by Joey Anderle
“On purpose,” He changed his words, “Or unless told.” Amending for the crossbow bolt still lounging in the headliner.
“So, if they aren’t worth much, we do what anyone else would do and kill them,” Auralee suggested in a reasonable manner.
Booker shook his head, “No no, definitely not,” he rejected.
Delvar called out, “We can make ourselves scarce, we are really good at it believe it or not,” he offered the Princess.
Booker turned around and held a finger up to silence the dwarf, “Please don’t. Right now I’m your best bet between standing six feet tall or being six feet under.”
Delvar nodded curtly, “Yes Sir.”
“Why not, it’s the easiest course of action,” Auralee continued.
Booker turned back questioningly, “Have you ever dug a hole? No, it isn’t!”
Auralee looked at Booker, “Well, what do you think we should do?”
“Send them on their merry way?” he proposed.
“Certainly not going to happen, what keeps them from just circling around and trying again? My life is at stake here.” Auralee jabbed Booker in the chest several times
“I clearly remember him saying the bounty was out for Sterling Wells,” Booker clarified.
“Oh please, they know that I’ve been attached to you. So putting a hit out for you and anyone you happen to be with,” She cleared her throat and tapped at her chest, “is a way of putting a hit on me without advertising it.”
“Ah, we wouldn’t have taken the offer if we knew it would put one of the King’s daughters at stake.
We wouldna never taken the job!” Delvar called out again.
Auralee turned to scowl at the dwarf.
Booker got her attention, “Hey, hey, hey so here’s the idea. We send the pair back; they can spread the word on the true intent of my bounty. Then we leave Alphonse to find out about the bounty and deal with it. He’d be none the wiser that we were even involved. Plus, a pair of freelancers like these two would always be nice to have in our back pocket,” Booker laid out for Auralee.
She looked upon the two, silently debating what he said.
“Mmm no,” She decided, her fingertips flaring up with a spell as Delver started to step back.
“Aura no!” Booker ordered, knocking her arm awry and sending the spell off to the side to flare out harmlessly.
“Sterling!” She growled, her pissed off visage now directed at him.
“You’ll thank me later,” Booker promised before making a quick nod to the duo as he grabbed her, “Run!”
Delver nodded and ran over to his now standing buddy, “Time to go pal, make ourselves scarce,” he told him.
Mordecai nodded and picked up his significantly smaller friend and took off down the ditch, then up into the nearby forest.
“DAMMIT STERLING!” Auralee swore as she attempted to wriggle her way out of Booker’s ever changing grapple,
Once the pair were out of sight, Booker disengaged and took a few steps back his hands up, “Calm down, Auralee!”
“I am calm!” Auralee shouted.
“No, you’re not,” Booker answered, slowly backing away on the pavement.
“Of course not! Why would I be calm when you just let two assassins free?!” Auralee shot a light orb into the forest where said assassins just escaped into.
Those poor, poor, probably blind now, squirrels, Booker thought.
“How are you supposed to be a good bodyguard if you let all the assailants go?” Auralee questioned.
“Good question, but a little hard to explain accurately when you actually look ready to skin me alive,” Booker answered.
“Then give it your best shot,” Auralee said, putting her hands on her hips.
Booker wrestled with himself to keep the pacing of his reasoning level, “So, we now know that it isn’t a singular body, all of these guys are the hitman equivalent of the lowest bidder. They will probably go back to where they came, which I bet is the same location if they are what I think they are.”
“Which is?” Auralee inquired.
“Freelancers, like me. Well, I do Running, so they are probably freelance do-anything’s,” Booker informed her.
She stood for a moment before telling him, “You’re going to have to clear that up.”
Booker gestured to himself, “I’m a Runner, I sign up to transport things, have you ever seen ‘Transporter,’ starring Jason Statham?”
She looked back at him in silence.
“No? Alright, I move things for money, don’t get caught, quickly and efficiency,” Booker explained, “The first guy was definitely a hitman, but those two probably do odd jobs.”
“Then how did they get access to the whatever you called it.” Auralee rotated her hand trying to remember its name.
“The what?” Booker rolled his eyes up trying to recall. “The tracker?” Booker thought a moment and then thought some more, “I’ll ask them.”
“How are you going to ask them, the next time we’ll see them they will probably be more accurate and actually stick one of us with a bolt!” The Princess paced forward.
