smelled ridiculously good, she noted, and immediately felt bad for noticing.
They’d nearly reached the end of the hall when Allie heard the crash of glass breaking behind them. Then Tybo pushed the emergency exit open and carried her precious boy outside. The door didn’t even start to close before Magnus was passing through as well with her.
“We won’t be able to get back to the SUV unseen.” Tybo’s voice was hushed as he paused to peer along the small paved laneway they’d come out on. It was just a track paved to allow the garbage trucks to come empty the building’s big bins. Otherwise it was usually empty as it was now. They were standing between the back of the apartment building and a high fence that blocked it off from the business plaza beyond.
“Over the fence,” Magnus ordered, and Allie watched with amazement as the man carrying Liam did just that. He took two running steps toward the eight-foot-high fence and then simply jumped over it like some Superman without the cape. He’d barely dropped out of sight on the other side of the fence with Liam when Magnus started forward.
Allie clutched at his shoulders, squeezed her eyes shut, and prayed as they suddenly launched into the air. She stayed like that until they landed on the other side of the fence with a jolt that rippled from his body to hers. When Magnus started running again, she opened her eyes to look around.
They were behind the plaza where deliveries were made to the individual stores, but the men were heading toward the end of it. She thought they’d run around the corner to the front of the stores. There were a couple of restaurants there where they could have sought haven, but instead they went to the back door of the last store with something or other Pizza on the sign. Allie wasn’t sure what it read. She never had spare money for fast food anymore so had never paid attention to the name of the nearby pizza joint, and the men were moving too quickly for her to read it properly before the door was open and they were inside with warm air rushing over them.
“I’ll see about getting us a ride,” Tybo announced.
When the man holding her grunted in what she assumed was agreement, Tybo carried Liam off up the hall toward the noise and delicious smells of the kitchen.
“The boy is safe with Tybo.”
Allie tore her concerned gaze away from the pair to peer at the man holding her. She quickly looked away again, though. Holding her as he was, his face was just inches from hers, his breath feathering her lips and cheeks when she’d faced him.
“You can put me down now,” she said quietly, and after a small hesitation, Magnus bent slightly to set her on her feet.
“Thank you,” Allie said, trying not to sound as relieved as she felt.
“You are welcome.”
Allie glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and then turned toward where she could see Tybo talking to an aproned man in the entry to the kitchen. Her eyes slid anxiously to what she could see of Liam. Her son was leaning into Tybo with his little arms around his neck as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Allie frowned at the sight. Liam usually didn’t take to strangers. Not that he met a lot of them, she supposed as she became aware that the Go bags were slipping and hefted them to a more secure position higher up her shoulder.
“Can I carry those for you?”
Glancing around to see Magnus’s hand reaching for the straps of the Go bags, Allie instinctively jerked back a step and slapped his hand away. “No.”
His eyes widened, but he let the matter go, and instead asked, “Who were those men in your apartment?”
The question brought surprise flashing over her face. “You tell me. They’re vampires like you.”
For some reason her words made him stiffen up like a soldier at attention. His words were just as stiff when he said, “I am an immortal. Not a vampire. And those men we stopped were nothing like me and Tybo. They are obviously rogues.”
Allie frowned at this explanation and was going to ask what he meant when Tybo returned with Liam.
“Time to go,” Tybo announced. “We’re catching a ride with one of the delivery boys. He’s pulling up out front. This way.”
“Just a minute,” Allie said with dismay, hurrying forward to