Bite Back Box Set 2

by Mark Henwick

  Trust and jump.

  “Alex.” I reached an arm toward him, inviting him.

  He hadn’t bothered with a towel any more than he’d bothered with swimming trunks, so he was cold and wet as he slid into bed next to me.

  The pair of them were about as relaxed as rattlers sizing each other up.

  About as relaxed as Felix and Cameron had been at Coykuti.

  That gave me a seed of hope.

  Jen was an alpha. Not a werewolf, but clearly every bit as alpha among humans as Alex or Felix or Cameron were among werewolves.

  What if she and Alex were just responding like werewolf alphas?

  If the glares and insults were a sort of crazy teasing?

  I was genuinely pinned down now. Alex was lying on my right arm, Jen was on my left. Apart from just pressing them together and hoping they wouldn’t explode, what could I do?

  Water from the pool trickled down from Alex’s hair and ran across his chest.

  The pool was a special salt-water version. No chlorine, thankfully.

  I licked some droplets off his skin, working my way up to his throat.

  Alex sucked in a deep breath.

  And what I did for one…

  I ran my tongue across Jen, nipple to jawline.

  Now both rattlers seemed to have forgotten how to breathe. I pulled Alex down to give him some life-saving mouth-to-mouth.

  Then Jen. All about balance.

  It worked, and now, we were cooking.

  I had a firm expression of interest from Alex which was currently pressed hard into my hip. Jen’s eyes were back to their smoky best and locked on Alex’s.

  Silence, but for three sets of ragged breathing.

  Alex’s eyes flickered down to Jen’s lips. As if in response, they parted.

  Eyes wide open, the two of them tilted forward over me.

  Lips touched and they jerked back as if scalded.

  Awkward.

  My school friend Cassie had made a better job of it with her cousin when I dared them to kiss in the garden shed. They’d been all of twelve.

  “Wow, that was hard,” the demon in my throat said. “Now, once more, with passion.”

  Jen shut her eyes and tilted her face.

  Alex met her halfway.

  Their lips touched, parted, touched.

  I forgot to breathe again.

  What would it feel like?

  They are in love. They are in love. They want to make love.

  Their desires are sacred to me.

  Which made it sound like some kind of duty, to allow them to love each other as they loved me.

  They were kissing now, a real kiss. I could feel the heat of it, the urgency, the need.

  It woke a need in me too. Watching them kiss was a mouthwatering, thigh-loosening, searing-hot level of erotic.

  This was no duty. This was all about pleasure. Hunger.

  We needed this. We needed our love to be equal and shared between us.

  Not some truth I discovered with eukori, but a truth I just felt as the fire began to burn in all three of us, each feeding the other’s flames.

  And as they kissed deeper, Jen trailed her fingertips over Alex’s chest, leaving tracks of goosebumps. Up and down between Alex and me. Brushing my nipple. His belly. My belly. My hip. The seal of skin where his belly pressed my side.

  The three of us were trembling.

  Her fingers paused.

  A question.

  My heart beat like it was trying to get out of my ribcage.

  Alex’s body shuddered and shifted. A tiny amount. Barely enough to provide space for a hand to slip between us, down to where his expression of interest was throbbing hot against my hip.

  An answer. An invitation.

  This was going to work. A flood of unbelievable pleasure and anticipation rocked my body.

  In an instant it was all gone. A second before it happened, both Alex and I knew. Alex was already up in a crouch between us and the door when it was thrown open.

  Yelena. Obviously straight out of her bed. Magnificently stark naked, silver hair worse than Medusa.

  Elizabetta and Dominé right behind her.

  “Sorry, Boss.” Yelena held out my cell. “It’s urgent.”

  I rolled off the bed.

  “Dante?”

  She shook her head. “Tamanny.”

  Chapter 51

  I put her on loudspeaker, icy fingers of apprehension clutching my gut as I got dressed.

  “Tamanny? Tamanny, are you all right?” I said.

