“What did you do to my dog?” Hagen demanded, fury eating through his voice like acid. “Drag him out here, then use him against us?!”
I was thrilled to have Orthus on my side, but I certainly hadn’t brought him with me.
Hagen charged me again, his face distorted in grief. His lips curled back from his teeth. His eyes went wide. His nostrils flared. In his rage, he seemed to have forgotten his gun entirely and was ready to rip me apart with his bare hands.
Still on my knees, I aimed the Ruger at his throat and squeezed the trigger. The gun clicked, but did not fire. I squeezed again. Another hollow click.
Jammed. Fuck!
Scrambling to my feet, I dropped the gun. Hagen’s fell to the ground. His hands curled into fists. Bending, I jerked up on my left pant leg and pulled the stiletto free from its sheath. Hagen ducked his head. He was going to ram me, apparently unconcerned about my blade.
Until Devich’s idiot project foreman stumbled between us, face pale and eyes wide as he stared at Orthus, who snarled from somewhere to my left.
“Move!” I shouted. Clearly in shock, Bowman stared straight ahead. “Aaaghh!” I shoved him as hard as I could with my free hand. He hit the snow on his ass, between me and the charging goblin.
The foreman finally scrambled out of my way as I raised my blade. Light glinted on polished steel. Hagen blinked against the glare. I lunged, and he thrust his injured right arm in front of my knife.
My blade sliced through his coat and into flesh. Hagen roared, in anger as much as in pain. I shoved harder. Blade met bone and stopped. The goblin screamed again. His good hand curled around my wrist, squeezing until my bones ground together. I let go of the knife, but it remained lodged in his forearm.
Hagen twisted my left arm behind my back, bending me forward with as little effort as it might take me to snap a twig. He drove me to my knees with that astounding goblin strength. I shouted in frustration and fury as my knees slammed into the frozen earth.
Fucking muscle-bound freak. I felt around desperately in the snow with my available hand for something to use as a weapon. I found nothing but more snow and long-frozen blades of brown grass.
“You’ll beg for death before I’m done with you,” Hagen snarled, forcing my torso down so that I was bent over my knees. “You’re going to scream, and scream, and scream.”
“Bowman, drop that thing ‘fore you get yourself killed!” the wraith shouted. I twisted in the goblin’s grip to see Allen following the project foreman toward something left of my field of vision.
Orthus. It had to be.
Bowman’s eyes were glazed in shock, his gait stilted. Allen hovered over his shoulder, gesturing desperately for him to drop… my gun. But Bowman couldn’t hear the wraith. He stumbled forward, finger on the trigger, features warped in terror and disbelief.
“Then you’re going to beg for mercy,” Hagen continued, pulling my right arm behind my back to join my left. “You’re going to plead for the end, but—”
“I get it, okay?” I snapped, wrenching my neck to glare up at him. “You’re gonna fuck me up. Either start shooting or change the damn subject.”
He rewarded my impudence with a vicious kick to my left side, my wrists still secured in his fist.
I bit my lower lip, desperate not to shriek in pain. “Motherfucker!” I shouted, as soon as I could suck in enough air. Screaming was against the tough-bitch code of ethics, but cussing was just fine. Expected, even. Especially considering that the son of a bitch had probably cracked a couple of my ribs.
“Drop the gun ‘fore that thing gets riled up and eats you whole!” Allen cried, and my gaze homed in on him. Bowman still couldn’t hear the spirit, of course. Frustrated, Allen grumbled angrily and reached for the gun. His hand went right through both the foreman’s fist and my Ruger. “Damn it!” The wraith finally turned to me for help. “Tell him to drop…” He trailed off, staring at me in shock and alarm.
I struggled in spite of the pain as Hagen pressed down on the back of my neck with one hand and bound my wrists with what could only be a pair of ice-cold handcuffs. Largely unbothered by his own wounds.
“No, Miss Walker,” Allen said, amending his original request. “Tell him to shoot the man. Tell him now! The dog can wait. Tell him to shoot the man with the cuffs!”
But that would do no good. The gun was jammed.
I wrenched my head, trying to get a look at Bowman, but I could only see Hagen’s legs and a widening pool of blood melting into the snow at his feet. I’d gotten him good with both the blade and the bullet, and he’d start to weaken soon. Hopefully.
“Orthus!” I shouted. “I could use a little help over here!”
The growling paused for a moment, then resumed, but came no closer. What the hell was the damn dog doing?
On my left, the foreman whimpered, and my gun clicked. He was trying to shoot the hellhound.
“Bowman, put the gun down!” I shouted, as the goblin wrenched my blade from his arm and threw it into the snow fifty feet away. “He won’t hurt you.”
“The hell he won’t!” Hagen punctuated his rebuttal with a near-blinding blow to my right temple. “Orthus, you worthless son of a bitch, get him!”
