by Adair Rymer
“Some things in life—” Logan said, breaking the kiss. “Are worth the risk.”
Even his eyes seemed to smile this time when he ducked out of my window. A few seconds later he was gone from view.
I crashed onto my bed wishing that I could just fall asleep for the time Logan was gone and wake up to him holding my hand. I knew three weeks wasn't all that long, but it was the longest we'd ever spent apart. That was a big deal to me.
A few minutes later Mom called me for dinner. Reluctantly I got up and made my way to the table. I wasn't hungry, but I needed the distraction. Kurt was making his usual mess and Mom did her best to keep it from getting everywhere. I picked at a few spoonfuls of Rice-A-Roni and was cutting my chicken into tiny pieces when I heard a commotion in the hallway.
Was it Logan and his family leaving?
I sprang from my chair and rushed to the door's peephole, hoping to get one last look at him before he left. Was it bad that I'd already started counting the minutes until he came back? He was the only thing that brightened my day, it was going to suck without him.
“Don't be nosy, Natasha.” My Dad halfheartedly warned, while serving himself another chicken breast.
It wasn't the Drakes I saw storming the halls that evening. It was half a dozen, angry, burly-looking men. One brutish, broad-shouldered man shot a look toward my peep hole that made me recoil despite knowing there was no way he could actually have seen me. They were headed to the end of the hall to where Logan lived.
And they all had guns.
I gasped.
“What is it, Natasha?” Dad wiped his mouth and walked over to me.
My face was white as a ghost when I told him what I saw. Dad covered my mouth and pulled me away from the door. He told Mom to take me and Kurt to the bedroom, while he called the police.
The police never made it in time.
And I never saw Logan again.
Chapter 1
Natasha
Seven Years Later
“NYPD!” I screamed the warning when the two men noticed us. I'd hoped my partner and I would've gotten a little closer to them before they saw us, but best laid plans were for rookies and casualties. “Freeze!”
Of course they ran.
Free whiskey and gummy bears! It didn't matter what I said. These guys were career criminals, violent ones at that. There was no way they were going to come quietly. Half the time I swear we just went through the motions in case we were caught on someone's camera phone.
They fit the descriptions of two low-level Irish mob enforcers. I didn't know it at the time, but it was the Irish mafia that walked through the halls of my apartment building that day when I was seventeen. There wasn't enough evidence to link them directly to the murder of the Drake family.
I might not have been able to do anything to save Logan then, but I’d be damned if I was letting these assholes get away today.
“Two suspects fleeing on foot. Requesting back up at Parker and Danvers—” My partner slowed down and called it in to the station as I blew past him. Ellis shouted at me right before I rounded the corner of the six-story tenement and disappeared from his view. “Kurtzman! Dammit, Natasha! Wait!”
Sorry, Ellis. I thought of Logan. I can't...
I understood my partner's hesitance. Any other time I might've listened and waited for back up. But if the Irish mob really was back in force there was no way I'd miss an opportunity to bring some of them in for questioning. The Irish were ruthless. Of all the gangs, I hated them the most.
We all had our reasons for becoming cops and they were mine.
We were in a rough area of town. Nine-one-one might as well have been a collect call. It was a toss-up who the residents distrusted more: the gangs or the cops.
Dirty, brick, X-shaped apartment complexes loomed all around us like massive, toppled cross gravestones. I kept my head down and snaked through the parking lots and fence-lined walkways.
It was quiet as a crypt for a Saturday night.
Far-off yells and horns were nearly drowned out by the steadily increasing drumbeat of my own heart. The only thing louder than that was a growing sense of doubt. What are you doing, Nat? You're in over your head and you know it.
No. shut up!
I squeezed my gun and flashlight a little tighter and crept forward. I was an officer of the law. It didn't matter that I was scared. I had a damn job to do and I was going to do it. I was going to take these guys down.
Fear was the real enemy, not the perps we collared. That's what they taught us in the academy. Fear was what got you, your partner, or an innocent bystander hurt. If you can't push past that fear you have no right to wear the uniform.
A hand grabbed my shoulder and shattered my delicate resolve.
“Shit!” I snapped my gun around and took a step back, but stopped when I saw the familiar short sleeved black uniform and bright shield emblem. “Oh thank, God. What the shit? You nearly gave me a heart attack.”
A black man, in a dark uniform on a dark night was hard to see. For a second I thought it was the nut job vigilante that people have been filing reports of.
“I'm not even sorry, Kurtzman. That's what you get for running off without me.” Ellis whispered. Despite being out of breath from chasing after me, his pinkish brown lips tightened into a thin line of concern. He didn't like how open we were here. “Any visual?”
I shook my head. I popped off my cap then brushed the curly red flyaway strands back up into my ponytail bun. With the back of my arm, I brushed the sweat from my eyes. It didn't matter that it was well into the evening, it was still almost a hundred degrees.
There's no hell on earth quite like NYC in the summer.
All my gear made me sweat like crazy. My under shirt was glued to my stomach. I hated being so small. The ill-fitting uniform was too baggy for my petite frame and small chest to fill out properly. The gun belt I wore rode up to my ribs and had enough stuff on it to make Batman jealous.
