Under the Gun (28 page)

He looked genuinely hurt. “It’s not like you won’t get anything for it.” Dixon’s eyes
were on me. They were hard and laser focused, and seemed to roll into me, to pool
around me and suck me in. But magic doesn’t affect me—not ever.

Only right now, I was drawn. I couldn’t look away.

“What are you going to give me?” My voice was breathy and low, and I almost didn’t
recognize it as my own.

Dixon was so close now that I shivered at the icy chill that wafted from his body.
He leaned into me, his lips brushing over my cheek, leaving a frozen trail.

“Eternal life,” he whispered.

My heart throbbed, and the blood rushing through my veins sounded unnaturally loud.
Dixon licked his lips, his eyes still on me, but hooded now, relaxed. He walked slowly
around me, as if examining every inch of me.

“No.” It was a weak croak, but the effort of pushing the tiny word out past my teeth
was immense.

“Aw,” he whispered, “don’t be afraid.”

I tried to shake my head, imagined myself spitting in his face. But I was rooted,
and his words were so very melodic.

I felt Dixon’s fingertips as they walked up my spine, the cold and pain biting to
the bone as he gripped. “You know, Ms. Lawson,” he said, his breath a throaty whisper,
“I’m really going to miss having you around the office.” Another sly grin. “Until
you come back, of course.”

He slid a long, slender hand from my forehead to the back of my head, smoothing my
hair and putting gentle pressure at the base of my neck. I felt his grip as he slowly
gathered my hair and pulled on it. I arched backward and he grinned, his eyes traveling
up the length of my exposed throat. I felt my own heart race, could hear my own blood
pulsing; my muscles tensed and my insides dropped to liquid as Dixon’s eyes latched
on to the vein throbbing in my neck.

“Don’t,” I managed.

Dixon smoothed an errant hair from the tight ponytail he was making, then used his
fingertip to frame my face. The gesture was so intimate that it dirtied me down to
my soul, and I knew that if I survived this, no amount of washing would ever make
me feel clean again.

“You really are very lovely,” he said, his dark eyes staring into mine.

I blinked up and saw the ink in them; saw a mesmerizing starburst of gold and copper.
It spun and moved and riveted me.

My eyelids started to feel unusually heavy. The heat that was searing me was now a
gentle warmth, and the blood that was pulsing was now a low, melodic hum . . . like
a lullaby.

I watched a red triangle of Dixon’s tongue poke out and moisten his lips. “I’m glad
we get to have this final meal together.” He twisted my hair and pulled me lower,
then used his other hand to smooth the skin on my neck. The cool of his hand was nice
and I licked my own lips, suddenly overcome with thirst.

“I need a drink.”

It was my voice, but my lips didn’t move. I didn’t make them move, didn’t feel them
move. But I was still talking.

“A drink, please.”

“We have to finish off your friends,” he whispered.

I don’t remember moving, but I saw the walls of the warehouse bob as I nodded my head.
Dixon took a single fingernail and sliced at the duct tape that hugged my left arm.
My arm swung free, the handcuff flopping against my thigh.

“Thirsty,” I said again, trying desperately to wet my lips.

Dixon cocked an eyebrow, then opened his coat and pulled out a gun. From somewhere
deep down, I know I should have been terrified. Something—someone—in my gut was urging
me to fight, but I was so tired, and so thirsty. I just stared while Dixon popped
that single silver bullet into the gun. “Hold it now,” he said, pressing it into my
hand.

I felt my hand, alien to me, tightening around the grip of the gun.

“Drink.”

Dixon smiled and his tongue curled around one angled fang. It was razor sharp. He
moved his tongue, pressing the edge of his fang against the bottom of his lip. I heard
the pop of the skin. I heard the rush of the blood as it bubbled toward the fresh
wound.

I needed it.

“Thirsty,” I mumbled again.

More smiling. More swirling of the coppers and golds in his eyes. I remembered that
my grandmother had a clock that would swirl like that....

I heard his fang slide out from his flesh. Could smell the musty, metallic scent of
his blood. It filled me. I wanted it.

