“Don’t bother. They’re still with us. Who the fuck is it? Do you recognize the car at all?”

  I shook my head. “Not really. I don’t pay attention to the make of cars. I couldn’t tell you the difference between a Camaro and a Camry.”

  “You should start. And don’t ever pick up a hitchhiker. I made that mistake once, and I’ll never make it again,” she said. “I have the scars to show for it.”

  I peeked in my side mirror. They were still behind us. Whoever it was, was driving a souped-up sportscar. And by the way they were taking the turns, as sharply as we were, they were on our tail, all right.

  “We can’t lead them back to Yutani’s house. Or to yours,” I said.

  “Well, do you want to try and take them on? I’ve got plenty of fire magic—I haven’t had the chance to use it for a couple months now.” She pointed up ahead. “There’s an empty lot up there next to Markin’s Thrift Store. We can park there. Why don’t you send Yutani a text and ask him to come out here. Tell him to bring Kipa.”

  I was tired of the headache and I had the feeling whoever was in that car was behind it.

  “All right. Let’s go.” I unbuckled my seat belt and turned around, climbing between the seats to get into the back seat as she raced down the road. Once there, I flipped forward the seat next to me. Beneath it was an opening into the trunk. I retrieved the bag I kept there and pulled out a long dagger. I fastened the sheath to the belt around my waist.

  “You want a dagger?” I asked. “I’ve got a spare.”

  “Yeah, I left Venom at home. Hold tight.”

  As she swung the car into the empty lot, I fastened a boot knife to my boot, then found a dagger for Raven. I tossed it to her as she brought the car to a stop, and she caught it with her right hand.

  “Ready?” I asked.

  “Ready,” she said as we hustled out of the car and took our places behind it. No use getting shot up, if they had guns.

  As the other car eased in, stopping some ten yards away, I strained my eyes trying to see who it was. My heart sank when I saw two tall, lean men step out of it. I recognized them all too well. They were coyote shifters who ran a krystaleth lab, making hardcore drugs and pushing them on children. I had “borrowed” some of their money in early March and they had chased me down. Yutani and the rest of the Wild Hunt crew saved me, spurred on by Morgana, and the rest was history.

  “Listen, these guys are trouble. Big trouble. Let’s get back in the car and make a run for it, or we—” I had barely spoken when Raven held out her hands and began murmuring an incantation. Oh crap, she had decided we were going to take a stand. It was too late to talk her into running away, so I readied my dagger. My powers as a Leannan Sidhe required close contact, and I was pretty sure these guys weren’t going to let me drape my arms around their neck and drain them dry.

  The next moment, a wall of flame sprang up, encircling both the car and us. Raven let out a happy sigh and unsheathed the dagger that I’d given her.

  “Holy fuck, that’s…”

  “A curtain of flame. My work with Väinämöinen’s been going well. That’s no ordinary flame, either. It’s going to hurt like a mofo if they try to come through it. You might want to call for backup now. I see another car entering the lot and I don’t recognize it.” She pointed to where a low rider was pulling in.

  “Crap, you’re right.” I punched the number for Yutani’s cell and waited. He came on the line almost immediately.

  “Hey—”

  “Get your ass over here to the lot next to Markin’s Thrift Store. Those coyote shifters found me and we’re in a standoff.” I wasn’t sure how long that Raven’s curtain of flame would last, but I wasn’t betting on it holding much longer.

  “Fuck. Kipa and I’ll be there as soon as we can. Do what you can to stay alive.”

  I shoved my phone back in my pocket. “Yutani and Kipa are on their way.”

  “Thank gods for that,” Raven said, shaking her head. “I don’t know how long my flame will hold out. It looks like your shifters summoned their gang buddies.”

  The other car stopped and four more shifters piled out of it. They were in it to win it.

  “What about getting back in the car and peeling out the minute the flames go down? Will they hurt the car if we drive through them?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never tried to drive through them before. I suppose there’s a first time for everything but for all I know, they might make the gas tank explode.” Raven frowned. “I’m not sure I’m willing to chance it.”

