Life in Shadows (14 page)

“So what
are you doing?”

“I’m trying
to figure out how to make it stop sending me updates when people send me
something or tag me.”

“Why’s
that?”

“Because he
changed his status and people are bugging me about what’s wrong.”

“Seriously?
He did that already? Shannon, this fuckin’ guy—”

“Is out of
my life now, okay?” Shannon sighed. “Let it go. I’m better off without him.
I’ll find somebody new sooner or later.” She looked out the window, wishing she
could step right out the door and out of this conversation.

“Well,
you’re a pretty gal, right? I mean I don’t want to get awkward, but you are,”
Ian pointed out. “I bet you get asked out a lot, right?”

“No.”

“Really?”

“I think I
project it or something, but...” Shannon let out a sigh. “I
 
hate
 
dating.”

* * *

Serena
hated being thrown through drywall.

She crashed
through the plaster and flimsy wood in a mess of dust and splinters and
continued straight through the coffee table in the living room, too. The naked
succubus flopped to a stop at the foot of the entertainment center.

“Oh, you
stupid demon
 
asshat
,”
ranted the angel in the bedroom. Through the hole in the wall, Serena saw the
angel swiftly pulled the burning bed sheets and pillows together into a bundle.
Jack’s lifeless, charred head and shoulders flopped up into view for a
heartbeat as the angel gathered him up with the rest.

“What did I
say? What did I fucking say to the last two fuckers I sent back to Hell with
their heads shoved up their asses?” She moved out of view, presumably heading
for the window to throw the bundle outside where the flames would provide less
danger to the building. The wall still burned, but the angel clearly meant to
remove what fuel she could before dealing with that.

Serena
shook herself. She ached all over, but it would take more than this to put her
down for good. That angel could do it, though. She knew exactly who she faced.
In the last few weeks, every demon in Seattle and far beyond it had heard of
Rachel.

She hated
feeling afraid, but she felt it now. Going toe to toe with an angel of such
power was suicide. Unfortunately, Serena knew full well that she’d never get
away if she simply turned and ran. She needed much more of a head start than
she would get out of the distraction made by a simple apartment fire.

The succubus
dove for a small closet facing the living room. Hidden behind hanging coats and
suits stood a tall, locked box of some of Jack’s favorite things. The lock on
the metal box couldn’t keep Serena out. Sharp talons grew from her fingertips
to provide all the cutting power she needed.

“I said,
‘No more of you fucking dingleberries in my city!’ That’s what I told ‘em to
tell all of you!” Rachel continued to rant as she came back into view. She had
curtains in her hands now, using them to beat at the flames still growing
across the bedroom wall. “Other people live in this building, you stupid bitch!
How the fuck am I supposed to put this out? Piss on it? I don’t have that kind
of plumbing!”

She snapped
the curtains at the wall again. “You still out there?” Rachel asked. The angel
looked over her shoulder. “I haven’t forgotten about y—”

Serena
pitched the grenade through the hole like a shot putter. Her timing was
perfect, as was her aim. Jack was not remotely the first dangerous man she’d
slept with. She’d learned all sorts of useful things from her lovers over the
centuries.

The grenade
exploded in mid-air less than a foot from Rachel’s back. Smoke obscured
Serena’s view, but the succubus didn’t waste time assessing the damage. She
pulled the automatic shotgun from its case, hidden behind more hanging clothes.

Clothing.
She would need clothing, too. A succubus had great powers of illusion, but
power was finite. Having a little to work with would make things easier. Even a
coat would do. With the Saiga shotgun locked and loaded, Serena kept the weapon
trained in Rachel’s direction while she grabbed a long black trench coat off of
a hanger.

In the
bedroom Rachel coughed as she got to her hands and knees. Her head felt like it
had been used as the ringer for a cathedral bell, and for that matter so did
the rest of her body. She recovered quickly, but even she wasn’t invulnerable.
Rachel blinked away her disorientation. At least the blast had blown out most
of the flames.

She
couldn’t have this here. People lived in this building. Protecting them took
priority. Bad enough that the succubus had started a fire. Rachel hadn’t
expected her to escalate from that to explosives. She got off her knees just in
time for the second grenade to land at her feet.

“Really?”
she grumbled before the grenade blew. It lifted her with enough force to bang
her up against the ceiling. Gravity immediately brought her crashing through
the smoldering remains of the bed.

“Fucking
knock that shit off!” raged the angel. She briefly reverted to the natural
intangibility of the angels, rushing up through the wreckage of furniture and
going straight through the wall to launch herself at her opponent. She couldn’t
remain intangible and land a blow, though, and her foe knew it. As soon as she
came through the ruined wall, the shotgun blasts erupted at point blank range.

Rachel
screamed more in anger than pain, though she felt plenty of that, too. A mortal
body would have been shredded; hers would be severely bruised when this was
over. Still she came on, bringing a furious left hook into Serena’s side. The
punch took the succubus off her feet and sent her flying over the bar
separating the apartment’s living room and kitchen.

She stormed
after her opponent. Serena’s mouth let loose another storm of fire the instant
Rachel came into view. Every tongue of flame that didn’t strike Rachel ignited
something beside or beyond her: the countertop, the wall, the carpet. Rachel
staggered back under the assault. The Saiga pounded her again with more shots,
driving her back another few steps farther.

Serena held
down the trigger. She saw blood and smelled burnt flesh. Even angels had
limits. Perhaps, Serena dared to consider, she might get out of here in one
piece after all. She rushed forward, throwing everything she had into a brutal
kick to Rachel’s midsection. The angel tumbled back onto the floor, still
coughing and still smoldering.

The last
two rounds burst from the Saiga, its barrel within arm’s reach of its target on
the floor, and then Serena was out the door.

