Shadow Bound (Unbound)

by Rachel Vincent

  “How are you supposed to defend yourself?” he demanded, and I noticed that he didn’t ask how I was supposed to defend him, which underlined for me the fact that he didn’t need to be defended.

  “Like I just did. I’m not untrained in unarmed combat, and I can use any weapons I gain. But I can’t carry them once the fight’s over.”

  Ian scowled like he had more questions, but he wasn’t going to ask them, and I knew why. He didn’t want to force me to answer any more forbidden questions. I could see it in his eyes. In the way he watched me in pity and concern, and I had the sudden, irrational urge to punch him, just so I wouldn’t have to see either of them anymore.

  I didn’t need his pity or his concern, and I didn’t want either. So I pushed off against the wall and started walking, and Ian fell into step behind me.

  “Are you okay?” he asked.

  “Fine,” I snapped. “I’m not some delicate flower that’s going to dry up and blow away at the first sign of pain.”

  “I never thought you were. In fact, you almost seem to be looking for a fight. Was all that really necessary, back in the alley?”

  “That was a mercy,” I insisted. “If I’d reported the incident, Jake would have told me to kill them both. But then there would have been no one to deliver my message.”

  “Your message daring Cavazos to bring his A game next time?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “And you really think throwing down the gauntlet was a smart move?”

  I shrugged. “Couldn’t let him think those clowns were a challenge. What is a gauntlet, anyway?”

  “It’s like a glove—” Ian shook his head, like he could jar loose all unnecessary thoughts. “That doesn’t matter. My point is—”

  “My point is that Cavazos will do anything to get you, and he won’t be the only one. Why should we wear ourselves out swatting flies all day, so that we’re too tired to fight when the eagle finally lands? With any luck, that message will piss Cavazos off enough that he’ll skip the preliminaries and bring on the main event.”

  “Does that mean you’re not going to report this to Tower? Aren’t you under some kind of contractual obligation to?”

  “Nope. Jake’s doesn’t do much micromanaging through direct orders. Sometimes that comes back to bite him on the ass—those are my favorite times—but usually that approach avoids much bigger messes.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Each command given is like a string that can’t be broken. Give too many to one person, and you’re eventually just going to tie that person in knots, and when that happens, nothing gets done. And sometimes people get hurt.” Not that Jake gave a damn about hurting people. “Instead Jake saves direct orders for things he really, truly means, and everything else is guided by a set of standard expectations. For instance, I’m expected to report any trouble we run into. But I’m not obligated to. If I get caught, I’ll be in trouble, but I won’t suffer resistance pain from defying an expectation, whereas I would from defying a direct order. And if I don’t get caught…” I shrugged. “No harm, no foul.”

  “And you’re willing to take that risk?” Ian sounded surprised, no doubt thinking of the resistance pain I’d just suffered.

  “What’s life without risks?” But the truth was that defying Jake’s expectations where and when I could was the only way I had of striking back. Of showing him that he might own my body, but he’d never own the rest of me.

  “Long,” Ian said. “Life without risks is long. And hopefully peaceful.”

  “And a long, peaceful life is what you’re looking for, Mr. Systems Analyst?”

  “Who says I’m looking for anything? You people called me, remember? You’re the ones who’re looking for something, and we both know that gives me the advantage.”

  “Yeah. That’d be believable if I didn’t already know you need something from Jake, too. If he finds that out, you’ve lost your advantage, and you may as well drop your pants and bend over for him.”

  Ian flinched. “That’s a rather indelicate metaphor.” His frown deepened. “It is a metaphor, right?”

  “Yeah. And it’s only as ‘indelicate’ as the point it makes. If you don’t thoroughly understand that Jake will fuck you over eventually, you need to turn around right now and start running.”

  Not that I could let him get very far. If he refused to sign, I’d have to take him in to be harvested.

  Ian blinked, his green eyes narrowing. “You’re right. You’re a horrible recruiter. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear you were working for the competition… .”

  “I’m working for myself.” And for Kenley. “Ultimately we’re all working for ourselves, no matter who we’re bound to.”

  “That sounds a little…mercenary.”

  I shook my head. “Simple self-preservation. No one’s going to look out for you the way you look out for yourself. That’s no different than in corporate America. Right?”

  Ian blinked, like my question had caught him off guard. “I don’t think that’s a fair comparison. No one in corporate America has tried to kidnap me at knifepoint.”

  “And no one in the Tower syndicate has tried to bore you to death with spreadsheets and casual Fridays. What’s your point?”

  He laughed, and I was startled to realize I liked the sound. A lot. I hadn’t heard real laughter—the nervous kind didn’t count—in a long time.