Dixon pulled me closer as the blood bubbled on his lower lip. He brought his head
down, his lips coming to meet mine. I wanted to help, to bring myself to him, but
I couldn’t; everything was heavy. I tried anyway and my arm flopped loose, listless,
like a rag doll’s. It swung behind me, the metal bracelet cuff clanking against the
metal folding chair.

The sound was startling.

It stopped the warm rush of blood, wrenched open my heavy eyelids.

“What the hell are you doing?” I cringed as Dixon’s blood dropped on my chin. I squirmed
to get him to loosen his grip but he dug in, pressing his lips toward mine.

“Look at me,” he growled.

“No!”

“Look at me!” The rumble came from his chest; it was so low, I felt it rush through
my entire body.

I backhanded Dixon as hard as I could, the muzzle of the gun digging into his belly.
It didn’t hurt him, but he was startled enough to jostle backward and I was fast enough
to yank the gun, steady it, and aim it directly at Alex.

Dixon grinned at me. “You’re going to send your fallen angel back to hell?” He blinked,
his eyes spinning once again. I felt my lips snake into a smile, then I cut my eyes
to Alex, Dixon’s gun leveled right between his eyes.

“Duck!” I screamed, squeezing the trigger.

Alex and Nicco peeled down, one a half second after the other. Alex tumbled forward,
his head smacking hard against the concrete. Nicco was the late one, and Feng’s silver
bullet pierced cleanly through his heart. His lifeless body crumbled over Alex’s.

I stifled a nervous sob while Dixon looked surprised and vaguely pleased. I tossed
the empty gun, hearing it slide across the cement, then dove for the pallets, yanking
off a strip of wood.

“I didn’t know you had any kind of fight in you, Ms. Lawson,” Dixon said, licking
his lips excitedly. “I love it when breathers fight. Gets their blood pumping. Tastes
delicious. Nice shot, too. Guess that target practice is really paying off.”

I gripped the piece of wood and steadied myself. “I thought you weren’t going to kill
me.”

“Be nice,” he said slyly, “and the offer is back on the table. Immortality.”

He rushed me and I used his momentum against him, planting a foot and sweeping his
knees with the pallet piece. I grunted and swung with as much strength and anger and
hate as I could muster. I saw the blank, gaping faces of the women on the trail, of
Tia Shively, of the ruined patrons of the delicatessen.

“No one is truly immortal, Dixon.”

I felt the wood piece make contact. It didn’t slice the way Vlad’s sword would have,
but Dixon’s feet went out from under him and I heard the thud of his full body weight
smacking against the cement floor. Had he any air in his lungs, it would have oafed
out.

“Get back here!”

I used the wood piece as Vlad had taught me and swatted at Dixon’s arms, blocking
his reach as he rolled onto his knees and lunged for me. He was fast, but I was smart
and for the first time in my life, confident. I lurched backward and tossed the folding
chair at him, hearing the clatter of the metal as it tumbled over him.

“I’m going to kill you slowly,” Dixon roared.

I looked over my shoulder and Dixon was a hairbreadth away, his fingertips reaching
out, just grazing my throat.

He pitched backward when Alex’s arms circled his neck, his hands still bound by the
duct tape. Dixon’s fingers wrapped around Alex’s wrists and I heard the sickening
sound of bones cracking, of Alex howling. I scanned the warehouse, my eyes going over
Nicco’s crumpled form and Sampson, chained, unmoving on the warehouse floor.

I felt the heft of the wooden stake in my hand and Dixon’s eyes flashed with obvious
amusement.

His eyes narrowed as the stake came at him, my grip sure.

“Go to hell, Dixon.”

I was sitting in the San Francisco Memorial emergency room, flanked by Nina and Vlad,
both of them staring on incredulously as I finished telling them the events of the
night.

“That’s unbelievable,” Nina said, shaking her head. Her hair was pulled back in a
wet ponytail that was soaking through her T-shirt. Once the heat wave had broken and
the sky opened up, the city streets became engorged with people celebrating the rain.
They threw their arms up and stomped through puddles; to the casual observer it may
have looked like a rain dance.

To the rest of us, it was a vampire-heavy group, celebrating the end of sunshine internment.

“So Sampson is okay,” Nina asked.

“Yeah, thanks to that werewolf super-speed healing thing. But Nicco . . .”

“Through the heart? I’m impressed, Soph. The heart is a much smaller target than the
ass.”

