Текст книги "Daimon"

Автор книги: Jennifer L. Armentrout

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Текущая страница: 3 (всего у книги 4 страниц)

 

CHAPTER 7

A deep numbness settled over me as I stood in a gas station bathroom. I turned my hands over and rubbed them together under the rush of icy water, watching the basin turn red, and then pink, and then clear. I kept washing my hands until they, too, felt numb.

Every so often a spasm shot through my legs and my arms would twitch, no doubt a by-product of running and running until an ache had settled so far into my body that every step had jarred my bones. My eyes kept flicking to the garden spade as if I needed to assure myself that it was still within reach. I’d placed it on the edge of the sink, but it didn’t feel like it was close enough.

Turning off the faucet, I picked it up and slid it under the waistband of my jeans. The sharp edges bit into the flesh of my hip, but I tugged my shirt down over it, welcoming the little stab of pain.

I left the dingy bathroom, walking in no particular direction. The back of my shirt was soaked with sweat and my legs protested the whole walking thing. I’d take a few steps, touch the handle of the spade through my shirt, walk some more and repeat.

Take the money and run…

But run where? Where was I supposed to go? We didn’t have any close friends that we’d trusted with the truth. The mortal part urged me to go to the police, but what could I say to them? By now, someone would have called 911 and her body would’ve been found. Then what? If I went to the authorities, I’d be placed in the state system even

though I was seventeen. We’d exhausted all of our money in the last three years and there were no funds left over except the few hundred dollar bills in my pocket. Lately, my mom had taken to using compulsions to get cheaper rates whenever we’d had bills to pay.

I kept walking as my brain tried to answer the question of what happens now?The sun was beginning to set. I could only hope the humidity would ease off some. My throat felt like I’d swallowed a dry sponge and my stomach grumbled unhappily. I ignored them both, continuing to put as much distance between my house and me as I could.

Where to go?

Like a sucker punch in the stomach, I saw my mom. Not how she’d looked last night, when she’d told me she loved me, that image of her escaped me. Now I kept seeing her dulled, green eyes.

A sharp stab of pain caused my step to falter. The ache in my chest, in my soul, threatened to consume me. I can’t do this. Not without her.

I had to do this.

In spite of the humidity and heat, I shivered. Wrapping my arms around my chest, I barreled down the street, scanning the crowds for the horrific face of a daimon. Several seconds would pass before the elemental magic they wielded would have an effect on me. It might give me enough time to make it run for it, but they obviously could sense the little aether I had in me. It didn’t seem likely that they’d follow me; daimons didn’t actively hunt half-bloods. They’d tag and drain us if they happened across us, but they wouldn’t seek us out. The diluted aether in us wasn’t as appealing as that of the pures.

I wandered the streets aimlessly until I spied a motel that looked somewhat decent. I needed to get off the streets before nightfall. Miami after dark wasn’t a place a lone, teenage girl skipped around happily.

After grabbing some burgers from a nearby fast food joint, I checked in at the motel. The guy behind the counter didn’t look twice at the sweaty girl standing in front of him—with no luggage and only a bag of food—asking for a room. As long as I paid in cash, he didn’t even care that I didn’t show any ID.

My room was on the first floor at the end of narrow, musty hallway. There were questionable sounds coming from some of the rooms, but I was more disturbed by the dirty carpet than the low moans.

The bottoms of my worn sneakers looked cleaner.

I shuffled the burgers and drink to my other arm as I opened the door to room 13. The irony of the number didn’t pass me by; I was just too tired and out of it to care.

Surprisingly, the room smelled good, courtesy of the peach air freshener plugged into the wall outlet. I set my stuff down on the small table and pulled out the garden spade. Lifting my shirt, I inched down the band of my pants and ran my fingers over the indentations the blade had left in my skin.

It could be worse. I could be like my mo—

“Stop it!” I hissed at myself. “Just stop it.”

But the aching pain welled up anyway. It was like feeling nothing and everything all at once. I drew in a shallow breath, but it hurt. Seeing my mom lying beside the bed still didn’t seem real. None of this did. I kept expecting to wake up and find that everything had been a nightmare.

I just hadn’t woken up yet.

I rubbed my hands on my face. There was a burning in the back of my throat, a tightness that made it hard to swallow. She’s gone. She’s gone. My mom’s gone.I grabbed the bag of burgers and ripped into them. I ate them angrily, stopping every couple of mouthfuls to take a huge gulp from my cup. After the second one, my stomach cramped. I dropped the wrapper and rushed toward the bathroom. Falling to my knees in front of the toilet, everything came back up.

