Sahvage ground his molars. “I’m going to wait until you tell me yes. I take lives against the will, but never females.”

Time stretched out, lengthening like a cord with give in it, becoming longer and longer. And in the electric quiet between them, he became acutely aware of her breathing. It was getting deeper. And that pulse at her throat? It was getting faster.

“I won’t hurt you,” he vowed.

“Yes, you will.”

She took her hand from him and turned away. Over at the sink, she ran water and put her finger under the rush with a gasp. Meanwhile, he stayed right where he was, a frown yanking his brows together.

When she cut the faucet and snapped a paper towel out of a roll, he said, “What the hell kind of male do you think I am?”

Pivoting back to him, she wrapped the wound up. “You’re a killer. Right? You seem to have to prove that not only to me but to everybody you meet. And killers hurt people.”

“You think you’re in danger around me. Seriously.”

“If life has taught me anything, it’s that I am not due any special exceptions. So yes, I think you are dangerous to me.”

He pointed to the front of the house. “I saved your fucking life out there.”

“Well, then we’re even, aren’t we. And you can leave with a free conscience.”

Sahvage looked at the shirt he’d taken off. Snatching the thing back, he pulled it over his head and got to his feet. As he loomed across the kitchen at the female, she met him right in the eye, not giving an inch.

“You’re going to die,” he said baldly. “Maybe with me around, but definitely without me. What’s out there? You don’t know where it went, and it’s stupid to assume that any kind of grave was involved. But I can’t make you save yourself or that old female downstairs.”

“Thank you.”

“Excuse me?”

“For the prognostication. Are you done, or do you want to try your hand at lottery numbers? Maybe who’s going to win the Super Bowl next year?”

“Have fun picking out a matched set of coffins. God knows you always make the right decisions, don’t you.”

On that note, he picked up his jacket and his weapons, and walked to the front door. Moving the massive piece of oak furniture aside, he let himself out.

Pity there wasn’t someone in the cottage strong enough to put the barricade back. But as that female had so often pointed out to him . . . not his problem.

• • •

Mae watched Sahvage disappear through the front door. He didn’t slam the thing shut. He didn’t have to.

When she was sure that he was gone, she rushed across to the parlor and threw the copper lock into place. Then she put her back against the stout panels of the hutch and tried to shove it into the door. When all she got was a lot of slipping shoes and hard breathing, she clamped her mouth closed on the curses in her throat—

A groan from the floorboards overhead had her whipping her attention to the ceiling.

Heart pounding in her ears, she swallowed hard and wondered where she had left her mace. Then she remembered she’d emptied the canister trying to gas that . . . whatever it was.

Staring at the ceiling, she heard nothing further. No doubt the old cottage was just reacting to the night’s drop in temperature—

Mae jumped and looked to the left. Was that something moving in between the legs of a side table?

Rubbing her eyes, she thought of Rhoger and melting ice.

And Tallah downstairs, all but passed out from exhaustion.

“We’re fine. This is all fine.”

Unable to stay still, she went into the kitchen—and stalled out. Not for long, though. Seized by an urgency utterly unrelated to the reality that she had all but kicked out her best shot at fighting anything that might show up at the cottage, she grabbed a bucket from under the sink and filled it full of hot soapy water. There was only a single sponge in the house, and it was going to have to take one for the team.

Getting down on her knees, she scrubbed the grimy square where the fridge had been. And scrubbed. And scrubbed.

Her arm went numb, her shoulder joint burned, her palms and fingers got raw.

But goddamn it, when she was finished? That floor sparkled.

Of course, the bright, sunshiny square made the rest of the old linoleum look like it had been laid back before the Punic Wars. And she was out of gas. Out of sponge, too.

Inspecting the thing’s frayed corners and the nearly black bed, she decided it looked like she felt: all used up, worn down, shredded.

Glancing at the clock on the wall, she did some math. Then she measured the refrigerator that blocked the back door and all the shutters that were in place—

“Shoot. Extension cord.”

It took some rifling around for her to find a three-pronged, mud-brown, ancient version of one, and as she plugged it in, she hoped it wasn’t going to burn the cottage down.

Okay, fine, the kitchen. Whatever.

She was looking around at the counters and the stove, and the misplaced fridge, and the table and chairs—and imagining it all covered in bright orange and yellow flames . . . when something registered in the back of her mind.

Mae frowned and went over to the sink. The silver dish that she and Tallah had used for the summoning spell was all clean and dry, and she picked it up to look at the scalloped ridges that rode down into the belly of the basin.

“What is it?” she asked no one in particular.

Yet something was definitely catching somewhere deep in her consciousness, the tug persistent, but nonspecific. And the harder she tried to divine what it was, the more elusive the preoccupation became.

“Whatever,” she muttered as she put the dish back down.

Given all the other things that were clamoring for mental attention and energy, she canceled the useless game of hide-and-seek.

“I have to go.”

Okay, who exactly was she talking to, she wondered as she glanced to the basement door. After a moment of indecision, she got a notepad out of a drawer and used the stub of a pencil to write a quick message for Tallah. She left the pad in the center of the table, grabbed her bag—and doubled back to add her cell phone number just in case the elderly female forgot what it was.

As Mae went to leave through the front door, she made sure she had her car key ready, and she said a quick prayer before she—

Ripped open the heavy weight. Spun around and closed it. Relocked things and ran for her Honda.

At the driver’s side, her car key refused to find home inside its lock, the metal slip-skipping around the hole. And the longer it took, the more she looked around frantically, all kinds of shadows pulling up from the ground, from the twisted vines, from the trunks of trees, everything coming to attack her—

The key finally went into the slot, and she nearly snapped it off as she cranked things free, fumbled with the handle, and threw herself into the driver’s seat. Slamming things shut and locking everything back up, her heart was pounding in her ears as she played the same ring-around-the-rosie with the ignition.

Before anything landed on the hood, punched a hole in the sunroof, and dragged her out by her hair, she managed to start the engine and put the car in drive. Except then she had to throw things into reverse—because for once she hadn’t followed her father’s very wise advice about being prepared to leave in a hurry. Stomping on the gas, the tires spun up mud and got her nowhere.