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“Don’t listen to her,” my voice inside the cell insisted. “She’s an imposter.”
I lost it. “Shut up. You’re in there mutilating an innocent man. You’ve killed God knows how many others on your way here. I don’t think they’re going to buy you as the good one here, Mayhew.”
A crack-pop issued forth from the cell, and Gabriel bleated out another noise of distress.
“Well, if I’m not playing nice, then I guess I’ll just finish what I came here to do.”
Mercedes looked from me to the other me, then turned her gun towards Mayhew. Thank God. I hadn’t had time to feed her the safe word, yet she still seemed to believe I was real and he was the imposter. It helped that Mayhew was in the process of dismembering my ex.
Though, come to think of it, I think I’d threatened to do the same thing once or twice myself.
&nbs
p; “You can’t kill it with bullets,” I told the detectives.
“You can kill anything with bullets,” Tyler countered, still eyeing me suspiciously, having not decided who should be his target.
“Not a demon.” I guess now was as good a time as any to let Tyler in on the situation.
He snorted. I wasn’t going to be able to ease him into the truth the way I would have liked to. This was a crash course at best, and if he chose to believe it, awesome. If not, well, there was a team of council wardens on their way here to enthrall anyone who encountered Bad Secret tonight. I hoped Holden had the presence of mind to request a clean-up crew. Memories of the men outside the door made hot bile press against the back of my throat.
“I don’t have time to make you understand. I wish I did. The thing in that cell is a demon. It has stolen my form and my memories. There is no way to tell us apart except that I’m standing out here, trying to save you, and she’s in there killing someone.” As if to emphasize his guilt, Mayhew did something new and awful to Gabriel, making my ex cry out in a horrible way. “Please, Tyler. Believe I am who I say I am, and I swear to God I will explain everything to you if we get out of this alive.”
“You won’t,” Mayhew said. “No one will make it out alive.”
Tyler stared at me for a heartbeat, then moved closer to Cedes and aimed his own weapon at Mayhew. I hadn’t bothered pulling a weapon since I’d left Columbia. Nothing I’d brought with me was any use against a full-blooded demon, and I’d left my gun with Holden in case he needed the firepower to keep Lucy safe.
I only knew one thing that might do me any good, and it was decorating the mantle at my apartment. I hadn’t exactly had an opportunity to swing by home and pick up a katana on my way here, but it was the only thing that would make sense in a fight against an immortal monster.
“How did he kill the two officers but not you two?” I asked when I came up next to them.
Now that I could see Gabriel, I wished I’d stayed by the door. Mayhew had Gabriel’s arms pinned behind him like the officer at the desk. My ex was on his knees, his handsome face twisted into a grimace. Blood was matted in his hair, and one side of his face was tacky with redness from a gaping cut on his forehead. I was guessing his face had been smashed into the concrete floor. His nose was crooked, and it looked like Mayhew had dislocated both shoulders.
I felt like I was being punished for every awful, painful thing I’d wished on Gabriel after he left me. Seeing him now with tears pouring down his cheeks and pitiful, mewling pants coming from his lips, I wanted to take it all back. Be careful what you wish for, they always warn you. Who knew my vindictive fantasies could come so cruelly to life?
Mercedes had apparently been answering my question, but I hadn’t heard a damn thing she’d said. “…you went for the door before I could stop you. By the time Tyler and I got here, well…” Her gaze drifted to the macabre tableau outside the door. “It was too late.”
Mayhew’s face was splattered with blood, making the whites of his eyes shine impressively.
“Drop the act,” I told him. “I bet you’re plenty impressive in your true form.”
He clucked his tongue at me and yanked back on Gabriel’s arms, the heel of my favorite boot jammed in his spine. Even though they were a demonic approximation, I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to wear the real thing again. And my leather pants were going in an incinerator when I got home.
If I got home.
Gabriel’s head lolled forward. His body had finally given up, and he’d passed out. It meant he was worse off than I wanted to think about, but it also meant he wasn’t feeling it when the stiletto heel punctured his spinal column.
The killer instinct told me to dive through the open cell door and make a grab for him. A much stronger survivor instinct forced me not to move. Mayhew wanted a reaction out of me. He was trying to goad me into acting stupidly, and I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction. I’d done enough stupid shit this past week to last a lifetime. If I added to the list now, more people would die, and I’d never forgive myself.
“Who was Oliver Mayhew?” I asked.
Mayhew let up on Gabriel’s arms, and the unconscious man slumped forward, collapsing into a heap on the floor like a broken mannequin. Obviously unable to resist showing off for a captive audience, the demon’s eyes glowed red, and he demonstrated his remarkable ability to shift forms. One moment we were looking at a blood-spattered Secret McQueen, the next Mayhew was a tweed-clad professor without a drop of crimson on him.
The detectives inhaled sharply in unison.
Mayhew must have loved shock and awe, because he shifted into a few other forms for good measure. Trish, Angie, poor Ellory from Lincoln, Nebraska. It was enough. If we walked away from this, Professor Oliver Mayhew would be the obvious culprit in the investigation. How we would spin it so the mundane public would believe it was too much for me to think about right then. But I knew it would be easier to sell the story if Mayhew was dead and gone.
He shifted from Ellory back to the professor form and grinned at Mercedes.
