Anarchy Found (4 page)

“How can I help—”

“Uh…” I cut Sheila off before she says my name out loud. “Secure the perimeter and the tunnel.”

“Perimeter and tunnel secure,” she says as soon as I’m done.

“That’s clever,” gun girl says. “What are you, some diabolical mad scientist?”

“Something like that.”

“I’m gonna get out of here. You can’t keep me here. And if you think I’ll surrender and let you—”

“Hey,” I say, putting my hands up, palms out in front of me. “Take it easy, OK? I’m not keeping you here. I just need to make sure the place is buttoned up. I have a lot of expensive stuff happening in this room.”

She stops backing up, and that’s enough for me at the moment. “Who are you?”

I shake my head. “You don’t need to know that.”

“I’m afraid I do. I brought you here. You made me bring you here. And now I see those wheels turning in your head. You can’t let me go. Not after I’ve seen all this stuff you have. Do you have permits for this place? Hell, do you even own this land?”

I scrub my gloved hand down my unshaven face and sigh.
Think, Lincoln. Think.
How the fuck do I get out of this? There’s probably six different ways I can handle this, but most of them would be difficult, involve a lot of talking and explaining, and I’m not in the mood for that shit right now.

“I just want to go, OK? But my truck is stuck in the mud. So if you help me get it back on the road, I’ll leave and never come back.”

I shoot her a grin, the one that disarms all the girls I never bring home. It’s big, with dimples, and makes my eyes soften so people trust me. “No problem. Let’s go do that.” I shoot her a little wink.

Gun girl recoils a little. She starts shaking her head again. “You’re lying. You’re lying and I’m not falling for it.”

“I’m not lying, I’m gonna help you.”
Just not the way you think
. I take a few steps towards her, but she takes off running to the right, trips over a floor mat, barely catches herself before she faceplants, recovers, and stops on the other side of my black muscle car.

“You wanna play the kiddy chase game, gun girl?” I laugh a little at the thought. She’s tough, and scared, and holding a weapon aimed at my chest. So the whole idea is a little ridiculous. But she’s very cute in her I’ve-got-a-gun-and-I-know-how-to-use-it way. “I can play, but I always win.”

“Well,” she says, a little out of breath and with one of her hands on the hood of my car, like she’s trying to calm down. I take a few steps forward, and she eases away. “I always win as well. So we’re an even match for this game.”

She’s in bolt mode. One wrong move and she runs. And even though I could catch her easily under normal conditions, I don’t have the energy to catch her right
now
. My body is more fucked up than it looks from that crash. I need to eat and recover or I’m gonna pass out.

Her feet are not sure which way to go until I make a move one way or another, so I need to play this smart. “There’s no need for such fierce competition,” I say, taking a few steps towards the front of the car. She sprints to the rear end, keeping the car between us. “I might not be a good guy, as you put it. But I’m really not gonna hurt you.” Especially after what happened out there on the road when I grabbed her foot and took her down. I want to think a little harder about that, but she starts to move, interrupting my thoughts.

“Right,” she says, moving two steps away with each one of mine. “I pegged you for some kind of deviant criminal the moment I saw you fly past me on that bike. Careless, reckless, and so sure you’re invincible, the safety of other people on the road is of no concern.”

“What are you, some do-gooder crossing guard? It’s a deserted mountain road. That’s what we do up here.”

“It wasn’t deserted, I was on it!”

“Yeah, but we went around you.”

“That’s not the point. You could’ve hurt me. What if I had swerved into—”

“OK, fine,” I say, getting bored with this quick. This was not how I planned to spend this day and I’m already getting a migraine. “I’m the bad guy, you’re the good girl. I give up. Now do you want help with that trailer or not? Because I’m still soaking wet here, and I’d like to change.”

And that’s when I make my move.

I reach down and grab the edge of my dripping wet t-shirt and pull it up over my stomach. I catch her eyes going wide just as I tug it over my head. And by the time I’m tossing it aside, she’s staring at my abs.

I almost can’t tuck down the laugh.

“I d-d-don’t trust you,” she stammers, fixated on my bare chest.

“What’s not to trust, gun girl? I’m sure you’d like to get out of your wet clothes too. Hey, I got an idea. How about I take you upstairs and give you some dry ones. We can have coffee, warm up a bit, and by then the rain will have stopped and we can go see about your trailer.”

The whole time I’m talking, my feet are inching away from her, making her drop her guard. And that’s when I make my second move.

I drop to a crouch and start crawling along the side of the car. Not the direction she thinks. Because she thinks I’m gonna take the shortest distance. But she’s wrong.

“What the fuck are you doing?” She’s unsettled. Maybe even frightened. I can’t say I blame her. But a guy’s gotta do what a guy’s gotta do to protect his man cave. “Oh my God,” she whispers. “Where the—”

And that’s when I get around to the front of the car again. I’m watching the shadow of her feet as she moves, unsure of which way to go. But she fucks up just like I knew she would. A moment later she takes a chance and loses when she rounds the car and comes right to me.

