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Clicking my tongue angrily, I twisted one of his fingers and the giant oversized dude was brought to his knees. The brown-haired steroid-junkie yelped when I pulled the digit with spite, punishing him and all the fucking jerks who’d ever made the mistake of underestimating a woman like he had with the action. One glare from me, and his buddies were smart enough to take a few steps back and shut their damn mouths.
“You touch another fucking woman without permission and I’ll come back to break this finger, and maybe another more sensitive appendage…” I warned in a hissing tone. Someone cackled next to me, and I turned to find the very person I’d been searching for in the crowd.
“I’m glad to see you haven’t changed,” the familiar face said, eyeing the dude on his knees. “I’d take the warning and scuttle home, mate. She always keeps her violent promises.”
The whimpering man-child high-tailed it out of there with his buddies in tow when I grumpily released his finger, and I was left with another fucking problem I didn’t need.
Pivoting, I glared at the man in front of me, clearly ready for a fight. The man I’d never outrun, Aidan, stood there, his kind eyes riddled with both relief and despair.
I hated that fucking look on him, and it ate away at my resolve to leave. It made me waver in my convictions and determination to punish the world of men and demons. He embodied a person I thought was lost; the person I could be if I truly let myself heal. Suddenly, I was saturated in an emotion I promised never to feel again.
Guilt.
Fucking shit!
“How did you find me?” I demanded, already looking around for somewhere to bind and stuff the Shadow Stalker.
But the South African was a slippery devil and would find a way out of any bindings I used on him, which only made this happy little reunion that much more annoying. Of all the days, he chose today to do what Aidan did best—be an obnoxious pain in my ass.
“Don’t be mad,” my annoying stalker-slash-friend started, and I already knew it’d piss me off from his tone, “but I may or may not have put a tracking bug into every bat you own. Just to make sure I could find you if you didn’t come back and needed my help, promise.”
Clever asshole.
“Aidan—”
“I waited,” the Shadow Stalker cut in, his sparkling eyes digging into my chest where I felt things I didn’t want to feel. “You want me to blame you, but I never will, Lady. We all knew what this job meant, and we were willing to die for it. But that’s not why I’ve come looking for you. Whatever strong demon attacked you put my grandfather and his Shadow Stalkers on high alert. They blame you. They think you did this.”
I swallowed and stole a look around me, damning him. “I’ll deal with it, Aidan. I’ve got bigger fish to fry though, so go.”
“Lady, I know you’ve partnered with a demon,” my longtime friend whispered urgently, and I took a step back. “I didn’t come here to stop you. I thought about what you said, and if this demon is like you, then I want to be part of it. You proved to me that demons can be more than just what we think, and I made a promise to you, remember? I said I’d always be by your side, even if the rest of the world was against you.”
Goddamn persistent asshole…
“Aidan, you can’t do this. I won’t let you. Just trust me to do what I need to do—”
My friend took a step forward, his eyes locked with mine. “I trust you, and that’s why I’m here. That’s why I won’t leave, no matter what mean things you say to me.”
Mean things? What were we, five?
When I laughed without meaning to, Aidan’s smile reappeared and he crossed his arms like he’d already won.
Dammit!
“I fucking hate you sometimes,” I spat, throwing my head back petulantly.
Aidan offered me his smarmiest smile yet. “I know. But I’m just as determined to make the ones who did this pay as you are. If I die doing it, it’ll be worth it.”
No matter what I said, he’d do what he wanted. Aidan always did. It was one of the things I liked about him, even though it was shit to deal with when I was his goal.
Aidan was one of the best trackers, so he had probably already done something to ensure I couldn’t get away even if I ditched all my favorite bats. I’d never shake him. But if he died, I didn’t know if I’d ever forgive myself for leaving him here tonight. It’d always haunt me, and I wasn’t ready to spend the next however long I had left regretting it.
Like I didn’t have enough to worry about, now I had Aidan and the Shadow Stalkers to figure out.
Suddenly, I noticed the crowds had thinned so much that a few faces stood out amongst the rest. Ones I’d want to bash in with the very tracking device in question. So, I readied my bat and put an end to our happy little mid-mission reunion.
Aidan, like it was any other mission, had his weapon out, and we both took a quick side-step into a nearby alley. It was our usual move to funnel our enemies into a space that forced single-demon combat, though we rarely faced this many at a time. Still, procedures like this existed for the inevitable fights ahead.
Like I hadn’t abandoned him, Aidan offered me his usual cheeky smile before we both swung into action. Flitting past him, I smashed one demon after another. I counted seventeen heads, bashing three in succession with my good ol’ spikey friend.
