“Jenks!” I cried out as he darted away. Beside me, Ivy wheezed. Her fingers rose to touch her mouth, coming away red with blood. Immediately she curled her fingers up in a ball to hide it, but a flash of fear lit through me. Internal bleeding. My gun, too, was gone, left behind somewhere on the summer-burnt grass.
“Almost there,” I said again as we moved another few feet, but inside, I was despairing. There were no hospitals in the ever-after, only demons who didn’t care. I didn’t think we’d make it all the way to the church. If Trent didn’t show, I might have just killed Ivy by trying to save her.
Ivy’s breath became labored, and the sudden shouting at the bridge yanked my attention up. With a quick flurry of motion, a woman swung wildly at Jenks, falling down the embankment and into the water, harried the entire way by the pixy. Suddenly she was screaming as Sharps, the resident bridge troll, rose up, swamping her.
Without a second look, the other vampire continued toward us, leaving her to sort herself out. He was vampire-child, beautiful, graceful, and sure of himself—and when he looked at me, I shuddered.
Jenks darted in and away, distracting him.
“Move faster, Ivy,” I begged, knowing Jenks couldn’t hold off a determined vampire. Eyeing the statue of Romulus and Remus, I brought up my second sight. A faint haze, ill looking and sporadic, hung at chest height. It was Al’s line, half dead because of the shallow pond someone had dug out under it, but unable to die because the other half of it lay in the dry, desolate ever-after. It reminded me of the demon himself, having given up on life but clinging so tightly to the memory of a love he had once had that now he couldn’t live or die.
He would never help me. Not now. And an old guilt pulled my brow even tighter.
From the water came a gurgling scream as the woman fought to be free of Sharps. Ivy moaned and I dropped my second sight. My eyes jerked to the controlled anger and grace striding toward us despite Jenks’s darting flight and bloodied blade. The vampire knew the line was there and was trying to cut us off.
Crap on toast. I wasn’t going to make it. I’d have to beat him off.
Ivy hung on my shoulder as I came to a heart-pounding halt, her head down and her breathing frighteningly raspy. A lousy twenty feet was between me and the line, and the suave man smiled when he rocked to a silent stand before us. He was the expected eight feet back, his hair moving in the light breeze as he assessed my determination, feeding off my fear even as I found a firmer stance. Eight feet. He’d fought magic users before. It was just far enough that he could dodge anything I might throw at him.
Fine. He was between me and the line, but I could still pull on it, and I allowed the line’s energy to funnel down to my hand and gathered it in a tight ball of frustration. He was stunning in his black suit, but it was more than his sculpted, carefully bred-for beauty. It was his attitude of a complete and utter lack of fear. He was wearing sunglasses, and an old scar on his neck said he was someone’s favorite. Behind him, the woman screamed at both Jenks and Sharps as she tried to get out of the water.
“Morgan,” the living vampire said, his voice holding layers of emotion, and Ivy stirred, drawn awake by either the screams at the lake or the pull in his voice.
“Go to hell!” Ivy managed, and Jenks joined me. Together we faced him, my knees shaking and Jenks’s wings clattering in threat.
The man’s eyes flicked to Ivy, then back to me. “Give it up.”
Not happening, and I found a better grip on Ivy, my bellyful of ever-after waiting for direction. “Come and get me,” I mocked, trying to lure him a foot closer.
“You’re not who I’m interested in. She’s almost dead. All I have to do is wait.”
Son of a bastard . . . This wasn’t the original team sent to kill Ivy. It was probably the one sent to collect her body, and they’d be eager for the extra kudos killing her would bring them. Behind me, a car door slammed. I didn’t dare look, but from the edge of my sight, three more men in suits started across the grass. Damn it, I couldn’t fight off four of them and protect Ivy, too, even with Jenks.
The living vampire’s beautiful brown eyes went black as he breathed in my fear. “Let us finish the job, or we beat you up and we finish the job anyway. She’s dying her first death before the sun goes down.”
“Over my dead body.” The sun was nearing the horizon, but there were hours left in its path.
“And my broken wings,” Jenks added, dusting Ivy’s scalp again as blood began to mat her hair.
They were almost to us. I had to do something, his being out of range or not. I thought of Trent. Had he gotten my text? Was he on his way?
“Dead?” the vampire said, recapturing my attention. “No, he wants you alive. For now.”
My frustration rose. The hazy read smear of the ley line was just behind him. Twenty lousy feet. “It can’t be done!” I shouted, Jenks’s dust tingling against my skin. “Tell Cormel it can’t be done!”
“Then you owe him for the year he’s kept you both safe,” the man said. “Watching you suffer Ivy’s second life will do.”
“I already saved him once! I’m not paying the same debt twice.”
The man chuckled, motioning for the arriving thugs to circle us. I could smell them, the rising scent of vampire incense bringing Ivy’s eyes open and a new tension to her face. “You prolonged his misery is all.”
He gestured, and I moved, throwing a single burst of energy at the beautiful man before turning my attention inward. “Rhombus!” I shouted, relief a slap when Jenks, contrary to his instinct, dropped down, safe inside my circle.
The rushing vampires skidded to a halt, stymied. Before me, my black-and-gold fist-size unfocused magic slammed into the head vampire, throwing him back four feet to hit the ground hard.
Nothing could get through my barrier unless it held my aura: not bullet, not vampire, not demon—unless he was very determined and I’d left an opening. But we were trapped in it, trapped twenty feet from safety. Damn it! This was so not fair. Every other demon could shift his aura to slip into a line, but I couldn’t jump on my own, couldn’t jump a lousy twenty feet. The line was so close I could almost feel it humming.
Dazed, the vampire found his feet, his beauty ruined by his snarl. “She’s going to die in there!” he shouted, stalking forward to halt so close the barrier hummed a warning and I could see the first wrinkles about his eyes. “She’s going to die, and then she will fall on you!”