Kiss at Your Own Risk (30 page)

Blaine swore and lit out down the right hallway, right toward the horrific sound of agony, of pain, of unrelenting death. “It’s not one of her inventions.” He knew that sound. He’d seen it. Never in real life. Only in a hologram. The one in which Trinity had succumbed to the curse. “It’s Trinity.”

Only this time it was for real.

He was too late.

***

Blaine had always prided himself on his creativity. Cross-stitching, battle tactics, figuring out how to escape from the Den. He was brilliant and had vision beyond anyone he’d ever met.

But when he blew up the door to the Pit of Despair and Joy, he realized that he’d fallen way short of doing justice to the image of Trinity-the-Black-Widow. He had a split second to register that Christian was on the table and alive, Mari was wrapped up beside him, and Angelica was absent, before he looked up and saw the swamp thing that used to be the woman he’d made love to.

“Now that’s not a pretty sight,” Jarvis observed.

Trinity was up against the ceiling, broken chains dangling from her wrists and ankles. Her hair was gray and white, spraying out from her head at all angles, so tangled they made Nigel’s muddy locks look like an ad for the Silk Protein Gloss they all used. Her eyes were black, her lips matched, and her fingers were curled in a fist that reminded him of the schnoodies’ claws.

“Hot damn,” he whispered, not bothering to hide his awe. It was the first time he’d seen her since he’d realized she loved him. “She’s even more beautiful than I remembered.” He could barely breathe, he was so overwhelmed by her sheer magnificence. “I should have brought her roses. Two dozen. Long-stemmed.”

Jarvis smacked him in the head with his palm. “Get your shit together, Trio. That’s no sweet girlfriend up there. That’s one bat-shit-crazy-killer.”

Blaine shoved Jarvis into the wall without taking his eyes off Trinity. “Hey, sweetheart,” he called. “You look fantastic. Love the hair.”

She saw Blaine and shrieked again. A prism flared to life in front of him and the hologram slammed a holographic icicle into his eye. It melted instantly upon contact, and his spectral image fell straight to the ground.

“She’s a persistent little thing, isn’t she?” Nigel said. “That’s true love right there, you lucky sod.”

“I know.” Blaine grinned. “Hello, my dear.”

A large, dripping icicle appeared in Trinity’s hand and she screamed again.

Jarvis reared back with his sword, but Blaine caught his wrist. “No.”

“Are you delusional? The chick’s gone psychotic—”

“Trinity.” Blaine walked toward her. “I believe in you. You’re stronger than this.”

“Come on, Trio.” Jarvis shoved him back. “You’re more pathetic than Christian. A little sex makes you think the girl’s not going to kill you? Look at her! The girl’s gone loco.”

Blaine saw Trinity cringe at Jarvis’s words, and he knew in that instant that Trinity was still in there somewhere. She could still feel pain. She could still be insulted. She could still shrink from the image of the monster she thought she was.

He shoved Jarvis off him and walked closer to her. She screamed and rose higher up toward the ceiling, clutching the icicle to her chest. “I know you’re not going to throw it,” he said. “You won’t kill me, Trin, because you don’t want to.”

She started to shake her head frantically back and forth. “Run,” she finally whispered, her voice raw. “For God’s sake, Blaine.
Run
.”

“No.” He moved closer. “You can shift the curse to focus on Angelica. It’s what we planned for and—”‘

“Blaine!”

He whirled around at the sound of Angelica’s voice. She had stopped in the doorway of her Closet of Creative Ideas, a small snake wriggling in her hand. Her eyes were wide and she looked shocked. “How can you possibly be alive?”

The three warriors attacked her at the same moment. Blades. Fireballs.

When the witch didn’t even bother to scream and the room filled with orange smoke, he knew they were in serious trouble.

Blaine’s eyes were burning when the smoke cleared, and he found himself chained to the stone wall with stainless steel links. Jarvis and Nigel were in the same situation, and the room smelled like charred skin from the metal burning them. He could feel his body getting weaker, and he knew others were facing the same. Not the most offensive position they could be in.

“Well, now, this just pisses me off,” Nigel said, his voice calm.

