I smiled back at him and slowly raised my arms out to my sides, as if I was inviting him to come over and give me a hug. That was exactly what I wanted him to do.
“I know, baby,” I crooned again. “And I’m so sorry. I’ve been wrong about so many things, including you. Especially you.”
Porter nodded. “That you have, Maria. That you have.”
“Well, why don’t you come over here and let me make it up to you? I promise that I’ll make it worth your while.” I let out a soft giggle and batted my gunky eyelashes at him, as though I really were trying to seduce him. The thought made me sick, and I had to grind my teeth to hold a fake smile on my face.
He walked a little closer to me and then a little closer still, his shoes crunching through the snow. The sounds reminded me of bones breaking, but I forced myself to keep smiling and keep my arms raised, even though I was leaving myself totally open and exposed to him.
Porter stopped right in front of me, and I peered at him through the screen of blond hair that still hid most of my face. He smiled at me for a second longer, then lunged forward and locked his hands around my throat.
“Did you really think that I would ever mistake you for her?” he snarled, tightening his grip. “She was the love of my life. You? You’re nothing but a damn nuisance.”
I laughed in his face, although it came out as more of a choking, wheezing sound.
“What’s so funny?” he growled. “Why are you laughing at me again? Why?”
Instead of trying to pry his fingers off my neck, I reached down and pulled him even closer. “I might be a nuisance, but I’m the nuisance who’s just killed you, you sick son of a bitch.”
He frowned, wondering what I was getting at, but I threw my head back and screamed as loudly as I could. The sharp, sudden sound made him flinch, and he shifted on his feet, just the slightest bit. I slammed my boot into his ankle, pulling him off balance. Porter staggered forward, and I used his own momentum to help me backpedal, dragging him along with me. He cursed, realizing what I was up to, but it was already too late.
Gravity is a bitch, and so am I.
With one final burst of strength, I kicked us both over the edge of the cliffs.
27
As we fell, I grabbed hold of every single scrap of Stone magic that I had left, every ounce of power that was still inside my body, plus what was stored in my spider rune pendant and ring. In an instant, I sent that magic surging out through my entire body, using it to harden every single part of me, from my dyed blond hair to my head to my arms, chest, legs, and feet. I also flipped us over in midair, so that Porter was on the bottom of our free fall.
“Wha—wha—aaah!” The dwarf’s words dissolved into one solid, unending scream.
I grinned and held on to him even tighter.
We seemed to fall forever, but less than five seconds later, we hit bottom.
Crunch-crunch.
Porter hit the ground first. An instant later, I slammed into him. The weight of my body, made much heavier by my Stone magic, drove his that much deeper into the ground—right on top of all those sharp, jagged rocks that lined the riverbank.
Porter punched into the rocks like a water balloon. Splat. I heard the crunch-crunch-crunch of his bones breaking, along with a loud series of snap-snap-snaps, as though all the vertebrae in his spine were exploding one after another.
I also felt every bit of the brutal impact, and the sudden sharp ache in my chest told me that I probably had a couple of cracked ribs. My brain rattled around inside my skull, meaning that I probably also had a serious concussion. But still, I’d take that over trading places with Porter any day.
I might not have had my knives, but I’d made my own body into a weapon, and Porter was dying as a result.
For a minute, maybe two, both of us were too stunned to move, so we lay where we had landed, him on the rocks and me on top of him, my fingers still fisted in his tattered suit jacket. Finally, Porter coughed, spraying blood everywhere. The drops stung my face with their wet, shocking warmth, and still more of them soaked into my fake blond hair. The sharp, coppery stench drowned out the chemical odor of the hair dye.
I groaned and slowly rolled off him, flopping down onto a small patch of snowy mud. Rocks sliced into my side and back, drawing blood and making me hiss, but I welcomed the pain. It told me that I was still alive.
For another minute, I lay there, surfing the waves of pain until they died down to a more manageable level. Then, just as slowly, I pushed myself up onto my elbow. It took me another minute to get my breath back enough to sit up the rest of the way and another minute still before I was able to glance over at the dwarf, even though he was right next to me.
Porter looked like he had broken every single bone in his body. His arms and legs were stuck out at impossible angles from the rest of his torso, and hard lumps jutted up against his skin from where the shattered bones had been forced so far out of place. His spine must have been crushed too, because it didn’t seem he could move a single muscle, not even his head to look over at me.
But believe it or not, he was still alive.
His eyes were still open and blinking, so I leaned over where he could see me. Slowly, his blue gaze focused on my gray one. He coughed again, more blood bubbling up out of his mouth, although the rest of his body didn’t actually move with it.
“You know what, Porter? You actually got one thing right,” I said, my words slurring a bit from the concussion.
“What’s . . . that?” he rasped.
I leaned down so that my face filled his entire vision. “Blondes really do have more fun.”
A low rasping sound rippled out of his throat. It almost sounded like a laugh of agreement. Then he coughed again, and a familiar glassy sheen covered his eyes.
I sat there and watched Bruce Porter, the Dollmaker, die.
? ? ?
Despite the fact that I was more or less in one piece, I didn’t have the strength or energy left to try to get to my feet, much less find a way out of here. So I rifled through Porter’s pockets, hoping that he had his phone on him and that it had somehow survived the fall. My fingers wrapped around a hard plastic case, and my heart rose. I pulled it out of his pants pocket and held it up where I could see it. The screen was cracked in three places, but the phone turned on.
It took me several tries, and I cut my fingers on the broken glass, but I finally managed to punch a number into the phone. And when it actually started ringing? I’ll admit it. A couple of tears slid down my face that had nothing to do with my concussion or cracked ribs.
“Gin?” Owen answered on the first ring, his voice sharp with worry. “Is that you?”
“Yeah, it’s me.”