“Um, thank you?” I bit my bottom lip. “But hey, I’m really sorry about—”

“You’re sorry you had to kill our boss?”

I stiffened and Vlad bristled; the woman sitting next to Nina perked up, her eyes
growing wide.

“Don’t worry,” Nina whispered to her. “He was evil. I knew it the whole time.”

“Alex Grace?” A white-coated doctor stepped into the waiting room and I sprang up.

“I’m here for Alex.”

The doctor looked me up and down. I had cleaned up as much as I could, but there wasn’t
much I could do to hide the bruises and the half of my skull that was as bald as a
cantaloupe.

“Rough night?” the doctor asked.

I cocked my head. “Actually, it was okay. Through here?”

I pulled back the curtain and poked my head in on Alex, who was stretched out on a
cot. He grinned when he saw me, his arm in an enormous cast, a bulbous bruise purpling
above his eye.

“Wow,” I breathed, “What happened to you?”

“Very funny.”

I lingered at the end of the bed until Alex beckoned me with his free arm. “Come here.”

I swallowed and stayed where I was. “Am I coming in to see my colleague or my friend?”

Alex sighed. “Lawson, you came this close”—he held his forefinger and thumb a millimeter
apart—“to shooting me. We’d better be friends.”

I felt my grin pushing up to my earlobes.

“How’s Sampson doing?”

I nodded. “He’s fine. He took quite a beating so he’s not healing as quickly as normal,
but he’s doing good. And word is already spread through the Underworld about Dixon
and about Sampson coming back.”

“Wow. That was fast.” Alex shifted in his bed, his sheets falling down, exposing his
naked chest.

I sucked in a shaky breath, but got a jolt of adrenaline, and tickled my fingers up
Alex’s chest. “It’s too bad we’re just friends and you’re in a cast. . . .”

Alex’s eyes flashed, his lips kicking up into that cocky half smile. “Oh yeah, why’s
that?”

I reached under the bed. “Because somebunny at San Francisco Memorial loves you.”
I planted the bunny-eared hat on his head and grinned.

“You want me to do what?”

In all my years as the only breathing employee at the Underworld Detection Agency,
I’ve been asked to do a lot of things—hobgoblin slobbery, life-or-death, blood-and-flesh
kind of things. But this? This took the cake.

Pete Sampson leaned back in his leather chair, and though I usually beamed with pride
when he did that—as I had been instrumental in getting him reinstated as head of the
UDA—this time, I couldn’t. My stomach was a firm, black knot and heat surged through
every inch of my body as he looked up at me expectantly.

“I really thought you would be excited to visit your old stomping grounds.”

My knees went Jell-O wobbly then and I thumped back into Sampson’s visitor’s chair.
I yanked a strand of hair out of my already-messy ponytail—my hair had been butchered
by a neurotic hoarder not too long ago and was just starting to reach ponytail status—and
wrapped it around my finger until the tip turned white.

“Excited? To return to the source of my deepest angst, my inner-turmoil—to the brick
walls that can only be described as a fiery, brimstony hell?”

Sampson cocked an eyebrow. “It’s just high school, Sophie.”

“Exactly.”

Most people would say that high school is the most traumatic time in their lives—myself
included. And since in the last few years I’d been shot at, stabbed, hung by my ankles,
almost eaten, and sexually harassed by an odoriferous troll,
most traumatic
took on a whole new significance.

“Isn’t there anything else we can do? Anything I can do? And I’m talking human sacrifice,
demon sacrifice, total surrender of my Baskin Robbins punch card.”

“Sophie,” Sampson started.

“Wait.” I held up a hand. “Are we sure we have to go in at all? And why me, specifically?
I mean”—I rifled through my purse and pulled out a wrinkled business card—“it’s been
a while since you’ve been back at the Agency, Sampson. See?” I slid the card across
the desk to him. “It says right there:
Sophie Lawson, Fallen Angels Division.
” I stabbed at my name on the card as though that would somehow give my title more
emphasis. “Does this case have anything to do with fallen angels? Because if not,
I’m sure there are other UDA employees who would be excellent in this investigation.
And then I would be able to really focus on my current position.”

