Hit List - Laurell K. Hamilton [54]
I called, “Newman, watch in front. I’ve got the shifters behind us,” I said.
There was a whoosh like the world’s biggest bottle rocket overhead. The heat pushed at the back of me, so that I flinched and dropped to one knee, turning as I did it to bring the MP5 up to aim at the Harlequin behind us. The explosion from in front of us made me flinch again and want to turn that way, but I had to trust Newman to handle anything in that direction. I knew there were two Harlequin behind us, and I knew I was fast enough to wound them; I didn’t know the same of Newman.
But there was only one thing in the road now. It was on fire, a blazing, burning shape, so bright that it chased back the dark in fire shadows, as it crouched on the road.
I heard Newman say, “Holy Jesus.”
It made me glance behind me to the roadblock that wasn’t there anymore. The road was clear. Tilford yelled, “Blake, get in!”
I got to my feet, the gun aimed back at the figure in the road. I realized he wasn’t crouching; he was trying to shift form. I stood on the running board, one hand on the handle by the roof, the other pointing the gun at the burning mass in the road. Did he think shifting form would help him heal, or put out the fire? Or maybe it was all he could think to do. Then he started to scream. It was a low growl of a scream as if a human throat and some large growling animal were both screaming at once. It was the kind of sound that would haunt your nightmares, or cause them. I’d seen vampires burn “alive,” but never a wereanimal. Vampires burn faster and more completely than humans do, but wereanimals are just people that heal almost anything. Anything but fire.
The SUV jumped forward. I grabbed the inside edge of the roof, one foot on the running board, the other on the door edge. My free hand aimed the MP5 out at the trees as they began to rush by. The open door brushed the trees and swung in on me. I used my knee to keep it riding just out from me. Edward was still at the sunroof. I wasn’t sure if Newman was in or out. Tilford was driving. I knew as much as I could. The car picked up speed. It bounced hard, and I was almost airborne. I couldn’t stay like this. I slipped into the open door and closed it behind me and hit the button for the window to rise. I had a moment to see Newman securely inside the car on his side. Edward slipped out of the sunroof and hit the button to close it. Then he yelled, “Anita!”
I was aiming at the window before I saw anything to shoot at. There was a gleam of silver, but it wasn’t at my closing window, it was at Tilford’s open one. I fired, and the bullet went past his head and into something dark at the end of that gleam of sword, because that was what it was, a sword, a fucking sword.
The shot was thunderous in the car, too small a space to be shooting without ear protection. I was deaf for a moment, but the figure fell and didn’t come back. The sword stayed like an exclamation point in Tilford’s shoulder and the seat. He was pinned.
Edward crawled over the seat and took the wheel. “Stay on the gas, Tilford.” He took Edward at his word because the car leapt forward as if he’d buried his foot to the floorboard. Edward steered one-handed, the other keeping the gun up and ready, though he had to watch the road, which left Newman and me to watch everything else. Fuck.
There was a noise from the roof, soft. I wasn’t even sure why I heard it over the engine and the ringing in my ears. It was almost as if I’d been listening for that soft slither of a sound. “They’re on the roof,” I said.
Newman didn’t react, so I said, “Newman, one of them is on the roof.”
He gave me wide, startled eyes. It was hard to tell in the dark, but he looked pale. The pulse in his throat looked like it was trying to jump out of his skin. He was scared, and I didn’t blame him. If I’d had time I’d have been scared, too.
I was looking up at the sunroof when someone looked down at me. I had time to register that there was no mask. It was just dark eyes