DX

by Carolyn Jewel

  “Mm,” he said after a bit, leaning back to check the time on his comms. “Damn.” Her heart did a little dive, because he looked disappointed. “Too late now. We gotta go. Buckle up, honey.”

  She’d barely clicked her seatbelt closed when he pulled out of the spot. In the rear view mirror, she could see Stephano’s unmoving body on the pavement. The corpse was already losing shape as the vampire’s body decayed into ash. He took the corner ten miles an hour faster than was safe. She clutched the dash with both hands. “Relax,”he said, changing lanes and braking hard to avoid rear-ending a taxi.

  Her seatbelt locked. “I don’t want to die.”

  “You won’t. I’m starving, aren’t you?”

  “No,” she said through gritted teeth.

  “Mimouza here we come.”

  “I hope we live to get there.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Mimouza was half a mile into the Lower, the most desolate, lawless part of Crimson City. Only half the street lights worked, the rest were either broken or missing. Trash spilled off the sidewalks onto the streets, and before long the GPS became useless. Whole intersections were blocked by rubble and military surplus blast barriers. Gang tags covered everything still standing and a lot that wasn’t. To a height of three stories or more, windows and doors were boarded over or behind a metal grill.

  Jaden found parking a block from the restaurant. The rat-a-tat-tat-tat of automatic weapons fire drifted over from the next street. Generators hummed from the upper floors of several buildings but what light there was from the inhabited buildings didn’t make it down to street level. How did anybody live like this? Exhaust and garbage gave the air an acrid scent and the stench of outdoor sanitation was overpowering. Many of the buildings here were fallen down, decrepit hulks scavenged into nothing.

  She and Jaden stood shoulder to shoulder on the sidewalk looking at his car. “You think it’ll be here when we get back?” she asked.

  “Milos will get me a new one.” He shrugged and armed the anti-theft system. “Stay close.”

  “Just so you know,” she said, “if we get mugged, I have a black belt in Aikido.”

  His head whipped to hers. He had on his sunglasses so she couldn’t see his eyes, but she could see his smile. The nice one. Covert got night vision lenses. “You promise to keep me safe, Hell?”

  “You betcha.” She made a phony karate chop. “Bring on the bad guys.”

  Jaden stopped walking and pulled her hard against his chest. Next thing she knew, she was kissing him back for all she was worth. “Wow,” she said when he stopped. Her toes were still curled. She buried her fingers in his short brown hair, and it was a stretch for her to reach. “Where have you been all my life?”

  “Yeah,” he said softly, his arms around her. One of his hands drifted to her ass, and his smile was just so sweet. “Wow.”

  They sidestepped a woman sleeping in a doorway and went into the restaurant. Inside, the decor was arched and pointed doorways with Byzantine patterns painted on the walls in glossy paint. The ceilings were tented with a pleated white fabric. Brass chandeliers with colored-glass lamps hung from the center of each room, and rugs of various shapes and patterns covered the floor.

  Music blasted over the sound system, drums, something oboe-like and a stringed instrument Hell didn’t have a name for. She recognized Per and Sybil, seated on pillows, clapping in time to the music while two dark-haired women belly danced in a clearing. Elijah Douglas was dancing with both women.

  Video did not do him justice. On-screen he was striking, but in person, the charisma of an Alpha wolf was overpowering. His shoulder-length hair was lighter than it looked on film. Jeans hugged muscled thighs and a fantastic butt. He wore a crisp white shirt, and he had the greenest eyes she’d ever seen. The werewolf danced with a nervous energy that suggested he was stronger than he looked. He shimmied close to one of the dancers, as sinuous as his partners.

  The maitre’d, in an ivory caftan, a brown fez and a sheathed dagger on a thong around his neck, hurried toward them. He did a double take when he saw Jaden. No wonder. Jaden had that close to the bone look a man got when he was more than fit, the flat belly that made the waist of his black cargo pants hit below his navel. Just now, the icy set to his mouth suited him. His Ray-Bans added to the intentional machismo. He looked scary.

  “Welcome to Mimouza,” the Maitre’d said. He bowed low but glanced over his shoulder at the still dancing Elijah. “This way, please, please.”

