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Roslyn Phillips gave us a happy wave and headed toward the porch, somehow not noticing the two dead men lying in the grass off to her left.
"What are y'all doing out here?" she called out. "I thought that y'all would be back in the salon where it was cool - "
What she did finally notice was the blood on Bria and me and the fact that Jo-Jo was lying on the porch between us. The smile slipped off her face, her eyes widened, and her mouth dropped open in surprise and growing horror.
"Gin?" Roslyn asked in a hesitant voice.
"Open your car door!" I yelled at her. "Now!"
Roslyn didn't ask any questions as she hurried around the car, yanked open the back passenger door, and pulled out the basket of vegetables that had been sitting there.
Tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and more tumbled out of the container and rolled across the driveway. Once that was done, she ran over to the porch. Bria and I started to lean forward to grab Jo-Jo's shoulders and ankles again, but Roslyn waved us away.
"Don't worry," Roslyn said. "I've got her. "
She crouched down and scooped up Jo-Jo like the dwarf didn't weigh any more than a small child. It was bizarre, seeing svelte Roslyn holding stocky Jo-Jo in her arms, but it wasn't entirely unexpected. Roslyn wasn't an elemental, not like Bria and I were, but she was something that was even better in this situation: a vampire.
My eyes narrowed. "You've been drinking Xavier's 2 blood. "
Like all vampires, Roslyn had to drink blood to live, but she got more than just vitamins and nutrients from it. Depending on whose blood she was chugging down, a vampire could absorb everything from an elemental's Fire magic to a dwarf's toughness from a frosty glass of O-negative. Even regular old human blood was enough to give most vamps enhanced senses and above-average strength. Since Xavier, Roslyn's significant other, was a giant, it only made sense that she was strong enough to pick up Jo-Jo.
Roslyn nodded. "Xavier says that my drinking his blood makes him feel better about me working at the club so late. He figures that if I have his strength, or at least a portion of it, then it's the next-best thing to him being there on nights when he's out working the police beat with Bria. "
"Remind me to thank him for that," I murmured.
Roslyn quickly carried Jo-Jo over to her car and ma - neuvered her into the backseat, while Bria raced back inside the house. I climbed in beside Jo-Jo, and Rosco squeezed into the footwell, covering my bare feet with his warm, plump body. A few seconds later, Bria reappeared and slid into the front passenger seat, her arms full of towels.
"Where to?" Roslyn asked as she jumped into the driver's seat.
"Cooper Stills's place," I said. "Start heading north. I'll give you directions as we go along. "
"You got it. "
I took Jo-Jo's bloody hand in mine as Roslyn threw the car into gear, backed up, turned around, and zoomed down the long driveway.
Chapter Six
While we raced toward cooper's place, Bria passed me the towels that she'd grabbed from the salon. I used the cloth to keep steady pressure on Jo-Jo's wounds, which had started bleeding again, despite the healing ointment that I'd slathered on them.
"Who did this?" Roslyn asked, smoothly zooming her car around a sharp curve. "And why?"
Bria shook her head. "I don't know. We were in the salon, eating and talking, when these guys burst into the house. It looked like they'd followed Sophia there.
They took her and shot Jo-Jo. Gin and I killed some of the men in the salon . . . " She looked over her shoulder at me.
"And I took out two more outside the house," I said, finishing the story. "But they still managed to get away with Sophia. "
Roslyn eyed me in the rearview mirror. "Gin?"
"His name is Harley Grimes," I snarled. "And he's a fucking dead man. "
I didn't say anything else, but Roslyn and Bria exchanged a glance. They had heard the vengeance in my voice, and they knew exactly what it meant.
At the sound of Grimes's name, Jo-Jo let out a low moan and weakly thrashed against me. I put a bloody hand on her forehead and smoothed back a few strands of her hair, trying to calm her down. Despite the violence that she'd suffered, her white-blond curls were still as perfect and springy as ever. So was her makeup, except for the drops of blood on her face.
"Shh," I said. "It's okay. Don't try to talk. We're on our way to cooper's right now. He'll be able to heal you. "
At least, that was my hope. The only thing I'd ever heard of cooper doing with his magic was using it to help him build weapons, sculptures, and fountains in his blacksmith's forge. But he had Air magic, and he was Jo-Jo's best chance of making it through this alive.
