Tonight might have been the first time ever that Luck hadn’t found herself a boy toy she wanted to take home. It wasn’t for lack of trying. She’d been armed to the teeth with her best red lipstick and highest heels but the selection had been dismal and not up to even her low standards.
The stench from the foul karma people had been throwing off choked me almost as badly as the shots of cheap tequila I had thrown back. Still, Luck and Murphy stuck it out there with me until the wee hours of the morning. I’d needed some time away from the tension of the house, and Murphy was having a good time furthering the woes of our fellow customers, while Luck enjoyed watching.
Luck and Murphy stumbled their way upstairs once we got back as I headed toward Fate’s room—now mine. Even though I’d resented being put on the spot, I was glad I wasn’t walking past a room Fate was sharing with Mother.
My hand hesitated on the knob but not for long. Even with the argument today, I always wanted to see him. Too much so.
I pushed open the door to an empty room and looked at the clock on the table. Two a.m. and he wasn’t here.
I got ready for bed as I listened for the door. I crawled under the covers and lay there, watching the minutes tick by. Two thirty. Maybe between telling him I didn’t want to stay with him and our fight earlier, he’d finally given up.
This was what I’d wanted. I pulled a pillow over my head to block my sight and deaden my ears, forcing myself to stop waiting. It didn’t matter if he showed or not. In fact, it was good if he didn’t.
I threw the pillow to the side and got up, walked a few steps. Maybe I should check and see if Luck was okay since she drank a lot. It’s not like I cared if Mother was in her bed or anything.
No. If that was what he wanted, then it would never have been worth anything anyway. I knew eventually he would tire of wanting me. It was for the best. Getting attached as much as I already had wasn’t good. I wasn’t even sleeping with him and I was becoming a clingy mess. I turned around and got back in my bed again.
Fuck him. He was a dick. Who cuddles with someone every night and then disappears because of a couple fights? Cuddle and dump might be worse than a one-night stand. This was harder than when he’d asked me if I was still planning on leaving after we had sex. No, this might even be worse than when he stole my piece of birthday cake. God, he’d been such a dick to me. Come to think of it, I didn’t know why I was speaking to him at all.
Fate? No—Dick. That was his new name. He’d see who didn’t give a shit next time I saw him.
***
“You’re looking kind of tired,” Fate said the next morning.
“Nope. I slept like a baby, better than I have in weeks.” Dick.
We stood, side by side, about fifty feet from the entrance of the local supermarket that I’d shopped in less than a month ago, when it had been brand new. I’d been so excited to have a new market, free of all sorts of human reminders left over from my mortal days. I’d go in and not have to pretend that I didn’t know the cashier at the checkout or that I didn’t know the manager played poker with my dad on Thursday evenings, that I hadn’t babysat the kid collecting the carts from the parking lot.
Now I stood there, forcing myself to look at the transformation. One of the front windows had been knocked out completely, and a steady stream of people were going in and out through the gap like it was the main entrance to a store on a Black Friday sales bonanza.
How things had fallen so quickly was baffling to me. They were still human beings—unlike the bastard next to me, who I wanted to hit over the head with the hilt of the gun strapped to my ankle. Malokin was like a virus spreading through the human race, or maybe he was simply the by-product of a world heading downward that fed his birth. It was hard to know which came first, just that a coincidence this strong wasn’t usually chance.
Either way, this was what life was now, and if we needed supplies, that’s where we had to go. I glanced over at Fate, keeping a stony expression plastered on my face.
I’d woken up as alone as I’d gone to sleep. He’d been up and as cheery as a cherry on an ice cream sundae this morning. He was having coffee and saying something about how we needed to make a run today and some bullshit about how I had to be the one to go with him. I guess he liked variety. He’d have to look somewhere else if he thought he was going to add me to the mares on his carousel.
“Ask.” He let out a disgruntled sigh and I wondered if my mask had slipped. “God, if I’d known you were going to be like this, I would’ve left a note.”
He was annoyed? I wanted to ask him if being a dick and bed hopping inconvenienced him but then he’d know it bugged me for sure instead of assuming. “Ask what? I don’t have any questions.” Not for him. Not anymore. Every question and doubt had been answered last night, confirming everything I’d thought when the philandering pig who insisted I stay in his room did a no show. Cuddling dick.
I took a step forward and he wrapped a hand around my upper arm.
“I’m sorry you missed the memo, but I’ve struck manhandling from my list of acceptable behaviors.” I looked down my nose at the offending hold, “If you wouldn’t mind?”
“How did you plan on enforcing this new list of rules?” he asked, offending hand still in place.
“If you were a gentlemen, like some others I know, I wouldn’t need to enforce it.” I let the implication of Knox hover in the air, waiting to see if it would hit the target.
His jaw clenched and his grip firmed. I’d call that a bull’s-eye.
“Ask.”
I turned away from him. He could keep me standing in this parking lot all day and night. I still wouldn’t ask. “I told you. I don’t care.”
