“Fuck!” I bellowed.
Clawed hands lunged out of the darkness, snagging my coat. A woman’s face of horror pressed against the bars, snarling, death on her breath.
“Get off me!” I pulled at her arms. Her bones snapped and fell away, but she kept her head firmly at the grate as if trying to push her away through.
The woman screamed as the male vamp came to join in the fun.
Sonny yelped as I shoved him out of the way, going for a high kick straight into the male vamp’s face. The force broke his jaw clean off, sending the lower part of his face flying. The vamp fell backward, tumbling to the ground. He rolled and crawled forward, eyes on me. One of his legs had broken, twisted at a horrible angle as it dragged across the ground.
Black gums and a tongue like a dried slug were fully exposed, the fangs still there in the upper mouth, bright and white, and deadly.
I stomped on the vamp’s back, above his heart. My foot went through with horrible ease, straight down to the one organ that was still full of life. The old tales of vampires being killed with a stake to the heart were true. It didn’t have to be a stake, though. Any sort of trauma would do, but it would need to be something with some real oomph to get the job done. With this broken, fragile thing, my boots were enough.
The vampire twitched and crumbled to dust within seconds.
Sonny had his back against the wall, utterly motionless and staring right at me. The female vamp was still trying to get at us.
More groans echoed through the tunnels.
“Brem just put you down here so he could hide you, eh?” I said.
Sonny didn’t answer, just carried on staring.
I sighed. Gullibility was a bitch. “Come on. We need to get out of here.”
He didn’t move.
“Look, it’s fine. They’re brittle as fuck, so we shouldn’t have too much of a problem.” Unless there were loads to fight at once. I didn’t mention that.
He still wasn’t moving. Great. Terror had frozen him up.
“Sonny?” I waved a hand in front of his face. All he did was blink at me.
I clicked my fingers. “Sonny! Snap out of it.”
“He … wants me dead.”
“What?”
“He put me here to kill me.”
Ugh. “Don’t worry about that now. Let’s not end up dead, yeah?”
“He … he …”
“Sonny! For fuck’s sake! You need to snap out of it!”
He carried on blinking as two more broken vamp men charged, one of them with a dislocated arm that bumped and swung as it ran.
“Bollockinghell!”
I met them head-on, cracking one in the skull while delivering a kick in the groin to the other.
As they went down, two women and a man ran down the tunnel.
“Fuck! Sonny!” I didn’t look back, my focus on my enemy. But I could hear his mumbled shock. He was stuck on a friggin’ loop!
“Sonny! Get your backside into gear!” I cried, diving into a sweeping kick.
I took out the man, but the two women fell on me before I could get up. Their claws raked my coat. Thank the universe for the material barrier between vamp nails and my flesh!
I head-butted one vamp, her forehead splitting open, then kicked her hard in the shin. That snapped too but didn’t make any difference. Crap! They tore into me. Those claws would make short work of my coat, and then my intestines would be painting the tunnel walls.
Crapcrapcrapcrap!
The vamps hissed, swiping at me. I moved my head out of the way just in time.
Way too close.
The distinct rattle of a rattlesnake cut through the groans of the vamps. A hiss and Sonny’s tail cracked the vamp with the broken forehead, taking her head clean off.
Sonny swung again, doing the same to the other vamp. The headless fuckers stopped clawing. Their bodies were still alive, but their determination had broken. I guess even an undead, soulless creature like a broken vamp is gonna be shocked at losing its head.
I drove my knuckles upward, breaking through the chest of the one mostly on top of me, straight through to her heart. My fingers pierced the moist flesh as I crushed with all my strength. She collapsed into dust as my crushing ended her, me getting a mouthful of it.
Coughing and sneezing, I rolled as Sonny took care of the other vamp.
“Bloody hell.”
“Here.” He was standing above me, offering his hand.
I took it, letting him pull me to my feet. “Thanks. Nice to see you didn’t leave me to die.”
“Could have.”
“Cheers for not.”
My coat was ruined. The poxy vamps had exposed my skin through their marks, having cut through my three layers of clothing.
“I liked this coat.”
“Jake!”
“Dean!”
Bones crunched as Dean let out a booming cry of rage.
“Come on!” I yelled at Sonny.
I ran toward the sound, two male vamps coming for us as we turned the corner. As a team, me and Sonny took them down.
“Jake!” Dean yelled again.
It didn’t matter that Sonny had saved me. If Dean was hurt, Sonny got hurt. This was his fault, after all. When it came to my man and our daughter, there was no telling what I’d do for them.
We turned another corner. Dean was there, crushing the chest of a vamp. Piles of dust sat around him, his jeans and coat covered in it. His swept-back hair fell over his face, his fists glowing pink with fae magic.
I ran to him, grabbing him in a bear hug. He crushed me right back.
“Are you okay?” he asked into my neck.
“I’m fine.” I pulled back, keeping my hands on him. “You’re not hurt?”
“All good, baby.” His dark eyes moved to Sonny, standing behind me. “Nice plan. Worked out well. Thanks a lot.”
“Spare me the lecture. Your boyfriend already unleashed one on me.”
Dean went to move, shadowy anger in his face.
I held him back. “Leave it.”
“I’ll deal with you later.”
Sonny didn’t say anything.
“Dean?”
His eyes moved back to me. They were
