Madoc looked smug for a second. He wiped it away on the sleeve of his shirt as the smoke got dense and hot enough to drag a wet cough out of his throat. His skin was flushed, more red than pink, and cracked painfully around his mouth and nose. Fat, wet blisters ran in stripes up his throat and splattered along the side of his face.
It would heal. Took had seen him hurt worse. It still made him care more than was probably safe… or fair.
“Okay,” Took said. “What are they going to do? Why lock their own men in the garden? It won’t burn.”
Madoc frowned and the long blisters pulled tight against his skin, but the screech of an approaching siren cut through whatever he was about to say. Took ducked his head to peer up the road and saw the sleek black police cars fishtail onto the narrow road just ahead of the fire engine.
“Backup is here,” Took said with relief. “We might get a ladder down.”
“No,” Madoc said abruptly. “We get out now. That’s why they cut the water. Get down. Get out of the line of fire. Let me deal with the Hunter.”
“Fuck off,” Took said. He hesitated as he struggled to swallow with no moisture in his throat. “Remember Michigan?”
Madoc did. He hesitated for a moment. “You’re not Kit,” he said.
“No,” Took agreed. “You can tell, because I don’t want to die.”
He never had. That was one of the solid threads hecouldremember. Even at the worst, he hadn’t been able to let go of the hope for tomorrow. It hadn’t felt like a strength then.
“Good,” Madoc said. “Because if you do, I’ll find you again and drag you back by the scruff of your neck.”
Tension plucked the air between them. Last time Madoc had said something like that, Took had banned him from the hospital. The time before that, he’d asked West to move in with him.
This time Madoc didn’t give Took a chance to ruin it. He reached up to his collar—a good faith tap of his fingers to St. Michael—and smashed out the window with his elbow. The hot glass exploded out with a pop, a starburst of fragments with the fire reflected in each of them, and he went out through the charred frame. Flames licked around him as he dropped to the ground, charred lines etched into his sleeves and over his thighs.
Hesitation caught Took for a second. He didn’t have his Biter’s uniform. All he had was an expensive ruined suit and good boots. It wouldn’t be enough to protect him from the fire. The scars under his shirt flared with the dull, hot memory of pain. Sunlight made them burn, but this would be worse.
Contempt stung more. He’d live. Or not die anymore. His place had always been on Madoc’s heels, and then he’d only been human. If he couldn’t do it now, with all the undying advantages of the undead, maybe he was as broken as West thought.
He tightened his grip on the gun—not that he thought his scorched tendons could let go right now—and vaulted out the window.
The fire hurt about as much as he expected. Took had found out early on that death shut off the brain’s gateway control. There was no switch to cut off the feedback from blistered skin, and the nerves gamely regenerated, like it or not.
Took’s hit the ground, tucked, and… for a second his brain went blank. What way had Kit gone when he hit the ground in Michigan? Left or right. Fuck, if he picked wrong, he’d end up under Madoc’s feet and screw them both.
He went left. No one tripped over him.
There were ashes in his eyes, hot and gritty under his lids, and his ears rang with chatter from scorched eardrums. As he got his feet back under him, Took scrubbed his fist over his eyes enough to give him a scratch-blurred field of vision.
His ears were fine, he realized. The pulsed chatter that echoed in the bones of his head came from the Hunter’s assault rifle as he trained it on Madoc. Despite the protection of reinforced leather over Madoc’s vital organs, the bullets chipped bone and shredded flesh. Madoc had his arms up to protect his head from a kill shot, but he couldn’t fight the percussion of impact that drove him, reluctant step by step, back into the fire.
Even through the mask, Took could make out the sneer that curdled the Hunter’s face and the hot glitter in his eyes. The satisfaction of the sadist—it made them stupid.
“If they’d told me I’d get to kill the likes of you,” the man laughed over the rattle of gunfire, “I’d have done this for free.”
Took took aim at his head first. The curve of skull made a good target under the streetlights, but the hood would be armored. A bullet wouldn’t kill him. It would just rattle his brain and put anyone else in the street at risk from a stray shot. Took dropped his arm to below the knee and fired.
The bullet ripped through the Hunter’s boot and punched out the other side. Blood and scraps of leather sprayed over the pavement. The Hunter screamed in pain and fumbled his gun as his leg went from under him. One bullet went wild and blew out the windscreen of a parked Porsche. The persistent drone of a car alarm joined the cacophony.
Took staggered to his feet and braced his gun with both hands. This time he aimed at the head.
“Drop the gun,” he rasped out. His voice sounded like someone else’s. It was rough and cracked, raw from the smoke. “Or I drop you. Tell whoever’s in the car to get out.”
The Hunter choked out a ragged laugh as he painfully straightened up and balanced precariously on one foot. Blood dripped from his shredded boot and puddled on the pavement.
“Better than handing myself in to VINE,” he said with jagged bravado. “At least death is clean. I won’t end up infected with your disease.”
He clumsily tried to lift the muzzle from where it threatened the pavement. Took curled his finger around the trigger of his gun, ready to take the shot if he needed to.
