TWENTY-SIX
Konstantin stared at the ceiling. Possibly, he was listening to Cyrus’s retreating footsteps, but all I could hear was the rushing of my blood in my ears. My rib still sent daggers of pain through my body with every breath, but I no longer felt blood trickling down the side of my face. All in all, I was in a lot better shape than Anderson was.
To make sure that remained the case, Konstantin shot Anderson yet again.
Anderson’s head was a bloody mess. He was never going to recover unless I could find a way to stop Konstantin from shooting him every couple of minutes. My stomach lurched unhappily. I told myself I had a concussion, because a tough chick like me had no business vomiting at the sight of blood. Never mind that I’d once tossed my cookies looking at crime-scene photos.
“Did you tell Cyrus Anderson’s big secret?” I asked. Not that I actually cared. I was just looking for an opening, some way to distract Konstantin long enough to let Anderson heal.
For one unguarded moment, I saw shock on Konstantin’s face. He hadn’t realized I knew that Anderson was a god. He hid his emotions quickly, but I cursed myself for opening my big mouth. Konstantin didn’t want anyone to know Anderson was a god, because he didn’t want anyone getting the idea that he himself wasn’t the most powerful being in the universe. And I might have just signed my own death warrant by admitting what I knew.
The scary thing was, I would probably be way, way better off if Konstantin killed me than if he kept me alive.
“I didn’t see any reason to burden him with that knowledge,” Konstantin said, giving me a once-over that made my skin crawl. I couldn’t have looked that appealing with my face all bloody and my hair scraggling out of its braid. My flannel shirt was blandly shapeless and buttoned to the top for warmth. And yet Konstantin’s leer told me he liked the way I looked just fine.
Maybe he just liked how a woman looked in chains.
It was hard not to squirm when Konstantin looked at me like that. I knew he was a rapist, and I hoped like hell that Anderson was going to come back to life sooner rather than later, before Konstantin decided he was in the mood to play.
“So what’s your big plan, anyway?” I asked as nonchalantly as I could. “Are you going to stand there and shoot Anderson in the head every couple of minutes for the rest of eternity? Because personally, I think that would get old after a while.”
I was trying to get under Konstantin’s skin, but his smile said he was finding me more entertaining than annoying. On another man, the smile would have looked genuine and disarming. Konstantin wasn’t traditionally handsome, but he knew how to make the most of what he had. His neat black beard disguised what I suspected was a weak chin, and I’d never seen him wearing anything other than designer suits. Today was no exception, though the suit was well on its way toward being ruined. Anderson’s blood spotted his pants legs and the bottom of his jacket.
“Actually, I’ve quite enjoyed it,” Konstantin said, his smile morphing into a phony frown. “Though I’d enjoy it more if he were alive to feel it.”
I shuddered. Cyrus might not enjoy hurting people, but Konstantin sure did. I wished Anderson had listened to me, though truthfully, I’m not sure what kind of plan we could have made to avoid this. We couldn’t have gotten to Konstantin without descending the stairs into the basement, and once we were in the stairway, we were sitting ducks.
Konstantin’s smile returned, and there was now an unpleasant gleam in his eyes to go with it. “But no matter. I’m sure I can find other ways to entertain myself once I’ve removed this thorn from my side.”
He tucked the gun into the waist of his pants. I hoped it would go off and blow his balls to smithereens. The damage would heal, but I suspected the pain would distract him for a good long while.
Unfortunately, my hopes were in vain. Konstantin bent down and grabbed Anderson’s arm, dragging him closer to the hole in the floor. The man might have looked like a fop in a fancy suit, but he was clearly carrying some muscle underneath, because dragging Anderson’s lifeless body didn’t even make him break a sweat.
My mouth went dry, and my heart rate jumped to red alert. I was aware of Konstantin watching me, savoring my reaction. I tried my best to keep my face neutral, but I don’t think I succeeded. I bit my lip when Anderson’s head slid over the edge of the hole, flopping limply into the darkness.
Konstantin kept dragging on Anderson’s arm, until Anderson’s shoulders crossed the edge and his upper body tilted precariously.
