Authors: Heather Frost
“I trust you can see yourselves out?” Romero asked kindly.
Patrick gave me a final look—one that I couldn’t read, so I hoped it didn’t hide a message of some kind—and then he turned and started back across the factory floor with my sister tucked safely in his arms. Toni followed a step behind, and despite my own situation I could feel a huge weight leave my chest. They were safe. They would be okay. Patrick wouldn’t let anything happen to them.
The nightmare was over for them.
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Thirty-four
Selena’s voice grew clipped. “Come. We’ll be late. That plane can’t wait forever.” Romero nodded, and I was pulled toward a door on the other side of the office—one that would lead directly outside, and in the opposite direction my Guardians were headed. We were soon walking down a very narrow ally, Demons taking up positions around us.
Selena was in the lead, Romero right behind her. They weren’t talking to me, but I picked up the words easily.
“The Demon Lord will surely accept this gift,” Romero was saying. “I’ll get my position back, and you, my dear, will no longer be on the run.”
Selena grunted, but even that sound coming from her was somehow delicate. “If we can make it to the plane. And are you sure he’s staying in Las Vegas? He usually prefers the Bahamas this time of year.”
“I have many sources, my dear. The Demon Lord is not as untouchable as he seems. Someday, he will learn that.” Selena sighed, and glanced down at her fingernails, her steps slowing just a little. “I really wish you hadn’t said that, my dear.” Romero laughed a little, thinking she was making some joke.
“What do you mean?”
Selena tugged at the hem of her blouse, as if she were straightening it, flattening it against her slim waist. “Because I’m the one
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who betrayed you to the Demon Lord. Even now, I do not work for you, but for him. He has promised me a . . . how did you put it? A noble position.”
In the flash of an eye she stopped walking and gracefully pulled something out from under the fold of her shirt. Romero turned to face her, shock on his face. He realized what she was holding the same second I did—a small dagger.
The blade flashed in the sunlight, and I watched in horror as Selena drove the knife right into Romero’s heart. I was too surprised to do anything more than watch with an open mouth as Romero groaned, and slowly fell to his knees.
He tried to form words, but nothing came out. In the end, he slumped limply to the ground, rolled onto his back, and died at her feet.
I waited for the other Demons to react—try to kill her or something. But they didn’t. It took me a second too long to realize that they weren’t surprised. This had all been part of a great plan.
Romero had been the only one in the dark.
Selena clucked her tongue at his dead body, and blew him a final kiss. “I’m sorry, my love. I only do as you have taught.” She glanced back at me, caught sight of my surprised face, and smiled.
“I disgust you? That will not hurt my feelings. I am used to the glares of jealous women.”
“You’re a monster,” I told her evenly, hoping that the venom I felt would be heard in my voice.
She smiled. “I prefer Demon.” And then she turned away from the man she’d just killed. We all started moving again, as if nothing had happened.
At the end of the alley I could see the waiting car. It was a black Lincoln limousine with darkly tinted windows, idling and ready, parked only a few yards from the buildings and ally mouth.
The back door was already open for us. I guess Toni was right when he said that these Demons lived an expensive lifestyle.
Selena had just disappeared into the car when it happened.
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The driver’s door opened, and I expected a Demon chauffeur to step out. Instead, I found myself staring at Jack. He was even wearing the old chauffeur’s hat. He winked at me, and then spoke to the Demons who had yet to notice him.
“I don’t think you blokes want to get in there—your driver’s got himself a bit of a knot on the noggin, and I don’t think he’s up to safely dealing with the traffic.” For a moment, everyone just stared at him. And then Jack pulled out two knives; seemingly from thin air.
The sight of the weapons spurred the Demons into action.
The two closest to him lunged, hoping to get him off balance. But neither of them wanted to get too close to the swinging blades. I wondered if they were afraid to be facing an immortal, when they themselves did have a weak spot. But then I figured that was why they were trying to disarm him.
I looked around wildly as the Demon’s grip on me tightened, hoping to catch sight of the others. For a moment my heart sank—Jack was hopelessly outnumbered—and then I saw Toni.
