“Damn,” I muttered.

A mumbled yell spun me to the right. I hurried, using the tombstones and weeping angels as cover as the yelling grew louder.

No other voices, just the sound of a gagged person attempting to speak. Eric would be gagged; I had no doubt about that. Gagged and trussed up like a turkey for Thanksgiving.

“Shut up, you!” A man’s voice cut through the air, sharp, like the crack of a whip. I shivered and crouched lower against the gravestone to my right. I peeked around it.

A perfect shaft shot high into the air, like the steeple of a church but with no church attached to it, the spire high above our heads. Feish lay against the stone base, lightly illuminated by a lantern on the ground, her yellow-green skin looking even more yellow than normal.

Next to her was a second figure, this one trussed up differently, and far more securely than her simple ropes. Bound in metal, he didn’t move, but there was no doubt in my mind it was Crash.

What the hell was this? I wasn’t expecting to have to rescue him.

One person watched them. One person?

Where was Eric?

Those two questions banged around inside my head, telling me they were important. Why only one person if Crash was so dangerous?

I pushed it away, getting myself ready to do something. Feish needed to be saved. And apparently Crash too.

I had no idea where Eammon or Tom were. But the knife-throwing thing that Officer Jonathan had taught me all those years ago would do just fine if I could get the guard to turn away from me and give me his back. I scooped up a couple of rocks in my left hand and threw them to the other side of the spire thing, away from me. There was a muted thud. The rock had hit something other than stone or the hard ground, but it didn’t matter—it had worked.

The guy watching Feish and Crash turned his back to me.

“You there!” he roared, pointing into the darkness, and then Eammon yelped as he was dragged out from his hiding place.

Whoops.

No way was I going to try and throw a knife when this guy had Eammon in hand.

What else did I have?

I swung my bag around the front of me, stood, and walked toward the spire as if I belonged here. “Excuse me, can you help me? They seem to have locked the gates and I can’t get out.”

The guy spun around to face me, still holding Eammon with his feet hanging high above the ground, his face slowly going purple.

I frowned. “You should put him down. He doesn’t look well.”

“Listen, Karen,” the guy drawled, dropping Eammon and walking toward me. “You need to leave before you see things you can’t unsee.”

Call me Karen, would he? I put my hands on my hips. “I want to speak to your manager. Immediately. Is this how you treat tourists?”

He looked over his shoulder at Eammon as if they were suddenly friends. “Tourists, am I right?”

He turned back to me as I swung a right hook I’d been just waiting to use. I caught him in the side of the head, right in the temple.

“Get him!” Eammon yelled.

“What do you think I’m doing?” I yelled back as the guy went to his knees. I completely forgot about the knives, because let’s be honest, I’d done enough damage.

I used my bag that was full of all sorts of stuff, including Gran’s book.

I swung it like a golf club, in a good uppercut that clapped his teeth shut and made his eyes roll in his head as he fell backward. He lay flat on the ground as Tom arrived, no doubt attracted by all the commotion.

He shook his head and scratched the top of his head. “How are you doing this?”

“Lucky? I do have a leprechaun with me.” I pointed at Eammon. “Even if he is half strangled.”

I hurried over to Feish’s side and cut her loose of the bonds around her wrists and ankles. She threw herself at me and I hugged her back, hard. “I’m so sorry!” I said, “Are you okay?”

“No,” she said. “Not your fault. Bad men came back, and Boss was sleeping.”

“It was my fault they came, looking for the knife I took.” I touched my hand to the purse at my side. Did a quick check and indeed it was still there, I could feel its shape through the leather. I looked over, assuming that Eammon and Tom would have set Crash free.

Nope. They stood a few feet back while he glared at them. I grabbed the lantern the guard had and dragged it over to where I could see the chains around his feet. I pointed to Eammon and then the guy I’d knocked out. “Eammon, see if boy-o over there has some keys.”

A moment later, a set of keys was pressed into my hands. I unlatched the ankle wraps first and dragged them away from Crash. I looked up to see him watching me. “You don’t have a gag on. Did you bite them?” A flash of something I would have called fire whipped through his eyes, enough to give me a shiver. “I’d be pissed too if I was dragged out of bed and wrapped in chains. Especially after someone stole your knife.” I grimaced. “I was going to bring it back. Honest. At least until I realized it was going to be used to kill my friend.”

He didn’t say a word. That was not good.

