Tamara tried to shoot me again and howled in outrage when she realized she had run out of bullets. She was making so much noise a whole squad of agents should have come to my rescue by now, but with a poisoned Zeus creating his own kind of havoc outside, I knew it would be futile to even try dialing for 911.
Tossing the gun aside, Tamara went after me again, snarling, "I'll kill you! I swear I'll kill you!"
"And you're psychotic, I swear, I absolutely swear you are." I knew – of course I knew I was better off keeping my mouthshut than provoking her like this, but I couldn't help it. I turned snarky when someone was trying to kill me. It was stupid, and I hadn't known about this part of me until now, but it was the truth, so there.
Tamara blasted another spell bolt at me, too fast for me to ward off with a shield spell, and I ended up jumping out of its way.
Unfortunately, I hadn't thought of checkingwhichway I would end up, and when I felt my back hit something cold –
Uh oh.
The windowpane shattered at the impact, and I started to fall.
Double uh oh.
A moment later, I saw Tamara jump out of the window, her cold-blooded eyes trained on me.
Triple uh oh.
It was official. The other woman had lost her mind, hell-bent as she was on killing me that she would even risk her own life –
And then I saw it, a long brown stick peeking from between her legs, and I realized she had been able to summon her broom before flying out of the window.
Cast it.
Not so insane, after all.
I mentally braced myself for impact as I continued to fall while the electric purple sky zoomed out in seeming slow motion. They say falling to your death wouldn't cause a person any kind of pain, the impact too massive that the loss of life would beinstantaneous. I really hoped that was true because otherwise I’d have to feel my skull crack against the ground, and I doubt that would feel anything but excruciating.
Tamara's eyes locked with mine. “You should have minded your own business.”
Maybe.But even now, with just seconds left before I lost my life, I couldn’t make myself regret it. If I had to do it all over again, I knew I would have done the exact same thing.
But if I could ask for one miracle, though –
“I want to see Paul,” I heard myself whisper foolishly. It didn't seem right that the face of an insane murderer was the last thing I'd see before I died.
Then open your eyes, agapoula mou.
My chest heaved in a sigh at the familiar sound of Mr. Handsome’s voice. That was it, then. I had died, I was in heaven, and an imaginary Paul was my reward.
Strong arms caught me just as the sound of spell bolts violently clashing against each other had my eyes flying open.What in the lair—-
Oh!
Golden hair, chiseled features, and a powerful body sheathed in an immaculate dark suit –
"P-Paul?" I stammered.
"Hello, Blair." But his gaze remained straight ahead, and as I dizzily followed his line of sight, I saw a demented-looking Tamara balanced on her broomstick and her hands movingwildly about in a casting frenzy: one to keep her shield spell up, and another to hurl a barrage of spell bolts towards us.
She put up a heck of a fight, in other words, but it was just as clear that nothing she did would ever be enough to beat off the INTERPOL detective clasping me to his side with one arm around my waist.
“It’s over, Agent Gries.” He advanced towards her at a steady pace, his demeanor terrifyingly calm as he used his one free hand to deflect her spell boltsandfire his own at the same time.
“Never!” Tamara’s hysterical scream rose over the cacophony of blowing winds and rainstorm. “I’ll make him pay—-” A shudder of rage shook her form, and she screamed as she fired another torrent of spell bolts, all of which Paul deflected with a wave of his arm.
Seriously, how strong were these INTERPOL detectives? Were they secret descendants of Hercules? Achilles? Maybe even the biblical Samson?