“That’s it? You don’t even ask? You know, I knew you had a lot of pride but don’t you think this is a bit ridiculous?” he asked, his hand not budging from my arm.
“I haven’t the foggiest idea of what you’re referring to,” I replied, refusing to even look at him.
“Fine. I’ll tell you anyway, since someone needs to save you from your whopping ego.”
“My ego?”
“I was at Lars’s last night. They had a problem over there.”
He dropped his hand. It was probably because he couldn’t achieve the smug look he was going for without being able to add the final touch of crossing his arms in front of his chest.
His hand was no longer forcing me to stay there and listen; I was forced to stay of my own volition. But damned if I’d make it that easy. “You could be making it up.”
“That’s the best you’ve got?” He raised his eyebrows while managing to squint his eyes at the same time.
He wouldn’t be able to pull off a lie like that with the way our co-workers gossiped. If he’d been with Mother last night, someone would have been spilling the beans by morning. I would have heard about it over breakfast. I could hear them now, Can you pass the bacon, Fate slept with Mother and I’d like the syrup as well.
I shrugged in acknowledgment as the toe of my boot sent a pebble flying. “I didn’t ask because it wasn’t a big deal either way.”
“I could tell. I love listening to the music so loud that I can’t hear my voice.”
Every time he’d tried to speak on the way over, I’d turned the volume on the radio up a couple of notches. My back to him, I looked at the supermarket because I had this goddamn smile trying to burst out on my face and it was stubbornly fighting all resistance. A subject change before he caught onto how relieved and giddy I was feeling wasn’t a bad idea. This was pathetic. It was like dying had set me back ten years of emotional maturity, right smack into the awkward teens again.
“I just don’t get it. How’s Malokin making everyone crazy?” It was a stupid question, in the sense that Fate didn’t have any more answers than I did. I knew he didn’t. We’d discussed this several times. But it didn’t matter, because that wasn’t the point. I had to get us back on work talk.
Unfortunately, I was worried the smil
e on my face tainted the tone I’d asked in. It was a somber question and I’d made it sound like I’d asked for my favorite flavor of ice cream. Hopefully he hadn’t noticed that my question about world disorder sounded a lot like the way I’d say can I have extra whip and rainbow sprinkles.
“That question is really eating you up.” I’d never heard Fate quite so sarcastic.
I put my hands to my cheeks, trying to manually pull the smile down. “It is.” Nah, that couldn’t have sounded as weird as I thought.
I heard Fate shuffling things around as he grabbed several duffle bags before he started walking toward the place. He was moving forward into the store. Back to death and destruction. Oh good, comfortable footing again.
The awkwardness was past, along with the honest moment. A lot of those seemed to be slipping by lately, with my encouragement, and I was starting to get sad about watching them go. But I still wasn’t ready to try and stop them leaving. I always had the excuse of unfortunate timing to fall back on.
I watched his back and the surroundings sucked up all my attention again. Destruction had a tendency to ground you in reality when it was smacked in your face.
He stopped and turned back to see I hadn’t moved. His eyes narrowed as he took in my still form.
I shook my head. “I don’t know about this.”
I’d spent years of my life defending criminals but always holding myself to a higher standard. Was I really going to contribute to a business being looted? Nothing about it felt right.
“Do you know the last time I had to do my own shopping? At least this is something you’re used to doing.” He pushed the sliding duffle bag back onto his shoulder.
“I’m not talking about shopping. I’m not comfortable contributing to this.” I pointed at the store.
He pointed toward our destination. “At this point, it’s either loot or don’t eat. I’ve had to not eat before. We won’t die but it sucks. As far as stealing, I’m going to send the corporation that owns this store a nice check as soon as the postal service is up and running again. I’ll round up if it makes you feel better but I’m eating tonight.”
I gripped my own duffle bag and forced myself to follow him. Those were terms I could live with.
“Stay close to me,” he said, as we headed toward the broken window.
“You have seen me fight, right?” I wasn’t a slouch when it came to hand to hand combat, as I’d proved in the past.
“Stay close anyway,” he repeated, and I knew what scene his mind was replaying. The almost rape. Why was it I could walk around kicking ass for months but get overpowered one time and I was the weak loser? Reputations suck like that. Hell to build and so easy to destroy.
“You know, there was something off about that guy. He was really strong. These are only scattered humans. Not even a true mob.” Not like what I’d seen heading down the beach the other night. It had been a group of twenty or so. They’d taken one look at Fate, machinegun in hand, and had kept walking.
Although word was getting around, even with the crazies, that there was a gang of three thirteen-year-old boys that liked to use pedestrians as target practice. They aimed to miss but they weren’t great shots. Our block was getting more and more peaceful.
“They aren’t a mob right now but in times like these, you don’t take anything for granted.” What he didn’t say was like how I let you walk into a convenience store alone.
I knew it was eating him up, because he felt some strange responsibility for me, so I let the subject drop. I didn’t care for the reminder myself.
We stepped over the low clearing of the empty window frame. The building was worse inside than I’d imagined.
