Heart of Venom

Chapter Four

The bullet punching into Jo-Jo’s body tore her loose from the men who’d been holding her. She gasped in pain, and her head snapped back against the wall, but she didn’t go down.

So Grimes shot her again.

This time, Jo-Jo’s bare feet slid out from under her, and she crumpled to the salon floor.

Bria, Sophia, and I all surged forward, struggling to get free of the men who were guarding us, but a ball of Fire magic flashed to life in Hazel’s hand. She spun around in the middle of the salon, laughing, the skirt of her red dress rippling out around her like waves of blood.

“Give me a reason,” she said, smiling at us all in turn, her magic making her eyes gleam with a dark, sadistic light. “Any reason at all.”

I looked at Sophia, but she shook her head at me. She didn’t want Bria or me to get shot—or worse, if Hazel had her way. I ground my teeth together in frustration, but I stopped fighting. I had my family to think about, and there was too much danger of Hazel burning Bria or

Sophia to death before I could kill her. Not to mention the fact that Grimes and the rest of his men could open fire on us at any second.

Sophia realized that I was standing down—for now—and she carefully pointed her right index finger at Jo-Jo, then raised her black eyebrows at me in a silent question.

She wanted me to save her big sister, no matter what happened to her in the meantime. Sophia was willing to sacrifice herself for the rest of us. She knew that the sooner Grimes and his men left with her, the sooner Bria and I could help Jo-Jo. My heart squeezed tightly, but I nodded back at her, telling her that I understood.

Grimes stared down at Jo-Jo, his face perfectly calm and composed. She was slumped against the wall, her skirt up over her knees, her legs sprawled out at an awkward angle. Her breath puffed out in short, painful, ragged gasps, and her hands pressed tightly over the two gunshot wounds in her chest. Blood oozed out between her fingers, dripping down and painting ugly crimson roses on her pretty pink dress. Scarlet specks also covered the white pearls around her throat.

I hoped that she might reach for her Air magic and heal herself with it, but I realized that I didn’t know if she could actually do that. Even if she could, maybe the pain was simply too great for her to concentrate on her magic, or maybe using her Air power now would sap what little strength—and life—she had left.

When Grimes was sure that Jo-Jo wasn’t going to get up, he gestured at some of his men. “You four, stay behind and make sure that Ms. Deveraux dies, then follow us back in the second car. I’m rather tired of knowing that she’s alive.”

His gaze focused on me, then on Bria, and he smiled again. “There’s no hurry, though. I got what I came for, so take a few minutes to amuse yourself with these two, if you want. Just be sure they won’t be able to speak to anyone about it after the fact.”

The four men let out dark, delighted chuckles at the thought of raping and killing Bria and me, but they weren’t nearly as cold and sinister as the black rage beating in my heart. I ignored the men and looked at Bria.

My sister’s blue eyes blazed with anger. I nodded at her, and she nodded back. We knew what we had to do now.

Grimes stuffed his gun back under his suit jacket, then gallantly flipped his gray fedora back up onto his head.

He leaned forward and mockingly tipped his hat at Jo-Jo. She glared at him as best she could, but her eyes were glassy and slightly unfocused with pain.

“I would say until we meet again, but we both know that’s not going to happen,” Grimes said. “But don’t you worry, Ms. Deveraux. I’ll take real good care of Sophia for you. Just like I did before. In fact, I plan to give her my full attention in the days and weeks ahead. After all, we’ve got a lot of lost time to make up for.”

Jo-Jo made a strangled sound, but Grimes had already turned his back on her.

He stepped through the salon doorway and crooked his finger at the two men still holding Sophia, who tightened their grip on her and started dragging her toward the doorway. Hazel stood to the side and watched, that ball of Fire magic still burning in her hand.

But Sophia wasn’t going without a fight. She grabbed on to one side of the doorframe, holding on with one hand and stretching the other out to her sister.

“Jo-Jo!” she rasped, a plaintive wail to her low hoarse tone that I’d never heard before. “Jo-Jo!”

“Sophia!” Jo-Jo screamed in return, holding out one hand and reaching for her.

The two men had their hands around Sophia’s waist, trying to drag her away, but the dwarf was stronger than they were, and she could have held on forever—if the wood hadn’t cracked.

