Ilona Andrews - White Hot

The Range Rover slid again, skidding on the ice. Troy caught the skid, steering into it.

They hadn’t attacked us while Rogan was in the car. They weren’t ready for that confrontation, which meant even now they would want to keep their identity a secret. If I didn’t want an attack to lead back to me, I’d use stolen cars, and if the 4Runner chasing us was stolen, it had no armor.

I tried the window. Locked.

“Lower the window.”

“Can’t do that. Stay buckled.”

“Troy!”

“I lower that window and crash, you’ll fly through the windshield,” he growled.

Getting off the highway was our only chance. “If you don’t roll down the window, they’ll keep shooting us. Even if the car shields us, the bullets will ricochet. There are innocent people on this road. Open the window!”

The window slid down. I unbuckled, took aim at the 4Runner, and fired five shots in a tight pattern. The windshield fractured. The 4Runner dropped back. The semi slid between the 4Runner and us, blocking the shot.

Three rounds left.

Ahead the exit lane for Hammerly Boulevard peeled off the highway.

The semi roared, speeding up. Troy stood on the gas, but it was too late. I locked my seat belt and thrust the gun down to the right, so I wouldn’t shoot myself or Troy.

The semi rammed us. The Range Rover jumped forward, slid, hurtling out of control, the truck thundering past us as it veered back into the left lane. We smashed into something solid. The impact punched me. The gun slipped through my fingers. The seat belt burned my shoulder and chest, knocking the wind out of me.

I opened my eyes. The deflated sacks of the front airbags hung from the dash. Troy lay limp in his seat. The impact had bent Troy’s door in, forcing his seat all the way back and pinning my knees in place. My Glock was somewhere in the car, probably on the floor by the passenger seat on my right, and I had no way to reach it. Great.

“Troy?”

He didn’t respond.

I put my hand on his neck and felt the fluttering of a pulse. Even; didn’t seem weak, although I wasn’t a doctor. I held my hand close to his nose. Breathing. Okay. Where the hell was that semi?

I tried to turn to look behind me and managed a half glance over my shoulder. The semi was gone.

The 4Runner had stopped ahead of us on the tollway in the right lane, its front toward us, oblivious to traffic that had to flow around it. The driver door swung open. A leg emerged below the door. It ended in a hoof.

A wave of dread rolled over me, a sickly overwhelming fear. My heart raced. Cold sweat broke out all over my body. The hair on my arms stood up. I had to get out. I had to get out now.

A second foot joined the first. Something wide and dark rose above the door. The dark thing unrolled and snapped into a leathery bat wing.

My chest hurt. My throat constricted, choking me. I unbuckled the seat belt with shaking hands and jerked, trying to get my legs free. Stuck.

It couldn’t be real. People summoned monsters from the arcane realm, but I’d never heard of anyone summoning actual demons. Yet it was right there, living, breathing, real, and every instinct I had howled and clawed at my logic.

The creature started toward me. Panic clamped me in an icy vise. The demon stood seven feet tall, its enormous leathery wings mottled with green and brown and streaked with thick cables of veins. Python scales sheathed its muscular arms and torso, the ridges of its bones cutting through the scaled hide to form an exoskeleton on its chest. Sharp bone ridges thrust up from its neck and shoulders. Its powerful dinosaur tail snapped from side to side.

Dizziness swirled through me, tiny black dots drifting before my eyes. I had to run away now or I would pass out.

The demon leaped over the concrete barrier separating the tollway from the exit lane. The hooves clattered as they touched the pavement. A ragged hood sat on its head, and within it, a horrible face looked back at me. Pale, wrinkled, with reptilian slits for a nose, it stared at the world with tilted inhuman eyes. They burned with furious violent red. Below the eyes, a wide slash of a mouth bared a forest of narrow, sharp fangs.

I flailed, yanking my legs, but the seat remained wedged. Let me out, let me out, let me out, please, dear God, let me out . . .

The demon jerked the door open.

I didn’t want to die. I would never hug my mom again. I wouldn’t see my sisters grow up. I wouldn’t be there when Bern graduated; I would never find out Leon’s magic. I would never find out if Rogan and I had a chance.

My family would be lost without me.

I wouldn’t die today. Demon or not, I’ll be damned if I lay there, petrified, and let him rip the life out of me. Not today. Not ever.

The demon locked his hand on my throat, pulling me toward him. The monstrous face leaned in, the mouth opening wider, teeth glistening, the red burning eyes excited as he squeezed my throat, cutting off my air.

Lie , my magic whispered.

I clamped both hands on its neck and pushed with all my power. Agony exploded in my shoulders, shot down my arms, and burst into a feathery lightning, biting deep into the demon’s flesh. The creature in my arms screamed, but the shocker’s lightning held it tight and I strained harder, forcing the full reserve of my magic into his flesh.

The scales turned transparent, betraying a glimpse of human skin underneath. Not a demon. An illusion mage. You bastard! Fry, you sonovabitch. Fry.

The illusion broke, a curtain jerked aside, and a man’s face screamed at me, big mouth contorted with pain.

A glowing thread swam across my vision. I had to let go or I’d kill myself.

I unclamped my hands from the man’s neck. He crashed down on top of me. I hit the seat with my side, the dead weight of his body pinning me, nearly crushing me. My back crunched. His feet in black boots drummed the air as he convulsed on top of me. There was nowhere to go. Thick pink foam slid from his lips. I shoved him back as hard as I could and he sagged on the side of the seat, halfway into the car.

I had no idea if he’d survived that. I had to be sure.

My nose was running. Tears rolled down my face, but the panic vanished. I finally saw my gun on the floor, out of my reach.

I gripped the seat and stood straight up, bending forward. My knees popped. I leaned on the left foot and used my weight to wrench the right leg free.

Faint tremors shook the mage’s legs. If he lived . . .

I jerked my left leg free, dove across the seat, grabbed my gun, and fired three bullets into the left side of the mage’s chest. Well, if he wasn’t dead, he definitely wasn’t happy. Great, I’ve turned into my mother. That’s what she would say.

The 4Runner hadn’t moved. Its driver door was still open. Nobody shot at me. Nobody followed the illusion mage.

I grabbed the corpse by the dark long hair and raised his head to see his face. A man in his thirties, tan, sharp-featured, wearing a black T-shirt, a trench coat, and black tactical-gear pants. Never seen him before.

I was a licensed private investigator involved in an accident. The tollbooth camera had likely recorded the crash. All my training said I had to call it in and hold tight until the cops and first responders got here. If Troy had a neck injury and I moved him, he could end up paralyzed. He could be bleeding to death internally.

But Troy and I were sitting ducks here. If that semi came back and rammed us again, there would be nothing left but a metal pancake and a bloody spot. Right now whoever had sent the illusion mage thought he was taking care of the job. If I called authorities for help and he somehow listened in, he would know we weren’t dead. There was no telling who would show up.