Page 94 (1/1)

The first room on the left was soly laid-back furniture Either Giorgio hadn’t gotten around to updating it or it was for the women The other room was a toilet covered in fancy tile So, likely, the re room hadn’t yet been updated Dead certain someone was in the room she’d left for last, she made her way to the door

At the sauns for knives They’d make far less noise and not alert anyone else in the house Then she drop-rolled into the roo attack froolden hair But Giorgio wasn’t used to fighting for his life He went for where her body should’ve been, rather than where she actually was

She’d cout before he could stop his headlong rush His blood stained his white shirt scarlet Well aware how quickly vaut wound, she thrust a second knife directly into his heart seconds after the first, then rose to stab a third into his neck fro out in hot spurts to splatter the warm yelloalls of what turned out to be the kitchen, but he still kept co that sounded like “whore”

“Better a whore than a sadistic piece of shit like you,” she said and, grabbing the hunting knife froh his left ear, then twisted

A shocked look on his face, Giorgio collapsed at last

Ashwini kneasn’t dead—she’d io to suffer immortal justice It could last years The blade in his brain should keep hi to risk it, with all the weirdness in this case For all she fucking knew, Giorgio was part reborn and would sha the kitchen in lieu of using up her own knives, she h his palms, forearms, and shoulders, careful not to ht athe bone She did the saio, she took no pleasure in causing the injuries Her only motive was to keep him in place Except for the last two knives she’d found—narrow and sharp filleting blades

“This is for every woman you’ve ever hurt,” she said and pinned the bastard’s testicles to the floor, the knives slicing easily through his pants “I hope that fucking hurts when you wake up”

Judging hiain

The sirens she could already hear told her backup would arrive long before Giorgio had any chance of rising Taking the stairs to the second floor, she went up on silent feetto see Janvier co down froirl safe,” in a low tone, then zeroed in on the blood on her jacket

“Giorgio’s”

Touching his fingers to her jaw, he looked down the corridor “Corneliusugliness she’d sensed even fro the sick feeling in her gut, she slipped her guns back out Knives wouldn’t do ht slow hih for Janvier to behead hi two roo sto that to Janvier with a single glance, she didn’t argue when he nodded at her to open the door so he could go in first As a vael than she did And she had a better chance of keeping hi the knob, she shoved it open before swinging around to go in behind Janvier He went in as low and as quiet as she had in the kitchen and caainst an attackexcept there was no attack

There was, however, an angel in the roo to believe what they saw in front of them When she chanced a quick look at Janvier, it was to see the same disbelief in his eyes

Janvier had shown her a photo of Cornelius soon after they’d first found his feathers The lossy chestnut so dark it was near black, his eyes a deep greenish hazel, and his skin a sun-stroked brown that—when paired with his sculptured features—spoke of the Mediterranean or northern Africa His wings had been spread in the iht

In front of the s stoodshe didn’t knohat to call his were noo lue and bone, the cream of his feathers visible only in sporadic patches, the red all but gone When he turned to face them, she saw his cheeks were sunken in, his skin stark white, and that his dusty-brown hair evidenced the sas, the skin on the exposed parts of his skull reminiscent of tanned hide

Ashwini could’ve circled his upper arer and thumb It was as if he’d lost all body fat and ht, his jaw sticking out in an odd way and his right leg appearing to have a second knee that pushed at the thin red silk pants that hung over his ee that was crushed on one side

His eyes were a filedand covered with blood, the saed his rotesquely at theain froenta and her skin a pale brown Ashwini shot hi it wouldn’t blow his skull to sel, that wouldn’t be a risk, but with this one

Cornelius fell forward but his head hole Good He, too, needed to face iel’s body off the woman, while Ashwini checked her for a pulse She had to use the wrist—the woman’s throat was too bloody aonly the e on the victim—her skin was a touch drier than it should be, the sheen of her dyed hair dulled but not absent It gave Ashwini hope that they weren’t too late “Come on”

Then there it was: a pulse, thready but present

Hearing boots sla up the stairs, she ran to the door, saw Trace “Get the paramedics!”