Angel Town Read Online Free PDF Page A

not.
    I closed my eyes, told the gnawing in my belly to go away, and waited for dusk.
    It was as good a plan as any.

5
     
    I reached down with my left hand, slowly. Pushed my right sleeve up, heavy leather dried stiff with blood and other things. Unsnapped the buckle. Dropped the cuff on the floor, and turned my wrist so she could see.
    The air left her all in a rush, as if she’d taken a good, hard sucker punch. “Jesus,” she finally whispered, the sibilants lasting a long time. “Jill—”
    “This stays between us.” I was now back to sounding like myself, clear and brassy. All hail Jill Kismet, the great pretender. “I’m going to take care of it.”
    She didn’t disbelieve me, not precisely. “How the hell are you going to do that ?”
    I shrugged.
    She read it on my face, and another sharp exhale left her. “And if…”
    I suppose I should have been grateful that she couldn’t bring herself to ask the question. So I answered it anyway. “If it doesn’t work, Anya, you will have to hunt me down. No pity, no mercy, no nothing. Kill me before I’m a danger to my city. Kill Perry, too. Burn him, scatter the ashes as far as you can. Clear?”
    She grabbed the absinthe bottle. Tipped it up, took a good, long, healthy draft, her throat working. “Shit.”
    “Promise me, Anya Devi. Give me your word.” Now I just sounded weary. My cheek twitched, a muscle in it committing rebellion. The scar cringed under the assault of sunlight, I kept it out. The pain was a balm.
    She lowered the bottle. Wiped the back of her mouth with one hand. “You have my word.” Quietly.
    I dropped my right hand. With my left, I pulled the Talisman up. Freed the sharp links from my hair, gently. It was hard to do one-handed, but I managed. I took six steps, laid the Eye on the table. The sunsword quivered. “For Gilberto. Will you…”
    “You don’t even have to ask. I’ll train him.”
    Then she offered me the bottle.
    Tears rose hot and prickling. I pushed them down. Took a swallow, the licorice tang turning my stomach over and my cracked lips stinging. When I handed it back to her, she didn’t wipe the mouth of the bottle. Instead, her gaze holding mine, she lifted it to her lips, too.
    I bit the inside of my cheek. Hard, so hard I tasted blood. The thought that it would be tinged with black made my stomach revolve again. There were so many things I wanted to say. Things like Thank you, or even, I love you .
    Because I do. We are lonely creatures, we hunters. We have to love each other. We are the only ones who understand, the only ones who will ever understand.
    Except I wasn’t a hunter anymore, was I?
    “I need a car,” I croaked. “It won’t be coming back.”
    * * *
    When I woke, the dream faded. For a second I had everything, it trembled inside my head…then it was gone. And I needed to go, too. Dusk was rising, and something told me the hotel might not be…safe. The need to get out and move itched under my skin.
    I found out something else, too: I liked heights. I especially liked gliding along rooftops like a ghost, peering into the streets below. Looking for something I couldn’t define while dusk rose from every corner, cloaking the city in peculiar static heat, the rising wind bringing me an oddly familiar tang of river as everything exhaled.
    Preparing for the plunge into darkness.
    Everything about it was familiar. Even the shapes of the city streets, the arterial bloodflow of traffic, the quiet neighborhoods and the back alleys, the parts that lit up only when the light failed. And yet, everything was unfamiliar—the sneakers were too light, and I felt oddly naked. Like I should have more, a heavy weight on my shoulders and something flapping at my ankles, something on my face and those little weights tied into my hair. Not to mention the fact that my left hand kept dropping to my side like it expected to find another gun. Or something else.
    The city revolved inside my head. I knew the street