My heart jumped into overdrive as we scrambled to our feet and ran down the alley, where it was darkest. If he happened to have a gun, which I suspected he did, he would be able to pick us off easily if we ran for the street. The lights were too bright to offer any cover. The way I saw it, we could run around the building and hightail it for the cafe. I prayed Norma had a key to lock the doors. And hopefully that alarm would bring the cavalry.
Cookie’s gaze darted wildly about as she ran. That woman could move pretty darned fast when she had to. But before we got twenty feet, the door swung open and crashed against the brick exterior of the building. Mimi screamed really helpfully. In case someone didn’t hear the earsplitting alarm.
“Run,” I told them as I turned and aimed the gun. Which was much harder than I’d anticipated with rain cascading in rivulets down my face. I fired one shot, and he ducked back into the building, allowing Cookie and Mimi time to get the heck outta Dodge. I quickly joined them.
“What do I do?” Angel asked, reanimating his grasshopper-in-a-skillet routine.
“Whatever you can, sweetheart.” I sprinted ahead and checked out the easement between the shelter and a candy-making factory next door. There were some crates and boxes, but it looked like we could make it through and the obstacles might make decent cover should the need arise.
Unfortunately, the need arose too soon. A shot sounded out, and Mimi fell to the ground with a squeak. She covered her head. I took aim and fired again, but not before he got off two more rounds.
For the first time in my life, I was in a shoot-out. A real, honest-to-goodness shoot-out with a bad guy. And apparently, we both sucked. I aimed for his head and shot the light above it. And I had no idea what the hell he was aiming at, unless he was taking out the windows at the candy-making factory as part of some strategic maneuver to outwit us. Cookie and Mimi were close to a Dumpster and they headed that way for cover. Evil Murtaugh was racing toward us when Angel tripped him. His gun crashed to the ground and went sliding.
“Get his gun!” I yelled to Angel as I bolted across the alley to join Cookie.
He glared at me and threw his arms in the air. “It doesn’t work that way.”
Oh, geez. There were rules?
“Are either of you shot?” I asked breathlessly as I took position behind the trash bin.
“I don’t think so,” Mimi said. “How long do you think it’ll take the cops to get here?”
“Longer than we have,” I said truthfully. Angel had kicked the man’s gun away, but it took him mere moments to track it down and head in our direction.
Now we were stuck behind a Dumpster with nowhere to run. I scrambled past the women to see if there was an opening in the fence bordering us. No such luck. It had to have been ten feet high. And since it was cinder block, I doubted my ability to crash through it without a really long running start. If we could climb onto the Dumpster, we could scale it, but that would mean exposing ourselves to Evil. And he probably had more bullets left than I did.
“I’m sorry, Mimi,” I said. She’d been hiding for a freaking reason, and we led the bad guy right to her. Way to go, Charlotte.
“No, please don’t be sorry.” She started crying and shaking uncontrollably, and my heart clenched in response. “None of this is your fault. It’s mine and mine alone.”
I did a quick sweep of the perimeter. Evil Murtaugh was almost upon us, gun raised and at the ready. I might could actually shoot him if he got within arm’s reach and stood really still.
“If I had just done the right thing twenty years ago.”
“Mimi,” Cookie said, wrapping an arm around her.
Before I could change my mind, I raised the.380 and stepped from behind the Dumpster, feeling more exposed than I’d ever felt before. Discounting that one time in Mexico City. Freaking tequila.
“You hit me!” I shouted through the pounding rain. I had no choice but to summon Reyes. I hated to bug, since he was being tortured and all, but …
An evil grin spread across my opponent’s face, making me realize why he was known ’round these parts as Evil Murtaugh.
“Rey’aziel—”
Without another thought, Evil Murtaugh squeezed.
Wait. I wasn’t finished.
But the world slowed and the bullet came to a rest in front of me.
“Didn’t we discuss your timing issues earlier?”
I glanced to my right as Reyes looked on, his robe undulating around him in glorious waves as if he were an ocean unto himself. Then I turned back to the expression of rage lining Evil Murtaugh’s face, to the raindrops hanging in midair, to the bullet as it trailed through the atmosphere toward me, splashing playfully through a drop. I could almost see the concussion of air as it propelled forward. It hovered mere inches from my heart. If time slipped, if it skipped a microsecond into the future, the bullet would hit home.
“How is this possible?” I asked Reyes.
I saw him shrug in my periphery. “That’s what happens when someone shoots at point-blank range,” he explained, his deep voice soothing despite my predicament.
“No, this. Everything just stops. Or, well, slows down a lot.”
“It’s the world we live in, Dutch.” He looked down at me, his robed head tilted as if in curiosity. “Well? Do you want me to take care of him for you?”
I did. I really did. But that one nagging issue still hung between us like a loose string on a sweater. I wanted to pull at it, but I knew if I did, I’d risk unraveling everything. For some reason that ranked right up there with Chihuahuas and weapons of mass destruction, I just couldn’t let it go. “Are you going to tell me where you are?”
“You’re going to bring that up now?”
“Yes.”
“Then no.”
“Then I can take care of this myself.”
The moment I said it, the moment the words slipped from my mouth, I realized there might be more to the rumors of my lack of mental stability than I’d allowed myself to believe. Wasn’t the fact that I needed his help the reason I summoned him in the first place?
“Sure about that?”
“Abso-freaking-lutely.”
It was official. I was psychotic.
With that growl thing he did that sent shivers down my spine, he turned from me in anger. “You are the most stubborn—”
“Me?” I asked, incredulous. “I’m stubborn?”
Oh, yeah. Just lock me up and throw away the key.
He was in front of me at once. “As a mule.”
“Because I don’t want you to commit suicide? That makes me stubborn?”
He leaned down, his face inches from mine, even though I couldn’t actually see it. “Abso-freaking- lutely.”
He totally stole that. I set my jaw. “I don’t need your help.”
“Fine. But you might want to just…” He put a finger on my shoulder and eased me to the left out of the bullet’s path. “Next time, duck.”
The feeling each time the world rushed back was comparable to a speeding freight train crashing into me. The force sucked the air out of my lungs, and the sound reverberated against my chest, echoing in my bones as the bullet picked up where it left off and flew harmlessly past. I stumbled to the side and had just enough time to look back at Evil Murtaugh as he blinked in surprise and aimed again.
If I had been paying attention, if the roar of the thunder and rain had not been so deafening, I might have heard the car speeding up the alley. And so might’ve Evil Murtaugh. As it stood, we were both a tad surprised when a black SUV came barreling toward us. The driver slammed on the brakes and skidded into a spin that swept Evil Murtaugh up like a tornado and threw him against the candy-making factory while leaving me untouched.
I stood a long moment, blinking against the rain pelting my face as the SUV screeched to a halt and Ulrich of the Three Stooges jumped out of the backseat. He strode to Evil Murtaugh as the passenger’s-side glass rolled down. Mr. Smith sat grinning at me.
