The Black Dagger Brotherhood Novels 5-8

by J. R. Ward

  In that vein, she took to slicing the backs of knees and the fronts of thighs. Incapacitation was something she had excelled at as an assassin, because a lot of times she’d had a message to share before she struck mortally. And sure enough, as she left moaning bodies in her wake, Butch swept up behind her, inhaling and turning to fine powder that which they had come to kill.

  As she carved and slashed her way through the inductees, she found herself keeping a second eye on John and . . . holy hell. He was one slick fighter.

  Who seemed to specialize in snapping necks. He was lethal for closing in behind the enemy, grabbing on and then with brute strength—

  The blow came from out of nowhere, catching her on the shoulder and sending her spinning into the wall, her knife popping from her hold as all kinds of Looney Tunes stars bloomed in her vision.

  The slayer who had hockey-checked her lunged forward and nabbed her dagger from the bloody living room floor, palming the weapon and coming at her with it.

  At the last minute, she bobbed left so that he stabbed the wall she’d hit, trapping the blade in the Sheetrock. As he went to try to get the thing free, she whirled around and nailed him in the gut with her backup blade, springing a hole in his lower intestines.

  Meeting his shocked stare, she said, “What, like you didn’t think I’d have a second knife? Fucking idiot.”

  She punched him in the head with the butt of her backup, and as he crumpled at the knees, she unsheathed her primary from the plaster and faced off at the fray. As grunts and smacks resounded around the house, she shifted through the fighting to find what was being unattended to—

  One of the slayers was flying through the front door, on a bolt for the great outdoors.

  She dematerialized out of the house and right into his path. As he went Three Stooges and pinwheeled to a stop, she smiled. “No, you may not be excused.”

  The lesser took off again and headed back for the fight—which was stupid because there was no one who would help him in there. Well, not to survive, that was.

  Her body was lithe and strong as she burst after him and the two of them came around in a fat circle. Just as he got to the door, she leaped into the air and took him down in a flying tackle, catching him around the neck and shoulder and wrenching him around, using the combination of her strength and her trajectory to crank the guy into a living, breathing question mark.

  They landed hard, but even as the air punched out of her lungs, she was smiling.

  God, she loved a good fight.

  John saw Xhex flash out the front door, but he couldn’t go after her because he had a pair of initiates so far up his ass he was coughing on their eyebrows. But he was going to take care of the crowding PDQ.

  Funny how when your female beat feet into the night on her own you got an extra burst of energy—

  Not that she was his female.

  Funny how reminding yourself of something like that made you mean as a snake.

  Reaching out to the slayer in front of him, John snapped the bastard’s neck clean off the top of his spine. As he bowling-balled the head, he thought it was a goddamned pity there wasn’t time to do the same to the kid’s arms and legs—so he could beat the other one senseless with the stumps.

  Unfortunately, number two had just grabbed John around the chest and was trying to bear-hug him into hypoxia.

  John palmed those wrists and locked the fucker in place, then pivoted around, jumped up, and pulled a straight horizontal in midair. They slammed onto the ground with John on top and the slayer putting the L-E-S-S-E-R in mattress. Rearing upward, John smashed the back of his head right into his opponent’s face, turning that nose into a geyser.

  Quick flip and John raised his fist high in the air.

  His second strike caused a round of twitching, which suggested the guy’s frontal lobe was having serious electrical transmission problems and the bastard was now in seizure-land.

  Wasn’t going to be any trouble as he waited for Butch to come at him. John lunged for the doorway that Xhex had dematerialized out of, his shitkickers skidding on the blood that was now running both rusty red and glossy black.

  Just as he came to the open doorway, he caught himself on the jambs.

  It was the most spectacular tackle he’d ever seen. The lesser she was chasing was gunning back for the house, having obviously rethought his escape strategy, and he was hauling balls, his bare feet screaming over the frosty grass. Xhex, however, was closing fast, triangulating an interception that was possible only because she was stronger and more focused than the former human.

