Chapter Five

I swung around to face Ghira. She stared at the smoking space where the portal had just blinked out of existence with laser focus.

“What have you done,” Ghira hissed loudly. Her tone sent a shiver through me. Even as a cop in L.A., I’d never heard so much hate in four words.

“You didn’t leave me much of a choice,” I answered. “Grayson, you okay?”

The sound of sirens came into hearing. Far away, but backup would be here soon.

“On your left,” Grayson said from slightly behind me. I didn’t turn to look, trusting him to have my back. He must have called for help and then came back for me.

“I told you what this meant to me,” Ghira said. She didn’t seem at all concerned that Grayson had his gun pointed at her, and I had a sword between us. Not concerned about the sword made sense. But I wouldn’t be so calm if someone was threatening to shoot me. Maybe she didn’t know what a gun could do.

“She’s dangerous, Grayson,” I said, like he hadn’t seen everything in that other world.

“I know, Jay.”

“Do you think we’re going to be able to hold her?” I spotted my handgun on the floor, about ten feet past the destroyed portal, where it must have fallen when I’d been knocked unconscious earlier. Before the whole trip through the portal.

“I don’t know how,” Grayson answered.

I eyed my gun, slowly circling around Ghira and making my way over to it.

“You think that thing will protect you?” Ghira snarled. “It’s useless against the fae.” So she did know about guns. Maybe. She charged me, completely unconcerned.

A shot rang out, but somehow Grayson missed her, only feet away.

Ghira was on me, sword flashing. I barely got my own up in time to meet hers, sending it grating down the blade, sparks flying. She wasn’t playing with me. This time, I would die, fast. She whipped around and slashed at me again, sliding the tip of her sword through the skin of my abdomen.

A loud pop, and her body stiffened, teeth clenched.

It took me a second to figure out what had happened. But in that moment, Grayson didn’t hold back with the taser. He held the button until it ran out of juice, Ghira’s body twitching and falling to the floor.

I put pressure on the scratch bleeding through my uniform and inched toward her. I bumped her with my boot, completely ready to jump away. She didn’t move. “Ha. Not so powerful against a taser, huh?” I bumped her again for good measure, but didn’t even get a groan in return.

“At least this thing worked on her, even if the gun won’t.” He nodded toward my wound. “How bad is it?”

I pulled my hand away, slick with blood. “Not deep. Just long.”

“Go get the first aid kit and show the new lot where to go.”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

Just because she sprawled unconscious on the floor didn’t mean I thought Ghira wouldn’t find a way to be terrible.

“I’m not leaving you alone with her until she’s got cuffs on.”

Grayson snorted. “Like you’d be able to help if something went sideways. We’d need an army.” He bent down to cuff Ghira, moving slowly.

She twitched and he jumped. I didn’t say anything though. She made me jumpy too.

The right cuff snapped into place easily. But then Ghira opened her eyes.

“Grayson!” I scrambled for the taser. Grayson jumped clear and I hit her with a second charge. Her body twitched for a moment again, then went still. Had it really affected her as much as I’d thought the first time, or had she just been playing a game?

“Crazy fae,” Grayson muttered under his breath as he rolled her over and pulled her left arm behind her back, slapping the cuff on.

The sirens stopped outside. The cavalry had arrived.

I slumped back against a crate, taking a deep breath and instantly regretting it when my wound separated again, sending a fresh splash of pain across my abdomen.

Two officers piled through the door, guns drawn. Grayson walked over and started explaining the situation as more of our friends burst into the warehouse.

Let him do all of the talking. I didn’t take my eyes off the woman on the floor. She was starting to move a bit again. If the first tase was a standard for how long she would be down, we really needed to get her locked up. Fast.

“Hey,” I waved one of the guys over. “We need to get this woman behind bars asap.”

“Fae?” the word burst out of one of the officers talking to Grayson and spread around the room.

“Didn’t dispatch warn you?”

I lost track of the conversation then. The room swirled a bit. The blood loss wasn’t terrible, but my body had been through a lot in the last hour.

Grayson jogged over and leaned down close to me while everyone else concentrated on Ghira. “I’ve got EMTs here, they’re just waiting on the all-clear call. You okay to wait a couple minutes? I’d hate for them to walk in and have that,” he nodded toward Ghira, “wake up and go at them.”

“I don’t need medical care,” I said. Yeah, I might be a tough cop, but that didn’t mean I liked needles any more than the next girl.

Grayson raised an eyebrow. “You let me see that wound, and then I’ll tell you if you need medical care.”

“I thought maybe you’d let this go,” I grumbled as I tugged my shirt up. I hissed as the fabric stuck to the dried blood.

Behind Grayson, cops drug Ghira away, one officer under each arm. Though I didn’t pray often, I shot up a quick request for them to get her back to the station safely.

“Guns don’t work right around her,” I called after the crowd of people surrounding the unconscious fae.

“I already told them all that.” Grayson poked at my cut and I winced away from him. “That definitely needs stiches.”

“Oh, come on, Grayson. It’ll be fine.”

He straightened and put his hands on his hips. “No, it’s not going to be fine. It’s going to break back open every time you move for a month.” He jabbed his thumb over his shoulder toward the fleet of people leaving. “I don’t want to have to pick up some other rookie I don’t know. Too much training.”

I rolled my eyes, but couldn’t help a small grin. Things hadn’t been easy for us in the beginning, but we’d worked it out. Now there wasn’t any other cop in the city I’d have at my back.

“Compromise. I’ll let the EMTs tell you that you need stiches.”

The warehouse somehow still had a ton of people in it, even with everyone escorting the first fae in the city to lockup. A light flashed, making me jump. But it was only CSU taking pictures of the body that had dropped what seemed like forever ago.

Which reminded me.

“Hey, you seen that other fae? The guy?” I shoved off the crates I’d been leaning against and took a second to get my balance.

“No. Should I have?”

I checked around us, uneasy. “I don’t know. He came through. Before I destroyed the portal.”

“Are you sure? I didn’t see anything.” He walked beside me, heading outside. While he carefully avoided actively helping me, he kept a close eye.

Was I sure? Not really. I hadn’t been too concerned with him in that moment. I shrugged. “Everyone should be on the lookout, either way. He gave me the willies.”

“I’ll let the sergeant know. But for now.” He threw open the warehouse door, letting the sunlight stream in. An ambulance was right on the other side, medics at attention. “You’re going to visit those people.”

I sighed. Might as well stop lying to myself. Hopefully I got some good pain meds out of this. I wanted to forget every moment of this day.