got even crazier when several people from the crowd joined in, tackling two of his attackers and dragging them off him. Diego would have thanked them, but then he realized they had Hobbs’s blood on them, too. With the first attackers out of the way, the two he’d mistaken for Good Samaritans immediately launched themselves at Diego, rage on their faces.
Trey yanked him out of the pile of violent humanity, shoving the people Hobbs was controlling far enough back to let them catch their breaths.
“We can’t keep doing this,” Diego yelled, shoving another person back before disarming a second, though he had no idea if the man was there to help him or kill him. “Hobbs could have taken control of dozens of people for all we know.”
“Go after him,” Trey called back, almost taking a knife through the chest from a woman with blank, glassy eyes. “I’ll slow them down.”
Diego didn’t pause, turning to take off running through the panicked crowd at full speed. He doubted anyone would pay attention to someone running as fast as he was when the entire place was going mad.
He didn’t have to go far to find Hobbs’s trail, following it at a dead sprint for two blocks until he smelled the man somewhere directly ahead of him. Apparently, the reporter had been sure his ambush would take care of him and Trey because he wasn’t moving very fast now.
Hobbs saw him just as Diego caught up to him, and dodged into an Italian café. The place was already in turmoil when Diego pushed through the door, people shouting and scrambling for the exits as the reporter backed away, brandishing a knife he must have grabbed from behind the counter.
“Everyone out!” Diego shouted, drawing his weapon and moving forward.
Unfortunately, he wasn’t fast enough to keep Hobbs from getting a hostage, a young girl who couldn’t have been much older than eighteen or nineteen. She struggled with the reporter for a few seconds until he swiped his bloody finger across her neck. The slim girl immediately stopped moving and stared straight ahead. That didn’t keep Hobbs from wrapping an arm around her and dragging her closer, or placing the knife against her throat, careful to make sure it was on the opposite side of where he’d left his own blood.
“Don’t do anything stupid, Hobbs,” Diego warned, moving into a position that gave him a clear shot at the man’s face, no matter how much he tried to hide behind the girl.
“Oh, I won’t have to do anything stupid,” Hobbs said in an incredibly casual voice as he traced the edge of the blade against her skin, enough to bring a line of blood to the surface. She didn’t react. “Because you’re going to step aside and let me walk right out that door.”
“You know I can’t do that,” Diego said, taking a bead on the center of Hobbs’s forehead. He would have pulled the trigger—he knew he could make the shot—but all it would take was one little twitch as the reporter fell and the knife would slice right through the girl’s neck.
“Then I’ll have to kill the girl,” Hobbs sneered, moving the knife a little harder, drawing more blood.
Diego shook his head. “I doubt you’re that dumb. You kill the girl, and I kill you before she hits the floor. I’ll feel horrible about not saving her, but you won’t feel anything at all. Ever again.”
Before Hobbs could reply, the door behind Diego opened and then Trey was there, looking somewhat worse for wear, his tactical vest slashed in several places and a laceration across his left cheek. But his handgun was dead steady as he moved to the side and took a bead on Hobbs from that direction.
Tension filled the air as the sound of sirens drifted closer. The area outside this café was about to get very crowded.
Hobbs must have picked up on that, too. His knuckles whitened where he gripped the knife, dragging the blade a little deeper into the girl’s skin. The way she didn’t squirm or make a sound was creepy and more than a little disconcerting.
“So, how’d you get Dave to share his ability?” Diego asked. He needed to get Hobbs focused on something other than the impending arrival of the cavalry. “Surely he didn’t simply offer it to you. Dave doesn’t strike me as the sharing kind of guy.”
Hobbs gave him an appraising look. “Whatever happened to Dave? You kill him?”
Diego shook his head. “Trying to take