  John didn’t have time to intervene even though he wanted to: Xhex jammed into the air, springing up and stretching out for the lesser. She clipped him right around the waist and winged him around, pasting him on the ground and slicing the backs of both his thighs so deep he screamed like a girl.

  She dismounted and was ready to go again—

  “John! Behind you!”

  As she shouted at him, he swung around and got faced by a slayer, the guy bull-rushing him right out the door. John landed on his ass, skidding back on the crappy concrete walkway.

  Which proved why you needed to wear good leathers.

  Dermabrasion much?

  Pissed off that he’d been parked on the front lawn with Xhex playing witness, he grabbed the hair of the slayer and yanked the thing into an arch that would leave the guy’s spine humming like a motherfucker.

  With a soundless growl, John pulled a reveal on his fangs and bit the fucker in the neck. Ripping all kinds of gross former human anatomy free, he spat the shit out and then dragged the gurgling thing back into the party by the hair. As he passed Xhex, he nodded at her.

  “You’re welcome,” she said with a small bow. “And nice move with that bite action.”

  Looking over his shoulder at her, the respect she paid him hit him harder than any of the slayers had or could: His heart swelled and he felt as if he filled out his skin better all around.

  Fucking sap that he was—

  The unmistakable pop of a gun going off behind him froze him where he stood.

  The loud ring was so close his eardrums felt pain rather than hearing anything specific, and for a split second afterward, he wondered who’d done the shooting and who, if anyone, had been shot.

  The latter was answered when his left leg went loose under his weight and he went down like an oak.

  FIFTY-SIX

  Xhex’s knife flew from her hand a split second after she saw the lesser come around the corner and level a gun muzzle right at John’s back.

  Her dagger traveled hilt over tip through the air, crossing the distance in the blink of an eye, winging past John’s ear so close she prayed to a God she didn’t believe in that he wouldn’t suddenly decide to turn his head for any reason.

  Just as the slayer pulled the trigger, her blade caught him in the meat of his shoulder, the impact shifting his torso, the pain making him drop his arm.

  Which meant John took the slug in the leg instead of the heart.

  As her male went down, she leaped over him with a war cry.

  Fuck Butch O’Neal. This kill was hers.

  The lesser was scrambling as he tried to disengage her weapon from his torso—at least until he heard her yell. Then he looked toward her and shrank back in horror—which suggested her eyes were glowing red and her fangs were fully extended and flashing.

  She landed in front of him, and as he cringed and put his hands up to shield his face and neck, she didn’t move: Her backup dagger stayed by her side and her third-stringer remained holstered on her thigh.

  Other plans for this boy.

  Using her symphath side, she burrowed into the slayer’s brain and popped the tops on his memories so that all at once, he felt the impact of every horrible thing he’d ever done and every terrible act that had been perpetrated against him.

  Lot of shit. Looooot of shit. He’d apparently had a thing for underage girls.

  Well, wasn’t th
is going to be satisfying on so many levels.

  As he went down to the floor, he screamed and clutched his temples—like he had a chance in hell of stopping the deluge—and she let him suffer and wallow in his sins, his emotional grid lighting up in all the sectors that indicated fear and loathing and regret and hatred.

  When he started to bang his skull against the dirty wallpaper, leaving a black stain where his ear was, she planted one and only one thought in his mind.

  Planted it like an ivy streamer . . . a poison ivy streamer that would take hold and infiltrate and own his mental real estate.

  “You know what you have to do,” she said in a deep, warping voice. “You know the way out.”

  The slayer dropped his arms and revealed his wild eyes. Under the weight of what she’d released, and as a slave to the dictate she gave him, he grabbed the hilt of her dagger and ripped it out of his flesh.

  Turning the point back toward himself, he double-gripped the weapon, his shoulders tensing as he prepared to send the blade on a rocking descent.

  Xhex halted him, freezing him so she could kneel down right beside him. Going face-to-face, she looked into his eyes and hissed. “You don’t go after what’s mine. Now be a good boy and gut yourself.”