My sides ached by the time I fell back against the wall, pushing the heels of my palms against my burning eyes. Every couple of seconds my mom’s blank stare flashed up, alternating with the look on the daimon’s face before he’d burst into blue powder. I opened my eyes, but I still saw her, saw the blood that’d run over the purple petals, saw the blood everywhere. My arms started to tremble.

I can’t do this.

I pulled my knees to my chest and rested my head on them. I slowly rocked, replaying not just the last twenty-four hours over and over again, but the last three years. All those times I’d had a chance to figure out a way to contact the Covenant and hadn’t. Missed opportunities. Chances I’d never get back. I could’ve tried to figure out how to reach the Covenant. One call would’ve prevented this from happening.

I wanted a do-over—just one more day to confront my mom and demand we go back to the Covenant and face whatever had sent us fleeing in the middle of the night.

Together—we could’ve done it together.

My fingers dug into my hair and I pulled. A tiny cry worked its way past my clenched jaw. I yanked on my hair, but the hot flash of pain zinging across my scalp did nothing to relieve the pressure in my chest or the yawning emptiness that filled me.

As a half-blood it was my duty to kill daimons, to protect the pure-bloods from them. I’d failed in the worst way possible. I’d failed my mother. There was no way around that.

I had failed.

And I had run.

My muscles locked up and I felt a sudden rush of fury rise inside me. Balling my hands over my eyes, I kicked out. The heel of my sneaker slammed through the cabinet door below the sink. I pulled my foot free, almost pleased when the cheap particle board scraped my ankle. And I did it again and again.

When I finally did stand and leave the bathroom, the motel room was pitched in darkness. I tugged the chain on the lamp and grabbed the spade. Each step back into the shabby room hurt after forcing my sore muscles into such a cramped position in the bathroom. I sat down on the bed, not meaning to collapse there and not get back up. I’d wanted to check the door again—maybe block it with something—but exhaustion claimed me and I drifted off into a place where I hoped no nightmares could follow me.

CHAPTER 8

Night turned to day, and I didn’t move until the motel manager knocked on the door, asking for more money or for me to get out. Through a tiny crack in the door, I handed him the cash and went back to the bed.

I went on repeat for days. There was a general sense of time changing when I would get up and wobble into the bathroom. I didn’t have the energy to shower, and this wasn’t the kind of place that put out little bottles of shampoo, anyway. There wasn’t even a mirror in here, just a couple of little plastic brackets framing an empty rectangle above the sink. Either moonlight or sunshine would break through the window, and I kept count of each time the manager visited. Three times he’d come to ask for money.

During those days I thought of my mom and I cried until I gagged into my hand. The storm inside me thrashed, threatening to pull me under, and under I went. I curled up in a small ball, not wanting to talk, not wanting to eat. Part of me just wanted to lie there and fade away. The tears had long since come to an unsatisfying end and I just lay there, searching for a way out. There seemed to be an empty void looming up ahead. I welcomed it, rushed in, and sank into its meaningless depths until the manager came the fourth day.

This time he spoke to me after I handed him the cash. “You need something, kid?”

I stared at him through the gap. He was an older guy, maybe in his late forties. He seemed to wear the same pinstriped shirt every day, but it looked clean.

He glanced down the hall, running a hand through thinning brown hair. “Is there anyone I can call for you?”

I didn’t have anyone.

“Well, if you need something, just call the front desk.” He backed away, taking my silence as the answer. “Ask for Fred. That’s me.”

“Fred,” I repeated slowly, sounding like an idiot.

Fred stalled, shaking his head. When he looked back at me, his eyes met mine. “I don’t know what kind of trouble you got yourself in, kid, but you’re too young to be out here and in a place like this. Go home. Go back to where you belong.”

I watched Fred leave and I shut the door behind him, locking it. I turned around slowly and stared at the bed—at the garden spade. My fingers tingled.

Go back to where you belong.

I didn’t belong anywhere. Mom was gone now and—

I pushed away from the door, approaching the bed. I picked up the spade and ran my fingers along the sharp edges. Go back to where you belong. There was only one place I did belong and it wasn’t curled up in ball on a bed in a craptastic motel on the wrong side of Miami.

Go to the Covenant.

