“Where are you going?” Maggie asked, wiping her hands on a dishtowel as she walked out of the kitchen into the foyer.
“To Dougie’s to watch the Air and Water Show from his rooftop.”
“Oh, okay. Should I expect you home for dinner tonight?”
“No. I’ll probably spend the night downtown.”
“Well, let me know if you change your mind.”
“Will do.” Quinn walked over and gave his mother a kiss on the cheek. “Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
Quinn drove off, and Dylan, Minerva, and I phased in as passengers a few minutes later. Since we were going downtown, and it was only three days until the August full moon, we thought it best to be highly visible and glued to Quinn’s side the entire day.
The traffic to the city was insane, but it was nothing like the traffic in the city.
“Everyone and their brother must be down here—and, yes, pun intended.” Dylan chuckled at this own joke.
“It’s a madhouse,” I agreed, getting more and more nervous about Quinn being here. Quinn gently squeezed my thigh in an attempt to ease my nerves.
“I think we’d do better on foot,” Quinn stated. “There’s a parking garage over there to the right. We’re only a few blocks from Doug’s apartment.”
Quinn pulled into the garage and parked the car. He texted Tommy to let him know we were nearby.
“BRING BEER!” Tommy replied. “THE GOOD STUFF!!” he followed up.
Quinn laughed. “When I’m buying, it’s always get the ‘good stuff.’”
We picked up a couple of six packs from a nearby market and set off on the short trek to Doug’s. It couldn’t have been a more beautiful day—warm, without a cloud in the sky. I closed my eyes for a moment to feel the sun on my skin. Perfect. But that feeling didn’t last long.
As I inhaled again to catch the scent of some nearby flowers, I was hit with traces of a rank, familiar odor. Instantly, my body tensed, and I grabbed hold of Quinn’s arm. Panic raced through me, pumping my body full of adrenaline.
“Crap!” I muttered under my breath. “You guys catch a whiff of that?”
“Yeah,” Dylan growled in a low voice, while Minerva nodded.
“What?” Quinn asked uneasily.
“Servants,” I replied in a somber tone. I took a deep breath and went into emergency autopilot mode, mentally running through all the options and methodically listing the steps we needed to take to get Quinn to safety. I looked at the hundreds of people around us. “We can’t teleport here,” I stated. “There were way too many witnesses. No alleys either.”
“There, three o’clock, a quarter mile ahead,” Dylan said under his breath. “Thing One and Thing Two.”
Sure enough, there were the two Servants who attacked me and Quinn the night I’d last dealt with Jaegar and Chase. They were standing there, waiting for us in their human forms as plain as day, but I could see their red eyes gleaming from behind their sunglasses.
“Wait, there are two more closing in on us,” Minerva added. “At one and two o’clock.”
“Okay,” I said calmly. “Let’s not panic. The garage is close by. We can make our way back there and escape unseen.” I was still clutching Quinn’s left arm as we did a one-eighty and started walking back towards the garage. Minerva stayed two feet behind and to Quinn’s right, and Dylan walked a few feet in front of us.
Quinn was breathing quickly, and I could hear his heart pounding. I squeezed his arm gently to reassure him that we were going to be fine, but to be honest, I was trying to reassure myself of the same. Quinn’s cell phone buzzed, and he nearly jumped out of his skin, which in turn, startled the three of us. Quinn grabbed his phone and checked the caller ID: it was Tommy.
He silenced his phone and stuffed it back into his pocket as we kept walking.
“Crap!” Dylan muttered under his breath. “Over there, nine and ten o’clock at forty yards.”
“Shit,” I said. “That makes six.”
“No, nine,” Minerva said anxiously. “Three, four, and five o’clock at twenty yards.”
“Son of a bitch,” Dylan growled. “How can all these people not notice them?”
“Because they don’t want to,” I replied. “C’mon, we have to pick up the pace before we’re completely surrounded. Let’s cut through that gas station to put some distance between us and them.”
We quickly jaywalked across a four-lane street towards one of the only gas stations in the Gold Coast. It was empty except for one car—a black limousine. A chill immediately ran down my spine.The limo reminded me of the one I’d seen lurking around Quinn’s loft last summer—the same one that tried to run us down.
