first people Pierce gets out of here.”
“I want to be closer,” he said, then looked over his glasses at the couple the next table over. Their chairs scraped as they beat a hasty path to the exit, and Al sat, taking meticulous care in arranging his coat.
Okay. Time to earn your rent, I thought as I exhaled heavily. I took a moment to loosen another button on my coat and feel for the comforting weight of my splat gun in my bag as I approached Ford, Mia, and Remus. Ivy would probably tell Edden to be circumspect, but it wouldn’t surprise me that if in their zeal, six FIB cars pulled up with lights on and sirens going.
If Mia didn’t behave herself, this was going to be over really quickly. She had tried to kill me twice, and I knew I should’ve been concerned when I said hi to Ford and sat down in the chair he had pulled up for me, but the only thing I was feeling was tired. That Edden had a warrant and I could shoot them now was a comfort. Eyes were heavy on me as I took the lid off my drink and sipped it. My shoulders relaxed as the hot, rich coffee slipped down. With a little effort, I could see the door and counter both.
Either Mia was going to sacrifice Remus and promise to be good, or this was a plot to see me dead, but I didn’t think Ford would read the situation wrong. The door jingled when a couple left with frightened backward glances, and Jenks gave me a distant thumbs-up. Damn, this was good stuff, and I made a mental note of what it was in case I survived. Raspberry Italian latte?
My eyes rose over the rim of the paper cup. Remus’s expression was both angry and frightened-a bad combination as his attention flicked from me to Al and back. Mia had an unsettling confidence about her as she held the sleeping Holly in her little pink snowsuit. One would never guess they were wanted for assault and possible murder. She was going to bail on him. I knew it. What did she know of love?
“Mia,” I said, seeing that no one else was talking. “Did you set the fire?”
“No.” Her voice was soft to keep Holly from waking, and the toddler’s hands moved in her sleep. Mia’s eyes were fixed on mine, trying to impress me with what I already believed was the truth. “The Walker did. She’s trying to pit my own city against me. I told you she had the skill of a falling log.” Her high voice held a shocking amount of hatred. “She wants Holly.”
Mia held her daughter closer, and the child shifted into a more comfortable position, lips pouting in her sleep. Remus’s hands clenched, and when he saw me notice their white-knuckled strength, he moved them out of my sight.
I put my hands under the table, keeping my elbows still while I pulled my splat gun out and set it atop my knees. “I didn’t think it was you,” I said to try to get them to relax. “I’m trying to stop Ms. Walker, Mia, but you were seen at the fire. The FIB isn’t going out of their way to help anymore. You need to come in. Someone’s going to get hurt.” Like me.
Remus stood, and my heart jumped. “We need to go, Mia. People are leaving.”
A faint, musty scent drifted from the angry man at his movement, tickling my memory. Fear pinged through me, and I froze. It smelled like cement. Cold and rough. Mia felt my fear, the woman going almost slack as my emotions puddled out from me. Ford did too, but his expression was of confusion, not satisfaction. He knew my fear didn’t stem from Mia, but something else, and I shoved the emotion away. Kisten. It’s from Kisten. I don’t have time for this.
Mia moved Holly to a more comfortable position, ignoring Remus. The baby’s eyes opened. Silently, she stared, and as I watched, Holly’s pale blue eyes became the pupil black of hunger. “Did you tell the FIB to drop their investigation?” Mia asked me.
I jerked my attention from Holly, surprised. “Ah, yes, but someone needs to go to jail for the Tilsons. You were living in their house. You beat up an FIB officer.” Tried to kill me twice. Jeez, what am I doing here?
Beside me, Ford swallowed hard, feeling everyone’s emotions and having a hard time separating himself. He was better than a truth amulet, but something was shifting, and I gripped my gun, setting my free hand casually around my cup. “Mia, let me tell them you are ready to cooperate,” I tried again. I didn’t want to shoot her unless I had to. “The captain of the FIB knows you’re sorry.” Liar, liar. “He knows the lengths to which Ms. Walker will go to gain custody of Holly.” Pants on fire. “He’s angry about what happened to his son, but if you come in, as a sign of trust, he will look past it. We can keep you and Holly together.”
