Blood Gamble (Disrupted Magic Book 2)

by Melissa F. Olson

  He shook his head a little, grimacing. “I’m fine. Vest caught most of it,” he yelled. “Broke some ribs.”

  “Come on.” As the cold water continued to pour down on us, I picked up my knife belt again and struggled to stand, feeling every bit of the pain in my body, including my heels in my drenched, shredded socks. Then I had to reach down and help Jameson up, and everything hurt even worse. With his arm draped over my shoulders, I stepped toward the doorway—but I could feel vampires in my radius, obviously moving closer, so I turned around again and we made our way to the big windows, picking our way around the rotten floor. I didn’t think we would ever make it there, and I was braced for another shot in my back or for the ceiling to drop on me.

  But that didn’t happen. We finally reached the blown-out windows, where I helped Jameson step through, onto the ground. He reached up to help me, groaning with pain.

  And suddenly Cliff was there, an assault rifle slung across his back with a leather strap. He reached up to my waist, helping me down to the ground. “Where’s Laurel?” I yelled over the noise of the water.

  Cliff was careful to put me a little ways away from the glass—he’d seen my socks, which were now smeared with dirt and watery blood. I could barely feel my feet. That water was cold. “Twenty yards away, protected in a circle,” he shouted. They’d stayed back a little, so us nulls wouldn’t undo her magic. Smart.

  “Help me get this thing on,” I said, holding up my knife belt.

  Cliff helped me unbuckle it, looping it around my waist and re-fastening it. I was swaying again, so he ducked under my arm, choosing the side without the wound. With me still half holding up Jameson, we probably looked like a demented kick line, but we managed to inch away from the house. As my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I saw the Range Rover parked haphazardly a little ways away. With everyone focused on the gunshots and the arriving vampires, he’d been able to pull up practically onto the lawn.

  “That is a lot bigger than I pictured,” I said, jerking my head toward the geyser.

  “Yeah, she tapped into the house’s water main,” Cliff replied. “She said the crystal Lex recommended is spectacular.”

  We stopped just in front of the car, where I had to squint against the headlights. “Jameson, get in,” I said to the other null. He looked bad, and was now shivering from the cold water, on top of it. “I’ve got to go back for Wyatt.”

  “Lucy must have killed him,” Jameson pointed out. His color was terrible. “We heard those shots.”

  “He might have gone through the window. I have to be sure,” I said firmly. Even if Wyatt had wanted to be put out of his misery, I wasn’t leaving him behind. If Lucy Holmwood was still alive, she would use him to vent her frustrations.

  I didn’t say it to Jameson, but in that moment I decided that I also wouldn’t leave until I knew for sure that Lucy Holmwood was dead. She couldn’t be allowed to run away and start this whole thing again somewhere else, or provoke a war with Los Angeles. I had started this hero bullshit, and I was going to finish it.

  I looked at Cliff. “Do you have a gun I can borrow?”

  Cliff reached into a back holster and pulled out a Glock. It was my Glock. Well, the one I’d had earlier. I looked at him with surprise, and he smiled at me. “I’ve been scouting the property for half an hour. I’ve got your boots in the car, too, if you want to grab them.”

  “Can you? I don’t want to get too close to Laurel while—”

  Beside us, with no warning, Jameson fell to his knees.

  I yelped and dropped down beside him, setting the gun on the dirt. “Jameson!” I looked for a wound, but he’d fallen away from the headlights, and between the low lighting and his black clothes, it was like trying to find a shadow inside another shadow. Cliff, who had squatted next to us, pulled a flashlight out of one of his coat pockets and flicked it on, shining the beam on Jameson’s shirt. “Here,” he said, pointing to holes above and below the Kevlar. “Looks like they were using buckshot. Nasty.” He palpated one of the upper wounds for a moment, and Jameson screamed with pain. “Broken collarbone,” Cliff announced. “And he’s losing blood too fast. We gotta get him to a hospital.”

  “You stupid lying liar!” I screamed at Jameson. “You are not fine!”

  “I didn’t want to slow you down, Letts.” He gave me a weak grin that tore into my heart. I groaned and fought the urge to tear at my hair. “Argh!” Why did this have to be so hard?!

