There was no sign of Roxy, though. She must be staying behind with Tucker to guard my friends. Or maybe she was waiting for Brody to flush me out for her, like he’d done on their previous hunts. Either way, she wasn’t here, so she wasn’t important right now.
Brody didn’t waste any time going over to the main gate and pulling out a key, which he slid into the padlock.
The Dalton gang had come for me.
* * *
Brody got the padlock open easily enough, but the chains wrapped around the gate slid through the metal bars and crashed to the ground, creating a series of loud clank-clank-clanks. The giant winced and let out a muttered curse at the noise. If he’d wanted to slip into the park quietly, he was doing a lousy job of it. I would have heard those chains all the way over at the saloon on Main Street. But I held my position and watched Brody bend down and drag the chains out of the way. I checked my phone. Just after eight thirty. Right on schedule. Tucker hadn’t wasted any time in sending his men into the park after me.
I texted Silvio. Party time here at the main gate.
He hit me back a few seconds later. In the lobby with the others. No sign of our friends or Tucker yet.
I’d expected as much, but disappointment still filled me. I wanted—needed—to know that Finn, Bria, and Owen were safe. Nothing else mattered.
Not even whether I lived or died here tonight.
Brody got the last of the chains out of the way and threw the gates open so that his men could stream inside. All of them were giants, and they were all still dressed in their cowboy costumes, complete with boots, chaps, jeans, and even hats in some cases. Several of them, including Brody, were also wearing large silver belt buckles, and a few had silver tips on their boots. I shook my head. Idiots. They should have been dressed all in black like me. All that shiny metal just made them that much easier to spot in the glows from the holiday lights.
Easy to see, easy to kill.
Brody waited until all the men were inside before shutting and locking the gate behind them. I did a quick head count. Thirteen giants in all, including Brody, for a baker’s dozen. As I watched, the giants all pulled out their guns, checking to make sure that they were ready to rock ’n’ roll. No fakes here tonight. Once again, I wondered if any of them had Roxy’s Fire-coated bullets loaded in their guns, but there was no way to know until they started shooting at me. But I had weapons and tricks of my own, and I was ready to unleash them.
Brody turned to his men. “Remember, this Blanco bitch is sneaky. So I want you to stay together in teams of three and be in constant contact on earbuds at all times. If you find Blanco, you can wound her, but don’t kill her. Tucker still needs to question her first. Understand?”
Brody didn’t mention the jewels. Probably because he realized that his men would kill me, take the gems off my body, and skedaddle instead of handing them over to him like they were supposed to.
The giants all murmured their agreement, then started making sure that their earbuds were working, as well as splitting up into four teams of three, except for Brody’s team, which had him as the fourth and extra man. Four hit squads of giants just to kill little ole me. Tucker wasn’t messing around. I was flattered.
I sent Silvio another text, letting him know exactly how many men Brody was bringing into the park. He texted me back a few seconds later, saying that he, Phillip, Lorelei, and Ira were still in the lobby, holding their positions until they spotted Tucker or our friends.
I slid my phone back into my jeans pocket and focused again on the men below, studying them more carefully than before. I didn’t sense any elemental magic emanating off any of them, but they didn’t need it. Not with all those guns, not to mention their own inherent strength and toughness. I would have to be quiet about how I killed them, at least at first, until I’d thinned the herd out a bit. Otherwise, they’d gang up and take me down. Then the party would be over before it even got started.
“Spread out,” Brody said, checking his guns. “And watch your backs. This isn’t a regular person we’re dealing with. This bitch is an assassin, and one of the best. Got it?”
Well, at least he was giving me my props. And he was right. I was one of the best.
And I was going to kill every single son of a bitch here tonight.
The men nodded back to Brody, and the four teams spread out, slowly heading down the walkway that led from the main gate into the park. I studied the men again, concentrating on how they moved, and who seemed like the biggest threat. That was obviously Brody, and the three guys with him looked just as tough and strong as him. But there were three giants who had teamed up at the back of the pack who were a bit shorter and leaner than all the others, so I decided to go after them first.
I waited until all the men had moved down the walkway, well away from my position, then climbed down the tree and followed them, still staying in the woods and off the path.
The four teams of giants reached the first big fork in the theme park and split up, with each team heading in a different direction. I palmed a knife and headed after the three men that I’d picked out to kill first.
The giants moved down the walkway, dutifully searching behind every food cart, barrel, and hay bale. But they were so busy looking at what was in front of them that it never even occurred to them that I could be trailing along in their wake. Oh, every once in a while, they would glance over their shoulders, but they mostly focused on what was up ahead, and not the Spider silently creeping along behind them.
The three giants reached the end of this walkway and stopped to regroup. I crouched down in the shadows behind a couple of prop tumbleweeds and watched them.
“Maybe she’s not in here,” one of them suggested. “Maybe she got out of the park with the tourists earlier.”
