Mind Thief

by C. A. Hartman

  But it was too soon. She couldn’t just stroll into a place where nobody knew her and immediately head to the bathroom. It would look suspicious to anyone who watched. Which meant she would have to wait until nature called again, assuming it did before he left for the night. She forced herself to look away and found a seat at the bar.

  There, a shaven-headed, tatted-up-to-his-neck bartender raised his chin at her.

  “Twenty,” she said flatly.

  That was how you ordered in Coyote. By ounces, not size. They had several cheap tequila options and some sodas, but beer was the only real option for that night.

  When Carlson returned to his seat, she watched him in the reflection of the mirror behind the bar. He was big, bigger than Jones. He wore monochrome prison tats and a noticeable scar that started at his hairline and traveled through his eyebrow, down his cheek, and all the way to his jaw. He didn’t look like a Midtowner. But he hadn’t been one in years, not since before his prison days. Nor did he have the ninja-like look of a Black Jay. Then again, he wasn’t a Jay. He was seeking revenge for one.

  Three minutes hadn’t passed before the guy sitting next to her turned and gave her the up-and-down. It was the Downtown way.

  “How you doin’, girl?”

  Quinn ignored her initial defensive reaction. “Alright,” she said. She raised her glass, a definitive sign that the overture wasn’t unwelcome. He did the same and they drank.

  They chatted a little, Quinn doing her best to stay in character, suddenly glad to befriend a thug. He made her look more legit when she was up to no good, and helped her pass the time before Carlson’s bladder called to him again.

  Eventually, it did, and Quinn excused herself.

  “Game time,” she muttered.

  “On it,” came Jones’s voice in her ear.

  Quinn headed to the back of the bar, where the din of smoke and noise mellowed, as did the light. Her heart began to pound like crazy, and dread nipped at her, making her hesitate. What was wrong with her? This was what she did best, and she’d done it countless times.

  But this was different. She didn’t have the backing of the Protectorate. And Carlson wasn’t a target she was being paid to jack; he was the father of the Jay she’d fried that terrible night at Linden’s place, the one who’d shot Jones and tried to shoot her. And someone who wanted her dead.

  They would only have one chance at this. The moment she entered that restroom, there was no going back. They would corner Jake Carlson, they would jack him and get the evidence they needed on the Jays, then wipe any memories he had regarding her. It wasn’t a perfect solution. But it was the best they had.

  She rounded the corner toward the men’s restroom, numerous possibilities running through her mind. Would there be other men inside? Would there be urinals to make things hard, or stalls to make things easy? Would Jake recognize her once he got a better look at her? Whatever the case, they would adapt. That’s what they did.

  She stopped at the men’s room door and took a deep breath, glancing behind her to make sure no one followed.

  Game time.

  Quinn reached for the door. But just as she did, it opened forcefully, banging into her and shoving her backward until she crashed into the wall. Someone was coming out. Just as her mind quickly formed an excuse for her presence there—silly her, she was wasted and got the restrooms mixed up—a hulk of a man grabbed her.

  “Goddamned jacker whore,” came the gravelly voice before a fist crashed into her face. She went flying back and slammed against a stack of empty boxes. Just as she went for her weapon, Carlson fled toward the back door… and right into Jones.

  She managed to recover herself and reached for her injector, ready to stick Carlson and drag him back into the restroom. But before she knew it, Carlson had somehow gotten past Jones and disappeared out the back, the metal door slamming into its doorstop with a bang.

  Jones sprinted after him and Quinn followed. They could do this in the alleyway if they had to, assuming no one from the bar heard the scuffle and followed them outside. They wouldn’t need much time; someone like Jake wouldn’t be trained to prevent mind invasion. But once she got outside, she stopped in her tracks.

  Jones stood there, a scowl on his face as he panted. He was alone. She looked in both directions… but Jake Carlson was gone.

  Quinn cursed under her breath, the desire to run and hunt Carlson down intense. But she didn’t. He could have gone in either direction, and he could easily lose them in Coyote’s circuitous alleys. Plus, chasing him exposed them both in a situation where neither could afford to attract attention. If Carlson waited around some corner with a weapon, or friends, the situation could turn ugly.

