by S. Massery
“Like, you need a background check on a new girlfriend type of help, or…”
“Sure, except she’s not a girlfriend. And… it might involve some hacking.”
He groans. “What kind of shit did you get mixed up in now?”
“I’m not sure.” I rub at my eyes. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”
“What’s the name?”
“All I have is a defense lawyer named James Elvira. Should be located near you. Vegas.”
He grunts, and the sound of his fingers flying across his keyboard fill my ear. He was in my unit working for a military sub-contractor, and he has one hell of a left hook. Luckily for my jaw, his niche is technology.
“What the hell are you doing in Vegas?”
I grimace. “I’m not. I’m in Wyoming.”
“Fuck. You know what? I’m not going to even fucking ask.” He makes a noise in the back of his throat. “Got him. Jesus.”
I roll my eyes again. “You’re a real dick. Just tell me.”
“What do you want to know about this guy? He’s about as clean as defense lawyers get. He’s defended some big names, including some mob bosses, and got them clear—so fuck ‘em, I guess—but he seems to deal with petty stuff. Tax evasion, fraud.”
“Can you get into his records?”
Silence fills the line for a stretch. Digging into someone is one thing. Breaking into private servers is quite another. While it may be easy for Mason, that doesn’t make it legal. “What you looking for in there?”
I kick the gravel and smother my sudden yawn. “Not a what,” I hedge.
If I were a betting man, I’d say Mason is flipping me off through the phone. I’m just lucky the bastard hasn’t hung up. It’s nice to hear his voice, even if he can be judgmental.
“Name?”
“Delia. I don’t have a last name.”
“Hacking in is going to take some time. Guy’s got a sophisticated online presence, from what I can tell. Why didn’t you call Zach on this one? You know he’s got connections.”
He knows I won’t do that. It’s his way of taking a cheap shot at me.
“Good ol’ Mason.” I chuckle. “You’re a real morning person, you know that?”
“It’s nighttime,” he grumbles. “And I happen to have a life. Plans. What the hell happened to you?”
“Text me when you get something.” I end the call and stuff the phone back in my pocket. It could be nothing. If I go back to my original assumption, Delia could just be a squatter with paranoia, thinking someone breaking into that house was going to kill her. Who knows how she got up there, or what she’s been through. Or…
Well, something else could be going on.
In the truck, Delia sits up and stretches, arching her back. When she spots me, she winces and retracts into herself. Pity unfurls in my chest as I watch her brush her hair out of her eyes. She looks young and lost.
Delia opens the door and jumps out, leaving her bag behind.
“What are you doing?” she asks, her voice laced with suspicion.
“I haven’t slept in twenty-four hours,” I say. “I figured I’d sleep.”
“And drop me off here? We’re in the middle of nowhere.”
I shake my head. Does she think I’m a savage? She said it herself—we’re literally in the middle of nowhere. The town just has a motel, a gas station with a produce section, a post office, and a small library.
I squint at her, asking something I already think I know the answer to: “Are you in some kind of trouble?”
She takes a step back. I move forward with her and snag her wrist. Images surface in my mind of her running away, down the road. Screaming. My patience is fraying, but when she struggles, past guilt reaches up and wraps its fingers around my throat.
Because of that, I almost let go. Her wrist is delicate under my hand. Her dark eyes are full of vinegar, and she glares at me.
“Delia.”
“Jackson,” she replies, mocking.
She keeps saying my name with bite, and I can’t lie that it makes my blood run hot.
She tugs on her arm again. “Let me go.”
“No.” Damn it, woman. Let me take care of you.
“No?”
“You’re staying with me. When’s the last time you had a meal? A hot shower?”
She stiffens. “Why? Do I smell?”
I laugh. It breaks open the dam inside me, and the guilt washes away—for now. “It’s a wonder you snuck up on me.”
Delia frowns, and so help me god, it’s adorable. Her lower lip puffs out, and her frown morphs into a pout.