A tingle ran along the back of my neck. The Covenant? Could I seriously go back there after three years, not even knowing why we’d left? Mom had acted like it wasn’t safe there for us, but I always chalked that up to her paranoia. Would they allow me back without my mother? Would I be punished for running away with her and not turning her in? Was I fated to become what I’d avoided all those years ago when I’d gone before the Council and punt-kicked an old lady?

They could force me into servitude.

All those risks were better than being chomped on by a daimon, better than tucking my tail between my legs and giving up. I’d never given up on anything in my entire life. I couldn’t start now, not when my life seriously depended on me not losing it.

And by the way the bed looked and how I smelled, I was officially losing it.

What would my mom say if she could see me now? I doubted she’d suggest the Covenant, but she wouldn’t have wanted me to give up. Doing so was a disgrace to everything she’d stood for, and to her love.

I couldn’t give up.

The storm inside me stilled and the plan began to form. The closest Covenant was in Nashville, Tennessee. I didn’t know exactly where, but the whole city would be swarming with Sentinels and Guards. We’d be able to sense each other—the aether always called out to us, stronger from the pures, more subtly from the halfs. I’d have to find a ride, because my butt wasn’t walking all the way to Tennessee. I still had enough money to get a ticket on one of those buses I usually wouldn’t consider riding in. The terminal downtown had been closed ages ago and the nearest bus stop going out of state was at the airport.

That was one hell of a hike from here.

I glanced at the bathroom. No light shone through the window. It was night again. Tomorrow morning I could take a cab to the airport and get on one of the buses. I sat down, almost smiling.

I had a plan, a crazy one that may end up backfiring on me, but it was better than giving up and doing nothing. A plan was somethingand it gave me hope.

***

After waiting till dawn, I caught a cab to the airport and lingered in the near-vacant bus terminal. The only company I had was an elderly black man cleaning the hard plastic seats and the rats that scurried along the darker corridors.

Neither were very talkative.

I pulled my legs up on the seat, cradling the spade in my lap while I forced myself to stay alert. After existing in the void of nothingness for days, I still wanted to climb into my favorite jammies and curl up in my mom’s bed. If it wasn’t for every little noise causing me to jump out of my seat, I would’ve fallen out of my chair in a dead sleep.

A handful of people were waiting for the bus when the sun rose outside the windows.

Everyone avoided me, probably because I looked like a hot mess. The motel shower hadn’t even been working when I’d finally tried it, and my quick rinsing in the sink hadn’t included soap or shampoo. Standing slowly, I waited until everyone got in line and looked down at the clothes I’d been wearing for days. The knees of my jeans had been torn open and the frayed edges were stained red. A sharp pang hit me in my stomach.

Pulling myself together, I climbed the steps to the bus and briefly made eye contact with the bus driver. Right away, I wished I hadn’t. With a head full of bushy white hair and bifocals perched on his ruddy nose, the driver looked older than the guy who’d been cleaning the chairs. He even had an AARP sticker on the sun visor and wore suspenders. Suspenders?

Gods, there was a good chance Santa Claus was going to fall asleep at the wheel and we all were going to die.

Dragging my feet, I picked a spot in the middle and sat down beside a window. Luckily, the bus wasn’t even half full and so the body odor usually associated with these buses was below the norm.

I think I was the only one who smelled.

And I did smell. A lady a few seats ahead of me turned around, wrinkling her nose. When her gaze landed on me, I looked away quickly.

Understanding my questionable hygiene was the least of my problems, it still made my cheeks burn with humiliation. How at a time like this could I even care about how I looked or smelled? I shouldn’t, but I did. I didn’t want to be the stinky girl on the bus. My embarrassment flashed me back to another horrendously mortifying moment in my life.

I’d been thirteen and just started an offensive training class at the Covenant. I remembered being thrilled to do something other than running and practicing blocking techniques. Caleb Nicolo—my best friend and an all around awesome guy—and I had spent the beginning of the first class pushing each other around and acting like monkeys on crack.

We’d been quite… uncontrollable when together.

Instructor Banks, an older half-blood who’d been injured while doing his Sentinel duties, had been teaching the class. He’d informed us that we’d be practicing takedowns and paired me up with a boy named Nick. Instructor Banks had shown us several times how to do it correctly, warning us that, “It has to be done this way. If not, you could break someone’s neck, and that’s not something I’m teaching today.”

It had looked so easy, and being the cocky little brat that I’d been, I hadn’t really paid attention. I’d told Caleb, “I so have this.” We’d high fived like two idiots and gone back to our partners.