“This is horrible.” People were dashing in here and there, grabbing foodstuff that they thought would last and getting out before a real gang showed up. Everyone who saw us walked in the other direction. I sometimes found it amazing how, after so many years of living in a civilized society, people still instinctually knew a threat.
“I know. It’s worse than a weekend.” Fate sounded disgusted for his own reasons. He moved confidently through the aisles, clearly more irritated about having to shop for himself at all than the manner in which he was being forced to do it. “I can’t believe my shopper disappeared. It’s impossible to get good help anymore.”
I grabbed a jar of kosher dills and put them in my bag, wondering if we should’ve searched for a cart.
“What happened yesterday with Paddy?” he finally asked. I’d been waiting for him to revisit the subject since I’d seen him.
“Nothing much new to report other than your relatives are crazy. As to that, are we talking cousins? Siblings?”
He stopped in the middle of the aisle. “Don’t go there again,” he said, ignoring my question.
I stopped with him, wanting to hash this out as well. Better in the middle of a bunch of crazies in the grocery store than the bunch of crazies at the house.
I stiffened my spine and prepared for battle. “I have no desire to go there again. But you need to know—I’m not going because I don’t want to. Not because you told me not to.”
“Fine.” He shrugged and started walking again, as if the subject were no big deal and it hadn’t been a huge fight last night.
“Fine?”
“Yes.”
“Because you’re still getting your way?”
“Yes.”
“Only this time and because it’s what I want.”
“We’ll see.” He picked up a can of black olives. “Do you like Puttanesca?”
“So, how are you linked to them?”
He stuffed the can of olives into the duffle bag on his shoulder along with another one. “I think that’s what I’m going to make tonight.”
“Why do I even try?” I asked, looking upward, more to myself than him.
“Good question,” Fate answered anyway.
“Where have the guys been, by the way? What was the emergency last night?” I asked, seeing if I could get him to crack somewhere else.
He stiffened just the tiniest bit, and if I hadn’t been staring at his back like a lovesick teenager I would’ve completely missed the slip.
“Minor incident with some humans. Not a big deal.”
He was lying and I was going to grill him over it as soon as I got past my shock. Why, after all this time, was I able to read him when I never could before? I’d always been able to read people but never Fate. Unless it wasn’t me. Maybe it was such a whopper that even he slipped a little?
“What happened exactly?”
“Nothing major.”
Oh yeah, this was a biggie. Picking up my pace, I dodged in front of him, out past the end of the aisle. I wanted to make sure I could see his lying face when I hit him with my next question.
“Shit,” I said, instead of my planned inquisition.
I yanked on Fate’s arm and tugged him deeper, back into the aisle with me.
“What?”
“The guy I saved on the yacht, the one we couldn’t find for my bucket list? The one Malokin had already gotten? He’s here.” I motioned to the right of where we were.
Fate eased forward slightly and then ducked back. “And he’s leaving.”
My response was immediate. “Let’s go.”
“Agreed.”
With everything going on, I’d forgotten that there was one bright point. My bucket list was back on, and this time I wouldn’t hesitate.
Chapter Twenty
We’d managed to track the guy ten blocks. The entire time I wondered why Malokin didn’t supply cars to all of his people. Not that I cared about their convenience; it was just that destruction was hard enough to look at when you were whizzing by at sixty miles per hour. At walking pace, it was too much to take in. Broken windows, burned buildings, looting—I was watching my home town fall apart piece by piece, my childhood memories slowly being torn down.
There was also the issue of other foot traffic. We’d gotten into it with a gang o
n the walk over when we’d had to duck into an alley. Watching Fate kick the shit out of five guys at the same time didn’t help my crush one little iota. I felt myself slacking off just to see him in action.
He’d given me a look after the fight that had me making excuses about not sleeping well last night and contradicting my earlier story of a great night. This crush I had on him was really screwing up my credibility. Fortunately, he hadn’t had enough time to dwell on my lack of performance, since we’d had to catch up to our target.
We followed the guy to a run down building, with no signs or markers that claimed the place other than a for rent sign that looked like it had been hanging there with no takers for quite some time. It looked like it might have been a strip mall at some point but had lost its purpose during an economic downturn because it was too far off the beaten path to sustain itself in anything less than a booming economy. The steady flow of humans walking in and out was probably the most foot traffic it had seen in years, possibly ever.
We got as close as we could without anyone seeing us before having to duck behind a partially broken brick wall. From there I watched the craziest and most degenerate of our current population enter and exit. “What is this?”
He pointed to the flow of people leaving. “They’re all armed. See the way some of them are testing the weight of their guns? It’s because they just got them. This place was empty a couple of days ago. Malokin must be setting up pop-up armories.”
“I guess we know where everyone is getting their guns these days.” Almost all of the people leaving were brandishing smaller arms. I was thankful that at least they weren’t arming them with automatic rifles and the heavy stuff, like we had.
Fated: Karma Series, Book Three Page 15
