Hide & Seek

by Scarlett Finn

Given that he didn’t need to sleep, he’d refused to stay in another motel the previous night and instead, had driven while she slept. Not even the promise of sex could dissuade him from getting back to town for his business.

  Rora was leaning against the hood of their car, her ankles crossed, her switchblade open. She held the end of the handle between two fingertips, dangling it in front of her to let it swing left to right. She nodded past him and he turned to see the group of gangbangers on the corner.

  “They bothering you?” he asked and tossed her a bag of chips. “Get in the car.”

  He turned around to start toward the gang. She threw the chips and knife onto the front seat of the car through the open window and had to run fast to get hold of his arm to stop him from going over to confront the group.

  Rora laughed. “You don’t have to break the arm of every guy who makes me uncomfortable,” she said, boosting up to kiss his jaw.

  “Says who?”

  “Let’s go,” she said. Strike gave her a water bottle and took her hand to start back toward the car. “I’ve got this weird creepy feeling… don’t you feel it? Like we’re being watched.”

  “You’re paranoid, Cupcake,” he said.

  “Where is my cupcake?”

  The reminder of the request she’d made before he went into the store made them both stop. But before he could respond, sounds shattered the air; a pop preceded an ominous whizz.

  Grabbing her head, Strike shoved her down into a crouch and pushed her toward the car. Keeping his grip around the back of her skull, he used his body to shield hers while hurrying her forward. Another pop. Another one. Strike got them around the vehicle and pushed her to the ground beside the wheel.

  “Not so paranoid now, huh?” she panted. “The gangbangers?”

  Rora hoped that maybe this was just an unfortunate coincidence.

  Strike shook his head. “One’s on the sidewalk, the others are gone.”

  She grabbed for him when he began to crawl toward the car door. “Where are you going?” she hissed. “There’s a sniper out there.”

  “That’s not a sniper,” he said. “Not a professional. If it was, we’d both be dead already.”

  “You don’t know that,” she said, pulling on his tee-shirt.

  “I do,” he said, peeking up through the window above him. “There’s a guy I know who could line that up to take both of us out with one shot… and he’s the only one anyone would send after me.”

  This was like nothing to him, his awareness was definitely switched on, but he wasn’t even really fazed that someone was shooting at them. Someone was shooting at them! “What?” she asked, exasperated by the casual insight. “Why?”

  “He’s the best,” Strike said and pulled her hand from his shirt.

  But Rora didn’t share his confidence. “Maybe he’s out there,” she said, falling onto her hands and knees. “Maybe he just missed.”

  He shook his head. “Raven doesn’t miss,” he said. “I’ve crossed paths with his best friend enough that he’d give me a heads up if there was a hit out on me… probably. We’re in a similar line of work… kind of.”

  Opening the door, he leaned inside. She heard the glovebox open and then he closed the door over. With a gun in his hands, he checked the clip and then put a hand on her shoulder.

  “Strike.”

  “Stay low, back up a bit,” he said and she shuffled backward to let him move forward. As soon as he could, he peeked up over the hood and almost immediately a gunshot echoed.

  To her horror, he didn’t immediately duck down, he stayed up there in his crouch until there was a second shot.

  “Strike,” she said, grabbing for him to try pulling him down. “Stay down would you, please? I like your head on your shoulders.”

  “Two shooters,” he said, coming back to her level. When he moved to rise again, she grabbed him, begging him with her gaze to stay down. He took her hand from his shirt again. “This will be over in three seconds.”

  “What?”

  But he was already up on his feet with the gun extended in front of him. He fired off two shots without blinking and then let his arms relax.

  He scanned the area, then offered her a hand. “What are you doing down there?” he said. Rora gave him her hand and he pulled her onto her feet. “Get in the car.”

  He tried to hand her the gun, but she pushed it back to him. “You might need it.”

  “They’re dead, baby.”

  Panic was making her pulse erratic; she couldn’t believe he was so calm. “You said there were two of them.”

  “Yeah, and I fired two shots.”

