by Angel Payne
The Purple Line ends at Union Station, and I walk to the platform for the Gold Line with my head down and arms tucked in. It’s a warm evening, with summer tickling the early June air, but I can’t stop shivering. As much as I hate being cold, I welcome the chill. I don’t want to be warm right now. Don’t want to even think of the last time I was warm, just an hour ago.
A lifetime ago.
A heartbreak ago.
I’d been giggling at the sight of Reece’s ass wrapped in my sweatshirt, along with his sheepish smirk. He’d asked how I’d like my eggs. I’d responded, “Hot and firm—like your fine ass, Mr. Richards.”
He’d grinned like a loon and told me I’d earned champagne with breakfast too.
I wonder how Angelique likes her eggs. I wonder if she earns herself champagne too.
The train arrives. I stumble onto it as the tears hit again.
By the time I stop, I’m honking gobs of snot into a tissue—and realizing I’ve bawled my way through three stops. Going the wrong damn direction on the line.
After groaning in three different octaves, I glare up at the salsa ad mounted over the door. It features three parrots in mariachi outfits, complete with little ornate vests and sombreros. I can see the humiliation pouring out of their little birdy eyes. “Been that kind of a night for you guys too, eh?”
I hurry off at the next stop. The train pulls away, leaving me alone on the platform to wait for the line going the correct direction. Not entirely alone, if I count the family of opossums scuttling in the shadows next to the tracks.
A gust of night wind howls through the station. The chill in my bones seeps deeper, prompting me to head for the shelter of the empty exit stairway. It could be fifteen or twenty minutes before I see another train, and I miss my sweatshirt for more practical reasons now.
“Think warm.” My mutter is low, rough, and miserable. “Think Palm Springs. Think hot bubble bath. Think Malibu in July.”
Yeah. Malibu. My go-to for long afternoons with my beach chair, a book, and a can of Cactus Cooler. The drink is one of my guilty indulgences, a holdover of childhood memories before we moved to the land of green tea and vitamin water. Bright orange drink. Glittering blue ocean. Brilliant cyan sky. So bright, it hurt to look at the horizon. So bright and silver…
Like Reece’s eyes.
No.
I refocus, thinking more about Malibu. The powerful rush of the waves countered by their gentle fizzle on the shore. Might and mist…
Like Reece’s voice.
“No, damn it.”
It’s barely more than a grunt, but it echoes through the stairwell like a shout. In reply, the air just gives me more ghostly wind…
And then a quiet laugh.
And another one.
Arms still crossed, I whirl around and peer across the station. Still nothing but the opossums.
I whip back toward the stairway.
And come face-to-face with three leering gazes.
Men.
Okay, boys—though they swagger and stare and salivate like men, taking me in like a pack of hungry wolves surrounding a rabbit. I attempt a polite nod—while backing away. All three of them step with me. One of them moves farther, sliding around to my other side.
“Good evening, gentlemen.” I try to give them the benefit of a doubt. Who am I kidding? It’s for my benefit too. I can’t allow my fear to buy into the intentions I sense behind their eyes. It’s true, right? What they say about predators being able to smell fear? With that thought in mind, I tuck a hand into my purse. “My hand is on my mace, so let’s ensure I don’t have to use it, all right?”
I’m so busy being calm, I never take a moment to tack on vigilant—demonstrated when my purse disappears off my arm. The whole thing is tossed across the stairwell except for the mace can, which flies twenty feet as the middle creep moves in, slamming me against the wall. He’s also the largest, with sizable muscles under his track pants and plaid shirt.
“We’ll show you how to use shit, all right.” He slides a greasy kiss to my cheek while the third guy scoots in, breaking open the fastening of my pants. My heart clutches and my breath halts as he uses the tip of a knife to slice the fabric open the rest of the way. “And if you’re quiet and pretty, we won’t have to show you how Freddie likes using his blade in other ways, either.”
“She is pretty,” the first one croons. “I like her, man.”
“Bitch is gonna be good,” says Freddie, twirling his knife. “I can tell. Called us gentlemen and everything. Hey, we should even use condoms.”
Shit-shit-shit-shit.