  As I looked down at Jameson’s ashen face, fear and despair started to overtake me, and I felt my radius practically explode outward, farther than it had ever gone before. But I didn’t care. I wasn’t paying any attention to what was happening back at the boardinghouse. I only had eyes for the null in front of me.

  Because he was dying.

  Don’t cry, I told myself, though my eyes were burning. Don’t cry. Somewhere in the distance, I vaguely heard more gunfire, but it barely even registered in my thoughts. Jameson was dying. Wyatt was still out there. I needed to focus. With effort, I forced myself to look at Cliff. “Take Laurel, get him to the closest ER. Right now.”

  He shook his head. “Look at you, you’re barely upright. You go to the hospital; I’ll find Wyatt.”

  “That would be awesome,” I said tiredly, “except without a null, these guys are . . . you know. Vampires.”

  “Oh,” he said in a small voice. “Okay. I’ll go get Laurel.” He turned and disappeared into the darkness behind the SUV.

  I looked down at Jameson, who was blinking really hard, like he was trying to keep himself awake. I bent and kissed him on the lips. They were cold, but then, so were mine. “Don’t die,” I told him, brushing wet hair off my face. “I’ll be really pissed if you die.”

  “Scarlett . . .” His fingers fluttered where they lay on his stomach, trying to find my hand. I grabbed them. “Come with me. Wyatt will be okay. He’s a vampire.” He didn’t say it, but his tone suggested that because Wyatt was a vampire, it didn’t really matter if he was okay.

  “I’m not like you,” I whispered. His face shifted, becoming infinitely sad. “But I don’t hold it against you,” I added.

  Cliff ran back toward us, with Laurel a few feet behind him. “Let’s get you up,” he said to Jameson, but before he could a loud crackle erupted from the direction of his belt. I jumped, then remembered the other walkie-talkie. We’d left it in that big room with the bust, along with my bulletproof vest.

  Cliff and I had just enough time to exchange a look before the walkie-talkie crackled again. “Attention, useless bitch,” came Lucy Holmwood’s seething voice. “I have your little pet here, with a stake positioned right over his heart. If you want him, come fetch him. I fucking dare you.”

  Cliff and Jameson both started to shake their heads, but I was already picking up the Glock and struggling to my feet. I leaned toward Cliff and pulled the handset off his belt. “Get them out of here,” I said quietly, and without listening to his response, I turned and began trudging back toward the boardinghouse, shivering with cold.

  I forgot to get my damned boots.

  Chapter 37

  As I returned to the boardinghouse, I saw that I’d been right: the closest corner of the big white building had actually collapsed, right where Laurel had created the geyser. I could still see a bit of water spurting out, but it was dying down now, and with Laurel leaving it wouldn’t last much longer.

  I held the walkie-talkie to my mouth. “Where are you?”

  Lucy’s voice cackled at me. “Just behind the building. Come and get me, bitch.”

  Name-calling? Really? But I clipped the handset to my belt loop and walked, trying to focus on my still-expanded radius. Behind me, I could feel a witch moving away. Laurel. Okay. I tuned out her signal and searched forward.

  In the past, they’d killed four or five at each of these parties, but Lucy had said she’d invited more vampires to take advantage of having two nulls. The last time I’d paid attention like this, there were maybe a doze
n vampires moving inside the boardinghouse and on the grounds around it. Now, though, I only felt two, one much weaker than the other. Lucy and Wyatt. But where were the others? Had they run away? Did Lucy persuade them to go back into the kill chute?

  Cautiously, I kept walking around the side of the building, trying to slow my breathing. I might need to suppress my radius again, and that couldn’t happen until I calmed the fuck down. At the corner, I paused and peeked around the side of the building. There were some shrubs in my way, so I eased my body around them, trying to peek through to see the back gravel area I’d become all too familiar with earlier.

  Then I saw them.

  The gravel and the area immediately surrounding it were strewn with bodies. Dead bodies. No buzz of life at all.

  There were maybe fifteen of them, all between the ages of twenty and forty, and where I could see their faces, they were all good-looking. So your typical vampire sample group. Some of them had tried to run, judging by the way they were positioned, and others had even crawled a few feet away before being cut down. Jesus. I’d heard shots earlier, but I’d been too distracted to count them.

