Stone Cold Lover (29 page)

“Wynn, are you harmed? Are the
nocturnis
still here? I am at the window. Let me inside.”

“Spar, is that you?” She sounded confused but unhurt, and he could see those emotions in her face when she appeared at the window with her phone pressed to her ear. “Hold on.”

She disconnected the call and slid open the window. “What
nocturnis
are you talking about? And what are you doing here? Where’s Fil?”

Fear and rage like nothing he had ever experienced crashed over Spar like a tsunami, and the metal platform beneath him trembled when he cursed in the foulest terms he could conjure. “It was another trap. A diversion. You called Felicity moments ago, sounding terrified. You said
nocturnis
were attempting to enter your apartment.”

“No, I didn’t. Spar, I swear it.”

“I believe you. I heard a few words, though, and the caller sounded exactly as you sound. Felicity was convinced. She sent me to rescue you. They must have used magic to mimic your voice.” He flapped his wings and prepared to launch himself back into the sky. “I have to return to her. They might even have her by now.”

“Wait!” Her urgent tone and tight grip caught him before he could fly. “I’m sure it was a trap, but I
was
just about to call you two. That’s how I can be a hundred percent certain it couldn’t have been me on the phone, because about ten minutes ago I just came to. From the vision. Spar, if they’ve taken her this is even more important. They’ll want to make her the next sacrifice, but now I know where we can find them.”

His lips curled back, exposing the sharp length of his fangs, and his talons ached with the need to rend
nocturnis
flesh. “Tell me. Now.”

*   *   *

Fil came to on a rush of adrenaline, moving from blankness to full awareness so fast, it left her dizzy. Or maybe that was the blow she’d taken to the back of her head. At this point, it was hard to tell. The cold and dark filled her with a sense of déjà vu that brought the memories of her vision rushing back, but when she opened her eyes this time, she found herself not in a damp, dank basement, but lying in the bottom of a motorboat while freshwater spray misted against her face.

Moaning, she reached up to touch the already swollen lump at the rear of her skull. She winced when the light brush of her own fingers sent her blistering headache straight past agonizing and on to debilitating. Between the pain in her head and the motion of the water, she forecast vomit likely within the next thirty to sixty minutes.

“She’s beginning to wake. Tie her hands.”

Someone grabbed her shoulder and roughly rolled her onto her belly before dragging her hands to the small of her back. If only the bastard had put his shoes within range of her mouth, she’d have decorated them real nice for him. Rough hemp bound her wrists together with her hands pointing toward the opposite elbows. She gritted her teeth and concentrated on taking slow shallow breaths through her nose.

She couldn’t see much of anything. Her head hurt too much to do a lot of thrashing around, and it was dark out here on the river. She assumed that’s where they were, cruising somewhere on the St. Lawrence. She hoped she hadn’t been down long enough for them to speed the entire way to Lake Ontario. Judging by the blackness of the night, she doubted it. They couldn’t have gotten to her more than an hour or two earlier.

God, she felt like an idiot. The Hierophant had shown up at her door and all she’d been able to do was gape at him while he instructed his minion to knock her senseless. She should have at least slammed the door in his ugly face. She doubted it would have kept him out for long, but it might have given her a chance to run. Or to dial her cell phone.

When Spar found out about this, he was going to kill her. He’d probably have to resurrect her dead ass to do it, since she doubted the Hierophant had come all the way to her apartment and kidnapped her so they could munch popcorn together and watch a
Big Bang Theory
marathon. She figured his plans for her had more to do with ceremonial knives and demonic overlords. Joy.

It stung to know that Ricky had been involved in her kidnapping, but recalling the vacant expression on his face while the Hierophant had instructed him to clock her a good one, she wondered if he might be under some kind of mind-control spell the
nocturnis
had concocted. Maybe it was wishful thinking on her part, but her friend hadn’t looked like himself, and no matter how mad he’d been at her the last time she’d seem him, she could never believe that the Rick Racleaux she’d known for almost fifteen years would knowingly hand her to someone who intended to rip her heart out of her chest. In her brain, the equation simply did not compute.

