by Kit Rocha
Six seemed respectful, but wary. Maybe that was just lingering mistrust--Markovic was the single remaining member of the corrupt leadership that had misled the city of Eden so badly. He would always be a symbol of that past, though he’d endured torture and emotional turmoil to help the sectors in their rebellion.
Or maybe it was simpler. The New Council was divided along one glaring line--either you were an O’Kane, or you weren’t.
“Not really,” Six was saying, a slight undertone of frustration in her voice. “It’s hard in Three. We have a lot of loners. Sometimes they take off. Sometimes they get stabbed and their bodies are dumped. It’s too soon to be sure what’s going on. It could be nothing...”
Hector, the man who’d been running Sector Five since the end of the war, shook his head. “He must have been on to something hot if someone had him murdered for it.”
“How much do the Suicide Kings cost?” Jyoti asked Six. “Did Bren know?”
“Cruz did,” Dallas rumbled from the head of the table. The king of Sector Four had arrived late, but the others had left that symbolic chair open for him--by instinct or design, Gideon wasn’t sure. But with half of the New Council composed of O’Kanes, Dallas was undoubtedly the most powerful man in the room--and out of it.
He glanced at the tablet in front of him. “Cruz says the leader doesn’t open his door for less than fifty thousand credits, and that’s for the one-man jobs. Something like that coup they pulled in Sector Seven back in the day would put you closer to a million.”
Derek Ford, another one of Dallas’s people--though currently in charge of the manufacturing hub of Sector Eight--snorted. “Not many people have that kind of money, not to waste on maybes. So...what do we think? Human trafficking? We’ve all seen it before.”
“But the usual destinations aren’t an issue anymore,” Jyoti countered. “We shut down the communes and illegal farms that wouldn’t agree to the new worker-protection rules.”
“And I came down hard on the stakeholders I caught trying to reinstitute any kind of unwilling labor,” Alya said. The newly minted leader of Sector Six wasn’t an official O’Kane, but her son was one of Dallas’s men, and she addressed him when she continued. “But we’ll need to do something about Seven, sooner or later. I know Ford’s trying to keep an eye on the wind farms, but that’s a lot of empty space. A lot of potential for mischief.”
“You’re not wrong,” Dallas said, tapping his fingers on the table. “But I don’t think Seven’s the problem here. The demand just isn’t there. Those farmers don’t have the money to fund an operation as profitable as this one would have to be.”
“So the usual destinations, as you call them, are out.” Markovic surveyed everyone at the table, one by one. “Time for us to look for new ones.”
“And to look closer to home,” Dallas added. “Make sure people aren’t disappearing from our own backyards, too. We have more movement than ever now that the borders are down between the sectors and Eden. If you wanted to snatch some folk without anyone noticing right away, there’s never been a better time.”
Jyoti swiveled her chair. “Gideon? You’re quiet.”
“I’ve been thinking about the Suicide Kings.” He leaned forward, rested his elbows on the table, and steepled his fingers. Casual, meditative--and giving the subtle impression of being moments from dropping into prayer. He’d taunted the more God-hating sector leaders with the gesture for so many years that it came naturally now.
And he’d thought about how to phrase this. “I’d like to take point on anything involving the mercenary group. Not only are my Riders best equipped to handle something like this, but I also have...certain unique resources at my disposal.”
One of Dallas’s eyebrows swept up. “Ashwin?”
Gideon gave his most beatific smile and shrugged gracefully. “I’ve been blessed with an embarrassment of riches.”
That earned him an eye roll from the king of Sector Four, which meant he’d done his job well. “Fine,” Dallas grumbled. “Any objections?”
His gaze swept the table, and everyone shook their heads. No surprise--Hector and Markovic were the only people seated at the table who weren’t bound to Dallas O’Kane by oaths or family.
Gideon had to admire the neatness of the coup Dallas had pulled off. All the privileges of influencing every decision made in their new world--and he still got to go home to his own sector, secure that his people would shoulder their share of the burdens of leadership.
