Page 57 of Helsing: Demon Slayer
He couldn’t stand to hear her sob. He tried to lift his hand, but it was too heavy. It fell against the console with a thud.
Dianne’s heart jumped to her throat after Ryan lost consciousness. As panic beat at her, she gripped the steering wheel so hard her fingers ached. Outside, the moonless night seemed all-encompassing. Without intending to, she pressed on the accelerator until the Opel’s engine roared, and cool air sent her hair whipping around her face.
Suddenly the highway curved. She barely managed to turn the wheel in time to keep them from smashing head-on into the trees and other foliage that lined the road. Even so, the rough sound of branches scraping the car’s side snapped her back to reality.
Ryan didn’t stir, however.
“Slow is smooth, smooth is fast,” she said, easing her foot up off the gas and forcing herself to breathe more slowly.
She glanced down and saw the Glock where it had landed between her and Ryan, whose large frame had sagged against the passenger door. She picked the weapon up and put it into her lap, as certain as she’d ever been about anything that she’d use it to protect Ryan.
He’d said he trusted her.
“Teamwork means I’ve got your back, too, Demon Slayer,” she said aloud. She wrapped her hand around the gun’s grip, the hard polymer too light for its power. It settled against her thigh like a vow.
Somberly, she gazed at Ryan.No matter what.
She refused to think about what would happen if she didn’t make it to the safehouse soon. If Ryan didn’t recover.
Not yet.
The drive to Shkodër in the black night took three times as long as the male voice in Dianne’s ear—Aerie Actual—said that it would under normal circumstances. Whoever he was, his no-nonsense tone kept her anchored and determined to get Ryan to safety and help. And he checked in with her in fifteen-minute intervals, sending music through the comms when they weren’t speaking that reminded her of the soundtrack of an epic movie. It galvanized her.
Dianne drove slowly enough that she didn’t outpace the illumination of the Opel’s headlights on the winding mountain highway. Overhead, faint stars sprinkled against the midnight-blue sky delineated the outline of the charcoal mountains crowding the horizon. Even though she drove with the windows down, she heard nothing beyond the sound of the car. When they passed unlit buildings, their walls briefly illuminated by the headlights, nothing moved. They could have been driving on the moon for all the signs of life that she saw.
Eventually the tension and Ryan’s still form got to Dianne, whose adrenaline waned into exhaustion as the night elapsed. She began to imagine that the sheer white tunic she wore took on a faint, ethereal gleam. Blinking her eyes several times, she succeeded only in seeing ominous ghostly figures on the landscape. Unnatural elongated figures that seemed to keep pace with the car.
“Aerie Actual,” said Dianne. The music in her ear cut off.
“This is Aerie Actual, do you have a situation to report?”
“A ‘sitrep’?” she asked, trying to inject humor into her question. Instead, she sounded tired and scared even to herself. “No, just needing to hear a human voice.”
“Not a problem. I’m here with you every step of the way.”
“What’s your name?” asked Dianne, gripping the wheel. “I’m Dianne, Olivia’s little sister.”
“Yes, I know.” The voice paused. “I’m Miles Baxter. I used to work with your sister at the CIA.”
“CIA?”Thatwoke Dianne right up. “Olivia was a spy?”
“She didn’t tell you?” Miles chuckled dryly. “It’s not exactly Christmas-dinner conversation, if you know what I mean.”
Dianne shook her head, half laughing. “It explains a lot.”
She went silent, mulling over the craziness of Olivia being a spy. After everything she’d learned and experienced in the past twenty-four hours, her sister working for the CIA seemed as normal as a day at the spa followed by cocktails for her.
“Hey,” said Miles, bringing her back to the present. “You’re a lot like her, you know?”
“How’s that? Olivia hasn’t been a damsel in distress waiting for a knight in shining armor to rescue her in her whole life.”
“From where I sit, you’re the one doing the heroic rescue.”
Dianne scoffed but didn’t deny his observation. She looked at the creepy ethereal forms that had thickened around the car, turning the night into an oppressive otherworld. Her tunic glowed brighter, almost in counterpoint. At the same time, her heart felt inexplicably heavy, as though an unseen weight pressed against her chest with each passing moment.
Up ahead, buildings clustered. She prayed that it was Shkodër, that the safehouse was just inside the city limits, and there was a medical team there, just waiting to save Ryan.
“Listen, Dianne, we have a team on its way to you. They’ll be there in just a few minutes. You just have to keep your head on straight and keep driving, no matter what.” Dianne heard a thread of tension in Miles’s voice that hadn’t been there a moment ago. “Ryan’s counting on you. Your sister’s counting on you. We’re all counting on you.”
