I looked over my shoulder, and my heart kicked against my ribs when I saw one of the Fae standing again, gun in hand. “Down!” I yelled, diving for the deck. Guthrie followed my shouted command. Rans didn’t, though he at least glanced back to assess the threat as the first shot rang out.
“He’s wasting ammunition,” Rans observed, as though we were discussing the weather and not a fairy taking potshots at us in the middle of the Caribbean. “That kind of range is marginal at best with a handgun.” His eyes flicked to me. “But stay down anyway—they’re only going to get closer as time goes on.”
I stared at him, windblown and sun-reddened with his rumpled designer clothing, lounging at the wheel of a stolen powerboat. “You really get off on this whole James Bond thing, don’t you?” I accused. “Boat chases... motorcycle chases... racing trains in sports cars—I totally should have guessed that about you the first time I heard the accent.”
“Does that make you the Bond girl?” he asked. “Hmm. I suppose I can see it, especially since your knife-fighting skills have improved.”
“I refuse to play the part of Felix,” Guthrie grumbled. “Just throwing that out there.”
Another gunshot split the air.
“Still only one Fae with a firearm?” Rans asked, all business once more.
I peeked over the edge of the hull. “Nope. One in each boat now.” I flinched lower at the next sharp crack of sound.
He nodded. “If they’d intended to trap us on the cruise ship, it’s unlikely they’re carting around an extensive arsenal. Those might be the only two with guns, and they may only be carrying a couple of extra clips.”
“Yay,” I said flatly.
“For what it’s worth, I can see Antigua now,” he added.
“Does that help us?” I asked.
“Not particularly,” he admitted. “Perhaps you’d better dig around in my bag and get the iron daggers out. There should be two, one for each of you.”
Grimly, I crawled across the length of the deck. Dragging his carryon out from under the seat where it was stowed, I unzipped it and started rummaging.
“Rans,” Guthrie said, sounding deadly serious. “I’m not taking a fucking knife to fight with. Seriously, I have no idea how to brawl with anything deadlier than fists. I’d be just as likely to stab my own eye out as stab whoever I was fighting.”
There was a beat of silence. “Well... the good news is, your eye would grow back if that happened.”
“Rans.”
More silence.
“I’m... truly sorry you’re involved in this, Guthrie.”
I bit my lower lip, not thrilled by how much that statement sounded like a gallows confession.
Guthrie’s chest heaved with a sigh. “Yeah, you already said. But you didn’t get me into it, asshole. I got myself into it by selling my goddamned soul in a foolish attempt to cheat death. And, hey, look how well that whole thing turned out, right?”
I thought of Guthrie’s wife, and wondered if he would somehow get to see her again after he died. Or would Myrial reaping his life-force prevent that? Wordlessly, I crawled forward and clipped one of the sheathed iron daggers to Rans’ belt. The other one I held onto, since my sundress didn’t have anyplace convenient to hook it. I glanced down at myself, wishing that gladiator sandals magically gave one gladiator-like fighting skills. I was getting better, true—but I’d never fought a Fae in close quarters. Much less six of them.
A glance showed the pursuing craft getting uncomfortably close. I looked back at Rans, sitting in the driver’s seat like a great big vampire-shaped target.
“Should you maybe make some kind of attempt to keep from getting shot?” I asked pointedly.
“Already been shot once today, love,” he retorted. “I expect I’ll get shot several more times in the next little while. Can’t be avoided.” He gave the pursuing boats an assessing glance. “Don’t fret, though. At this distance and with lead bullets, it’d take one hell of a lucky strike to hit anything vital enough that it would put me out of commiss—”
With a crack of noise, something whizzed overhead. Before I could so much as flinch, Rans’ skull exploded in a burst of red, and his body slumped sideways. I stared, uncomprehending, mouth open but no sound coming out. Things around me decelerated into slow motion, my thoughts freezing into stark denial.
Rans’ hands dragged against the boat’s steering wheel as he fell, and the small craft slewed hard to the left as the wide-open throttle and the rudder fought each other under the influence of physics and inertia. Guthrie—closer than I was and maybe not quite as disabled by shock—lunged for the controls. The boat rolled dangerously sideways, throwing me against the inner wall of the hull. Rans’ limp body toppled over the edge like a ragdoll, arms and legs windmilling as he disappeared into the water.
Holding my breath against the scream that wanted to break free, I huddled against the side of the boat and waited to die.
Look at it this way, I’d told Rans not half a day ago. If you do end up losing me, at least you won’t have long to worry about it.
I squeezed my eyes tightly shut as Guthrie wrestled the vessel under control, but the sudden loss of forward momentum had been enough to allow our pursuers to close the final distance between us. The boat’s engine coughed and spluttered to stillness as Fae magic scrambled whatever electronics controlled the fuel system, and we were drifting, dead in the water.
Dead...
Why wasn’t I dead? If Rans was gone, I wanted to be dead, damn it. He’d promised me. He’d promised me we’d never have to live without each other—
I peeled open one eyelid and peered around, still holding my breath; the dagger handle clutched in my numb hand. The boat rocked crazily as it recovered from nearly capsizing.
“Zorah!” Guthrie barked. He was on his feet in front of the controls, arms out for balance as the swells buffeted us. “Get down—try