* *
*

“Fuckin’
cop. I know that guy. He gave me a ticket last week.”

The police
car rolled down Broadway Avenue in the opposite direction. Shannon looked at it
in the mirror more out of reflex than rational thought. She had the shotgun
seat, her clipboard in her hand so she could keep up with the
larger-than-normal load of paperwork after their trip to the ER. It was silly
to look in the mirror. How could she even see the guy’s face? “So how fast were
you going?”

“Not the
point,” Ian grumbled. He drove on, the bitter frown on his face unchanged since
they left the hospital.

“Mm-hm.”
Despite the continual downer of a day, Shannon managed a smirk at his answer.

“No,
seriously,” he countered. “I’m just sayin’. I told him I was an EMT and
everything. Still wrote me up. Fucker.”

“No
respect, I guess,” his partner shrugged. “God, what a day.”

“Yeah, it’s
pretty shitty. You know Frank’s bound to re-shuffle the schedule so we aren’t
working for the next few days, right? Just so he can say he doesn’t have us on the
street while there’s a complaint pending?”

“It’s a
bullshit complaint, Ian,” Shannon replied. “The nurses all said that guy’s in
trouble with the hospital for his own fuck-ups and wants to shift blame for
this somewhere else. Seattle Fire thought it wasn’t a life-threatening call,
otherwise they wouldn’t have given him to us for transport in the first place,
so we’re covered there. And we did everything we were supposed to do and
nothing we weren’t supposed to. We did everything we could.”

“That don’t
mean it won’t turn into a thing.”

She let out
a long sigh. “Yeah.”

“Sorry
about your boyfriend.”

“I’m over
it.” She paused. “He could’ve done it a couple weeks sooner, though. I wanted
to go to a show on Halloween, but he got all hung up on going to some party
with his douchebag friends. Now I’ll never get tickets.”

“For what?”

“Local
bands playing downtown. Throbbing Ennui. Rockerdammerung. Cool guys.”

Ian
smirked, but said nothing...until he couldn’t hold it in. “Seriously?”

Shannon
smiled back without looking at him. “Kiss my ass.” Then she blinked and leaned
forward for a better view. “Hey, is that black smoke up there?” Shannon asked,
pointing off to an apartment building a couple blocks ahead off of Broadway.

“What, that
building there?”

Then they
saw the windows burst as an explosion went off inside the corner apartment.
Shannon grabbed for the radio. “Go, go!”

* * *

She heard
sirens as soon as she made it to the rooftop. Smoke from the fire downstairs
billowed up around the corner of the apartment building. The sun wouldn’t set
for hours. All in all, it made for more eyes looking her way than she would’ve
liked, but Serena could escape from mortal vision fairly easily. Angels were
another matter. That required serious effort and drained her of power she would
need before she reached safety. Evasion was more practical.

The natural
thing to do would have been to run out with all of the mortals fleeing the
building to the streets below. She could enlist some altruistic fool in her
escape or simply blend in with the crowd. The rooftop was closer, though, and
she didn’t want to compound her problems by letting some random resident’s
guardian angel spot her and join in the fray.

T
he rooftop also allowed her a
brief
use of her wings rather than her feet. It was easy to forget that the succubae
had wings; half the time they were concealed, anyway, and even apart from that,
the demons rarely flew. Today, however, she was grateful for this much faster
option.

She picked
a direction, spread her wings, and took to the air. She made it all of six feet
up.

The hand
that grabbed her ankle exerted enough force to nearly break it. Serena yelped
as she was flung back down onto the roof. Rachel immediately followed up with
an angry fist that drove into Serena’s stomach. Reflexively, the succubus
jerked half-upright, bringing her face right into the angel’s elbow.

Rachel
released Serena’s leg, jerked her to her feet by her wrist, and held on tight
as she unloaded punches and kicks on the succubus. In a matter of seconds, the fight
had entirely turned. Regardless of Rachel’s injuries and flagging strength, she
had the upper hand and wouldn’t lose it now. The fact that the succubus held it
together even this long spoke to her high rank in whatever demon lord’s court
she served.

By the time
Rachel let go, Serena was punch-drunk and swaying on her feet. The angel wound
up for an uppercut and let it fly, crying out, “Shoryuuuken!”

Then she
opened her eyes and saw the unconscious succubus fly in an arc off the roof and
down onto the street below.

“Aw, shit.”

* * *

Amazingly,
the street was fairly clear when Shannon and Ian came around the corner. Their
siren wailed, their horn honked, and their lights flashed, and for once
everyone seemed to know what that meant and got the hell out of the way. Their
ambulance was the first response vehicle to arrive.

Ian and
Shannon looked quickly for someplace to park where they wouldn’t block any fire
trucks. Consequently, both of them only saw the woman in the trench coat fall
from above and land in front of them out of the corner of their eye. No one
could reasonably hold Ian responsible for hitting her with the ambulance, but
he let out a guilty shriek just the same.

“Take care
of the wagon!” Shannon said, jumping out of the ambulance without missing a
beat. She rushed over to the fallen woman, making sure to look in every
direction and assess the situation. Shannon couldn’t really see how the victim
had gotten there—nobody could jump from one of the rooftops all the way out to
here in the middle of the street—but at least it didn’t look like any other
women were falling from the windows.

She looked
about Shannon’s age. Fit. Naked under her trenchcoat. Battered and bloodied,
but not lethally so to outward appearances. She smelled of smoke. A big, ugly
gun lay beside her. Shannon slipped her gloves on without even thinking about
it as she looked over her patient. The woman was already on her back, and thus
in a good position to receive care. “Can you hear me?” Shannon asked. She took
up her wrist and felt for a pulse. “I’m a paramedic. I’m here to help you. Can
you hear me?”