Nick had executed the takedown perfectly, sweeping out the leg while maintaining control of my arms. Instructor Banks had praised him. When it came to my turn, Nick had smiled and waited. Halfway through the maneuver, my grip had slipped on Nick’s arm and I’d dropped him on his neck.

Not good.

When he didn’t get up right away and had started moaning and twitching, I’d known I’d made a terrible miscalculation concerning my skill level. I’d put Nick’s butt in the infirmary for a week and had been called the “Pile Driver” for several months after that.

Up until now, I’d never been so embarrassed in my life. I wasn’t sure which humiliation was worse, though—failing in front of my peers or smelling like gym socks left forgotten in the hamper.

Sighing, I glanced down at my travel itinerary. There were two transfers: one in Orlando and the other in Atlanta. Hopefully one of those stops had some place I could clean up a little better and grab some food. Maybe they’d also have drivers who weren’t nearing their expiration dates.

I looked around the bus, smothering my yawn with my hand. There were definitely no daimons on the bus; I imagined they’d loathe public transportation. And—from what I could tell—I didn’t see any possible serial killers who looked like they’d prey on dirty chicks. I pulled the spade out and shoved it between me and the seat. I dozed off pretty quickly and woke up a few hours in, my neck cramping something fierce.

A couple of the people on the bus had these neat little pillows I’d have given my left arm for. Wiggling in my seat until I found a position that didn’t feel like I was cramped in a cage, I didn’t notice I had company until I lifted my eyes.

The woman who’d sniffed the air earlier stood in the aisle beside my seat. My gaze fell over her neatly coiffed brown hair and pressed khaki pants, not sure what to make of her. Had I stunk up the bus?

Smiling tightly, she pulled her hand out from behind her back and held a package of crackers out toward me. They were the kind with peanut butter in the middle, six to a pack. My stomach roared to life.

I blinked slowly, confused.

She shook her head, and I noticed the cross dangling from a gold chain around her neck. “I thought… you might be hungry?”

Pride sparked in my chest. The lady thought I was some homeless kid. Wait. I AM a homeless kid.I swallowed the sudden lump in my throat.

The lady’s hand shook a bit as she pulled back. “You don’t have to. If you change—”

“Wait,” I said hoarsely, wincing at the sound of my own voice. I cleared my throat while my cheeks heated. “I’ll take it. Thank… thank you.”

My fingers looked especially grubby next to hers even though I’d scrubbed them in the motel bathroom. I started to thank her again, but she’d already moved back to her seat. I stared down at the package of crackers, feeling a tightening in my chest and jaw. Somewhere I’d read once that was a symptom of a heart attack, but I doubted that was what was wrong with me.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I tore into the package, eating so fast I really couldn’t taste anything. Then again, it was hard to savor the first food I’d eaten in days when tears clogged my throat.

CHAPTER 9

At the transfer in Orlando, I had several hours to try to clean up and grab some food. When the bathroom was free and it didn’t look like anyone would be coming in, I locked the door and approached the sink. It was hard to look at myself in the mirror, so I avoided doing so. I stripped off my shirt, holding in a whimper as several sore muscles pulled. Choosing to ignore the fact I was kind of taking a bath in a public restroom, I grabbed a handful of rough, brown towels that were sure to make my skin break out. Dampening them and using the generic soap, I cleaned up as quickly as possible. Ghosts of deep purple bruises still marred the skin from my bra to my hip. The scratches on my back—inflicted when I’d wiggled through my mother’s bedroom window—weren’t as bad as I thought they’d be.

All and all, I wasn’t that bad off.

I was able to score a bottle of water and some chips from a vending machine before boarding the next bus. Seeing the remarkably younger driver made me feel so much more relieved, since it was starting to get dark out. The bus was fuller than the one from Miami had been, and I was unable to fall back asleep. I just sat and stared out the window, running my fingers along the edge of the spade. My brain kind of clicked off after I finished the bag of chips and I ended up staring at the college-aged boy several rows ahead. He had an iPod, and I was jealous. I really didn’t think about anything during the next five or so hours.

It was around two in the morning when we unloaded at Atlanta, arriving ahead of schedule. Georgia’s air was just as thick with humidity as Florida’s had been, but there was a smell of rain. The station was in some kind of industrial park surrounded by fields and long forgotten warehouses. We seemed to be on the outskirts of Atlanta, because the dazzling glow of city lights appeared a couple of miles away.

