Dead of Night (Ghosts & Magic #1) (11 page)

I felt the cold deadness of Mickey's fur in my hand. Or maybe she'd been bitten by a rat? Was that why she was telling me? Did she think I was responsible, and she wanted me to know about it before I got the toast treatment?

"It wasn't me." I held Mickey out towards her. "I only came for that, and I don't kill children." Did I really think I had a chance of getting out of here alive?

The tears hit her cheek and ran off her chin, leaving wet splatters on her suit jacket. "It wasn't a rat bite."

"Who was she?"

"My responsibility. The daughter of a deceased friend. She was only nine."

The ringing of alarm bells in my mind was sudden, and loud.
 

"What is it?" She must have seen my expression.

"Little girl, about this high?" My heart had already been pounding, my adrenaline already pumping. An overwhelming feeling of dread joined the mix. I thought getting caught was bad.

"Yes. How did you-"

I dove away from the door just in time, as the loud popping of gunfire echoed through the hallway, and bullets ripped through the wood. The lady in red wasn't so lucky. The shots slammed her hard, knocking her backwards into a bookshelf. Whoever they were, they were crack shots, or they could see through the door or something, because they managed to leave the stone and the pedestal totally unharmed.

I crouched in the corner, finding the knife and holding it at my side. The gunfire stopped. I could hear two pairs of feet coming down the hall.
 

"Come on, Mickey. Back at it," I said, reaching out for the rat. It came alive as it had before, sniffing and turning. When the gunman kicked the door open and saw the motion, he turned his rifle on it and let loose. I used the distraction to get the knife to his neck and cut his throat, fighting against the nausea that rose up as a result. This way of killing was too personal for my taste.

If he had been alone, I would have been fine. The guy behind him opened up, and it was all I could do to get out of the line of fire and keep the other guard in front of me, catching some of the rounds and deflecting others. A bullet whizzed past my ear, the hot slug scorching it on the way by. I shoved my victim, trying to push him into the other guard, but he backed up and then jumped over.

I recognized both of them. They were supposed to be defending the place, and instead they were making their own move on the stone. What the fuck was this thing that they were staging a bloody coup to get it?
 

He smiled when he saw me, the muzzle of the gun swinging my direction. I was in the open, and all I had was a knife.
 

A sudden flash of energy bolted across the room, catching the guard full-on. He shook and rattled as the power coursed through him, and then fell to the floor. I whipped my head around, to where Red was laying propped against the bookshelf, bleeding out but still alive.

I stared at her for what felt like forever, but it was only a couple of seconds.

"They're going to blame you for this." Her voice was faint. A soft chuckle followed. "I should have known. I should have seen this coming."

I stood up and looked towards the door. I needed to get the hell out of here. "I was just supposed to steal the stone."

Her laughter was louder, mixed with a choking gurgle. "Then steal it, necromancer. It's the only way you might live long enough to continue dying."

I walked over to her and crouched down. Her eyes were turning glassy, but she didn't look afraid. "Dannie was right. I was supposed to die here, wasn't I?"
 

"Live, die, it doesn't matter. You aren't important . You're just the ghost.
I
was supposed to die here. It was supposed to be taken, but not by you." She looked over at the smoldering guard. "Eight years, and they got to him.
You
need to take the stone. Don't let them get it. Bring it to Jin." She reached up and took hold of the ruby. "Take this with you. She will know I sent you. If she survives, you survive. There is no other way."

I stared down at her. I never should have picked up that goddamned card in the first place. I needed to get away from there. I needed to get back to Danelle and get her out of Chicago before Black's kill team...

"I was paid by Black. The card came from Black."

She coughed up some blood. "It wasn't Black."

"How do you know?"

"It wasn't Black," she repeated.

There was no motion down the hallway... yet. "Why should I help you?"

"Help yourself. You'll die if you don't do as I say."

I crouched in front of her, trying to decide what to do. If I left without the stone, I could get away for now, but someone would be coming after Danelle and me. Whether it was Black or not, any House could fund a kill team. They would figure out who had done the job, and they would find us, and we would be dead.
 

I could take the stone, and call it in like I was supposed to. If I had been set up, I would just be painting a big fat target on my ass. The fact that they had convinced Red to be here when I walked in... Danelle had been right. Those two ogres were supposed to be dead right now.
 

Red was right, too. Her rope was the only one not already tied into a noose.

I had been stupid for taking the job, and for dragging Dannie into this. I had been stubborn and greedy, with a side of desperate.
 

Why couldn't things be simple?
 

"Where can I find Jin?" I leaned over her and reached for the necklace.

"New... New York." She was struggling to speak. All the color had gone out of her. She reached up and put her hand on my wrist. "The House... you don't know... secrets... protect the treasure."

"Treasure?"
 

Her eyes shifted past me, towards the pedestal. She took one more deep, gasping breath, and abandoned this world for whatever came after.

My head was spinning while I took the ruby necklace from her corpse. I would have loved more answers, but my magic didn't work on users. Instead, I got up and walked over to the guy that Red had toasted.
 

"Wake up, asshole."
 

Without his name, it took a lot more effort to bring him back. Without his name, it would make him harder to control. Under any other circumstances, I wouldn't have even tried it. Thankfully, the fields were strong here, and it helped spare me from some of the burden.
 

The corpse moaned, and sat straight up. His clothes were whole, but his body had been scorched beneath them, leaving the flesh burned and blistered.
 

"What the hell?" His eyes zipped around the room, frantic.
 

"Not yet." I didn't like to bring fresh kills back. They tended to spend too much time being shocked and confused that they weren't in Kansas anymore. Death was a bit of an adjustment. "Get up,"
 

His eyes found me as he rose to his feet. He looked down at his barbecued complexion.