  She turned to Jones, who was more silent than usual as he stuffed his energy weapon back into his pocket. He had the same scowl on his face, but Quinn quickly realized it wasn’t quite a scowl. It was a grimace. When she looked down at his shirt, she saw why.

  Blood. Lots of it.

  Chapter 16

  Quinn sat waiting at the Coyote med clinic. She squirmed in her seat, then got up to pace the lobby. She sat down again when people began looking at her funny.

  Flashbacks of Daria’s head injury returned, followed by those of a half-dead Jones getting rolled away on a gurney at Midtown General. It was a swirl of bad memories, accompanied by the bad feelings that came with them, all bombarding her like she’d invaded a target’s mind. But this time they were her own thoughts, and she couldn’t escape them. Because once again, Quinn sat and waited while her partner faced serious injury. And this time it felt worse because the injuries weren’t due to the job. They were due to her.

  It all happened so fast. One moment she faced that men’s room door, and the next she stood in that putrid alley watching Jones’s t-shirt turn bright red.

  “You! Purple hair!” came the shout.

  Quinn jumped. A doctor with glasses and bedraggled hair stood waiting, looking tired and impatient. When she approached him, the doctor didn’t say anything, only turned and walked down the hallway, motioning for her to follow.

  “Is Jones okay?” Quinn said when she caught up to him.

  “He’ll be fine,” he muttered. He turned the corner and pointed to a room, then continued down the hallway.

  Quinn hesitated and looked inside the room. There was Jones, resting on the bed, shirt off and pads on his wound. She hurried over to him.

  “You okay?”

  He waved a hand at her. “I’m fine. They did a quick surgery to fix the damage.”

  Quinn sighed, shaking her head, knowing it could’ve been much worse. “You shouldn’t have to go through this. This is my fault—”

  “Girl, you know how many times I been stabbed?” He lowered his voice. “That fucker saw us comin’ and did what he had to do. I shoulda known better. Shoulda been prepared for that. Workin’ these rich bastards for the Protectorate has made me soft.”

  She sat down, relieved he wasn’t angry. “If that’s true, how did he know?”

  “Dunno. Probably recognized you. You looked Coyote to me, but them people know an outsider when they see one. Or he could be trackin’ your phone. I’ll look at it later.”

  She grabbed his hand. “I got this. I’ll pay for it.”

  Jones gave a laugh. “You don’t gotta pay. We got the decent insurance now, remember?”

  Quinn stared at Jones. He was right. This would cost them little to nothing, far less than what Daria’s head injury cost her and what Jones’s surgery cost the Protectorate. She’d grown up living in fear of a medical situation ruining her financially, and she’d forgotten she wasn’t in that situation anymore. “I’ll cover whatever insurance doesn’t.”

  Before Jones could respond, the doctor returned. “We need to take one last look. If you check out fine, you can go, stabby.” He looked at Quinn. “Purple hair, time for you to get out.”

  Quinn stood up and turned to Jones. “I’ll wait until you’re done.”

  “No
. Go home. You can’t be here.”

  As much as she hated it, Jones was right. Carlson or any of his associates would know about the injury and could come looking for them. She needed to get out of Coyote as soon as possible.

  Quinn stared out the window of the taxi as it drove north. She’d had to wait for a ride, since taxis almost never roamed through Coyote. Nobody in Coyote could afford one. And Coyote types rarely had the need for transportation because they rarely left their neighborhood. Their motto was Live in Coyote, Die in Coyote.

  Quinn watched in silence as the taxi passed by one of the Protectorate safe houses. Part of her wanted to tell them the truth, but she couldn’t. Not until she’d solved the problem and had something to offer them. Them finding out any time before that meant she became a liability to them and they would cut her loose.

  Tonight, she and Jones had screwed up. Jake Carlson had escaped their clutches, and without much effort on his part. He’d outsmarted them both and got away without a scratch. Jones was right; Carlson had seen them coming.