“Not much of a welcome home party,” Blaine agreed. He quickly scanned the room, looking for options as Angelica raced across the room and tossed a small tulip charm into a large black ball.

Huh. He didn’t have the best memories of that cauldron.

“Your girlfriend’s getting feisty,” Nigel commented.

Blaine looked and saw that Trinity was playing with the icicle again. “Trin—”

She looked up and he saw the desperation in her eyes. The terror of what she’d become. “You can do it,” he said. “I know you can.”

She shook her head, and he saw her eyes glistening with tears.

“Dammit, Trinity! I know—”

A dozen knives flashed through the air, and she was suddenly pinned against the ceiling by Nigel’s blades. He’d put them through her clothes, not her skin, but Blaine sent a fireball smacking into his buddy’s face anyway. “Don’t scare my girl.”

“Just giving her a break. Can’t you see it’s not easy for her to keep from whizzing down here and poking you in the eye?” Nigel tossed the sparks out of his hair. “Have you learned nothing from Angelica? One of the key things a man has to do is know when his girl needs a little help.”

Had he misjudged what she needed? Blaine looked at Trinity. Yeah, he saw relief on her beautiful features to be locked down, but he also saw absolute devastation, and he knew it was because she was so dangerous that she needed to be trapped to keep her from hurting the man she loved. “Hey, love,” he said softly. “It’s going to be okay, I promise—”

“Hope you made a better choice than I did.”

Blaine looked over at Christian’s voice, and he grinned. “Nice to see you, man. I thought you were passed out.”

“Playing possum.” Christian jerked at the binds. “Mari. Get us free.”

Mari shook her head. “I believe Angelica. This is all for your good. For us—”

Christian glanced over at the witch, who was bent over the pot and working. Blaine knew the witch went into the zone when she was working, and she wouldn’t be listening to them. “She’s going to infect you so that you kill me. The curse of the black widow.”

Mari’s face went pale. “You’re lying. You don’t care about me.”

“No, I don’t, but I care about me. And I’m willing to take advantage of the fact that you love me to save myself.”

Mari scowled. “And that’s why I need her help, to deal with you.”

Blaine rolled his eyes. “Nice job, man. Way to work it.”

Angelica turned and she was carrying the snake in her hands. “It’s time, sweetlings.”

Blaine swore. “Let Trinity go, Nigel. We need her.”

“No way.” Jarvis was starting to swing his sword, and the air was filled with humming. “If you let Trinity go, it’s over. She’s bailed on you before. Don’t trust her.”

Blaine looked up at the woman looking down at him with murderous eyes, and he knew he couldn’t do it without her. If he wanted to save Christian, to save the others, he needed help, and he needed hers. “I trust her.”

“Like you trusted her before? Like Christian trusted Mari?”

Blaine glanced over at Mari, who had been released from the chair and was walking reluctantly toward the witch, her palm outstretched to be bitten by the snake. To be infected so she could kill Christian. Yeah, she looked wary and a little nervous, but she was doing it of her own free will. Shit. Was he making the same mistake Christian had made?

“Trio.”

Blaine looked over at Christian. “Yeah?”

“Trinity told me the story.” Christian tugged at his chains and his rat scurried off the table to hide underneath a cabinet, as he always did when things were about to get ugly. “I’d be inclined to trust her, you know, given that we have no other options. She’s our best bet.”

That was all Blaine needed. “Nigel. Now.”

Nigel swore, but he released the knives.

Trinity screamed and came swooping down toward him, brandishing the icicle like she was about to take it to his head. Which he really hoped she wasn’t. He didn’t flinch. “Trinity. We need to kill the witch. Now.”

She charged right for him, the icicle aimed for his heart, screaming in that really freaky way he was beginning to find so familiar and sweet. There was nothing like the piercing shriek of murder to make a guy feel loved.

“I hate it when you’re wrong,” Jarvis said, raising his sword toward Trinity.

“No.” Blaine stilled Jarvis’s hand. “I trust her. Let her come.”

***

A voice somewhere in her mind was screaming at her to stop, but Trinity could do nothing but watch as she plunged the icicle toward Blaine’s heart. She was less than five yards away and—

“I believe in you.”