  “Good point. Magical flames can be tricky. All right, then get ready to fight. They’re fast, and they’re dexterous. Don’t let your guard down. They fight dirty and they fight to win.”

  “I’ve fought some of the worst.” Raven’s eyes sparkled.

  The Ante-Fae could be scary as fuck, and Raven—the Daughter of Bones—was a good example. She had first contacted the Wild Hunt when her fiancé had vanished, and she was there when they found the serial killer who had killed him. She hadn’t hesitated to take him out, in a most disconcerting way, from what I’d heard. Apparently, explosions were involved.

  “Okay, so we’re doing this. I’m glad I didn’t drink much.” My headache was echoing now, but since I didn’t have a choice, I did my best to push it out of the way and focus.

  The other coyote shifters spread out around the flames, three of them moving over to our exposed side, waiting outside the ring of fire. In the light of the flames, they looked mean, and they looked hungry.

  “You might as well take the flames down, doll,” one of them called out. “We can wait you out, so why don’t we get right to it?”

  My stomach lurched. I thought about telling them we had backup on the way, but that wouldn’t frighten them. These guys played hard and fast, and they liked to rumble.

  “How much longer will your spell last?” I whispered to Raven.

  “It’s going to die out soon. I can’t cast another like it for a while, since that’s a powerful spell and it took a lot of my magical reserves.” She shifted, leaning down to strip off her sandals. “I knew I should have worn my boots.”

  “Stay behind me, if you want. I know physical melee isn’t your thing.”

  “No, but I can give them a fight.” She froze as the flames began to sputter. “Okay, this is it. Stay alive till the guys get here. Six against two isn’t the best of odds.”

  And then, as swiftly as it had appeared, the flames fell and we were left in the dark. The only light came from the headlights of their cars and the diffused light from the streetlights. As soon as the flames vanished, the shifters moved in, three in front of us, and three on the other side of our car.

  A noise startled me. One of them had taken a running leap and was on the roof of my car, crouching, staring down at us with a blade in his hand.

  “Well, hello, pretties,” he said, and I knew right then he was the leader of the group. He wasn’t one I remembered—he had to have come in the second car.

  “Get in the car, Raven. Go through the passenger side. I’ll hold them off.” I didn’t want her hurt on account of me.

  But she laughed. “I don’t think so. Come on, boys, let’s see what you’ve got for us.”

  One of the shifters closest to Raven made a lunge toward her as the leader leapt off the car and landed in front of me. I dodged him and thrust with my blade. The dagger was razor sharp and I managed to clip his jacket, slashing it with a long gash. I couldn’t tell if I’d hit flesh beneath the material, because I didn’t have time to look.

  As I passed by him, I spun, trying to see how Raven was. I couldn’t see her blade anywhere but as the coyote shifter loomed over her, she brought it up from the folds of her skirt and plunged it into his lower abdomen. He shrieked as she yanked the blade out and darted out from beneath him. As he stumbled forward, I turned to face my own attacker.

  He was chasing me as I tried to lead him away from the car. Mid-sprint, I turned again and pulled out my boot knife, sending it whistling through the air toward him. He froze as the blade hit center on his chest, lodging in his heart. He looked down, a look of bewilderment still clouding his face, as he toppled forward. I’d managed to land the blade directly in his heart.

  Two down, but there was no time to rest. The other four were closing in, and they were being more cautious now that they knew we would fight back.

  I darted over to Raven. “Back to back. That way we can keep them in sight.”

  She shook her head. “We won’t be able to keep all four of them off us using just daggers. I’m trying to assess what energy I have left and what spell I can manage. Maybe we do need to make for the car. I can blind them temporarily.”

  “Then do it. We need to—” I stopped as a car pulled in to the lot. “Reinforcements are here. I just hope they’re ours.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Behind me, Raven tensed. We waited as three figures stepped out of the car. Relieved, I saw Yutani, Kipa, and Wager. They headed toward us at a dead run.