“That’s the easy part, there’s always a place for people in our kind of work to hang.” Booker settled his hands in his pockets.
“How do you know so much, yet so little?” Auralee wondered.
“Plausible deniability,” Booker answered, taking a few more steps back to his ride, “I just want to know enough to get the job done,” He shrugged.
Auralee strode to her side of the car and flung an arm to the wreck Booker had caused, “And what about this mess?”
“I already sent a text message to Riley. He’s the guy in charge of these kinds of messes, cost me a pretty penny though for him to come clean up. So I’ll just bill that to Alphonse.”
Booker started the car.
CHAPTER NINE
Booker reached over and turned down the volume to his cassette player as he turned into the gas station in front of Kitches, “So it’s going to be something new to you, but I think you can handle it. While I’m pumping gas, if you would walk into Kitches and get us a booth so we can eat it’d be much appreciated. Just walk in and say you’re with me and you will be treated like the Royalty you really are. I’ve been going there for years. and everyone knows and loves me, Brian is out of town; else I would introduce you to him too.”
Auralee nodded along as she moved her arm in and out of the open window, “How long will pumping this gas take you?”
“I don’t know, a few minutes probably,” Booker answered.
The two got out of the car once Booker had parked and went their separate ways, Booker walking over and watching Auralee disappear between the double door entrance to Kitches.
“They grow up so fast,” He remarked as he turned and pulled up the hook and placed the gasoline nozzle into the car. Once he got the gasoline tank filling up, he leaned against the car as he checked his messages.
“Hmm,” He scrolled through the job offerings, “If I weren’t so busy with the Princess, I could go and make a mint,” he mumbled.
The nozzle made a solid thud noise, and the sound of flowing gas ceased. With a sigh, Booker looked at the total, “Another bill for Alphonse, how does he do his taxes?” he wondered aloud before putting up the nozzle.
He got in the car and pulled into a parking spot nearer the restaurant. Getting out and walking in, he stopped and gawked. Half the staff was standing around the booth the Princess sat in, “Man I sure hope none of those are kidnappers.”
Booker approached the table and was soon within earshot of the praise and greetings the princess was receiving. He greeted the onlookers as he made his way through the small crowd, “Hi, hello, afternoon, tis I Sterling Wells, but hey that’s no biggie.”
“Oh, how are you doing Booker?” Laurel greeted him, a smile on her face. “I see you’re here with Princess Auralee?”
“She’s here with me but alright,” Booker corrected, “Wait, how do you
know about the Princess part?”
“Does that really need explaining,” Laurel asked, brushing enough of her hair aside to show the rather sharp edge (of) to her ear.
Booker was surprised, “Since when?”
“Since I was born, didn’t you know?” Laurel looked around and nodded to those here in the group, “Most of us aren’t native.”
Booker shook his head, “No, what about Brian?”
“Especially Brian, he’s the reason we all work here, little risk of being caught,” Laurel tapped Booker’s shoulder as he sat nodding. “I thought since you’re here all the time, and your line of work and relationship with Brian and all you’d know.”
“So what you’re saying is,” Booker thought aloud, “She’s more popular than me.”
“Yeah,” She sympathized for Booker and patted him on the shoulder one more time, “Let me go get you some tea.”
Laurel soon returned with his drink that he slowly sipped as the Princess talked with the staff and a couple of the patrons, all questions, comments, and concerns as to why she was there. A few bows and a couple of people paying their respects.
“Jealous,” Auralee remarked at the sulking Booker who was staring out the window longingly.
“Much,” He confessed, “I, who have been here countless times, and may as well own stock. You, who walked inside and fetched a booth.”
She stuck her tongue out at Booker as Laurel came back with his refill, “Oh and we have a call for ‘Mister Wells’ Booker.”
Booker frowned, “Who would know?” He slid out and walked with Laurel to the bar where the phone rested.
“Yello, Sterling speaking,” Booker greeted the caller.
“It’s later,” the caller informed, “And you wouldn’t happen to know why Riley was needed out on Bandits stretch, would you,” Alphonse inquired in a sweet tone.
“Mmm,” Booker pursed his lips and Alphonse continued.
“Or, perhaps why there are words amongst certain circles of Booker the Merciful?”
“Umm,” Booker looked over to Auralee, that was notably fast too, he thought.
Alphonse nodded on the other end, “I thought as much, how long will it take for you to wrap up what you are doing at Kitches?”