  And he had a really nice smile…

  No! Don’t look at his smile, Kori! I couldn’t afford to like Ian Holt, because then I’d feel guilty for damning him to a life of crime and violence, and once I let myself feel guilty for one horrible thing I’d been forced to do, all the others would crash down and bury me in regret for a lifetime of necessary evils. Unrelenting guilt was a crippling blow to any assassin, and one I had no plans to suffer.

  Ian blinked, and his eyes narrowed. He was studying me again, and I had to squelch the urge to flinch away from his assessment. “You know, Tower might think he’s scary, with his gun-toting guards and over-the-top security system, but I know the truth.”

  “And what’s that?” Why did my voice sound so…frail?

  “You’re the most dangerous weapon he has, armed with nothing but the tongue in your mouth. And what a nice mouth it is.”

  Eight

  Ian

  “I…” Kori sputtered, blinking at me like the day was suddenly glaringly bright, leaving her exposed, and I realized that the only thing I enjoyed more than making her spew expletives was leaving her speechless. “What the hell does that mean?” she finally demanded, and I frowned. In my experience, most women love to hear how pretty they are and I’d never once pissed one off by saying so.

  “It means exactly what I said. And by the way, the proper response to a compliment is ‘thank you.’”

  Her scowl was unrelenting. “You’re not supposed to be complimenting me!”

  “I’m not supposed to…?” My frown deepened, and my confusion only grew.

  Kori squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head, but when she met my gaze again, she still looked mad, for no reason I could understand. “I mean…you don’t have to do that. It’s not necessary.”

  “Necessary for what?” I felt like we were suddenly speaking different languages, and hers was nonsense.

  Kori glared at me through narrowed eyes. “This is all a game to you, isn’t it?” she demanded, then rushed on before I could answer. “You better start taking this seriously, Ian, because Jake never loses and I don’t like games.”

  “That’s unfortunate, because you play them well.” I snatched a handful of napkins from a pretzel vendor as we passed on the sidewalk and handed one to her, then wiped the bald man’s blood from my hands. One of my knuckles had split open, but I couldn’t have left enough of my blood behind to be of any use to someone else.

  “I’m not playing,” she snapped, swiping at the blood on her own fingers without ever slowing her step. “I’m telling you one fucking truth after
another, most of which I’ll probably get in serious trouble for, and you’re treating me like some bimbo who can’t see past her own reflection.”

  I stared at her, almost as fascinated as I was confused. “How the hell did you manage to twist my compliment into an insult? I think that qualifies as some kind of special skill.”

  “We obviously disagree on what qualifies as skill.”

  I stopped, and she went several more steps before turning to frown at me. “I don’t understand you.”

  “You don’t have to understand me.”

  “I do, though.” I wanted to understand her worse than I’d ever wanted to understand anyone in my life, and I couldn’t quite convince myself that my motivation was purely professional. Yes, the better I understood her, the easier it would be to use her to get to her sister. But the more time I spent with Kori, the harder it was to remember that she even had a sister, much less what I’d come into Tower’s territory to do. “We’re going to be spending a lot of time together over the next few days, and I’d like to know where the land mines are buried before I step on the next one.”

  “I think your best bet is steel-toed boots.”

  I laughed out loud at the thought of boots—any boots—protecting someone from a land mine. Even a metaphorical land mine. Then I wondered again why her landscape was so riddled with them. “Why are you telling me things that could get you in trouble?”

  “Because they’re…true.” She shrugged, and her frown deepened as she searched for more of an answer.

  “And you like the truth?” Interesting, for a syndicate employee.

  “I’d call it more admiration than true enjoyment, but yeah.” Kori frowned and dropped her used tissue in a trash can on the corner. “I guess you could say I like the truth.”

  “Why?” Every time I thought I was close to figuring her out, she said something that threw me for another loop, and though I’d given up trying to anticipate the dips and twists in the conversations, I couldn’t help loving the ride.

  “Why do I like the truth?” she asked, and I nodded. “I don’t know. Because it’s the truth. Why does anyone like anything? Why do you like coffee?” she demanded, when I glanced into a coffee shop while we waited for the crosswalk light to change.

  “Because it wakes me up, it’s warm in my hands and it tastes good. Your turn. Why do you like the truth?”

  “I don’t know how to answer that.” And from the stubborn set of her jaw, I could see she didn’t even want to try.

  “Yes, you do. You’re smarter than you think you are, Kori.”

  “How the hell would you know that?”

