“Ten bucks, just like it says on the basket,” said Annette.
“How much after the discount for helping you ransack Alex’s pirate shithole?”
“Just take it,” I snapped.
Hob snatched the pin. “All of you piss-for-brains realize this could be a trap, right? Alex knows you’re onto him. He’ll be ready for you.”
“It doesn’t matter.” I thought of Morgan and Sage upstairs. Even the stupid cat. Strength and purpose filled me in a way I hadn’t felt for more than thirty years. “This is what we do.”
“Mggoka’ai ya ng nafl’fhtarl. Yar h’lli R’gngyk h’tungg il. Mggoka’ai ya— Sorry, let me grab a lozenge. This is murder on the throat.”
CHAPTER23
Annette
Icouldn’t recall the last time I’d seen Jenny carry a weapon, let alone two.
A beautifully polished, unstrung composite bow rested in her lap. Strapped to her hip was a sheathed xiphos, a Greek short sword with a double-edged blade and a cylindrical pommel that was currently jabbing into the passenger’s seat of my BMW. A quiver of arrows rested between her feet.
“What happened to the pacifism thing?” I asked as I drove.
“Artemis told me I’d have to take up her blade and bow again. She was right. I have to stop him.”
You didn’t have to be a PI to pick up on her guilt and anguish. “Alex’s choices aren’t your fault, Jenny.”
She didn’t answer.
In the back seat, Temple had his nose so deep in that book, I was surprised the book didn’t chomp it off. I hated dragging him out of the house again. He looked so exhausted. But he’d insisted, and after my last bout with Alex, I couldn’t turn down the help.
A rumble like far-off thunder shook the car. I tightened my grip on the wheel and tapped the brakes. The other cars on the road were doing the same, except for one that had jumped a curb and taken out a parking meter.
“What the hell?” I muttered. The sky was bright and blue. And thunder wouldn’t jostle traffic.
A block later, I turned onto Lafayette Street. A hundred yards farther, I hit the brakes again. People were running in the opposite direction, shouting and panicking and snapping selfies. I inched the car forward until I saw what they were running from.
A chunk of the street had collapsed into a sinkhole thirty feet wide. The edge of that sinkhole ran directly beneath the Gauntlet.
The bar’s windows were shattered. Flyers and broken glass covered the ground like snow. A gargoyle teetered at the edge of the roof before tumbling loose. It struck the blacktop at the edge of the sinkhole, cracked in half, and fell deeper into the hole.
I hoped that one had been a mundane statue and not one of Duke’s living creations.
I pulled over and parked. I ignored the meter. Jenny helped Temple out of the back while I assessed the situation.
“Tell me Alex hasn’t opened a chasm to hell,” said Jenny. “I hate those.”
“This isn’t even a pothole to heck,” I assured her. Water sprayed from a broken pipe, dousing the dirt and pavement. Broken cables hung along the edge, running parallel to the road. Ten feet down was nothing but muddy water. Who knew how much deeper it went?
The ground rumbled again, and the Gauntlet’s front wall sank a foot and a half. More dirt and road collapsed.
“Something’s down there.” Jenny stepped into the tight curve of her bow and bent the limbs back to string it. She made it look easy, but I’d once tried to string that thing, and it had been like trying to bend steel. She strapped the quiver to her hip, opposite the xiphos. “Smells like the sludge we found in Alex’s classroom but stronger.”
“What about Alex or his thralls?” I asked.
Jenny shook her head. “It’s hard to pick up other scents over all this.”
My phone buzzed with a text from Duke. I skimmed it and swore. “The main floor just collapsed. Duke got most of the customers out, but there are still a few people trapped in the apartments upstairs.”
“Go.” Jenny nocked an arrow. “Temple and I will handle whatever’s down there.”