"You fucking killed me?"

"You would have killed me first, but no. Red took care of you." I turned back and put my hand to the stone, shocked by the warmth of the light shining down onto it. It was soft and smooth, and didn't weigh anything close to what I had been expecting. I held it in the crook of my arm like a football. "Who paid you to turn on Mrs. Red?"

"Turn on?" He shook his head. His expression was still one of shock. In this case, it was at least making it harder for him to resist my control. "No, we wiped the original set last night. Stuffed 'em all in a big laundry bin downstairs, and then this woman did us up in makeup so we'd look just like them. Paid? I don't know. I just do the dirty work."

"Who organized the team?"

"Some fixer or other. He wore these fancy italian shoes."

Shit.

"How many of you are in the house?"

He looked down at the other guy's body. "Six, and Carla."

"User?"

He nodded.

"What kind?"

"Water."

She must have been the maid downstairs. "Close?"

He shrugged. "They should have been blasting your sorry ass by now. I thought necros were against the rules?"

What? I bent down and grabbed the other assault rifle from its former owner, and then I moved past him to the hallway. I didn't hear anything. At all. "Lead the way, smokey."

He didn't have a choice. He raised the assault rifle and walked up the hall ahead of me.
 

"It's clear," he said when he reached the crosswalk.
 

I joined him there, looking out from behind. The gunfire was still ringing in my ears. There was no way every living thing on the property hadn't heard it.

"Do you know what this thing is?" I asked him, shifting the stone in my arm.

"No. Don't care either."
 

"Even though you died trying to get your hands on it?"

"Especially because of that."

We walked down the hallway. There was nobody there. We turned right and headed past bedrooms and bathrooms, a game room with a pool table and a large formal dining room. We spilled out into the foyer through a pair of mahogany doors.

Carla and the rest of the goons were waiting for us.

In a pile on the floor.

Their throats ripped out.
 

Bloodstains ran along the marble. They had been killed elsewhere, and dragged here. I checked my watch. 10:43:54. There were only two ways someone could have done this. One, they had started the killing before I had even gone in. Two, there was more than one assailant involved.

Either way, this whole thing was getting exponentially more fucked up by the heartbeat. A third team had been sent to take out the second, after the second had taken out the first and... well... me?
 

"Go on out and make some noise."

He looked back at me, his dead eyes still able to show some fear.
 

"They can't hurt you, you're already dead. Go." I pushed a little harder on him through the tether. He walked ahead, into the midst of the gore. I turned around and headed back the way I had come. I should have gone back out the rear in the first place.

No. That was stupid. There was no chance I was going to be able to get away on foot. I needed to get to the garage, and hope that they kept the keys with the cars.
 

I tried to remember the blueprint as I ran, my mind flowing over the red dots and the outlines of the walls. The garage was off the west wing, the other direction from the way I had come. I traced my steps back to the library, forgetting about caution in my mad dash to get away. I skidded around corners and sprinted along the hallways, my finger on the trigger of the assault rifle, ready to blast anything that appeared in front of me.

I shoved open the door into the garage at the same time I heard the gunfire. It only lasted for a second or two. I don't know what happened to my new partner, but the speed at which he'd been silenced caused me to spin around and take aim.
 

There was nothing there.

I backed into the garage, looking over my shoulder. There were four cars, lined up in a row. The closest was an Escalade. I wasn't about to be picky. I tried the door. Unlocked.
 

A dark shape hurtled through the doorway, cornering with impossible dexterity and rocketing towards me.
 

It was over before I could think.
 

I pulled open the car door, using it as a shield, and was thrown backwards to slam into the side of the SUV from the force of my attacker smashing against it. My shoulder lit up in throbbing pain, taking the brunt of the force so I wouldn't drop the stone. I clenched my teeth, pulled off the car and ducked down, looking below the battered door.

Six feet of muscle and fur, a large semi-canine head with sharp, nasty yellow teeth. A fucking werewolf? It was laying on the floor, blood running from a gash in its head. It seemed dazed as it tried to pick itself up.

Today was full of surprises. The Houses weren't supposed to use necromancers. They were even more not supposed to use ferals. Ferals were efficient killers, vicious and violent, but they were also beyond difficult to keep in line. That a House had chosen them on purpose to head-up this orgy of chaos and death was chilling.

There was no way to know if this one was alone, so I assumed it wasn't. I ran around the Escalade to the next car in the line, a Lexus sedan. I made it into this one without a catastrophic event, found the keys above the visor, hit the button to open the garage door, and started the engine.
 

I looked over to find the big bad wolf, but it must have still been on the ground. I put the car in drive and hit the gas, blasting out of the garage. I saw another dark form coming from my left as I accelerated - a second werewolf. He pounced forward towards the car, and nearly caught me, his shoulder smashing into the rear quarter panel. It rocked from the force, the wheels skidding and spinning, and then righted itself. I watched the feral fade in the rear-view, a hulk of a thing with mottled black and white fur. He stood and watched me for a second, and then retreated back to the front of the house where a brown version waited.
 

I kept going, gaining speed as I reached the front gate. I expected it to be closed. I was wrong. It was sitting open, undamaged and unguarded. I knew there had to be a reason for it, but in the moment I didn't care.
 

Someone had done some serious work, and spent some serious cash in order to take out Mrs.Red and get their hands on whatever the rock resting on the passenger's seat was. My survival had just thrown a big wrench in their scheme, and I had a feeling they had the will and the means to throw something even bigger and badder than a few werewolves back at me.

The one thing I knew for sure: I would never, ever take a job without consulting Dannie first, ever, ever again.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

A case of the munchies.

I wasn't stupid enough to keep the Lexus for long, especially with the dent in it. The only way I could have made myself easier to find would have been to turn around.