Bria nodded again. She bit her lip, looked up and down the alley to make sure that we were still alone, then reached out and hugged me tight with one arm.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “For everything. I just . . . I wanted to nail that bastard so damn bad.”
Even though a dozen shallow cuts dotted my hand, I reached up and smoothed down her hair, leaving streaks of blood behind in her tangled golden locks. “I know.”
Bria shuddered in a breath. I hugged her even tighter, but when she dropped her arm and pulled back, her face was as calm and composed as mine.
“See you on the other side—”
The screech-screech-screech of tires cut her off. A black SUV stopped at the end of the alley. The doors opened, and vamps started pouring out, all with guns, all racing in our direction. They’d finally found us, and they were out for blood—ours.
Bria’s mouth flattened into a determined line, and she raised her gun to fire at them. But I grabbed her shoulder, spun her around, and shoved her through the open door and into the building. Bria staggered forward, almost plowing into Catalina. While she struggled to right herself, I grabbed the duffel bag full of guns, ammo, and other supplies and tossed it inside too. Bria whipped around, but I reached through the opening, grabbed the door, and pulled it shut. Then I wrapped my hand around the knob and let loose with a burst of Ice magic. The intense silver light of my power pulsed for a moment, searing my eyes, before it faded away. By the time I blinked again, three inches of my elemental Ice coated the knob, the door, and a good chunk of the surrounding walls. A crude but effective lock. Nobody would be getting through that right now without an axe or some serious elemental Fire power.
“Gin!” I heard Bria’s muffled yell through the door. “What are you doing?”
She rattled the knob on her side, but she couldn’t get through the thick layer of Ice I’d caked on it.
“Go!” I shouted back to her. “Just go!”
Crack!
Crack! Crack!
Crack!
The vamps raised their guns and started firing. I cursed, then grabbed hold of my Stone magic, using it to harden my skin. But instead of running away, I palmed one of the knives hidden up my sleeves and sprinted toward the gunmen. I still needed to buy Bria some time to get Catalina through the building and over to the street so Xavier could pick them up, and I couldn’t think of a better way to do that than by killing a whole passel of Benson’s men.
The vamps’ mouths gaped open, revealing their fangs. Apparently, my charge had surprised them, but they recovered quickly enough to empty their guns at me.
Crack!
Crack! Crack!
Crack!
Bullets pinged off the walls, the trash cans, the Dumpsters, and even me, and the burn of gunpowder filled the air, overpowering the pungent scent of the garbage. But I kept running, and the vamps quickly ran out of bullets.
Aw, I just hated that for them.
Two of them cursed and stopped to reload, but it was too late, because I was already there. I grabbed the first man I reached, pulling him close and slicing my knife across his stomach one, two, three times, before shoving him away. He went down screaming.
I moved to the left side of the alley. This vamp was quicker than his friend, and he landed a quick one-two combo to my chest. But his blows didn’t hurt all that much, thanks to the protective shells of my silverstone vest and my Stone magic, and I buried my knife in his throat before he could strike again. He died with a bloody wheeze.
A third man stepped up and grabbed my hand, trying to bend my wrist back to get me to drop my knife. So I slammed my Stone-hardened head into his, making his nose crunch like a potato chip. He let go of my hand and staggered back, but I reached out, latched onto his tie, and yanked him toward me, even as I shoved my knife into his heart. He yelped once like a wounded animal.
I stood there, eyes flicking back and forth, body tense, blood dripping off the end of my knife, but there were no more attackers to cut down, and the only sound was my harsh, raspy breaths—
Screech-screech-screech.
Three more SUVs pulled up at the end of the alley, and more vamps spewed out of the vehicles, close to a dozen this time, which was more than I could easily handle. Besides, I still needed to get to Bria and Catalina, so I turned and ran toward the far end of the alley.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
More bullets zipped in my direction, but I was booking it, and the vamps had to step over their dead buddies to take aim at me. I focused on the exit up ahead and forced myself to sprint even faster. Bria and Catalina should almost be to Xavier by now. I needed to get there too, so I put on an extra burst of speed and hurtled out of the alley—
Once again, I heard the screech of tires, but I didn’t see the vehicle until it was too late.
I whirled around to find a black SUV bearing down on me. The driver hit the gas, making the vehicle jump the curb and careen up onto the sidewalk where I was standing. I had just enough time to reach for my Stone magic, trying to harden my skin even more, before the SUV slammed into me.
I rolled up and over the hood, cracking the windshield with my head just like the vamp I’d plowed into with my car at the bridge. The brutal impact made me lose my grip on my magic for one precious second. But that was all it took for me to fly off the side of the car and hit the pavement.
Lights out.
19
I wasn’t sure how long I was unconscious. Probably only a few seconds, since I woke up sprawled across the pavement, my arms trapped underneath my chest as though I’d tried to break the flying fall with my hands.
Every single bone in my body ached, and I could feel more blood trickling out of all my many cuts and scrapes, but I was still in one piece. I must have managed to grab hold of enough of my Stone magic to protect myself before I hit the asphalt and blacked out—
Squeak-squeak-squeak.
Squeak-squeak-squeak.
Footsteps sounded on the pavement. I blinked and found myself staring at a pair of white sneakers. He shifted to one side, and his pant leg rode up, revealing one of his socks, mint-green with a white argyle pattern. I craned my neck up, then wished that I hadn’t, as that small motion spread the aches in my bones out to all the other nerve endings in my body. I felt like an egg that someone had dropped on the sidewalk, cracked and oozing everywhere.
Beauregard Benson towered over me. The vamp’s blue eyes flicked over my body, his gaze cold but curious at the same time.
“Amazing that her brains aren’t leaking all over the street, along with the rest of her,” he said. “But that’s Stone magic for you. I’ll be interested to see her reaction in the lab.”