Dark Debt (Chicagoland Vampires 11)

I made it across the street in one miraculous piece, raced across a concrete courtyard in front of a skyscraper that gleamed with blue and red lights. They cast a colorful glow across the ground, highlighted the runner as he dodged tourists and late-night workers, shoving them into one another to create obstacles for me.

He darted into a long, narrow park bound on both ends by circle drives. The southern circle dropped down to the river; the northern one dropped to lower Illinois Street.

He ran to the southern end of the park, turned back to me, grabbed his crotch. “Why don’t you come and get this?”

What a class act.

“Because I’ve seen bigger,” I said dryly, stepping onto grass still soft from the winter snowmelt and walking toward him. I spun the dagger in my hand, watched his eyes widen as it caught the light. “But I know how to get dirty if that’s what you want.”

“Oh, I bet you do.”

“Who do you work for?”

“Fuck you.” His tone was as mean as his gaze. He didn’t know me or anything about me, but I was his enemy, and he didn’t care if I lived or died.

“Not in a million years. Do you work for the Circle?”

“You think it’ll be that easy?”

I shrugged casually. “I’m pretty sure I just chased you across Streeterville and managed to keep up.”

I flipped the dagger rhythmically through my fingers as casually as I might have scratched an itch, watching him, waiting for a lean or movement that would signal his next move.

“Not bad for a girl.”

“That’s what the last guy said—right before I kicked his ass.” I beckoned him forward, dipped my chin, smiled thinly. “If you’re so manly, come and get me.”

Sirens began to wail nearby. Someone had called the cops; I could only hope Ethan had managed to contact my grandfather, ask him to intercept. It wouldn’t do to have vampires arrested tonight, too.

Ginger didn’t want any part of cops. He feinted left, then barreled forward. But I’d been distracted by the sirens, caught the fake too late, shifted my weight too slowly. I jumped for him, extending my body, managed to grab his legs and bring him down. He kicked out, boot connecting with my cheekbone and sending a bolt of bright pain across my face. He jumped up and took off again.

I blinked back tears, but without pausing to think, relied on muscle memory and flipped my dagger toward him.

It connected, lodging in the back of his thigh. He cursed feverishly and hit the concrete on his knees, then yanked the blade out and tossed it away. Gaze narrowed, spittle at the corners of his mouth, he rose again, limping as he vaulted down the stairs to the road below.

“Damn it,” I muttered. A jackhammer pounding in my skull, I jumped to my feet and started for him, pain jolting through my head each time I made contact with the ground, and ran toward the small wall that overlooked the street below.

He was taking the stairs at a gallop, nearly to the ground.

There was no time to hesitate. I put a hand on the rail and vaulted over it.

The ground disappeared beneath me; for a moment, I was airborne. For whatever chemical or physical reason, gravity was more forgiving for vampires, so the jump from the upper street to the lower felt more like one big step than a twenty-foot leap.

I hit the middle of the street in a crouch, horns blaring deafeningly as an eastbound CTA bus roared toward me. I rolled out of the way, hair whipping around as the bus barreled past, four inches from my face, forcing the breath right out of me.

“Crap on toast,” I said, sucking in air before kicking up my legs and vaulting to my feet again.

I dodged the next car for the sidewalk, scanned the street both directions.

He was gone.

I cursed but set off at a jog, peering into the windows of a bodega, a fast food restaurant, and the fancy lobby of a fancier skyscraper, hoping he’d ducked inside to wait for me to give up, and I’d catch a glimpse of red hair in a corner behind a pop machine or a potted plant. But there was nothing.

This apparently being the CTA hub of Streeterville, a second bus sped past me, this one heading north. I glanced up. There, in the back left window, was Ginger, middle finger raised.

The bus turned and disappeared, taking him with it.

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