A Taser! She had Tasered him! Damn it all to hell.
Audrey slipped from behind her desk. He felt his arms yanked, then the pain was over. His body snapped back to normal, all functions restored, and he spat the first word that popped into his mouth. "Fuck."
Audrey slapped a piece of duct tape over his lips. He growled and lunged at her, but his arms didn't move.
She'd zip-tied him to his chair.
He'd been had. She'd tricked him like he was a sucker. Like he was a child. The moment he got free, she would regret it. He would make her deeply regret it.
Audrey bent over him, running her fingers through his clothes with practiced quickness, and pulled his knife from the inner pocket of his hoodie. The slightly curved black blade was almost six inches long and razor-sharp, but thick enough to parry one or two sword strokes.
"Nice knife."
The point of the black blade pricked the skin just below his eye. She bent over him, her voice shaking with quiet rage.
"You have no idea what you've cost me. I worked for months to get this job, and you ruined everything. Do you know what it's like to have to start over? Do you know how hard it is to get legal in the Broken?"
The knife cut his skin. He felt a drop of blood slide onto his cheek. Kaldar held very still. No need to agitate her.
"I've worked so hard. I've been so good. I like this job. I was supposed to get benefits in three months. And you and that pathetic excuse for a human being crushed it all. What did you give Alex to get to me, huh? Couldn't have been money. He doesn't care about money. No, it had to be drugs, didn't it? That bloody moron would sell me out for a dime bag of pot. If he told you, he'd tell anyone. The Hand, the Claws, anyone!"
Audrey raised his knife. If she stabbed him, he'd lunge right and hope she missed the heart. For a moment, she looked like she would plunge the knife into his chest, then she leaned over him, her face an inch from his and spoke, each word a furious promise.
"Don't follow me. If I ever see you again, I'll cut out your eyeballs and make you swallow them."
Audrey turned and marched out of the office, carefully closing the door behind her. The door clicked. She'd locked him in.
Kaldar surged to his feet, spun his back and the chair toward the heavy desk, and braced the chair's legs against it. If his luck held, the chair was as old as it looked. He strained. The wood groaned. He'd done this a couple of times before. The trick was enough pressure at the right angle.
The last thing he wanted was for Jack to find him tied up. He would never hear the end of it.
004
JACK crouched on the curb and surveyed the parking lot. The tall glass-and-concrete building rose in front of them. From his vantage point, the front door was clearly visible. Next to him, George kept messing with the skateboard. He had good balance from fencing, and if he pushed with one foot, he could stand on it while it rolled; but Kaldar had said there was a way to make it roll faster by rocking side to side. So far nothing George had tried worked, but he was entertaining to watch.
Jack inhaled the scents. The parking lot smelled of many things, but through it all he sensed the vivid trail of Kaldar's track. This was fun, Jack reflected. Even waiting was a lot more fun than school.
"Door," George murmured.
Across the parking lot the glass door of the building swung open. A pretty woman with copper-colored hair stepped out and started out down the sidewalk. She walked another ten feet, out of view of the door, and broke into a jog.
"Go!" George said. Jack shot across the parking lot at a dead run. He burst through the doors, following Kaldar's scent. An older man behind the counter yelled, "Where are you going?" Jack ignored him and turned right. The scent trail led him past the elevator to the stairs. Jack bounded up, taking the stairway two steps at a time. Smart of Kaldar to take the stairs. Can't track scent through the elevator.
Seven floors, eight, nine, ten. There! Jack slapped the door open and jumped out into the hallway. The scent said, "Left!" He turned left and dashed down the hallway. Doors punctured the walls. Not this one, not that one, no, no, no. This one. He gripped the door handle. Locked.
Jack took a step back and hammered the heel of his foot into the door. It popped open. Jack ducked inside and almost ran into Kaldar, who for some reason had pieces of wood dangling from his wrists. They looked like chair pieces. Kaldar jerked his arms up, exposing pale plastic things wrapped around his wrists. Jack pulled his knife out and slashed at the ties. Chunks of chair crashed onto the floor.
"Where is your knife?" Jack asked.
Kaldar's face was frightening. He grabbed a small sliver of wood and headed out of the office, "She took it."
"What do you mean, she took it?"
Outside in the hallway a woman with gray hair blocked their way. "What are you doing? Where is Audrey?"
Kaldar spun away from her and marched to the stairway. The woman chased them.
"She took it after she Tasered me and tied me to the chair."
They went through the doorway, and Kaldar slammed the door shut and shoved the piece of wood he was carrying under the door.
"Oh, so you gave her your knife so she wouldn't kill you."
Kaldar stopped and stared at him. The woman shoved the door from the other side and cursed.
"Too bad," Jack said. "It was a nice knife. I really liked it. But it was a good trade."
"You have an odd mind."
"Is that bad?" Jack asked.
"Not at all. It makes you unpredictable. That's an excellent quality." Kaldar shook his head and kept walking.
"So what now?"
"Now I get my knife back."
Chapter Five
IT was ruined. Audrey clenched her teeth. Everything she had worked for, everything she had tried to accomplish. All of it was ruined.
She took the turn too fast. The Honda careened, threatening to veer off the road. She gripped the wheel and steered it back into the lane. Why was it that every time things went well, someone showed up to shatter it all to pieces? Her father, her brother, this idiot. She was so mad, she had almost run over some blond child in the parking lot. He actually fell off his skateboard in his rush to avoid her. She'd stomped on the brakes so hard, she'd hurt herself. The boy had scrambled off before she had a chance to ask him if he was okay.
It was good that she had no superpowers because she would have burst into flames and left a trail of charred trees in her wake.
She didn't even ask "Denis" who he worked for. It wasn't the Hand - all of Louisiana's spies were so twisted by magic, none of them would make it through the boundary into the Broken. The more magic you had, the harder it was to travel into that world, and he seemed damned comfortable in it. Wasn't a Claw, either. He didn't look Egyptian.