Oh fuck.
I shook the sensation off and whirled, looking for her.
“If you want us to attack you, we’ll be happy to oblige,” another voice taunted. Similar to Calista’s, it had to belong to one of her sisters.
“Lots of us will be happy to oblige,” a third voice sang out. Eerily alike to the other two, it had to be the third triplet. “You’ve captured far too many of us,bounty hunter.” The siren spit out my title like it was as foul as this place.
Ah! There. I pinned my attention on the crest of a nearby ridge. Silhouetted by orange stood three identical women. Their kelp-colored hair appeared black, undulating around them as if it were alive, though heat waves probably caused the effect. With their mouths turned into identical snarls, they appeared appropriately ferocious.
But they didn’t scare me. I was going to kill all three of the bitches for taking my bestie.
Brock pressed his back against mine, watching the opposite direction so no one could sneak up on us.
“We’re here for Cass,” I shouted to the sirens. “Give him to us and we’ll leave. We’re not here to cause trouble.”
Though I sure as hell would cause a whole shit ton of it if they didn’t hand over Cass right this second.
“That’s not how kidnappings work. We’re the ones who ask for something, and you’re going to give it to us,” Calista declared, sounding all too fucking pleased with herself.
I growled, low and long. I was going to strangle Calista with her own stupid green hair, and then I was going to kill her sisters. Twice.
“Cass isn’t a bargaining chip,” I ground out, my voice deadly, wrapping the fingers of one hand around the hilt of my katana.
Calista laughed, empty and echoing. “That’s exactly what he is. And if you want to see him alive again, you’re going to do exactly as I say.”
Heat flushed through every part of my body, and it wasn’t the lava. Pure fucking rage bubbled within me. I was going to tear the sirens limb from limb.
Brock brought a calming hand to my shoulder and called up to the sisters. “What do you want in exchange for Cass?” he asked, but his muscles were tight. Rage coiled through him as much as it did me; he was just better at the diplomatic role.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Calista sang out.
No, you fucking crazy bitch, it isn’t.
“We want your bounty hunter girlfriend to open the gate to the underworld all the way. If she does that, then we’ll hand over her ugly friend.”
Oh hell no. I breathed hard and heavy through my nostrils. No one called my pot-bellied, pink furry bestie “ugly.”
It also hadn’t occurred to me until that moment that the full force of the sirens’ army couldn’t come through to Earth; the gate was still magically barring their entry. Yes, the gate was open a bit, and some creatures had managed to slip through it, but if the gate continued to be the reason no more creatures were coming through, I needed to do everything in my power to keep the gate doing its job.
Opening my mouth to unleash every insult I could think of, Brock shook his head in caution, and I restrained myself—barely.
“Why don’t you open the gate yourself?” Brock asked.
“Oh, don’t worry, we will if you don’t cooperate, but it’s much easier if she does,” Calista answered, anger tingeing every one of her words.
Water started to flow down the side of the cliff where the three sisters perched, and I found my rage growing hotter as I remembered them trying to drown me.
“And if she opens it?” Brock continued, when he obviously had to fucking know that there was no way in hell I would open the gate all the way. Just one fog demon had been enough to nearly bring down the entire town, and it had stopped at one town only because it’d just been getting started when we killed it.
“Whenshe opens it, that will be our business, not yours,” Calista snarled. “After that, our little transaction will be concluded.” With that she … floated … down the waterfall she’d created and landed on the ground before us. Her sisters followed until all three were standing about thirty feet away.
Good.Come closer so I can kill you easier.
“You must know we can’t let you unleash a bunch of demons on the Earth...” Brock growled, hand on the butt of one of his guns.
Because, duh. These siren triplets were seriously cray-cray if they believed for a second I’d let them unleash the contents of the underworld on humanity.
“We’re not asking you tolet usdo anything,” the second sister said, taking one step closer.