Help-help-help-help!
The pleas pound my spirit in time to the frantic air that’s cycling between my lungs and nostrils. The asshole handles the knife with enough fearless finesse that I know he’s used it on human flesh before. That he won’t hesitate to do the same right now. Wasting my strength begging for mercy isn’t viable either. The guy’s stare is jacked with enough insanity and arousal, I’m sure he’d enjoy my pleas—and my pain. He backs up the theory by barely flinching when his tall friend kicks him in the shin.
“Fuckface.” The big one grunts. “We used our last ones on that little thing with the pink hair in Santa Monica last night.”
“Ohhh yeah. Sorry, man. I was baked.”
“Like you are right now?”
“Hmmm. Maybe.”
“Pffft. That settles it.” The first guy drops the front of his pants. “I get to go first. Freddie takes forever when he’s high, and I’m not waiting like I did last night.”
“Yeah?” Freddie retorts. “And what did you have to lose? I nailed her good and hard. Lubed her for you, dickhead. Wasn’t like we had to worry about Boltalicious poppin’ outta the woodwork.”
The comment primes my tears, making me acknowledge the thread of weird hope to which I’ve been clinging—that someone, anyone, will come along with both the guts and the force to prevent this from happening. But the Lone Ranger is just a comic book character, and Boltalicious is on his mysterious do-gooding break—meaning this is going to happen.
I squeeze my eyes shut, hoping it’ll happen with me still in one piece at the end.
Too late.
Physically, I’m still whole. Mentally, I’ve already started to detach. Survive. The goal stamps on my mind, my beacon in the darkness of what these monsters prepare to do.
Tall Boy laughs, cinching my hands even tighter. He moves to the side, which angles his armpit over my face. I struggle not to breathe, an impossibility given the new force of my tears. Stenches assault my senses, each of the odors at least three days old. Grease, motor oil, sweat, pot—and those are the elements I can identify. A few others are nasty mysteries, for which I’d likely be grateful if I could feel anything except terror. “Ha. Good one, cuz,” he says. “Boltalicious. That shitpile’s as ragged as a wad of chewing gum anyhow.”
“Pretty on the outside, gooey on the inside?” The creep still playing with his penis drawls it.
“If I ever got to mix it up with the guy? Shit yeah. I’d expose that hustler for what he really is. Penny pranks, special effects, and low-budget magic tricks.”
He pauses, but only for a second. Encouraged by his friends’ snickers, the asshole clearly has more to say.
Until he doesn’t.
The air is blasted, sucked, and moved around us with such violence, all four of us are toppled to the concrete floor like a rug has been yanked from under us.
Whomp. The guy who was just pinning me is slammed back up against the wall. His arms and legs splay out, pinned in place by giant invisible thumbtacks. That’s the only way I can describe it. The asshole squirms, fighting bonds that aren’t there, incredulous shock claiming his face just before a wet splotch appears at the front of his jeans.
The force of nature that put him there steps out of the shadows surrounding the tracks.
A badass in black leather. Hybrid ninja boots. Maserati mask. Lips curled in fury.
“Ab
racadabra, motherfuckers.”
REECE
Thank fuck this isn’t one of those gigs requiring me to get it right on the first try. Because right now, I’m a super hero with completely screwed alignment. As in, enraged-to-the-point-of-impaired screwed.
After three failed attempts that resulted in two of the three jerkwads bonking around the station like pinballs at the mercy of a maniac, I finally succeed at my original intent—knocking them together hard enough to land them in the same unconscious heap. That being done, and after vowing to send a check to LA Metro as penance for crashing them into five lights, two vending machines, and several support pillars, I wait for the calm to settle in. I force deep breaths in. Back out. Concentrate on loosening my fists. No use. Fuck me.
I raise my head, getting a glimpse of myself in one of the chrome tube railings, and am stunned I’m not the color of glowing broccoli. On paper, my reaction makes sense—but the daggers chopping up my gut aren’t garden-variety fear. This shit is terror, stark and sick, spawned the moment I got back to the penthouse and obeyed a gut instinct to check the security cams in the executive-office hallways. Watching Emma all but crawl out of the copier room while leaning into a clearly concerned Neeta pricked my first alarm. The shit clanged to five alarms once I clicked to the front desk feed—in time to watch my preening ex-girlfriend making nicey-nice with Fershan Bennett, my cufflinks in her hand.