  The werewolf saw her. His gaze slid to Jaden and then back to her before he held out a hand, gesturing to her to join him and the belly dancers. Hell looked to Jaden for some clue to what he expected her to do. He didn’t move. Not a twitch. She shrugged and walked across the rugs.

  The music vibrated in her when Elijah clasped her hand and whirled her into the dance. She went in close, her head beating with the drums. Her ears pounded, her blood throbbed in her veins. Her balance was off because she fell against Elijah’s broad chest. Her head whirled, and she stopped dancing.

  Her breath caught in her throat. Someone— Something was pushing her aside, in her head. A presence pulsed inside her, in her body. She shouted, but no sound came out. She moved away, stumbling. The presence went with her, encircled her, drew the area in which she perceived the world into an ever-shrinking circle. Sound blared in her ears, words that made no sense. Feelings that weren’t hers rocketed through her. Triumph. Joy.

  Helen Marshall. You are mine now.

  The floor jumped at her, pulsing until she felt sick to her stomach. How had she fallen without feeling it? She fought the sensation in her head, but whatever had her clamped down, compressed her until all she could do was huddle in a tiny corner of her mind.

  Another presence slithered inside her, darker, more dangerous and more malevolent than the first. Her head exploded in pain and she screamed in the vortex, a whirling, teetering ripping away from herself. With a physical rebound that felt like a punch, sound and sensation returned to normal. Except the darkest presence remained. Her stomach curdled at the taint of evil. She shuddered, a full body shiver. Elijah stood arm’s length from her and Hell knew this wasn’t the same man she’d seen when they came in. Someone else was looking at her through Elijah’s green eyes. The DX, she thought. The DX had Elijah.

  “Move!” Jaden yelled. The dark presence in her jumped and goaded her. It hoped for a fight. It wanted to kill and rend and maim. “Now!”

  She had control of her limbs again. Hell turned for the door, but not before a flash of light blinded her. Behind them, someone shouted. Jaden pushed her down with a hand to the back of her head. Her knees slammed into the floor hard enough that she felt the concrete underneath the rug. Something sizzled in the air above her, and ozone and smoke filled her lungs. Jaden hauled her to her feet, pushing her toward the exit. She kept low and headed for the door. Outside, he grabbed her around the waist and, with her leaning against him, still reeling from whatever had happened to her in the restaurant, they ran. She was more clear-headed by the minute. Across the street where he’d parked was nothing but empty space. An animal howled inside Mimouza. The front window exploded outward in a spray of glass and splintered wood.

  They took off running. Street lights dimmed and went out. A transformer popped, and she smelled smoke and burnt wires. Far away, she heard an explosion and sirens. Two blocks from the restaurant, the eerily quiet city was lit only by the moon.

  She glanced over her shoulder and saw six men loping down the street, gaining with chilling speed. Male werewolves, Hell realized, still in human form. There were werewolves after them, and they were in the Lower, where the Cazadores carefully regulated illegal hunting. Three of them split off to the opposite side of the thoroughfare. More charged into the street, racing ahead. Werewolves were now in front of them and behind them. The few people on the street scattered, giving her, Jaden and the dogs sole possession of the sidewalk. The streets rang with slamming doors of alternate exits. There wasn’t
anywhere to go but deeper into the Lower.

  Hell lost sight of the dogs in the shadows, but she could hear them. Sweat trickled down her back and between her breasts as they ran. Her throat was raw and parched, her leg muscles streaked with pain, and her boots were killing her feet. The dogs were driving them to wherever it was the others were waiting. Some dead-end where escape would be impossible. Over the pounding of her heart and the thud of Jaden’s shoes and hers, she could hear the dogs running.

  The sidewalk tilted precariously. Moonlight spilled onto the street, casting enough light so she could avoid the worst of the cracks. Jaden kept a grip on her hand, but she was slowing him down. A werewolf howled when they reached a barricaded corner. Every nerve in her body screamed for her to hide now. The dogs had driven them onto a street blocked at one end by the rubble of a brick building with an intact rear wall. At least ten werewolves waited there. To the right, the ruins of several concrete blast barriers barred escape. There wasn’t any way out but the way they’d come and there were six more dogs behind them.

