Dead Harvest

  There was no point arguing, I realized. Dumas was right. I did believe. "What do you mean, my day is coming?"

  "Oh, you'll find out soon enough. You wanna know the funniest part?"

  "What's that?"

  "If you had only guessed at what I am, you wouldn't be in this predicament."

  "How's that?"

  "Ain't no sin to kill a demon. But as far as you knew, it wasn't a demon you were killin'. In this-here game of ours, intent is everything, and your intentions were just as black as can be. Tell me that ain't the bit that's gonna keep you up at night." Dumas laughed. "Anyways, this has been fun and all, but I got places I need to be. See you 'round, Sam."

  And just like that, I was alone.

"Do you think they saw us?"

  I glanced back through the glass door through which we'd ducked. It was plastered with multicolored sheets of paper – ads for roommates, dog-walking services, and the like, all obscuring my view of the street beyond. "I don't know."

  We were standing in the vestibule of a Vietnamese noodle joint, just a tiny patch of threadbare floor mat stacked high with free weeklies and wedged between two doors. The interior door was propped open, giving me a view of the restaurant's spartan dining room and teasing my empty stomach with the aroma of ginger and lime and simmering meats. What few patrons there were made no attempts to hide their puzzled stares, and I couldn't blame them. What a pair we must make: Kate, scraped and filthy beneath her bluestreaked hair and studded choker, looking for all the world like a punk-rock zombie. Me, pallor ashen from loss of blood, much of which had dried red-brown into my tattered clothes. I, too, looked like a dead man walking, which was funny, cause for a change, I wasn't.

  "So what do we do?" Kate asked.

  It was a fair question. We'd barely made it a couple of blocks from the station before we'd spotted them: a pair of demons, combing the street, the black fire that burned in their eyes belying the impassive expressions that graced their otherwise human faces. I had no doubt that there were more of them – dozens, maybe hundreds by now – fanning outward from the spot we'd last been seen, determined to put a stop to this war, to this girl, once and for all. I wasn't about to let that happen, but that meant we needed a plan. From the looks on the diners' faces, we sure couldn't stay there.

  I looked into Kate's eyes, so trusting and innocent despite all they'd seen, and I wished I had something to tell her. Truth was, I was out. Out of gas, out of ideas. I had no fucking clue where to go, or what we'd do when we got there. I'd fucked this job up from the get-go, and now, the whole city was on our tail – humans and demons alike. We'd be lucky if we lasted the night.

  But of course I didn't say any of that. No, what I said was this: "We've got to get off the streets, and quick. Find a place to hole up while things calm down. If we stay off the radar for a while, there's no way for Bishop or the demons to get a bead on us. That means first we've got to get out of here. It's probably a matter of minutes before someone here calls the cops, if they haven't already. Right now, I'm thinking kitchen."

  Kate nodded, and we ducked out of the vestibule, darting through the dining room and pushing open the kitchen's swinging double doors. The kitchen was hot and narrow and cramped, with two apron-clad cooks barely visible behind stainless steel counters stacked high with pots and pans and bins piled high with fresh-cut veggies. They shouted at us in their mother tongue, but we were gone as quickly as we'd come, banging open the heavy metal door that led to the alley behind the place. It slammed shut behind us, and I leaned against it while I got my bearings.

  But for a mangy cat asleep atop a dumpster, the alley was empty. The way my heart was pounding, I guess I was surprised. I half-expected the place to be crawling with demons, eager to tear us limb from limb. Guess the damned aren't much for optimism.