Marked: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Thrice Cursed Mage Book 2) (3 page)

I ducked instinctively as bullets pinged off our vehicle, which was when I realized they were bouncing off the windows instead of going through them. Ricky caught my expression, and it must have been strange because she shrugged.

“Yeah, it’s bulletproof. Just because I can heal from gunshot wounds doesn’t mean I like getting shot full of holes.” She glanced back at the road, and her hands were a literal blur of motion as she worked the clutch and the wheel with her superhuman reflexes. It made me wonder how many of her kind were professional racecar drivers. Probably all the good ones. Well, that wasn’t fair at all.

“Good to know,” I said, trying to catch my breath while adrenaline surged through my veins. “But why did you come to save me?”

“Remember when I was slicing you open, and you told me a story?” She didn’t look at me, but I saw her tongue snake out and rake over her lips, and I had to try very hard to ignore the fight-or-flight response that exploded through every inch of my being. “You said you were helping Sera because she happened to be there when you got all high and mighty.”

“Yeah…” I said, resting my head against the headrest and staring at the ceiling so I wouldn’t freak out. My hands started to shake anyway. I’d been about to be killed by a bunch of gun-toting maniacs and had survived only because I was demon-enhanced. What would have happened to me if I’d never gotten my magic? I’d be good as dead now. The thought was sobering.

“Well, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m a girl.” She gestured at herself with one hand, and even though I hadn’t been paying her much attention before on account of the whole moments from death thing, my eyes followed along the line of her body.

She was wearing a pair of tight black yoga pants along with a pink and black top that hugged her lithe, nubile form in a way that would be hard not to notice under normal circumstances. Even though she wasn’t super chesty, the outfit did a good job of making me not care very much. I pushed the thought away before it could get its claws in me and cause problems of a decidedly different nature than men with machineguns could. While it might have been okay to admire the werewolf, something told me, I didn’t want her getting the wrong idea.

“I noticed,” I said, looking away as my cheeks threatened to color. As far as I knew, I’d never really been one to go after the cool, tomboy-type girls, but just looking at her made me want to go for it in a way I couldn’t describe. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the time or place to think those kinds of thoughts. If I did, well, I might get us both killed, and I really didn’t want that. Besides, I had a murder to commit and a sister to save.

“What’s your point?” I asked, forcing myself to think unsexy thoughts about the Yankees and how they were a way worse team than the Mets, you know, to distract myself.

“I also happen to be in distress, and since you’re all about taking down supernatural jerks, I thought you might lend me a hand.” I couldn’t see her staring at me since I wasn’t looking at her, but I could feel it like a high-intensity laser beam.

“I’m actually sort of busy,” I replied, spinning around in my chair and gesturing behind us. We were so far away, the only thing I could see of the carnage was smoke billowing high into the sky. That wasn’t that strange, I guess, given her supersonic driving, but I still hadn’t heard any sirens. What was the deal with police in this town? Did they even respond to calls?

She stopped at a red light and tapped anxiously on her steering wheel. “I noticed,” she said in an eerily similar imitation to my own voice. The only difference was she sounded a little dumber. I gritted my teeth. Why did people always sound dumb when they mimicked my voice? “But I think you’ll help me anyway.”

“Why is that? Do I seem like the kind of guy who helps murderous werewolves?” I asked, turning and looking at her. She was staring at me like she was trying to decide whether or not she wanted to eat me. A shiver ran down my spine, and I unconsciously reached for the door. Maybe I could leap out and run away… except Ricky was a werewolf, and not just any werewolf, but the alpha werewolf of this city. If I ran, she’d chase me, and worse still, she’d enjoy it.

“Because at this particular moment, our priorities happen to align.” The light turned green, and she swung her gaze back to the road. “Those assassins work for a fellow named Pierce Ambrose, and he’s one bad mamma jamma. He probably won’t stop coming for you until you kill him. I’m not sure what you did to piss him off, but, and let me be clear on this, I don’t care. I just want you to help me.”

“I can work with that,” I said, leaning my head against the window and staring out at the cars outside. I’d thought about shrugging, but she wasn’t looking at me so I wasn’t sure my gesture would have had the effect I was going for.

