“You’re sure?”

“Nope. It’s not the bone conjurer, but that is the skull, I’m sure of it. You drive, I’m going on foot.” Annja opened the door. “Can you keep close?”

“No problem. Go get him, sword-wielding warrior woman.”

She sprinted down the sidewalk. A good two hundred feet ahead of her, the man turned. The small case the skull had been enclosed in swung out in his grip. He saw her and took off in a run. He dodged right, disappearing from view.

Pumping her arms, Annja forced her pace to long strides. She considered calling the sword to hand, but dismissed that idea. She didn’t need it right now, and it would only slow her down.

Taking the turn led into a long narrow alley, which opened on to some kind of building yard enclosed by chain-link fencing. That didn’t stop the man. He expertly mounted the fence, and swung himself over.

“Thugs,” Annja muttered. “They never cease to surprise me.”

Annja hit the fence at a run and landed high, her fingers piercing the chain links. The curved metal was cold and her toe slipped its hold, dropping her body to hang by her fingers. Working the tips of her boots into the convoluted links, she levered herself up to latch a forearm over the top of the fence. Lifting her upper body, she pushed, and when her chest had risen above the chain link, she dipped forward, releasing the fence and arching her back.

She landed in a crouch. The man ran toward a warehouse.

Garin’s Escalade pulled up with a squeal behind the fence as Annja entered the warehouse. It was late. Moonlight cast across the floor at the far wall, but where Annja stood, the atmosphere was hazy at best.

Scattered lumber and plastic-covered pallets stood everywhere. The dusty smell of Sheetrock clued her to a stack of whiteboard to her right.

Before her on the hardwood floor, smeared shoe tracks advertised the murderer’s intentions. He’d gone right.

Garin entered with pistol held before him and a keen eye to the surroundings. Annja nodded, acknowledging the trail by pointing it out. He nodded left and gestured she go right.

She dashed between two stacks of lumber piled three feet higher than her head. The building must be a lumber warehouse. Racing to the end, she slapped a palm on a stack of wood. An electric air nailer wobbled.

“Oh, yeah?” Annja grabbed the yellow nailer and gave the trigger a squeeze. No nails were expelled because the safety was on. But it was charged, and ready to use. “Nice.”

The clatter of boards alerted her that the man was close. Nailer wielded like a gun, she slunk along a wall of lumber, her shoulders tracing the clean edges, and crept to the end of the stack.

Raising the nailer before her, she decided it would prove a fitting weapon. With a sword she’d have to put herself close to the danger. With the nailer she could buy herself some room.

Stepping forward to the next aisle of stacked lumber, she dodged a look down the aisle. Empty.

Heavy breathing signaled her quarry was nearby. Putting her back to the next stack of lumber, she guessed he was down the aisle. Footsteps moved closer.

Annja spun her hips and turned her body to stand in the aisle.

The man ran toward her, but seeing she was armed, he abruptly stopped.

Flicking her forefinger over the safety guard, she took aim and fired. His skull snapped backward with impact. Three inches of steel finishing nail pierced flesh, bone and brain. He stumbled a couple paces, slapping his palms against the plastic-covered lumber.

Prepared to fire again, Annja waited for the man to drop. Remarkably, he maintained balance. A gruff shake of head and a growl preceded his wicked grin.

She gaped at the man.

He gripped the two-inch portion of nail jutting from his skull, and yanked it out. A bubble of blood pooled at the nail hole, but didn’t drip down his forehead.

He winked.

“You are so kidding me.” Annja tossed the nailer aside. “I hate it when I feel like the heroine cast in the movie opposite the villain who just won’t die.”

The man’s feet shuffled. He fled down the aisle away from her. Annja pursued.

In the narrow aisle she couldn’t call the sword to her, but as soon as she exited the first row and spotted the man’s coattails, she summoned the sword.

Reaching out, her fingers tingled as the sword found its way from the otherwhere and into her grip. She liked the solid feel as it made itself whole. It claimed her as much as she claimed it. They were one.

Annja raced forward. The footsteps in the dust stopped, but only because she skidded up to a swept section of cement flooring.

Garin’s voice echoed close by. The men must have run into each other.

The crunch of a fist connecting with bone sounded before Annja saw either of them. Charging to an abrupt stop at the edge of stacked Sheetrock, she lowered the sword and caught her breath.

The warehouse resounded with male grunts. Clothing whipped with sharp kicks and precise punches. The murderer possessed some knowledge of karate or judo and delivered a few direct kicks to Garin’s chest. The formidable immortal took the violence with little more than a wince.

Fist to skull crushed the nail hole in the man’s temple. He didn’t go down. Of course not; he was the villain who would not die.

Drops of blood tracked across Annja’s forearm. That was from Garin.

She scanned the floor. Garin’s gun lay against a stack of lumber, thirty feet from where the men fought.

The men matched each other in height and bulk. Yet Annja wondered what strength the thug could wield against Garin’s very human strength. Just because he was immortal didn’t mean he had superpowers. She’d seen him injured by bullet and blade.

Something slid away from the clash of testosterone. The case containing the skull. Annja tracked it as it cut a fine path through the Sheetrock dust, and came to a wobbling stop against a two-by-four.

“You just going to watch?” Garin said on a huff. He managed a bloody grin at Annja, before lunging to deliver a pulverizing punch to the man’s gut.

The man landed three feet from where Annja stood. She tapped him on the skull with the sword’s tip. “My turn, big boy. You up for taking me on?”

She allowed him to roll over and jump to his feet. The hole where the nail had pierced was bloody but it hadn’t magically healed. He was just a man. She had no reason to fear him.

The man eyed the sword curiously. He spat blood to the side. “I don’t normally fight chicks,” he said. “But I’ll give it a go.” He spread out his arms, not a position of preparation but of surrender. “Would you fight an unarmed man?”

She tipped the sword up under his chin. Don’t get too cocky, she chided inwardly. You may feel as though you have control here, but if you’ve learned anything, it’s that you never do.

“I hardly believe you would walk about unarmed. Don’t have another guitar string handy?” she asked.

He lifted his hands slowly to place palms out near his shoulders. Annja kept the sword tip under his chin. A twist of her wrist pressed it into his neck above the Adam’s apple. Flesh opened and blood beaded, a shallow cut.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about, girlie,” he offered. “Watch the blade. Where’d a sexy thing like you get a badass weapon like that? Someone’s going to get hurt with that thing.”

“You must be that someone. Who are you? You work for Serge?”

“Serge? Lady, I was just taking a casual stroll, then you come along and go all Witchblade on me.”

“Wrong mythology, idiot. And I’m not buying your lies. You took the skull from Professor Danzinger after you killed him.”

“Never heard of no professor. As you can tell, I never went to no college.”

All of a sudden he can’t speak properly? Maybe he was an idiot.

“Keep him there, Annja.”

The hairs on the back of Annja’s neck prickled at Garin’s voice. She hadn’t been paying attention to him. Now he stood behind her, where the skull case had landed.