by S. E. Smith
“We are bond mates,” he argued, ignoring Bert. “You wear my mark just as I wear yours.”
“I’ll stick my hand in acid before I’ll ever be anyone’s mate. Better yet, you should stick your hand in it. That’s the noble thing to do, isn’t it?” she retorted.
“Trying to remove the mark will not change anything! Our bond is deeper than a mark, it is a chemical reaction that proves we are compatible! The symbol merely shows that we are a match if anyone dares contest it,” he furiously replied.
“I don’t have chemical reactions unless it is a bad case of indigestion, and you are right up there with the worst I’ve ever had!” she snapped back before she rose to her feet. “Go home, alien. You aren’t wanted here.”
Derik held himself still as Amelia ‘Runt’ Thomas grabbed her empty cup, turned, and walked over to the clear glass doors. She pulled the door open and disappeared inside. His gaze followed her as she crossed the crowded interior of the restaurant.
“Okay, you both lost me, but I’m pretty sure you weren’t talking about DiMaggio,” Bert murmured, turning in his seat to face Derik again.
Derik looked down at the rice bowl in front of him and shook his head. He stabbed the fork into a piece of meat and reached for one of the cups of beer. He drained the contents before he picked up the other one, and he looked into the restaurant again. Runt was waiting to refill her drink from a machine.
“No. It is… complicated,” he finally replied.
Bert chuckled and nodded his head. “Women in general are complicated. Women like Runt—well, I don’t know if there is a how-to manual big enough on how to deal with someone like her. I do have to say; I don’t think I’ve ever heard her say so much before. What did you do to piss her off?” Bert asked.
“I’m not sure,” he confessed with a rueful look at Bert. “Who is DiMaggio?”
All traces of humor disappeared from Bert’s face, and the older man leaned forward, resting his arms on each side of his bowl. Curious about the change in the man, Derik leaned forward as well.
“DiMaggio had started out as a small time crook three decades ago, but soon took over this part of the city and held onto it ever since. I worked the beat near the river during that time…,” Bert quietly began to share.
Chapter Four
Runt adjusted her backpack and took a sip of the cold water that she was carrying as she strolled along the sidewalk. The sun had sunk below the horizon and the streetlights were coming on one by one to cast the world in an eerie tug-of-war between artificial light and shadows.
It had taken a little bit of maneuvering, but she had managed to slip out the restaurant’s back exit without Bert or Derik seeing her. It helped that the restaurant was so busy—and that Bert was filling Derik’s ear with some wild tale. Bert loved having a captive audience.
Runt sighed. She knew Bert was on Cosmos’ payroll. At first, she was hurt that he had deceived her. She’d thought he was one of the many homeless who lived by the code of the streets, but an intensive background search on him had shown he was a highly decorated former member of the Metropolitan Police Department, and he wasn’t homeless. Score one for my super cautious nature and my insane invasions of privacy, she thought with a wry smirk.
Still, there was something about Bert that drew her to him. He had the same calming effect on her that her mom had when she was alive. Of course, the last thing she needed was another parental figure in her life! Between Cosmos, Avery, and RITA, she had enough replacements without adding more.
“I also don’t need a creepy alien who thinks I’m his!” she muttered to herself.
What in the hell do you think you are doing?
Runt snorted when she sensed the frustration and outrage in Derik’s silent demand. The guy was really too easy to fluster. She smirked at the thought of what she could do next. If she was really good at annoying him, maybe he would finally give up and go back to wherever he came from.
Not without you, he growled in response.
Game on, alien, she retorted.
What does that mean? What kind of games? he demanded.
She raised one eyebrow in disbelief. Derik didn’t look like he was much older than she was, and he didn’t know what ‘game on’ meant? She would have thought even an alien teenager could figure out that one.
It means ‘yes, without me, and if you want to try, go ahead. You’re gonna lose’, she dryly replied.
Stay where you are. I will come to you, he ordered.
Whatever, she replied.
