“I'm not traumatized!” My temperature rose with the lie.
“I have to assume you are.”
“Andreas—”
“Take the three weeks, Kaid. You need it. Plus, you don’t have a choice.”
I desperately needed the time off. I absolutely couldn’t take it. “Andreas, you can’t leave me sitting at home for three weeks. Not this time—”
“Suck it up. The decision has been made.”
Grumpily, I drank my coffee and rejoiced that I hadn’t mentioned killing an assassin in my kitchen last night. Sarakas would have flipped for sure.
Three weeks? What kind of bullshit was that? Maybe he didn’t think it was a raw deal; he could spend the impromptu vacation with his perfect girlfriend. No one egged his house or burned crosses in his yard or entangled him in international terrorist groups.
The company RFID tag around my neck jabbed me and took its reading. The fascist program reduced my DNA code into an algorithm to communicate with a watchdog program, declaring exactly where I was. If not for my favorite tech pirate, Rainer, the tag would tattle on me all day long. Rainer somehow managed to get the RFID to ‘lie’ by creating a DNAcoy, the only reason I could get away with half the crap I did. Regardless, the tag gizmo pricked me at random intervals, which was disconcerting as hell. I could never forget it, like a three ounce anvil around my neck.
Exhausted, I fell asleep on the drive. When I woke, Andreas’ short black curls were the first thing I noticed. He needed a haircut. His blue eyes looked like winter-struck clouds.
Dr. Robles met me in the lobby before I even gave the receptionist my name. Sarakas sat down to read an idle magazine. His shirt gathered over his sidearm and tightened across his lean abdomen. I wasn’t allowed to take weapons into the exam room. I pulled a Glock from my pants, flicked on the safety, and passed it to him. Our fingers touched, but I barely felt it.
Like a ghost in my own life.
Unarmed, I went with the doctor. She asked me to hop up on the table where a clever machine hovered above and mapped my body. Bones, blood, tissue, brain. All there, yet distended and completely irrelevant. She voiced a laundry list of injuries and concerns, growing more heated by the moment. I ignored her for the most part, staring at the monitors and the fat webs of hard damage beneath my skin.
“Whoever pulled the shrapnel left metal in you,” she hissed, offended by the poor work. “What’s with the forearm? Are you tangling with threshing machines now?”
Her jaw clicked as she ground her teeth. She wheeled her chair away from the monitor, folded her arms, and looked me square in the eye.
“Do you know why it’s called Gorgonblood?”
“Myth says blood taken from the right side of a Gorgon contained magical properties.”
“And blood from the left side?”
“Poison.”
“Precisely. Every cure has a cost. Ms. Durant, your body is healing remarkably. Unfortunately, it is also turning into stone.”
“Excuse me?”
“Your considerable, compounding scar tissue is hardening at such a rate that it has started to crack. Here and here, see these? Fission seams. You’re breaking, Kaidlyn. If these weak points start to split, you can wind up with torn or severed muscles, not to mention more grafting and rehab time. See this area above your hip? This scar band is starting to separate. Worse, Gorgonblood scars put down roots. They go deep. When it tears, it will sever your abdominals. Starting to look like Humpty Dumpty, sweetheart.”
She’d never called me sweetheart before, which meant it was really bad.
“We’ll have to purge,” Doc said.
“What?”
“We’re going to pull your blood and filter it. Returning you to neutral, so to speak. The current concentration of Gorgonblood is wavering near toxic levels and may impede my ability to do my job. You need to lay off the pills, agent.”
“I’ll try.”
“The drug doesn’t go away and it doesn’t burn clean. Its residue clogs everything. Furthermore, we will have to remove significant scar tissue. Laser cutting makes it easier. You’ll look better than you have in years, but sadly…”
“It’s going to hurt.”
“That’s putting it mildly. I recommend a medically induced coma.”
“Seriously? Man.”
“The work I’m discussing will involve extensive, deep tissue reconstruction and I’d like to utilize a new—”
“Are you sure this is necessary?”
“Unless you want to be confined to a wheelchair.”
