Page 78 of Bent Out of Shade
I tugged my socks away from Boo, who’d been batting them around, and yanked them on. “I wondered if it was demonic in origin, but I didn’t have any sense of it being enchanted.” I turned a stricken gaze on Harry. “I swear, I wouldn’t have given it to her if I thought it was dangerous.”
He nodded. “We need to get inside her place. Maybe she’ll speak to you and you can get the amulet away from her. If that doesn’t cure her, I’ll whisk her over to the Carpe Demon lot. Let them examine her.”
“You can get there?”
He shot me an “obviously” look. Guess his neutrality allowed him access to their secret HQ.
Shoving my phone in my purse, I jammed my feet into my shoes, and flung open the door.
“I’m coming,” Laurent said.
“No, mate,” Harry said. “I can’t fly both of you.”
“Fl-fly?” My mouth fell open.
“I get carsick,” the gargoyle said sheepishly.
That seemed to settle the matter—at least for him—because he snapped out an enormous pair of wings, tossed me on his back between them with a “Hold tight!” and shot out the door.
We flew straight up into the sky. I was screaming and hanging on for dear life, my arms wrapped around Harry’s neck, my legs cinched around his waist, and my eyes screwed shut. Not this again.
“Choking!” He tried to loosen my fingers, but I gripped him tighter, my screaming growing louder.
I felt his sigh rumble through him, and we tilted forward. The wind was no longer rushing down over the crown of my head, so I cracked my eyes open.
Harry had turned horizontal, streaking across the sky like Superman. We weren’t at airplane altitude, more like very high treetops, but I preferred to travel looking up at roofs, not down.
My head swam and I moaned.
“Don’t hurl,” he ordered. Now that I’d stopped screaming, I heard the leathery beat of his wings propelling us in strong strokes through the air.
“Someone will see.”
“Nah. My magic prevents that. You’re good.”
“No! I am the furthest thing from good!” It came out as a high-pitched jumble. I grabbed his collar, tugging upward like it was a bridle on a horse. The material ripped under the force of my movement, fluttering free before blowing away. Whoops.
Harry groaned.
The warm breeze streamed through my hair and the sun kissed my skin as we soared over the water toward the North Shore mountains, the waves twinkling like precious jewels. It was one of those perfect September days where summer had yet to end.
“Kill me,” I whimpered.
He pointed at one of the backyards up ahead. “Almost there.”
“How are you going to laaaaaaaaa—”
Harry dove for the ground.
My stomach fell clear out through the soles of my feet at his suicidal rush to pancake us against the earth. I couldn’t even scream through my final moments.
Mere feet before impact, he pulled up sharply and smoothly touched down. “See? Safe and sound.”
I let go, staggering backward before my legs gave out, and I fell onto the ground, rolling over to kiss the grass. There was not enough Ativan in the world to make me repeat that journey.
Harry tugged me up before I’d finished blessing terra firma, and I took stock of my surroundings. We were in the pocket-sized backyard of one of the ubiquitous Craftsman bungalows built here in the 1920s and ’30s.
He strode up the rickety back stairs and knocked briskly. “Nora,” he called out. “I’ve brought Miri.”