I might be delirious. My laugher grows louder. Finally, she cracks a smile. My eyes latch on to it, because damn if it isn’t the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen. My memories are haunted by the ghosts of my past, but she cuts through the haze. I see her.
We stare at each other for a moment before she comes to a decision and nods. She follows me into the lobby, hovering over my shoulder with her hair in her face and hood pulled low. The receptionist doesn’t even bat an eye at her. Delia takes one of the keys to our room and trots away.
I shake my head as she goes. I could’ve gotten her a separate room, but I don’t trust her to stick around if I leave her alone. What the hell have I gotten myself into?
She slips into the room, and I climb into my truck, starting it up to move it in front of the room. My phone rings, Mason’s name flashing across my screen.
“That was fast. You find something?”
“Hello to you, too,” he grumbles. “Listen, I got nothing. There was one mention of someone with the initials D.M. and not much else. I’m thinking this guy Elvira keeps his important records on paper and nowhere else. Smart man.”
I growl and hit the steering wheel. “Okay. Thanks.”
“Jackson.” Mason hesitates. “I checked with Spike. He’s heard of Elvira.”
“You brought Spike into this?” My brother. My asshole, dickhead brother—who happens to be a vice detective in Vegas. There was a reason I didn’t call him. He’s one year younger but infinitely more annoying. A stand-up citizen. By the book.
Except, apparently, when it comes to Mason.
Mason chuckles. The two have been a couple for almost six years—common knowledge to everyone except Spike’s coworkers. I can’t blame Mason for going after Spike—good-looking genes run in our family. Still, I never pictured my best friend being interested in the straight-laced type. And Spike? He’s cleaner than soap.
I haven’t talked to Spike since Christmas. Mason and I talk a little more frequently, but only to let me know if there are fights near me. If I didn’t have a physical way to burn off my anger, I’d go insane. Mason shows up at these underground fights and gambles like he’s a billionaire with nothing to lose. We’re usually successful at leaving my brother out of our shenanigans.
Mason continues, oblivious to my unease, “Apparently, Elvira represents the Morettis.”
“Fill me in here, Mace,” I say. Morettis? Never heard of them.
He scoffs. “Seriously, Skye? Biggest Mafia family in Vegas. Actually…”
I can sense that he’s going to steer this conversation to a long-winded off-topic train of thought. “Mason.”
“Yeah?”
“Unless it’s an emergency, I’m going to go crash. I haven’t slept in… what day is it?”
He laughs. “Yeah, I know how you get with those fires. By the way, I’m setting up a fight. Salt Lake City.”
My eyes feel like sandpaper. “Catch me up on that later.”
“You got it.”
I end the call and pull my bag from the backseat. I can’t wait for a shirt that doesn’t smell like smoke, and for a bed and a hot shower. I almost groan at the thought of it.
I open the door slowly, half expecting Delia to still be in the shower. The door to the bathroom is closed, so I exhale and step farther into the room. Out of the corner of my eye, a shadow flies at me. In the house, I was caugh
t off guard. Now, it’s fair to say I’m a little more on edge.
I drop the bag and grab the assailant, flipping them over my shoulder. They land on their back hard, and I wince. Hard enough to knock the wind out of them.
It’s then that I realize it’s Delia.
“What the fuck?”
She groans and gasps on nothing, her mouth gaping. After a second, she sucks in a lungful of air.
“Jesus!” she yells.
I haul her up. Her hair is wet, her feet bare. She glares at me, and I glare back.
“Are you trying to get yourself killed?”
She shakes her head. “Was it a fluke that I could pull a knife on you at the house? Did I get lucky?”
“Yes, you got lucky. Is that what this is? You just trying to prove that to yourself?”
She turns and goes over to one of the beds. It’s the one farthest from the window, so I’ll give her some credit: she’s smarter than she appears. “I wanted to know that I could.”
I drop my bag on the other bed and sit, yanking off my boots, and I soften at her expression. “Take the win, Delia. If you get the drop on someone, you sure as hell better take it. Next time, don’t hesitate.”