  Giving her the gun, he urged her toward the side door and went past her to skirt the hood. Rora was still blinking in shock when he came marching back a minute later. His expression was set in a tight scowl, his jaw working like he was full of fury.

  “Get in the car,” he barked.

  “But, I—”

  “Get in the goddamn, motherfucking car, Aurora,” he snapped and tore open his own door to get inside.

  Her ass had barely touched the leather before he was skidding out of the parking lot. The thump of her heart in her chest was nothing to the heat of anger radiating from the man at her side.

  “Strike,” she said, reaching over to touch his forearm.

  He snatched it away. “Don’t,” he growled. “Say nothing.”

  “But… where are we going?”

  “To visit an old friend.”

  His mood didn’t improve on their journey back to the city. It took another three hours for them to get there, though it probably should’ve taken five, but Strike didn’t care much about speed limits at the best of times. When he was this mad, she doubted that he cared about anything.

  They drove to a decent part of town, pulled up at the curb at a steep angle without caring about finesse, and slammed out of the car.

  Rora had to run to catch up with him after he went inside what appeared to be a fairly up-scale apartment building. He took the stairs two at a time and went all the way to the top then marched straight along to the door at the end.

  Planting a hand on the door frame, he used the side of his other fist to bang on the door. A second later, the door opened, but Strike didn’t let it get more than an inch before he flung it out of his way and stormed inside.

  “Strike!” Rora called and hurried along the corridor to catch him.

  He was inside a beautiful apartment that had walnut floors and an internal balcony, but that wasn’t the focus of her view. Rora was horrified to see that Strike was holding a tiny woman, even smaller than Rora was, by the upper arms, shaking her with his fury.

  “Where is he?” Strike growled.

  “I—”

  “Shula, I’ll rip your fucking throat out. I swear to God I will.”

  Rora rushed up beside him and tried to pull him off, but Strike thrust an arm out, pushing her away. She was going to run back into the fray with her nails out until she caught sight of the woman’s face. The stranger wasn’t afraid. Not one bit. She was surprised, that much was clear. But afraid? No, not so much.

  “Try it,” Shula said. “It’s been a long time since we trained together, Strike.”

  Strike pulled her higher. “Don’t fuck with me, Silk. Where is he?”

  “Not here, obviously,” Shula said. “You know he saw you walk in here.”

  “Good. I can’t fucking wait to take him apart,” Strike said, letting go of the woman to take off his jacket. “Tell me he’s on his way.”

  Marching into the corner, he opened a long wooden box that stood on a cabinet. “I doubt it,” Shula called out. Rora could only see Strike’s back and wondered what he was doing. She almost missed the way Shula was eyeing her. “He doesn’t miss you like I do, and he’ll stupidly think I might be safe with you.”

  “You are fucking safe,” Strike said, turning around to face them. “Until he gets here.”

  Rora gasped when she saw him adjusting knuckle
dusters on his hands. “What the hell do you think you’re going to do?” she asked, rushing over to stand in front of Shula.

  The woman exhaled a sound of amusement and strode around her and over to Strike. “I should charge you storage for those,” Shula said and folded her arms. “You know you can’t fight him. He’ll kill you.”

  Strike sneered. “He’s already tried that once today, didn’t work out.”

  Some of Shula’s ease disappeared when she frowned. After a second, she shook her head. “No,” she said. “He wouldn’t.”

  Taking one set of the brass knuckles off, Strike put them in his pocket and took out his phone. “I executed two of his slaves today, they’d say different.”

  Shula’s hand went to her mouth. “Oh my God, Strike, you didn’t! It wasn’t—”

  “None of his precious high council,” he said and turned the phone to Shula who looked at it. “Recognize them? Tell me they’re not X.”

  She breathed out and put a hand over the screen to push it down. “I don’t know what happened. It’s a mistake. Thane would never come for you.”

  “No, it’s not a mistake,” Strike said. “It’s the price of doing business.”

