Daylighters (The Morganville Vampires #15)(91)

“Wow, this is a boring, bullshit propaganda show,” Shane said as Claire maneuvered the clippers into position and pressed hard, gritting her teeth as pain streaked up her arms from the stress and angle. “Hey, Sully, are you serving doughnuts and coffee, at least? Because I hear the KKK runs a great craft table.”

Claire’s bonds snapped, and the pressure on her shoulders eased from a red-hot burn to just a tingle. She caught Shane’s eye as Sully moved toward them, and gave him a sharp upward jerk of her head.

“You,” Sully said between gritted teeth. “Come here, you little *.”

“Hey, I’m not little,” Shane said. “So tell me, is your white sheet in the laundry, or did you just forget to pack it?”

Sully grabbed Shane’s arm and dragged him off balance and away from the stage. There was a backdrop set up, and he yanked Shane behind it.

Hannah sighed, shook her head, and pointed at Kentworth to go see what was happening. That left just her and Claire standing together.

Claire took a long step back toward where Shane had disappeared, careful to make her wrists seem like they were still pinned behind her.

Hannah was watching her.

Claire kept moving until she could put the barrier between her and anyone in the crowd who might be watching. Hannah followed.

As Hannah stepped into the shadow, Claire pulled her freed hands out from behind her back and grabbed for Hannah’s gun.

She wasn’t fast enough.

Hannah’s hand clamped down hard on the butt of the automatic pistol, holding it in the holster, and Claire realized with a sinking sense of bitter disappointment that she should have known a former Marine wouldn’t be taken that easily. Not by some inexperienced, untrained girl half her size.

“Nice work on the cuffs,” Hannah said. “Now take your hand off my gun, Claire.”

She did so, slowly, and stepped back. Shane was having a full-on bar brawl, still cuffed, with Sully. Kentworth was standing back, Taser in his hand, looking for an opening. He didn’t look especially happy about the whole thing.

Shane slammed his forehead into Sully’s face and grinned with bloodied teeth. “Amateur,” Shane said, as Sully cried out and went down hard, holding his gushing nose and whimpering. “That’s called an Irish handshake. Somebody named Sullivan ought to know that.”

Kentworth moved in with the Taser, and Shane arched his back and sidestepped the lunge, like a matador with a bull. But he wasn’t going to be able to get away, not with his hands still pinned behind him.

Claire looked wide-eyed at Hannah. Now or never, she silently thought. She couldn’t take the gun, not against Hannah’s well-trained reflexes.

But Hannah could give it up voluntarily.

Chief Moses nodded slightly and moved her hand away from the holster.

Claire lunged forward and grabbed the weapon; she checked the safety, which had been ingrained in her by weapons training with Shane, and clicked it off. “Call him off,” she said. She didn’t aim the gun at Hannah. She didn’t think she had to.

Hannah said, “Kentworth. Back off. Now.”

He stepped away, leaving Shane wobbling a little, bloodied but still standing. He had a red bruise forming on his forehead, and he spat blood from a cut lip, but she’d seen him worse. A lot worse.

Sullivan was still on the ground, cradling his nose. He yelled something, but it was incomprehensible.

“Knife,” she said to Hannah. Hannah unsnapped a holster on her other side and pulled out a military-style blade with a black grip, which she handed over. Claire took it and backed toward Shane. She kept the weapon raised this time, and focused on Kentworth, who was casting doubtful looks at Hannah, clearly not sure what he was supposed to do about this.

She sawed carefully through one side of Shane’s flex cuffs, and as his hand came loose, she pressed the handle into his palm.

“You give me the best presents,” he said, then freed his other wrist with a practiced slice. The flex cuffs dropped to the grass. “We’re going now. Keys.”

“What?” Kentworth asked.

“Car keys. Toss ’em.”

Kentworth was clearly considering going for his weapon, not his keys; whatever doubts he had about the Daylight Foundation—if he had any at all—were back-burnered by the fact that two of his prisoners had somehow managed to escape their restraints and gain weapons. When he twitched slightly, though, Hannah said flatly, “Give them the keys. That’s an order.”

“I can take her, ma’am.”

“And you’ll have to wake up tomorrow knowing you shot a teenage girl dead when you didn’t need to,” Hannah said. “Toss the keys, Charlie. They’re not going anywhere.”

Kentworth looked doubtful, but Hannah’s firm, calm tone made the difference. He unclipped the keys from his belt loop and tossed them at Shane’s feet. “It’s a long way to the car, son,” he said. “You might want to think about the danger you’re putting your girlfriend in out there.”

Shane twirled the keys around his finger for a second, then tossed them. Claire thought for a second that his aim was off, but it wasn’t, because he wasn’t throwing them toward her at all.

He was throwing them toward Hannah, who effortlessly fielded them. “Sorry about this,” she told Kentworth, and before Claire could really understand what exactly had just happened, Hannah walked past Kentworth to Sullivan. She rolled the protesting man over and used her handcuffs to pin his hands behind his back. When Sully gave a gargling yell of protest, she leaned an elbow into his back. “Sully, I could do a hell of a lot worse to you than just handcuff you. If I have to gag you, you’ll choke on your blood from that broken nose. So stay quiet, or I’ll make you quiet.”