Page 142 of Price of Angels

“Michael!” she screamed when she saw him. “Michael!”

And then the pain.

Cold, so very cold, like ice spearing through her abdomen. Her breath caught, and her heart stuttered, as the awful sharp thrust of cold bit into her belly.

And then the great spill of warmth, heat rushing inside and outside of her, pouring down her belly beneath her clothes, flooding her insides with hot liquid.

The blood.

He’d stabbed her.

“Michael,” she said, as his face became clear. He was running toward them, his knife in his hand.

“I love you,” she whispered.Oh, love, you almost made it in time. Almost.

It was his mother’s coat. The long, plaid wool number with the nipped-in waist and the big pleats in back. His mother had always looked like a movie star in that coat. And it was his mother’s dark hair spilling across the snow. And it was Holly’s pale, green-eyed face, her lips forming his name.

He saw the knife go in, through the layers of coat and clothes, saw the way her face blanked as the pain registered.

The man on top of her stood, pulling the knife from her, its tip dark and dripping with her blood.

Drip-drip-drip onto the snow.

Michael came to a staggering halt. He’d reached them. And she was already dead.

The hounds circled, baying in a frenzy, tails beating in the air.

Cassius lifted his bloody muzzle in greeting. Abraham Jessup clutched at his ruined throat, his savaged belly, his clothes shredded.

“Sammie, Bear,” Michael said, snapping his fingers, and the hounds came, sitting down beside him. Their job was done and they knew it. They were bay dogs.

Cass was the catch dog.

Michael aimed the tip of his own knife at Jacob Jessup, at the man’s sweaty red face. “I’m going to gut you.”

Jessup was scared. Michael could smell the stink of fear on him. But he said, “Why? She isn’t gonna make it.”

“Because it’ll be fun.”

Abraham was groaning, trying to push up on his hands.

“Cass.” The Dane came to him, head tilted at an alert angle, jaws steaming with wet blood. Michael pointed to Jacob. “Hold,” he commanded.

Jacob tried to run, but Cass locked onto his arm, dragged him back. When Jacob tried to stab at him, Cass dodged, released and changed his grip, clamping his teeth onto the hand that held the knife. Jacob screamed and the knife fell into the snow. Blood followed, a trickling stream, steaming when it hit the snow, as Cass’s fangs punctured his flesh.

Michael was prepared for a fight. He was prepared for the wild punch thrown from Jacob’s free hand, and he caught the man’s fist, crushed it tight in his fingers. He was prepared also for the startled, terrified rush of understanding in Jessup’s eyes. The look of a man who knows he’s about to die.

Michael drove his knife into Jacob’s belly, in to the hilt.

Gasp. Hiss of breath.

Then he withdrew it, and ran it through the man’s windpipe.

“Cass, release,” he said, and Jacob fell backward, twitching like a landed fish after he hit the snow.

Abraham whimpered when the huge dog’s jaws closed on his shoulder. Michael knelt beside him, leaned in so he could smell the fear-sweat, so he could whisper in his ear.

“St. Michael the archangel, defend us in battle. Be our protection against the malice and snares of the devil.”

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