Rubbing my aching neck, I shuffled into the station. A few people had cars there waiting for them. I watched college boy rush over to a sedan and a tired-looking but happy middle-aged man climbed out and hugged him. Before my chest could tighten again, I turned away to seek out another vending machine to raid.

It took me several minutes to find the vending machines. Unlike the ones in Orlando, these were all the way back near the bathrooms, which I found gross. I pulled out the wad of cash and separated a few singles from the hundreds.

A shuffling sound, like pants dragging along the floor, caught my attention. I looked over my shoulder, scanning the dimly lit corridor. Up ahead, I could see the glass windows of the waiting room. After freezing to listen for several moments before I dismissed the sound, I turned back to the machine, grabbed another bottle of water and anotherbag of chips.

The idea of sitting for the next few hours made me want to break something, so I took my meager goodies and headed back outside. I kind of liked the wet smell in the air and the idea of getting rained on wasn’t too bad. It would be like a natural shower of sorts. Munching on my chips, I headed around the terminal and past a rest stop full of truckers. None of them whistled or propositioned me when they saw me.

This, in a way, totally ruined my whole image of them.

Across from the rest stop turnoff were more factories. They looked like something straight out of a haunted house reality TV show—broken or boarded up windows, weeds overflowing the cracked pavement, and vines trailing up along the walls. Before Matt had decided I was a giant freak, we’d gone to one of those carnival haunted houses. Come to think of it, I should have known he’d be a wuss. He’d screamed like a girl when the guy had come out at the end and chased us with a chainsaw.

Smiling to myself, I followed a narrow path around the rest stop and tossed my empty bottle and bag into a trash bin. The sky was full of heavy clouds and the loud purr of the tractor’s engines was comforting in an odd way. In four hours I’d be in Nashville. Four more hours and I’d find—

The sound breaking glass startled me. My heart leapt in my throat. I whirled around, expecting to be faced with a horde of daimons. Instead of found two young guys. One had thrown a rock through the window of a maintenance building.

What rebels,I thought.

I moved my hand away from where I had the spade shoved into the back of my pants, studying them. They weren’t much older—or cleaner—than me. One was wearing a red beanie… in May. I wondered if there was some kind of weather situation I was unaware of. My gaze drifted to his partner, whose eyes kept bouncing from his friend to me.

And that made me nervous.

Beanie boy smiled. The off-white shirt he wore clung to his scrawny frame. He didn’t look like he was getting three square meals a day. Neither did his friend. “How ya doin’?”

I bit my lip. “Good. You?”

His friend gave a sharp, high-pitched laugh. “We’re doing okay.”

Knots began to form in my stomach. Taking a deep breath, I started to edge around them. “Well… I’ve got a bus to catch.”

Giggles shot a quick look at Beanie Boy, and damn, Beanie Boy could book it. Within a second, he was standing in front of me and had a knife pointed right at my throat.

“We saw ya with the money back at those machines,” said Beanie Boy, “and we want it.”

I almost couldn’t believe it. On top of everything, I was being robbed.

It was official. The gods hated me.

And I hated them.

CHAPTER 10

In stunned disbelief, I lifted my hands above my head and exhaled slowly.

The one withoutthe knife gaped at his partner. “Man, what are you doing? Why’d you pull a knife? She’s just a girl. She’s not going to fight us.”

“Shut up. I’m running this show.” Beanie Boy grabbed my arm as he leered in my face, pressing the tip of the knife under my chin.

“This wasn’t part of the plan!” argued the guy who didn’t seem to want to stab me. I eyed him hopefully, but he was staring at his partner, his hands opening and closing at his sides.

Great,I thought, I’m being robbed by unorganized criminals. Someone’s definitely getting stabbed and it’s probably going to be me.Instead of fear, I felt a hot stab of annoyance. I so did not have the time for this crap. I had a bus to catch, and hopefully, a life to reclaim.

“We saw ya getting the food.” He inched the tip of the knife down my throat. “We know ya have money. A whole wad of cash, right, John? Must be a lot of hooking to get that kinda money.”

I wanted to kick myself in the face. I should’ve been more careful. I couldn’t pull out a wad of cash and expect not to be robbed. Surviving a daimon attack only to have my throat slashed for a few hundred dollars? Dammit, people sucked.

“Did ya hear me?”

I narrowed my eyes, figuring I was about five seconds from going ballistic. “Yeah, I heard you.”

