Page 53

“Stop delaying—” Gideon snatched my neck. Thick, oily fingers squeezed. “Or I will crush the life out of your fragile cockroach human bones.”

Purple lightning split the night sky, and in its glare, the dark outline of a gloriously winged demon flash-burned into my eyes. His wings parachuted open—the broken one still bandaged but clearly healed enough to fly—and he swooped in, landing in style on the roof of the vampire’s car. Zee spun Shareen in his hand and propped the sword’s blade against his shoulder. “Did someone say cock?”

Cain spluttered his surprise, fingers squeezing my throat. “How did you⁠—”

“Ha!” Zee tipped his Stetson hat and strutted down the windshield to the hood. “Some advice, Mr. Evil. Don’t employ lowlife scumbugs who have definitely had the pleasure of my company. I’m not cheap, but I do get around.” He smirked.

“Enough! Give me that!” Cain snatched the pendant from my hand, and flung me away. My back hit the car, my head smacked the metal. Everything flashed black, so I missed the moment when my knees hit the gritty asphalt, but the shock of pain was real.

“Adam!”

I wasn’t sure if it was Victor or Zee who spoke. The bridge and its lights spun and pulsed in time with my thumping skull. But it was going to be okay. On my knees, with Gideon Cain about to lay into the others, I opened my fist, and there in my hand, was the fragile little bead that contained all my truth, taken from Gideon’s pendant with a little sleight-of-hand and misdirection.

There would be no going back after this, no hiding, no pretending I was a sweet and innocent human. I was about to seal my fate and maybe even lose my freedom.

But Cain would kill Victor and Zee.

I had to save them.

Save them all.

With the world spinning and my body ablaze, I tossed the bead into my mouth and gulped it down.

CHAPTER 15

Nothing happened.

Cain roared, Zee let out a battle cry, and I think it was Tom who made all the cars on the bridge come alive with honking and snarling engines, launching them at Cain’s hired lupine shifters.

But as for me and the bead I’d swallowed?

Nothing. Happened.

Had I swapped the wrong bead?

I’d switched my bead for the one Victor had taken from the broken harvester machine, and popped that on the end of Cain’s pendant when I’d clicked my fingers, distracting everyone and providing a decoy so Cain didn’t notice the sleight-of-hand.

I’d definitely swallowed the right one. Maybe. The beads were small, and I’d had to roll it across my palm with the decoy in just a few seconds . . .

But if I had consumed the right bead, why wasn’t I changing? Why wasn’t I me again?

Lifting my head, I saw Victor wrestling with Cain’s wicked tendrils, each one lashing at him then looping around him, crushing tighter and tighter. Victor’s fangs were out, his face pinched in agony. He could take a few hits, but being crushed?

Zee roared and flew at Cain—sword raised, wings aglow. Lightning snapped from above and stabbed at nearby cars, adding to the chaos. Unnatural thunder shook the air, the bridge, and even my heart in my chest.

Cain simply raised his free hand and flung up some kind of barrier. Zee froze, mid-air, and then with Cain’s sweeping hand gesture, Zee was flung against the bridge’s cables, making them twang and sway. Zee poofed away and reappeared behind Cain, sword raised.

But again Cain grabbed him with some kind of force and flung him away, like a wolf toying with a rabbit before tearing it apart.

He was playing with them both.

I had to stop this. But how? My only plan hadn’t worked. The bead hadn’t suddenly turned me back, although I did feel nauseous and kinda achy . . . a bit feverish . . .

A pair of fine, shiny black shoes appeared beside me, and in them stood a pair of legs wearing pressed trouser pants with that neat straight line down the front. And as I looked higher, there was Tom Collins’s less than impressed face. “Are you going to lay there all night while they fight for our freedom?”

“I was just thrown against a car.” I winced. “It hurt.”

“Boo-fucking-hoo. What do you want? A pity party? Get up, get over there, and do what you do best.”