A drop of Boyle’s acidic blood from where her bullet had nicked him dropped onto her leg, burned a hole through her jeans and touched her skin. White hot pain seared through her.

Isabelle screamed.

Boyle recoiled in surprise and she managed to push up and aim the gun at him. She squeezed off a shot, but the demon pushed her hand at the last second and it went wide, ricocheting off a nearby wall.

“You have new weapons,” Boyle hissed.

One hand pinned her wrist and the other came down over her throat as he straddled her. Her windpipe closed and her eyes bugged. The primal terror of having her breath cut off shut down her brain for a moment and made her thrash as hard as she could…to no avail.

Her hand went to his wrist, her fingernails digging in. The syringe was so close, but she couldn’t reach down and pull it free, couldn’t take her hand from Boyle’s wrists in a desperate and futile attempt to grasp it.

But why wasn’t he killing her?

Distantly, in the back of her mind, rationality flickered. He couldn’t kill her. Not now. Not yet. Not this way.

From the mouth of the alley came the sound of pounding footsteps and yelling. It was about time. Granted, it was the dead of morning, but two shots fired and a woman’s scream should have roused someone.

“I’m coming for you soon,” he growled low. “This information I give you is a gift. Take advantage of the time you have left and make yourself ready to die.”

A figure rose up behind Boyle and struck the demon over the back. Boyle grunted and backed away from her, rising and whirling around to roar at his attacker, still shadowed from Isabelle’s view. Men yelled and shots rang through the air.

Boyle’s charge on the witches was short-lived. Rolling to her side, she watched the demon scramble backward under the assault of copper-filled bullets. Likely, Boyle understood that the guns the attacking witches wielded were not ordinary. Boyle spared one last look at her, his expression intent, and then, instead of poofing through a doorway, he took off down the alley.

Isabelle lay on the ground taking in gulpfuls of bad air and watched Adam, Theo, Micah, and Jack run past her in pursuit of Boyle.

Thomas came down at her side. “Isabelle, are you all right?” All the blood had drained from his face and he looked exceptionally pissed off. Not at her, she presumed.

She coughed and snaked her hand into his lap. “I thought you said you weren’t going to give me space?” she gasped, her voice raspy. It was a joke, but he didn’t take it that way. A look of profound guilt passed over his face. She felt the pinch of it through her empathy.