  “Is ’at you, Ms. Farrell?” She sounded so small and frightened. Trying not to cry. Her words were blurred, as if her mouth were numb.

  “Yes, it’s me. Call me Amber. What’s happening?”

  “I…you said I should call you, if…” She stopped, and beneath her stifled sobbing, I could hear traffic noises.

  “Where are you?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, the sound of panic in her voice. “I jus’ ran. Can’t remember how I got here. I don’t know what to do.”

  “You’re doing fine, Tamanny. Fine. Now, I can hear cars.” I spoke as calmly as I could. “You’re on a road. Can you remember anything about how you got there?”

  There was a pause. “Just ran. They took me to a club. Supposed to be a fashion show or something. I’m feeling real bad.”

  Her voice trailed away.

  “Tamanny?”

  “There was a bridge over the road. Big bridge. There was a wire fence thing with school buses. Under the bridge. An’ people in rags. And y’know, graffiti. Like faces and stuff.”

  Elizabetta frowned, making a gesture with her hand—need more.

  “Are there street names?” I said. “What can you see?”

  Tamanny gave a scream.

  “What’s happening?” I yelled.

  “Sorry. Sorry,” she mumbled. “There was a guy sleeping on the sidewalk. I thought it was trash, but he woke up. He scared me. Everyone’s staring at me.”

  “Street names?”

  “Oh. Can’t see. There’s some kinda flea market? The booths are blocking everything. Wait.”

  A car horn blared and I could hear her apologizing again.

  We could hear music and shouting in the background.

  “San Pedro,” she said.

  “Oh God,” Elizabetta whispered. “She’s heading into South Central.”

  “Is there a restaurant you could go in?” I said.

  “No money,” she said. “Left my purse. Had to. Just got my secret cell. It’s a secret. Promise you won’t tell.” She started crying. “Tore my dress a little getting through the window. Pretty dress.”

  What the hell happened to her?

  “Tamanny, if there’s a restaurant that looks good, go in there,” I said. “Hand the cell to the manager and I’ll talk to him. I just want you off the street.”

  “Yeah. They’ll be looking for me,” she said. “They paid their money. Have to get off the street. There’s one here. Restaurant. Alcan…Alcantara.”

  There was the sound of a door and some elevator music.

  “Hey! You. Out!” I could hear someone shouting at her, then Tamanny desperately trying to explain and get him on the cell.

  “Yeah, I’ve seen this kind of scam before. Get the fuck outta here, you drunk whore.”

  The sound from the restaurant cut off and the noise of cars and people came back.

  Tamanny was sobbing openly now.

  I was finished dressing and headed for the garage.

  “Keep talking to her.” I handed my cell to Elizabetta.

  “Car’s too slow,” I said to everyone else. “I’m taking the Kawasaki.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Alex said. “I can make my own way back.”

  “We’ll follow in the car and meet you,” Yelena said. Julie and Keith had joined her.

  How would we meet? Where?

  I wasn’t thinking clearly yet. I ran back to the office and got the colonel’s Ops 4
-10 comms equipment.

  It took frustrating minutes to patch in signals to a master commset, linking me with Yelena and Elizabetta.

  There wasn’t time to patch the cell in as well. I’d be able to hear her relayed through Elizabetta’s set, but I wouldn’t be able to talk to her.

  I grabbed the cell back from Elizabetta.

  “Tamanny, listen to me,” I said. “I’m on my way. I won’t be long. Just twenty-five minutes, okay? I need you to go into a store and wait for me.”

  “There’s an Urban River store,” she whispered.

  “Good. That’s a good choice. Go in and wait for me.”

  “What about a police station?” Julie said.

  Elizabetta shook her head. “Long walk. Not a good—”

  But Tamanny had heard as well. “No!” she said, her voice blurring with urgency. “There was a judge. Vering. Veringham. Something! Can’t trust police.”

  Oh God.

