Free Steel's Edge by Ilona Andrews Page B

chance. Move the stone, and everyone walks away from this.”
    Ã‰léonore held her breath.
    â€œFine,” the slaver said.
    Daisy shrieked, a high-pitched sound suffused with pain.
    Ã‰léonore chanced a look at the window. The blond slaver was holding something pale and bloody between his index finger and his thumb. Daisy writhed in the hands of two other men.
    â€œThat was an ear,” the slaver announced. “Next we’ll do fingers.”
    *   *   *
    â€œWE have to go.” Charlotte stared at Malcolm Rooney, towering over her by eight inches.
    Around them, the Rooney house was a flurry of activity: short, plump Helen Rooney dialed one number after the other on her cell, going down the list of contacts, while their two teenage sons stockpiled weapons on the porch. As soon as she’d arrived, their oldest son and daughter had left to carry the message down to the neighbors, and now armed men milled about at the house.
    â€œNow you listen to me,” the big man leaned closer. “They’re safe behind the wards, and Éléonore is a tough old lady. She can handle herself. Sixteen men is a lot of firepower. We sure as hell aren’t going to ride out there unprepared, or we might as well just slit our own throats and be done with it.”
    â€œThey’re alone in the house!” She saw a dozen men ready to go.
    â€œIt will be fine,” Malcolm said.
    She looked into his eyes and knew arguing was useless. He would do this at his own pace or not at all.
    â€œAnother hour, and we’ll be good to go.”
    â€œAn hour?” He was out of his mind. You could get the entire town up and moving in thirty minutes.
    â€œIt will be fine,” Helen Rooney said, the phone still to her ear. “It just takes time to get everyone together, that’s all. Everything will be okay.”
    The sickening, nagging feeling in the pit of Charlotte’s stomach said otherwise.
    Malcolm pulled a shotgun off the wall. “You’re lucky East Laporte is a different place now than it was six years ago. Back then, you would’ve gotten no help, but now people will come together.”
    He turned his massive back to her. She realized what was happening: the Edgers were delaying on purpose. Nobody wanted to confront sixteen armed men, so they were dragging their feet, hoping things would resolve themselves.
    Charlotte took a deep breath and let go of her persona as an unassuming Edge healer. She raised her head, sinking the icy, unmistakable tone of command into her words. “Mr. Rooney.”
    He turned, surprise stamped on his face. He had expected the Charlotte who lived down the road. Instead, he got Baroness Charlotte de Ney, the Healer of Ganer. She stood before him, the full power of her magic in her eyes, her power radiating from her. The house was suddenly silent.
    â€œYour wife is developing osteoporosis, you have an enlarged prostate, and your youngest son doesn’t have ADHD, as your wife told me; he has hyperthyroidism. If you want any of these problems to be treated in the future, you will stop patting my shoulder and telling me not to worry my pretty little head about it. You will get this mob together now and follow me out there, or so help me gods, I will make your life hell. You think those aches and pains you feel now are bad. After I get through with you, you will be a broken man. Move.”
    *   *   *
    TULIP went rigid in her arms. “Don’t look,” Éléonore whispered.
    Daisy flailed, throwing all of her weight. “No! No, no, no . . .”
    The slavers dragged her to the ground and pinned her hand to the edge of the sidewalk.
    Knife flashed. Daisy screamed, a wordless, sharp shriek of pain.
    â€œLeft pinkie,” the slaver announced. “You planning on getting married? Because I’m about to take the ring finger.”
    Tulip jerked, trying to get out of