She kept on walking. The shadows grew as the streetlights started to be spaced further apart. The only things lighting this stretch of cracked sidewalk were the plethora of neon signs and the muted lights from the windows nearly covered with advertisements.
She reached out as she passed a trash can and dropped her empty cup on top of a mound of trash, then shoved her cold hands into her coat pockets, scanning the area as a sudden sense of unease rose inside her.
She stared at a man across the street who was leaning against the brick wall, talking on a cellphone. The tip of his glowing cigarette stood out in the darkness, and the faint light from the store cast an eerie shadow on his acne-scarred face. A thin spiral of smoke rose when he exhaled and straightened.
She pursed her lips when he met her gaze, his eyes filled with animosity and recognition. Karl Biggie—ex-con and right-hand man to Ramon DiMaggio, one of the men responsible for her mother’s death.
Well, if nothing else, I’ve found what I was looking for, she thought with distaste.
What? What were you looking for? Derik demanded in her mind.
Runt frowned. She’d forgotten about her alien. Well, not her alien—but the alien, she hastily corrected with a grimace.
I like your first thought better, he chuckled.
An unexpected sensation of warmth filled her, and she gritted her teeth. Runt forced herself to shrug off the feeling. She would not be distracted from her mission. That was the reason she had left both men back at the restaurant. She’d quickly decided that if Bert wouldn’t tell her where DiMaggio was currently residing, she’d find someone who did know. After all, she reasoned, it shouldn’t be that difficult to find one of DiMaggio’s goons in the area and simply follow him back to wherever his boss was hiding.
It was just her luck that Karl was the one she’d run into. There was no love lost between the two of them. Karl was one of the few who would recognize her.
Karl tossed his cigarette down on the ground and stepped on it. Runt pulled her hands out of her pockets and gripped the straps of her backpack. He crossed the road, heading in her direction. She lifted her chin when he slowed and stepped onto the sidewalk in front of her.
“It’s been a long time, Runt,” Karl commented.
She shrugged. “Yeah,” she agreed.
“The boss has been looking for you. He wants to see you,” Karl said.
She rolled her eyes. Of course DiMaggio would want to see her. He would probably like to see the five million dollars that had disappeared from his bank account, too, but she had given it to a dozen charities across the country a long time ago.
“I bet. Sorry, not interested,” she muttered.
Karl’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not asking,” he sneered.
Runt raised her eyebrow. It amused her to see a flash of irritation sweep across Karl’s face. There was really too much foot traffic about for Karl to do anything without being noticed. Not to mention the fact that she had stopped in front of the CCV cameras outside of Wong’s Family Foods.
“And I’m not going,” she replied with a glance up at the camera. “Say cheese, asshole.”
She watched Karl lift his hands and curl his fingers as if he would love to wrap them around her neck. He opened his mouth just as a sleek BMW sedan pulled up behind him. The doors swung open in unison and three men in dark suits stepped out.
At first, she thought the men might be some of Cosmos’ people until she saw the smirk on Karl’s
face. She turned to run, but she was quickly surrounded. Strong fingers gripped her upper arm in a bruising hold. Fury swept through her.
“I’ll take care of the video. Take her to Mr. DiMaggio,” Karl instructed.
“Asshole,” Runt muttered as the man holding her arm pulled her toward the waiting car.
“I’ll show you how much of an asshole I can be— later. It’s a date,” Karl promised with a malicious grin.
Runt kicked, and with great satisfaction, she felt her foot connect with Karl’s crotch. Clutching his throbbing balls, the man fell to his knees and began rocking back and forth while uttering a string of strangled curses.
“Just a little something to remember me by until we see each other again,” Runt growled.
“Come on,” the man holding her arm demanded.
Runt sensed a force of rage and denial barreling toward them, and when she peered over the car’s open back door, her gaze collided with Derik’s. Before she could try to escape again, her captor pushed her head down and shoved her into the car, following her inside with a growled command to the other two men.