  This was my doing. I’d been upset, and I’d completely lost track of my radius and how it was expanding. Lucy had used my carelessness against these poor people.

  In the center of all this carnage, Wyatt lay flat on his back, with Lucy Holmwood sitting on his chest. Her skinny legs were splayed out to either side of him, and there were discarded guns around her—probably Wyatt’s own weapons. Lucy had both hands wrapped around a large wooden stake, which had already pierced Wyatt’s chest. He was breathing shallowly, and I wondered if she’d punctured a lung.

  I must have made some kind of noise, because her head suddenly shot up, her eyes finding me in the shadows. “Come out, come out, wherever you are,” she sang, her now-human eyes scanning the bushes.

  I pushed out a deep breath and stepped around the shrub, into the light. “Hello, Lucy. Did you run out of bullets?”

  She beamed, and I saw the wildness in her eyes, something I’d only seen before on a werewolf about to lose control entirely. Uh-oh. I didn’t know if it was my actions, Jameson shooting Arthur, or the news about Claire, but we’d definitely broken Lucy Holmwood’s brain. “Yes, more’s the pity. This creature”—she wiggled the stake a little bit, and a guttural moan escaped Wyatt—“has extra bullets, but I don’t know how to put them in.” She shrugged. “Ah, well. I never did mind getting my hands dirty.” She smirked at me. “I couldn’t have done it without your help, though.”

  Guilt lanced through me, but no, I wasn’t taking responsibility for this massacre. This was all Lucy. “And what exactly is your goal here?” I asked, walking closer. I had the Glock tucked in the back of my jeans, right below the knife belt, but my hands and arms were shaky from cold and blood loss, and I didn’t trust my aim, especially with my injured right arm. If I missed, she would kill Wyatt, so I would need to be nearly within arm’s reach before I drew the gun, or even a throwing knife. “You could have run away just now, with or without killing Wyatt there. Why are you still here?”

  Her eyes burned. “Because none of it matters,” she spat. “You killed Arthur. You killed Claire. You killed the show. I have nothing left, and it’s all because of you, you beastly little tart.”

  Victorian insult words really don’t have much sting these days, I’ve noticed. “You want to fight, is that it?” I asked. “I’m right here.” I doubted I could even pull together a basic aikido throw, but if I could get her to step away from Wyatt, I could shrink my radius and he could heal and—

  But Lucy shook her head. “First I’m going to make you watch me kill this little worm,” she said through gritted teeth, looking back at Wyatt. “This traitor who came here to—”

  Enough. Wyatt was out of time, and I wasn’t going to get another chance. I didn’t want to risk the gun, in case I missed and hit Wyatt, so I whipped a knife out of my belt and threw it at her.

  I was aiming for the neck again, but the blade flashed in the air and buried itself in Lucy’s right shoulder. She screamed, and her human instincts told her to retreat, so she scrambled off Wyatt and scooted away from me, moving toward the building door and escape.

  The second knife hit her in the belly. I tried to focus, to get my hands to stop shaking, but the third knife glanced off her cheek, leaving a long gash of gore. I stumbled forward to stop her, to get closer, to protect Wyatt, but she managed to grab the doorknob with bloody fingers, yank it open, and stumble inside. She was still in my expanded radius, still human, but getting away fast.

  Fuck her. I went to Wyatt and dropped down onto my knees beside him. He was still human, too, but he was alive, though his breath came in short gasps.

  Then I felt a third vampire suddenly pop into my radius, but before I could react Lucy Holmwood came backing through the doorway again, her hands raised. I was confused until I saw the gun come through the doorway, followed by the man holding it. My jaw dropped open.

  “Dashiell?”

  Chapter 38

  He was dressed like an FBI agent in a movie: a black bulletproof vest over nice slacks and a white shirt that he’d unbuttoned at the collar. His face was grim but controlled. Lucy, who hadn’t removed the knives from her shoulder or stomach yet, was glaring at him with feral rage.

  “How the hell did you get here so fast?” I blurted.

  Dashiell shot me an amused look. “I have a plane, remember?”

  “Ohhhhh.” I’d forgotten, actually. Dashiell didn’t advertise his wealth, and since I’d first met him I’d only heard of him using his private aircraft a handful of times, usually when Beatrice wanted to visit friends. I’d never even seen it.