“Wait!” I whispered frantically as I stopped dead in my tracks. “I think I know that limo.”
“Oh crap!” Quinn said under his breath as the confused expression on his face changed to one of instant recognition.
“We’ve got to get out of here, fast.” I scanned the area. All nine Servants were closing in on us, circling us like vultures.
“I’m not seeing a lot of options here,” Dylan observed.
“Inside the gas station!” Minerva exclaimed. “One witness is better than hundreds.”
“Let’s go!” I gripped Quinn’s arm protectively, while Dylan gripped the other, and we beelined our way to the small enclosure.
“What is that?” I asked, noticing a faint hissing sound.
“I don’t know,” Dylan said, also perplexed.
Keeping our distance from the limo, it wasn’t until we walked around the back of the vehicle that I realized what was making the noise—gas fumes from a cut line. Suddenly, another puzzle piece locked into place—the explosion at the gas station in Amsterdam that had destroyed Peter and five others.
“Run!” I screamed, but it was already too late.
Everything seemed to shift into slow motion, beginning with the limo exploding, the force of which catapulted the four of us into the air like ragdolls. I couldn’t keep hold of Quinn—none of us could. We landed scattered on the ground, with Quinn and Dylan closest to each other—and to the fiery inferno that now was the vehicle. I knew they didn’t have much time before the neighboring gas pump would explode.
“Get him out of here!” I screamed. I tried to teleport myself to Quinn, who was unconscious, but I couldn’t. Something had grabbed me by the arm. I looked behind me and saw Rex.
“Nice to see you again,” it sneered before yanking me into another black Mercedes limo and slamming the door shut. No matter how much I struggled to get free, I was no match for the demon; he must have been jacked up on Shepherd’s blood—probably mine.
“Go!” the Servant commanded the driver.
“I got Quinn! You go after K.C.!” I heard Dylan shout.
I wrenched my neck and looked outside the car window just in time to see another, much bigger explosion. I could feel the limo shake from the impact. As I watched the huge mushroom cloud of smoke form, I knew a gas pump had blown.
“No!” I wailed.
“Say bye-bye to your boyfriend.” Rex laughed.
Please let Dylan have gotten to Quinn on time, I prayed. Please let them both be okay.
“Hi there!” Minerva greeted Rex cheerfully as she materialized in the vehicle.
“What the—” the Servant exclaimed. But before it could even finish, she phased out only to rematerialize in its lap and thrust a knife right in between its eyes.
“Time to go.” Minerva grabbed me and teleported us from the car. We heard a gut-wrenching, ear-splitting shriek from inside the vehicle. A couple of seconds later, the limo came to a screeching halt.
“One down,” Minerva said triumphantly we phased back into view in an alley a half-block from the gas station. She wiped the dust from her hands. “Now let’s go find the boys.”
By now, a sea of people had created a perimeter around the gas station. Two of the eight pumps were engulfed in flames, and I heard sirens coming from ev
ery direction.
The gas station attendant was giving his report to a police officer. I overheard him say there were two women and two men caught in the explosion. He went on to say it looked like one of the girls had been rescued and the other escaped, but the two guys were trapped by a ten-foot high ring of flames and couldn’t get out before the second explosion occurred. He didn’t think there was any possible way they could have survived.
Minerva and I looked at each other. I didn’t know whether to scream, cry, or laugh. The flames would’ve concealed them, allowing Dylan to teleport Quinn to safety. On the other hand, if Dylan couldn’t reach him on time—if he’d been a second too late …
“C’mon,” Minerva said. “We gotta go. People are starting to stare.”
I glanced around and realized she was right. Then I looked at myself and realized that my clothes were torn and I had black soot and oil smudges all over me. Minerva didn’t look any better. Hoping Quinn and Dylan escaped, we slipped through the crowd as quickly as possible and headed back into the alley, where we teleported ourselves to La Casa.
“Quinn?” I called out frantically when we got there. “Dylan? You up here?”
