Andy reached behind me, fumbled the gallon jar of silver liquid, and looked at me with the most heartbreaking plea. "Help," he whispered. I felt the tide roaring in again, stronger this time. He couldn't resist that, not even for me.

I helped him lift the jar.

One swallow.

Two.

Sam's next bullet hit the jar and exploded it into a shower of glass. The potion coated us both and swirled in thick silvery streams in the blood on the floor.

But it worked.

I felt the black surging inside Andy fall away, and the sudden pulsebeat of life took over. For just an instant, his eyes locked with mine, and I saw a promise there.

An acceptance, too.

Donal's huge hand swiped at his feet, but Andy sidestepped and waltzed me with him. He put me gently out of the way, and turned to Sam Twist.

"You got plenty of cause to hate," Andy said. "Your brother's been used hard. But you took it too far, mister. You got no quarrel with Holly."

"She's a witch."

Andy's smile turned wolfish. "So am I, mister. And now you got a quarrel with me."

Sam fired again, and hit Andy. The bullet wounds didn't seem to matter at all; with a bellow of rage, Sam rushed forward, still firing. Andy moved like a bullfighter, avoiding the attack, and swung his arm around Sam's throat from behind. He threw his weight into the motion. Sam's feet slipped in the blood, and his neck snapped with a muffled dry crackle. It happened too fast for me to really take in, and then the life was leaving Sam's blue eyes and his body falling in that utterly empty way that only the dead can fall as Andy let him go.

Donal howled, and it hurt me to hear it. He crawled past us and cradled Sam's broken body in his massive arms, small as a toy.

I tightened my grip on the cleaver and swallowed hard. As I took a step toward him, Donal looked up at me. I knew he could take me apart.

And I knew he was done fighting.

Andy turned toward me, and our gazes met again.

He'd taken two steps toward me when Lottie's poison took hold. Andy's fearsome strength of will might be able to deny bullet wounds, but this was different. Very different.

His legs folded, and he fell to his side, panting. His pupils grew huge, no longer silver but black, black as the death that was coming for him.

"Next time," he whispered. "You watch yourself, Holly Anne."

I dropped to my knees beside him and put my hand on his forehead as he began to convulse.

I tasted poison on his lips, and I wondered in a black, desolate fury if it would be enough to finish me. It wasn't.

The universe wasn't quite that merciful.

"Miss Caldwell," Detective Prieto said. I raised my head slowly, every muscle aching and hot. Part of it was Lottie's poisonous mixture; the other part was a collection of injuries I hadn't realized I'd accumulated until the heat of battle was past. I was back in the hospital. They'd taken Donal away in a steel prison truck, howling for his dead brother. They'd taken Andy away in a coroner's wagon, along with Sam. I'd screamed about the two of them riding together, but the cops thought I was out of my mind. Maybe I was.

I looked at Detective Prieto wearily, too exhausted to care about the pity in his eyes. "Did you find her?"

"We did," he said. "She was drugged. Chained up in a room underneath Sam Twist's house."

I nodded. "And the others?"

He just looked at me. Sam hadn't needed the others, of course. He'd needed only Lottie to keep Donal alive.

Perversely, Lottie still lived, like the cockroach surviving nuclear winter. And so did Donal, for all the good it did him.

"You okay?" Prieto asked. It was my turn to stare, and he turned away from what he saw in my expression. "Lottie's down the hall, I hear. They say she'll make a full recovery."

With that, he pushed open the door to the grim little hospital room and left. It hurt too much to stand up, but I did it anyway, and shuffled to follow.

Prieto was getting into the elevator when I emerged, but he caught my eye and jerked his chin down the hall. "Four down," he said.

The doors shut.

Carlotta was a lovely woman with the soul of a pig. I'd always known that, but I'd never really known.

I'd never seen the depths. Now I couldn't get out of them. Not without climbing over someone else.

She'd do.

Carlotta was asleep. She looked older than I remembered, with black hair threaded with silver and lines on her face. Could have been someone's mother, someone's grandmother. Asleep, you couldn't see the real person.

Her eyes opened when I dragged a chair up next to her bed—brown, as confused as any soul dragged back from the dark. Except she'd been drugged, not dead, and the softness cleared from her in seconds.

"Holly." She nearly spat my name. "I should have known he'd spare you. Sam always liked you."

I didn't answer her. Somewhere, in the coldest part of me, I was seeing the agony of Andy's last moments, and I was realizing how much Lottie would have enjoyed it.

"The others?"

"Dead," I said. My voice sounded soft and distant. "How long have you been doing this?"

"Doing what?"

"Bringing back the dead and fighting them like dogs. For money."

Lottie's bitter brown eyes narrowed. "Don't you judge me, you little bitch. We all bring them back for profit." She smiled slowly. "I'm just creative."

The room looked red for a few seconds, and I had trouble controlling my breathing. My hands ached, and realized I'd clenched them into tight, shaking fists.

"Creative," I repeated. "Why'd you ask Prieto for Andy?"

"I knew somebody was stalking us," she said. "If anybody could stop it, Toland would have been the one. Besides—" She was still smiling, and it had a sharp, cutting edge to it. " — he'd have made me a lot of money, after. A lot of money."

I shuddered. It was hard to stay in the chair. Hard not to put my hands around her throat and squeeze.

"You're done," I said. "I'm going to make it my personal mission to see you're finished."

"How?" Lottie's laugh broke on the air like ice. "You're a stupid girl. I'm the victim. You counting on the Review Board? Better not. With so many resurrection witches gone, they might give me a fine, but they need me. Now more than ever."

She was probably right, at that. Resurrection witches were a rare breed, and she and I were the only ones left working in the city. The Review Board would blame Sam. Lottie would get away with a slap on the wrist.

Lottie would do it again, and I wouldn't be able to stop her. The police wouldn't act. The dead didn't have legal rights.

I stood up. Lottie's dark gaze followed me as I crossed to the door. There was a thumb-lock on the inside, and I flipped it over.

Lottie laughed. "You going to kill me, Holly? You going to spend your life in prison over dead men?"

"No," I said. "Funny thing about comas, Lottie. You can slip back into them without warning. It's really tragic."

A flash of something in her eyes that might have been fear. Her hand reached for the call button.

I got there first.

I held her down. She struggled, and snarled, but when my lips touched hers, it was all over.

I was the best resurrection witch in Austin. One thing about being able to give life to the dead… you can take it from the living. It's forbidden, but it can be done.

I didn't take all her life. Just enough.

Just enough to leave her wandering in the dark, screaming, trapped inside her own head. Her body would live, mute and unresponsive, for as long as modern science could maintain it, but Lottie Flores would never, ever bring back the dead again.

Not even herself.

Andy was in the morgue downstairs, and I had to see him. What I'd done to Lottie had hurt me in ways that might never be right again, but somehow seeing his face, even in death, would give me peace.