One more tug, and Konstantin let go of Anderson’s arm, tossing it into the mouth of the hole. The weight of his arm was enough to tip the scales, and Anderson started slipping into the hole, headfirst. I wanted to howl in rage, but I somehow managed to stifle the sound. Still, a little whimper worked its way out of my mouth as Anderson fell. When he hit the bottom of the hole, there was a metallic clang. I didn’t know what it meant.
“Anderson can walk through walls,” I said, my voice shaking. “He can get out of there.”
If nothing else, he’d be able to brace himself against the sides of the hole and inch his way up. But I knew there was more to Konstantin’s plan than just dumping Anderson in a hole.
Konstantin leaned over the hole and fired three quick shots. It would be nice if that were the last of his bullets, but I didn’t think he was careless enough to let that happen.
“It’s very hard to keep death-god descendants contained,” Konstantin agreed. “I found that out the hard way, as you know. I imagine it’s even harder with an actual god.” He grabbed one of the sections of girder stacked beside the hole, dropping it down. “I don’t know if he has some kind of animal he can conjure to dig him out if I bury him.” This time, he used both hands and threw two sections down at once. “But I’m not about to take chances.”
“What are you going to do?” I didn’t know how tossing pieces of steel down into the hole was going to help keep Anderson trapped, but I had a sick feeling I would soon find out.
“After my mistake with Justin, I’ve decided a little overkill is in order.” He got impatient with throwing the steel down one piece at a time, positioning himself behind a stack of pieces and giving them a mighty shove.
I winced, even knowing that Anderson was currently dead down there and couldn’t feel all those heavy pieces of metal raining down upon his vulnerable flesh.
Konstantin looked over the edge of the hole and nodded in satisfaction. “That ought to be enough,” he said, more to himself than to me.
He held out both his hands toward the hole. “I reinforced the hole with steel pipe, and put a good size layer of girders on the bottom.”
A blast of heat sucked all the moisture from my eyes and mouth. I couldn’t see very well from where I was sitting, but my skin felt seared and raw from the heat, and the edges of the hole began to glow, first red, then white.
The steel was melting.
I screamed out a protest as the sides of the hole began to melt and run, flowing downward into the hole. I thought of all those pieces of metal Konstantin had tossed down there, melting around Anderson’s body, burning the flesh from his bones.
Konstantin smiled and made a big show of dusting off his hands. “Even a god will take some time to recover from the damage all that molten metal will do. And when he does, the steel will have cooled around him. He’ll be trapped like a bug in amber.”
I was crying again, dammit. I tried to hold on to the hope that Anderson was as indestructible as he’d thought he was. “B-but, he can walk through walls. He can get out of the metal.”
Konstantin took one last, satisfied glance at the hole, then sauntered toward me. I wanted to scoot away from him, but there was nowhere I could go. The best I could do was draw my bound legs up toward my chest as he squatted beside me with that smug, sadistic smile.
“Let me explain some basic rules of physics to you,” he said. “A human body cannot pass through a solid object. Death-god descendants pass through walls by making themselves incorporeal, but they can’t actually move themselves when they’re incorporeal. Imagine them like astronauts, floating through the vacuum of space. If you give them a push, then the momentum will keep them going indefinitely. But if you could drop them into the vacuum in complete stillness, then they’d have no momentum to move them, and nothing to push against to give them momentum. A death-god descendant takes a step toward whatever barrier is in his way, giving himself momentum. Only then can he go incorporeal and keep moving.
“Anderson will awaken completely immobilized by his metal casing. He can go incorporeal all he wants, but with no momentum, all he can do is flail around.” Konstantin frowned dramatically. “It might have been enough just to immobilize him by burial. After all, Kerner could go incorporeal, but he couldn’t get out of his grave until his jackals dug him out. But, as I said, overkill seems like a good idea.”
Konstantin sat back on his heels with a happy sigh as I tried to absorb the horror of what he’d just told me. I really wanted to find a flaw in his theory, or at least to believe he was lying. But no, he was way too happy and self-satisfied. He was sure Anderson wasn’t getting out of that hole. Ever. And I was beginning to fear he might be right.