It wasn’t something Gideon could have managed. The loyalty he received in Sector One was too tied up in faith and belief to be anything but blind. Most people simply obeyed him without question. Even the ones like Deacon, the ones who questioned, still trusted Gideon more than their own instincts.
O’Kane’s people believed in him, no doubt about it. Their loyalty was beyond reservation. But they followed Dallas with their eyes open, and when he set them free to build their own empires, they did just that. Autonomous, but still deferential.
A tidy coup, indeed.
The conversation moved on, and Gideon retreated again and let the voices flow over him. The negotiation over trade and the details of manufacturing held little interest to him. Sector One had been all but self-sufficient for decades. Of course, new opportunities had opened along with the borders between sectors, but the scramble to take advantage of them might distract the noble families of One and give him some breathing room.
One way or another, the Riders would have to deal with the threat the Suicide Kings posed. And they’d have to do it without losing Deacon, or anyone else. Gideon would sacrifice a lot for the greater good. But perched as he was at the top of the world, in the capitol building thirty of his men had paid for in blood...
He had to admit he was tired of watching his Riders die for a peace they never got to enjoy.
Chapter Six
Ana spent an afternoon and evening being frustrated with Deacon. When he skipped the training session she’d arranged with Ashwin, the confusing tangle of emotions churning in her middle boiled into hot anger. But when he didn’t appear the next day--not for breakfast, not during their afternoon debriefing, not even for dinner--her anger twisted with infuriating shards of sympathy and performed some sort of sinister magic.
By the time Ana was sprawled on top of her brightly colored quilt, still clad in her sweatpants and sports bra, guilt had wiggled its way deep into her heart and planted hooks that left her bleeding.
She knew what she’d put on Deacon. She knew it like no one else but Gideon could know. It was the truth that drove her out of bed before dawn and settled in her bones as a soft ache when she’d trained too hard. It was the weight that kept her up some nights, staring at the stucco ceiling by the light of a single flickering candle, her restless mind refighting sparring matches she’d lost.
Being worshipped was a double-edged sword.
She still remembered the first time it had happened to her. Every detail of the moment was carved into memory. Ivan’s gray T-shirt with the rip along the hem. The faint smell of paint from her newly detailed motorcycle. The vague throb of the fresh ink on her shoulder, and the way the breeze tickled over the bare skin of her arms--she’d worn a tank top that day deliberately, proudly.
Showing off her Rider tattoo.
The little girl had been nine or ten. Brown skin a few shades lighter than Ana’s, with silky black hair as curly as Ana’s own. She’d shaken free of her mother’s hand and bolted across the parking lot as Ana kicked down the stand on her bike, her big eyes going impossibly wide.
“Girls can be Riders?”
With that sweet, innocent question, Ana’s life had changed forever.
She’d loved it, that first time. And the second, and the third. Even the tenth time still made her heart leap. But after three short months, she’d been swallowed whole by the hopes of dozens upon dozens of little girls--
And she hadn’t seen it coming.
She should have. The other Rider
s always attracted excited young boys and swaggering teens. Kids didn’t understand the more serious implications of a Rider’s duties. They didn’t understand death. They just saw heroes, larger than life and celebrated by the sector--and they wanted to be heroes, too.
The boys had never doubted they could achieve that goal. But the girls... The intensity of their newborn excitement clung to Ana like invisible threads wrapping her tighter and tighter. Their dreams weighed ten thousand pounds.
Ana had to carry them alone.
No wonder she’d lashed out at Deacon. Even when he scraped her nerves raw, he’d always been a solid, unshakable foundation. The hero of heroes, uncompromising and unchanging. The wall she threw herself against in order to toughen up. She needed him to be something more than human so she could believe it was possible. Because a human couldn’t hold up under the pressure Ana felt every time a little girl’s eyes lit up at the sight of her. A human would falter. Fall. Eventually, it had to happen.
