One guy left.
He raised his gun and fired three more times. But his friend was in the way, and the bullets slammed into his back instead of my chest. I pulled myself up and shoved the dead guy at the last man. The body flopped against his wounded arm, and the gun slipped from his hand.
I threw myself at the last guy, but he saw me coming. His fists slammed into my chest.
Hard, solid blows. I jerked back, my foot caught on something, and I fell to the carpet.
He leaped on top of me, wrapping his hands around my throat. I tried to break his grip, but he was stronger. My hands scrabbled on the floor, looking for one of my knives, his gun, anything I could hurt him with.
A leg moved in my peripheral vision, and a foot slammed into the guy's head. The man grunted, and his grip loosened. I shoved him back and rolled out from under him, my eyes flicking over the bloody carpet. There. I grabbed the base of one of the broken lamps. The curved glass had shattered, leaving a sharp, serrated edge about five inches long. Perfect.
The guy clamped a hand on my shoulder and yanked me up, determined to finish choking me. I spun around and slashed his throat.
The glass dug into his flesh, instead of slicing deep and clean the way my knife would have. The edges caught and snagged on his stubbled skin. Nothing easy and painless about it. The man shrieked an ear-splitting sound of keening pain. He tried to jerk away, move away. I thought of Fletcher and followed him. I pulled the glass out, taking chunks of flesh with it, then shoved it right back in. Hard. What had been a trickle of blood increased to a crimson torrent, spattering down my torso and onto my T-shirt, jacket, and jeans.
The man's hand clamped down on my shoulder like a vise, making me wince. Blood and mucus bubbled out of his trembling lips. We stood there. Me driving the glass in deeper and deeper, his hand tightening that much more with every millimeter. His eyes glazed, and after about thirty seconds, his grip slackened. I shoved him away, and he joined his two dead buddies on the floor.
My eyes went to Donovan Caine. To my surprise, he had his leg up, ready to kick out with his foot again. The detective stared at me, then the men on the floor. He lowered his boot.
"Sorry about the mess," I said.
Chapter Fifteen
The corner of Donovan Caine's mouth lifted up into a faint smile-or grimace. Hard to tell since red welts and shallow cuts dotted his features like lumpy, ugly freckles.
The beginnings of a shiner rimmed his right eye, and a bruise had already darkened his left cheekbone. I'd saved Caine from being beaten as bad as Finn, but the detective had still taken several good licks.
"You're the one who's a mess," Donovan Caine said.
I glanced at my reflection in the mirror over the dresser. Blood coated my face like some sort of mud mask Jo-Jo might use at her salon. More blood covered my jacket and T-shirt, blackening the fabric, and drips and drops painted my jeans and boots in gobby, Jackson Pollock patterns. Distinct fingertip bruises ringed my throat, a macabre necklace of purple jewels. I probably had a matching set on my shoulder from the guy's death grip. When you added the blood and bruises together, I looked like I was dressed up for Halloween-as a murder victim.
Not exactly the face I wanted to present to the detective, but I'd looked worse. Much worse. But tonight, something about the blood made me feel old. Tired. Used up.
Just once, it might be nice to go out at night and not have to incinerate my clothes when I got home. Just once.
I dropped my eyes from the mirror. "Job hazard."
Caine couldn't go anywhere, since he was still strapped down. I walked behind him.
The detective's hands were cuffed, with the chain threaded through the back of the chair. Silverstone handcuffs. Looked like Caine never went anywhere without a set.
Kinky.
"Key?"
Caine jerked his head. "On the dresser."
I retrieved the metal key and bent down behind the detective. His rigid muscles coiled, and he drew in a sharp breath. He smelled faintly of soap, and I could feel the strength of his body, even though he was shackled to the chair. Caine probably thought this was just a ruse. That I was going to slit his throat instead of freeing him.
I might have considered it, if I hadn't already offered to work with the detective. My word still meant something to me, too.
The handcuffs clinked open, and Donovan Caine got to his feet. He turned to face me and massaged his wrists, rubbing the feeling back into his hands. His gaze skimmed over the mess of blood, bodies, and broken furniture. He spotted the discarded gun, half-hidden under the remains of one of the crystal lamps, near his feet.
"You have a decision to make," I said in a quiet voice. "You can pick up that gun.
Turn it on me. Try to avenge your partner's death."
I didn't add he'd die where he stood when my knife ripped through his heart. Caine had seen what I was capable of. Witnessed my skills firsthand. I just hoped it was enough to temper his dogged determination to make me pay for Cliff Ingles's death.
"Or?" The detective kept rubbing his wrists, but his hazel eyes never left the weapon at his feet.
"Or we can call a truce, and you can come with me. Work with me to get to the bottom of this. They want you dead now, too. They want us all dead." Donovan Caine stared at the gun. A second ticked by. Five more. Ten. Fifteen. Thirty.
He flexed his fingers, an Old West sheriff about to draw down on the mangy, good-for-nothin' gunfighter threatening his town, his peace of mind, his way of life. I tensed, ready to strike.
The detective lifted his eyes to mine. His gaze was the color of smoky topaz, or perhaps a fine whiskey, oscillating from pure gold to burnished brown and back again. Emotions flickered in the amber depths, one after another, like lightning bugs winking on and off. Disgust. Anger. Mistrust. Suspicion. Curiosity.
"Why did you come here?" he asked. "You could have let them kill me." I shrugged again. "Like I said before, I need you. Need to know what you know about Gordon Giles. I believe I heard something about files and a flash drive?"
Caine rubbed a hand through his black hair. "Yeah. They seem to be missing. My friends here were under the assumption I had them."
"But you don't?"
He didn't respond. Caine knew how to keep his face blank too.
I moved around the room, picking up my knives and slipping them back into their various slots. I also rifled through the dead guys' pockets, digging out their wallets, cell phones, and jewelry. Nobody was wearing a chain with the triangular tooth rune on it, but one of the men had the shape tattooed on the back of his left wrist. I spotted it when I took off his watch.