One second, Sophia was hanging onto the doorway.

The next, the wood had splintered off into a long shard, sending her flying back into the hallway with the men.

They landed in a tangle of arms and legs, the men shouting and Sophia snarling.

“Now, now. We’ll have none of that,” Hazel said.

Stepping into the hallway, she grabbed Sophia by her hair, jerked her up, and slammed the ball of Fire magic into her back. Sophia screamed, but after a moment, the flames licking at her T-shirt were snuffed out. Sophia had Air magic, just like Jo-Jo did, and she was using her power to push back against Hazel’s Fire.

But it didn’t work.

As soon as the flames disappeared, more Fire flashed to life in Hazel’s palm, and she shoved it into Sophia’s back, causing her to scream once more. That gave the two men she was fighting a chance to latch on to her again and start dragging her down the hallway.

Sophia fought them—she fought them with all the strength and magic she had, but it wasn’t enough. Not with Hazel burning her over and over again and laughing the whole damn time. The more Sophia struggled, the more magic the Fire elemental used on her, and the more she cackled with glee, until her light, pealing chuckles rang through the entire house.

Sadistic bitch.

As difficult and painful as it was, I shut the sound of

Sophia’s screams and agony out of my mind and focused on the four men left in the salon. They weren’t at all concerned about the elemental battle raging in the hallway.

The two men who’d been guarding Jo-Jo started kicking the dwarf, adding to her injuries, while the two men holding Bria and me decided to listen to Grimes’s advice and have some fun with us.

The man guarding me tightened his grip on my arm, his fingers digging into my skin. “Don’t you worry, honey,” he said, leering at me. “I’ll treat you real good.”

“Really?” I said. “Is that so?”

He pulled me up flush against his body. “Oh, yeah. I’ll give it to you so good that you’ll be begging me for more.”

I coldly smiled into his face, then whipped my right hand out from behind me and stabbed him in the throat with my knife. I yanked the weapon out as brutally as I had driven it in and followed up my first fatal blow with another furious punch to his heart. He was dead before he hit the floor.

He wasn’t going to be the only one, though—not by a long shot.

I shoved the dead man away, grabbed another knife from the buffet table behind me, and headed toward Bria’s man. He was so surprised by what had happened to his buddy that he gaped at me. He didn’t notice Bria drop her hand down to her side or the bluish white light that flickered in her palm as she reached for her Ice magic.

Bria drove her elbow into the guy’s side, making him grunt, release of her, and stagger back. But she wasn’t about to let him get away. Instead, she whipped around, grabbed his jacket, pulled him forward, and shoved her hand into his face with one smooth motion.

Then she unleashed her magic on him.

The bluish white glow of her Ice power intensified, burning as brightly as a star, and a frigid sensation blasted through the salon, colder than any winter day. A second later, the light faded, and Bria let go of the man.

He thumped to the floor, his whole head encased in two inches of elemental Ice. If he wasn’t dead already from the extreme, sudden frostbite, he’d suffocate soon enough. I was already turning to the two men kicking Jo-Jo, but

I made a mental note to tell Bria how impressed I was by the creativity—and viciousness—of that display of her power. I’d have to remember that particular trick.

The last two men finally noticed that Bria and I were fighting back. A little smarter and quicker than their friends had been, they raised their guns and fired at us.

Crack! Crack!

Bria and I both dived for cover behind two of the salon chairs. The bullets hit the chairs, sending bits of fluffy white fabric puffing up into the air like snow. Bria had managed to snag her straw bag in the confusion, and she quickly upended it and grabbed the gun that came tumbling out. She clutched the weapon with her right hand as another ball of elemental Ice pulsed to life in her left palm.

Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!

The men continued to fire at us.

“Go!” Bria shouted. “Get Sophia! I’ll cover you!”

I hated to leave her in the middle of a fight, but she was right. We had to save Sophia.

I nodded at Bria. “Now!” I screamed.

We both rose from behind the salon chairs. The men raised their weapons to fire at us again, but Bria reared back and threw her Ice magic at them, causing them to duck down out of the way of the chilly blast. She followed that up by raising her own gun and firing it at the men while I sprinted for the doorway.

