“I’ll find a way to pay you back,” she snarled. “Then you’ll never have to see me again. But if you feel your Viking pride has been dented, and that you have to kill me over twenty-four hundred dollars—which, let’s face it, you probably spent more on those shoes—well, what kind of man does that make you?”

Johan ran a hand across his forehead. “I can’t let you walk out of here, Kitty. Yes, you stole from me, and yes, your stupidity with the backpack cost me a lot more than twenty-four hundred dollars. But you have also witnessed a brutal execution.”

“I didn’t see anything.”

She hadn’t been able to look away, and knew in her soul that, should she survive this, Sly Boy’s rain-cloud face would haunt her dreams forever.

“I made the mistake of trusting you once before,” Johan said, “and it cost me dearly. Letting you live might be the right thing to do, but it’s not the smart thing.”

He nodded at Xander, who lifted Kitty to her feet. She felt his breath on her neck, too close, too intimate.

“I have many notable qualities, but being a good judge of character is apparently not one of them.” A regretful smile touched Johan’s lips. He held his Viking ax with his hands at either end of the engraved handle. The ready position. “I thought you were different, Kitty.”

One more time . . . clutching the deck of her skateboard with both hands, driving the tail backward with an unequaled fury. Except this time Kitty wasn’t imagining it, she was doing it. The fire snapped and crackled inside her. She shrieked—a sound like steam escaping.

Xander was shorter than her by three inches, so the board didn’t strike him in the balls, as she’d hoped, but in the gut—in the delicate lacework of nerves below the belly button. The result was similar. He woofed out a breath and doubled over, letting go of her hair to clutch his middle. Kitty turned quickly, still clutching the skateboard, and smashed the deck into the side of his skull. The force reverberated through the board, into her arms, and across her shoulders. She even felt it in her rib cage. Xander felt it more, though. He wobbled gamely, then fell to his knees. Blood ran from his nose.

This happened quickly. Three seconds max. It took exactly this long for Johan to react. He lunged for Kitty, but she ducked and twisted away from him. In the same move, she got her board rolling on the cement floor, then hopped onto it and pushed away.