Page 3

CHAPTER THREE

Chairs scraped as everyone shot to their feet. The sound of multiple safeties clicking off sounded eerily loud in the darkness.

Panicked murmurs rose from the staff.

“Nobody move!” Vlad barked.

“What the hell is going on?!” James snarled to his left.

Crimson flared around Vlad as he drew on his incubus powers, the familiar heat of his demon magic settling in his veins and across his bond with Tarang. The darkness retreated slightly, allowing him to make out shapes around the table.

Giovanni and Wei Chen stared nervously at the red light dancing off his body. James and Marco blanched.

They’d heard the rumors about him.

“Is that—?” Wei Chen started.

Cortes’s shout had them flinching. “ Shield! ”

The sorcerer was on his feet, his sword and whip in hand. Golden light bloomed around him, his Arcane Magic casting their shadows across the walls and ceiling. Popo’s eyes and wings glowed as the familiar manifested his presence and his powers.

The restaurant staff scrambled backward wildly, their faces white with terror where they’d dropped to the floor. Vlad’s men watched the room tensely, weapons in hand.

Marco whipped his gun from his shoulder holster. The muzzle swung wildly between Vlad and Cortes, fear making the whites of his eyes gleam in the gloom.

“Put that down!” Giovanni barked.

Wei Chen was frowning at Cortes.

A flicker of movement caught Vlad’s eyes. His heart stuttered.

Dark shapes were dropping into view outside the windows, their forms barely visible against the night sky and the city backdrop. They crashed through the glass in a shower of sparkling shards, the screams of pedestrians drifting up from Madison Avenue drowning out some of the noise as deadly fragments rained down on them.

The masked figures unclipped the ropes they’d rappelled down from their harnesses and raised the automatic firearms hanging from their chests.

“ Get down! ” Vlad roared.

He tackled Wei Chen as bullets started flying. They hit the ground hard.

The crime boss grunted but had the sense to stay still.

Vlad rolled and came up in a crouch in front of her, the diamond studs in his ears shifting to deadly swords as they dropped into his hands. The blades hummed with the same crimson energy that made his eyes and flesh glow, an extension of his demonic heritage.

Crockery crashed as the Triad bodyguards and Giovanni’s men flipped the table and dragged their charges behind it. Bullets scored the wood, filling the air with wood chips.

Vlad’s heart slammed wildly against his ribs as he glanced over his shoulder.

Thank God I asked Yuliy to bulletproof that thing!

Kevlar gleamed inside the holes cratering the table’s surface.

Tarang’s snarl filled the air as he launched himself at the nearest attacker.

Marco gurgled. James cursed. The way the Italian and Chinese bodyguards recoiled told Vlad they could see the tiger too.

Giovanni and Wei Chen stared unblinkingly, unable to drag their gazes from the familiar who’d made himself visible so as to engage the enemy.

They’d heard rumors about the tiger too.

Tarang brought down one of the masked figures with devastating force, his fangs tearing the man’s jugular open like it was paper, the spray of hot blood painting his muzzle crimson. He batted another man with a powerful strike from his paw that sent him flying into a wall with the sound of breaking bones.

Some dozen more assailants came through the windows, their dark tactical gear absorbing what little light poured in from outside as they fired at the Black Devils men trying to get the restaurant staff to safety.

Vlad clenched his jaw. Someone planned this!

“Boss!” Milo’s shout carried over the chaos.

Vlad’s head snapped around. His youngest bodyguard was trading shots with three masked attackers who had burst through the door, his face tight with concentration where he crouched behind a column.

Ilya grabbed two men running toward Vlad by the back of their heads and smashed their skulls together. He turned and shot another one point-blank in the eye.

The strange magic Vlad had sensed earlier grew stronger, making his stomach roil. Cortes joined him, the Colombian cursing viciously in Spanish as he brought an assailant down with his sword.

“There’s something seriously wrong with this magic, whatever the hell it is!” he barked.

The sorcerer’s whip cracked through the air and wrapped around another attacker’s throat. He yanked viciously. The man’s neck snapped with a wet crunch.

“Ilya! Get them out of here!” Vlad jerked his head at Giovanni and Wei Chen where they crouched behind the overturned table, their bodyguards forming a protective circle around them and their sons.

Ilya hesitated before nodding. He herded the crime bosses and their retinues toward the kitchen where the Black Devils had evacuated the staff.

A grunt had Vlad’s head swinging around.

Milo clutched his bleeding shoulder where he’d been shot, his gun hanging loosely in his limp grip. He clenched his jaw as two men aimed their weapons at him.

Vlad brought the bodyguard’s assailants down with the demonic spell he’d learned to cast from his father in Hell, the scarlet energy sphere evaporating flesh and bone as it tore through them and blasted a five-foot-wide hole in the wall.

The remaining men converged on him.

Vlad stood his ground and effortlessly blocked the shots whizzing toward him with his swords, the bullets pinging off the blades and clattering to the floor.

A roar left his throat as he lifted the lid on his powers.

Demonic magic detonated from him on a violent crimson wave that made the chandeliers tremble and his attackers falter. They flinched at the ferocious sound that issued from Tarang, the noise rattling the glass behind the bar.

Vlad and Tarang moved, his swords and his familiar’s fangs and claws finding easy targets as they flitted amidst their targets in a macabre dance of death. Cortes’s blade gleamed across the way as he opened an attacker from navel to sternum. Popo dive-bombed another man, his wings trailing golden light as he struck the guy in the eyes with his claws.

The hairs lifted on the back of Vlad’s neck. He ducked, narrowly missing the saber that would have decapitated him. He dropped and twisted as he kicked out. The masked figure who’d attacked him jumped, avoiding his attempt to swipe his legs out from under him.

Metal whistled close to Vlad’s face.

He leaned back sharply and raised his swords in a cross guard. Steel rang against diamond in a shower of sparks.

Vlad clenched his jaw.

This guy is good.

A scream from the direction of the kitchen made his shoulders knot.

He kept his gaze on his attacker and gave Tarang a silent command.

Go!

Tarang hesitated, his worried gaze swinging from Vlad to the lithe man standing a short distance away, the stranger’s dark pupils gleaming dangerously above his mask.

I’ll be alright . Vlad cut his eyes briefly to the familiar. Protect our people!

The tiger whirled around with an irritated sound and bounded for the kitchen.

The masked man resumed his attack, each strike flowing into the next with deadly grace. But Vlad hadn’t survived this long in the criminal underworld by being an easy target to bring down.

He feinted left and drove his right blade through his attacker’s guard. The man moved to avoid it and stepped right into the path of Vlad’s second sword.

Blood sprayed as diamond pierced flesh. His attacker stumbled back, clutching his shoulder.

Vlad was about to deliver the final blow when pain exploded inside his body with a suddenness that made black spots swarm his vision.

He gasped, his swords slipping from suddenly numb fingers. Ice filled his veins, spreading outward from his core on a wave that stole his breath and made his heart stutter.

The sensation was like nothing he’d ever experienced.

It felt as if someone had reached inside him and twisted, corrupting the very essence of what he was.

What’s happening to me?!

The sickening gleam Vlad glimpsed in his attacker’s eyes before the man retreated into the shadows told him he’d fallen into the enemy’s trap.

Tarang’s roar of distress echoed through their bond, the tiger’s anguish slamming into Vlad like a physical blow as their connection started to fray.

The world tilted sideways.

The last thing Vlad saw before darkness claimed him was Cortes’s alarmed expression as the sorcerer bolted toward him, his mouth open on a desperate shout Vlad never heard.