Deadshifted (Edie Spence 4)

No wonder he’d been trying to steal Valium—benzos were among the only things that helped when detox was inevitable.

Marius looked up at me. We both knew the score. The good news was, Tan-man wasn’t dying of whatever mysterious ailment was going around. The bad news was, Tan-man would be useless to us here, or more useless than he already had been. “We’ve gotta get him downstairs,” Marius said, leaning forward to indicate that “we” meant me.

I shook my head. Even if finding Asher was statistically impossible at this point. “I don’t want to go. ”

“I’ll take him,” Kate volunteered.

Marius grabbed the man by the shoulders. “Can you stand?”

“Yeah. Maybe. ” He let Marius hoist him aloft, and Marius looked at the woman.

“Go straight back the way we came. No detours. ”

“Sure. ” She herded the man slowly, him leaning on every passing door, and cast a glance back at me, eyeing my belly. “You should try to be safe. ”

Easier said than fucking done, but I smiled and waved anyhow.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

The four of us looked at one another in the hall.

“I believe Edie and I would like to be paired together now,” Nathaniel said, gazing coolly at me.

Jorge’s face screwed up into a question, but I shook my head so he wouldn’t argue. “You’re right. I think we would. ”

“For whatever good it will do,” Marius said. “This is a useless goose chase. Everyone’s already gone. ” Which was, in itself, creepy. Marius gathered himself and held the sheet of paper up with all the names. “Fine. You two—the Kontises; we’ll take the Morkins. ”

Marius naming everyone all the time only made it worse. Marius unlocked the door for us and Nathaniel started rapping on it. “Mr. and Mrs. Kontis?” he said archly as we stepped in. No response. He pressed the door open and gestured with his other arm, looking at me. “After you. ”

I hesitated long enough that he had to know I was thinking too hard. Should I show him my back so he’d know I wasn’t scared of him, or not, so he’d know I was? I went with caution, edging down the narrow entry hall, my back to the wall, until we reached the cabin’s main living space. I heard the door shut softly behind us.

My back still against a wall, I watched him enter the room. “What’s your game?”

“I have no idea what you mean,” he said, with a malevolent smile. “I’m flattered by your attention to me, but I’ve only just become a widower. I’m afraid a year must pass before we can date. ”

I didn’t know how to respond to that. I wished Asher had told me more while he could.

“I’ll ta

ke this side,” Nathaniel said, and went into a darkened room.

We were supposed to be searching. But fuck all these other people, I went into the room after him.

My safe time away from supernatural creatures other than Asher had made me soft. I walked into the room, assuming I’d find him in the bathroom, or at the balcony door, but he was waiting just inside for me. He grabbed one of my arms and twisted it up and behind me, making me rock forward on my toes as he caught me around the chest with his other arm and pulled me close, like we were lovers dancing.

“Let us be clear on two things,” he whispered, his voice in my ear. “I could kill you before they heard you scream, and I could fling your body over the edge without thinking twice. ”

“Let go of my arm,” I said, trying not sound scared.

He didn’t. He hoisted it higher. I grit my teeth not to yelp in pain, eyes watering.

“What did you do with Asher?” I hissed.

“Is that his real name?” he said. I didn’t respond. “I suppose next you’ll tell me he’s not even a doctor?” Nathaniel went on, voice dripping with irony like venom.

“Where is he?” I couldn’t turn around, I couldn’t even squirm away from his hot breath in my ear.

“Are you really pregnant by him? I’ll know if you’re lying. ”

I didn’t want to say anything. His grip on my arm tightened and pulled.

It went. It just went. I could feel a tearing and then heard a pop and it was too late, he’d dislocated my arm. I gasped and cursed in a huge rush. “Yes! Yesyesyes!” He still didn’t let go. The pain radiated away from my shoulder in waves, like the ocean outside.

“Good,” he said, his voice stretching out the word in my ear like a purr.

I started panting in pain and blinking back tears from my eyes. “What are you doing here? What do you want?”

“Revenge. You’ve heard the saying an eye for an eye? Well, I want a child for a child. ”