Living With the Dead (Otherworld 9)

"Shit! It's Solheim. He's been knocked out."

That snapped Robyn back to the present. She tried to creep forward for a better look, but Finn laid his arm over her back, holding her down.

"Solheim, come on, wake up."

A groggy "Wha - ?"

"Goddamn it, you were supposed to take care of them. You fucked up, didn't you? They saw you pull your sidearm."

"Wha - ? No, I never - It's right here. I - I was looking through the binoculars, then..."

Robyn didn't catch the rest, her mind looping back to the first bit. Take care of them? Pull his sidearm? She remembered trudging through the forest, Finn glancing back at Solheim, her thinking he looked like a prisoner being led to a firing squad.

Because he was.

No, that was crazy. Why would - ?

Why not? Finn was right. These men weren't police officers.

Running footsteps crashed through the forest. "Solheim, Barrett, Mac! Alvarez needs you up front. Something's going down." The footfalls stopped. "You took care of them, right?"

"They got away. We were just - "

"Shit! No. We need all hands up front. Their car is disabled, right? You managed that, I hope."

A chilly, "Yes, sir."

"Then, Solheim, scout the perimeter. Don't let them escape. Barrett, Mac, follow me."

When they were gone, Finn helped Robyn to her feet.

"We need to warn Hope and Karl," she said.

"I know. You still have the gun?"

She reached into her jacket. It slid out easily now. All in the angle, she supposed.

"Any idea how to use it?" he asked.

"I'll figure it out."

* * *

HOPE

After what Rhys told them about Adele, Hope supposed she should have been able to dredge up a few ounces of sympathy for her, growing up in a cult, believing she'd been sold by her mother.

But she'd given her "sister" birth control pills so she'd be forced into what Hope could only call group rape. She'd preyed on Colm's infatuation, then abandoned him, knowing he'd been conditioned to avoid capture with suicide. She'd murdered Portia Kane, Judd Archer, the bike officer and, if Rhys guessed right, an innocent bystander at the fair.

So as Hope stood in a garden and watched Adele - battered and bowed, her gun in the hands of the young woman she'd betrayed, her arm in the grip of the woman whose son she'd gotten killed - there was no mercy in her.

With each new accusation, Adele's terror spiked. And Hope guzzled it down.

"You have betrayed the kumpania," their leader, Niko, said. "You've maliciously interfered with your sister, Lily. You've caused the death of your brother, Colm. And you've committed the ultimate betrayal, conspiring with a Cabal - "

"No! It's not true. None of it. I - "

Neala cuffed the side of Adele's head. As Adele cried out, Neala's expression didn't change. When she'd first dragged Adele to the meeting place, delicious chaos vibes had danced around her, her grief mingled with the thrill of bringing her son's killer to justice.