When I moved to Crash’s wrists, Eammon grabbed my shoulder. “Be careful, lass.”

“Back up then, if you’re so scared,” I said as I slid the key into the lock. I really should have listened to him. I should have remembered how easily Crash had knocked me across the room. And I’d just reminded him that I’d basically stolen from him, which was kind of what had put him in this position.

He lunged forward, grabbed me by the elbows, and stood as smoothly as if I weighed nothing. “Where. Is. The. Knife?”

“Put me down,” I said.

“WHERE IS IT?” He roared the words and a feeling washed over me that had no place in our present situation. Calm. I was totally calm.

“When you’re done with your little tantrum, we can discuss it.” I kept my eyes on his, so I caught the flicker there. Just the slightest crack in his armor. “Seriously, I know you’re strong, we all do, but I still have to find Eric, and you’re slowing me down. I won’t allow it. And you aren’t getting the knife back. Just so that we’re clear on that point.”

His fingers tightened to the point that I knew I was going to have bruises, but I didn’t flinch. If anything, I channeled a little of my gran and tipped my chin upward so I could look down my nose at him. “Grow. Up.”

Eammon let out a strangled noise that might have been a laugh, or maybe a groan. I wasn’t sure which. “You made a knife for some bad people. I took it. Get over it.”

Crash lowered me to the ground. “You are a thief.”

“Why, because I stole your heart?” I said it with all the flippancy I could muster. “The truth is, you’re the criminal here, not me. Right?”

His eyes narrowed. “I am not a criminal.”

“Tell that to the council.” I turned and he grabbed the bag from my shoulder, slick as could be. “HEY!”

He reached into it and pulled out the knife, spun it once and then it just kind of disappeared. “That’s mine.”

“Son of a bitch! If Eric dies on that blade, I will never forgive you!” I glared at him as if my glare would mean anything to him. He tossed my bag back to me which I caught in mid-air, still as light as if there were nothing in it.

His eyes were hard. “You cost me a sale.”

Was that how it was going to go then? “You are about to cost me a bounty if Eric dies. Which is rather beneficial to you, if you recall?”

He put both hands on his hips, mimicking me. “Is that so? The few hundred dollars that you were going to hand me over because of this cheap ass?” He pointed at Eammon who bristled but couldn’t deny that Crash was wrong. That was exactly what Eammon had planned.

I didn’t think my spine could stiffen any more, but apparently, I was wrong. “I would never have shortchanged you.” A thought struck me then, a guess. “Seeing as Jinx directed me here, to you, in essence saving you, I suppose she is working for you? Is she like your guard spider? Damn it, never mind,” I waved a hand between us before he could say anything. “Eammon, we have to go. Eric isn’t here.”

I didn’t wait for them. I hugged Feish again and whispered, “Tea, later this week.”

She squeezed me back. “Tea it is.”

“You are not having tea with Feish!” Crash snapped.

I raised a brow at him. Knowing it wasn’t smart to challenge him, I did it anyway. “You think you can control her?”

Eammon cleared his throat. “He owns her. That’s how it works.”

My jaw dropped and a spew of profanities flowed from my mouth like a lava spray, burning every ear in its path. Eammon and Tom stepped back from me at the words, and even Crash’s eyebrows shot up. “Basically,” I said once I’d run out of some steam, “if you didn’t catch it, that’s a no from me. Feish, we need new people at the Hollows. Come with us.”

“She isn’t free to go,” Crash said, and I would have sworn there was a bit of sadness in the way he said it.

I wanted to argue, I wanted to tell him he was wrong, that slavery was nothing short of barbaric, no matter how you looked it. Only it wasn’t the human world, it was the world of shadows, and I was now as much a part of this world as he was. Slavery? Really? Some of my gran’s teachings bubbled up, reminding me that slavery was still pretty active here, especially for those with underrated powers.

Feish blew me a kiss.

Or I think it was a kiss, hard to say really with those big lips of hers. Maybe she was blowing me a bubble, the equivalent of a fish kiss. “Go, save the bigfoot.”

I wanted to do more for her, but it would have to wait. I walked as fast as I could back to Tom’s parked sedan, Eammon and Tom beside me. I slid into the backseat and closed my eyes. I was going to sleep for a week once this was over, waking only to down an Advil and maybe get a hot water bottle for my lower back. “What the hell now? How do I find Eric?”