“We're partners, you little rabbit.” That was John Ellis' nickname for me because I was short, fast and white. It didn't matter that I was the minority at our precinct, no one but the bad guys cared about that crap. “You gotta wait for these old bones to catch up. Jackie Heights is especially dangerous for cops.”
“So what? We just look away while known mafioso scumbags shit all over our backyard?”
“Hell, no!” Ellis shot back. “But in a place like this, you need more than just two cops.” You gotta take it easy with this Irish vendetta crap. The city already has one Shadow, we don't need two.”
“Oh, don't give me that bullshit. My job is to get them off the street, I'm not out for blood like that vigilante. If he even exists. I actually respect the law.” I scanned the courtyard for the mobsters. Where the hell did they go?
“Yeah and that's why you're only a few months away from a promotion.” John Ellis was in his late forties and had over two decades more experience than I did. I should listen to him, but if I had a chance to make an arrest then I was taking it.
Blindly chasing the Irish mafia into gangland territory wasn't going to bring Logan back. Even if I busted every last Irish mobster, Logan was still gone.
I was overcompensating, I knew that. But what choice did I have?
Imagine getting arrested by a cop who was five-foot-nothing. I had to be aggressive and tough or no one would've taken me seriously. I had to work twice as hard as everyone else because I looked like a little kid playing police officer. No one thought I'd make it this far.
Except me.
“You don't want to fuck up your shot at being detective by getting yourself killed.” Ellis continued, offering a knowing grin. “Or more importantly—getting me killed.”
“Don't smile so wide, you'll give away our position.” I cracked a smirk of my own and winked. Few people would understand the off-color humor that came with being a cop, especially in this city. Getting exposed to the absolute worst humanity had to throw at you forced you to develo
p a sense of humor, even if it was a dark one. John and I were far tamer in that regard than some of the other cops we worked with. “Do you have an ETA on backup—”
Two loud cracks abruptly split the air.
My partner lurched forward then collapsed.
“Ellis!” I instinctively reached for him as he fell, then called it in on my radio. “Officer down! Officer down! Need immediate assistance!”
My partner was unresponsive. He was sprawled out on the brick walkway that led to a side door exit of the apartment complex. Could I drag him inside the building?
No, dammit! I could see from where I was the door didn't have a handle. It was designed only to let people out. Shit! Remember your training, Nat!
Blood bloomed from the hole in Ellis' chest, matting his uniform against his right pec and shoulder. It also streamed down the side of his face. I was a hundred percent sure my partner was gone. It was only when I turned his head over that I understood why Ellis was unconscious and not dead. The second shot had just grazed the top of his head, the impact knocked him out. It was a one-in-a-million shot. A millimeter to left and it would've pierced his skull. A millimeter the other way and it would've missed altogether.
The receiver on my chest squawked that two cars were in route.
“They ain't gonna make it in time,” A husky voice called out from the other side of the courtyard. “Ye know that, right?”
I immediately trained my gun on the balding speaker who stepped out from around the adjacent complex building. The one working, freestanding, exterior light cast the man in hard, menacing shadows as he casually walked down the brick pathway that linked the two buildings. His rumpled gray blazer was dirty and torn at the bottom. It was one of the Irish mobsters I was chasing.
“Stop!” I yelled. “Drop the gun and get on the ground.”
The flickering, occasionally dimming light above the mobster made the gun he used on my partner twinkle gleefully. Although the weapon hung harmlessly by his side in his hand, it twitched with deadly eagerness. These men weren't known for their restraint.
I'd seen that first hand seven years ago.
If he raised that gun again, I'd have to shoot him. For as much as I hated the Irish mob, I would rather see him in cuffs than in a pool of his own blood. My respect for the law was why I became a cop and it was why I stayed my hand. Some days, that resolve was more difficult to stick to than others. With my partner bleeding out beneath me, this was one of those days.
“Bad night for a stroll, pig.” This time the voice came from behind me. It was the ragged, breathy sound of a heavy smoker who'd been forced to run. Despite the man's wheezing, I could still recognize his thick Dublin accent. “Drop your piece.”
Dammit. I froze.
The Irish had split up. The man in the gray blazer had kept my attention while the other one had doubled back and come up right behind me. It was a trap and I had walked us right into it!
I fucked up. Bad.
Curtains were drawn and lights in windows all around us went dark in rapid succession. I suddenly realized how alone we were. Between all four buildings, Ellis and I were surrounded by hundreds of apartments, but we might as well have been on the surface of the moon. No one wanted any part of this situation.
The worst part was I couldn't blame them. The Irish were in this part of town a hell of a lot more than the cops were.
Why didn't I listen to Ellis and wait for backup? Stupid!
I felt the barrel of the man's pistol stab into the back of my head. I gasped in air, but tried to keep it together. I was no use to my partner if I fell apart now.
“Ok. Ok. Take it easy.” I dropped my gun and watched as it was kicked far out of reach. I prayed for the sound of sirens, but none came. The mobster was right, backup would never make it in time. I had to stall. It was the only way Ellis and I were making it out alive. “What do you want?”