  Even worse, they no longer had the element of surprise in their favor. Now, he knew she was on to him, and that she had the means—and the cojones—to pursue him. In the future, he would take measures to ensure she got nowhere near him.

  Quinn gritted her teeth. Setbacks were part of life, and part of her work. But she hated them anyway. Especially when they threatened her livelihood.

  When the taxi passed 30th Street and the landscape began to change, she started to feel better. Midtown, friendly or not, had fewer dark corners for someone like Carlson to hide in. Men like him stood out like a rose garden in the desert when they came to Midtown, with those tattoos and that huge facial scar.

  No, if Carlson came after her, he wouldn’t do it in Midtown. He’d proven that by only leaving her mail and sending her messages, never showing his face despite knowing where she lived. Then she had another thought. Bungled or not, tonight had one positive point: despite Carlson knowing she was coming after him, they were now on equal footing. She could find him, just like he’d found her. A smart man would realize he’d lost the advantage and back off. Only time would tell if Carlson was smart.

  When the taxi stopped, Quinn paid cash for the fare, mentally tallying up how much she’d spent on taxis that day. Normally she would have cursed wasting so much money on a failed errand. Now, she wondered if that money wasn’t well-spent after all. Carlson now knew who he was dealing with. They’d been unprepared this time, but that would never happen again.

  She got out of the taxi wearing her Midtown best—a sundress and light jacket, her neck tats scrubbed away and the rest of her Coyote attire stuffed into a bag. As the taxi drove away, Quinn began walking the three blocks to her building.

  Suddenly, someone grabbed her from behind. A hand covered her mouth and beefy, strong arms wrapped around her and pulled her off her feet. She knew immediately who it was.

  Carlson.

  She thrashed about, her screams muffled by his hand. As he dragged her into a narrow passageway between buildings, Quinn prepared her best self-defense quickly. If alone, Carlson couldn’t kill her while also restraining her and covering her mouth, and she had a narrow window to turn this around.

  She bit down on his finger as hard as she could. Teeth plunged through skin and sank into muscle until her jawed ached and she tasted the acrid flavor of blood on her tongue. He grunted loudly and cursed, then his fist slammed into her face.

  A burning pain exploded in Quinn’s nose, and then she saw nothing but darkness and fury. She kicked back her foot and landed on something hard—maybe a shin or a kneecap—and Carlson’s grip loosened enough so she could get free.

  In a moment, Quinn had her brass knuckles in hand. Without enough room in the narrow space to get a full hook, Quinn took the uppercut to his jaw, or what she hoped was his jaw, since it was too dark to see much. The crack that resulted told her all she needed to know. She pulled out her weapon, ready to deploy it, knowing it was the only thing that would ward off the steady stream of deadly force that Carlson would level at her. But instead of retaliating, he stumbled back, just enough so that the streetlight illuminated his face. And that’s when she saw it.

  Darker skin tone. No facial scar. Her attacker wasn’t Carlson.

  When he saw her weapon, he dropped something and ran off. Quinn stood there for a moment, not knowing what the hell just happened. When she looked down, her bag lay there, her purple wig and a few other things scattered about.

  A mugger. He’d targeted her, tried to steal her bag, and found himself battling a former Downtownie with a few tricks up her sleeve instead of a defenseless Midtowner.

  Shaking, Quinn gathered her things and left the narrow passageway, adrenaline racing through her as her eyes darted back and forth. The street was empty. She hurried to her building, and when she was almost there, she heard her name.

  She jumped, looking up to find Devin and Lucifer, out for their late evening walk. When Devin saw her face, his expression shifted to surprise.

  “What happened to you?”

  As if on cue, pain throbbed in her nose. She put her hand up to her face and felt warm blood. Devin picked up Lucifer and came closer, taking a good look.

  “I… I got mugged,” she finally said.

  “Jesus,” he said, looking her over and noticing her bag. “What did he take?”