I think she gets my meaning.
She turns her dark eyes on me and scowls. “You disarmed me.”
I don’t deserve recognition for that. It was pure instinct, and my throat tightens when I realize that it could’ve gone south fast. How many times have I had someone point a knife at me, draw it against my flesh, and end up with it buried in their chest? Too many times.
“That’s why you’re not supposed to hesitate.” I look toward the bathroom. “You done in there? I need a shower and sleep.”
“Knock yourself out,” she mutters, falling onto her bed.
I close the door of the bathroom and lean my head against it. There’s a shitstorm surrounding this girl. Tension envelops her, and I have a feeling that today is the calm before all hell breaks loose. I can’t leave her now, on the edge of this.
Sighing, I drop my bag and slide the shower curtain open. There are streaks of dark red in the tub, almost too maroon to be blood. But… I have no idea what it could be. And honestly? I don’t have the mind to care about it right now.
Once the water is hot enough to fill the room with steam, I step in and let it assault my skin. It washes away the smoke and ash of my job, but not the memories. Houses being burned. People fleeing. Lives of firefighters and civilians lost if we don’t do our jobs right. Something tells me that the life I knew before today fractured, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to get back to it.
My job is to save people.
What sort of person would I be if I didn’t try to save Delia?
3
DELIA
I run toward my mother. Blood drips from her nose, and droplets fly everywhere as she shakes her head. She catches my shoulders.
“Hide, baby,” she tells me. “Don’t let them find you.”
She shoves me away, down the basement stairs. It’s an endless fall while the world flashes by me: pictures hanging on the walls, blood staining the paint, broken glass.
The falling jerks me awake. I bolt upright, chest heaving, covered in sweat. It takes me a full minute to register the motel room, not in the estate just outside of downtown Las Vegas, or in my old childhood home where I last saw my mother. She never said that to me, so I don’t know why I’m dreaming it.
The bed next to me, which had been occupied by one Jackson Skye the last time I checked, is empty. The bathroom door is open, and the light is off.
A shiver runs up my spine.
The clock reads ten fifty-two p.m. I’ve been asleep for a little over three hours.
I slide out of bed and creep toward the window and pull back the heavy drapes. His rust-red truck is out there. Relief flows through me that he didn’t abandon me. It’s ridiculous. I’ve been on my own for two weeks, but apparently it was two weeks too long. Now, I’m desperate for help.
When a black SUV pulls into the motel lot, all my muscles lock up. Fear takes ahold of my lungs. Its headlights flash over Jackson’s truck, and I drop the drapes just before they illuminate my window. I duck, my heart pounding, and try to count to five.
The room’s door handle turns. There’s no way out except the door—or the window—and I’m unarmed. They could walk in and shoot me in the face, and I’d be powerless to stop them. Even the hunting knife, which is in my bag on the other side of the bed, wouldn’t be enough.
I lunge, arms extended in front of me. Desperation rings through my body, clear as a tolling bell. I search for the gun in his hand, but there’s nothing except—
I slam into him, knocking us into the door.
Jackson grunts.
Whatever liquid was in the cup in his hand—coffee, maybe, judging from the burn of it—spills over us. His arm binds me around my ribcage, under my armpit and across my back. He doesn’t so much as glance at me, then hauls me farther inside the room, closes the door, and dumps me on his bed.
“What the fuck, Delia?”
I think that’s his favorite phrase, but outright panic won’t let me smile. I fall off the bed and scuttle toward my bag. “We have to go.”
He follows me away from the door, squinting at me. “What?”
He looks down at his shirt and scowls.
I’m riffle through my bag for the knife.
He sighs, grabs his own bag, and disappears into the bathroom.
“This is bad,” I mutter. “We’re so fucking screwed.”
Headlights illuminate the window again, filtering around the edges of the blackout curtain.
Someone knocks on our door, and I close my hands around the edge of the blade. I immediately duck.
This is déjà vu.
One.
Two.
Three.
