“Spread out,” Brody said, checking his guns. “And watch your backs. This isn’t a regular person we’re dealing with. This bitch is an assassin, and one of the best. Got it?”

   Well, at least he was giving me my props. And he was right. I was one of the best.

   And I was going to kill every single son of a bitch here tonight.

   The men nodded back to Brody, and the four teams spread out, slowly heading down the walkway that led from the main gate into the park. I studied the men again, concentrating on how they moved, and who seemed like the biggest threat. That was obviously Brody, and the three guys with him looked just as tough and strong as him. But there were three giants who had teamed up at the back of the pack who were a bit shorter and leaner than all the others, so I decided to go after them first.

   I waited until all the men had moved down the walkway, well away from my position, then climbed down the tree and followed them, still staying in the woods and off the path.

   The four teams of giants reached the first big fork in the theme park and split up, with each team heading in a different direction. I palmed a knife and headed after the three men that I’d picked out to kill first.

   The giants moved down the walkway, dutifully searching behind every food cart, barrel, and hay bale. But they were so busy looking at what was in front of them that it never even occurred to them that I could be trailing along in their wake. Oh, every once in a while, they would glance over their shoulders, but they mostly focused on what was up ahead, and not the Spider silently creeping along behind them.

   The three giants reached the end of this walkway and stopped to regroup. I crouched down in the shadows behind a couple of prop tumbleweeds and watched them.

   “Maybe she’s not in here,” one of them suggested. “Maybe she got out of the park with the tourists earlier.”

   A second giant shook his head. “No way. We reviewed all the security footage and checked every single person who left all afternoon long. Blanco wasn’t one of them. She’s in here somewhere. We just need to find her. Let’s keep looking.”

   The final man nodded, and the three of them started forward again, heading down a new path. My knife still in my hand, I got to my feet and followed them.

   With a lot of ground to cover, even along this one walkway, the giants did the inevitable thing that was going to get them killed—they split up.

   Two of the giants headed over to check behind some food carts that were clustered together, while the other stepped into a short alley, peering behind every single barrel and water trough that lined the walls. I waited until the lone man was deep into the alley, then darted over to the entrance and stopped, hiding behind a tall cardboard sign of a cowboy playing a banjo.

   Then I waited—just waited for him to come back this way.

   The alley was a dead end, and it didn’t take the giant long to search it. A minute later, he headed back toward my position. The other two men were still checking the food carts and completely ignoring their friend.

   My knife in my hand, I readied myself, slowly breathing in and out, drawing air deep down into my lungs for the explosive burst of energy that I would need to take down all three giants.

   The lone giant moved past the sign that I was hiding behind, not bothering to search behind it again. His second—and last—mistake. In a hunt like this one, you always had to check places coming and going, because you never knew who might be sneaking up on you.

   The giant stopped at the end of the alley and raised his hand to his ear. I held my position and waited, knowing that he was going to check in with Brody.

   “Rattlesnake Alley is clean,” the giant said. “Heading over to help Ellis and Clyde check some food carts.”

   He waited a second for Brody’s reply, which I couldn’t hear, then nodded. “Roger that. We’ll keep searching.”

   I slithered out from behind the sign. Despite all the holiday lights, the giant never noticed my shadow creeping up alongside his, and I was able to get right up ­behind him. He stopped to look around, and that’s when I struck. I reached up, dug my fingers into his hair, yanked his head back and down, and cut his throat.

   He was dead before he hit the ground.

   But I was already moving, jumping over his body and sprinting across the walkway toward the food carts, plastering myself up against the side of one just as the other two giants came around the far end. Those men were still looking for me, so it took them a few seconds to spot their buddy’s body lying at the alley entrance.

   “What the—” one of them sputtered.

   I stepped around the cart and threw my knife at him. The blade zipped through the air and sank into his throat, cutting off the rest of his words. He staggered back against one of the carts, his legs sliding out from under him, already closer to dead than alive.

   The third and final giant whipped around in my direction, raising his gun, but I darted forward, snapped up my hand, and sent a spray of Ice daggers shooting right into his face and throat. The man’s gun slipped from his hand and clattered on the ground as he coughed and coughed, trying to dislodge all the sharp, jagged pieces of Ice from his throat. I closed the distance between us, palmed another knife, and sliced the blade across his stomach, right above his ghastly dinner plate of a belt buckle.

   He couldn’t even scream as he flopped to the ground, trying to shove his guts back in where they were supposed to be. I ended his struggles by driving my knife through his heart, then ripping it back out again.

   I whirled around, staring at each giant in turn, but they were all dead, so I looked past them at the walkways beyond. But everything was quiet, and no one had heard me eliminate this first team of men.

   So I went over, pried my thrown knife out of the giant’s throat, wiped it clean on his plaid shirt, and slid it back up my sleeve. Still holding my other knife in my hand, I stepped over their bodies and headed deeper into the theme park.

   Three down, ten to go.