“No. It has to be freely given.”
The doorbell rang. I shot a look down the hall and saw her silhouette through the glass panes. “Now what do we do?”
“I would suggest you get the door open, Risa dearest,” Hunter replied, proving the keenness of her hearing yet again. “Otherwise I will not be pleased.”
“Kinda hard to do when the owner is unconscious.” But I walked over and booted the cobwebbed heel of his shoes. “Hey, wake up.”
He didn’t flinch. I tried again, harder this time. Still nothing. “Can you wake him?” I said, glancing at Azriel.
“I shouldn’t, but given the growing precariousness of the situation—” He paused, his expression one of concentration. After a moment, the shifter groaned and rubbed his eyes. Then he saw us.
“What the fuck?” He jerked upright abruptly. “Who the hell are you two? And what the fuck is that?”
“That,” I said grimly, “is the woman you brought home.”
“No fucking way.”
“Look, I don’t particularly care if you believe me or not,” I said, voice tart. “The fact is you have the mother of all spiders in your living room and you were almost her dinner. Now, be a good chap and go invite Director Hunter into your house so she can deal with the beast.”
He blinked. “The director? As in, the Directorate?”
“Yes,” I said, and mentally ordered the man to just go. It wouldn’t have done any good, of course, even if I had been telepathic, because of the whole “freely given” restriction.
But if he didn’t hurry, things were going to get bad pretty quickly. The throbbing in Amaya’s steel was stronger, as was my damn headache. And I didn’t even want to think about the amount of blood I was losing, but my socks were beginning to feel rather wet.
“If this spider escapes the power net,” I continued, “we’ll all be damn dinner. So please, just go open the door.”
He looked from me to the spider, then to Azriel, and rose—and just about fell flat on his face again. I’d forgotten about the web wrapping his feet and lower legs.
“Fucking hell, it was trying to eat me!” His voice held edges of both anger and hysteria.
“But it didn’t!” I cut in harshly. “Just hop down the damn hall and open the door. We can’t hold this bitch much longer.” I paused. “We’ll explain everything later.”
He gave me a “you’d better” look, then hopped in a rather ungainly fashion down the hall and opened the front door. Two seconds later, Hunter was striding toward us. There was little emotion on her face, but her pupils had expanded to the point where there was little green left and the sheer depth of hunger that radiated off her stole my breath and had my gut churning. This was Hunter as I’d hoped I’d never see her—eager for her revenge, ravenous for the blood of her enemy.
Thank god I had Azriel with me.
I glanced back down the hall. The shifter was still standing by the open door, but his expression was slack.
“His expression is as empty as his mind,” she said, her low voice vibrating with anticipation. “Do you think I desire a witness to what I am about to do?”
I swallowed heavily. “We’re witnesses.”
She turned her black gaze on me, and I took an involuntary step back.
“Yes,” she murmured, voice silky. “But I have nothing to fear from you; do I, Risa dear?”
I felt like a rabbit caught in the spotlight, only this particular one shone with a dark, dark light and promised a bloody, brutal death.
“Your threats grow tedious, Hunter.” Azriel’s voice held little inflection and no doubt for good reason. It wouldn’t take much to set her off. “And you are here for the Jorõgumo, remember.”
“Yes.”
Hunter’s gaze returned to the caged spider, and the energy radiating off her suddenly spiked. Only it wasn’t aimed at any of us, but rather the Jorõgumo herself. Her form began to flicker, change, shrink, until what stood before us was once again a woman.
A woman who looked suddenly scared.
Just for a fraction of a second, I almost felt sorry for her. Then I remembered what she was and what she’d done. The death Hunter was about to give her was surely quicker than the one she’d given any of her victims.