  “Nothing. We scuffled and then he ran off. I don’t know if he heard someone coming, or what…”

  She wanted to tell Devin the truth. That she did as much damage to him as he did to her, if not more. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t let on that she could fight well enough to scare off a man twice her size. Not in Midtown, where people—even former Downtownie Devin—would find that suspicious.

  “Do you want me to call the cops?”

  “No,” she said a little too quickly. “I… I’m fine. It was dark and I didn’t get a good look at him anyway. It’s a waste of their time.”

  “Then let’s take you inside and get you cleaned up.”

  As Devin watched her, Quinn wanted to argue, but didn’t. Jones’s words about loneliness returned, and the prospect of Devin helping her sounded pretty good after the day she’d had.

  Devin led her inside. “Let me drop off Lucifer and I’ll come over.”

  She told him her apartment number and headed home. Back at her place, Quinn examined herself. The bleeding had stopped and her nose wasn’t broken. It just hurt.

  When the doorbell rang, she froze. She realized she couldn’t let Devin in her apartment. Her things were everywhere as she’d scrambled to prepare for going after Carlson, and there were many suspects wigs, outfits, and technical gadgets that would make Devin suspicious.

  Never get dimed. Never let people even wonder about you. You have to seem like everybody else.

  That mantra had been burned into them during training, and ever since. It was a sobering reminder, one she needed right now. She’d botched a job by underestimating an ex-con looking to kill her. Then she’d lowered her guard and gotten attacked by a random mugger. And she’d been moments from letting Devin see too much of her personal life. Jones said he’d gone soft… apparently, so had she.

  She opened the door and stepped out into the hallway, closing it behind her. “Hey, Devin. Look… I appreciate the offer for help. But I’m tired, and the wound isn’t anything a little ice and a drink won’t fix.” She smiled.

  Devin hesitated, his expression changing. Like it wasn’t the answer he wanted to hear.

  But he only nodded. “I understand.”

  “Hey you two!” came a feminine voice.

  Quinn turned to find Merritt at the end of the hallway, waving eagerly with a grin on her face.

  “Hey Merritt.” Quinn gave a brief wave, but an uncomfortable feeling settled in at Merritt’s sudden appearance, right when Devin stood at her door. When Merritt disappeared into the stairwell, Devin pulled out a slim leather wallet from his pocket and took out a car
d. “This is my number. Call me if the pain gets worse, or if you feel nauseated or dizzy or anything out of the ordinary. Understand?”

  She nodded, taking the card. “I will. Thank you.”

  Quinn slipped back inside and closed the door. She grabbed a bottle of tequila and the fixings for a diablo. Before she could make the drink, she heard a knock again. She smiled and peered through the peephole.

  It was Devin again.

  “What are you doing tomorrow?” he said when she cracked open the door.

  “Avoiding all alleys?”

  He smiled a little. “Feel like going to a Demons game?”

  Chapter 17

  Quinn and Devin stood in line with a crowd of people clad in black-and-silver baseball jerseys and hats. She looked around at couples of all ages, fathers with their sons, groups of men… and started to wonder what she’d been missing for twenty-eight years.

  She could never afford to attend a baseball game growing up. The games got prohibitively expensive after the drought came, once Demon Stadium got bought out by private investors and rebuilt to protect spectators from the deadly heat. As such, she’d never developed much of an interest in the game. It probably didn’t help that her dad had spent more time watching the games on TV with a bottle in his hand than paying attention to her.

  Devin presented his phone to the ticket checkers, who scanned them both in. Next, they stood in line for security scans: an electronic scan followed by a pat-down that she suspected was for alcohol more than anything dangerous. The stadium owners also owned a large liquor company and wanted to ensure spectators bought only from them.

  Once they entered the once-forbidden stadium, Quinn couldn’t help but stare. It was huge, for one thing. And nice, with comfy seats and plenty of food and drink options. Best of all, it was air-conditioned. She felt Devin’s eyes on her.

  “You’ve never been here before,” he said.

  “First time.”

  “Welcome to El Diablo’s favorite pastime.”