Deacon’s fall had wounded a dozen people. Ana’s would break the hearts of thousands.
Exhaling roughly, she swung her feet over the side of the bed and sat up. The wooden floor was cool beneath her bare feet, but not so chilly that she had to find her boots. She padded to the door and slipped into the darkened hallway and down the stairs.
The kitchen was abandoned, as usual. Sometimes Gabe or Bishop claimed it to concoct elaborate meals, but most of the time the Riders just ate whatever food someone brought over from the temple, where initiates practiced their cooking skills with varying success. The fridge was stacked with leftovers--tonight’s lasagna, last night’s fried fish, and a bowl of fresh strawberries that must have come from the greenhouse.
Ana snagged one of the remaining bottles of the hard cider Nita’s cousin brewed and twisted off the cap. She drained half of it in three long gulps, savoring the sweet and tart apple flavor as she made her way back up the stairs. She paused at the top, shadowed in the dim hallway, and strained to hear past the quiet hum of silence.
Thwack. Pause. Thwack. Pause. Thwack.
It was soft but unmistakable, a sound she knew as well as her own heartbeat. The sound of a frustration-fueled fist slamming into the heavy bag.
Instead of turning left toward her bedroom, Ana swung right and followed the sound to the workout room.
The harsh electric lights illuminated the space, leaving nothing in shadow. In the corner, Deacon--clad only in his jeans--was pounding his bare fists into the bag. The muscles of his back tensed and bunched with every solid swing. The power in each punch sent the canvas bag rocking wildly.
The rough fabric had to be scraping his knuckles raw. She tried to focus on that, and not on the hypnotic flex of strong muscle under smooth skin, like a work of art that was somehow both exquisite and functional.
“What do you want?”
He hadn’t turned to look at her, but Ana supposed that made what she had to do easier. After another bracing sip of her cider, she exhaled. “I came to apologize. I’m sorry for snapping at you the other day.”
He stopped pummeling the bag and caught it in both hands as it rebounded. He stood there, silent, his shoulders shaking.
When he turned around, the bastard was laughing. “All you do is snap at me, so you’re gonna have to tell me which time you mean.”
Her cheeks heated. Guilt withdrew--mostly. “Because you’re an asshole. But I still shouldn’t have said that shit. About people worshipping you. That’s our baggage, not yours.”
“Maybe.” He frowned and flexed his fingers absently. “Or maybe you were right.”
“It’s not about being right.” She drained her cider and stepped through the door to set the empty bottle on a bench. “I know people worship you. And I know how much being worshipped sucks sometimes. So...I’m sorry.”
“Yeah.” Deacon turned and swept up a towel from the floor near him. “Did you want this?” he asked, jerking his head toward the bag.
She weighed the restlessness inside her against the placid bulk of the bag. “Honestly, I’d rather swing at something that hits back.”
One of his eyebrows swept up in an arch.
A single bottle of cider wasn’t enough to get her drunk. It wasn’t even enough to get her tipsy. But she could feel the bubbles in her blood, and the tattered shreds of her self-control weren’t enough to keep her quiet.
She arched her own eyebrow in turn and pulled one arm across her chest in a slow stretch. “C’mon, that bag can’t be giving you a satisfying fight.”
“The bag can hurt me more than I can hurt it.” His expression was full-on challenge now, confident and self-assured. “Can you say the same?”
A few days ago, the answer would have been no. As the leader of the Riders, Deacon had held her fate in his hands, cradled next to the dreams of a thousand little girls and her chance of living up to them. A few days ago, he’d been a god.
Today, he was human. A flesh-and-blood man.
Ana stretched her other arm and grinned. “Why don’t we find out?”
He swiped the towel over his face and lifted one huge shoulder in a shrug. “Why not?”
It didn’t take long for Ana to warm up. Her limbs felt loose and ready, her mind blissfully focused. She made sure her hair was secure in its bun on top of her head as she strode to stand across from him on the thin floor mats.
