Amber allowed herself a short moment of pleasure at the sight of them fleeing, then looked back at the Hound and felt her insides go cold. He got off the bike. Walked up to her.

She flew at him and then a gunshot rang out and she stumbled as the Hound keeled over backwards, a hole in his head. She turned, expecting to see Milo walking up.

Chief Novak approached, that demonic grin stretching across his face as his gun drifted in her direction. “On your knees. Hands behind your head.”

“Seriously?” she said. “I can’t catch one break? I can’t get a minute without someone new trying to kill me?”

“Apparently not,” said Novak.

Amber looked down the barrel of his gun, and did as he’d instructed.

“This is your doing, I presume,” he said. “Endangering a whole town to save yourself.”

The Hound moved, the hole in his head already healed. He sat up, and Novak shot him in the temple and he flopped back down.

“The Shining Demon himself could just walk on in here and there would be nothing we could do to stop him,” Novak said. “For what? So you could prolong your life for another few weeks? He was always going to find a way to kill you. It was inevitable. You wouldn’t be able to run forever.”

“I don’t care about forever,” Amber muttered. “Just about right now.”

“Now? Now I kill you. With the mayor dead, and you dead, maybe the rest of the Hounds will back off, though I doubt it. Not after this.” Novak holstered his gun, hunkered by the Hound, and gripped him under the chin. His nails grew long and cut into the meat, and with some difficulty he pulled the head off. He straightened up and tossed it away. “But I have to try, don’t I? This is my town. I have a duty to protect it.”

Then she heard it, the sound, and she looked to the junction, hope flaring in her chest. It built and built and then the Charger roared across the intersection.

And it was gone again.

Amber sagged, and looked back up at Novak.

“Unfortunate,” he said. “I would’ve really liked to have seen who was fastest on the draw.”

“It would’ve been Milo,” Amber said. “He reads cowboy books.”

And then, screeching round the corner, the beast of black metal, the Charger, with its red headlights and its engine fuelled by the souls of the dead. It braked, and the engine cut off, and the door creaked wonderfully as Milo climbed out.

He took off his jacket, threw it on the back seat, and started walking towards them.

It was almost odd to see someone not in their demon form, but here he was, tall and mean and looking like someone had just kicked his dog.