They all drew their guns as the driver swiftly pulled away from the curb and accelerated. The man next to her rolled down the window as they drew near Bert and Derik. Panic engulfed Runt when she saw him aim his gun.
Twisting in the seat, she grabbed the man’s hair and pulled as hard as she could. Pain exploded through her cheek when he backhanded her. Behind her, his companion wrapped his arm around her neck and began to squeeze. She didn’t let go of her captor’s hair until they passed Bert and Derik.
Dark spots danced in front of her eyes. She struggled to remove the arm around her neck, but the man refused to let go. As her mind grew fuzzy, she closed her eyes and mentally reached out to Derik.
DiMaggio… Bert… knows…, she forced through her oxygen-deprived brain.
I will come for you, Derik responded.
I… know, she thought before the world went black.
Chapter Five
“Hold up,” Bert cautioned.
Derik ignored him and started to follow the car, but when a man inside the car extended a weapon through the open window, Bert grabbed his arm and jerked him back into a nearby narrow alley, dragging him down to crouch in the dark.
When Derik caught a glimpse of Runt struggling with the man, he looked down at Bert’s hand on his arm. His eyes blazed, and his teeth grew noticeably longer and sharper. Bert held fast until the car sped past them, only then reluctantly releasing him.
“She said you would know where they are taking her,” he growled, turning toward Bert as his teeth slowly began receding into his gums.
Bert grimaced. “I have an idea of where they may have taken her. DiMaggio has been moving around a lot since he lost a huge chunk of change. Some of his creditors didn’t believe he’d been hacked. But, listen, we can’t go anywhere until you look a little more human, if you know what I mean. The guy that Runt put on the ground is Karl Biggie, DiMaggio’s right-hand man. His only job the last two years has been to find Runt. He would know for sure where DiMaggio is hiding,” Bert said, slowly rising to his feet.
By the time Bert finished speaking, Derik’s teeth and eyes were just as scary as they’d been when his mate was taken. The pain the man felt from Runt’s kick would be nothing compared to what Derik would do to him.
“Then we will ask him,” Derik replied.
“Seriously, you need to… Oh, to hell with it. Come on, you don’t look much weirder than half the teenagers anymore,” Bert finally muttered.
Derik followed Bert around the corner and into the store. A young Asian woman stood behind the counter. Her eyes were wide and fearful. She anxiously looked at him and Bert as they entered. He kept his lips pressed firmly together to hide his teeth while Bert talked to her in a low voice.
“Where’d he go?” Bert asked.
“To the back office—please, he has my husband…,” she quickly added.
“We’ll take care of this,” Bert gently promised.
“The man has a gun. He said if I called the police, he would kill him,” she warned in a shaky voice.
Bert reached out and patted her trembling hand. “I’ve got something even better,” he reassured her.
Derik saw the woman look at him. Her eyes widened even further when she saw the unnatural swirl of fire in his silver eyes. A glimmer of hope appeared in her expression, and she nodded.
Bert motioned to him before he pointed to a door in the back of the store. Derik replied with a sharp nod. In unison, they threaded their way through narrow aisles, Bert pulled a weapon from his coat pocket, and they silently went through the door to the short hallway on the other side. They pressed their backs against the wall, and behind another door, Derik could hear Karl Biggie ordering the woman’s husband to erase the hard drive for the closed-circuit video system.
Derik edged in front of Bert, and kicked the door with such force that it was ripped off the hinges. The door hit Karl, knocking him into a shelf lined with cleaning supplies. Derik stepped into the room, grabbed the flimsy door, and tossed it aside.
Karl’s dazed, startled eyes met his, and the man instinctively aimed the gun still tightly clutched in his hand. Derik struck like a cobra and grabbed Karl’s wrist. With a quick twist, the sickening sound of snapping bones filled the small office, followed by the thump of Karl’s gun as it hit the linoleum floor.
Derik wrapped his fingers around Karl’s neck, cutting off the man’s scream of pain. He then lifted the man up until his feet dangled several inches off the floor. Karl desperately clawed at his arm. Derik flashed Karl a menacing smile.
