Page 19 of The Raven

The Angel Of Death

The Cop

“He’s loading his shit into the car,” Raven said, her tone laced with desperation. I pressed on the gas, swerving at the last minute to overtake a crawling truck.

It was a damn good job that it was the early hours of the morning, and few cars were on the road. There was no way I’d have been able to drive like the devil was chasing my ass if it were the middle of the day.

“How does that work? You know, your connection with the raven?” I asked, curiosity getting the better of me despite the current situation.

Raven pulled her gaze away from where she’d been staring out the windshield, focused on what the bird was showing her.

“I don’t really know. When Oz sent me back, he said she would be my guide,” Raven replied quietly. “I feel her. When she’s worried, I feel it. When she’s warning me, I know… When she’s hurt, so am I.”

I looked over at her, her eyes on the arm resting across her body. Now she’d mentioned it, I’d noticed she hadn’t used that arm when she knocked me out of the way of Grim’s bullets.

“If she gets hurt, so do you,” I said, more to myself. She didn’t reply. My mind churned with what that could mean for her. “Do you think Grim knows?”

“I don’t know.”

A heavy silence filled the car, the two of us lost in thought at the repercussions of what would happen if Grim made that discovery.

Turning the corner, the Viper’s warehouse loomed ahead. I’d lost count of the number of times I’d visited the place in the past, looking for the smallest hint of evidence I could take to Brenner to convince him to reopen Raven’s case.

The place was a den of iniquity. It needed burning to the fucking ground in my humble opinion.

Tension crowded Raven’s body as she stared at the building, but just as I opened my mouth to ask her what the plan was, the garage door lifted, and Pyro’s car sped out, the man of the hour in the driver’s seat.

Our gazes clashed before he slammed on his brakes, shoved the car into reverse, and spun around, driving off in the other direction.

My heart rate spiked, adrenaline flooding my system as I floored it without giving it a second thought. There was no way on earth he was getting away.

It had been a long time since I’d been involved in a car chase, something that happened a lot when I was a uniformed cop, but less so since becoming a detective.

Not that it mattered, years of training kicked into gear, and I took a steady breath, telling my heart to calm. The worst thing you could do in a chase was lose your head; that was a surefire way to get yourself killed in a crash.

The same could not be said for Pyro. In his desperation to get away, he almost lost control several times, clipping parked cars and nearly hitting a garbage truck as it stopped to collect the waste.

His recklessness allowed me to catch up to him, and by the time we hit the road that would take us out of Hadleigh Peak, we were only a few feet away from his bumper.

But I couldn’t quite catch up enough to take him out.

Raven was quiet in the passenger seat, leaving me to concentrate, but I could sense the tension radiating from her body. She was as worried as I was that somehow, Pyro would find a way to escape us.

Wracking my brain to think of a way to stop Pyro without a bunch of fellow cops to box him in or deploying a stop stick, an idea pinged into my head.

“Remember when you were twelve, and I thought it was a good idea to teach you how to shoot?” I said, keeping my attention focused ahead.

From my periphery, Raven swiveled to look at me. “I don’t think now is an appropriate time for a trip down memory lane.”

My lips pulled into a small smirk. “Actually, it is. Look in the glove compartment.”

She did as she was told, rummaging through the crap I kept in there and pulling out my spare handgun. She turned it over in her hands, studying it. “I remember,” she whispered as if she were recalling our time in the woods where I taught her how to shoot cans.

My father was furious with me when he found out, but I told him I taught her because I wanted her to always be able to protect herself. He started coming to the woods with us, making sure I was teaching her properly and that we were both safe.

“You think you can shoot his tires?” I asked, gripping the steering wheel with a solid grip as we rounded a sharp corner, the back end of the car swinging out.

“I can try,” Raven said, undoing the window to lean out.

Trying to keep one eye on the road and one eye on her, I held the car as steady as I could. The first shot went wide, but the echoing of the gun alerted Pyro to her shooting at him. He accelerated harder, beginning to put distance between us.

Raven fired again. This time, the bullet smashed the rear window, glass spraying everywhere, and Pyro ducked in his seat, momentarily losing control of the vehicle.

“Try again,” I said, desperation in my voice.

I needed to bring this pursuit to an end, and fast. If we hit the freeway, there was a strong possibility that Pyro would kill someone with the way he was driving.

“Take your time, hold your arms steady, and relax your body. The gun is just an extension of you.”

Raven’s shoulders loosened as I spoke the same words I’d said when I taught her how to shoot all those years ago, when she grew frustrated at continually missing the cans.