“A fucking pony. Shut up, bitch.” The man in the gray blazer, then turned to scold his partner. “The fuck you waitin' fer, Micky? An invitation? Kill 'em already.”
“Jesus. Gimmie a second, ye bleedin' twat!” The round mobster behind me complained through labored breaths. “I was the one to run around the goddamn building.”
“Oh, boo hoo, ye fairy fuck. Get out of the way.” The man in the gray blazer gestured impatiently with his gun then leveled it directly at me. “I'll plug 'em.”
Brooklyn was the most violent borough in all of New York City, but it was also my home. This was where I grew up. This was where I met the only man I had ever truly loved. And this was where he was taken from me.
This was the end. I always knew I would die here in Brooklyn, but I never thought it would happen this quick. Staring down the barrel of that mobster's gun made me wonder. Was this what it was like for Logan right before he died?
My heart was racing, my adrenaline was spiked, but strangely, I wasn't afraid. I was a good, self-loathing catholic girl. Maybe I would get the chance to see Logan again when I died.
They say that your whole life flashes before your eyes when you're about to die, but that wasn't true. It was more of a highlights reel. In the instant between the seconds it took for that thug to pull the trigger I relived only the most special moments of my life.
All of them involved Logan Drake.
Chapter 2
Shadow
“NYPD!” The short, female officer on the ground shouted at the two men who I'd been following from the rooftops. She then pursued them foolishly into an unfriendly apartment complex neighborhood. “Freeze!”
That's a silly thing to do.
Did some distant part of me know her? I couldn't remember. Everything from my life before was so distant in my mind. I barely remembered the man I used to be. Whoever that man was, he and I had very little in common anymore.
You're so much more than a mere man now. The super powered part of me roared in my head. The serum that coursed through my veins urged me forward with white hot urgency.
In the low light of night, from two blocks and seven stories away, I could see beads of sweat roll out from under Micky Flattery's felt cap as he circled around the building to get behind the two officers. Hopefully I'd kill those two Irish thugs, before they killed the cops.
I wasn't supposed to give a damn about the people who get caught in the crossfire. They trained me to be the world's most effective assassin. That was the sole reason I was enhanced with these abilities. I had other plans.
There was too much ground cover, I didn't have a clear shot on either target. I needed to get closer.
I ran along the length of one rooftop and hurled myself closer to the action. Like a man catapulted through the air, I cleared an inhuman distance and landed noiselessly on the building above the officers. I got there faster than anyone should be able to, but still not before Sean O'Grady stepped out of the shadows and fired two shots.
“Oh, boo hoo, ye fairy fuck. Get out of the way.” Sean O'Grady raised his gun. He was going to kill her without a second thought. “I'll plug 'em.”
What should I care about some cops that got in over their heads? That's not why you're here, the serum reminded me. I came back to do one thing, and saving lives wasn't it.
Super or not, I'm no hero.
It didn't matter how much of this shit I had pumping through my veins, or how easy it would've been to give in and lose what little humanity I had left, a small part of me still protested. It's the small part of who I was before all this that refused to die. It screamed in my mind and heart, I do still care!
That's why I jumped down to save that girl. I wasn't too far gone.
Not yet.
I smashed out the freestanding sidewalk light on my way down. Even through my combat boots, several bones in my feet and ankles shattered from the impact. I easily recalled how they should go back together and the serum in my body reknit them. Remaking broken feet was the first thing I learned after I got my powers. I needed to. I tended to jump or fall off things a lot
.
All eyes, even the ones hiding in darkened apartment windows, snapped my way as glass and fizzling lamp light rained down around me. Right before the courtyard was plunged into a darkness that shouldn't be possible in New York City, I saw a female officer's face.
Who was that girl? And why, when the serum muted all the emotions not essential to completing my mission, did it even allow me to wonder?
“Holy mother of Christ, he does exist. The fucking Shadow of New York!”
Remember why you're here! A familiar, overwhelming emotion flooded my senses; Vengeance.
I threw out two knives from hidden sheathes I kept under my short, tactical jacket. Both hit their marks and Sean O'Grady collapsed into a lifeless heap. He didn't even have time to scream.
I preferred knives when I had the option. They were silent and there was an art to using them effectively. I had guns of course, but I never liked them. They were too loud and too... easy.
“Stay back, Shadow, or I'll gut the bitch right here.” Micky was still out of breath from running around the building. I could hear his heartbeat galloping even from all the way across the courtyard. He was scared.
A shot rang out, but not at the girl fortunately. He was blindly firing, hoping to hit me.
“How?” I asked tauntingly, “I have all the knives.”
He muttered near-silent prayers. With my enhanced hearing I heard them as if spoken through a speaker. I also heard his bowels let go. There's always something satisfying about hearing a grown man crap his own pants in terror.
With the lights out, I had leveled the playing field, but that meant neither of us had a shot at one another. I knew where Micky was, but not accurately enough to throw a knife or fire a gun. My vision was like that of an eagle, incredibly sharp, but even I needed light. With my night vision goggles broken in a previous fight, I would have to take Micky down the old fashioned way— with my hands.