Those damn cufflinks.
Yeah, the ones I haven’t been able to even look at for a year, so deep and Pavlovian is their hold on my memory. On my fear…
Fear not rising to half of what struck when I comprehended the scope of Angelique’s game—resulting in Emma leaving her shift and fleeing the Brocade.
Running from me.
In the middle of the damn night. In the heart of downtown LA. Into the very situation I’ve been paying Zalkon to help avoid. But this isn’t his fault. This is my shit to own. My mess to fix after thinking a neutral meeting with Angelique wouldn’t end up with the woman trying to keep me on her hook, no matter how dirty her tactics.
Like showing up at the front desk of my own damn hotel and smearing that dirt on the one person who never deserved it.
Garbage I’ll have to clear from my life another day.
Right now, I’ve got other nonrecyclables to worry about.
Fortunately, two of those chunks are down for the next few minutes. Now to deal with the Grand Poobah trash daddy.
“What the hell?” the blow stick yells. I let him dangle, getting a firsthand taste of my “penny pranks” with his ass still flattened to the wall. Indulging a sadistic streak, I focus another electric pulse south of his waistline. He screeches as I push the energy harder, crushing his balls like a device in a BDSM dungeon, turning his erection into a raisin. “Wh-What are you doing?” he gasps. “Come on, man. Th-That’s my junk, dude!”
“Couldn’t have said it any better myself, dude.” I twist my wrist the other way, giving his ’nads a new spin on the Blue Balls Tilt-A-Whirl. “Stop whining. You’ll be back to normal in two or three weeks.”
“Two or three weeks?”
I shrug. “Give or take. Though, keep sticking that shit into places it’s not welcome, and I’ll be back up your ass, turning it into permanent pieces for the county scrap heap.” Finally, I yank back the magnetic field, letting him crumple to the floor and tuck into full fetal. “We copasetic on that?” When all I receive is a hurried nod, I take a step closer. “Sorry. Speak a little louder. We ‘hustlers’ have shitty hearing.”
“Yeah,” he finally grits. “We’re copasetic.”
I nod, though I’m hardly relaxed. Now the difficult part of the night. Turning to Emmalina—and communicating Reece’s message using Bolt’s persona.
As soon as I face her, I’m shocked but not shocked. Yeah, this is going to be hell to pull off—but for reasons I hadn’t foreseen even from miles away.
As always, her beauty temporarily sucks out my breath. Even now, with her hair a brilliant tangle, her cheeks streaked with makeup, and the front of her pants slashed open, she mesmerizes me in ways I can’t describe. Flips exclusive buttons. Wakes primitive urges of possessiveness. I want to haul her close. Inhale her until I breathe nothing else. Kiss her senseless, and then ban her from ever taking the goddamn train again.
Not a possibility anymore—but not because of the façade I have to keep up. Because of all the shields she’s had to drop and her estrangement from the creature she’s bared. A woman who gapes at me, eyes as wide as always, but in fear instead of wonder. Who trembles in a rush of night wind but recognizes her chill extends far beneath her skin’s surface. Who opens her mouth, trying to form words, but only croaks helplessly—and clearly hates herself for it.
Lost, and visually pleading with me for answers, she closes the distance between us with three faltering steps. As she grabs onto me, red-rimmed stare not leaving me, she rasps two words that stab to the center of my gut.
“You’re…real.”
I nod, wondering why I suddenly feel like the mirage to her desert traveler. But I’m not the one who vanishes. Her eyes roll to the back of her head, and she goes unconscious in my arms.
With a soft, sublime smile on her face.
Chapter Ten
EMMA
I’m smiling.
I know it before I even open my eyes.