A second giant shook his head. “No way. We reviewed all the security footage and checked every single person who left all afternoon long. Blanco wasn’t one of them. She’s in here somewhere. We just need to find her. Let’s keep looking.”
The final man nodded, and the three of them started forward again, heading down a new path. My knife still in my hand, I got to my feet and followed them.
With a lot of ground to cover, even along this one walkway, the giants did the inevitable thing that was going to get them killed—they split up.
Two of the giants headed over to check behind some food carts that were clustered together, while the other stepped into a short alley, peering behind every single barrel and water trough that lined the walls. I waited until the lone man was deep into the alley, then darted over to the entrance and stopped, hiding behind a tall cardboard sign of a cowboy playing a banjo.
Then I waited—just waited for him to come back this way.
The alley was a dead end, and it didn’t take the giant long to search it. A minute later, he headed back toward my position. The other two men were still checking the food carts and completely ignoring their friend.
My knife in my hand, I readied myself, slowly breathing in and out, drawing air deep down into my lungs for the explosive burst of energy that I would need to take down all three giants.
The lone giant moved past the sign that I was hiding behind, not bothering to search behind it again. His second—and last—mistake. In a hunt like this one, you always had to check places coming and going, because you never knew who might be sneaking up on you.
The giant stopped at the end of the alley and raised his hand to his ear. I held my position and waited, knowing that he was going to check in with Brody.
“Rattlesnake Alley is clean,” the giant said. “Heading over to help Ellis and Clyde check some food carts.”
He waited a second for Brody’s reply, which I couldn’t hear, then nodded. “Roger that. We’ll keep searching.”
I slithered out from behind the sign. Despite all the holiday lights, the giant never noticed my shadow c
reeping up alongside his, and I was able to get right up behind him. He stopped to look around, and that’s when I struck. I reached up, dug my fingers into his hair, yanked his head back and down, and cut his throat.
He was dead before he hit the ground.
But I was already moving, jumping over his body and sprinting across the walkway toward the food carts, plastering myself up against the side of one just as the other two giants came around the far end. Those men were still looking for me, so it took them a few seconds to spot their buddy’s body lying at the alley entrance.
“What the—” one of them sputtered.
I stepped around the cart and threw my knife at him. The blade zipped through the air and sank into his throat, cutting off the rest of his words. He staggered back against one of the carts, his legs sliding out from under him, already closer to dead than alive.
The third and final giant whipped around in my direction, raising his gun, but I darted forward, snapped up my hand, and sent a spray of Ice daggers shooting right into his face and throat. The man’s gun slipped from his hand and clattered on the ground as he coughed and coughed, trying to dislodge all the sharp, jagged pieces of Ice from his throat. I closed the distance between us, palmed another knife, and sliced the blade across his stomach, right above his ghastly dinner plate of a belt buckle.
He couldn’t even scream as he flopped to the ground, trying to shove his guts back in where they were supposed to be. I ended his struggles by driving my knife through his heart, then ripping it back out again.
I whirled around, staring at each giant in turn, but they were all dead, so I looked past them at the walkways beyond. But everything was quiet, and no one had heard me eliminate this first team of men.
So I went over, pried my thrown knife out of the giant’s throat, wiped it clean on his plaid shirt, and slid it back up my sleeve. Still holding my other knife in my hand, I stepped over their bodies and headed deeper into the theme park.
Three down, ten to go.
24
It didn’t take me long to find the second team of giants. They were only two walkways over, checking the shadows around a series of food carts, just like the first team of men had done. But they were far more cautious than the others, staying together, with one man constantly looking behind them, watching their backs. I wouldn’t be able to sneak up on them like I had the first set.
So I glanced around, thinking about where we were in the park in relation to the traps that I’d set. The lassos were the closest. Those would work. I slid my knife up my sleeve and grabbed one of the silenced guns out of its holster on my belt. I made sure the weapon was ready to fire, then got to my feet and sprinted from the shadows, across the walkway and over to one of the alleys, all in plain sight of the giant serving as the rear guard.
“Hey!” he yelled. “There she is! Heading into that alley! Come on!”
The three men abandoned their search and raced after me. I risked a glance over my shoulder, wondering if one of them might rush past his buddies in his eagerness to get me, but they stayed together in their tight pack formation. I grinned. Perfect.
I veered into the alley. Halfway down the corridor, I stopped running and crouched down behind a barrel that had been pushed up against the wall. The gun was in my right hand, and I reached down with my left and snatched up three long, thick, heavy lassos that I’d attached to a hook in the opposite wall and snaked across the ground to this side of the alley. I used my Stone magic to protect my palm from the rough ropes, braced myself up against the barrel, and peered around the side, waiting for the men to get close enough.
A second later, the three of them sprinted into the alley, running as fast as they could.
“Hurry up!” one of the giants yelled. “Don’t lose her—”
Zip!
I yanked the lassos tight, and all three of them sprang up off the alley floor, creating a trip-wire right at ankle height.
