fast and furiously for anyone else to follow.
Flynn whirled to fight off a couple of the human Dark Angels who’d managed to stay conscious, and while he was busy, Eva walked forward, step by step by step, feeling her determination and will swirl around her as if she were floating through a dimly remembered dream.
“I can walk right through it,” she told them dreamily. “I don’t have any magic at all. Not that kind of magic.”
Flynn grabbed at her arm, but he was too late. She was already at the circle. She simply stepped across and felt nothing more than a mild tingling sensation. Behind her, Flynn roared in frustration, and she saw him try to smash through the invisible magic barrier, but it kept him out. He was slicing and hacking at it with a sword he’d gotten somewhere, but it all seemed somehow distant to her because something was calling to her, calling so powerfully.
The girls surrounded her, weeping, and she touched as many of them as she could. “It’s all right, girls. I’ll get you out of here.”
At her words, the demons all turned toward her, moving as one in a shockingly coordinated motion. Scott—Snake—sauntered out from behind them.
“I always knew you’d come back to me, babe,” he said, and his eyes glowed red in the firelight. No. That was wrong. His eyes actually were red. He’d gone fully over to the demonic realm then.
She sorrowfully shook her head. “You made the wrong choice, Scott. So many wrong choices. I’m so sorry for you.”
He threw his head back and laughed, a long, hyena-like sound. “You’re sorry for me, you stupid slut? Be sorry for yourself. I’m going to gut you for the power you’ll bring.”
He was so wrong, and he didn’t even know it. She raised her hand, prepared to do the one thing she’d never wanted to do, but Snake must have suspected something because he hurled his dagger, end over end, across the stone floor at her. She watched, paralyzed by the sight of her death advancing on her, but then an object hurtled in front of her.
No, not an object. A man.
“Flynn,” she screamed. “No!”
But it was too late. He’d somehow burst through the magic circle and thrown his body in front of the dagger to protect her. It struck true and sank deep in his chest, and blood bubbled up from his mouth as his body smashed down to the rocky ground.
She cried out and fell to her knees next to him.
“I protected you?” His eyes held an edge of desperation. “I saved you?”
“You saved me, my love,” she told him, wrapping her arms around his head so it didn’t touch the stone beneath him.
And then, as he gasped out what she thought must be his final breath, Eva looked around her at the hundreds of demons, reached deep, deep inside herself, and pu
shed. Every single one of them snapped to attention, frozen in place but with eyes locked on her. Waiting for an order to obey.
“Kill Snake,” she told them. “Destroy him.”
The demons shuddered with unholy glee and swarmed Snake, who screamed and screamed and screamed as he died. Eva, holding Flynn’s dying body in her arms, found that the sound didn’t bother her at all.
That realization, though, bothered her more than a little.
“You can control demons?” Griffin stood over her, and she thought she saw fear in his eyes, quickly masked.
She turned her head slowly to look at the demons, who were now dancing along the rim of the pit of fire. “It turns out it was no harder than offering a bit of hot dog.”
“What?”
“Never mind,” she told him, cradling Flynn’s body. She pushed again and, as one, the demons all turned toward her again.
“Begone,” she ordered, and they bowed to her and then jumped, tens of them at a time, into the fire pit.
Jake ran over to her. “Flynn! Eva! Are you okay? You—” He stopped speaking when he saw Flynn.
Eva blinked up at him, feeling the world go hazy around her. “We saved the girls?”
Jake knelt beside her. “We saved the girls. And I happen to have a little bit of healing magic from my mother’s side of the family.”
She didn’t understand his words though, because by then the power that had swept through her from the demons had drained out of her body. She didn’t need it anymore anyway. Flynn was gone.
January was as good a time as any to die.
Chapter Twelve
Atlantis, two days later
“He’s lucky to be alive, the idiot,” a man growled, and Flynn opened his eyes to find his brother Dare glaring down at him.
“Not feeling lucky so much right now,” Flynn muttered, trying to sit up but then falling back against the pillows in the— He looked around. Huh. Healing temple He must have been worse off than he’d thought after he’d jumped in the path of that knife to protect—
My Paranormal Valentine: A Paranormal Romance Box Set Page 31