Silence.
“Dylan, love?” Minerva called out.
More silence.
I don’t like this, I thought to myself.
“Neither do I,” Minerva replied aloud, having read my thoughts.
We walked through the house, finding no sign of the boys anywhere. I ran out onto the veranda and saw Dylan standing atop the retaining wall at the far edge of the property, which overlooked a hundred-foot drop to the rocks below. He dropped a pebble and then scooped it up before it fell out of reach, almost losing his balance in the process.
“Dylan!” Minerva cried out. “What are you doing?”
“I was so close,” he mumbled, looking out over the horizon. “He was within my grasp.”
“Dylan,” I said, my voice trembling with fear. “Where’s Quinn?”
“I tried my best, I swear.”
“Dylan, where’s Quinn?” I repeated, sheer terror creeping up my spine as I frantically scanned the patio for him.
He turned to face me. “They got him, K.C.,” he replied in a shaky voice.
“What?” I couldn’t have heard him correctly.
“Those bastards got him.”
“No.” I shook my head, refusing to believe what Dylan had told me. “No. We went through every scenario. We played them out a hundred times—”
“Not this one,” Dylan stated. “Just after you were taken, Quinn and I were trapped in the flames. It was so damn hot, and Quinn was pretty beat up. I grabbed his arm and was about to teleport him here when I swear to everything that is holy, three Servants walked through the flames. One crushed my hand that was holding onto Quinn with the heel of his boot.” He held up a broken hand he’d yet to heal. “Then another dragged me away from Quinn by my feet while the last one grabbed him. The next thing I knew, all three Servants were gone—Quinn was gone. I barely managed to get the hell out of there before the second explosion.”
“This can’t be happening.” My head was spinning. “Please tell me this isn’t happening,” I begged.
Dylan’s tortured expression confirmed it was, indeed, happening. “Evie, I’m so sorry. I never meant to let you down—to let Quinn down.”
I looked at Dylan’s battered body. I saw the tears welling up in his eyes.
“Quinn’s gone?” I felt like the breath had been knocked clear out of my lungs. No mater how hard I tried, I couldn’t breathe, which I knew was silly because we didn’t need to, and yet, I felt like I was suffocating. I dropped to my knees.
“Evie, breathe,” Minerva instructed, dropping to her knees in front of me. “Just breathe.”
I looked at her, but I couldn’t see her. I couldn’t see anything. The Servants had Quinn. It was all I could hear echoing in my head.
And then a different thought popped into my mind—if only I’d been able to fend for myself, if Minerva hadn’t had to come to my rescue, it would’ve been two Shepherds against three Servants. The Servants took Quinn because of me.
“It’s all my fault,” I mumbled before my body slumped completely to the ground and I blacked out.
*
“K.C., can you hear me?”
I opened my eyes to see Dylan and Minerva hovering over me.
“What—where am I?”
“You’re still in La Casa,” Dylan explained. “We managed to stop you from phasing to the Archives after you passed out.”
“I passed out? Why—” I stopped myself when I remembered our conversation. “How long was I out?” Panic stirred within me again. I tried to sit up in the lounge chair, but Dylan held me down.
“Whoa! Just a minute or two,” Dylan exclaimed. “Take it easy.”
“Take it easy?” I snapped angrily. “The Servants are doing who knows what horrible things to Quinn, and you want me to take it easy?”
“And she’s back,” Dylan smirked, letting up on his hold of me.
I stood up and stretched me neck. “Hey, I feel—”
“As strong as an ox?” Dylan asked.
“Something like that.”
“That’s ‘cause you’ve got Big D coursing through you,” he winked.
“That’s a description I never want to hear again.”
“I gave you some of his energy to keep you from phasing to the Archives and reawaken your conscious mind,” Minerva explained.
“You gave us quite a scare there, missy.” Dylan’s expression changed and his voice took on a more a reprimanding tone. “We need you—Quinn needs you—so don’t be making a habit of going catatonic on us, got it?”
