“And the Báthorys aren’t the only ones missing some dealers,” Ord continued. “The Gedeon organization and Frontino family also have fewer employees than they had two weeks ago.”
A buzzer sounded in the front of the store. The owner came down the hallway to the back.
“Delivery, sorry for the interruption.” He went to open the back door.
Ord made an impatient sound. “If this place wasn’t so perfect for me, I’d have moved by now. The noise lately—”
The owner’s body flew across the small storeroom and smashed into a wall lined with steel shelving. The shelving fell against a stack of boxes filled with garlic, which toppled onto the floor.
None of this affected the stance of the balaclava-wearing gunman who fired a spray of bullets through Ord’s open door.
Ord hit the floor behind his desk. I plastered myself against the wall next to the door. Ian made a flying dive out the door and onto the floor of the storeroom, his gun drawn. This unfortunately coincided with the boxes falling over.
On top of my partner, burying him in garlic.
The gunman turned and ran.
Oh, hell no.
“You okay?” I yelled over the ringing in my ears from the gunfire.
Muffled curses coming from under the boxes indicated the affirmative.
This wasn’t a robbery. The shooter had been posing as a delivery guy.
He’d been aiming at Ord.
“In pursuit,” I yelled over my shoulder.
Ian’s muffled curses were less muffled. I chose to ignore the “No!” that I really couldn’t be all that certain I’d heard.
What wasn’t muffled was Ord slamming and locking the door to his freezer/office.
Apparently there were limits to his Southern hospitality.
The one thing I hadn’t needed any training on when I’d started working at SPI was running. I’d mostly used it to run away from something trying to kill and eat me, though not necessarily in that order. Running was both offensive and defensive. Running from took the same skill as running after. Either one could help keep you alive.
Today I was running to apprehend an assassin who just tried to kill my best source, even though Ord had locked me and Ian out of his office. I tried not to think that said assassin had a gun and had just displayed a willingness to use it. I also had a gun, but was lacking in enthusiasm.
Ian would follow as soon as he could wrestle his way clear of those boxes. Yasha was circling the block waiting for our pick-up call.
Yasha Kazakov was our driver. Catching supernatural bad guys was easier than finding a parking place in New York. A driver who wasn’t shy about throwing his weight around was a must. Yasha was also a nearly hundred-year-old werewolf, but he didn’t look any older than Ian. With the Russian werewolf’s preternatural hearing, I was sure he’d heard the shots.
“Yasha, pursuing suspect on foot,” I said into my new phone’s earpiece. I sucked in a double lungful of air. “Approaching Greenwich Street.”
If there was one thing that Yasha loved, it was running down bad guys of any shape or substance with the Suburban that he considered his partner. I’d never asked if he loved her more than me or Ian. I didn’t think I wanted to know the answer.
“Am half block away,” came the Russian werewolf’s voice in my ear.
I hoped Yasha wouldn’t do a three-point turn or drive on the sidewalk to intercept the gunman, but I wouldn’t put it past him. Heavy traffic or no traffic, if Yasha thought he could do it, he would. The Russian werewolf’s mantra was, “I saw it in a cartoon once and I think I can do it.” There were two werewolf packs in New York: one in Manhattan and another in the outer boroughs. Yasha wasn’t a member of either one. He considered SPI his pack.
There were plenty of disadvantages of working for a secret agency, but the biggest pain in the ass was not being able to yell “NYPD! Freeze!” At least not legally.
When in pursuit of an armed suspect running down a busy sidewalk, the goal was to catch the suspect without anyone being shot. In theory, a suspect trying to get away didn’t want to bring any more trouble down on their heads by opening fire on a crowded street. And the West Village was definitely crowded with traffic and people.
Even with all the foot traffic, I had no trouble spotting him.
He’d taken off his balaclava to try to blend in, but all that did was give him a serious case of hat hair.
He definitely wasn’t a goblin. He wasn’t using a glamour of any sort, and silver skin would’ve been a standout. As far as I could tell, the ears had rounded tips, which eliminated him being an elf. Besides, he couldn’t run nearly fast enough to be an elf.
Until I could get a closer look at him, I’d say he was human. About six foot. Dark blond hair standing straight up, presently weaving through the pedestrians near the end of the next block at Hudson Street.
Bingo.
Beyond that was Seravalli Playground. If I had anything to say about it, he wasn’t going to get that far. Even though he was running from me, I didn’t delude myself into believing he was scared of me; he simply didn’t want to get caught.
Or he could be leading you into a soul-ripping, heart-staking ambush, my little voice said. Did you ever consider that?
I hadn’t, but I had an assassin on the run in broad daylight, and I would chase him until my lungs exploded if it meant bringing in a man who’d been told to permanently silence Ord Larcwyde—and who had no qualms about me and Ian as collateral damage. That was someone worth interrogating.