Now, as inconspicuously as possible, Tucker glanced back over his shoulder and watched the group of slayers saunter into the diner, taking seats at the soda counter. Three of them. He’d tangled with plenty of slayers in his lifetime as a vampire, but he’d never once been scared. He was now. Because the beautiful soul sitting across from Tucker had chosen him to bring her somewhere safely. She trusted him. And the fact that her safety could be called into question made a growl burn up the walls of his throat.
“Tucker?”
“When I tell you to, I need you to get under the table and stay there, Mary. Hands over your head. Do you understand me?”
The tempo of her breathing escalated. “Yes.”
Tucker picked up his discarded spoon and held it at chin level, using the reflective metal to watch for movement behind him. It was no coincidence that these clowns were in the same middle of nowhere diner as him and Mary. The slayers had followed them. Or been alerted of their whereabouts by someone who’d spotted them between here and New York. One or the other. The slayer network was vaster than anyone realized and Tucker was nothing if not recognizable. Hell, he worked for the king and dressed like a drug dealer. Pretty hard to miss.
As the three figures remained in place, Tucker took a mental catalogue of the situation.
The fae had been allies of the slayers, right up until Tilda bounced over to the dark side. To Hadrian’s side. Had the news spread through the underworld already? Was Mary no longer safe from the slayers?
To say nothing of him—a vampire. He’d never be safe from them. Not as long as he walked the earth, but that was the least important thing on his mind at that moment.
There was only her.
His back teeth ground together. Hard.
Company policy was to leave the slayers alive, since they were humans, but if they tried to harm Mary, it would be game over.
He’d deal with Jonas’s disappointment and potential penalty later.
Through the chorus of a sizzling stove and Willie Nelson’s voice, Tucker listened for the tiniest hint of the air changing. And when it finally did, it happened fast. The bodies reflected in the spoon loomed closer and Tucker growled, “Now, Mary.”
No sooner did she disappear beneath the table did Tucker kick up and out of the booth, hitting his first assailant with a spin-kick to the jaw. With bone crunching under the arch of his foot, he was already launching the next attack, using the flat edge of his hand to send the second attacker’s jugular into the back of his neck.
He leaned back just in time to avoid a stake.
It whizzed past his face from the left, arcing down toward his chest. Mary’s cry painted the air—and that’s when the world seemed to break down into tiny little molecules. Something wild and hot and sharp lanced him in the middle. He detected flavors in the air. His senses were already extremely well-tuned, but they reached another level of accurate when her distress reached his ears. She’s in danger. They are putting her in danger.
In Tucker’s periphery, he saw that everything in the restaurant had lifted. Ketchup bottles, napkin holders, silverware. The milkshake machine was sputtering, shooting ice cream onto the atmosphere, white glops changing shape behind the counter like miniature ghosts. Plates of food rose from tables, every object hovering in the air, as if awaiting his command.
His fingertips buzzed.
And he had an uncharacteristic taste for violence.
A snarl curled his lip and he plucked the stake from the slayer’s hand, bringing the blunt end down hard on his head, rendering him unconscious. With one assailant down, he threw an elbow backward and shattered the cartilage of a nose. In the split second it took Tucker to deal with the second man, the third took a step in Mary’s direction and said, “There she is. Tilda’s brat,” sneered the slayer, eyes bright with fight-lust. “Your mother thinks she can switch allegiances so easily? She won’t for long. Time to send a little message.”
Every window in the diner blew out.
Car alarms screamed in the parking lot.
Everything that had been suspended in mid-air exploded, letting loose a deafening roar of breaking glass and debris landing on walls, the floor. The other customers in the diner dove out through the broken windows, the waitress following suit. And there was a part of Tucker that was alarmed by this side of himself—because it was definitely him commanding the objects. Projecting his outrage into the immediate area and causing destruction. It was all him.
Because Mary was under threat.
His hand shot out and caught the one who dared advance on her. Caught him around the neck and lifted him off the ground. He experienced a bloodlust like he’d never felt before and it would have been so easy, so easy to flick his wrist and end this sucker’s life. He deserved it for wanting to harm the girl. But Tucker saw Mary huddled beneath the table, his name on her trembling lips, and the ringing in his ears thinned, the taste for vengeance souring in his mouth.