Chapters (43)
- The Outlaw Demon Wails
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- The Undead Pool: An Excerpt
- Chapter 2
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Also by Kim Harrison
- Credits
- About the Publisher
“It was an accident,” I finished, putting my knees together as I said it again. “What was I supposed to do? Let them bleed that woman to death?”
“There are always options…,” he cajoled as we turned down my street.
“Tom admitted he called Al with the intent of letting him go to kill me. Said he would get a raise. The girl heard him. Ask her.” I dropped my chin back into my hand and stared at the passing night. Fear gripped my heart at a recurring thought. I had been summoned out of the ever-after like a demon. Would I be drawn back into it when the sun rose?
A huge ache filled me. I just wanted to go home, surround myself with the people I loved, and hide, reassuring my subconscious that I was alive and home, even if I might be dragged back to that hell of an existence in a few hours. That Trent was still there, trapped in a tiny black cell waiting for a horrible, degrading future, didn’t help.
I didn’t like Trent. Nothing could excuse his murdering, drug-lord past, and I’d seen nothing that convinced me he would change that part of himself. But it bothered me; all the good and bad he had done shouldn’t end so uselessly. I was shocked to realize that I cared what happened to him. He was responsible for a lot of good, even if it was for selfish reasons.
Staring out the window as we passed Keasley’s dark house, I rubbed my arm, almost able to feel Trent’s grip there, his last chance to touch someone lingering on me still. He hadn’t asked me to save him. He hadn’t asked me to stay and fight. There’d been no anger or frustration that I was going to be free, pulled to where he couldn’t follow and leaving him to suffer both our punishments.
In the moment when everything had fallen from him, he’d asked me to make sure his people survived. His words had been free of the guilt I now felt. He only sought the reassurance that his people would live, that his life would amount to more than running drugs and murder.
Well, there was no way I was going to make sure the elves survived. He could do his own dirty work. I’d simply have to rescue him so he could do it himself. Crap on toast, I really needed to talk to Ceri.