“Yeah, sorry.” Dylan was right. Quinn was in danger, and yet again, Minerva had to come to my aid. I was so angry with myself for being this weak. Enough was enough. I promised to be there for Quinn, and I couldn’t do that if I was a basket case. I could feel myself shift back into my autopilot mode. “No more emotional meltdowns, no more freak-outs—I promise.”
“Look, we’re all a mess, and you’ve got every right to be mad at me for what happened—”
I grabbed his good hand. “I know you did everything you could to try to save Quinn. This one’s on me. This was my fault,” I managed.
“We were ambushed, K.C. The Servants had this all planned right down to the last detail. They wanted us to take that shortcut through that gas station.”
“I know. And I should’ve seen it coming.” I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Yesterday, I found out the Servants caused an explosion in a gas station in Amsterdam, killing three humans and their Shepherds. I was waiting until after we’d left Doug’s to tell you all because I didn’t want to ruin my birthday surprise or Quinn’s day with his brothers. Obviously, I screwed up and made the wrong call. I never thought the Amsterdam incident would have anything to do with us until I recognized the limo and saw the cut gas line. But by the time I’d put two and two together, it was too late. I was too late.”
“This is not your fault. Even if you had told us, I wouldn’t have connected the dots between that explosion and what happened to us before we were in the throws of it,” Dylan stated.
“Me neither,” Minerva added.
“But maybe we would’ve been more alert. Maybe we could’ve convinced Quinn not to go.”
“K.C., we were on DEFCON one, and we still couldn’t stop what happened. And as far as convincing College Boy not to go see his brothers today? We would’ve been more successful convincing a snake it had legs!” he scoffed. “So don’t beat yourself up about waiting to tell us,” Dylan continued.
“There’s more—Peter was one of the Shepherds destroyed in the explosion.”
“Oh man.” Dylan closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Can this day get any worse?”
Apparently it could because at that very moment my body seized in pain, causing me to clutch my chest. Another flash of pain ripped
through me, and I dropped to my knees.
“Evie, what’s wrong?” Minerva cried out.
I looked up at Minerva, fighting back the tears. “They’re hurting him. My soul—it can feel his pain.” The pain only fueled my determination. “We have to find him,” I declared.
We teleported back to Chicago. By now, the gas station was besieged with all kinds of emergency vehicles and news trucks. As we managed to inconspicuously walk around the perimeter of the scene and retrace our steps, I overheard bits and pieces of the live broadcasts:
“The Chicago Air and Water Show was marred by tragedy this afternoon when two gas pumps at what’s left of this Gold Coast gas station behind me exploded …”
“This is Dan Davison reporting live. Less than an hour ago, tragedy struck, claiming the lives of at least two people at this gas station behind me at the intersection of …”
“It was reported that two men and two women, who were apparently here to enjoy today’s festivities, were caught in the explosion. It’s believed a Good Samaritan driving by the scene may have rescued the two women. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the two men, who are believed to have perished in the flames.”
“… Police have recovered a cell phone believed to belong to one of the two victims in this explosion. It may very well be the only link to the identity of one, or possibly both, of the victims, as no remains have been recovered at this time. This is Kelly Kincaid, live from the scene.”
The gas station attendant was also interviewed: “There’s no way those two dudes coulda survived that second explosion. There were trapped in this crazy-looking ring of fire. It must’ve been thirty feet high. You all are wasting your time looking for bodies. Of course there ain’t no bodies—they were blown to bits and probably melted. Do you have any idea how damn hot those flames were?—Oh shit, can I say ‘damn’ on live T.V.? Anyway, the flames practically melted me they were so hot! And I was standing all the way over there!”
So that was it. Quinn and Dylan were presumed to have died in the explosion. The gas station was destroyed, probably along with any video footage of us, making it highly unlikely they’d identify any of us on camera—not that the Council Tribunal would stand for that anyway. But if it was Quinn’s cell phone they’d found, they’d be able to place him at the scene, and his parents would be informed of the tragic accident that took their son’s life and the life of one of his yet-to-be-identified friends. The Harrisons would never recover from the death of their youngest son. I couldn’t let this be the end of Quinn’s story. I had to get him safely back home.
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