Elemental Assassin 03 - Venom

night-vision goggles from the dashboard and peered through them. The Hummer doors opened, and Slater slipped out, along with four other giants. Elliot Slater ran his hands down his suit jacket, smoothing out the wrinkles. Then he jerked his head at his men. But instead of walking back down the street in our direction, Elliot Slater and his men tromped through the grass to the right of the Hummer. I scanned over and spotted a modest house hidden behind a thin row of freshly planted trees. It looked like it had just been built, given the amount of loose dirt, cement blocks, and two-by-fours that still ringed the structure. The house was the only one on its block, and more than a half mile from the next-closest building.
    “Looks like they’re slipping up on a house on the next street, Jasper Way, according to the sign at the end of the corner. Going in the back instead of the front,” I said.
    “Jasper Way?” Finn asked. “What’s the name of this subdivision again?”
    “Paradise Park,” I replied. “Why? Does one of your many conquests live around here?”
    “Probably, but the name sounds familiar for some other reason.” Finn frowned and tapped his fingers on his thigh, trying to remember something important.
    I peered through the goggles again. A light burned in one of the downstairs windows of the home, but the curtains were drawn, so I couldn’t see inside. A gleam of white caught my eye, and I looked to the right.
    “The name on the mailbox says Coolidge.” I frowned. The name tickled my memory for some reason.
    “Coolidge?” Finn asked.
    “Yeah, Coolidge.” I snapped my fingers. “I remember now. After Elliot Slater finished beating me that night at the community college, I heard Mab talking about someone named Coolidge. About how Mab wanted him taken care of—the sooner the better. Must be why Slater and his men are paying him a late-night visit. I wonder what the poor guy did to piss off Mab.”
    Finn sighed and closed his eyes for a second. “Not him, her,” he replied. “Coolidge is a her, Gin.”
    “How do you know that?”
    Finn stared at me, his green eyes flashing like emeralds in the semidarkness. “Because it’s in that file of information I gave you.”
    A hard knot formed in my stomach. “Which file?”
    “The one on Bria,” Finn replied. “Bria Coolidge. That’s the name she’s using now.”
    Oh,
fuck.

10

    I dropped the night-vision goggles, grabbed my ski mask from the dashboard, and yanked the black fabric down over my head, hiding my pale face and brown hair from sight.
    “Gin—”
    Finn said something, probably telling me to wait for him or slow down, but I couldn’t make out what it was. I was already out of the car and sprinting toward the house.
    Elliot Slater and his giants had a good head start on me—almost a quarter of a mile. I saw the five of them slip through the trees that circled the back side of the house. Another few seconds and they’d be at the back door and surging inside. An icy fist squeezed my heart and lungs, making it hard to breathe. I’d just found my sister again, and now Slater and his men were here to kill her. Why else would they be sneaking around Bria’s house this close to midnight?
    Run, run, run, run…
The thought drummed through my head as my boots slapped against the pavement. I chugged past the parked Hummer, leaped over the concrete curb, and ran through the frost-covered grass. The tiny blades crackled like glass under my smashing feet. If Slater and his giants bothered to stop and listen, they’d hear me coming for sure. But I didn’t care. All that mattered was getting to Bria before she got dead.
    I broke through the line of spindly pecan trees, and Bria’s house rose up in front of me, two stories of charming gray brick. I blocked out the blood roaring through my ears and reached out with my Stone magic. But the house was freshly constructed, and the stones were too new to tell me anything about Bria—or what might be happening inside.
    I was a hundred feet away from the back door when lights flashed and a series of
pop-pop-pop
s sounded. The distinctive sights and sounds of someone firing a handgun. A window shattered, and a series of loud curses spilled out into the night air. Bria was putting up more of a fight than the giants had expected.
    A few seconds later, an intense, bluish white glow filled the downstairs windows and burst through the open back door. Even though I was outside, I could still feel