She jerked her gaze to Blaine’s face, and she saw the truth in his eyes. He wasn’t defending himself. He wasn’t flinching. He was watching her with absolute confidence. Like she was a warrior he would trust with his life. “Don’t,” she whispered. “I can’t—” But even as those words slipped out of her mouth, something inside her rebelled.

She was so tired of losing! She was sick of hating herself! She wanted to look at herself the way Blaine looked at her. She fought to slow down, to divert the icicle, but the tip kept going, she couldn’t stop—

“I believe in you,” he said again.

His simple words ripped right through the scream of terror driving her. That short phrase, utterly truthful, even when faced with the Son of Sam coming for him. Blaine saw good in her. Something worth loving, despite everything she was.

A man who trusted no one and nothing, trusted her.

I want to be that woman.

She grabbed the back of the icicle with her other hand and wrenched the tip to the side. It slammed harmlessly into the wall beside Blaine’s shoulder and exploded. He caught her against him, a brilliant smile lighting up his face. “I knew you could do it.”

“No!” She twisted out of his reach, not daring to share his jubilation. “It’s not done.” She could feel the fire within her, the need to kill. It wasn’t over. She swung around quickly and looked at Angelica. The woman who had done so much to hurt the man she loved. “It’s your turn.”

She opened her heart to her love, to her fury, to her disgust at being a pawn to this abomination and she channeled it all into the vision of the woman before her. An enormous hologram flared to life over the witch’s head, lighting up the whole room.

Angelica looked up as an enormous holographic warrior appeared above her head, holding a golden ring shaped like a halo. He slammed it down over her head, like a crown. A holographic image of her shrieked and began to melt.

A fiery halo immediately flared up in Blaine’s hand and he hurled it across the room like a Frisbee. The witch screamed and ran for the door, and the halo landed quietly on her head just as she flung the lock and yanked the door open.

On the other side of the door was Napoleon, and she felt into his arms, her legs already melting as she groaned his name. The chains holding all the men fell away, and Mari turned and raced back toward Christian, begging his forgiveness.

An icicle formed in Trinity’s hand, and she stumbled backwards as the hologram appeared above Blaine’s head again. “You have to kill me,” she whispered. “I’m the Chosen, and I’m cursed. Just promise me that you’ll find Smutty and save my dad.”

“You proved to me that you can manage the curse.” Blaine tossed a fireball at the icicle and melted it. “There’s got to be another option besides killing you.”

But as Angelica’s anguished cry of death filled the room, the tulip on Trinity’s collarbone began to glow. Not a burning like before. A brilliant white light of life and rebirth.

Blaine swore and covered it with his hand, and they looked at each other, and she knew there was no other way for it to end. Which was just a tremendously huge bummer. “I really didn’t think it would come to this,” she told him.

He grimaced. “Me neither.”

“Angelica!” Napoleon’s anguished cry filled the room. “My love!”

And then the smell of rotting bananas drifted over the odor of smoke, burned flesh, and singed hair.

Trinity exchanged looks with Blaine as another icicle formed in her hands, a sudden idea in her mind. And she saw from the way Blaine was looking at her glowing tulip that he’d just thought of the same thing. “Will it work?”

He melted her icicle and looked over at Napoleon and the fast-melting witch. “It might.”

“If it doesn’t—”

He touched her tulip, and she knew they were in a race to win before Angelica took over her body. “It will.”

But she saw the fear in his eyes, and knew he wasn’t sure.

***

Trinity whirled toward the door as Augustus raced into the room, a pink star clutched in his hand. “You die now,” he screamed. He hurled it at her. “You are so bad for my reputation—”

Trinity didn’t flinch as Blaine intercepted it with a pink flaming arrow. “I have an offer for you,” she said. “A better deal.”

He hurled another one, and Blaine nicked it aside. Then another. And another.

Blaine swore and she realized his fire was getting less bright with each hit. She glanced up at him and saw water beading his forehead. Her throat constricted, and she felt sudden fear stab her heart. “You’re really dying?”

“I’m fine,” Blaine retorted. “Make the offer. Now!”

