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“Either Reed was particularly distressed by our meeting, or Maguire is acting out. Either should know better than to waste a Ferrari on vengeance.”
Ethan wrenched the car to the left across blaring traffic and onto a side street. The white car followed, leaving the crash of metal and tinkle of glass in its wake as cars hit one another to avoid smashing into it. He zoomed down a narrow street, dodging around parked cars like a skier on a slalom course.
The Audi maneuvered behind us, mirroring every swerve. Maguire was an asshole, but a capable driver. Ethan turned right, tires squealing with the motion, had room to speed up. But the Audi was right behind us, and inched closer.
“Hold on,” Ethan said, and we jerked forward as the Audi slammed us from behind.
“He is fucking insane!” I said, gripping the armrest to keep my seat.
“I fear you’re right.” Ethan sped up, but the Audi kept pace, knocked us again.
“All right,” Ethan said, “I am done with this asshole. Hold on.” He grabbed the parking brake, yanking it up as he wrenched the wheel so we spun around to the left, drifted down the street as the tires screamed in protest.
Ethan hit the gas and we darted down the street in the opposite direction. But Maguire knew the same trick, or close enough, and spun the car around to follow us.
No—not just to follow us, but to reach us. As we zoomed down the empty residential street, blowing past houses and cars and sleeping humans, the Audi darted forward so we were even.
Maguire flipped us off through the window, then slammed his car into ours.
“Shit,” Ethan said, and held the wheel, tried to keep us stable, but wind caught the car like a sail, and suddenly we were airborne. For a moment, time slowed, and Ethan gripped my hand, squeezed it with bone-crushing strength.
Take care, Sentinel, he said silently.
We rotated, flipped, soaring through the air like a luxury projectile. The world spun, dark sky now our floor, the pavement our sky . . . and then we landed with a jolt I felt in every bone, muscle, and tendon. We bounced once, then again, before skidding to a stop.
Sound and pain and smell returned with a roar like an ocean wave cresting over our heads. I tasted blood, felt a stabbing pain in my side.
I’d knocked my head against the seat back, and I blinked until the world stopped spinning. When the carousel slowed, I glanced over, the movement wrenching something in my neck.
Ethan sat beside me, utterly still, eyes closed, head bleeding from a visibly nasty gash in his forehead. Smoke began to fill the car from the crumpled hood.
I cursed, unhooked my seat belt, kicked the car door until it opened, and climbed out. I staggered on my feet and grabbed the side of the car because the world had started to spin again.
“Do not pass out,” I ordered myself, my knuckles white as I fought to stay upright while darkness circled around my vision. I clung to consciousness, taking one step at a time, my ribs screaming, both hands on the car for balance, moving around it to Ethan’s side of the car.
His door was dented, but I wrenched it open.
“Ethan!” I slapped him, got no response, tried our psychic connection. Ethan.
The silence was deafening. I put a hand to his throat, felt a low and steady pulse. The car was filling with smoke; I was going to have to move him.
I unbuckled the seat belt, leaned him forward, reached around his chest, pulled him out of the car. It wasn’t easy hauling one hundred and eighty pounds of undead weight with what I’d diagnosed as a broken rib and probably a concussion, but I managed it, and got him to the curb when sirens began to scream in the distance. I laid him on the sidewalk, tore a strip from my T-shirt, pressed it to the unpleasant-looking wound in his forehead.
I didn’t stop to consider the possibility he might have been killed, that both of us might have been killed. That, I knew, would have set off an entirely new wave of panic, and I didn’t have time for that.
When Ethan’s eyes fluttered open, my hiccupping breaths sounded suspiciously like sobs.
“Ferrari?” was all he said.
I laughed between sobs. “Totaled. You’re going to need another new car. And Luc is never going to let you drive again.” Hell, Ethan would be lucky if Luc ever let him out of the House again.
“You drive,” he said, and closed his eyes again, a smile flitting around his mouth. “Headache.”
“You took a good knock. Amazingly, your head is not actually filled with rocks.”
Ambulances, fire trucks, CPD vehicles streamed down the street. EMTs climbed out of the ambulance with gear in hand, rushed toward us.
“I’m fine,” I said to them, ignoring the pain in my side. “He’s a vampire, so he’ll heal, but he’s got a pretty bad cut.”