  One of the shifters took that moment to lunge at me, probably banking on me being distracted, but I brought my foot up, kicking him square in the balls. As he yelped, leaning over, I brought my dagger down on his back, stabbing him between his shoulder blades. Raven thrust her palms forward toward the other three and a brilliant light—a lot like a camera flash—blinded them. They stopped in confusion as the guys descended.

  Yutani went into a front flip over the head of one of them, and landed directly in front of him. He punched him in the gut and then body-slammed the shifter to the ground. Wager, wielding a stun gun, caught another shifter on the shoulder, sending the coyote to the ground. Four wolves appeared, flanking Kipa. Members of his elite guard, the wolves surrounded the last shifter, who raised his hands, fear filling his eyes.

  “Don’t kill me, fucking hell…” The shifter went down on his knees, arms toward the sky. Kipa’s wolves snarled at him. Wager brought out handcuffs, enough for the three who were still alive. Yutani and Kipa cuffed them, shoving them roughly to one side.

  As the wolves surrounded them, the guys walked over to us.

  “Are you okay?” Kipa asked Raven.

  She nodded. “Yeah, I think we’re just… We didn’t expect to be fighting tonight.”

  “Who are they?” Kipa asked. “Do you know?”

  “Enemies after Lyrical. She put a crimp in their krystaleth production a while back and made off with some of their proceeds,” Yutani said dryly. “She’s managed to get herself on their shit list.” He frowned. “I didn’t realize they were actively out to get you, though. We’ll need to interrogate them and figure out how to put a stop to their organization.” He paused, staring at us. “You two look dressed to kill. How was the club?”

  “Good,” I said. “But I think the coyote shifters were there. I felt watched all evening and ended up with a horrible headache. I suppose they were there, waiting for us to leave, and I sensed them.”

  “Well, there are three fewer of them to worry about after tonight. Let me call Akron.” Yutani pulled out his phone.

  Akron was a raven shifter who ran a clean-up crew for precisely times like these, when the Wild Hunt threw it down and needed someone other than the regular medical examiner. Though, given the coyote shifters were a problem for the cops as well, we should probably inform them.

  “How many are in this gang of fucknuts?” Wager asked. Half–Dark Fae, half magic-born, Wager had been a private investigator who worked down in the catacombs until the vampires had ventured into the depths and shut down underground Seattle for non-vampires. Now he worked for the Wild Hunt. I wondered, when the vampires reopened the catacombs, would he stick around or go back.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “They had a pretty sophisticated operation, and they trolled the flophouses for their victims.”

  In Seattle, the poverty level was grueling, and it was far worse since the dragons had arrived. There were a lot of houses in the grittier parts of the city that were used as flophouses. Slumlords would rent beds for cheap, by the day or night. The addicted would rent one out to sleep off a crash from coming down, or sleep off a hangover. Runaways rented them to have a place to stay for the night, and so did the sex workers who didn’t have a stable to return to. They weren’t safe, but then again, sleeping outside under the overpasses wasn’t safe either.

  “They also hang out at playgrounds, hoping to hook the kids, especially those they can encourage to run away from home. My guess is that this band of coyote shifters also have their fingers into the sex slave industry.” Yutani’s eyes narrowed.

  There had been a point in his life where he had been homeless, close to being an alcoholic. Herne had saved his ass. Yutani had a real thorn in his side about how the city ignored the problems of the mentally ill and those who needed a helping hand to clean up and find a job. Seattle was a gorgeous city on the surface, but the underbelly had a lot of problems that—so far—didn’t seem to matter to the powers that be.

  I walked over to the men, patting the heads of the wolves. They leaned into my fingers, and I knelt, hugging one of them. “Thank you,” I said. Then, I turned to the thugs, cautiously out of their reach. They might be handcuffed, but I didn’t trust them.

  “So, who sent you after me tonight? I recognize the dead leatherneck back there—one of your leaders—from our sordid history. But why the fuck are you bothering with me?”

  One of the men snorted. “Why should we talk to you, bitch?”

  I waited for a moment, but they clammed up and wouldn’t look at me. Finally, I motioned for Yutani to come over. “I want answers. Can you separate that one and hold him down?”