“How soon would I land in a wheelchair?”
“Maybe next week. Maybe next month.”
“Jesus.” I rubbed my head. “But a coma?”
“Ms. Durant—”
“For how long?”
“Two weeks.”
She leaned forward. The freckle beside her eye danced with stress. A wisp of hair crossed her forehead while she made her case. I didn’t hear a word.
Two weeks of…nothing. No murder attempts. No drama. No wolves. No pirates. No sudden kisses. No sudden death. No expectations. Simpy sleep. Mindlessness.
A man with a bomb strapped to his chest had tried to hug me.
Laughing all the while.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s do it.”
She sat back, interrupted, startled.
“Let’s get it done,” I said.
She smiled. “Thank you.” As if I was doing her the favor. “Usually, I’d spend more time talking this through with you and give you a chance to wrap up some odds and ends, but I have a feeling you’ll chicken out if I don’t act immediately. I’ll tell your partner.”
“I should…”
She waited.
I shook my head. “Never mind.”
She left. Quiet, chill, I waited until she returned. I felt tight, anxious, half dead, and utterly alone.
“Ready, sleeping beauty?” She arranged needles, tubes, and equipment. Her hair fell across her cheek, obscuring all but her mouth, and I flinched.
She looked precisely like my dead mother.
Drugs took me, slipped me under a warm blanket, tucked my dreams into the corner, and settled down like a leviathan. Drippy pipes. Machines, blades, monitors. The sound of construction. A jackhammer, ratta-ratta, tap-tap. The taste of strong coffee lingering on my tongue.
Then nothing.
Chapter 4
Clifford
I was busily minding my business when I smelled trouble.
Big trouble, of the vermin variety.
Like rats, this particular mutt kennel carried a scent around with them. Cheap housing, cheap booze, too much sour meat, and utter lack of self-discipline.
Sick animals sleeping near asbestos and rat poison.
I glanced out the window. All my classes had finished and my students were gone. Thankfully. The parking lot was empty save my worn Rodeo hogging a spot near the carniceria where I bought embarrassing quantities of questionable cheap meat.
My visitors slouched. Bad posture, bad intent, plus generally weak spines. The first wore gaudy gold chains, slick shirt, and greased hair. Primped as much as his broke ass could handle. His buddy wore yellow and twice as many chains. Shiny shoes. Hard hands, pointy eyes, and a shifty habit of glancing over their shoulders.
Cowards. Thugs. The whole ratty lot of them.
I could lock my door and see if they’d break it. They might. Then I’d have to dig deep into shallow pockets and pay for replacement glass. If I wanted an excuse to kick someone’s ass, surely I wouldn’t have to sacrifice a window.
“Clifford,” the first said. I remembered him, vaguely, as a bookie who couldn't balance his books. Took bets on illegal fights involving humans and dogs, not always on separate rosters. His name was Scritch, like scratch an itch. Before his disease, he weighed in at a buck twenty, couldn't handle his booze, and somehow managed to slip his dick into a dozen women without ever keeping one.
Not my favorite guy.
&n
bsp; His partner was unknown to me. Bigger, hungrier, eyes like magnets. Intense but flat. Nothing good going on in there. His yellow shirt reminded me of caution cones on a wet floor.
No doubt I could easily take them both, so I figured I could afford to hear them out. Briefly.
“What do you want?” I said. “Open classes aren't until Thursday. Should stop by, Scritch. I'll teach you a thing or two.”
He reddened, but his friend didn't blink or flinch. Tough guy.
“I need to talk to you about something, Cliff,” Scritch said.
Hated when people called me that.
“Speak, then,” I said.
“Things ain’t right around here anymore. Tell me you didn’t notice the city feels different. Maybe you noticed strange mutts around.”
“No stranger than you.”
“Mutts are coming from overseas, Cliff. They're crossing our borders and slinking into our cities. They're buying houses, businesses, and scooping up people's debt. They're bringing their friends, throwing parties, and wiping some of our brothers right off the map. They strolled in and stole our land, Cliff. In weeks, maybe even days, we'll be completely outnumbered.”