  Elizabetta squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. I was afraid she’d be unable to handle any more, but she got a grip on herself and when she spoke again to Tamanny, her voice was bright and soothing. “No need to go to a police station. Just into the store. Amber will come get you. Keep talking to me, hon.”

  I was already running for the garage.

  I heard on my commset that Tamanny was inside the store as I fired up the Kawasaki and Alex settled in behind me.

  We left tire marks down the drive and out onto the avenue that would take us to the Santa Monica, the freeway on the big bridge that Tamanny had walked underneath.

  Like every other major road, it was choked with cars, but I wove in and out. The motorcycle was tall, narrow and powerful, designed for dirt riding, but that also made it excellent at dodging cars.

  Maybe I could make it in fifteen.

  “Tell me about your dress,” Elizabetta said on the commset.

  “’S beautiful. Red. Black pattern on it. Orchids. Looks like birds growing on vines.”

  “That sounds lovely. You tore it? Will we be able to fix it?”

  “I don’t know. It was so scary climbing out. Dizzy.”

  Elizabetta murmured something I couldn’t hear as I screeched past a pair of idiots having an argument through their car windows.

  “Didn’t want to drink it,” Tamanny said. “Thought I was supposed to be on the catwalk. Didn’t want to fall over. It made me sick anyway.”

  That might have been what saved you—vomiting the drugs out.

  I squeezed around a truck and onto the freeway.

  Ten minutes. Come on! I could make it in ten from here.

  They’d have found she was missing after five or ten minutes. They’d be unsure which way she’d gone to start with. Maybe another ten minutes organizing the search. That was a lot of time to get away, but she was a beautiful fourteen-year-old staggering along the road in a torn red dress and crying. People would notice. Her pursuers could be right behind her.

  “I could hear them talking,” she was saying. She’d been calmer once she’d gotten inside the store, but she was crying again now. “They didn’t think I could, but I could.” She hiccupped. “Mom says it’s all right. Everyone in the industry does it. But it’s not, is it?”

  “No, Tamanny, it’s not,” Elizabetta said. “I’m sure…I’m sure your mom didn’t mean it. This must be a misunderstanding. But let’s get you somewhere safe first, and then we’ll talk about it.”

  The wind blasted the tears from my eyes.

  “Amber, I got through to Billie.” Yelena’s voice over the comms startled me. “Most of the Belles are on patrol, but she and a couple of the others are heading into South Central from the other side.”

  “Good,” I said.

  “Not so good. She tells me there’s a street market going on. It’s illegal, but down there the cops stand back unless something major goes down.”

  “How major?” Bad things happen in riots, and South Central was the toughest of LA areas, full of gangs.

  “She says it’s usually okay.”

  Usually.

  “Have they closed the roads?” I said.

  “No, but traffic will be slow through there. It’ll hold everyone up equally. We’re stuck ourselves; can’t even get on Santa Monica. How far away are you from Tamanny?”

  “Six minutes. Less, I think.”

  Yelena went quiet.

  “Tamanny? Tamanny?” Elizabetta was calling.

  “What happened?” I yelled.

  “I don’t know. We were talking about her mother. The line just cut.”

  “Call the Urban River store on the landline,” I said. “Let the manager know the problem. Get me the exact location as well.”

  “Okay.”

  Alex slapped my arm to draw my attention.

  “Switch to the Harbor freeway,” he said. “First exit take Adams. Crosses San Pedro in the right area.”

  I twitched the Kawasaki through a couple of gaps and down the exit ramp.

  We were so close; less than four minutes away.

  What if they’ve found her?

  They wouldn’t be able to get away in a hurry. I’d find them.

  Elizabetta was getting no answer from the store, but then Tamanny called back.

  “Thank God! Are you all right?” Elizabetta said.

  “Yes. I’m sorry.” She was crying again.

  “What happened?”

  I could hear the street sounds again. She was back outside.

  “I called Mom. You said she…I had to…”

  Elizabetta’s voice was so quiet I could barely hear it. “What did she say?”

  “I should go back.”