Then she rolled her neck, poised on the balls of her feet...and waited.
Seconds ticked by. She felt them, just as she always did, but the chattering doubt didn’t fill her head. Ana would stand here all night if she had to, waiting for him to move.
She didn’t have to.
Her first clue was a tensing in his chest. Subtle, followed by the tiniest shift in his heel. That was all the warning she got before he flew at her, his massive body barreling straight for her midsection.
Muscle memory kicked in. Ashwin had charged her a thousand times now, and she knew how to get the fuck out of the way. She flowed out of Deacon’s path and ducked under his arm. The back of his knee was a beautiful, tempting target, but as soon as she lifted her foot to take him down, he twisted with impossible speed, and Ana had to pivot desperately to avoid being grappled to the floor.
She danced out of the way and immediately regretted it. Deacon’s reach exceeded hers, and getting inside his guard without being hit was going to be hard. With any other man his size, she could taunt him into taking massive swings to wear himself down while she ducked and dodged.
There were two problems with that. First, Deacon was fast. She couldn’t count on evading him, and one or two solid hits from him would hurt.
Secondly, trying to wear Deacon down was a mistake. The man could go all night.
All night.
No, fuck him. She wouldn’t allow the bastard back into her head. Pushing the thought away, Ana circled, testing him with feints he ignored.
Fine, she’d give him something real to react to. What was the worst thing that could happen? She’d end up on her back?
She’d be there anyway if she didn’t move.
She followed the next feint with a real swing, coming in fast and hard at his side. If she miscalculated, she’d leave herself totally exposed. But Deacon moved to protect himself and Ana shifted directions rapidly, crashing into his body and catching him off balance. She ignored the heat of his skin under her hand as she hooked her heel behind his and jerked, pushing back at the same time.
Too late to disengage. He went down and she followed, pinning one arm to his side with her knee. She lunged to catch his other wrist and slap it down against the mat next to his head, leaving him trapped on his back with her straddling his stomach.
The giddy thrill of success filled her. For a few seconds, that was all she could feel. Deacon was on his back, and she was on top of him, and she’d fucking won, and she wanted to laugh at how light she felt, how clear her head was. No nagging voices, no thousand pounds of other people’s dreams. Just victory.
And a p
rickle under her skin that built as she flexed her fingers and felt Deacon’s steady pulse beneath them.
Deacon was on his back.
And she was on top of him.
As if a dam had shattered, observations flooded her no-longer-clear head.
Her face was two inches from Deacon’s, and he was staring up at her with brown eyes edged with gold that she’d never seen up close before. His dark hair was short and spiky from the sweat of exertion. Mussed. He looked mussed. The beard and mustache she’d never really paid attention to framed lips she suddenly couldn’t stop looking at--that forbidding mouth that, this close, looked almost yielding.
The parts of him she was sitting on weren’t yielding. His abs tensed under her ass, and Reyes’s words came back to her, mockingly accurate.
Stern but bangable.
God help her, if she’d settled a few inches lower...
His hips arched. Just a little. Maybe as involuntarily as the way her fingers tightened around his wrist. Her other hand splayed on the mat. The air between them crackled.
She had to stop staring at his mouth.
His lips parted, and he sucked in a sharp breath that tugged at her in places she was trying to forget existed. Then, a heartbeat later, the world tipped over in a disorienting blur.
Ana landed on her back, the unimaginable heat and hardness of his body pressed to hers.
The fact that she was only wearing a sports bra hadn’t seemed important a few minutes ago. That was before his skin came in contact with hers. The coarse hair on his abdomen tickled her stomach, and the thin cotton of her bra wasn’t nearly enough protection. Her nipples contracted into stiff points that would have humiliated her if Deacon’s body hadn’t been in the process of betraying him far more apparently.
His dick was hard. The slightest shift of her hips made him tighten his fingers around her wrists, and he opened his mouth. “Ana--”