“Sounds awful.”
“This is serious, man. I mean, this bitch ambushed twenty of our men. Her filthy, cowardly crew surrounded them and killed them, no fighting chance. Twenty brothers gone in a flash.”
“I only have one brother. Ain't you, is it?”
“Don't be that way. Some Russian cunt slaughtered Iago's wolves. That’s my kennel, my friends. She came onto our land and attacked without provocation. Iago, he's trying to protect his city, you know? These foreigners come in, acting like they own the place, ripping territory away from our people. We can't allow it. Someone has to stand up. Someone has to make them pay.”
“And you think Iago is that someone.”
“If we unite, we can stop this invasion. Cliff, Clifford, we can end the chaos. We can end the city’s downward spiral. If we stand together, pull our resources, and build a stronger pack, we'll be unstoppable.”
“Not my concern.”
“Join us, Cliff. Clique up. Become one of us again.”
“I was never one of you.”
“Things have changed. Nothing is the same anymore. Everything that's happened in the past, it's in the past, y'know? Forgotten, poof. No harm no foul.”
“I haven't forgotten what was done to me, and I sure as hell am not going to jump on Iago's bandwagon. That mutt is foul, Scritch. Rotten like dead meat in maggot city. Doesn't have anything to do with me.”
“You should reconsider,” his friend in yellow said. I didn't spare him a glance. Could break his neck in a flash, toss him in the dumpster out back, and no one would notice.
“Remember Little Jamey?” Scritch said. “They killed him, Clifford. Desecrated his body. Poor Jamey.”
I crossed my arms and ignored the memory of Jamey’s quick-dealing sneaky hands, contagious laughter, and endless stream of endearing, stuttering profanity.
“Your people need you, Cliff.”
“I don't have a people, and I don't need one. Certainly don’t want back into a group that only cares for me when it benefits them. I do not need your politics, idealism, tyranny, and hedonism. I'm good. Right here, all by myself, I'm happy. Got it? Take that back to where you came from. Spread the message around. I'm not joining anyone. Ever. I like that you dressed up all pretty for me, though. Definitely makes an impression.”
Scritch bristled. His friend cocked his head, watching with sneaky eyes, like something that would creep up on me from behind in a dark alley.
“I can see this is a bad time,” Scritch said. “We’ll stop by later. Think about it, would ya? Don’t pass up an opportunity to be someone who matters.”
I didn’t make any promises. I turned my back. Utter dismissal, a bit stupid. While they left, I reached behind the small counter at the entrance and retrieved the joint I had rolled and hidden for emergency use. Like for when assholes who stank of sick dogs pissed me off and threatened to start a turf war. My fists thickened with swelling bones. I flicked a lighter and sparked the joint. Breathing deep, I pulled in the sweet, acrid crackle of powerful, cheap weed.
I drank in the smoke, held it deep, and filled my being with it. Closed my eyes and tried to meditate and be grateful for life and calm my heartbeat. Tried to squish my anger and indignation into a tiny wisp of smoke, like I could exhale and never see that particular anger again.
The smoke almost covered the scent of my newest visitor.
“Hey, gorgeous,” she said.
My heart stammered. My gut sank. My teeth sprouted and smoke escaped. I brought the joint back to my lips and dragged the futile drug into my lungs, even though the pot’s relief couldn’t stand up to this trial. I pinched it off, hid the joint, and tried to rally strength.
I didn’t wanna. Didn’t want to turn. Certainly didn’t want to see her. Couldn’t bear the sound of her voice. Her angry, entitled voice, completely different from the intoxicating, sultry tone she took when she wanted something.
Should have locked the door.
I turned.
She. Was. Perfect.
Hourglass. Firm. Shapely. Legs a man would die for. Ass that could change the world. Eyes... Lord, how had I forgotten? What was I doing? Look at those lips…she wanted me to kiss her. Then she’d wrap those legs around me and we’d fuck for days.
I grabbed an orange from the fruit bowl on the lobby counter, began methodically peeling it. Invigorating citrus oils burst under each twist of my thumbnail.