When she tried to turn her head, though, the agony that followed made the math just a touch easier. If his heart really wasn’t in the whole human-sacrifice thing, did he have to hit her so hard? A pulled punch would have been as good as an olive branch, given the present circumstances.

Those circumstances really were going to make her hurl if they stayed on the water much longer. Not that hurrying toward their destination sounded like a great idea, considering what she assumed was going to happen when they got there, but getting off the water and onto solid land held a very strong appeal. Mostly to her stomach.

Her head cast a different vote. When the bow of the speedboat ran aground on a sandy bottom, the force of the impact sent her sliding forward and tapped her injured head gently against the hull. Once again the world went gray, and she felt her grip on awareness slipping, but hey—unconscious of reality meant unconscious of pain, right?

When she came to, she’d have to remember count her frickin’ blessings.

*   *   *

The second time she awoke had less to do with the flood of hormones in her bloodstream and more to do with the impact of a hard shoulder to the gut as she was lifted and tossed over it to be carried. She promptly opened her mouth and spilled the contents of her stomach down the back of someone’s legs. Was it wrong that when she’d finished heaving, she laughed?

Her captor seemed to think so. He immediately cried out in disgust and threw her to the ground, sending her landing half on top of her own pool of vomit. Thankfully, that half wasn’t anywhere near her face, or she’d probably have puked again.

Jesus, she just knew she had a concussion, and these bozos kept slinging her around like a sack of potatoes. If they didn’t start being more careful with her, they’d find her dead of a brain bleed or intracranial swelling before they got her anywhere near their precious altar. And wouldn’t that just piss off the big boss?

Fil moaned, less for the effect of playing the helpless captive and more because her head just fucking
hurt.
At least if she’d been in the NHL, they’d have let her go lie down in a dark room for fifteen minutes before making her exert herself any. These jokers started kicking her in the side and ordering her to get to her feet. Did she look like some kind of Woman of Steel to them?

“I’m not touching her,” someone snapped, and from the proximity of the voice she guessed it was the guy she’d barfed on. “It’s bad enough she got puke all over the hem of my robe, but now she’s covered in it. If she can’t walk, let the reporter carry her. He’ll never know the difference.”

Another man chimed in—not barf boy, but not the Hierophant, either. No way would all of these bodies have fit in the tiny motorboat, so they must have been waiting here. Wherever “here” was. “No, I can’t stomach the smell of it. She needs to be cleaned off before we bring her into the circle, or I’ll vomit myself.”

“Throw her in the river. That should wash off the worst of it, and it’s not like it matters if she catches cold.”

Oh, no, it mattered, but no one paid any attention to her struggles. Given how weak she felt, she couldn’t really blame them. She doubted she could fight off a demonic kitten at the moment, which was why she landed in the river water without so much as a scream.

That was a good thing, really, because it meant she had her mouth closed and didn’t end up swallowing a gallon of
eau de rivière
that she would then just have to vomit back up. Once had been enough for the evening. With her hands bound behind her back, she couldn’t swim, but the part of the water she’d landed in was shallow enough that she was able to get her feet under her without too much effort. She considered pushing herself farther out into the current, slow though it was near the city, just to escape, but hard hands reached in and hauled her out before she could act on the thought. Maybe the cold had slowed her reflexes: The river felt icy against her skin.

So did her soaking-wet clothes, once she made it back onto dry land. They acted like a personal air-conditioning system, wicking the heat from her body and leaching it into the surrounding atmosphere. Couple that with the breeze off the river and she could feel her internal temperature plummet. She began to shake, and the stubborn part of herself just hoped the bastards who had kidnapped her wouldn’t mistake it for fear. Right now she was too damned cold, too damned angry, and in too damned much pain to be afraid. She’d save that for when the knives came out.

