shaede assassin 05 - shadows at midnight Read Online Free PDF Page A

toward me and a rush of anxiety coursed through me. I stilled. Didn’t move a single inch as his gaze passed through me to focus on the passing traffic outside the window. Something about him unnerved me and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
    I let out a slow breath and at the same moment, Ian’s full lips parted. He cupped the back of his neck and rolled his shoulders. Looked like I wasn’t the only passenger in the back seat feeling a little mild discomfort. Good.
    Ian’s driver reached out and cranked up the dial on the stereo. Heavy bass and electronic beats filled the confines of the Escalade in a wild stream of EDM. Swedish House Mafia. I swallowed down a snort. Ian and his crew were almost too cliché. The music vibrated through my incorporeal form in a wavelength that I felt deep in the center of my being. Ian didn’t seem to notice the music as his guys in the front seat bobbed their heads to the beat. He sat still as a statue, his gaze burning a hole straight through me, as his lips formed a hard line.
    I needed to get this job done . Before Ian’s strange behavior creeped me the hell out.
    His gaze focused. Not on the passing traffic, not on the guys in the front seat. His cold gray eyes dialed in…on me. Tendrils of shadow writhed around me, echoing my physical agitation. The son of a bitch looked right at me and a ribbon of icy fear unfurled within me.
    No. It was my imagination. A human couldn’t see through shadow. Couldn’t see me. There was nothing special about Ian Dexter. He was simply another black-hearted thug who’d outstayed his welcome on this plane. And his time was up.
    Whether it was my own stupid fear that prompted my actions or not, I drew my blade and struck. The dagger pierced his jugular and ribbons of crimson gushed from the wound as I withdrew the blade. My breath left my lungs in a rush as a wry, knowing smile curved Ian’s lips.
    “Sh—aede.” The sound gurgled from his throat in a hoarse whisper as he bled out beside me and those gray eyes that had seen right through me, went suddenly blank.
    The car sped away and I let it pass out from under me. I brushed the asphalt below, frozen in place in the middle of the street as late night traffic passed on either side of me. My heart raced in my chest as I watched the Escalade disappear in a sea of red taillights. I didn’t dare reclaim my corporeal form. Not when I was so thrown off my game. Instead, I raced toward Belltown and The Pit. I’d been so damned rattled by Ian’s dying word that I didn’t even snag his gold medallion of Saint Jude that he wore around his neck as proof of death. Damn it. I’d never botched a job for him before. Tyler was just going to have to take my word for it.
    “How did you know I wasn’t human?” I’d taken my ass chewing for not retrieving Ian’s medallion, and it was time to move on. The client wanted the drug lord’s death to be low-key, but word would spread in the underground. Ty would get wind of it whether or not I’d supplied him with a trophy. It was all the proof he’d need and his anger would be short lived. I was through with shop-talk. Right now, I needed some answers for myself.
     “What do you mean?” Ty’s tone remained flat, the edge of annoyance at my minor fuck-up not yet forgotten.
    “You know damned well what I mean.” Ty had sensed my otherness from the get-go. It hadn’t taken long for him to call me on it. As far as I knew, he was the only human who knew about my supernatural existence. But Ian Dexter’s reaction as he bled out beside me, made me realize that I’d been foolish to assume that Ty was one of a kind. At least in regards to his supernatural knowledge.
    “Anyone close enough to you could tell,” he remarked with a shrug. His gaze didn’t meet mine. Instead, he kept his attention focused on the crowded dance floor.
    Ty was the only person I’d let into my life since Azriel had left me. He didn’t know much about me and yet, he knew