Page 114 of Hell’s Half Acre

“Time to time. You?” Marcia took a drink from the exact place his lips had touched.

“Time to time. I usually come with my friend, Lawson Myers.”

Both women went absolutely still, which told him what he needed to know.

Marcia was the first to recover. “Where’s your friend today?”

“The morgue.” His voice held a hint of a growl.

When Allison started to get up, Luke caught her hand and spoke between clenched teeth. “You don’t want to try running. You might be a werewolf, but a hellhound runs more than twice as fast as you do, and five times as long. Think of a leopard trying to outrun a cheetah.”

“You’re a hellhound?” Marcia was pale as she sat back in her chair. “That explains a lot. Why are you here?”

“Tracing a scent,” he lied. “It led me to you. Y’all were with my friend when he died.”

“And?” Marcia challenged.

“I want to know what happened.”

“Pack business,” Marcia said defensively.

His gaze went to the cross necklace that lay against the hollow of her throat. “You do understand who and what hellhounds are, right? Your soul belongs to us. We’re your predators.”

“It’s not my time to die.”

“You sure? ’Cause I’m the one in touch with the devil. I’d trust my timetable over yours any day.” He didn’t know why, but he’d always liked playing this game with evil creatures. The scent of their fear was delicious. Maybe because he had an image in his head of the two women seducing Lawson right before Allison took his head.

That was followed by another vision of her killing Larry and assaulting Faro.

He turned his attention to Allison. “What are you after?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He shook his head at her. “Yeah, you do.”

Bowing up, Allison glared at him. “You can’t prove anything.”

Luke burst out laughing. “You think you’re dealing with law enforcement…?” Technically, she was. But… “Where I’m from, you don’t get a trial. You do get your heart weighed to see where in Hell they send you. This is pass-fail. And you’ve failed.”

She bolted for the door.

Shaking his head, Luke turned toward Marcia. “Are you planning to be stupid, too?”

“I didn’t kill anybody.”

“Accomplice isn’t just a human crime.” Luke motioned for Sorcha to join them. “Stand up.”

Marcia scowled. “Why?”

Luke pulled out his handcuffs.

“You said you weren’t law enforcement!” Marcia tried to fight, but he cuffed her with little effort.

“I say a lot of things. Not all of them are true.”

“You bastard!” she snarled, rising on her tiptoes in an effort to say it to his face.

She was woefully too short for that.