“Let me be crystal clear, Mac. I want Pierce Ambrose dead, and if you’re the type of guy who can kill Van, then maybe, just maybe, you can kill Pierce Ambrose too.” She reached up and finger-combed her red hair nervously, almost like she thought I’d refuse to help her, which was probably the smart play. I could walk away right now.

Of course, if I did that, I’d be sentencing my sister to death since I had to kill Ambrose anyway and having her help me would greatly increase my odds of success, but I was willing to bet Ricky didn’t know that. She was just playing the percentages. If Pierce was after me, I’d kill him. Still, if I was her, I’d stay away and let me do it on my own. Her helping so directly was a dumb move. It meant she was doing this for more reasons than she let on, and that could be dangerous.

I swallowed hard as another thought reared its ugly head. If Ricky was seriously asking me to help her kill the same guy I had been hired to kill, what had this Pierce Ambrose done to piss off so many people in the supernatural community and why was he still alive? Not only did he have an actual demon wanting him dead, he had the alpha of a werewolf pack wanting him dusted too. Not many people could survive such a combination. I would have thought I’d have done a better job vetting my targets before accepting jobs. Some assassin I was. Only, I probably had known Pierce was incredibly dangerous and had been overly confident. Stupid overly cocky previous self, look what you’ve gotten me into.

“Were you following me?” I asked before taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly in a vain attempt to calm myself. It sort of worked. Maybe I needed to try counting to ten.

“Yes.” Color filled her cheeks as she looked away. “I asked Duane where you were going and persuaded him to give me the address he’d had you dropped off at. And before you go and get all high and mighty,” she blushed harder, “you should be happy I showed up when I did. Otherwise, you’d be paste right about now.”

“Hey, I’m not judging,” I replied, keeping all my comments to myself because the last thing I wanted to do was anger the werewolf sitting next to me while I was trapped inside what amounted to a very tiny metal box moving at high speeds. “But the timing makes me think you might be working with the people who tried to kill me.”

She shot me a look that could have melted steel. “Mac, if I wanted you dead, you’d be dead, and I’d be using your entrails as a jump rope.” Her words conjured an image in my head I was very keen to dismiss. “But do me this solid, and I’ll make sure no one ever comes after Sera and her tyke ever again. Okay?”

I took a deep breath and let it out through my teeth. I should take the deal, and not just because I needed to kill Pierce Ambrose to save my sister and her son, but because it would keep Sera and her son safe too. I wasn’t sure why Van and Vassago had wanted the woman, but I was willing to bet that killing Van was more like a Band-Aid than a permanent fix.

Sera and John would no doubt be much safer with Ricky’s pack watching over them. I still wasn’t sure why I cared so much about them. Saving them last time had cost me a day, and right now, that extra day would have been invaluable. I know you aren’t supposed to cry over spilled milk and all, but this definitely felt like I’d knocked the last of the baby’s milk off the counter right before feeding time. Surely a few tears were in order.

“Okay,” I replied, not even feeling a little guilty because I was totally going to wax Pierce Ambrose anyway.

“Awesome,” Ricky said, and the elation in her voice almost made me feel guilty. Almost. “So what’s the plan?”

I opened my mouth to shout something like “You mean to tell me you don’t have a plan?” but before I could, a gargoyle leapt off the building next to us and broadsided our Corvette. The force of the impact sent our vehicle careening through the guardrail on our left in a squeal of tortured metal and a shriek of broken glass.

Chapter 4

Have you ever been trapped inside a metal coffin while a two-ton living statue tried to splatter your skull like a casaba melon? I hadn’t before either, and let me tell you, it wasn’t nearly as fun as it sounds, and yes, I realize it doesn’t sound terribly fun. That’s sort of my point.

As we slid down the muddy embankment toward the lake below, the gargoyle’s stone fist punched through the Corvette’s bulletproof hardtop ridiculously close to my skull. Its stone fingers wrapped around the metal and peeled the top of the car back like it was the lid on a sardine can.

“Goddamn it!” Ricky cried while grabbing hold of her seatbelt and tearing it free of the car’s frame in one fluid motion. It was pretty amazing because I’d managed to do little more than stare dumbly up at the creature while it eyed me like I was a particularly tasty sardine. Yup, not done with that metaphor quite yet. It’s got at least three more uses left, I think.

