The road unspooled under Sawyer’s boots. But then the sky betrayed him because its pale golden light broke over the jungle’s spine and spilled across the cracked pavement. He felt it before he saw it. It was like a fire which bloomed under his skin. The first spear of sunlight cut through the street and like a bolt from Zeus it struck him.

  His breath caught. The heat was instant. By then, some of his tarp poncho had peeled away, lost to the wind, so the light seared small pockets of his skin which now smoldered. He cried out from the pain.

  Knowing he had to stop, he fleeted in through the closest door which was a battered green roll-up with FERRETERíA painted in chipped yellow letters on the sign above it, a hardware store.

  The freighter, suspected to have Cormac, would take ten hours or more to pass its checks and hit the open sea again due to the backlog of ships passing through the canal. That gave him some time, but not much.

  He shouldered through the entrance. The clerk, a middle-aged man distracted by his phone, barely looked up. Sawyer headed straight for the shelving along the back wall. He yanked a folded blue tarp from a stack and threw it over himself like a cloak.

  He then drifted sideways through a doorway and into the shop next door. It was a clothing store whose racks were lined with discount jackets and mismatched sportswear. He grabbed a black hoodie, yanked it over his head, and then grabbed a plain black mask, gloves, and anything else he needed to cover every square inch of skin. The zipper struck halfway up but he forced it until his jaw remained hidden. The last thing he grabbed were sunglasses.

  He almost made it back out of the back door when he heard a voice barking in Spanish, sharp with suspicion.

  Sawyer didn’t slow down. The clerk’s footsteps gave chase. By the time he hit the sidewalk, Sawyer dropped the tarp and drew his hood. He then fleeted a distance away until the crowd along the streets grew thicker when he slowed and blended into it.

  He cut two blocks east then ducked down a side street that opened into the rusted skeleton of a long since abandoned steel mill. Inside, the air was still and the floor gritted with years of dust and metal shavings. The shadows were deep enough to hide in. He found a corner and dropped onto the cold concrete. He dialed Bradford.

  “I need a place, somewhere permanent enough to work from.”

  “You mean a safehouse?” Bradford asked.

  “Preferably, an apartment. Buy one using a shell and send me the address.”

  Bradford didn’t argue. He just hung up.

  An hour crawled by. In that dead space, Sawyer replayed the Reaper attack in his head over and over again. Cormac was gone, dragged off by those freaks. His brother’s scent was just gone. There was no trail, no chance to fight them off. The image of Cormac in the hands of Harland Morrow made his jaw clench until it ached. Would they ransom him? Would they torture him for information and then kill him? Would they turn him?

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  The thought twisted into something deep inside his chest.

  When his phone buzzed, an address lit the screen.

  Daylight still ruled the streets. He didn’t want to risk traveling any more during the day, even though he was covered up. The pain from that kiss of sunlight from before still pulsed within his wounded skin which, frustratingly, wasn’t healing as quickly as he hoped. Safely concealed in the shadows of the steel mill, he peeled off his wraps and inspected himself more closely. The exposure to the sunlight had scarred his face, chest, and arms, and made him look like a proper monster to anyone who would have witnessed him. The sudden need for strength sharpened into a point he couldn’t ignore.

  That’s when he decided to call a cab.

  The first one that rolled up was an ancient yellow Toyota with an old woman behind the wheel. He didn’t approach, and instead remained in the shadows. She muttered to herself, checked her phone, and eventually drove off.

  Ten minutes later, a hatchback with a younger man pulled up. Sawyer stayed put again. The kid looked irritated, smoked half a cigarette in silence, then left.

  The third was a dented white sedan. The driver was a Panamanian in his mid forties. He was stocky and wore a collared shirt. Sawyer almost waited for him to leave. But then the man stepped out. He shouted rapid fire Spanish and demanded his passenger come get his ride or he’d find him and punch his teeth in.

  The man pulled out his phone and dialed Sawyer’s burner. When it went to voicemail, the cabby yelled and cursed like someone possessed by anger.

  Sawyer stepped forward into view. He let his voice go low and calm. “Lo siento. I’m disabled. Can you pull in through the bay doors?”

  The man swore again, but then stomped back into the cab. He eased it forward through the entrance of the steel mill.

  Sawyer had been hiding in the shadows. The next second, he was at the driver’s door and yanked it open. His hand clamped around the man’s collar and he dragged him half out the seat. His fangs slid in without much thought. His bite was exact and deep.

  The man thrashed once.

  Then the rush hit.

  It was hot. The living power flooded through Sawyer’s veins. His muscles sang as his skin knit ever tighter over his bones. The burn from the sun dissolved like sugar in water and his pulse slowed to a perfect rhythm.

  After draining the man, he let the cabby’s body slump sideways against the wheel. He searched the man’s pockets and found his wallet. There was cash, a couple hundred dollars. There was also a photo of a smiling woman, and five kids all crammed together on a sagging couch.

  He felt nothing.

  Taking the cash, he dropped the wallet.

  With his new strength surging through his limbs, Sawyer slipped from the steel mill and into the maze of alleys. In a blur, under the cover of darkness, he fleeted toward the apartment’s address that Bradford had sent him.

  The thought followed him all the way.

  Maybe Harland didn’t make me a monster. Maybe I already was one. He had certainly done some things in Kabul, but quickly shoved those memories away.

  With the daylight coming soon once more to haunt him, he knew he couldn’t remain inside that darkened steel mill. Now that he was in Panama City, he had to find a way to intercept the Asmodeus before he lost his brother to Harland Morrow for good.