Touched by Fire (Demons of New Chicago #1) - Kel Carpenter Page 0,1
grimaced. He turned on his heel and bolted through the back door while I stood there shaking my head.
Typical. Fucking typical.
This was exactly why I worked alone nowadays. Trenton just happened to be a high-profile client that needed some semblance of discretion. So much for that. As I bent to grab him by the collar of his shirt, I noticed half the bar behind me had stood up.
Goddamn supernaturals.
Always with the pack mentality.
They could fight among each other like dogs, but when a human entered the mix, it was us versus them.
“What are you doing?” Crouched over, I peered between my legs at the big burly man and cursed. He was probably a shifter, and an alpha, given the assertiveness. Betas were more my style. Omegas didn’t bother with shit unless there was literally no other choice.
I straightened my back and gazed over at him.
“Mind your own business, buddy,” I said. “You don’t want to get involved.”
He stepped forward. “Actually, I think I do.” Yup, my initial guess was right. Definitely an alpha. Standing behind him was probably a group of betas. Not to mention the other supes in the bar. I let out a ragged breath. My heart started to speed up.
I didn’t panic. Not like most humans.
When confronted with conflict, I got this giddy excitement inside. It was crazy, and extremely self-destructive, but all my life I’d found myself unable to back down from a fight if directly faced with one.
“I got a bone to pick with this guy,” I said, nudging Trenton with my boot.
“Really?” the alpha said, taking another step forward. “Because it looks like you’re a hunter, and I don’t like hunters.”
I lifted both hands in surrender, though one of them was holding a firearm, so I doubted it looked as innocent as I’d hoped. “I’m not with human patrol,” I said, and for once I was telling the truth. What I didn’t say was that I used to be. It was how I got my start. “This isn’t a speciesist thing.”
“Who’s your boss?” the alpha asked, and I knew this was going to go one of two ways.
I could tell them who I worked for, and there would be good odds everyone would sit the fuck down. But my boss didn’t exactly like being known. He liked it even less when his employees used his name to get out of trouble. Wasn’t good for business.
If I told them who, and he found out—which he would—I’d be fired within twenty-four hours as the best-case scenario. Worst-case, he’d take it personally and my head would come off.
Which meant plan B.
I groaned.
“Why couldn’t Egzy do the one thing,” I complained. Using my foot, I kicked the unconscious dude in the side, and he went sliding under the table I’d been seated at. In a single motion, I cocked my gun and fired.
The bullet landed between the alpha’s eyes. The skin around the edges glowed orange and sizzled. He fell backwards, hitting the floor with a loud thud.
The sound seemed to spur the bar into motion. All at once, half of it tried to flee and the other half decided to stand their ground. I ran, sliding over the bar top and flipping over the other side to land on my ass and hide behind it. I pulled the second pistol from my jacket, turned, and peered over the edge.
Supes mowed over one another to get to me and I opened fire.
Gunshots went off left and right, loud enough to only add to the pandemonium. Bullet casings hit the veneered counter with little tinks. I shot one after another, aiming for the same place each time.
The fun thing about supes was that for a long time they were really fucking hard to kill.
Each of them had different weaknesses, and most of them were nothing like the legends.
Vampires, while they didn’t like sunlight, they didn’t burn alive in it. It just blinded them.
Werewolves weren’t allergic to silver. At all. In fact, no metal really harms them. It’s where you hit them that matters.
Witches and warlocks would be the easiest, were they not such a pain in the ass to get near. A single word or wiggle of their fingers and they could kill you faster than you could kill them.
And that was really just the tip of the iceberg as far as supernatural species went.
The one thing I really had going for me was that I was a near-expert on all of them.