  A splatter of black blood hit her leather pants as the guy nailed himself right in the stomach and dragged the blade crosswise, making a nice messy hole of things.

  And then on her mental command, even as his eyes were rolling back in his head, he withdrew the weapon and handed it to her hilt first.

  “You’re welcome,” she muttered. Then she stabbed him in the heart and in a flash, he was gone.

  As she pivoted around, the sole of her boot squeaked on the wet floor.

  John was looking up at her with eyes that were not dissimilar to the slayer’s, his stare peeled so wide he was showing no lid at all on the top or the bottom.

  Xhex wiped her first blade on her leathers. “How bad are you?”

  As John gave her a thumbs-up, A-OK, she realized the house was quiet and looked around. Everyone was still standing: Qhuinn was just straightening from a decapitation, and wheeling around to see if John was okay. And Rhage was coming in at a run from the kitchen with Vishous on his heels.

  “Who’s hit—” Rhage skidded to a halt and stared at the hole in John’s leathers. “Man, three inches up and to the left and you’da been a soprano, buddy.”

  V went over and helped John to his feet. “Yeah, but at least he could have taken up knitting with you. You could’ve taught him how to crochet socks. Brings a tear to the eye.”

  “If I recall, I’m not the one with the wool fixation—”

  As a wheezing boiled up from the living room, Vishous cursed and rushed to Butch’s side as the guy all but fell into the hallway.

  Oh . . . man. Maybe she needed to revise the “everyone standing” thing. The former cop looked like he had food poisoning, malaria, and H1N1 all at the same time.

  She focused on Qhuinn and Rhage. “We need a car. He and John need transport back to the mansion—”

  “I’ll take care of my boy,” Vishous said gruffly as he became a crutch for Butch and escorted him back over to the living room couch.

  “And I’ll go get the Hummer,” Qhuinn said.

  Just as he turned away, John slammed a fist into the wall to get everyone’s attention and signed, I’m fine to fight—

  “You need to get seen by the doctor,” she said.

  John’s hands started to fly so fast she couldn’t track the words, but it was pretty damn clear that he was not on board with getting benched just because of the slug of lead in his leg.

  Their argument was interrupted by a brilliant glow that had her leaning to the side and glancing over her shoulder. What she saw explained so much and not just what had happened in the fight they’d all been in: on the ratty sofa, V had Butch in his arms and their heads were together, the pair of them so close there was no gap whatesoever between them. And in the midst of their embrace, Vishous’s whole body was glowing, with Butch seeming to draw strength and healing from him.

  V’s obvious care and sympathy for the guy made her dislike him less—especially as he turned his face and looked over at her. For once, his icy mask slipped and the despair showing in his eyes proved he wasn’t a total asshole. On the contrary, he seemed to feel the pain of his Brother’s sacrifice for the race. Truly, it ate him alive.

  Oh, and . . . Butch was apparently his. Which explained why V had it in for her. He was jel that she’d had a piece of what he’d wanted, and as rational as he was, he couldn’t stop resenting her for it.

  Only once, though, she thought at him. And never again.

  After a moment, V nodded, as if he appreciated the reassurance, and she returned the respect. Then she refocused on the males in front of her. Rhage had hopped on the hell-no-you’re-not-fighting train, picking up the slack she’d left.

  “I’m going back with you, John,” she cut in. “We’re going back together.”

  As John met her eyes, his emotional grid was lit up like the Vegas Strip.

  She shook her head at him. “I’m going to keep to our deal. And you’re going to take care of yourself.”

  With that, she resheathed her knives, crossed her arms over her chest, and leaned back against the wall, all going-nowhere-fast.

  She’d saved his life.

  Without a doubt, Xhex had given John his future back before he’d even known he was going to lose it: The only reason he was still alive was because she’d clipped that slayer in the shoulder with her knife.

  So, yeah, he was grateful for all that, but he really wasn’t interested in her playing nursemaid.

  Besides, it wasn’t as if candy striper was the highest and best use for her talents.

