I didn’t wait to see what Philip was going to do. I turned and started sprinting, but not in the direction of the door like she probably expected. I had no doubt they’d shoot me if I tried to get past them, and I figured I had at least a minute until they could all pile into the van and get clear. There was no way I could run fast enough to make it out before they did, but if I could just remember correctly…

There. Just past the foreman’s office was a bank of windows that overlooked the river. Many of them were broken, but most weren’t. I risked a glance back and saw that the van had cleared the broad doors and was accelerating fast.

Any second now…

I wasn’t stupid enough to try and dive through the windows since I wasn’t sure I had enough mass behind my scrawny ass to actually break through. Instead I snatched up an abandoned chair mid-stride, then swung around in a big arc like one of those hammer-throwing dudes in the Olympics, and let it fly at the windows.

It smashed through with satisfying ease and a few seconds later I heard a muted splash. But I was already moving. I sort of expected the place to blow up right as I was diving through the hole that the chair had made in the glass—because that would have been insanely awesome and dramatic. But instead I simply hit the water in an awkward splash with no explosion to propel me.

The water was cold enough to make me gasp for breath—which sucked ass since I was still underwater at the time. I wasn’t the best swimmer in the world by any stretch, but I finally managed to get my head above water, cough out the nasty river water, and start doggie-paddling away from the edge of the building with everything I had.

The place blew not even five seconds later, and the force of the blast shoved me underwater again. Instinct screamed at me to get my head above the surface, but I fought back and stayed underwater, even doing what I could to get deeper. As I expected, debris began to rain down into the water almost immediately. I barely missed getting clipped by a large section of a brick wall, but I did get smacked hard in the shoulder by a twisted hunk of metal. It bore me down several feet before I could wriggle myself free, all while I hovered right at the edge of full-blown panic. I didn’t want to think what could happen to me if I somehow got trapped at the bottom of the river.

My lungs were bursting by the time I started paddling my way back up. A brick or something equally hard and heavy whacked me on the head right before I surfaced, and I had to tread water for a moment while I fought the dizziness and gulped air. C’mon, little parasite, I numbly urged. I know I’ve been asking a lot of you lately. I promise I’ll give you a nice big brain as soon as we get out of this.

I heard more sirens now, and lots of people shouting. I started paddling again, nice and slow, toward the far end of the building in the hopes that I could get out of the water over there without anyone seeing me. ’Cause I had no idea how the hell I could explain why I was there and what had happened.

I couldn’t feel the cold anymore—couldn’t feel much of anything, which I knew was a damn good thing and a bad thing all at once. But my arms and legs kept moving and the combination of the current and my sloppy paddling finally got me down to the rocks that formed the bank on the south end of the factory.

It took me several tries to clamber up out of the water and onto the rocks. Everything was so numb that I couldn’t get a decent grip and I slipped several times. The hunger was getting damn serious, but at this point I could only hope to maintain enough control not to attack anyone. I didn’t really have a choice. If I stayed in the water it would only make it worse.

Breathing through clenched teeth, I eased my head up over the edge of the bank and peered at the activity. The outer walls of the factory still stood—but smoke poured from what was left of the roof, and flames licked out of the gaping holes that had once held windows. At least half-a-dozen police cars were there, but they’d clearly shifted their mission to keeping everyone clear of the scene until firefighters could get there—which wouldn’t be long to judge from the sound of more sirens and the honks of approaching fire engines.

The wind shifted, sending clouds of acrid smoke over me, but for the moment I welcomed it. At least the smoke drowned out the smell of everyone’s brains, which meant I might actually stand a chance of controlling the hunger for a while longer. I decided not to think about what I was going to do after I got away from here. I didn’t have the faintest damn clue.

Another car pulled up just as I was about to climb the rest of the way up. I hunched down, waiting, then stiffened as the driver got out.

Pietro Fucking Ivanov.

I seized a rock, but before I could carry out my not-very-well-thought-out plan of “run at him while screaming like a maniac and then bash his head in a lot over and over” Marcus exited the passenger side, staring in naked horror at the burning factory. My shock doubled as Ed climbed out of the back seat.

Wow. Apparently a lot had happened while I was gone.