“Enough dawdling.” This time the Hierophant spoke. Fil would never forget the sibilant hiss of his voice, the almost effeminate tenor that had greeted her at the top of her stairs. “If she’s conscious she can walk. Bring her.”

Hands roughly grasped each elbow, positioning her between two of the cultists as they began marching up the narrow beach into the trees. A quick look around confirmed her suspicions. She’d been taken to one of the tiny, unnamed islands that dotted the river north of the city, mostly forgotten compared with their larger, better-known neighbors. Here, the chances of anyone stumbling on their activities was remote—remote enough that Fil knew looking for help would prove useless. She was on her own, at least until her Guardian realized what had happened and flew to the rescue. She had utter confidence that Spar would come for her; she just had to pray he came in time. Until then, her survival rested in her own hands.

She allowed herself to be guided deeper into the trees while she assessed her captors. In addition to the Hierophant and Ricky—who continued to stare blankly straight ahead and trail the Hierophant like a robotic puppy—the group contained six male figures in dark hooded robes. They looked like escapees from a medieval monk convention. All but two wore their capacious hoods drawn up and forward, obscuring their features. Barf boy and one other had pushed the fabric back to drape around their necks in a sort of cowl.

The Hierophant looked just as she remembered him from her vision. Of average height, he had the slim, undernourished build of a computer geek, along with the accompanying pale, pasty complexion. He looked to be somewhere in his thirties, that indefinable kind of stage that only indicated adulthood, with no sign of youth or age to pin it down further. He wore his black hair a touch too long to be called short, and too short to be called long. Everything about him screamed unremarkable, until you looked at his face.

He had sharp, thin features that might have been called aristocratic or even handsome if the taint of evil hadn’t been scrawled so plainly across them. His narrow lips wore a tight curve that spoke of cruelty, the kind that said he enjoyed the sight of pain, and enjoyed causing it even more. He made Fil’s skin crawl. The other cultists she hated on principle, but for this man her hatred was visceral, curling in her gut and rattling like a snake on the alert, angry and poisonous.

She stared at his back as he led the way through the trees. As the vegetation thickened, they had to walk single-file, though one of Fil’s captors made sure to keep a firm grip on her arm and walk so closely behind her she could practically smell what he’d had for lunch wafting forward over her shoulder.

She could see that they followed some sort of rough path across the uneven ground, which hinted this was undoubtedly the location Wynn had been searching for. Everything indicated they’d been using it for a while. She supposed the island had been an ideal location, far away from prying eyes and unlikely to come under scrutiny from the authorities. Basically the perfect setting for acts of unspeakable evil.

Fil preferred not to participate in those acts, so she needed to start coming up with a plan. Fast. She doubted the island was big enough that their little march would take much longer, and if they intended to strap her to some kind of bloody altar, her chances of not dying would likely decrease dramatically. Time to get moving.

When she saw the trees begin to look sick and stained, bare of leaves and darkened as if charred by invisible flames, she knew they were getting close to the ritual site. Taking a deep breath, she faked tripping over a root in the path and made sure to stumble hard into the man in front of her. The unexpected impact threw him off balance and she had the brief, satisfying image of his smacking into another
nocturnis
and sending the whole line of them tumbling to the ground like dominoes. Of course, it didn’t happen that way, but her unexpected “fall” wrenched her forward so suddenly that the man holding her loosened his grip for a fleeting second. It was all she needed.

She yanked against him with all her strength, using her entire body weight to add to the force her movement. She felt his fingers tighten their grip even as they slid over her dripping skin. If she’d been wearing long sleeves, he probably would have caught her by her clothing, but she was out of his grasp and into the trees before he could finish swearing at her.

There weren’t a lot of places she could go on the tiny island, and she knew they’d catch up with her before long. They knew the area infinitely better than she did, and they were the ones with the motorboat. Running had been a delaying tactic, something to give Spar just a little more time to discover where they had taken her, because she knew he’d be searching, and she knew he would never stop until he found her. To help him out, she would stall for all she was worth.