  Although she tried to appear calm, there was a new kind of urgency in Shula’s tone. “Listen to me, he would never come for you. I know you’ve had your differences, but he would never—”

  “I wasn’t the target,” he said. “Your boyfriend’s an idiot, but he’s not a fool.”

  “He’s none of those things,” Shula said, moving her hands onto her hips. “He’s not a fool, or an idiot… or my boyfriend.”

  Taken aback, Strike actually took a reverse step. Rora was just watching the pair from the other side of the room, but even she was shocked, but only because Strike’s whole expression opened. She’d never seen him look so stunned.

  “Shu—”

  “Don’t, ok?” Shula said, holding up a hand. “It just happened and I’m still… adjusting.”

  “And you didn’t call me to come rip off his limbs because…”

  “He’s one of your oldest friends,” Shula said. “Because Emeritus would hang us all by the neck… because he did nothing wrong… and because you’re never in the country.”

  Shula turned to walk away from him. Dropping onto the couch in a slouch, she let her head fall into her hands. Rora didn’t really know what to do; this woman was obviously tired, and probably heartbroken if she’d just broken up with her boyfriend. She looked to Strike for direction, but his focus stayed on Shula.

  “This is about Lawrence,” Strike said.

  Shula let out a burst of laughter and lifted her head, letting her hands flop down between her knees. “How the hell do you do that? Not even Thane can get into my brain and pick it apart like that and I’ve been sleeping with him for more than a decade.”

  “He’s too close to you,” Strike muttered. Rora felt a bit better when she saw the familiar frown settle over his features. “What did Lawrence do? You might as well tell me because you know I’ll find out.”

  Resigned, Shula sighed. “He has this legal thing… hack all you want, but don’t dare tell Thane a thing,” she said.

  “You know I love keeping secrets from your First,” he said and winked at her.

  Shula groaned like she was out of patience. “Don’t fuck with his head. I’m already afraid he’ll go on a rampage.”

  He tipped his head. “City better watch out. Good weekend for looting I guess.”

  “If you’re up for a challenge, go to Xylo tonight. He’s opening the sanctum, all bets, all in.” Strike shook his head. “Chicken?”

  He sneered at her. “You’re assuming that your ex is going to live long enough to toss in his token.”

  Something warm crossed Shula’s features. “When you and Thane fight, it goes on for hours,” she said. “Anyone else would yield in a fight like that, but not you two. You’re both as bull-headed as each other.”

  “Oh, I’m not gonna beat him, I’m gonna call Raven.”

  Shula leaped off the couch with a renewed kind of panic. “You can’t call Raven!” she said, storming over to him. “Look, I don’t know what happened today. But it was obviously a mistake. There will be an investigation and—”

  “I’m not a member of your little cult.”

  “It’s not a cult,” she said. “And you don’t have to remind me that you don’t follow our rules.”

  “I don’t follow anyone’s rules,” he muttered. “And I will take Thane down if he doesn’t call off his dogs. I don’t care who he is or how far back we go.”

  “You’re nuts, you kill two of our guys and you’re threatening him?” Shula said, finding her anger.

  “He needs to learn to stick to his business, which is this city, nowhere else,” Strike said.

  Shula scoffed and drew an invisible circle in the air with her finger. “The whole world is your playground. Rich of you to tell anyone else to stick to their own sandbox, isn’t it? If those guys were operating out of the city limits, it was for an important reason. You know Thane only lets our cause leave the city in exceptional circumstances. And you said you weren’t the target. So please accept X’s apologies that you were caught in the crossfire,” she said and then muttered, “though I’ve never known you to shy away from a fight whether it was yours or not.”

  Strike grabbed her arm again. “This is my fight,” he said and glanced past Shula to look at Rora, who was still there near the door.

  He didn’t look for long, but it was long enough to make Shula twist to check her out. “Who is she? A little vanilla for you, isn’t she?”

  Strike didn’t do a great job of hiding his smirk, but Rora huffed. “What the hell does that even mean?”

  “I’ll tell you later,” he said.