She faced Augustus again, ignoring the stars flying at her face. “Have you heard of Napoleon? World’s greatest assassin?” She felt her tulip creeping down her chest, and she knew Angelica’s soul was moving into her body.

“
I
own the title of World’s Greatest Assassin.” Augustus threw another, and this time, the star glowed brightly before finally dying under Blaine’s defenses.

She knew they were almost out of time. “What if you could knock Napoleon out of competition?”

Augustus paused mid-throw. “I’m listening.”

“He’s right behind you.”

Augustus glanced over his shoulder. Napoleon was down on his knees, clutching a melting Angelica in his arms. He was trying to pull the halo off her head, but having no luck. She was telling him what a bastard he was, and he was declaring his love for her. “That’s the big, famous man?”

Trinity coughed, and her legs started to go numb. A flash of dizziness sent her stumbling, and Blaine caught her against him. He was damp, leaking water. “You’re okay,” he said. “I’ve got you.”

She tried to focus. Willed her mind to stay coherent. “Angelica is Napoleon’s true love. If she dies, he’ll be pissed and go on a killing rampage. You’ll never keep pace. But if you dusted her and hid her in your lair, he’d spend the rest of his days trying to get her back. He’d have no time for assassinating. You’d have no competition.”

Augustus stood a little taller. “Excellent idea, except for the fact she’s dying. My pink stars don’t reverse that process.”

“I know how to save her.” Trinity gasped and lost feel of her legs. Blaine scooped her up and cradled her against his chest, pressing his lips to her temple. She leaned into him, focusing on how good it felt to be held by him again, a gift she’d thought she’d forsaken when she’d walked out on him. “If you free my dad right now, I’ll tell you how to save Angelica. But she’ll be dead in about thirty seconds, so decide.” Trinity coughed again, and her mind was getting so fuzzy. As if it was fading. She leaned her head back against Blaine’s chest.

“Hang in there, babe,” he whispered. “We’re almost there. Stay with me.”

“Trying,” she mumbled. Getting difficult. The warmth from the tulip felt so good, so warm, calling her toward it.

“Done.” Augustus pulled a baggie out of his pocket. “No, not that one.” He pulled out another. “No, not that one.”

The room began to spin and Trinity fought against the blackness trying to take over her mind. Against the vortex calling to her soul.

Blaine tightened his grip on her. “I’m not letting you go.”

She bit her lip, holding his words in her heart. She wanted to stay with this man. “Hurry,” she whispered.

“Ah, yes.” Augustus unzipped a baggie and dumped the contents out on the floor. He threw a small red disc at the pile. A small puff, an explosion, and suddenly Elijah was lying on the cold stone. His eyes were closed, but his skin was no longer pink, and she could see his chest moving. He was alive.

“Dad!” The room blackened and Trinity was vaguely aware of falling.

“The halo,” Blaine snapped. “That’s what’s killing her. I’ll take it off and she’s yours. Deal.”

Trinity peeled her eyes open long enough to see the halo disappear from Angelica’s head, then she felt her consciousness slip away, and she knew they were too late.

Her soul had gotten the boot.

***

Blaine felt his whole world shudder as Trinity collapsed in his arms. “Trinity.” She started to slip out of his grip, his hands too wet to hold on. “Don’t you dare leave me!”

Christian was suddenly by his side, helping him lower Trinity safely to the ground. “I’ve got your back, Trio.”

Mari crouched beside him and ignored Christian’s lethal glare. “Tell her you love her, Blaine.”

“She knows.” His legs gave out and he began to slump over. He fought to hold onto her, but he was too weak, too soggy. His chest hurt, he couldn’t think. Just felt this overwhelming weight crushing him. The cold floor had never bothered him, but it dug into his knees. The drip of the faucet in the corner was too loud, grating at him. The scent of lavender, getting fainter and fainter as his woman left him. “Dammit, Trinity! Don’t you dare!”

“For heaven’s sake, have you learned nothing from being here?” Mari shouted. “Don’t be a complete ass! Tell her you love her and that you’ll be there forever for her. That’s all a woman wants, to be loved. Tell her.”

Trinity began to glow even more brightly. The iridescence began creeping up her neck, toward her head.