“However long you want us to take plus thirty minutes,” Booker answered.
“I’ll see you in an hour; you have explaining to do,” Alphonse informed Booker before he hung up.
Booker set down the phone in the cradle, turned and walked back in thought, tapping and stopping Laurel on his way back, “When we’re done here, I’m going to need a large vanilla milkshake to go, for Alphonse.”
She nodded and continued her duties as Booker slid back into the booth, “So Auralee,” he started.
She set the menu to one side and looked back at Sterling.
“We have a Princess, her Runner, a vintage mustang with a full tank of gas and a crossbow bolt. Probably an open contract out for you. Delvar and Mordecai are spreading the word of one ‘Booker the Merciful’ about me. We have about an hour and a half to come up with as much damage control potential when we…” He pointed between the two of them, “have to explain to Alphonse how things have gone pear shaped in only twenty-four hours.”
He paused for a moment before continuing.
“Sooo,” Booker drummed his fingers on the side of the table before throwing out his idea, “Were you taught how to lie in those royal classes of yours? You know, for the good of the people? And when I say the people, I mean specifically me, for the good of me?”
Author Notes
Written Dec 30th, 2016
Thank you reading along and I hoped you enjoyed reading this as much as I did writing it, and welcome to my sort of after show talk.
The amount of dead words that this story was built upon, I’m pretty sure, could build another small book. To me this was a good thing as it allowed me to rebuild and remodel the characters and scenes until I had something I was PROUD to put out. This trial error approach let me try different styles and I finally fit into a pattern I felt like I could work with.
Some of the rewrites had lots of swearing, one of the rewrites had none. The princess didn’t come to fruition until this exact rewrite. The only real constant in all the stories was Sterling Booker Wells with his cocky attitude and penchant for fast cars and clothing.
I went and found all the files and did all the math and the total word count from concept to four total rewrites not including this one was an additional 16,323 words more than this book.
That number is for the curious; AKA me.
My enjoyment of writing stems from wanting to entertain people, make something people from around the world can consume and share back to me. Since I’ve been quite shy and oft stuck in ‘analysis paralysis’ I was volun-told to give writing a try after my dad had seen a few of my jabs at the art of literature.
I don’t read a whole lot of fiction. When I was younger it was all I would do since I was in some form of trouble here AND there (apples don’t tend to fall far from the tree). I read the popular things for my demographic, most of which circling the fantasy genre is a form or fashion. So when I went for it I picked a genre I was most familiar with reading.
Urban fantasy.
On the topic of writing what I’m familiar with, I would like to bring your attention back to Booker, who’s name I had to continuously butt heads with one of my editors (AKA my dad).
Some of his attitude and responses are eerily similar to this books author. Coincidence? I’ll leave that up to y’all once we get to know each other better. Whether it be through these author notes or social media (you can find me on Facebook at www.facebook.com/jnanderle ). Shameless plugs aside, I definitely look forward to build my own crowd, or, the Courier Chronicle Crew.
Since I’m the Captain of this SS Author Notes, we are steering course to the Shout Out Isles. Opening with the Double D’s as my dad refers to them, Ms. Dorene Johnson and Ms. Diane Valasquez for their invaluable work of making this grammatically readable and understandable. Mr. Jeff Brown for his brilliant work on the cover, infinitely better than anything I could’ve pieced together and on first glance makes the novel look like an actual professional effort versus the truth: (a teen trying to earn some extra money and diversify his skills.) The Just-in-Time team who are working on the final edition as I write these words and everyone who has supported me (family and friends) over the years..
HAHAHA. I lied.
We have one more shout out on this course, MY DAD. His patience is certainly not that of a saint (sorry!), but on a scale of a puppy waiting to go outside and a saint he’s a solid 8, maybe an 8 and a half as he’s seen this plant grow and wilt several times since the start of September. He’s read this more times than I have and somehow still gets the names mixed up.
I genuinely can’t thank him enough in this piece, so I hope to do right by him and write some stories that make him proud he pushed his son up the steep hill that is this writing and publishing process.
Thank you guy’s again, and I can’t wait to be writing the next authors note as it’d mean that I am done with Book 01, Freelancers Folly. If you have any questions, comments, concerns drop them in the Amazon review section. I want to hear your query’s on what happens next or opinions on the next car Booker is going to drive since I don’t see the poor Mustang lasting very long if he continues driving it like he does.