Granted, my position more often than not found me pinning a big baddie to a corkboard
or locked in a public restroom sans clothes, but still.

Sampson stacked my business card on top of a manila file folder and pressed the whole
package toward me.

“You should go in because you know the high school.”

“I’ll draw you a map.” I narrowed my eyes, challenging.

“And because everyone else around here—” Sampson gestured to the open office and I
refused to look, knowing that I would be staring into the cold, flat eyes of the undead—and
the occasional unhelpful centaur. “Well, everyone else would have trouble passing.
Besides, it’s not like you’re going in alone.”

“I’m not worried about that. And hey, I’m flattered, but there really is no way I’m
going to pass as a student.”

Though I’m only five-three (if I fudge it, stand on a phone book and stretch), often
wear my fire-engine red hair in two sloppy braids, and have, much to my best friend’s
chagrin, been known to wear SpongeBob SquarePants pajama bottoms out to walk the dog,
it had been a long time since anyone mistook me for anything more than a fashionably
misguided adult.

“You’re not going in as a student. You’re going in as a teacher. A substitute.”

I felt as though all the blood in my body had drained out onto the brand-new industrial
grade carpet. Because the only thing worse than being a high school student is being
a high school substitute teacher.

My left eye started to twitch. “A substitute teacher?”

My mind flooded with thumbtacks on desk chairs and Saran Wrap over the toilets in
the teacher’s lounge. Suddenly, I longed for my cozy Underworld Detection Agency job,
where no one touched my wedged-between-two-blood-bags bologna sandwich and a bitchy
band of ill-tempered pixies roamed the halls.

“A substitute teacher,” I repeated, “who saves the world?”

Sampson’s shrug was one of those “hey, pal, take one for the team” kind of shrugs
and I felt anger simmering in my gut.

“You can ‘teach’”—he made air quotes that made me nauseous—“any class you’d like.
Provided it’s in the approved curriculum. And not already assigned.”

I felt my lip curl into an annoyed snarl when Sampson shot me a sparkly-eyed smile
as if being given the choice to teach freshman algebra or senior anatomy was a tremendous
perk.

“If this high school isn’t about to slide into the depths of hell or in the process
of being overrun by an army of undead mean girls, I’m going to need a raise. A significant
one,” I said, my voice low. “And a vacation.”

Sampson nodded, but didn’t say anything.

“So,” I said, my eyebrows raised.

“Do you remember last year when a body was found on the Mercy High campus?” Sampson
asked.

My tongue went heavy in my mouth. Though I was well-used to the walking undead and
the newly staked, the death of a young kid—a breather who would stay dead—made my
skin prick painfully. I nodded.

“That’s what this is about?

Sampson didn’t answer me.

“Her name was Elizabeth Thompson, right?”

It had been all over the papers: a local student mysteriously vanishing from an exclusive—and,
before that day, safe—high school campus. A week later, her body had been discovered
dumped near Fort Cronkhite, an old military installation on the Marin side of the
Golden Gate Bridge. Though the story was told and retold—in the
Chronicle
, the
Guardian
—and the Mercy High School campus was overrun with reporters for the better part of
a semester, there weren’t a lot of details in the case. Or at least not a lot were
leaked to the press.

“That murder was never solved,” Sampson said, as he slid the file folder over to me.

“Didn’t someone confess? Some guy in jail? He was a tweaker; said something about
trying to sacrifice her.” The thought shot white-hot heat down my spine, but I tried
my best to push past it. “I still don’t have to see what this has to do with the high
school. Or with me having to go into it. I followed the case pretty closely”—I was
somewhat of a Court TV or pretty much anything-TV junkie—“and I don’t remember any
tie-back. I mean, the girl was found in Marin.”

“She was dumped in one of the tunnels at Battery Townsley.”

I shuddered. “People go through there all the time.”

“Her killer obviously wasn’t concerned about keeping Elizabeth secret.”

I shook my head. “I still don’t understand what this has to do with us—with the Underworld.
Everything about it screams human.”

Sampson gestured to the folders and I swallowed slowly, then looked down at them.
Directly in front of me was a black-and-white photo of a smiling teenager—all perfect
teeth and glossy hair—and it made my stomach roil even more. My high school picture
was braces doing their darnedest to hold back a mouthful of Chiclet teeth and hair
that shot straight out, prompting my classmates to announce that my styling tools
were a fork and an electrical socket. I yanked my hand back when I realized I was
subconsciously patting my semi-smoothed hair.