  He dragged the coyote shifter out of the group and the wolves closed around the other two. I knelt beside the man on the ground and reached out, stroking his face with my fingers.

  “You really, really want to talk to me, don’t you?”

  I could feel his heart begin to race, pulsing under my fingers.

  “You like me, don’t you?” I held his gaze with mine, my hunger rising. It had been on edge after Rake, anyway, and now I stoked it. “Come on, you want me, don’t you?” I kept my voice low, sultry, and the hunger hit full force as I let my glamour loose.

  He shifted, his insolence turning to fear. “Don’t…I know what you can do…” His breath came heavy as he struggled against Yutani’s grasp.

  I straddled his lap as Yutani braced his back. “Don’t resist—I can make the experience ecstatic, or I can make it hurt like hell. It’s your choice.”

  Yutani stiffened. I couldn’t tell if he was wary or aroused.

  The coyote shifter closed his eyes. “What do you want to know?”

  “Why were you after me? Was it because I stole from you and killed one of your buddies a few months ago?” I pressed my lips to his, inhaling a touch of his chi. I struggled to control my hunger to feed. Not yet, not yet…wait for his answer.

  “No,” he said, shivering. He was hard, his cock pressing against the material of his pants, fear and lust coursing through his veins.

  “Then why were you after me? Tell me, and I’ll give you a reward.” I ground against him a little with my crotch. He moaned. I wanted to feed on him, I wanted to draw every breath out of his body, to drain him dry and watch him wither away.

  “Someone paid us to catch you. We were told not to kill you. We were supposed to capture you and take you to him.” The words rolled out of his mouth as if they were being ripped from his core. Secrets always took the most effort—but he would give them up for me.

  “Who? Who paid you?” I reached around and yanked his hair, pulling his head back as I forced him to look me in the eyes.

  “I don’t know—honest. I don’t know who paid us or why. I was following orders.”

  Barely able to restrain myself, I glanced up at Yutani. He shook his head and shrugged. I turned my attention back to our prisoner. “How many kids have you personally abused?”

  He let out a strangled cry as I stroked his face again. He was going to come any minute. “I don’t know—I lost count!”

  And with that, I let my hunger off the chain. I slammed him to the ground as Yutani jumped out of the way, latching my lips onto his, drawing his chi deep into my lungs, making it hurt as much as I could, ripping the life force out of him rather than gently coaxing it. I refused to allow him to scream, keeping my lips fastened on his. As the chi filled my lungs, I continued to drain him dry. He immediately lost his erection, struggling but unable to move. I had ensnared him with my glamour—a web of pain wrapping around him. I tightened it, squeezing every drop of chi out of every corner of his body and soul.

  Heady with energy, I broke free, laughing as I watched him convulse below me. He was still alive, though he wouldn’t be much longer if I had my way.

  “How do you like it? How do you like being abused by someone stronger than you? Knowing you’re somebody’s toy? You like it, boy? Answer me!”

  Yutani touched me on the shoulder, and I jerked around, staring up at him. He silently held out his hand and, my chest heaving, I took it, allowing him to pull me off the coyote shifter. I staggered back, staring at the man on the ground.

  “He’s a blot on society. He should be out of the gene pool!” I began to shake. “I want… I want…”

  “Breathe. Take a deep breath. He’ll go to Cernunnos’s dungeon. He’ll never see the light of day again, and he’ll wish to hell you finished him off,” Yutani said, pulling me into his arms. I pressed my arms against his chest, holding onto his shoulders as I tried to control myself.

  I did as he said, taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly. I was so agitated that I couldn’t even cry. And in the depths of my mind, all I could see was the floor as I knelt on it, my face pressed against the marble as Kilnakarn rained blows on my back with his belt.

  “Come back,” Yutani whispered. “Come back. You’re free, you’re here with us.”

  I swallowed hard, reining myself in. As I sniffled, Raven came over and Yutani gently transferred me to her arms. She was soft and warm, and she brushed my hair back from my face.