I spring forward, grab her by the legs, take her down to the floor, sit on her stomach, and pin her hands above her head. The nausea hits me again, only this time it’s so strong, I might actually throw up.

She writhes underneath me, still gripping the gun, but her finger’s not on the trigger. So before she can even think about shooting me, I drag that arm down, place my full weight on her wrist with my knee, and then grab the gun from her hand.

“Now stop,” I growl, as the saliva pools in my mouth. I might heave and my head is aching even worse than before. I need her to give in right now so I can stop this fight. “It’s over. You’re gonna cooperate, I’m gonna get you out of here, and we’re gonna forget this day ever happened.”

“Get off me,” she says, kicking her legs up, trying to unseat me. My head spins.
Hold it together, man. Hold it together
.

I lie down across her chest, almost smothering her with my weight. “Stop,” I say, leaning down to whisper in her ear. She shakes her head like it tickles, but I touch my lips to her soft skin and breathe, “I don’t want to hurt you, but you’re gonna have bruises if you keep struggling.”

“Let me go.”

“I will, but not until you’re still.”

She tries to take a deep breath to calm herself, but I’m too heavy so she can’t get enough air. I ease up a little and she draws in air through her teeth. My head clears and the sick feeling starts to subside.

Yeah, she’s still pissed and yeah, that sure the fuck was something I haven’t felt in fifteen years. I’m gonna have to get out the big guns for this one and put a stop to this before it goes too far. So I lean back down and kiss her.

She twists her head back and forth a few times, but I don’t give up. My lips lock with hers and then I’m probing with my tongue, trying to get her to submit.

“Stop,” she says with a little desperation.

But it’s a chance to kiss her deeper. I slip my tongue into her mouth and she goes still. A moment later her lips soften and she’s kissing me back. I let go of her wrist and ease my knee up off her arm to see if she’s gonna fight. But her hands go right to my hard muscled shoulders and she digs her nails in.

Fuck. That feels good. Good enough to make me close my eyes and almost make me change my mind about getting rid of her. I pull away and now we both need to catch our breath. “That’s more like it.” She turns her head away from me, unwilling to accept the fact she kissed me back. “Do you want to come upstairs?” I ask. “Get some coffee? Dry off and calm down?”

She’s very fucking cute. Little dimples in her cheeks, even when the frown is there. Her hair has a bit of wave to it and drapes over her shoulders. Something between blonde and brown. Her eyes are hazel. Swirls of brown and green and blue.

“I don’t know,” she says, interrupting my moment. “I really just…” Her body relaxes more as she gives in to me. “I really need to go.”

And fuck if I don’t like that little bit of giving in. Because what the hell… I can feel myself getting hard.

Well, I’m sure as fuck not giving her
that
power over me. So I get up and extend my gloved hand to her for the third time today.

She takes it, squeaking out a little, “Thank you.” She stands there, looking at the ground, like she can’t believe this is where we’re at.

No one is more surprised than me. “Just let me get my keys, OK, gun girl? And then we’ll go talk about this like grown-ups.” I walk over to one of my big red toolboxes, open the top drawer, fish around a little and come up with what I need.

I walk back over to her. She’s still in the same place, but now her arms are wrapped around herself, like she’s freezing. She probably is. She’s soaking wet and covered in mud.

“Cold?” I ask, smiling down at her so she gets a little lost in my eyes. She nods and I pull her close to my bare chest, knocking her off her guard even further. I lean into her ear and whisper, “Sorry, gun girl. But I have no choice.” She tries to turn her head to look at me, but I’ve already bitten the cap off a hypodermic needle.

I stick it right into the fleshy part of her shoulder.

First Kiss

First Kiss

Chapter Five - Lincoln

The static hum of a police scanner fills my car as I ease my way through the dark, wet streets of Cathedral City. Sheila is commenting endlessly on the scanner though the computer in the dash, but I’m only half listening. Case is waiting for me and I’m late. I had to turn my phone off last night to stop worrying about his incessant calling, but everyone has to face the music eventually and my time is now.

The darkness of the city streets mimics my mood, but that’s not unusual. My mood has been dark for many years now. Too many to count. And looking back, was there ever a time when things looked bright?

If so, I’ve blocked it out.

What else can you do? I mean, why bother wishing for something you can’t have? Why bother with hope that will fail you over and over again, when you can count on revenge and retribution to deliver every single time?

It fills the holes. Maybe those holes aren’t overflowing with satisfaction yet, but that’s OK. Being filled up with indifference is better than being empty.

I pass one of the cathedral ruins that stand guard at the entrance to the Merchant District and look up for a moment. There was a time back in school when I was obsessed with them. I studied each of the thirteen cathedrals like a historian looking for the meaning of life. This one is barely standing. Three walls are gone, the stones hauled away centuries ago after the old city fell during a long-forgotten war, the treasures inside pillaged, the stained glass broken. There’s not one scrap of glass left. Not one shard, not one sliver of color remains.