“What? The prom queen—” I stopped and sucked in a sharp breath when my eyes caught
the headline plastered over the photo: M
ERCY
H
IGH
S
TUDENT
M
ISSING
.

I scanned quickly.

I looked up, frowning. “I don’t understand. I mean, it’s horrible, but we don’t even
know if she’s really missing.”

“She is, Sophie.”

Sampson pressed his lips together and sighed, his shoulders falling in that way that
let me know that he wasn’t telling me everything. “There has been talk of a coven
on campus.”

Relief washed over me and I sort of chuckled. “Sampson, every high school has a coven
on campus! It’s called disgruntled teenage girls with black dye jobs and too much
angst-y time on their hands pretending to read tea leaves and shoot you the evil eye.”
I waved the article in my hand. “I don’t see how one has to do with the other.”

“When Elizabeth Thompson was found last year, she was in the center of a chalked pentagram.
Black candles at the points.”

I licked my suddenly dry lips. “They didn’t mention that in the paper or on the news.”
There was a beat of silence in which Sampson held my eye; finally, I rolled mine with
a soft, snorting laugh. “Wait—they think it was witchcraft? Have you seen
The Craft
?
Teen Witch
? That’s Freak Out Your Parents With Wicca 101.”

“She had an incantation carved into her flesh.”

I blinked. “Carved?”

“I consulted both Kale and Lorraine.”

I sucked in a breath, willing Sampson to stop talking. Kale and Lorraine are the Underworld
Detection Agency’s resident witches. Kale was recently run over by a car but spent
her down time controlling the elements, and Lorraine was the most powerful Gestalt
witch the Green Order had seen in decades. She was also a top Tupperware saleslady
and if anyone knew a true incantation—or, for Lorraine, how to burp a lid—it was these
ladies.

“They both confirmed that the incantation was legitimate. Elizabeth Thompson’s killer
was summoning a demon—and not a good one.”

“Oh.” The word came out small and hollow, dying in the cavernous room.

“As I mentioned, Elizabeth’s body was found seven days after she went missing. It
was obvious that her attacker wanted—or needed—her to be found on that day.”

“I don’t understand. How do you—why—how do they know that?”

“According to the police report, an anonymous call came in at 7:07 that morning.”

“Seven-oh-seven on the seventh day?”

“Of the seventh month.”

I frowned, resting my chin in my hands. “Maybe her killer is just OCD, did anyone
explore that angle?”

I knew the significance of sevens—and I knew the demon Elizabeth’s murderer was calling.

“Seven is divine. Seven-seven-seven is—”

“Satan.” The word took up all the space in the room and I found it hard to breathe.

Everyone knows 6-6-6 as the devil’s “call” sign—or they think they do. And while it
does have true significance—mostly in movies, fiction, and speed metal songs—it is
more like a pop-culture high-five to the Prince of Darkness. The trio of sevens is
the summoner.

My heart was throbbing in my throat. I knew the answer, but still had to ask. “Do
they think the other girl—”

“Alyssa.”

“Alyssa, do they think she—that she may have been abducted by the same person?”

Sampson’s hulking silence was answer enough.

Something tightened in my chest, and Sampson, his enormous cherrywood desk and his
entire office seemed to spin, then fish-eye in front of me. I gripped the sides of
my chair and steadied myself.

“We want you to go into Mercy and see what you can find out about this so-called coven.”

“Are they even rela—”

Sampson held up a hand, effectively silencing me. “The girls in the coven were absent
from class the day that Alyssa Rand went missing.” He eyed me now and swallowed hard.
“They were also absent the day Elizabeth Thompson’s body was found. The PD’s notes
say that these girls were cited for bullying Elizabeth.”

A memory wedged in my mind and I was fifteen again, awkward, terrorized, cornered
in a Mercy High bathroom by a selection of mean girls with Aqua Net hair and slouchy
socks.

“How long has Alyssa been missing?”

“Forty-eight hours,” said Sampson.

“So we only have five days,” I said, licking my lips. “We should get to work.”