The three giants stumbled over the lassos, landing in a heap in the middle of the alley. Their heavy weight yanked the ropes out of my hand and pulled me off balance, but I recovered before they did. Even as they yelled and scrambled around, trying to get back up, I got to my feet and emptied my gun into them.
Pfft!
Pfft! Pfft!
Pfft! Pfft! Pfft!
When that first gun clicked empty, I pulled out the second one from the holster on my belt and fired it as well.
Pfft!
Pfft! Pfft!
Pfft! Pfft! Pfft!
The giants’ screams dissolved into wheezing rasps and gurgles. Then, even those noises stopped.
Six down, seven to go. Not quite halfway done.
Since my guns were equipped with silencers, the shots were fairly quiet, but, of course, the giants’ panicked cries rang out, echoing through the theme park like claps of thunder, and I knew that it wouldn’t be long before the other two teams came running. So I tossed my two empty guns away, darted forward, and scooped up two new ones from the dead giants. All the while, I kept glancing around, realizing how exposed I was. But maybe my luck would hold, and I could slip back into the shadows before the other two teams of giants converged on my position—
Crack! Crack! Crack!
Bullets slammed into the wall beside me, making wood chips fly in all directions. I really needed to quit jinxing myself like that.
I snapped my head around to see three more giants sprinting down the alley toward me.
“There she is!” one of the giants yelled. “Get her!”
Crack! Crack! Crack!
More and more bullets zinged through the air toward me, but none of them exploded with Roxy’s elemental Fire. Looked like she’d kept all those burning babies for herself. But bullets were still bullets, so I reached for my Stone magic, using it to harden my skin, even as I snapped up my own stolen guns and started firing back.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
My shots made the giants hunker down behind a couple of water troughs for cover, but I wasn’t as good a shot as Finn was, and I was too far away to take them all down the way that he would have. Still, I kept firing as I backpedaled away from the giants, just trying to buy myself a few seconds’ head start. But all too soon my guns click-click-clicked empty, so I threw them away just like I had the others.
The giants peered around the water troughs and surged to their feet, realizing that I was out of ammo, but I had already turned and started running away.
Well, I wasn’t running away from the giants so much as I was running toward something—the water tower.
Crack!
Crack! Crack!
Crack!
Bullets chased me down the alley, tearing holes through barrels, pinging off metal signs, and blasting apart balls of tumbleweed. The giants had recovered quicker and were moving faster than I’d anticipated. Good thing I’d already done my prep work.
I skidded around the corner and stopped, since this was where I’d left that water hose running. The steady gush of water had already coated this part of the walkway, making it gleam like polished jet underneath the soft white glows from the holiday lights. I crouched down, slapped my hand against the wet asphalt, and blasted it with my magic, turning all of that water into a solid sheet of elemental Ice. The second that was done, I ran over to the water tower, the one with two wobbly legs, thanks to yours truly.
I wrapped both my hands around the first sawn-through post and let loose with another blast of my Ice magic, driving the shards of my power deep down into the cut I’d already made. The wood creaked and groaned at the sudden blast of cold, but it didn’t snap. And it wouldn’t—not until I wanted it to.
Once I finished with the first post, I went over and repeated the process on the second. Then I backed up far enough so that I could see both posts at the same time and waited for the giants to get in range.
Sure eno
ugh, the three men who’d been shooting at me raced around the corner, never even stopping to think that I might have set a trap for them. Cowboy boots might look cool, but they don’t have great traction. The second the giants stepped onto the Iced-over asphalt, their boots slipped, propelling them forward, and they all shouted and threw their hands up into the air, like three skaters stepping out onto a rink for the very first time. One after another, they all fell on their asses in the middle of the walkway, right in the shadow of the water tower. Perfect.
I tuned out their surprised yelps and reached for my Ice magic again, gathering up more and more of my power until I had two silvery balls of magic pulsing in the palms of my hands. Then I threw both hands forward at the same time, aiming at the two posts that I’d already cut into and frozen over.
My Ice magic slammed into the two posts, and the already weakened wood snapped like a couple of matchsticks.
Crack! Crack!
Without those two posts for support, the tower couldn’t stay upright. With a loud, ominous creak, the wooden container tipped forward and toppled to the ground, splintering into a thousand pieces and spewing water over everything in its path—including the three giants who were still sitting in the middle of the walkway on my sheet of elemental Ice.
The giants yelled and tried to scramble to their feet, but it was too late. Water gushed out like a geyser from the broken container, drowning out their panicked cries. Even as the water cascaded over them, I stepped forward, raised my hands, and sent out blast after blast of Ice magic, right into the center of all that rushing liquid. The water was already cold from sitting in the tank in the December chill, which made it easier for me to freeze—and the giants right along with it.
The water hit the ground, then blasted up in sheets of elemental Ice, frozen solid by my magic. I thought that the giants shouted for help or maybe even screamed curses at me, but I was too busy sending out wave after wave of magic to care. My mother had been right. These men had come into the park to murder me, so they were getting exactly what they deserved.