Jackson opens the bathroom door, light spilling across the darkened room.
Gunfire destroys the silence, and I scream as bullets shred the door, the wall, the window. Glass shatters. I flatten my body into the carpet, covering my ears with my hands. A picture frame falls from the wall above the dresser. Feathers from the comforter float down around me. What do they have out there, machine guns? I can’t stop screaming until I’m too aware of it. I clamp my mouth shut.
Something heavy lands on top of me. I almost scream again but I turn my head. It’s Jackson, flattening us into the floor. There’s a pause. Silence reigns, ringing in my ears.
“Get under the bed,” he whispers.
He grabs the knife, which I had dropped when the gunfire started, and puts it in my hand. He closes my fingers around the hilt, staring into my eyes. I’m sure they’re wide, afraid. I want to tell him that the knife won’t do much against an AK-47 or whatever type of gun they have, but he springs up and rolls into the bathroom before I can make a peep.
They kick the door in. It flies open and smacks the wall with a bang that stops my heart. We’re going to die. I brought Jackson into this mess, and now someone innocent—more innocent than me, anyway—is going to be murdered. It’s too late to warn him away. Death has found us.
I push myself farther under the bed.
There’s a single shot, the sound muted. I strain my ears, which ring after what we just went through. Someone grunts, followed by a wet noise, like a gargle after you brush your teeth. Something drops to the ground.
“Delia,” Jackson says.
I snap my eyes open and sidle out from under the bed. Relief sweeps through me that he’s whole, alive and in one piece.
He stands in the doorway, a gun in his hand pointed toward the floor. “Get our bags. My keys—”
I snag them off the floor. “Got it.” I come around the bed and freeze.
There’s a man on the floor, blood pooling under his torso. His eyes are open, but… he’s mostly dead, if not all the way dead.
“Don’t look at him,” Jackson says in a low voice.
“I—”
&nb
sp; I can’t say that I recognize him, because I don’t. But up until this moment, I wasn’t quite sure who was after me. Now? I know without a doubt. The relief dies. The dread takes over.
“You listen to me right now,” he growls.
I jerk up and stare at him. He isn’t looking at me. He’s watching the night.
“I’m going to get you out of here in one piece. There are two more men out there. Do they want to take you or kill you?”
“Kill,” I breathe.
He nods. “Okay. Come here.”
He extends his free hand back toward me. I slide my palm against his and lace our fingers together, then flatten myself against the wall. I match my breathing to Jackson’s. He isn’t worried. He doesn’t even flinch.
Who is he?
“When I say go, run to the front bumper of the truck. We’re both getting in the passenger side, but let me cover you.”
I nod, but he doesn’t look at me.
I whisper, “Okay.”
He lets go of my hand and double-checks his gun. I grip the truck keys in my free hand.
“Go,” he says.
He starts firing at something I can’t see. We run together, his hand bracing the top of my head, forcing it down. He keeps firing.
“In, in, in.” He shoves me into the truck as soon as the door is open. “You know how to drive, right?”
A bullet punctures the driver’s-side window, creating an inch-wide hole and spiderweb cracks. The heat of it sears my skin as it buries itself in the seat. “I don’t have a choice,” I yell, letting the fear and adrenaline override my common sense. I start the truck and gun it in reverse. I spin the wheel, and the tires squeal. The whole cab jolts when I hit a curb, but Jackson doesn’t flinch.
“Highway,” he orders. “Go west.” We drive in silence for about thirty seconds. “Turn here. This ramp. Here.”
“Fucking hell.” I swerve onto the ramp. The clock on the dash reads eleven-oh-seven p.m. How on earth had only fifteen minutes passed since I woke up? “Where were you? When I woke up, you were gone.”
He grunts. “I was talking to my boss.”
I snort. “At eleven o’clock at night? Yeah, right.”
“Fires burn round the clock, Delia. I had a feeling I wasn’t going to be able to report back in”—he glances at his watch—“thirty-six hours. I was calling to tell him.”
