The Witch With No Name (The Hollows #13)(118)
Author: Kim Harrison

Adrenaline pounded. My head snapped back again as I broke his hold. Breath held, I spun him to stand between his buddy and me. The gun seemed to explode in the small room, and I shoved my living shield at the shooter, not knowing if he was shot or I was shot or we had both lucked out.

Arms flailing, my would-be attacker fell into the shooter and they crashed into the small dinette table. Drawing my splat gun, I shot them both. One last spasm, and they were still.

“Ivy!” I spun, then went down on one knee as another gun went off and fire engulfed my leg. My breath came in with a gasp and my free hand clamped over my thigh. A man across the room was pointing a gun at me. Shit.

Howling, Ivy blocked a swinging lamp to jam the palm of her hand into someone’s jaw. Hair swinging, she planted her right foot and plowed the other into the man who’d shot me, sending him pinwheeling back into the window. He hit with a thud, shaken but not out. The lamp hit the floor and shattered.

Agony crept up my thigh, throbbing to my skull as I hobbled forward, splat gun pointed. Two puffs of air to put him out—and then I fell almost as fast as he had, my hand clamped to my leg. Light-headed, I sat on the couch, not letting go of my gun as Ivy took a last look around the room and strode forward. Blood was a slow but steady leak from my leg. We’d gotten them all, but where was Landon?

“You okay?” Ivy asked, winding her hair back into a bun as Jenks dusted my leg. There was no exit wound. It was still in there.

“I don’t know.” I strained to see the other side as the pain retreated into a heavy throb.

Ivy reached to touch it, and I jerked away. “It doesn’t look bad,” she said.

“Well, it hurts like hell.”

“That’s good then,” she said, her worry lines beginning to ease. “Where’s Landon?”

“Look out!” Jenks shouted, and my heart thudded. One of the men I thought I’d downed was aiming another one of those stupid guns at us.

“Move!” I shoved Ivy and brought up my splat gun. Please let there be enough propellant, I begged. I lunged for the floor, aim never wavering as I squeezed. The bang of the man’s gun echoed, drowning out the puff of my weapon. I hit the floor, my shoulder taking most of the force as the ugly sound of the bullet burrowing into the couch slid through me.

Heart pounding, I lay on the floor, watching the man’s eyes roll to the back of his head. I’d gotten him.

Ivy stood as the man’s head hit the floor with a thud. “Should have double-tapped him,” she said as she extended a hand to me.

“I was a little busy.” With a heave, she had me back on the couch. Where was Landon?

Ivy wiped her hand under her nose as Jenks flitted over the room, verifying that they were all down. “None of them used any magic,” she said uneasily.

“You noticed that too?”

Jenks’s wings clattered as he rose up. A door slid open and Landon strode out, flanked by two men with guns. “Because very shortly there won’t be any and I wanted to be prepared,” Landon said. “Shoot them.”

Ivy lunged for the cover of a fallen chair. I yanked her back to me, tapping the line and throwing a circle of protection around us. Bullets pinged off it, and Landon motioned for them to stop. His lips were in a tight line, and I thought he looked ridiculous in his traditional robes and that stupid flat-topped hat. Newt could get away with it, but not him.

“Landon, you’re an idiot!” I shouted, the scent of spent gunpowder making it through the barrier where bullets couldn’t. “I’m not letting you do this!”

Ivy grimaced. “Let me out.”

She darted her gaze to the doorway, and I dropped the circle.

Ivy was a blur, leaping to the doorway to hide behind a wall as they sprayed it. I rolled to the broken coffee table, peeking out to see Landon standing alone as his men advanced on Ivy. I didn’t know where Jenks was. If you’ve hurt him, Landon . . .

Vampire fast, Ivy burst from hiding, diving between the men with guns. One man accidentally shot the other in the chest while trying for her. He froze in shock as his buddy went down in a spray of blood—and then Ivy was on him. A kick to the back of his knee sent him to the carpet, and she tackled him. One leg wrapped around the last man’s neck and she began to squeeze. The man fought back, sending them crashing into the walls and furniture.

My leg throbbed as I stood. I had to lean heavily on the couch, pointing to Landon, then me, as if in invitation. Ivy could handle two men with automatics. Landon was mine. Where is Jenks?

“Trent chicken out?” Landon said, and I lurched a step closer as the unfocused magic in the room began to build.

“He’s taking his daughter and ex-fiancée out to lunch.”

His lip twitched as he followed the ramifications of that. “Call your vampire off and maybe you live.”

“Oh, I’m dead already,” I said, ignoring the pain as I pulled myself up straight. “It’s just a matter of how much damage I can do first.”

“Call her off, and maybe she lives,” he amended, and in the split second my eyes flicked to Ivy, his hand flamed with a white-hot fire.

Again pain exploded, this time in my chest. Wide eyed, I fell to kneel before Landon as I struggled to breathe, to keep my heart beating. In his hand was a twisted mass of my hair, taken probably from my brush at the church. He’d made a target-specific spell, and I couldn’t fight it.

“Son of a fairy whore!” Jenks shouted, back again. “Ivy! Quit playing with that guy! Rache needs help!”

“No, I don’t think so,” Landon murmured, and I heard Ivy hit the floor, groaning. The man she’d been choking rose, kicking at her as he screamed. I tried to move, but every muscle sang with fire. Breath fast and shallow, I gripped the carpet, pulling myself closer to him. I would not fail in this. I wouldn’t!

“If you’re going to be a demon, you should be a demon,” Landon said softly, and I twitched, my back arching as I fell, looking at the ceiling, trying to get a clean breath. Landon’s hands were glowing, a haze of purple hanging between them. Slowly his hands came together. Struggling, he pulled them apart to show a spiderweb spool of glittering gold hanging in the air. And then he blew it at me.

I could do nothing as it settled over me, seeping in past my aura, winding its way to my core. My heart pounded as it begin to search, little darts of magic moving through me like a parasite. Groaning, I rolled over, but it clung, soaked in. Tendrils wafted out past my skin and then fell back as if the curse was looking for something to use to invoke. A soft, insidious chanting came from Landon, along with the sounds of Ivy’s frustrated struggle and Jenks’s swearing.