Shadow Kissed 03 - Shadowman

and so quickly. How else could she get through his security and out of the Segue building, some three hundred yards away?
    â€œSomewhere. He won’t show himself.”
    Adam grunted. Obviously, Khan’s behavior wasn’t unusual to him.
    Layla scanned the woods, letting her eyes adjust to make out a couple of crouched soldiers in the thick brush. Bullets couldn’t kill a wraith, but they’d slow it down long enough that a trained team could incapacitate and take it into custody.
    â€œHow many?” she whispered.
    â€œAt least six,” Adam answered. “This isn’t a full-blown attack. They’re just testing the perimeter with small parties.”
    â€œWhat are they after?”
    He flicked his gaze over. “Talia. Always Talia.”
    The look in his eyes—worry, anger, frustration—made Layla like him for once. Every day he worked to stop the wraiths, crouching in the cold dark to keep his wife and children safe. He was a soldier, like these men, dedicated to a cause. If he was hard and controlling, she guessed he had reason to be.
    â€œThe perimeter is secure, Mr. Thorne. One casualty. One wraith in custody. No further wraith-sign.”
    â€œDoesn’t feel right,” he answered.
    Could’ve been the cold, but Layla had that bad, skinprickling feeling, too. Like she was in the center of a bull’s-eye, oblivious to the arrow winging her way. The soldiers at least had night-vision gear. Adam had his technology. She was in a T-shirt and sweats. But yeah, okay, with Mr. Enigma, dark lord of the fae, nearby.
    Layla cast her gaze around, though she knew she wouldn’t find him, especially in the dark. A wooly group of pines darted from the earth into the atmosphere. She followed them up to the faint twinkles in the sky.
    Just in time to see a . . . a thing , a body, dropping from above. It altered its trajectory toward her, its length flattening as it descended. So not dropping, flying. It had no visible feet or hands, though its trunk seemed to have mass. Old, ripped clothes hung off its shoulders. Its face was ravaged with decay, mouth open, teeth extended to feed. Wraith, but not wraith.
    Layla grabbed the gun from Adam’s holster, flicked the safety off, and fired above into shadow-webbed branches.
    â€œIn the trees!” someone shouted a little too late. Rapid gunshot report battered her ears.
    A roar of wind darkness blew through the air, riffling her hair and blasting across her back.
    Her trigger finger stalled as the wraith was caught midair, twisting, almost crawling up the sky. A hideous crack broke the quiet as it bent double, but the wrong way, then fell to the earth with the hollow clatter of loose bones in a fleshy bag.
    She’d seen a couple of wraiths brought down before. She’d written about the experience. But never had she seen one shredded like that. Had to be Khan at work again. Khan, her door opener, dream lover, and wraith killer.
    She searched the sky, heart pounding, breath coming in great puffs of frosty air.
    Another crack , and she turned, bracing in fear as a wraith fell dead to the ground.
    The soldiers fired their guns again, but if not for Khan, men would be dying.
    Layla grabbed Adam’s arm. “Will they hurt him?”
    Adam had dark, hungry glee in his eyes, a sharp smile cracking his face. “Not a bit.”
    The sky went ashy, the sun finally claiming the day. For a moment, Layla saw a swath of Shadow whipping like a cloak around the silhouette of a man. Khan. He was all darkness, arms outstretched, hands raised, body midpivot in the sky. With a pulse, he dispersed into a gritty ink stain and reformed some distance away, a tornado of black to cast another wraith to death on the ground.
    â€œShow-off,” Adam muttered.
    Layla was breathless. “How does he do that?”
    â€œDo what?”
    â€œKill them so quickly, so easily. I’ve never actually seen one die.”
    Adam’s eyes glittered. “The wraiths are dead already. He just, uh, seals the deal.”
    The explanation made no sense. It had to be a fae thing, a magic thing.
    Adam was up, moving toward Khan’s first kill. Which was crazy. More wraiths could be out there, yet Adam seemed perfectly comfortable to move around without cover. His men followed suit. Everyone was confident of their safety in Khan’s presence.
    Layla craned to look above and all around her. Khan was still nowhere in sight, so