  John glanced past her to the scorched mark on the floor—which was all that was left of the slayer who’d shot him. Goddamn . . . to think she’d done the worst of the damage without even touching the fucker? That was one fancydancy weapon she had in her mind. Shit, the horror on that bastard’s face . . . Then he’d slit his own abdomen open. What the hell had he been seeing?

  Now John knew why symphaths were feared and segregated.

  And man, between that little show and the Heisman move she’d pulled out on the front lawn, he realized she was precisely what he’d always known her to be: a fighter to the core.

  She could more than handle herself in the field—she was an out-and-out asset in the war. Which was why they both needed to keep going tonight and not waste time back at the house getting a Band-Aid put on his boo-boo.

  Shoving himself up off the floor, he put weight on the injured leg and the thing howled like a bitch. But he ignored the yelling—as well as the conversation that sprang up all around him.

  Cheap talk from the peanut gallery: free. Opinions about his leg: not worth the powder to blow up.

  Selective deafness? Priceless.

  What he was interested in was how many they’d killed tonight. And whether they’d gotten the ferret. Looking into the living room, he—

  Rhage stepped in front of him. “Hey, hi! How are you?” Hollywood stuck his hand out. “I’d like to introduce myself. I’m the piece of meat that’s going to force you headfirst into your buddy Qhuinn’s Hummer as soon as it gets here. Just figured I’d introduce myself before I rope your ass and throw you over my shoulder like a bag of sand.”

  John glared at the guy. Not going anywhere.

  Rhage smiled, his incredible beauty looking like something heaven sent. But that was just the external shit. Internally, he was straight from hell—in this situation. “Sorry, wrong answer.”

  I’m fine—

  That piece-of-shit, motherfucker, cocksucking son of a bitch actually ducked forward, grabbed John on the wound, and squeezed the bullet’s new home.

  John screamed without making a sound and went down in a free fall, landing on the blood-soaked floor with a splash. Bringing up his leg, he tried to cradle his thigh, as
if showing some belated TLC would convince the thing to calm down.

  As it was, he felt like he had jagged glass jammed into his muscle.

  “Was that really necessary?” Xhex demanded overhead.

  Rhage’s voice was no longer teasing. “You want to reason with him? Good luck. And if you think any slayer would do differently, you’ve got your head wedged. There’s an obvious circular hole in the front of his leathers and he walks with a limp. Any half-wit asswipe’s going to know what his weakness is. Plus he smells like fresh blood.”

  The rat bastard probably had a point, but Christ on a crutch . . .

  It was entirely possible that John passed out from the pain, because next thing he knew, the self-proclaimed “piece of meat” was picking him up to carry him out of the house.

  Yeah, whatever. That was a no-go. John shoved himself free of the guy’s hold and tried to land without cursing or throwing up. With his mouth making up all kinds of fuck-oriented words, he limped past Butch, who was looking much better, and V, who’d lit up a hand-rolled.

  He knew right where Xhex was: behind him, with her hand at his back like she knew he was wobbly and might go down at any minute.

  Not a chance, though. Sheer grit got him to the Hummer and in the backseat on his own. Of course, by the time Qhuinn hit the gas, he had a cold sweat all over him and couldn’t feel his hands or his feet.

  “We did a body count,” he heard Xhex say.

  When he looked over, she was staring across the seat at him. Man . . . she was fucking beautiful in the distilled light from the dash up front. Her lean face had a smudge of black lesser blood on it, but her cheeks had high color and her eyes had a special sparkle to them. She’d gotten off on tonight, he thought. She’d enjoyed it.

  Fuck him. She really was the perfect female.

  And how many did we take out? he signed, trying to distract his inner nancy.

  “Twelve of the sixteen new recruits as well as both of the slayers who came across the field with the ferret. Unfortunately, that new Fore-lesser was nowhere to be found—so we have to assume the little bastard bolted as soon as we infiltrated and took a handful of inductees with him. Oh, and Butch inhaled all of those downed except two.”