Poison. I looked down at the jar and let it slide out of my hands and back to the counter.

"Come out," Andy said. "You want us dead, you do it barefaced."

"All right," said a smoke-strained, whisky-rough voice from the hall, and a big redheaded man stepped into the light. There was a gun in his hand, pointed not at Andy, but at me. "How's this?"

Sam Twist. I'm just the dispatcher. "Sam—" I wet my lips. Andy stepped between me and the gun, and I heard three loud pops in quick succession.

Andy just stood there and took the bullets, shook himself, and said in a voice I didn't even recognize, "You all done, Irish, or you want to reload?"

I slid slowly along the counter, angling for a view of Sam. He was calmly holding the gun at his side.

"No need," he said. "I was just softening you up a little. No question, you're one hell of an opponent. That's why I tried to get Holly to take a pass on bringing you back again."

"Mine," scraped another voice, and the thing that shuffled into view next to Sam… if it had been born human, it hadn't stayed that way. Misshapen, malformed as a dropped lump of clay, but roped with muscle. Dead gray eyes. Pointed teeth displayed by lips that had been cut or ripped away. Sam was a big man, and this—creature—topped him by a foot or more. Its shoulders were broader than the doorway.

I remembered the photographs of the cops. Beaten to death. Necks snapped.

Andy had never looked fragile to me until that moment.

If he was worried, or even startled, it didn't show. He bounced lightly on the balls of his feet, eyes fixed on Sam's monster. "Well, ain't you pretty?" he said, cool and quiet. "Your momma must be real proud."

The thing swayed, but didn't move. Its blind-looking gaze strayed from Andy… to me.

A low growl started in its throat, a diesel engine running rough, and I felt Andy's whole body tense. "Get behind me," he said. "Holly, dammit, do that right now."

I did, but not before I got a glimpse at the blood soaking the front of his shirt, and the tattered flesh beneath. Dead men could die, and they could feel pain, and no matter how focused and tough Andy was, he couldn't overcome this monster.

Not alone.

"Who is he?" I whispered. Sam couldn't have brought this creature back, not on his own.

"He was my brother Donal," Sam Twist said. "Before Lottie got hold of him."

He was Lottie's. But Lottie was dead. Wasn't she? "She—brought him back?"

"He got knifed in a bar fight," Sam said. "Strongest man I ever knew. I begged her to help, and she did. She brought him back. But I didn't know what she'd do with him."

Sam moved over to the side, edging to where he could once again see my face, and line up a clear shot. Andy didn't move. He clearly thought it was better to stand between me and Donal.

"What did she do?" I was acutely aware now of the blood pooling at Andy's feet, of the waves of darkness vibrating the air between us. Death was coming, and coming no matter how hard he pushed against it.

"What does it look like she did, you bitch?" Sam spat, and the sudden raw fury in him exploded like nitro. "She used him. My own brother. She told me she put him back to sleep, but she didn't. She set him to fighting other dead men like some trained bear, and brought him back, kept dragging him back until there was nothing left. She took bets." Sam swallowed hard. "But he remembered. He heard my voice on the phone, and he remembered."

Sam's face was red, distorted with anguish, and his eyes were glittering with tears. I swallowed hard to clear the lump from my throat. "He came to find you," I said. "Oh, Sam, I'm sorry."

He sneered at me. There was no more sanity in his eyes now than in his brother's. "Keep your pity," he said. "I don't want it. I'm putting you down, bitch. I'm putting all of you down."

Lottie wasn't dead. Lottie couldn't be dead, if Donal was still alive. Sam had her somewhere, under lock and key, maybe drugged or worse, but still breathing.

She was Donal's only vulnerability.

I was still partly blocked from Sam's view. With my right hand, I dug my cell phone from my pocket, flipped it open, and hit and held the speed dial number I'd assigned to Detective Prieto. I had to hope he'd answer or, at worst, that his voice mail would give him the clues he needed after the fact to put it all together. "You kept Lottie alive," I said. "Right, Sam? To suffer."

"Damn straight," he said. "When I'm done with you, I'll take out Annika, and we can move on to the next town. You have to be stopped, all of you."

"You're using Donal just as much as Lottie did," I said. "Let him go, Sam. God—please, let him go!"

"No," he snapped. "Not until every single one of you is dead. Don't move, Holly. I want you to watch what happens next."

He knew. He knew about Andrew; he'd heard how traumatized I was when I'd lost him before.

He wanted me to watch him die again.

Donal was fast, but Andy was faster. Even wounded, he was as lithe as a cat. He dodged Donal's roaring charge, tripped the twisted giant, and bashed Donal's skull hard into the marble counter. I backed away, dodged behind the fighting men, and screamed into the phone, "Prieto, it's Sam Twist, find Lottie, Lottie's the key—"

Donal's hand slapped the phone away from me, and it bounced and broke into scattered pieces against the far wall. A bone snapped in my hand, and I choked back a scream, then another as I felt Andy's torment surge stronger. He was feeling my pain, too.

He'd do anything to stop it, and that was so dangerous.

I needed the gun Sam held.

I settled for grabbing a cleaver from the block next to the stove. Lottie, like all good cooks and witches, kept her tools in order; the cleaver had a wicked fine edge, a silky deadliness that vibrated the air.

I kept Donal between me and Sam as he sought for a clear shot. Andy slipped in his own blood; his strike at Donal's massive throat lost its strength, and Donal's huge gray hands closed on his shoulders.

I felt Andy's arm being wrenched out of its socket. I screamed. He grunted and pulled halfway free, but Donal bunched up a fist and drew back—

I threw myself to the floor and swiped the cleaver through Donal's Achilles' tendons, and he toppled, howling, like a tree. The table collapsed under his impact. Andy squirmed free, panting, and I felt the tide coming faster, deeper, all that darkness swirling and clouding the air between us as he tried to get to me…

Sam fired twice. One shot hit Donal's flailing arm and kicked a fist-sized chunk of flesh out of it. The second shot…

The second shot took Andy in the chest as he lunged to cover me.

"No!" I shrieked, and took his weight in my arms as he collapsed against me.

There was no fighting the emptiness that rolled over me now, the call of endless peace, and I felt Andy slipping away.

I felt him find some small, impossible anchor in that tide, and his body shuddered against mine, holding me tight against him. He can't. He can't make it. Even the dead had to die.

But Andy refused to go.

He pulled back, and his eyes were liquid silver, the color of the potion I'd dosed him with in the morgue. His skin was as pale as paper. Most of his blood was poured out on the floor, an offering to harsher gods than I could ever worship.

But he stayed standing.

He took in a deep breath, and closed his eyes. "Potion," he whispered. "Give it to me."

The jar behind me on the counter.

Poisoned.

"No," I said. "No, Andy."

Another shot struck him. I screamed something at Sam, I don't even know what, and he bared his teeth in response. Donal was crawling toward us across the floor. He couldn't stand, but he wouldn't give up. He wanted me dead as much as Sam did.