I staggered up over the low wall, hoping that none of the firemen or police were looking toward the river. “Marcus,” I croaked, but there was too much noise. Scowling, I pitched the fist-sized rock still in my hand at Pietro. It missed by several feet, but it did hit his windshield, making a marvelous spiderweb of cracks. All three men turned in unison.

“Hi, boys,” I rasped. “Miss me?”

Marcus ran to me, scooped me up in his arms before I could do more than twitch, then hurried back to the car as Pietro pulled the back door open.

“God almighty, Angel,” Marcus said, sliding in with me and then clutching me close. “I thought I’d lost you.”

“Here,” Ed said, thrusting a blanket at Marcus. “Wrap her in this.”

I lifted my head to look at Pietro as Marcus tugged the blanket around me. His eyes met mine and his face crumpled.

“Angel, I swear I didn’t know that this…” Pietro gestured vaguely in the direction of the factory. “Any of this…I had no idea. I swear.”

I opened my mouth to tell him he was full of shit, to tell him I knew he’d thrown me under the bus, but all that came out was, “Braaiinns.”

Yeah, I was kinda hungry.

Pietro handed me a brain smoothie and then we got the hell out of there. A roadblock had been set up, but Pietro showed the deputy something in his wallet, and was waved on through without any further questions.

I finished the first smoothie and was still in pretty lousy shape, but the other two zombies had apparently planned for the possibility of a high need for brains and had a cooler packed full of smoothies and baggies. The hunger started to fade by the time I finished the third smoothie, but it took me downing two baggies of straight-up brains before I felt even close to “okay.” Damn good thing that Pietro owned some funeral homes.

“We need to talk,” I finally said, relieved that my voice was normal again. “Especially, you, Pietro.” I glared at the back of his head while he drove. “But first we need to go to NuQuesCor.”

“No problem, Angel,” Marcus said. He still had an arm around me which I didn’t mind one bit. “What’s at the lab?”

“Heads,” I said. Ed stiffened and flushed. “I don’t know how many—if any—are still there, but I want to get them back.”

Marcus exhaled and didn’t argue. Not that I expected him to. “It’ll take about fifteen minutes to get there.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Pietro said, pulling out his cell phone.

I narrowed my eyes. “What do you mean? If any of the heads are there, I want them back.”

“And you’ll get them,” he replied, dialing a number. “But you’re looking to break in and take them back by whatever means necessary, right?”

I scowled. “Pretty much. I’m a little tired of playing nice.”

He put the phone to his ear. “Dominica five-oh-four.” A pause. “NuQuesCor in Colomb, Louisiana. Retrieval of any human heads matching the victims of the decapitation murders that occurred in St. Edwards Parish in the last four months. Most likely from the labs of Dr. Sofia Baldwin or Dr. Kristi Charish.” Another pause. “One hour.” He clicked off and set the phone down. “Do you mind if we try it my way first?” he asked me.

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” I muttered, leveling a black glare at the back of his head.

“Fair enough,” he replied. “Why don’t we allow Angel to get cleaned up, and then we can say everything that needs to be said over coffee.”

Chapter 29

When Pietro said he wanted to give me a chance to clean up I figured we’d stop at a convenience store where I could wash the worst of the grime off in the bathroom and then buy a vastly oversized shirt that I could wear as a dress until I could get home. It’s what I’d have done.

That, however, was not how Pietro Ivanov handled such situations. No, instead he rented a room at the only Hilton in St. Edwards parish, handed me the key card, and informed me that if I wanted a shower I should go on up, and that he would obtain clothing for me.

I stared at him for a few seconds, then silently took the card, went on up to the room, and took the hottest shower of my entire life.

He must have made another one of those mysterious phone calls while I was scrubbing blood and river grime off me, because, laid out on the bed when I emerged was a selection of clothing, various toiletries, and even an assortment of makeup—in my damn color palette even. And, finally, a note on the bed that said that the others were down in the hotel café and to please join them when I was ready. I was tempted to take my damn sweet time, but I knew that this whole mess was far from over, and everyone needed to know what was going on.

In the end it took the four of us talking it out to piece together just how the hell everything had gone down.

First, I found out how Ed came to be there with Marcus and Pietro. It was simple, really. After Ed got my dad to his little safe house in the woods, he went straight to Pietro and said, “You fucking owe me.” And, yes, he used those exact words. To his credit, Pietro did agree that yes, he did fucking owe Ed.