He’d been hiding at the end of the alley behind a rusting dump-ster, and was now behind us. He slammed heavily into a stunned Demon’s back, and they both hit the ground.
Still, there were five other Demons unoccupied—not counting Selena. And then Patrick darted into the fray, from the same direction Toni had come from. I watched him for a moment, almost awed by the sight of him in a fight. He looked so concentrated—so deadly. Knowing that he was here for me—to protect me—made my stomach flip. I saw the knife in his hand flash in the sunlight, but then the converging Demons interrupted my view of him, and all I could hear were grunts of pain, and an occasional yell.
So much was happening so quickly, I hardly knew where to look, or what to think.
The Demon holding me wasn’t as distracted as I was. He shoved me toward the car, even as Selena started screaming for someone named Jose to get me inside.
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I was hauled roughly forward, and though I fought to struggle and drag my feet I was no match for Jose’s size and strength. I stumbled reluctantly to the car, and was forcefully flung inside. I crumpled to the floor at Selena’s feet but didn’t really have time to get my bearings before Jose was pushing in after me.
Selena barely waited for him to get his last leg inside before she was slamming the door closed and locking it soundly. She raised her voice at Jose, worry cracking her words. “Go! Get to the front! Don’t let anyone inside, and get us out of here!” Jose was already moving, long before she’d finished. Once he was past me, I was moving too. I scrambled across the floor, crawling desperately for the other door which hadn’t yet been locked. I heard Selena move to follow me, but I was able to grab the handle and push the door open before she could stop me.
I literally fell out of the car, my hands shooting out to catch me before my face hit the hard ground. The lower half of my body was still inside the limo, but I was working hard to fix that. I crawled quickly, but not quickly enough. Selena’s fingernails dug into my swinging right leg, keeping me in place.
“You’re not going anywhere!” She hissed, murderously angry.
“Get back in the car!”
I tried kicking her, but her grip was too good. I wasn’t going anywhere. And I was completely terrified. She pulled, and I started sliding back into the limo. My stomach was being crushed against the bottom rim of the open door by the time my groping fingers snagged the jagged edge of a nearby pothole.
The blood was rushing to my head, and my palms were being painfully scraped by the sharp rocks that littered the ground.
Despite my fears I continued to pull for all I was worth, hoping that gravity alone would be enough to help me break free from her horrible grip.
I heard her groan in anger and frustration. The car thrummed suddenly to life, and I felt the car lurch forward as dirt was kicked up by the rear tires. I lost my hold on the crumbling pothole, but 304 K • • •
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my hands continued to grope as the ground started rolling past, surely gaining speed—I was gasping and getting dangerously dizzy. I was leaning out of a moving car!
The sounds of the fighting faded from the other side of the vehicle as the rear tires struggled to find traction on the dusty asphalt, but I thought I could hear running. But who was giving up? The Guardians, or the Demons?
Selena’s nails were as sharp as daggers. I swore they were making holes through the denim, and I could feel pinpricks of sweat or blood coming to the surface of my skin. I continued to struggle, sure that getting out was still in my best interest—even if the alternative was the most dangerous thing I’d even tried: falling out of a moving vehicle. Because the limo had found traction and was now really accelerating. I couldn’t stay like this for much longer. And if I didn’t get out now, I wouldn’t survive the fall.
Selena seemed to follow my train of thought. She couldn’t pull me back in, but she was also unwilling to let me continue on this way and end up dead. She needed me alive. Or rather, the Demon Lord wanted me alive. And so she gave up, mere seconds after the car had begun its desperate getaway.
I was gasping in pain, my trembling arms and hands too gashed up to remain groping at every rock and pot hole we moved past—we were going too fast. It was all I could do to keep my head from smashing into the ground that was flashing past.
“This isn’t over,” Selena barked, biting each word off like a curse.