Remus bent over his wife, hissing in her ear, “They lie to get what they want, then tell you you’re a liar when you ask for it. I won’t have my daughter pushed from foster home to foster home, sleeping on stained mattresses and beat up for not having a real mom or dad.”
I doubted that would happen with Holly, and Mia reached up and touched his hand. “Remus, love,” she said, eyes on mine. “I’m not turning us in. I’m finding out if the FIB is taking me seriously. She warned them, and if they come, I’ll know their answer.”
Oh. Shit. Heart pounding, I dropped my hand below the top of the table and gripped my gun with both hands. Show of lethal force or not, if you twitch, I’ll down you both. “Think about it, Mia…You broke the law. You either live by society’s punishments or live outside it in the abandoned stretches, off scraps. You said you made this city. You’re really going to leave it? Killing me won’t help you. It will tick them off.”
Ford stood, and Remus tensed, held in check by Mia’s hand on his, atop her shoulder. “You told me you weren’t going to hurt anyone,” the psychiatrist said. “I believed you.”
Mia jiggled Holly as she fussed. “At the time, I thought the FIB was smarter than that. Clearly the FIB won’t listen until scores of them are dead. But they will listen. The witch is shunned, dross I can kill with impunity.”
She’s nuts! She is freaking insane! Behind me, I felt Pierce turn. It was the eeriest thing I’d ever felt, but I swear, I felt him turn. In an instant, Jenks was before me, shedding hot sparkles. “I wouldn’t say impunity,” the pixy said, blade pointing at her.
“I’m of a mind to agree with the pixy,” Pierce said from behind me.
I watched Remus assess them, but it was Mia who said, “What the devil are you? You don’t even have an aura!”
“So I’ve been told, and if you’re powerful smart, you’ll pull foot and not look back.”
Holly started to whimper, and Mia jiggled her, gaze rising up to Remus. Behind me, I heard the clatter of boots and the jingle of the door as someone left. They were going voluntarily now, and the place was almost empty. I turned to the counter. Junior was there, staring, frightened. “Call the I.S.,” I mouthed. This was too much for the FIB. No way.
Remus saw, and in a bellow of rage, he ran at Junior.
I bolted upright, gun tracking Remus, but I didn’t have a clear shot. Ford dropped, staying out of the way. A woman gasped and ducked under her table.
Junior’s eyes widened at Remus. Shouting a word of Latin, made strong in his fear, he set a circle. Remus ran right into it as he tried to jump over the counter. Blood spurted from his nose as he fell back, bellowing as he hit the floor. Pierce grabbed his arm, and Remus smacked him with an unfocused blow that sent him reeling. Catching his balance, the small man licked his thumb and fell into a boxer’s stance. He was going to get himself killed. Again.
“Git the blood out of your eyes and stand so I can row you up salt river,” Pierce said, then made a face at me to get on with it. Jenks, too, was shrilling at me to shoot him. But it was too late. I couldn’t hit one without hitting the other.
“Don’t kill him, Remus,” Mia was saying calmly. “I think I know the little man.”
“Back up, Rache!” Jenks exclaimed, darting from one end of the shop to the other. “Before she starts sucking on you!”
And Al was laughing, almost choking on his grande latte as he clapped.
A chair scraped as Mia stood. The scent of cold cement and mold flowed from her and Holly. I backed up. My hand had crept up to my throat, as if I could feel cold fingers there. “Killing me isn’t going to stop the FIB, Mia,” I said, thinking this was a great time to be having a flashback to Kisten’s killer.
Mia stood, the table between us, Holly holding tight to her as the baby howled. Behind me, Pierce grunted as he took a blow, and something crashed. “You’re mistaken,” she said, eyes on me, not the fight behind me. “Killing you will stop everything. Remus, quit playing with that dead man and hold the witch down. Holly is hungry.”
Oh my God. That’s why she hadn’t touched me yet.
There was a thump and Pierce groaned again. I turned to see Pierce slumped against the wall among the remnants of a table. Grinning, Remus came at me with grasping hands. I shoved a chair aside for some room and kicked off my heels. Pissed, I swung the barrel up, and at the bottom of an exhale, I pulled the trigger.