Hazel and the other two men had already managed to drag Sophia outside. knives in hand, I sprinted through the house and ran out the open front door. I leaped down\ off the porch and hurried across the lawn, my bare feet squashing the grass.

A large white van sat in the driveway, parked at a haphazard angle behind Sophia’s classic convertible and a beige sedan that I didn’t recognize. Hazel had already gotten into the driver’s seat of the van and had cranked the engine. Sophia was still struggling with the two men at the back of the vehicle as Grimes looked on, apparently unwilling to get his suit or his hands dirty. I didn’t bother screaming at the men to let go of Sophia. They’d do that as soon as I killed them—and Grimes and Hazel too.

Grimes must have seen me racing toward him out of the corner of his eye, because he turned in my direction.

He frowned and considered me a moment as though he were surprised that I’d managed to get past his men and make it all the way outside.

Then he threw his Fire magic at me.

The flames streaked through the air, seeming to burn hotter and brighter as they zoomed across the lawn. I didn’t have time to duck them, not if I wanted to save Sophia, so I used my Stone magic to harden my skin as the elemental Fire engulfed me.

The searing strength of the heat stopped me in my tracks, and it took all my concentration to keep holding on to my own power so I wouldn’t be incinerated. Grimes wasn’t quite as strong as Mab had been, but his magic still packed a hell of a wallop.

I didn’t want to waste precious seconds dropping to the ground and rolling around to smother the flames, so being one of the rare elementals who was gifted in not one but two areas, this time, I grabbed hold of my Ice power. I sent out a blast of magic and used my cold power to douse the Fire trying to scorch my skin. The flames immediately froze into weird twisted shapes, cracked off my body, and plummeted to the ground like icicles falling off a roof. The cold Ice hissed as it came into contact with the hot embers and smoldering grass underfoot. I darted forward again.

Apparently impatient with his men’s lack of progress, Grimes was now wrestling with Sophia himself. He didn’t bother to look at me to see if I was still standing. He seemed confident enough in his magic to believe that one fiery burst was enough to toast me to ashes. Fool.

Grimes grabbed Sophia and rammed her head into the side of the van. She kept fighting him, so he slammed her head into the metal again, hard enough to leave a dent behind. She collapsed on the driveway, unconscious.

Grimes easily picked her up and tossed her into the back of the van.

“Stop!” I screamed, trying to distract him long enough for me to get to Sophia. “Stop!”

He glanced over his shoulder at me and frowned again, as though I were some bothersome bug he thought he’d already swatted away. He gestured at his men, and they moved from the driveway over to the edge of the lawn in front of the house. I headed toward Grimes, but his men put themselves in between the two of us, and I had no choice but to go through them to get to him.

So I tightened my grip on my knives and threw myself into the fight.

The men pulled out their weapons, but I didn’t give them the chance to fire. I sliced one of my knives into the gun hand of the man on my right, then pivoted and did the same thing to the second man. They both grunted with pain and surprise, but they snapped their hands up, ready to beat me to death. I didn’t care. I moved back and forth between them, whirling this way and that, cutting into the first man, then the second, until they resembled a couple of piñatas, only with blood and guts pouring out instead of candy.

I finally managed to cut down one of the men in front of me. The other followed a moment later, giving me a clear path to the van and Sophia trapped inside.

“Sophia!” I screamed, running toward the vehicle.“Sophia!”

Hazel threw the van into gear and whipped it into a U-turn right in the middle of Jo-Jo’s lawn. The tires threw up grass and dirt, and the van fishtailed, but Hazel managed to get it under control. She gave me an evil grin before flooring it.

I dropped my knives and chased after the van, throwing myself forward, trying to use my speed and momen— tum to latch onto one of the rear door handles, but I just wasn’t quick enough to catch the vehicle, and my fingers missed the handles by several inches.

I fell flat on my face instead.

My Stone magic softened the landing, but I still felt the jarring, bruising impact through my whole body.

Still, I pushed the pain away, rolled forward, and surged back up onto my feet. I wasn’t giving up yet— But I was too late.

The van zoomed down the driveway, screeched through a hard right turn, and raced out of sight—taking my friend along with it.