And then the painful biting in my leg was gone—had it even been a full five seconds since the car had come to life? Selena released me, shoving my legs out the door even though I was already falling toward the passing ground. I was able to let out a strangled gasp of fear as the blurring road raced up to meet me, and then my shoulder bit harshly into the rocky ground, jarring my entire body. I crashed onto my side, the momentum from my fall combined with the acceleration of the limo and Selena’s push causing me to bounce and roll across the broken and dusty
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asphalt, away from the narrow road and down a slight decline. I wanted to cry out, but my mouth was clamped shut—a protective instinct as the side of my face was ripped up against the dry rocks.
After a painful eternity, my body came to a stop. I was curled on my side, every inch of me aching, an ugly desert brush I’d barely avoided obscuring my view of the limo I could hear now speeding away from the fight Selena worried she couldn’t win.
I hurt—a lot. Memories of the painful car crash I’d barely survived resurfaced, and I started shaking. I tried to tell myself that the limo probably hadn’t even gotten up to thirty, but obviously that didn’t make me feel much better.
I was suddenly aware of shouting back by the warehouse, and I laboriously attempted to fall onto my back so I could look for my friends.
“The car!” A stressed voice yelled. Toni? He sounded so far away.
“Kate’s in there!” My Grandpa cried. “I saw them push her in!” They must not have seen my less than graceful fall, and though I wanted to reassure them I couldn’t make my voice work—the breath had been literally knocked from my lungs. I squinted through watering eyes, able to see a few bodies on the ground, maybe a hundred feet away—Demon bodies, I hoped. I assumed they were dead, because they had no aura.
It was strange; I didn’t feel sickened at the sight. Maybe that was because I’d seen so many deaths lately. Or maybe it was due to the fact that I was hardly aware of anything but pain. I was heavily bruised, and pretty cut up in places. But I was pretty sure that nothing was broken, which seemed amazing to me.
A few people were standing back where the limo had been.
Though the dirt was still settling back against the road I could make out Jack, supporting a limp Demon with one arm, his fist clutching a handful of material near the Demon’s throat. He was pummeling the poor Hispanic.
There were other figures, too. One had a colorful 306 K • • •
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aura—Grandpa. Two others had thin silver threads outlining them. Jack was preoccupied, but the other three figures were staring after the limo, standing in the middle of the road.
Toni was the first to speak, breathing heavily. I couldn’t hear the words, but he was obviously speaking encouragingly to the man next to him.
Patrick had both hands on his head, fingers digging into his hair. He didn’t seem to be listening closely to his friend’s words.
I didn’t need to see his aura to know that he was tired and frustrated. He spun around sharply, away from the sounds of the fleeing limo. He kicked at an offending rock, sending it skirting down the road. He turned back to say something to the others, but he suddenly stopped, and jerked back around. Miraculously, he’d caught sight of me lying there, curled in a loose ball a short distance off the road. I don’t know how he’d spotted me when the others hadn’t, but I didn’t care.
I couldn’t hear him, but somehow I knew that he gasped my name. Fear and relief shone on his face even as the others fought to follow his gaze. He darted forward, sprinting down the driveway toward me, the others following more slowly—as if they hadn’t quite caught sight of me yet. I don’t think I’d realized how far I’d actually gotten in the limo until I saw him running toward me.
He’d never get here fast enough, in my opinion.
He veered right when he got closer, jogging across the rocks and dry dirt until he was skidding and dropping to his knees beside me. One hand slid beneath my head, the other brushed the hair off the exposed side of my face. “Kate?” He asked desperately, leaning closer, swallowing with difficulty. His blue eyes darted over me, always lurching back to my face before they could wander far.
My eyes fluttered against the dust he’d kicked up, and I winced. “Ow.”
“What hurts?” He asked quickly, breathing heavily. “Is anything broken?”
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“Ow,” I repeated, entirely unhelpful.
His blue shirt was dirty, and there was a long rip near his left shoulder. Blood surrounded the area, and though I was worried for him I couldn’t yet make myself form real words.
His light fingers touched at my stinging cheek, a deep grimace twisting his face as he gauged my pain. “Kate,” he breathed, jaw clenching tightly in anger. His trembling fingers lifted from my skin and clenched into a tight fist.