  She snatched a broken two-by-four off the ground and swung it in the wolves’ direction. “I’m not going down without a fight, you furry little freaks!”

  “This way.” Jaden grabbed her around the waist and boosted her up the pile of destroyed blast barriers. She dropped her two-by-four in order to jam her fingertips into any available hole and hoist herself over the top. Below, the dogs howled in outrage. Jaden vaulted over the top while she was picking her way down the other side, slowed by a wobbling ledge of concrete and rebar. In the dark, Jaden was a shadow moving down the mound of debris. Her pink top seemed a spectacularly bad fashion choice now. At the bottom, Jaden held out his arms, and she jumped. He caught her like Baryshnikov catching the Sugar Plum Fairy. They sprinted into an empty intersection fled by a group of teenagers who left behind the lingering scent of weed.

  Wolves came over the barrier and another rhythm joined the pounding of two feet. Four paws. Another howl split the air and was answered from a distance. Jaden’s grip on her hand tightened. He came to a stop at the next corner, wrenching her down to crouch beside him in the concavity created by the bent metal grill of a long-closed shop. He reached into the garbage-filled space behind them and swept an armful of filth onto the street. Hell covered her mouth and nose against the stench. Jaden wasn’t even breathing hard. She sounded like a bellows. He slid his back partially over her, pressing her against the grill. He drew his gun, replaced the clip with another one from near his waist and screwed on a silencer.

  The question was whether all his covert special teams secret assassin training at taxpayer expense was enough to overcome half a pack of pissed off werewolves.

  CHAPTER 4

  The first dog came around the corner fast. It missed the trash but shot past their niche. How Jaden could see in this shadow-shifting darkness, night-vision lenses or not, Hell had no idea. He fired and after a soft popf from the gun, the dog went down and didn’t move. She smelled blood, sharp and coppery, and pushed backward until the metal grill dug into her back. Jaden accounted for the kickback and held steady while the second wolf charged around the corner. This one hit the trash and slid off balance. Jaden’s shot sent the dog reeling against the burned out wreck of a car. The wolf yelped, bounced off, gathered itself and leapt. A second shot took it down for good. The body lay in plain sight in the intersection, unmoving once it re-transformed to human shape.

  Across the street a light hissed and buzzed, flared yellow and died. The flash shed enough light for her to see wolves on the opposite corner.

  “Elijah wants the woman,” said a raspy voice from the near side of the corner. With one body in plain sight, this dog was more circumspect than the first two. Jaden scanned the area, his attention lingering at the spot where the other wolves had vanished into the dark. Hell was convinced every wavering shadow must be one of the dogs crossing the street, setting up an ambush. The last werewolf pursuer still in human form stepped into view. A shaft of moonlight crossed her face. “I promise you, no tricks.”

  “Tell Elijah I eat weaklings like him for breakfast.” Jaden sounded calm and insanely confident.

  “This was not the agreement.” The woman threw her head back as if she were in pain. A shudder rippled through her. She’d never seen a werewolf transformation, and she didn’t want to now. Or ever.

  “Not my problem,” Jaden said.

  “It is now.” Her rasping words melted into a howl.

  The hair on the back of Hell’s neck prickled. Cartilage, bone and sinew broke and reshaped, morphing the woman from human to canine with a crackling, wet popping that made Hell’s skin crawl. Movement flickered at the corner of her eye. A shadow elongated and became a werewolf slipping into the moonlit street. Another stayed corner-side and a third slunk up the sidewalk where earlier the teenagers had vanished. Yet another dark form leapt onto a wrecked car at the corner. One hind leg went through the rusted roof, but the beast moved forward to where the roof was more stable. The werewolf was at least four feet high at the shoulder with a shaggy coat of fur ruffled at the shoulders. Across the street, the light flared up again. Overhead electrical wires buzzed and sizzled. Jaden muttered under his breath, a prayer, Hell thought, in some language she didn’t recognize. The wolf on the car snarled, exposing sharp canines.

