A Clash with Cash #3
I stepped forward, stealing the string from Phillip’s pocket and quickly pinning the Dark Fae to the floor with my knee.
“I don’t need you. I could easily kill you for the part you played in my parent’s death, Dark Fae.
I owe you nothing.” I swiftly looped the string around the pinned Fae’s neck, ready to decapitate him. “I owe you nothing,” I repeated.
Phillip crouched in front of Cassius, smirking. “Sorry, old friend. In the future, you’ll remember not to piss her off. She’s stronger and faster than me, and she’s got more reasons to want you dead than alive.”
The string around his throat moved as Cassius’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “You’re right. Silly me. That was such a rude request.” I dug my knee into his back, and he groaned. “I’ll remember it in the future. We’ll call it even for letting your parents die.”
Burning heat reached my eyes with the blasé way he talked about my parents’ death, but I reined it in. A good Hunter never let the emotion show on their face. “So, you’ll do it and tell no one?”
“We’ll do a blood vow, you and I,” Phillip followed up, causing the man beneath me to audibly groan in protest. “Otherwise, you may be inclined to sell the information to the highest bidder.”
“A blood vow?”
“It’s something you can only strike up with a magic-user like him. It binds the vow in blood and will immobilize their magic if they break it.” The Austrian’s light eyes glinted devilishly. “It’d render someone like Cash useless and vulnerable, and therefore open to attack.”
“You’re a serious bastard, Phil,” Cassius complained. “Fine! I’ll do it. Get this strong-ass chick off of me.”
Phillip’s mouth quirked upwards before his eyes found mine. “You heard the man. We’re running out of time, and I’d like to get out of here before the Organization catches wind of him being here.”
Wait, what?
“Eyes everywhere,” Cassius grumbled. “Okay. I do this and you can’t hunt me down after today. I can’t be an informant to you anymore. She’ll bring them right to me.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Phillip replied as I released the man beneath me. “Do it and go. I don’t care.”
I moistened my lips, trying not to let my thoughts stray to what I’d learned about not only my parents’ deaths but myself. “I really wish I could drink alcohol…”
Phillip touched my cheek affectionately, his expression giving away his tender regard. “You and me both, engel.”
Cassius watched the exchange. “What’s going on between the two of you? I sense something naughty.”
I glared at the light-haired menace. “You’re really working hard to be pinned back to the floor, aren’t you?”
“Oh, I like how feisty this one is. She’ll do great things.
” Cassius pulled out a dagger from his coat, then cut into his wrist. “Let’s get this blood oath over with so I can get the hell out of here.
” The two did some seriously confusing hocus pocus before Cassius was back in front of me, his purple magic glowing around his body again.
“This probably won’t hurt,” he said, skeptical of his own words.
Great.
“Anything funny and I kill you,” I promised.
Phillip chuckled lightly. “He won’t. Cassius may be a lot of things, but first and foremost, he’s a coward.”
Cassius mumbled angrily under his breath. “I prefer caution prone. No sense in dying when you can run away.”
So, a coward.
“Well, at least I’ll know never to rely on you,” I commented viciously, uncomfortable with him touching me.
Cassius shrugged as the purple glow traveled down his arm and took shape over mine. “That’s fair. If not for the fact that Phil’s helping keep me alive, I’d have nothing to do with him.”
“That’s the sweetest thing you’ve ever said to me, Cash.”
The Dark Fae rolled his eyes and focused on my arm. When the purple glow continued up my arm and across my chest, something inside of me came to the surface. Then, in an instant, my skin was on fire and burning. I started to yank my arm away from his hold, but the Fae tutted me with his tongue.
“Almost done,” Cassius exclaimed over the loud crackle of his magic, holding tighter. “If you pull away now, it’d make things worse. The seal can’t be broken right now, and you’re stronger than me. Plus, I don’t want to have to regrow an arm tonight or mend a dislocated shoulder.”
I clamped my jaw shut and fought the pain. “How is this world chalk full of snarky bastards like you? Really not loving how many I’ve already met.”
“Hey. Hope you’re not referring to me with that little side remark. I’m basically the nicest person in this room right now,” Phillip commented, though his expression was etched with concern. “Don’t forget, you nearly decapitated him just a few minutes ago.”
Cassius hushed the two of us as we bickered. “Something’s wrong,” he whispered, and the burn in my body intensified. “Shit. This magic’s—”
Before he finished, purple turned to red and exploded between us.
The three of us were vaulted separate directions by the burst of magic and thrown into different walls.
I hit, the surface cratering, and the fire coursing through my veins consumed me.
The red crackle of magic suffused the outside of my body before I collapsed and everything went dark.