  I didn’t have time to swear and scream. I’d come up against the outskirts of the street market. A scatter of market stalls sprawled out into the street and an accident with a truck ahead completely blocked the way. There were too many people on the sidewalks.

  I pulled in next to a stall and flicked the side stand down.

  “Here’s fifty.” I slapped a bill into the surprised stall holder’s hand. “You get another if the motorcycle’s still here when I come back. Half an hour.”

  Alex and I ran, weaving between the people.

  “Liz,” I spoke into the comms as we ran, “get her back inside, but first she has to get rid of that cell. Give it away, or toss it in a car if she can. Anything.”

  “What? Oh, they’ll be able to track it, of course.”

  I heard her talking to Tamanny.

  She couldn’t go back in the same store. The manager had closed the shop. He didn’t like the look of the crowds.

  Elizabetta got her searching for another store and a handy vehicle to carry her cell away.

  I could understand the store manager’s concerns.

  Coming down to this area from the Fashion District, along San Pedro, it might as well have been a different country. North of the Santa Monica, there were palm trees on the side of the road and open spaces, clothes factories. Further on, the skyscrapers of downtown, the shopping paradises of Hollywood, Rodeo, Melrose: the glittering streets of plenty. South of the freeway, single stores of essentials, hardscrabble and discount, handwritten signs and peeling paint, bars on the windows and lots of places to buy liquor.

  And maybe earlier today, it had been just the market stalls feeding on the Christmas glut of shoppers, expecting any minute to be moved on by the police. Then, when that didn’t happen, it had become a street party. Forty-gallon drums had come out onto the sidewalks and were being used to grill meat to the smell of charcoal and firelighters. Sharp operators were selling cheap booze out of stolen shopping carts. A competition was running to find who had the loudest boom box.

  But as the day faded, and crowds started to move rather than loiter, the carnival atmosphere attracted others as surely as blood in the water called sharks.

  Smoke from the fires mixed with city smog and hung over the streets as the lights began to come on. The faces that came out of it seemed stranger the further
we went.

  More storekeepers were lowering their shutters. Not good business anyway with the street market there, and no incentive to stay open late.

  Stallholders were starting to eye each other to see who would move first, who would make that call on the balance between losing the last bit of business and risking everything.

  Cars started moving easier, cruising, lights gleaming on their shadowed windows.

  And now people were staring at us, a pair of gringos running through South Central like our tails were on fire.

  Yelena came on the comms, confirmed the Belles had gotten near the top end of Avalon and had to leave the bikes. “Billie says she’s worried, Boss. She’s seen Vagos and Mongols, Five-deuce and Conejo. Those hombres don’t mix well in small areas.”

  Shit. We were about to be in the middle of a turf war between southside LA gangs and motorcycle clubs.

  “There’s a place still open.” Tamanny’s voice came thinly in my ears. “Called Trabajo. They’ve got a sign says five-dollar clothes. It’s between a liquor store and a place that says…uh…Reparacion secadoras y lavadoras.”

  “Tell her I’ll find her there.”

  “Please hurry,” she said when Elizabetta relayed the message. “Okay. The cell’s going in the back of a truck just pulling away now.”

  Tamanny had gone, and with any luck, Forsythe was tracking her cell and would spend an hour or two chasing it down to Harbor.

  All we needed was a couple of minutes more.

  But the crowd in front of us wasn’t thinning or drifting away. It was getting younger, more hyped every step we took. Alex and I slowed down. Nothing like starting a fight by jostling someone.

  And we were out of place and in a hurry. Bad combination.

  Just one more minute!

  But this wasn’t shoppers in front of us. It was packs of gangbangers squaring up against each other.

  On our side: Five-deuce—African American, floppy forage hats and beards, chunky gold rings and hand signals.

  On the other side: Conejos—Hispanic, shaved heads and sharp mustaches, full sleeve tats and big shirts with plenty of space for guns.

  Most of the market stalls were gone. Three had simply been abandoned. Whatever it was they’d been selling had been stripped clean.