Living with the Dead

HOPE

Karl knocked Hope to the floor as gas filled the room. She yanked her shirt collar over her mouth, then looked to make sure he was doing the same, but he'd flipped around, grabbing Rhys's legs as the man dove for the floor.

Smoke swirled around them, thick as Maine fog. The men disappeared into it, a leg or arm appearing for a second, then gone with a crack and a grunt as they fought. Her eyes stung, watering. She blinked hard and peered into the fog, smacking the floor as she searched for her gun.

"Get Robyn!" Karl shouted, knowing she'd be trying to come to his rescue instead.

"Rob?" Hope yelled.

A cough answered.

"Cover your mouth," Hope called, choking back her own cough as the gas burned her throat. "Close your eyes. I'll find you."

She crawled, hunching along on one hand, the other holding her shirt over her mouth. She closed her eyes – she couldn't see anyway. Chaos eddied through the gas, steady waves tickling over her skin like a lover's touch, making her shiver.

Robyn coughed again, to her left now.

"Stay where you are!" Hope called.

A grunt of pain and a curse from Rhys. Chaos shuddered through Hope, the demon begging her to stop and enjoy it. She gritted her teeth and told the demon this wasn't the time. It ignored her until another crack, this one followed by a hissing growl that the demon recognized as Karl in pain. That shut it up.

"Robyn?"

A hacking cough, to the right now.

"Stay put! I can't – "

Booted footfalls clomped into the room. Shadowy figures appeared in the fog. Hope scuttled to the side and flattened up against the bed. The figures passed.

The room had gone quiet now.

Another cough. Robyn must have mistaken the men for cops. But a murder suspect didn't warrant a riot squad takedown. Gas and SWAT teams were the Nast's trademark. Hope knew now who Rhys worked for.

Hope slithered across the floor, toward Robyn. She couldn't be more than a few yards away – the room wasn't that big. The footsteps stopped. Hope did, too, lifting her head to listen.

A dull thump right beside her. A voice, muffled, as if by a gas mask, the words indecipherable. When the response came, Hope was concentrating hard enough to make it out.

"Think so."

A hollow, echoing snort. "Comforting. You gonna…" The rest was muddled. The answer was a laugh.

Robyn coughed.

Hope held her breath, but the men kept talking. Then a voice came from the back near the bathroom. "Move it. Mr. Nast wants us on the road pronto. We've got to grab that clairvoyant girl before dark."

"Take his legs and I'll…"

Hope didn't catch the rest or the response, but the gist of it was that they were trying to get someone outside. Rhys. The gas would hold the rest of them until they'd moved their comrade to safety.

She waited until they'd gone. Then a cough came, so soft it was more a throat clearing. Hope crawled toward it. A sliver of light filtered through the fog from the drawn curtains, meaning Robyn was next to the front door. Perfect. A few more feet and Hope would be -

Her forehead smacked into the door. Hands caught her, tugging her down with a "shhh."

She reached to pat the hand, tell Robyn she was okay. Her fingers touched a ribbed cuff. Rhys's sports jacket.

Hope spun, fists flying into the fog. One struck home, the impact jolting up her arm. She swung the other in the same direction. It hit with a smack. Then fingers vise-gripped around her wrist hard enough to make her yelp. Rhys wrenched Hope's arm behind her back. Her eyes flooded with fresh tears, salt stinging her burning cheeks. She tried to punch with her free hand, but he slammed her onto the floor, nose hitting hard, pain exploding.

Rhys crouched over her back, pinning her down, arm still jacked up behind her back. When she wriggled, he ratcheted her arm higher, making her gasp.

"Shhh!"

She smashed her foot into his leg. He yanked her arm higher and she bucked until the pain forced her to stillness, panting and blinking back tears.

Rhys yanked Hope to her knees.

"Up," he whispered, with a heave that forced her onto her feet.

She heard fingers sliding along the wall, as if searching for the knob. The door eased open, and a breeze gusted in, pushing the fog back as Rhys propelled her through. The fresh air hit like an icy blast. She gasped. Her throat and lungs and eyes burned. Even her skin felt hot. Her stomach roiled.