It’s puzzling, because I know I’m not even in my own bed—am I even in a bed?—though right now, none of the “important” details seem to matter. I feel like I’m waking up from novocaine. Something should hurt, but I don’t give a damn. I may not give a damn again. Everything’s soft and quiet and smells so freaking good…
I roll over. Whimper a little. Okay, ugh. The earlier question? About what should hurt? The answer is everything. Have I been hit by a truck?
I amend that assessment the second my eyes are open.
If it was a truck, it knocked me to a damn beautiful spot. At first sight, I wonder if I’m back in the penthouse at the Brocade. The view is just as sweeping, with the beginnings of dawn sifting through the maze of city lights below. But geographically, everything is wrong. The ocean’s a little closer. The neighborhood’s a little nicer. There are a couple of broad greenbelts nearby. I’m sure one of them is the LA Country Club’s golf course.
The bedroom I’m in is no less breathtaking. Though the color palette is all California mission tones, brown and sand and gold, there’s nothing traditional about the furniture. Everything is elegant but practically space-age, looking crafted especially for its place in the room. I’ve never been in a bed this huge, which seems like a king and a half, with several pillows as long as I am tall. There’s a control panel in the nightstand with more buttons than a starship from one of Wade and Fershan’s games. Though each of the buttons is accompanied by an icon, I’m hesitant to push anything with novocaine brain still in effect.
“Where the hell…”
I let the query fade. It’s not the proper question. Another horse belongs in front of this cart.
What the hell has happened to me?
A stab of alarm gives way to crazy flashes of memory.
Reece, waving from the elevator. Adoration in his eyes. My sweatshirt around his waist…
Blasted into nothing by Angelique La Salle. Her siren’s smirk. Those cufflinks in her hand…
Blasted apart again, the only choice my heart would allow. Running. Refusing to confront my own stupidity. My blind trust in an idiot’s fairy tale…
Really blasted then, by the creeps in the train station. Their hands on my body. Their knife in my clothes. Their threats in my ear…
Then the biggest explosion of all.
Him.
Flinging them through the air. Pinning them to the wall. Black leather. Grim fury. Effortless power. Supercharged. Supersonic.
A super hero. Saving me.
“Holy shit.”
I sit straight up. Tousle the covers with a bunch of swipes and kicks. Maybe I just
need to confirm they’re real. That I’m still real. That being real won’t smash away the memories.
Memories? Or a dream?
“Holy shit.” I whisper it this time. I run a hand over the sheets and the plain white T-shirt into which I’ve somehow been changed. It fits me like an oversize gunnysack, but it’s as soft as these million-count sheets, smells as clean as cedar, and beats the hell out of the eau de gangbanger in which my work clothes are likely drenched by now.
But for all that, I’m still left with no clues about who it really belongs to. What the hell is going on?
I’m saved from confusing contemplations about that by a harsh vibration from the nightstand. My phone, inside my purse, is easy enough to grab. I smile in gratitude at the caller’s picture and eagerly swipe at the screen.
“Neeta.”
“Emma!” The punch of her voice makes me lean away for a second. “Baap re! You are okay!”
“I…I think so.”
“Where are you?” Her demand is pitched with panic. Before I can come up with a decent answer, instinct steering me away from the obvious, she rushes on. “We saw you. On the news. It was everywhere!”
“On the news?” I shake my head, trying to free it from the fuzz. “What? Why? How?”
“The security camera feed from the Soto metro station.” She takes a huge breath. Her tone softens. “You were attacked, Emma. Do you remember?”
“Yeah,” I say too quickly. I rub my forehead with the opposite speed. There’s so much to process. Too much, even before the most daunting thought of them all thunders back into my gray matter. “Yeah. I remember it all.”
Tangible stillness. Then her reverent murmur. “Even the last part?”
“Even the last part.”
“So…Bolt is real?”
“Yeah.”
And I think I’m in his apartment right now.
Fortunately, Neeta’s occupied with her own high gasp. “By all the gods. Emma.”
I wince. Her fervor slams me, too huge to take in. I’m motion sick, and the only thing turning is the earth on its axis. Maybe if I beg hard enough, God will do me a solid and halt it for a few minutes. “Can… Can I call you back in a little while?” The Almighty will likely want my full attention on the stop-the-globe request.
