Page 81 of Fuse

“Holy fuck.” The response nearly overlaps me. But just when I think I’ve really lost it and am hearing voices, Wade’s rough bark becomes tangible on the air—as the man himself breaks into the bathroom. Literally, he’s broken in. Angie and I didn’t notice the door on the other side of the vanity, since there’s no knob on this side and the seam is totally plastered over. But thank God—again—for those blueprints, allowing him to kick through the rubble he’s created, one hand extended, already shouting, “Come on! This hall dumps back out into the other one. We can circle around and take her and her goons by surprise!”

By the time he’s done, his yell has become a full roar. By necessity.

Because of the alarms that start wailing throughout the entire building. But not just any peals. These are the we’re-all-going-to-die kind, straight out of duck-and-cover reels from the last century. I honestly suspect we’re going to burst out of the secret passage and find ourselves face-to-face with aliens, terrorists, or biologically restored dinosaurs.

What awaits us is worse.

Or better, depending how we choose to perceive it.

Because technically, finding Faline Garand is exactly why we came here.

Just maybe not looking so dewy and fabulous, even while jogging up on the heels of the henchmen who have summoned her to our exit point. And especially not being so damn prepared, despite having swapped out her sleek catsuit for a dark-red sheath she probably poured herself into, joined with black suede hip boots that take the term “statement shoe” to a new stratosphere. But at the moment, it’s not her boots I’m fixated on. It’s the gleaming daggers in her hands that catch the light as she twirls them with practiced ease.

Crap, crap, crap.

I hold myself back from saying it, no matter how hard the words gurgle and push at the base of my throat. Could have something to do with the moisture causing me problems elsewhere: whopping beads of perspiration, dripping past my eyebrows and collecting on my lashes, start fuzzing out my vision. I compel myself to take the valuable seconds and attempt to shake the fog free, but everything’s still a blur even as I haul my Glock out of my uniform’s other pocket. But my periphery is still fully functional, and it gives me the welcome notification of Wade brandishing a similar pistol, along with a Bowie that makes Faline’s knives look like fast food plasticware. I send up a fast prayer that Angelique has taken precaution to come equally prepared.

Only to realize, in the next moment, that she would have been wasting the time and effort.

Two more goons rush onto the scene, obediently bracketing Angie with nothing but a commanding jerk of Faline’s head. Before they’re fully in place, Angie’s eyes pop wide, her predictive psychic hearing going to work…

Giving her the heads-up that her handlers are going to clamp bright-red glow ropes around her ankles and wrists.

Glow ropes?

Only…they’re not.

These shackles are worse. A terrifying whole bunch of worse.

At once, as Wade and I watch with widening gapes, Angelique’s energy changes. While it’s still clear her vital organs and mental functions are intact, those glaring shackles have immobilized every muscle up and down her arms and legs.

“Holy. Shit,” Wade grits out—a shock I share but feel as paralyzed as Angie about expressing. If I repeat those words, I have to face the reality that’s brought them. That just like that, Faline has used our own damn tactic against us and hijacked the surprise party we were bringing for her.

My pulse triples, beating what is left of my nerves to a pulp. I whip a glance Wade’s way, taking in his pumping chest, flexing fists, and throbbing veins in the sides of his neck. Ohhhh, shit. The bitch has flipped the tables on us, but my friend looks ready to take a try at flipping them back.

Damn it, Wade. Don’t do anything crazy. Don’t do anything crazy!

And I’ve given myself permission to say that…why? Because I hadn’t made one of the craziest calls of my life when I decided to break in here and do this? Because I’m not standing here in front of Reece’s hugest nemesis, still telling myself not to feel like a geek in a maid’s costume while she’s approaching with the serenity of a practiced geisha? Because I’m not still struggling in vain against the invisible strands around my arms and legs, frantically thinking—violently praying—the bonds will somehow give way just because we’re the good guys?

That’s the movies, you dumb shit.

The good guys only get to win in the movies.

But they get to move in the movies too.

“You bitch!” Wade seethes.

“Salope.” Angie’s version, while rasped like a title of a poem, carries ten times the insulting intent. But if the witch notices or cares about either version, she doesn’t show it by one iota.

“Well, well, well. Angelique, my old friend.” Faline pivots to slide the back of a finger down the side of Angie’s face, though her steady scrutiny doesn’t falter from Wade and me. “You certainly took your time, darling. I expected you hours ago, amiga. And you really did not have to bring apology gifts…though I am most grateful for the kind gesture.”

Shit.

By gifts, the woman isn’t referring to a couple of potted plants or some scented candles. Though at the moment, I wish I felt more like a pillar candle than a fern in a pot, the roots of my balance hopelessly knotted while just a breeze would knock me over.

In contrast to my stupefied silence, Angie breaks into hissing French profanity. But Faline is much more interested in Wade and me, appraising us from head to toe. My heart thunders faster, wondering what will happen once she’s done.

And dreading the unnatural stillness she takes on when she is.