Touching Silver (26 page)

Olivia didn’t think. She just ran. She heard Gabriel ahead of her, dragging Stacy up a dark flight of stairs. He had the advantage in the dark house. She could only follow with her ears. Stacy kept screaming, a new shout following each thump of her body against the steps. As hard as it was to hear, Olivia thanked her for each one.
Smart girl. Keep telling me where you are.
She raced up the staircase, and she didn’t pause when she heard somebody behind her, running quickly and breathing hard.

She nearly tripped when she reached the landing, but she regained her footing before she fell on her face. Her feet came down silently on the thick carpet. There wasn’t a single window, a single morsel of light from anywhere. Stacy’s shouts were cut off sharply, as if a hand fell over her mouth, and for a moment the silence completely disoriented Olivia. For a wild moment, she wished she had brought her coin. It would lead her to the girl, even if it stole the rest of her energy in exchange.

She stopped for a moment, pressing herself flat against the wall, her ears straining in the darkness. Somebody was still behind her, and Gabriel was still somewhere in front of her, but with any luck the gloom would work in her benefit. Holding her breath, she willed herself to blend with the shadows. The earlier pain hadn’t faded, and now her body thrummed and pounded with Stacy’s fear. The race up the stairs had only exacerbated the headache, but Olivia forced herself to focus on the world beyond her immediate discomfort.

One single fuck up would end it all. One bad second. One moment of hesitation.

Click
.

A door opening. To her right, but close. Surprisingly close. Had Gabriel been within touching distance the whole time? She hoped he would be stupid enough to turn on a light, but the door shut again without another clue.

She began walking again, running her hand along the wall, searching for the door. The tips of her fingers jammed into the molding, and she skimmed over it to press her palm against the hard wood of a door. The pain behind her eyes shattered, a bubble of red agony bursting, giving her immediate, but not complete, relief. Stacy was behind that door. Olivia didn’t have a doubt in her mind.

She turned the knob quickly, ready to push into the room and save Stacy.
It’s a trap. He would have locked the door
. The thought hit her just as the door swung open, and she hit the floor, rolling away from the entrance as bullets whizzed over her head. The shots told her exactly where Gabriel stood and she remained on the floor, holding her breath once again.

He fired into the darkness six times, then she heard him fumble. Looking for a light switch? She jumped to her feet and leveled her gun. When the lamp overhead sparked into life, her Glock was pointed between Gabriel’s eyes, and his gun was pointing at the floor.

“Missed me,” Olivia said. “Now let her go.”

Gabriel had Stacy trapped against his chest, his arm angled to pin his elbow across her breasts while his hand clamped over her mouth. His long fingers partially blocked her air, and the fresh scratches on his forearm indicated she had struggled—hard—to escape his grasp. It hadn’t worked, though. The steel determination in his eyes was chilling, his body unmoving.

“Now why would I let her go when I’ve worked so hard to get her back, Detective?”

“Because if you don’t, I’ll kill you.” She flicked her thumb over the safety.

He didn’t blink. “I’m not afraid of dying.” His fingers closed over Stacy’s nose, pinching her nostrils shut. “Do you think Stacy is?”

The pain that had disappeared as soon as she found Stacy spiked behind her eye. Her body jerked—she wanted to double-over and clutch her head and try to will the sting away, but she refused to leave herself vulnerable. She knew she couldn’t shoot in her condition. If she missed by less than an inch, she’d hit Stacy.

“You’re not afraid of dying?” She wished her voice didn’t sound so weak. “Don’t you believe in hell?”

His eyes narrowed as they swept over her in a calculated assessment. “Interesting. Have you developed such an affinity for your cases that you’re sympathetic to their pain? Or…”

He loosened his hold over Stacy’s nose enough for her to breathe in shallow, audible pants. Though Olivia didn’t move, her muscles relaxed in tandem with Stacy’s. The lift of his brow meant Gabriel saw it, too, and the change in him was immediate.

“You’re a Keeper.” He gestured at her with the empty gun as he pulled Stacy more tightly against his body. “You have the other coin.”

A Keeper
? She didn’t know what he was talking about, but she heard the capital letter when he said the word. She could deny she had the coin, but it hadn’t been a question. He knew somehow.