  “Because I’m smarter than you think I am, too.” I glanced at the crowd gathered around us, waiting for the light, then nodded toward the coffee shop and was relieved when she actually followed me to a rectangle of shade beneath its awning. “Why do you like the truth? Dig deeper.”

  She crossed her arms over her chest and thought about it, and for a moment, I was sure she would refuse to answer. But then she met my gaze with a shrug, understating how carefully she’d obviously considered the question. “Because it’s right there for the taking. A lie, you have to think about, but the truth is… The truth is easy.”

  “No, it isn’t. In my experience the truth is usually the hardest thing in the world to say. Or to hear.” Or to see, lying on a bed, unmoving, staring at the ceiling with no sign of life.

  Her mouth thinned into an angry line. “You don’t want an answer, you want a fight. You’re going to come up with an argument for anything I say, aren’t you? Why does it even matter why I like the truth?”

  “It doesn’t matter to me,” I said, my lie as steady as her anger. And I should have left it at that, but I couldn’t help myself. Her steel spine and the occasional glimpse of vulnerability reminded me of Steven, and the bitter truth surged through me, scorching a trail through my veins. The memories. The loss. The rage still burning inside me.

  Remembering should have made it easier for me to do what had to be done. But it didn’t. Kori’s mouth and her fiery grit—so different from Steven’s quiet determination—made her real. They made it harder to picture myself destroying Kenley Daniels, if that meant destroying Kori in the process.

  “Why you like the truth doesn’t matter to me, but it should matter to you,” I insisted, still trying to sort through it all in my head. “You can’t recruit a man you don’t know, and how are you supposed to get to know me in a matter of days when you don’t even know yourself, after a lifetime in your own skin?”

  “I know myself,” she snapped. “And I’m starting to get a pretty damn clear picture of you, too.”

  “That first part, maybe.” But she didn’t know me. She couldn’t. And if I was wrong about that, I was as good as dead. “So tell me why you like the truth. The real answer.” I looked right into her eyes, practically daring her.

  Kori glared at me, and I watched her, obviously pissing her off with nothing more than the fact that I wasn’t pissed off. “The truth is real, even when nothing else is,” she said at last, whispering so no one else would hear, dragging the words out like she didn’t want to let them go. “It’s steady. It doesn’t change depending on the circumstances. It never changes. The truth will look the same in the dark as it does in broad daylight, and it quacks like the duck it is. That’s a relief—knowing what you’re getting. I like it.”

  I smiled. I couldn’t help it. She was fascinating, and she obviously had no idea. Not that it mattered. I couldn’t let myself want her, and I certainly couldn’t have her; she’d want to kill me once I’d killed her sister. And even if by some miracle she could forgive that—though she wouldn’t—she liked the truth, and my entire existence was one big lie. The reasons she had to hate me were too numerous to count and too huge to see around.

  “Syndicate life must be hard for someone like you,” I said, trying to drag my thoughts back on target, which proved almost as difficult as dragging my gaze away from her eyes. From her lips, half open, like she’d forgotten what she wanted to say. I wanted to taste her, right there on the sidewalk. Just once. Just for a second. And for one terrifying moment I was suddenly certain I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on anything else until I’d done exactly that.

  Then her frown grew skeptical, like she thought I was baiting her again. “Life is hard, period. Dying when there’s another option is easy, even when it hurts, but that’s the coward’s way out. Sometimes it takes guts to live, and that’s the fucking truth.”

  “So it is.” I dropped my soiled napkin into the trash can a few feet away, and her brown-eyed gaze followed me. “Show me something true, Kori. Show me something real about the syndicate, even if it hurts to see.”

  Something horrible. I needed to see or hear something so terrible it would drive all other thought from my head and purge the sudden need tugging on my fingers like strings on a puppet. The need to touch her.

  “You sure? I could show you lots of pretty lies,” she offered, her voice delicate. Brittle. “You’d know they were lies, but they’d make you smile.” I just watched her, denying myself what I had no right to want, and finally she nodded. “The awful truth it is. Let’s go.”

  I followed her into the coffee shop without a word, and Kori pulled me into the ladies’ restroom, then flipped the light switch by the door. Darkness descended and I exhaled slowly, enjoying the sudden calm it brought, like the start of an evening, after a glass of good wine. Everything seemed a little easier in the dark. Even with a strip of light shining from under the door and an emergency light flashing in the far corner.

  Something touched my chest, and the breath I sucked in was loud in the silence. Her hand slid along my stomach, slowly, lightly, and I held my breath, wishing for more. I hated myself for that, but denying it would be pointless. I wanted greater pressure from her fingers. Longer contact.