Satan incarnate, that’s what she was. I dared to look up.
God, I wanted her.
I returned to the task of busily peeling the orange.
“Who was that leaving? Are those promoters?” She thought the two thugs were involved in the pro circuit. How cute. I shrugged. Wasn’t her business anyway. Of all the times for her to visit. What did she want?
There I was, staring at a complete stranger, seeing a woman I once loved.
She hadn’t even bothered to tell me before—
A growl hit my throat, and I shook my head to jar it loose. She had been MIA for months, and now she dropped in and the first words off her lips had to do with my potential to earn money. Clearly, I meant jack shit to her. “What do you want, Mercedes?”
Her hip swung left, her tits arched, a pout took her lips. What an act. A very sexy, dangerous act.
“I miss ya, baby.”
“Baby?” I said, throat like granite, blood reaching a fever pitch. “Get out.”
“But—”
“Get. Out.”
“Don’t be that way.”
“Why did I have to find out from your mother? Your mother, of all people!”
She crossed her arms under her tits. Boing. Didn’t matter how juicy that golden standard of cleavage looked, I was mad. Too mad. I could break her neck and toss her in the dumpster, but a hundred dicks would notice her absence.
Wasn’t always that way. Once, she liked to cook. Laughed at stupid reality shows. Collected unicorn figurines. She used to light up a dance floor, not a pipe.
She could have—
I slammed shut all the ideas of what she could have been, or what we could have done together. She killed all of that, and I sure as hell couldn’t get near her. For better or worse, one of us would end up dead. Fever struck my eyes and I knew it would end with her body in a gutter.
“I’ll give you three seconds to leave before I scar you up so bad even Fat Louie won’t take a crack at your slit.”
Her cheeks paled, more because of what she saw on my face than the language.
“One.”
She spun on her high heels and walked her high ass out of the building, an extra swagger and an extra hurry in her step.
The squashed orange dripped from my fist.
This wasn’t working.
I needed something more than pot.
And I knew who could help me.
Chapter 5
Clifford
The Rubicon Café occupied prime real estate in Red Sector, the singular remnant of sexual freedom and open market in the city. Despite being completely illegal, it was a low violence area. People journeyed to Red to cure their troubles, not to start trouble, and the crowd looked out for each other. Prostitutes knew it was the safest place to pick up a john, and clients could find the cleanest, most businesslike exchange of anything they were in the market to buy.
Me, I needed drugs. Better ones, or more of them.
Old bus stops, unused by public transit, had become small pods of entrepreneurs and venture capitalists.
Shoulder to shoulder on the sidewalk, the crowd shuffled politely, everyone with a destination in mind. I inhaled the combined perfume of people in various degrees of filth and cleanliness, under the influence of a plethora of substances or states of mind, some stinking of desperation, others reeking of food, chemicals, and oils. A lot to process. I headed for a bus stop with tires and a green barrel on its small mesh roof.
Usual bustle, typical hustle. Kids bartered and hawked stolen goods. Ladies sold their goods as well, helping the nearby condom vendor with a convenient merchandising opportunity.
I bought a pack of condoms from the street vendor outside. Not that I was getting laid, but I wanted to loiter and scope out the street. On impulse, I bought a lice kit, too, in case the girl Nancy got brave enough to let me help her. Or maybe keeping her stinky was a good idea, a self-defense mechanism against pedophiles on the street.
Someone intentionally touched my elbow, and I turned.
“Hey, Hunter. Man, how ya been?” I said. He had grown thicker since I last saw him, looking manlier for it. His tall mohawk, once green, was now fluorescent orange. “Haven’t seen you in ages. I hear you’re off the grid.”
“As much as possible. Ditched my phone months ago, staying away from tags and terminals. Figure it’s for the best.” The kid could play Scrabble like none other. Knew how to make a sale. Golfed like a pro. Had impeccable taste in booze. Underemployed, for sure, wasting away.
“What do you need, man?” he said.
“Something stronger.”
“Stronger than what? To do what?”
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