Shadow Bound

by Rachel Vincent

  I turned back to John, who still favored his right leg and was edging toward the Dumpster, probably in search of something to use as a weapon.

  “When you break your word, you send your body into self-destruct mode. And when you’re given conflicting orders, there’s no way to obey them both, thus there’s no way to avoid pain. First comes a real bitch of a headache.”

  I feinted to the right, then slammed a left hook into John’s temple. He grunted and stumbled backward, and I followed while he was still off balance. “Next comes uncontrollable shaking and cramps. Then the loss of bowel and bladder control.” I kicked John low in the gut for emphasis. He hunched over the pain in his stomach and I was already circling again before he stood.

  “Then your body begins to shut itself down one organ at a time. Starting with the kidneys, and everything else housed in your gut.” John lurched toward me, fists clenched, and I danced away from him on the balls of my feet. Before he could follow, I twisted into a midlevel kick, and my boot slammed into his right kidney.

  John moaned, an inarticulate sound of pain, then fell to his knees.

  “And in the case of conflicting orders, if one of them isn’t withdrawn, the breakdown of your body continues until you die in a pool of your own evacuated fluids.”

  “Kori,” Ian said, with a glance at the man curled up on the ground. “That’s enough.”

  “Is it?” I grabbed a handful of John’s hair and pulled his head back, one knee pressed into his spine. “What were you gonna do after you took me down?” I demanded. “How were you going to stop me from coming after you? Knife to the chest?”

  John shook his head, and several of his hairs popped loose in my hand. “Across the throat,” he gasped. “Then I was gonna throw your corpse facedown in the river and cash in on my bet.”

  Ian scowled, but didn’t press his position.

  I shoved John facedown on the concrete and put one foot on the back of his neck. “Tell Cavazos I consider this a personal insult. If he doesn’t make a serious effort next time, I’m shipping his men back in a series of small boxes.”

  Then I stomped on John’s good hand, and his screams followed us as I knelt to pick up the knife I’d taken from them, then followed Ian onto the sidewalk.

  The first of the resistance pain hit me as I folded the knife closed and slid it into my pocket—a flash of agony behind my eyes, accompanied by the glare of white light in the center of my field of vision. An instant migraine. And that was only the beginning.

  “You okay?” Ian asked, when I staggered on the sidewalk, one hand pressed to my forehead, as if that could stop the pain.

  “No.” I stopped to lean against the wall of a dry cleaner’s storefront and Ian stood in front of me, blocking me from view without being asked. If I hadn’t been in so much pain, I would have questioned that kind of instinct, coming from a systems analyst.

  I slid my hand back into my pocket and felt the smooth edges of the pocketknife, amazed by how calm the feel of the weapon made me, even as pain threatened to split my skull in two.

  I’d been forbidden to arm myself, a fact I’d forgotten in the afterglow of the scuffle in the alley—even that little bit of expended energy had helped release some of my bottled-up rage. Carrying John’s knife was an ongoing breach of the oath of obedience I’d sworn to Jake Tower, and I would hurt for the length of the breach—until I got rid of the knife, or my body shut itself down in protest.

  Yet even knowing my life could end right there on the street, my undignified death witnessed by an endless parade of strangers—not to mention Ian Holt—I didn’t want to give up the knife. I’d won it in a fair fight. The knife was mine, and so were the skills needed to use it better than its original owner could ever have managed. Weapons were freedom. Power. Autonomy. And by denying me the right to arm myself, Jake had denied me all of those things, too. Intentionally.

  I was still being punished.

  While my head threatened to crack open like a pistachio seed, my hands began to tremble and my stomach started to cramp, and the pain was too severe to be hidden.

  “Kori? What’s wrong?” Ian’s voice was tense with concern, and he glanced back and forth between me and the people passing us on the sidewalk, to see if anyone had noticed my weakened state. And that was all I could take, not physically, but logically.

  Resistance pain weakened me and made me vulnerable, which made him vulnerable by extension. There were people—even my fellow syndicate members—who wouldn’t hesitate to take advantage of that weakness, for any of a dozen reasons. And if I let Holt get hurt, Jake would kill me.

  “Here. Take this.” I pulled the knife from my pocket, my grip shaky, and Ian only hesitated for a moment before taking it from me. The instant the metal left my hand, the shaking stopped. The stomach cramps eased, and slowly, the pain in my head began to recede.

  Ian glanced at the knife, then slid it into his own pocket. Then he met my gaze, silently demanding an explanation. When that produced no results, he tried again, verbally. “What’s going on, Kori? Why can’t you hold the knife?”

  I exhaled slowly, not surprised that he recognized resistance pain for what it was. Then I braced myself for more. “I’m not allowed to carry a weapon. At the moment.”

  Another bolt of pain shot through my skull and into my brain—I wasn’t allowed to tell him that, either.

  I squeezed my eyes shut as my hands curled into fists at my sides, like I could actually fight the agony. But I couldn’t. This pain was much stronger than the previous bout—literally blinding, for a moment—but shorter in duration, because telling Ian something I wasn’t supposed to tell him was a terminal breach of my oath to Jake. Over and done with quickly, as opposed to an ongoing breach, like carrying a weapon would have been.

  Ian’s frown deepened. “Why not? What moment? This moment? Saturday morning specifically?”

  “It’s less a Saturday-morning thing than an until-further-notice thing.” That one came with no additional pain—the breach was in the admission, not the details.

  “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 la
nds? 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 an
d 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.