Page 24 of A Heist for Filthy Rivals (Mythic Holidays #3)

I explain to Devilry exactly where to find the pin-bomb, and then I wait, feeling her fingers tug at the fasteners of my pack, still hardly believing that those same fingers were rubbing my dick a few minutes ago.

She’s an atrocity and an astonishment. Teasing and treacherous, wicked and lovely.

I like the deep black of her hair and the strands she has dyed blood-red.

I like the full pout of her red mouth, the saucy way she tosses her head when she’s angry.

I like the fluid movement of her body when she’s fighting or climbing.

She’d fuck the same way, I think—impatient, vigorous, taunting.

If I ever get to come inside this woman, I think I will die of pure shock and bliss.

“Wake up!” she whispers harshly, striking my shoulder. “Is this it?”

She holds out the tiny orb, no bigger than a human eye.

“That’s it.” I start to take it from her, but she holds it out of my reach.

“First explain what it does,” she demands.

“It’s a flash-bang grenade,” I whisper.

“Did you make it yourself?”

“Of course. I designed the first one when I was about eight. It’s not very destructive, but it’s an excellent distraction.”

There’s a new look on her face—an expression I haven’t seen from her yet. Admiration and grudging respect. But she only hands me the pin-bomb and says, “Let’s see if your work is any good.”

I turn the tiny crank slowly and carefully so it won’t make noise. Then I click the trigger mechanism into place, but I don’t push the button yet. “I was hoping to save this for an emergency.”

“This is an emergency,” she whispers. “If we stay up here any longer, we’ll be too weak to fight. We need to get out of this tower. If we can’t make it all the way to the basement, we can at least find a room to hole up in and rest, maybe eat and drink something. You got any food or water?”

“I had water, but I threw my water jug into that nest of bodach beads. That’s your fault.”

“Your stupidity is not my fault.”

“Do you have anything to eat or drink?”

She squirms visibly. “No.”

“Now who’s unprepared?”

She sighs, exasperated. “There’s a kitchen on the first floor, behind the central stairs.

I don’t think the shockwave from my weapon reached it.

Maybe it’s reasonably intact and we can find something to eat there.

I did fix myself a snack earlier, but you idiots showed up sooner than I expected and I barely got a chance to eat anything. ”

“What sort of snack?”

“Sausage and cheese.”

“Mmm.” I tilt my head back, my mouth watering. “Any hot mustard?”

“Are you going to use that grenade or not?”

“Keep your corset on, I was just asking. Oh, that’s right—you don’t wear a corset, do you, sweetheart?”

She flushes pink, and I allow myself a grin before I press the button and toss the pin-bomb onto the table at the side of the room.

“Why did you throw it there?” Devilry hisses.

I shrug. “It’s glowing. Looks like magical crap. Should cause some fireworks.”

Her sigh of exasperation disappears into the sound of the pin-bomb ticking loudly. The monster leaps up and stalks toward the noise, reaching the table just as the grenade explodes.

I expected the table to be scorched and the flash powder inside the pin-bomb to fizz and sparkle and pop, messing with the creature’s senses.

But instead, there’s a violent crack, and a sheet of green flame soars up from the table, searing the creature’s snout.

Crystals shatter, raining pink and purple shrapnel, and yellow fireworks explode in the air.

“Go, go!” I yell.

Devilry is already moving, leaping down through the rafters. She drops to the floor and sprints for the exit. I’m several steps behind her, but I make up the distance with longer strides.

The monster is screaming, whirling this way and that, its fan organ spasming, its nostrils scorched and smoking.

The table has broken in half, and it’s leaking black ichor and rivulets of green and pink liquid, as if the crystals themselves are bleeding.

I don’t know what kind of magic it held, and I’ve got no time to gawk at it.

Devilry and I are pelting down the stairs when we hear the beast’s voices babbling and roaring behind us. It recovered far too quickly and it’s already pursuing us.

“Faster, faster,” I urge Devilry, but then I realize she’s whimpering as she runs, and when she misses a step, she vents a little scream of pain. She’s hurting worse than I realized.

I dash past her, grab her arms, and swing her onto my shoulders in a sideways carry. She fusses, but her protest disappears in the cacophony of the monster’s tormented voices.

The effort of carrying Devilry, on top of my own exhaustion, is almost too much for my body to take.

