Rob Thurman - Deathwish

The Auphe closed it in our faces.

I felt them jerk it out of existence, collapse it into nothingness.

I hadn’t known they could do that. I hadn’t . . . oh, Jesus. It was Niko they wanted first. Last time, this time. The one person I could least afford to lose. The one I couldn’t lose.

The two who had appeared behind us on the upper stairs moved apart, leaving the way clear between them. “Run,” the one with Cambriel’s head said. “Give us our chase. Give us our thrill. Run, meat. Run, whore. Run.”

We did. We ran up eight flights. For anyone else with a concussion it probably wouldn’t have been possible. For Niko it was not only doable, but he had to slow down so that I could keep up. Ultraconditioned athlete or machine, take your pick.

At the fourth-floor landing a man in scrubs and a lab coat was scanning a clipboard. With one quick motion Niko gave him a hard shove back through the door and slammed it in his face. We went up four more before the scream came. He hadn’t stayed behind the door like he should have. I didn’t have time to feel guilt over his death. I didn’t have time for anything but the running, lungs burning and legs propelling with all the strength they had. We were still ahead of them, but only because they let us be. They were taking their time, drawing it out. Having their fun.

The last door was locked. I shot out the lock and we were on the roof. We could’ve gone out onto one of the occupied floors, but I didn’t think that would stop the Auphe. Not this time. They were in the heat of the chase, insane with it. A cold insanity and ready. They were so damn ready. Niko and I ran to the edge. At least sixteen floors up, there was nothing below us but the street. Nothing to hold on to, no way to climb down.

The door slammed open across the roof and they were there. Blood on their teeth and claws, dripping down pointed chins. Running. So quick I barely had time to point the Glock, but not time to pull the trigger—they were so fast they were almost on us when Niko tackled me and we went over the edge. I felt the concrete ledge hard against my knees, the breath-sucking tumble. Then there was free fall, lights flashing past us, and the hard thud of the ground beneath us. Not the street, but the bristle of winter grass.

I’d tried one last time. Tried one last time on the way down to be Auphe, and the Auphe had let me.

Niko rolled off of me to lie at my side, and I stared at the morning sky above Rafferty’s backyard. I waited slow seconds as the air finally began to wheeze back into my lungs. I’d created the gate one floor down as we fell from the hospital roof, the gate open one moment and closed the next. The Auphe had allowed it. Why? Because even in the madness of the hunt they knew what they wanted.

Me. And Niko had played on that when he’d pushed us over the edge. Him they wanted dead, but me they needed alive. They’d still been at their homicidal vengeful play, trying to take him, then the others. I had a feeling, though, playtime was about to be over. They might live almost forever, but they didn’t know that I would. They’d tire of the chase and soon. Torture was good fun and all, but they had their plans too. Then they would all come, and it wouldn’t be long. Not two, not nine, but every last one of them—which would accomplish both their goals. A massacre, and me pulled back to hell to remake the Auphe race.

I coughed and said hoarsely, “I never thought my dick would save our asses.”

“You had to say it, didn’t you?” Niko studied the sky with me. Blue and clear—a good day to still be alive. “But in this case you’re an idiot whose penis did save our lives. And I hope I never have to say or think that again.” It had been our only chance, Nik’s plan, the only way I wouldn’t have seen my brother die before my eyes while they held me back.

And if for some reason it hadn’t worked, hell, hitting the pavement would’ve been one goddamned better way to go.

I hadn’t known that the Auphe would let us escape the relatively painless death of a sixteen-floor fall. I’d strongly suspected, but I hadn’t known. I had known the only other option was not preferable. I turned my head, the grass rustling in my ear, and watched as Cal continued to stare at the sky, memorizing it, as if it were the last one he’d ever see. The faith he’d once had at the beach, the determination since, had drained away, leaving his face blank and empty. I watched it go as the stomach-wrenching nausea from the gate slowly began to subside. Cambriel, and the stranger who’d gotten in the Auphe’s way at the hospital—it was all hitting him now.

He’d kept his word, anticipating the Auphe twice . . . as much as anyone could. You could anticipate a tornado, a tsunami, yet there were times when there was no place to go to escape them. This, I thought, was one of those times.

“Did you flip them off on the way down?” I asked.

“Hell, yes, I did.” He gave a small smirk, but it faded away almost instantly, and the emptiness was back again.

I sat up, reached over him to take his right hand that still held his gun, and placed it on his chest. “If the time comes and we can’t win,” I said steadily, “you go first.” I’d done all I could to protect him his entire life. I would protect him at the end of it as well.

His knuckles tightened on the Desert Eagle. “That won’t stop them from killing the rest of you.”

“No, but it will infuriate them, madden them. If I take the one chance their race has at survival, they’ll take the rest of us quickly. They’ll be too infuriated to do otherwise.” And if they didn’t . . . we’d fight until our choices were gone. If it came to the torture the Auphe had promised, we would have an escape. A clean death. I’d rather die by my hand than the hand of an Auphe. Either way, Cal wouldn’t have to see it. I might not be able to save his life, but I could save him that, and I could save him from much worse. I would never let the Auphe take him again.

He looked at me with eyes unutterably exhausted and far older than they had any right to be. “Together.”

“Together,” I promised. I held up a hand and he let go of the gun to clasp it, hard and desperate, then he pulled himself up to a sitting position.

He let go and rubbed his face. “I think we have codependency issues.”

“There’s no one I would rather have them with, little brother.” I stood and nudged his hip with my foot. “Up. You need to sleep. One hour in a day and a half doesn’t quite qualify.”

“Cyrano,” he responded. The shadows under his eyes had advanced to circles so dark they were almost black. “I don’t think I’ll ever sleep again.”

I thought he would’ve proven that true had I not palmed two sleeping pills at the hospital. Slipped into his coffee, he’d collapsed on the living room couch, dead to the world. Promise, who stood beside me, leaned down to brush the hair from his face. She didn’t bring up the breeding remark the Auphe had made on the hospital stairwell. Either she didn’t truly want to know or knew Cal wouldn’t want me to talk about it. “We’re not going to survive this, are we?” she said softly.

I said nothing. It was answer enough.

“Perhaps you, Cherish, and Robin would if you ran,” I said eventually. “If you hid. Once Cal and I are gone, they’d have little reason to follow you. You can’t torment those who are already dead. Wasting their time on you would be pointless.”

“But the Auphe are mad. What is pointless to us may not be so to them.” Her hand wrapped around mine. “All my life I’ve only survived. With you, I’ve actually lived. That is worth dying for.”