Ricky’s left hand lashed out in a blur of motion I could barely follow with my naked eye. She smashed her fleshy fist into the giant rock monster. A sickening crack that was equal parts bone and stone filled my ears as the gargoyle actually lifted off the hood of the car and hit the muddy ground like a bag of wet cement. The dazed creature slid backward across the embankment, throwing up a cloud of dirt and debris as Ricky’s hand flopped like a dying fish at the end of her wrist. Broken bones writhed and twisted back into place underneath her skin while blood oozed from the torn flesh on her knuckles.

A look of annoyance flashed across her face as she glanced from her ruined fist to me. She glowered at me like the gargoyle was my fault. Which maybe it was, I had no idea, but I hadn’t told her to punch it in the face either.

“Why are you still wearing your seatbelt?” she asked, and the tone of her voice made me feel very stupid and useless. Before I could respond, she reached out with her non-shattered right hand and unfastened my seatbelt. “We need to get out of here before your buddy makes me punch him again. I don’t know about you, but I’m not exactly fond of slugging it out with a goddamned statue.” She held up her ruined fist for emphasis.

“Yeah, you should try wearing gloves or something. That’s what boxers do, you know, because they punch so hard, they’d break their hands without them,” I said, snapping myself out of my shock and scrambling up onto the seat so I could jump from the Corvette before we wound up in the lake. It wasn’t exactly an awesome plan, I’ll admit, but I was sort of under a lot of pressure at the moment.

“When this is over, I’m going to punch you in the face,” Ricky said, and the tone in her voice made me think she was totally serious. Deciding not to increase my chances of an ass-whooping at the hands of a pissed off werewolf, I wisely kept my mouth shut.

I tried to work up the courage to jump from the car as the gargoyle got to its feet and stared at us. One side of its face looked like it’d been hit with a goddamned sledgehammer, and as I leapt from a moving vehicle as it slid toward a lake, I realized I was about to have a whole different problem. I was about to be out in the open with a huge rock monster hell-bent on killing us. At least I think it was trying to kill us. For all I knew, smashing our car was gargoyle for, “I love you.” Either way, I wasn’t exactly fond of finding out the gargoyle equivalent of a hug.

“Whatever you say, Stumpy,” I said before hitting the ground in a roll and coming to my feet covered in mud, grass, and slime.

Ricky landed lithely next to me on her feet without disturbing so much as a blade of grass. She shot the monster a glance before backhanding me across the face with her good hand. My head snapped backward as I crumpled to the ground in a fit of throbbing pain. She smirked at me.

“Don’t call me Stumpy, jackass,” she said, turning away from me while I rubbed my jaw and prayed my teeth weren’t actually loose. No, surely she hadn’t hit me
that
hard.

As I got to my feet, the Corvette slid off the edge of the embankment and fell into the lake with a splash that threw water in every direction. My gaze swung toward it to see the poor Corvette sinking into the lake with a level of finality I couldn’t quite describe. I can’t say why, but even though it was an inanimate object, I felt bad for the car. It didn’t deserve to have walked the plank.

Ricky barely spared it a glance as she sprinted toward the gargoyle, her neon pink running shoes a blur on the muddy ground. When she was a few feet from the lumbering monster, she leapt high into the air like she was Trinity from the Matrix. Time seemed to slow down around us as her right foot lashed out and connected with the monster’s dented face.

The bones in her leg and foot shattered with a crack that made me wince in commiseration. The ragged ends of her tibia and fibula tore awkwardly through her skin in a spray of crimson as the creature’s head snapped violently to the side. It wobbled like a drunk who had just had a bottle broken over its skull. Then, before I could blink, the monster’s left hand snatched Ricky out of the air by the mop of short red hair on her head and flung her away like yesterday’s garbage. She hit the lake some twenty feet away and skipped across the surface before sinking into its depths.

“Damn,” I muttered, hoping she wasn’t dead as I watched the concentric circles of water spread out from where she’d disappeared into the murky water. Ricky was a werewolf who’d just kicked a statue so hard she’d broken her leg. Surely, she could survive being thrown into a lake. Still, there was no way of knowing if she was even still conscious. If she wasn’t, there was a good chance she’d drown, even if she was a super-fast-healing werewolf. I needed to help her, and to do that, I needed to end this quickly.