LITMIR.BIZ

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wallet or your money.”

      His arms tightened around the woman. “If Nicolae sent you, you can’t have her. She’s family.”

      “I’m not with Nicolae. I’m with the NYPD. I want some answers.”

      His eyes narrowed. “Sorry. Unless you got a reason to arrest me, I have nothing to say.” Mario nodded toward the gun. “And I’m guessing you won’t shoot someone you only wanted to question.” He spun and walked away.

      Damn.

      I hurried to keep up, but he made it to the next corner before I did and disappeared.

      I hesitated. If the man didn’t want to talk, I had nothing on him that I could hold over his head. I had to let him go. Question was, whether to follow or go back and see if Blaise needed help with our real target, Jimmy.

      I’d turned back and had taken all of two steps when the blast of gunfire ricocheted off the walls of the street Mario had turned onto.

      Adrenaline spiked in my system and I raced to the end of the building.

      Mario lay on the ground, light glinting off the circle of blood spreading from the hole in the side of his head. Several men, make that werewolves—by the smell of them—stood in a semicircle around the downed man. One of them waved another forward. “Get the girl. Nicolae will want his property returned.”

      The man’s words made my blood boil. Before I could think through the odds, I stepped forward.

      One five-feet-two-inch female cop against seven burly male werewolves.

      Yeah. I could be stupid when passion kicked in.

      A woman in jeopardy —human or werewolf—got my ire up and I didn’t back down. I held my weapon steady, aimed at the man who’d given the orders. With my finger, I pointed at the man hefting the woman onto his shoulder like she was an insignificant bag of potatoes.”Put the girl down.”

      “You gonna make me?”

      “NYPD.” I dug my credentials out of my breast pocket and flipped them open with my empty hand, my gun-bearing hand steady on the leader. “You are all under arrest for the murder of this man.”

      The man carrying the woman sneered. “You’re gonna arrest all of us?” He laughed out loud.

      I fired at his feet.

      The man jumped, a scowl bearing down on his forehead.

      The leader stepped forward. “You got enough bullets to take us all out?”

      “I have plenty, they’re silver, and I’m starting with you.” I held my position. “Put the woman down.”

      Their leader jerked his head to his partner. “Put her down, like the she-cop said.”

      “You’re kidding right?”

      “On the contrary. I see this as an opportunity we can’t resist.” The leader’s hand went to the front of his jeans and he cupped his package. “We can all have a little fun with the little she-cop before we deliver the goods to the boss.”

      “He said get the job done and get back.”

      “Think, dumbass. How will he know how long it took us?” The leader’s mouth pulled up in a sneer. “In the meantime. I get her first.”

      “Did you miss the fact I’m holding a gun?” I pointed the weapon at his chest.

      “Nah, but I’m banking on you shooting him first.” He thrust the man standing next to him in between him and me. I shot the man in the knee, he went down. Without blinking, I took the leader out with a shot in the knee as well.

      “Did I mention, I was top of my class on the firing range?” I pointed at the man carrying the woman. “Now put her down and leave before I take you out as well.”

      The werewolf slid the woman to the ground and ran, taking the other four weres with him, abandoning the two with the injured knees.

      As they clutched at their wounds, cursing me, I divested them of their weapons and crouched beside the woman.

      She moaned and stared up at me, her eyes glazed, but open.

      “Nicolae will kill you.”

      “Not today, honey. Not today.” I tapped on my headset. “Blaise, you out there?”

      Static rumbled in my ear. Not good. I’d have to find a phone or get back to our vehicle to call this one in.

      The woman gripped my arm, her fingernails digging into my skin.

      “Hey, lighten up. You’re safe.” I patted her shoulder, awkwardly. Give me a gun and I’m all over it. Nurturing wasn’t in my nature.

      She shook her head, her eyes round, staring over my shoulder at whatever was standing behind me. “Nicolae.”

      Too late, my sense of smell kicked in with a sickly sweet aroma, similar, but not the same as what I sensed around Blaise.

      Demon.

      Instinctively, I spun, swinging my leg out, while still in a crouch.

      I caught the demon’s legs at the shin, knocking him off his feet.

      The woman on the ground pushed to a sitting position and swayed. “Get the amulet. The necklace. It’s the key. Get it.”

      I only half-heard her as the demon staggered to his feet, eyes gleaming red, his hands rising, fingers curling.

      My throat tightened. No air made it through to my starving lungs. I clawed at the invisible fingers that squeezed the breath out of me.

      The demon the woman had referred to as Nicolae lifted his arms into the air.

      As if a noose tightened around my neck, my body rose from the crouched position, my feet left the ground.

      For a moment, I dangled in the air.

      In the next second, I was flung twenty feet, hitting a brick wall, my weapon knocked from my grasp, skittering across the pavement, out of reach.

      My head bounced against the hard surface, and I slid to the ground, gray fog engulfing me. Not the pleasant cloud of my earlier dream, but the encroaching pall of a nightmare unfolding before me.

      Nicolae gathered the woman in his arms and turned to leave.

      “Help me.” Her bleating cry for help jumpstarted my lungs.

      I sucked in a breath, pushing back the darkness, and lurched to my feet. The demon would not get away with the woman.

      “Not on my watch, you don’t,” I muttered as my feet churned beneath me and I threw myself at the demon’s back.

      Caught off guard, he dropped the woman to the ground and spun.

      I clung to his back, my arm hooked around his throat, hanging on for dear life. I hadn’t gotten around to clarifying how to kill a demon with my partner, no matter how many times I’d wanted to kill him for one infraction or another.

      The demon reached over his shoulder and grabbed my jacket, his fingernails lengthening, tearing into the leather, slicing through my shirt and ripping into my flesh.

      Pain ricocheted throughout my body, the affected area burning as if he’d poured battery acid directly onto the wound.

      I bit down hard on my lower lip to keep from crying out and tightened my hold, one finger wrapping around a leather strap hanging around his neck.

      The woman on the ground reached up. “The amulet. Take it,” she cried.

      Flipping my wrist, I twisted the leather around all the fingers on that hand.

      Then as if shot from a cannon, my body was blasted away from the demon. The force sent me flying. Since I had the leather strap wrapped firmly around my wrist and fingers, the leather tie snapped and the necklace came

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