“I do. It’s not here. And you’re not getting it.” She tried to gauge her chances of getting a clear shot, but Stacy completed shielded Gabriel’s body. “But it showed me what you were doing to the girls, and it showed me where to find you.”

“Of course it did.” Like she’d said something stupid. “I knew setting those fires would find where that bitch hid the coin from me. You police are so reliable that way. I just never expected the cop to find it to be a Keeper.”

She did not want to have a long chat with this man, especially with Stacy standing between them. But she had to know what was happening, and it didn’t look like anybody else could tell her.

“What is a Keeper?”

His mouth twisted into a knowing smile. “The guardian. To the Silver Maiden, to her priestesses. Your life is bound with theirs. You…” she could practically smell the hunger seeping from his pores. “…are as valuable as any of the others.”

She didn’t believe in destiny, but it seemed everything in her life led up to Gabriel’s revelation. Her decision, over her father’s strenuous objections, to go to the Academy instead of the law school that had already accepted her. Her request for a transfer to Cold Cases just one week after Stacy’s case had been shuffled there. Agreeing to the not-really-a-date with Isaac, and following him from dinner to the arson.

All of that, and more, so she could find the Silver Maiden. So she could protect it from a man who thought he was honoring it.

“And you nearly blew my head off. I hope you take that as a lesson.”

“I take it as fate. Because I don’t miss, Detective.” The sudden flicker of his gaze to the open doorway directed hers for the same fraction of a second his was there. The dark-haired woman she recognized from Isaac’s photograph stood there, breathing heavily.
Marisol
. “Don’t,
prima
. She’s a Keeper.”

Olivia turned, trying to keep an eye on both Gabriel and Marisol. Marisol didn’t hear him. Or maybe she didn’t care. She had a small gun drawn, pointed directly at Olivia. Olivia stood between Stacy and Marisol, and if she moved to dodge the bullet, Stacy would take it in the chest.

“There are others,” Marisol said. “We don’t need her.”

“We haven’t been able to find one,” Gabriel reminded her.

“The window is closing. The moon will set in fifteen minutes. We can
find
another Keeper.”

Several gunshots from downstairs drowned her words. Olivia kept her focus on the woman, taking advantage of the sudden distraction to fire her own gun. The bullet ripped through Marisol’s arm, forcing her to drop her weapon and sending her reeling out of the room. She knew Isaac would be upstairs to find her—she couldn’t let herself believe he had been on the receiving end of those shots.

“I don’t miss either, Gabriel. This is your last chance.”

The dark house was a drawback. A huge drawback. Isaac had no idea which direction the others had taken, and without light, he couldn’t just arbitrarily open doors and look inside to see if they were there. He only knew they were upstairs. The boards creaking above his head were a dead giveaway.

Then the shot gave away even more.

It took too long to find the stairs, and he raced up them two at a time. Not Olivia.
She’s not shot. She’s better than that. Better than the homicidal maniac I just sent her after…

He stopped the train of thought before it careened out of control. Focus on the goal. Parker was down. Only two more left to go.

He made it halfway up before a body slammed into him, nearly sending him tumbling back to the bottom. His hand shot out and grabbed the railing. It didn’t stop the runaway, though. The sound of rushing footsteps faded as whoever it was flew down the rest of the stairs.

The person fleeing wasn’t Olivia. Which meant they were running
from
Olivia. She wasn’t hurt.

He reversed his direction and practically leapt down the stairs. His heel skidded almost immediately on something wet. Bending down, he only had to touch the patch to know it was blood.

Isaac hurried into the room he had just left, resisting the urge to close his eyes against the sudden light. Marisol stood in the circle of stone, blood flowing freely from the arm hanging uselessly at her side to stain the grit around her feet. She chanted in a language Isaac didn’t recognize, a language that sounded like nothing else he’d ever heard. A familiar blue light gathered at her feet.

Nathan was only feet away, but Marisol didn’t acknowledge him, and Nathan did nothing to stop her.

Each word falling from her tongue made the light burn brighter. Isaac almost thought each falling drop of blood did the same. If he shot her, would that speed up the process of whatever she was doing? Obviously she thought it was some kind of escape. What they had been planning for Stacy. What—

Remy.