My lungs feel huge and tight, ready to explode out of my chest. My heart is roaring, thundering, and every muscle I possess is bellowing at me to stop, to rest. But I leap down the stairs, fast as I dare, until I come to the broken part of the first-floor steps and the hole beneath.

The sentient ooze is gone, thank the gods, but I’ll have to cross a big gap between the last intact step and the only strip of floor that’s clear of rubble.

“I can’t jump with you on my back,” I gasp out, and Devilry swings down from my shoulders instantly.

The moments of rest I gave her must have helped, because she manages the awkward leap from the banister to the intact part of the hallway, to the left of the stairs.

I follow her, but I’m unsteady, swaying and nearly toppling into the hole.

That moment of hesitation costs me. The beast’s forepaw rakes my right shoulder, and then I feel one of its prehensile tails wrapping around my wrist. I yell, convinced I’m about to be eaten, that my final cry is going to join the terrible voices emanating from its throat.

But Devilry screams at the monster, slashing off the end of the tail with her dagger, and the beast withdraws, bawling in agony.

I race into the kitchen with Devilry, and we slam the door.

“Furniture,” she rasps. “Pile things against the door. Quick.”

Together we drag over a table and chairs, slamming them into place. I wrench a cabinet from the wall and add that, too. The monster throws its weight against the door twice while we’re working, but the wood doesn’t give.

Once we’ve completed our fortifications, we withdraw to the other side of the room, watching the door like a pair of foxes in a trap.

Oddly enough, the beast seems to lose interest now that it can’t hear us, see us, or smell our blood.

Maybe, despite its ability to hold onto its victims’ voices, it has a short memory.

We listen to the sound of its great feet padding away down the hall.

“It might be back,” Devilry says. “It likes to prowl.”

I nod. “If we hear it again, we’ll stay quiet so we don’t attract its attention.”

By unspoken agreement, we both head for the pantry, which is surprisingly chilly—probably cooled by Fae magic. I see the way Devilry’s eyes dart around the space. She’s uneasy because there’s no way out, and both of us know that a good thief never likes to be boxed in.

“Can’t be helped,” I tell her. “It’s cozier in here anyway.”

“Smellier, too.” She wrinkles her nose. “We both stink.”

It’s amusing to me how sensitive she is about smells, given that we’re both criminals and our work often coincides with unpleasant conditions.

I only notice odors when they’re especially powerful—like the rank stink that Slaughter tended to give off whenever he moved.

But she’s right—the close quarters do make the stench of my own body more noticeable.

“I’ll be right back.” I rise abruptly and head out to the kitchen.

A little experimentation reveals that the faucet over the sink has hot water, so I set the drain plug in place and fill the sink while I strip down. Everything comes off—my pack, my boots, my belt, my weapons, and every piece of sweat-soaked, dusty, grimy clothing, including my cum-stained pants.

I hunt around for something that resembles soap and settle on a bottle of sweet-smelling liquid that I hope is safe for my skin.

I can’t imagine the Fae have much need for soap.

Surely they can just use magic when they want to clean something.

But I’ve heard that their magic takes energy out of them.

Perhaps sometimes they like to do things the prosaic way.

I wonder if they ever feel half as tired as I do right now.

I find a drawer of folded cloths and use one to wash myself. I plunge my entire head into the sink at one point and come up spluttering because I forgot to breathe out through my nose and water got into my sinuses.

It’s not easy doing this without a tub, and since I’m trying to be thorough, I end up splashing about half the water from the sink onto the floor.

“What the hell are you doing out here?” Devilry exclaims, peeking out of the pantry. I slap the wet dishcloth over my privates, and her eyes widen. “Never mind... I don’t want to know.”

“I’m eliminating the stench you found so distasteful, my lady.” I bow to her, water dripping from my hair and shoulders onto the floor.

“You’re flooding the kitchen, idiot.”

“We already blew up a lot of this building. I think a few puddles are the least of its problems.”

Her gaze travels to the sink. “Is that water hot?”

“It is. Want me to run you a sink-bath?”

“I can do it myself.”

“You do everything yourself, don’t you? Why not let someone else take control for a change?”

Her eyes spark. “Control? Is that what you want? To control me?”

I would argue or try to explain, but suddenly I’m just too fucking tired. I toss the dishcloth into the sink. “Think whatever you want.”

She watches me as I pick up my clothes and remove everything from my pockets. Her eyebrows rise progressively higher at the number of tiny knives, lockpicking tools, ignition materials, and fuses I was carrying.