She fired a third time, and thank fuck, the bullet hit its target. Smoke hissed from the busted tire as the back of Pyro’s car began to fishtail, swerving from left to right as he grappled to regain control.

Reaching over, I tugged Raven back into her seat. “Hold on,” I barked.

The engine of my car squealed in protest as I pushed the gas again, bracing myself as I rammed into the back of Pyro’s car.

Metal clashing against metal filled the night air. The airbags in the front of my car erupted, cushioning my head from slamming against the wheel, but not stopping my legs from taking the brunt of the collision.

With the speed and momentum we were traveling at, Pyro’s car flipped, rolling twice before coming to a stop on its roof.

Black smoke hissed from beneath the hood, along with what I assumed to be gasoline leaking onto the tarmac.

From the smashed side window, I could make out Pyro hanging upside down, desperately trying to pull himself from the wreckage.

“Are you okay?” Raven asked, conflict raging in her eyes.

“I’m fine,” I gritted out, trying to ignore the pain in my legs.

I was sure nothing was broken, but fuck, I was going to have some bruises to contend with.

“Go deal with him.” She hesitated, her gaze raking over me, looking for injuries.

I reached out to cup her cheek. “I’m okay, Blackbird. Worry about me after you’ve ended him.”

Pyro’s shouts for help seemed to snap Raven back to the here and now. She leaned forward to plant a chaste kiss on my lips before getting out of the car, walking towards the mangled wreck with determined strides.

When she reached Pyro, he froze, looking up at her with his face twisted into fear. Good, now the fucker knew how she felt the night he and his buddies violated her.

Needing to hear what she was saying to him, I sucked in a breath, wincing as I got out of the car, and leaned against the hood for support, pain rushing from the tips of my toes, right up to my shoulders.

“Not nice when the tables are turned, is it, Pyro?” Raven said, speaking with a deadly calmness in her voice.

My heart swelled as pride rushed through me. Despite coming face-to-face with the men who did wicked things to her, she didn’t show an ounce of weakness. Didn’t shy away from holding them accountable for what they’d done.

Pyro remained silent as Raven bent down and picked something up from the ground. When she flicked it, a small flame burst to life. His eyes widened as she held the lighter out, allowing the flame to flicker, taunting him.

“Was it this lighter you used when you set the fire in my apartment? I bet it was. This was your prized possession, right? What were you hoping to do? Destroy evidence of your wrongdoings, or was setting a fire your way of leaving your mark? Your way to let everyone know the Vipers were responsible for what you did?” she said, stepping closer to Pyro.

The coward remained silent, his eyelids shutting like he could pretend she wasn’t in front of him if he couldn’t see her.

“You know, I remember the first hint of smoke that reached me when you set the fire,” she continued, and I found myself holding my breath to make sure I heard every word of her recounting what happened.

“I was terrified, but I also found peace in the scent, knowing that everything was finally about to end.” She paused, looking at the flame still flickering.

“Do you feel that sense of peace, Pyro?”

She threw the lighter on the ground, the flame hitting the puddle of gasoline that had pooled underneath Pyro’s car, and instantly catching fire. “You don’t deserve peace.”

With that, she turned her back on Pyro, walking toward me as the flames took hold behind her. My breath caught in my throat, and my pulse accelerated as I watched her.

She was the Angel of Death, cloaked in beauty as she emerged from the flames of Hell, forcing every person who had wronged her to crawl to her and worship her as their queen.

Pyro’s screeches tore into the night as thick smoke billowed from the car, the entire vehicle engulfed by the blaze. But I couldn’t tear my gaze away from Raven, and when she reached me, I was unable to stop myself from grabbing her hips and pulling her toward me, slamming my mouth onto hers.

We devoured each other’s mouths as Pyro’s screams fell silent, and the only sound that surrounded us was the crackles of fire and metal twisting from the heat.

When we parted, Raven’s cheeks were flushed red, and my breath came out in short spurts. “Only one left,” I whispered, cupping her cheek.

She nuzzled into my hand as if she was craving my touch as much as I needed hers.

“One left,” she replied, sadness filling her tone.

Unspoken words lingered between us. One left, and then it was over. Raven would be gone.

“Do you know where Grim is?” I said instead of what I really wanted to say.

I don’t want to go on without you.

“No. My raven is looking for him, but he’s hiding somewhere.”

“What do we do?” I asked, my ears pricking with the faint sounds of sirens ringing in the distance. It was time for us to go.

“We force him out of the shadows.”