“I heard.” His gaze, when it met mine, was filled with a very inhuman hunger and excitement. Fae might be sensualists, but they obviously weren’t averse to the excitement that came with danger—and that it could be deadly only made the chase all that much sweeter, it seemed.
I shook my head. “You’re crazy.” And so was I for even considering going along with his scheme.
“That’s been said before,” he agreed. “I am, however, still alive.”
Silence fell. We continued up the Calder Freeway for a while, then swung left onto Lawson Road and up into the forest.
“Can you use a gun?” he asked, as he suddenly turned onto a dirt side road.
“I can, though I prefer not to. Why?”
“It’s interesting that you appear neither shocked nor horrified by the thought I might be carrying weapons in the truck.”
“Probably because my capacity to be shocked by anything has been erased by recent events. What are you planning?”
“Are you good enough to take out the tire of a car speeding past?”
“I think so.” I’d certainly done it a few times in my past life as a cop, but that had been a while ago now, and not only were my skills rusty, but the guns were very different.
“God, where have you been all my life, woman?”
“I’ve been avoiding men like you,” I said dryly. “Where’s the gun?”
“Locked box under the backseat. Key code 3754.”
I undid my seat belt and twisted around. Once I found the locked box, I typed in the code. A drawer popped out, revealing several guns cradled in foam. I chose the Glock semiautomatic simply because I’d used earlier versions. After checking that the internal locking system was engaged, I shoved in a single-stack, ten-round magazine.
“There’s a blind corner just up ahead,” he said. “I’ll let you out just after it. Hide in the trees and shoot out the rear tires. I’ll take care of the rest.”
I nodded, throat suddenly dry and heart going a million miles an hour. Excitement, not fear.
He slid around the corner, raising a thick cloud of dust that hid his sudden stop. I opened the door, scrambled out, then ran for the trees as he took off again.
The red cloak wasn’t far behind him. He came around the corner too fast and skidded sideways on the dusty road. I released the internal locking system, sighted on the nearest rear tire, and fired. The first two shots missed. The next two didn’t.
The tire exploded, and the car—still going too fast and not under complete control after the semi-slide around the corner—reacted violently. The tire exploded, came off the rim, and fired thick bits of rubber in all directions as the car pulled savagely to the left. The driver’s reaction was instant and totally wrong—he slammed on the brakes. This succeeded only in accentuating the car’s reaction, and he spun completely around and then slammed into several trees along the side of the road.
Jackson’s truck reappeared through the choking cloud of dirt and reversed straight into the undamaged side of the car, buckling both doors inward. For all intents and purposes, the red cloak was trapped.
I lowered the weapon but didn’t slip the ILS back on. The red cloak might be trapped, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t still dangerous.
Jackson climbed out of the truck, a wide grin splitting his features and his enjoyment so strong it burned the air. “Shall we see how our captive fairs?”
I nodded and gave him the gun. He was legal to carry. I wasn’t, and we did have a more official follower somewhere behind us.
He approached the broken car from the front and with caution, the gun held at the ready. The engine was screaming, the sound high-pitched and grating, and steam billowed out of the grille. The smell of gas stung the air, a potentially dangerous situation if there were any sparks or if the leaking vapor hit the hot exhaust or catalytic converter.
There was no movement inside the car. The air bags had all gone off, but were even now deflating, beginning to hang like loose white sacks from their moorings. The windshield had shattered, the bits of glass glittering like diamonds all over the crumpled front end. The red cloak inside wasn’t moving. There was blood in his dark hair and he slumped half-sideways, as if the seat belt was the only thing holding him upright.
Jackson stepped closer, his nostrils flaring. Distaste spread across his face. “God, these things smell rancid.”
“Well, they are diseased.” I stayed where I was and rubbed my arms. I’d been close to these things once before, and that was more than enough.
“This one is also human.” He hesitated. “Or maybe that should be was human.”
“Most vampires were human at one point in their lives,” I reminded him. “That in itself is not an oddity.”
“Yeah, but regular vamps smell like vamps. These things still have a human overtone. It’s as if they’re not quite turned.”
Which would explain why they could waltz around in daylight when regular vampires could not.
As he took another step closer, flames began to lick the bottom of the car. “Jackson—”
“I can feel the fire,” he cut in. “It’s no danger, trust me.”
“Meaning you’re putting it out?”
He flashed me a grin over his shoulder. “What, and waste all that lovely heat?”
“That lovely heat,” I said tartly, “will crisp our suspect, which is not such a good thing if you want to question him. Not that I think that’s a good idea.”
In the shadows crowding the rear seat, something moved. Tension and fear suddenly crawled across my skin. “I think there might be—”
Before I could get the rest of the sentence out, a seething, screaming mass that seemed more animal than human exploded from the car. Jackson swore and raised the gun, but it was flames, not bullets, that shot out at the red cloak. They encased the creature, but didn’t stop him. It cannoned into Jackson, sending him sprawling, and came straight at me.
I swore and threw myself sideways, hitting the dirt hard enough to hurt but rolling back to my feet in one smooth motion. Fire erupted from my flesh, burning around me—through me—until I wasn’t flesh, just a seething mass of flame. The creature lunged for me, his body afire and his red eyes glowing with both the reflection of my fire and his own madness. I retreated, trying to keep out of his way, but he was too fast and too close. His wickedly curved nails sliced through my flames, but there was no flesh left to rend and tear and possibly infect.
I loosed a long stream of fire at him. It lassoed his torso and snapped tight. My flames, stronger and more deadly than Jackson’s, raced across the red cloak’s flesh, but he didn’t seem to care. He just kept coming at me even as his flesh blackened and began to peel away.
Two shots rang out, the sound barely cutting across the roar of my fire. The red cloak’s head exploded, spraying blood and bone and brain matter everywhere.
I shuddered, suddenly glad I wasn’t wearing skin. The last thing I needed or wanted was to be covered in red cloak goo.
The rest of the body continued to burn, the combination of Jackson’s flames and my own quickly rendering flesh, muscle, and bone down to little more than ashes that the wind picked up and scattered through the forest.
I took a deep breath, then doused my fire and regained human form.
Jackson stared at me.
“I’d guessed what you were, but it’s a totally different fucking thing to see it.” His voice held a touch of awe. “I had no idea a phoenix could become nothing but flame.”
“And I didn’t know you could draw fire into your body and use it as a weapon. I thought fire Fae could only shape and control it.” My gaze scanned him. He didn’t seem to be hurt or bleeding, but I nevertheless added, “Did he scratch you at all?”