  Recognizing the distant promise of heat in his eyes, Rora smiled, proud that whatever it meant, it wasn’t something he disliked about her.

  “Wow, ok,” Shula said. “Well now that I’ve clearly slipped into a parallel dimension, I should probably go shoot myself.” Strike broke his stare on Rora to look down at Shula. “I will talk to Thane for you. But, please, don’t do anything stupid, he’s got a lot on his plate right now… We heard a rumor.”

  “What kind of rumor?” Strike asked.

  He and Shula eyed each other for a few seconds before the woman exhaled and gave in. “A potential global threat. We don’t know much. Thane’s dedicating all of X’s resources to it, but we’re not getting far. Word is the Black Jewel’s involved.”

  “Possible she’s on the deceased list.”

  “You killed her?” Shula asked like she couldn’t quite believe it. Strike just lifted a shoulder. “I can’t tell you much, not until we find out—”

  “What’s the point?” he said.

  Shula blinked. “Yes,” she gasped. “How did you know that? Shit, look at who I’m asking. But, seriously, Strike, this is dangerous, even for you. We’re trying to track Gallagher and—”

  “He’s dead.”

  “What? How do you know that?”

  “ ‘Cause I watched him put a bullet in his brain,” he said.

  Shula folded her arms again and crooked an unimpressed brow. “You have been busy, haven’t you?”

  “I didn’t kill him,” Strike said and held up his hands, but he couldn’t look innocent if his life depended on it.

  Shula exhaled. “I have to call Thane, I have to tell him. We need to know everything we can about this threat. If Gallagher’s dead, there’s only one last hope.” She started forward. “There’s a girl—” Strike caught Shula’s arm and held it while he looked across the room. Rora was put in the spotlight when Shula looked once, then twice. “Shit, Strike, trust you. The entire world is scrambling, looking for Gallagher’s assistant and you’re sleeping with her! How the hell do you do that?”

  Bowing down, Strike whispered in Shula’s ear. The woman’s frown deepened, then loosened. Her head tipped a fraction and then she exhaled.
/>
  Strike leaned back to look into her eyes. “Shu?”

  “Fine. We’ll let it go. But no Raven.”

  In another shocking move, Strike kissed Shula’s cheekbone before turning to head for the door, his façade of indifference back in place. Picking up his pace, he snagged Rora’s arm on the way past to pull her out of the apartment with him.

  He took her back to the car and drove off, leaving Rora confused. “Strike?” she asked. “Is Shula your ex too?”

  “If I’d thought about touching Shula, you wouldn’t have the pleasure of my company now,” he said. “Her man is so in love with her he isn’t rational. He lost his mind over her when they were kids, he never got it back.”

  And now they’d broken up. “That’s heartbreaking,” she said, gazing straight-ahead. “He must be devastated if they’ve separated.”

  “He’ll get her back,” he said, checking his mirror.

  There wasn’t an ounce of doubt in those words. “How do you know?”

  “ ‘Cause if he doesn’t, I’ll kill him,” he said. “I’m gonna drop you off with Buddy.”

  Tensing, she forgot about Shula and grew suspicious. “Why? Where are you going?”

  “Business.”

  twenty-five

  Buddy was snoozing when they got back to his place, so Strike gave him a kick and told him to watch her. Rora wasn’t really sure if that was meant to be for her protection, or if he meant lock all the doors and windows so she couldn’t get herself arrested again.

  Rora didn’t mind the dig because any reminder that he shouldn’t fuck with her was ok in her book. That didn’t stop her from asking Strike half a dozen times if he was definitely going to come home to her. He assured her that he would, that he’d only be gone for an hour… or two.

  Buddy went back to sleep and she didn’t begrudge him his nap. As long as Strike upheld his vow to come back to her, she had no desire to be arrested again.

  Rora had been flicking through a newspaper for a few minutes when she noticed Buddy’s phone on the table. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen her phone, but Buddy didn’t mind her using his phone to play games and read news, so she guessed he wouldn’t mind her checking messages either.