“Mr. Wong, why don’t you go let your wife know you’re okay,” Bert said to the frightened store owner. Then he instructed, “Give us a couple of minutes, though, before you call this in, okay?”
“Yeah… Okay,” Mr. Wong choked out.
Out of the corner of his eye, Derik saw Bert step to the side so the shop owner could leave, then he returned his full focus to the man he was holding. Karl was no longer struggling to escape. In fact, his eyes were beginning to roll back in his head. Derik realized that the man was about to pass out from lack of oxygen. In disgust, he turned and dropped Karl onto the rolling chair that was in front of the desk.
The chair tilted at an odd angle under Karl’s weight. Derik removed a long blade from the sheath at his waist, gripped the arm of the chair to steady it, and placed the sharp point against the pulsing artery in Karl’s neck.
“Where did the men take my mate?” he demanded.
“Wha….?” Karl asked, his voice slurred from a mixture of dazed confusion and pain.
“Where have they taken my mate?” Derik growled slowly, the point of his blade drawing blood.
Bert reached out and gripped his arm. “You better let me handle this before you kill him, son,” he grimaced.
Derik tightened his grip on the chair arm, leaving deep imprints in the metal; then he straightened and stepped aside. Bert gave him a relieved nod before he stood in front of Karl and slapped the man several times on the cheek.
“The bastard broke my wrist,” Karl whimpered.
“Yeah, well, be thankful he didn’t rip off your whole arm. Now, where did the others take the girl?” Bert demanded.
Karl looked back and forth between Derik and Bert with a desperate, calculating expression. Derik narrowed his eyes. If the man so much as twitched wrong, he would break a few more of Karl’s bones.
“The Digs… They took her to The Digs. DiMaggio wants his money back… with interest,” Karl finally replied.
“You better be telling us the truth, Karl. My friend here doesn’t take kindly to being lied to,” Bert said.
Karl shot them a pain-filled sneer. “I don’t need to lie. If you want to die, I’m more than happy to help you into the grave. DiMaggio has enough firepower to kill an army. You don’t stand a chance,” he choked out.
Derik had heard enough. His fist slammed in
to Karl’s chin with a sickening thud. Karl’s head snapped back, then he slumped off the chair and fell in a boneless mass to the floor. Derik turned, looked at Bert’s bemused expression, and shrugged.
“The shop owners will not have to worry about him escaping,” he stated.
“You think?” Bert dryly retorted as he stepped over Karl.
Chapter Six
Bert muttered under his breath as they walked along the dark streets. Derik wasn’t sure if the old man was doing it to fit with his persona or just liked talking to himself. He grimaced when Bert repeated for the fourth time that they were probably going to die.
“We are not going to die. I will go in and rescue my mate,” he said.
Bert scowled at him. “Mate? What are you, part animal? Animals mate. That little girl deserves to be respected. She’s either your wife, your girlfriend, or that newfangled term couples call themselves nowadays—significant other. I don’t like the word mate; it just don’t sound respectful enough for my little girl. I’m old-fashioned in that sense, if you know what I mean. And for your information, yes, we probably are going to die because there is no way I’m going to stand outside while you face DiMaggio and his men alone,” he snapped.
Catching Bert’s wrist when the old man started to wave his hand, Derik turned and faced the human. He studied Bert’s face, expecting to see a fearful expression. Instead, he saw resignation and determination. A small crooked smile curved his lips.
“I am not human, Bert,” he quietly reminded the man.
Bert raised an eyebrow. “Does that mean you can’t die?” Bert demanded.
Derik shook his head. “No, I can die—I am just not that easy to kill,” he grudgingly replied.
“Yeah, well, neither am I, and I’ve had a lot more years of practice with people shooting at me,” Bert stated.
“I’m sure that you are not, though I believe this time it would be best to allow me to go alone. Something tells me that my ma… that Runt would not be happy if something were to happen to you,” Derik said.