  Without moving the gun away from the enraged-looking Lucy, Dashiell gave the gravel area a quick look. “I see you’ve been busy,” he remarked, the way you comment on the traffic report.

  “Uh, this was mostly her,” I said. Then a thought struck me, and I added in a weak voice, “Please don’t kill her.”

  “What?” Now Dashiell did look at me, incredulous. “Surely you’re not going to suggest we take her to her sycophantic cardinal vampire for judgment?”

  “Ohhhhh no. No. But I promised this dude he could kill her.” I gestured at Wyatt, who was conscious but breathing shallowly. “We made a deal.”

  Dashiell just raised his eyebrows, looking a little doubtful. Wyatt seemed to be barely hanging on. Then, to my immense surprise, the vampire actually clapped one hand over the stake wound in his chest and climbed to his feet, with only a little help from me.

  “Do you mind, sir?” he said to Dashiell.

  My cardinal vampire looked at me. I nodded, letting my trust for Wyatt show on my face. Dashiell shrugged and handed the gun over. The cowboy kept one hand over his injury, and raised the weapon with the other.

  “You fuckers, you have no idea what’s coming to you,” Lucy snarled. Her hands were clutched into fists, but she stood her ground. “You think we were the only skinners in town? The only ones looking for revenge? I’ve made calls. You have no idea what will happen to Las Vegas without us here keeping the balance—”

  “Ms. Holmwood,” Dashiell said formally, “you are, in some ways, my responsibility. I turned Claire Clairmont, who turned you. I apologize for the pain and suffering my actions have apparently caused in this chain of events. But for the crime of murdering your fellow vampires, I sentence you to death.”

  Lucy’s eyes widened. Dashiell nodded at Wyatt, who gritted his teeth and pulled the trigger.

  I looked away. It felt a little cowardly, but my nightmares were crowded enough. When Lucy’s body hit the dirt, Wyatt stepped forward and put two more shots in her heart. I felt her presence blink out of my radius. She was just another corpse now.

  It was over.

  Wyatt turned to look at me, swaying on his feet. “Miss Scarlett?” he said faintly. “I’d be much obliged.”

  “What? Oh.” I suppressed my radius, pulling it in tig
ht around me. Wyatt became a vampire again, and his chest wound instantly started healing.

  He smiled with tired relief. “Thank you.” He turned to Dashiell, holding out the gun, handle first. “And thank you, sir.”

  Dashiell took it, watching Wyatt with those cautious eyes. “You are quite welcome. Scarlett has informed me that you’ve been of great service.”

  Had I said that? I must have. Or Cliff had overheard me talking about it. It didn’t really matter now. I was kind of dizzy. “She also said you’d like her to help you move on,” he added carefully.

  “Yes, sir,” Wyatt replied, guarded. “We made a bargain.”

  Dashiell’s face grew stern. “Scarlett is my employee, and should not have agreed to kill another vampire without checking with me.”

  “Hey—” I began, but Dashiell spoke over me.

  “Moreover, I’m inclined to believe that enough vampires have died here tonight.” He gestured to the carnage around us. “I would therefore consider it a great favor if you would come back to Los Angeles with us and work in my service. For . . . let’s say a year. At that point, if you still want to die, I’m happy to get out of your way, and Scarlett will not be in trouble.”

  Oh. I got it then. I wasn’t actually in trouble—Dashiell didn’t actually have much say in what I did on someone else’s territory, unless I threw his name around while I did it. But he was either trying to spare me or save Wyatt—maybe both—so I kept my mouth shut.

  Wyatt eyed him for a long moment, considering the offer. “Please, Wyatt,” I put in. “Please don’t make me kill anyone else tonight.”

  He turned and met my eyes. He looked so sad, and alone, and just . . . done. For a moment I almost considered opening my mouth and recanting, but I held my ground.

  Finally, Wyatt said, “You didn’t have to come back to save me, Miss Scarlett, but you did.” To Dashiell, he added, “All right, Mr. Dashiell. I accept your proposal of a year of service. For her.”

  I felt my shoulders sag with relief. I wouldn’t lose any sleep over the Holmwoods, but playing a role in Wyatt’s death would have haunted me. Now I had at least a year to not worry about it.