His head jerked in time to see Nathan come to the same conclusion he had. When Nathan began to run, there was only a moment to make the choice. Which wasn’t really a choice at all.

His shoulder hit Nathan’s midsection, his arms around his waist as he tackled Nathan to the ground. They landed on the circle of stones, and a sharp pain bloomed in his side. Behind them the light exploded, the house rattling all the way to the floorboards, and he threw his body over Nathan’s to shield him from the stones and sand that suddenly flew through the air.

Nathan shoved him away, unmindful of the dangerous debris raining on them. Isaac refused to budge until the final aftershocks ceased. Nathan scrambled away from him and jumped to his feet, his eyes showing a spark of life for the first time since Remy disappeared.

“What the fuck did you do that for?”

Isaac stared at him in disbelief. “You were going to throw yourself into that.” He gestured toward the disaster that had been the middle of the room.

“Yes. I was! Do you have a better suggestion for finding Remy? She’s God knows where, and she’s alone, and you kept me from going to her.”

He didn’t want to hurt his friend. He really didn’t. But Nathan was thinking with his heart, not his head.

“And how do you know she’s not dead? How do you know whatever that fireworks display was, it wasn’t some massive sacrifice? Or that it killed her because she’s not one of those priestesses?” He tried to take a step closer to Nathan, but the other man immediately stepped away, freezing Isaac in place. “You might be willing to run that risk, but I’m not. I’m not letting you do that to yourself.”

“I would have rather taken the chance and died than stay here. And that was my choice to make. Not
yours
.”

The venom in Nathan’s voice was worse than seeing the anger in his eyes. “Yeah, well, turns out you’re not the only one who can make selfish choices like that,” he snapped. “Because I’d do it all over again.”

Turning on his heel, he headed for the doorway. Olivia was still out there. And Gabriel. He’d think about the consequences with Nathan after they were all safe and out of this house.

Earthquake
, Olivia thought immediately as the house rocked around them. But a look of unreserved horror crossed Gabriel’s face, and his arm slipped on Stacy, giving her room to move.

“Down!” Olivia shouted.

Stacy immediately dropped to her knees, wiggling out of Gabriel’s grasp. Gabriel didn’t seem to notice either woman in the room. He tripped over Stacy in his effort to get to the door.

“Freeze!”

Gabriel didn’t stop. She didn’t know where he was going or what he thought he was doing. But she didn’t care. She was going to end it. She squeezed the trigger once, aiming low, for his knee. Gabriel crumpled to the ground, a high-pitched sound that wasn’t a sob, and wasn’t a shout, escaping his throat.

Stacy curled up into a ball against the wall, but in spite of her instinct to make sure the girl was okay, Olivia knew her first priority had to be Gabriel. She edged forward, trying to keep her balance in the still-shaking room.

His foot lashed out, but the earthquake worked against him. His attempt went wide, and he fell against the doorjamb, snarling in pain when his shattered knee slammed against the hard wood.

Gabriel would probably have another gun on him, and when his hand disappeared beneath his jacket, she didn’t want to give him the chance to prove her assumption correct. She gripped the muzzle of her gun and rushed forward, bringing the butt down on the back of his head with all her strength. It connected with a sickening thump and Gabriel’s face hit the floor.

“Olivia!”

Isaac’s voice echoed down the hall, followed by his racing footsteps. She looked up in time to see him skid to a halt, his attention jumping to Gabriel lying half-in, half-out of the room.

“Are you all right? Where’s Stacy?”

Olivia took a deep breath and pointed to the huddled girl. “She’s right here. She’s fine. What happened downstairs? What were all those shots?”

His mouth set into a grim line. “Nathan killed Parker. But Marisol got away. Disappeared like Remy did.” He glanced back at the stairway, and for a second she saw the anguish in his dark eyes. “Nathan tried to go after her, but I stopped him. I don’t think I’m his favorite person right now.”

Olivia touched his arm. “It’ll be okay. Let’s get this mess cleaned up and Stacy home to her family. I’m sure they miss her.”

He caught her before she could turn back to Stacy. “You didn’t answer my question. Are you okay?”