His fingers dug in my skin. “Then give us the damn money!”

“You’re going to have to get it yourself.” My gaze went to his friend. “And I dare you to try it.”

Beanie Boy motioned toward John. “Get the money out of her pocket.”

His partner’s eyes darted between his friend and me. I hoped he refused, because he was so going to regret it if he didn’t. That wad of cash was all that I had. In it was my ticket for the next bus. No one was getting that.

“Which pocket?” the one holding me asked. When I didn’t answer, he shook me, and that was it.

My bitch switch was flipped and, well, my sense of self-preservation went right out the window. Everything– everythingthat’d happened boiled up inside me and burst. Did these wannabe gangstas actually think I was afraid of them? After everything I’d seen? My universe went red. I was going to stomp the ever-loving crap out of them.

I laughed in Beanie Boy’s face.

Bewildered by my response, he lowered the knife a fraction of an inch.

“Are you freaking serious?” I wrenched my arm free and grabbed the knife from his fingers. “You’re going to rob me?” I pointed the knife at him, half tempted to prick him with it. “ Me?”

“Whoa, now.” John backed up.

“Exactly,” I waved the knife around. “If you want your bal—”

A shiver went down my spine, icy and foreboding. An innate sense kicked in and every fiber of my being screamed out a warning. It was the same thing I’d felt before I’d spotted the daimon from the balcony. Panic punched a hole in my chest.

No. They can’t be here. They can’t.

But I knew they were. The daimons had found me. What I couldn’t wrap my head around was whythey had. I was just a freaking half-blood. I wasn’t even a snack pack to them. Worse yet, I was like Chinese food to them—they were going to be craving aether again in a few hours. Their time would be better spent hunting down pures. Not me. Not a half-blood.

Clearly distracted, Beanie Boy took advantage. He shot forward, grabbing and twisting my arm until I dropped the knife in his waiting hand. “You stupid bitch,” he hissed in my face.

I pushed him with my free hand as I scanned the area. “You have to go! You need to go now!”

Beanie Boy pushed back and I stumbled to the side. “I’m done messing with you. Give us the money or else!”

I gained my balance, realizing these two were too stupid to live. So was I for hanging around and trying to convince them. “You don’t understand. You have to go now. They’re here!”

“What’s she talking about?” John turned around and scanned the darkness. “Who’s coming? Red, I think we should—”

“Shut up,” Red said. Light from the moon broke free from the heavy clouds, glinting off the blade he jabbed at his friend. “She’s just trying to freak us out.”

Part of me wanted to bolt and let them deal with what I knew was coming, but I couldn’t. They were mortals—obscenely stupid mortals who’d pulled a knife on me—but there was no way they deserved the kind of death coming their way. Robbery attempt or not, I couldn’t let this happen. “The things that are coming are going to kill you. I’m not try—”

“Shut up!” yelled Red, swinging on me. Once again the knife was at my throat. “Just shut up!”

I looked at John, the saner of the two. “Please. You’ve got to listen to me! You need to go and you need to make your friend go. Now.”

“Don’t even think it, John,” warned Red. “Now get over here and get this money!”

Desperate to get them out of here, I dug in my pocket and pulled out the wad of cash. Without thinking, I shoved it at Red’s chest. “Here—take it! Just take it and go while you still can! Go!”

Red looked down, his mouth dropping open. “What the—”

A cold, arrogant laugh froze the blood in my veins. Red whirled around, squinting into the darkness. It was almost like the daimon materialized out of the shadows, because the spot had been empty a second ago. He stood a few feet from the building, his head cocked to the side and his horrific face twisted into a gruesome smile. To the boys, he looked like a yuppie in Gap jeans and a polo shirt—an easy target.

I recognized him as the daimon I’d hit over the head with a lamp.

“This is it?” John looked at Red, visibly relieved. “Man, we hit the lotto tonight.”

“Run,” I urged quietly, reaching behind me and wrapping my fingers around the handle of the garden spade. “Run as fast as you can.”

Red glanced over his shoulder at me, snickering. “Is this your pimp?”

I couldn’t even respond to that. I zeroed in on the daimon, my heart doubling over as he took a slow, lazy step forward. Something wasn’t right about the daimon. It was… too calm. When the elemental magic took over, amusement flickered over his arresting features.

Then, when I was pretty sure I couldn’t be having a crappier week, a second daimon stepped out of the shadows… and behind her stood another daimon.