Rhys kept pushing her. She smacked into someone. A hard blink and she could make out a short figure in front of her. Another blink brought the face into focus – a preteen girl fixing Hope with a glower before shouldering past, muttering.

Hope glanced behind her. Rhys was blinking hard, eyes streaming. He swiped his jacket sleeve across them and reached into his pocket. Hope threw herself forward. He pulled her back, wrenching her arm up without a beat. A shake of his hand, unfolding his sunglasses, and he put them on.

"Keep walking."

Hope looked around through the glaze of tears. Another gust of wind rattled along the motel front, shaking the screen doors and sending fast-food wrappers swirling about their feet. The sun needled her eyes. Strands of hair whipped her face. One head shake and she knew she had more hair outside her ponytail than in it.

She pictured what she looked like, rumpled and disheveled, eyes streaming as she grimaced against the sun like a kidnap victim pulled from an underground hole. With a guy at her back, wrenching her arm up, she obviously wasn't out for an afternoon stroll. If anyone noticed, they decided not to care.

As her eyes and lungs cleared, her stomach chimed in, wanting its share of attention. Typical. Motion sickness or nerves always set her gut roiling like a teakettle, bubbling over at the slightest provocation. And right now, the tear gas had it feeling provoked.

When she stumbled over a sidewalk crack, her mouth filled with bile. She gagged and forced it down, the taste only making the nausea worse.

"What's wrong?" Rhys said gruffly.

Hope swayed, her free hand clutching her stomach. "The gas. I feel…"

"It does that. Just keep going."

"I-I don't think – " She took a deep breath, head tilting back. "Okay. That's better." She took one more step, then doubled over, moaning and gagging.

"Oh God, I'm going to – "

She swung, so fast his slackening grip fell from her arm. He grabbed for her, catching her wrist. And that is when the Aikido lessons paid off, Hope's body instinctively recognizing the hold and reacting without instructions. A wrench, a grab, a flip and he was on the ground with his arm now pinned up behind his back.

At that moment, someone decided to notice. A burly middle-aged man lumbered from the parking lot, glaring at Hope from under bushy brows. A woman being forced along a motel sidewalk hadn't been worthy of his attention, but apparently, that same woman pinning a man twice her size was somewhat suspicious.

"He – he attacked me," she said, gulping air between words.

"Hope," Rhys said under his breath. "You don't want to – "

"The – the manager. Get the manager. Please."

Hope lifted her teary, reddened eyes, and the man jogged off toward the front office. She flew off Rhys, gave him one hard kick in the ribs and ran.

A man shouted. Rhys? The burly man? She didn't know and, frankly, didn't care, just hunched down and pummeled the pavement.

As she veered into the lot, she slowed to a jog. A very fast jog, arms pumping, trying to look like an ordinary runner.

She jogged to the edge of the motel lot, just past the boundary fence, then wheeled, running along it. She measured the distance until she'd be at the rear of the motel. Then she turned to the fence, ready to climb.

In front of Hope was an eight-foot-high sheet of solid two-by-fours. Not a finger- or foothold to be seen, and not a chance in hell of jumping up and grabbing the top.

In the past twenty-four hours, she'd scaled two fences, so she'd seen this one and thought no sweat without making sure it could be scaled without grappling hooks.

The demon growled in her gut. Get the hell over that fence. Get through it. Smash it down. Karl is over there, in danger.

Which was all very fine, but unless the demon could conjure up real superpowers for her, she wasn't flying over or through that fence. She kept jogging along, hoping a way over would miraculously appear. A ladder would be good. A rope just fine. Hell, at this point, she'd settle for a strong vine or overhanging branch. She found two knotholes, but even her size-five toes weren't squeezing in them.

Could she get around the back end? If the fence belonged to the motel, it would stretch the full perimeter.

Just get past it, the demon screamed. Around, over, through. Get Karl!

Every second she fussed was another second for the Cabal to load him into a van… if they hadn't already. She had to go back the way she'd come. She turned… and there was Rhys, running full tilt toward her.