  That must have been a signal because the others attacked at the same time. Things happened fast. Jaden pushed her behind him. A flash of yellow light seared her eyes, and she could smell something burning. An animal howled in pain. By the time she could see again Jaden had killed the one nearest the corner. A grey wolf streaked through the air, body extended. It hit Jaden hard, slamming into his gun arm. There was another burst of yellow light. Some kind of modified U.V., she thought. Covert got all the fun toys. The street lights surged and dimmed, then went out. Electricity arced through the air and shot past her head.

  Two more dogs attacked. She heard him break one’s neck. The other lunged for him and Jaden’s weapon clattered to the sidewalk. She scrabbled on the concrete in the direction she thought the gun had traveled after it hit. Behind her, a chilling snarl broke short. She squinted, saw a black mound in the blackness and stretched out her arm. Her palm landed on the handle of the gun. She grabbed it and whirled in Jaden’s direction, afraid he might already be dead.

  A human man lay on the sidewalk, his neck bent at an impossible angle. A second man sprawled at the curb, eviscerated. Body low and balanced, Jaden launched himself at her. She looked up in time to see the wolf on the car leaping at her, muzzle open, snarling. Her heart about exploded. No way could she get off a shot in time. She was dead. Dead because she hadn’t seen the wolf until it was too late.

  Jaden collided with her. The gun flew out of her hand and skittered across the concrete. He rolled with her in his arms when the dog hit them, growling and snapping. She ended up underneath him, face down. Covered by his body, she gasped for breath. Her ribs hurt from the landing. One of the dog’s paws hit the pavement, claws scraping the pavement and just missing her shoulder. She could see the gun now. Jaden rolled off her, and she extended her arm. Her fingers closed around the just-short-of-hot silencer. She grabbed it and whirled. “Head down, head down!”

  The werewolf’s jaws were inches from Jaden’s face, but he had one hand around the dog’s throat. He ducked, she put her butt on the sidewalk for stability and pulled the trigger. At a range of three feet, she couldn’t miss, and she didn’t. The silver-loaded bullet dropped the wolf. She scrambled toward Jaden. He lay prone on the sidewalk, pinned by the dead werewolf. She used her foot to shove the body off him.

  In the darkened street, she bent over him, running her fingers over his still body. He was breathing, thank God, but then panic flooded her. He’d been bitten. Badly. Hot, wet blood, full and coppery to her nose, ran down his left upper arm and covered her fingers. She stripped off her shirt and tied it above the wound. When she was done, she sat on her haunches and gathered herself. He’d
been bitten by a werewolf. Surviving the bite wasn’t the worry. She rifled through his outer pants pockets until she found the canister every Field Agent carried. She unwrapped it, popped the seal and slid out a syringe loaded with an emergency dose of SaniLyco. Werewolf antidote had a twenty-four hour window of effectiveness, but it was a law of diminishing returns. The further out you got, the higher the chances you’d convert anyway. The probability increased by the minute, not the hour.

  Overhead, lights came on with a deafening pop. Except for the electrical buzz, the street was silent. She blinked in the bright light.

  “Whoa,” she said instead of thank God. Her heart skipped a beat.

  Agent Jaden Lightfeather wasn’t Jaden Lightfeather anymore. This guy was wearing Jaden’s clothes, his sunglasses were on the sidewalk next to him. Blood oozed from his arm, and her tourniquet was still in place. But he had long black hair in a ponytail trapped under his shoulders. His skin was a deeper gold and his face was— completely foreign and frighteningly wild. And sublimely beautiful. His eyes opened, and his hand clamped around her wrist. He sat up. Hell reached for the gun with her other hand, but he said something that sounded like gibberish to her and the gun melted. Heat from the remains pulsed like a miniature furnace.

  “What are you doing, Hell?”

  “Jaden?” But that was absurd. Except for his brown eyes, he didn’t look anything like Jaden.

  “Yes.” His face was delicate, ethereally fierce, if there could be such a thing, slanted cheekbones, a straight nose, a mouth that looked as if it could be gentle but wasn’t. His body was as perfect as Jaden’s, though. Maybe more so. His ponytail reached at least to the middle of his back, and some sort of metallic silver thread was worked through the two thin braids that held back his hair. He took the syringe from her, but didn’t let go of her wrist. “That won’t do any good.”