Chapter Ten
Down on the shores of the Hudson River, in the clearing in the public forest, the bullet from the female’s old-fashioned gun sailed by Allhan’s left ear close enough to clip it.
And as a little stinging sensation and a warm, wet feeling registered on the side of his neck, he smiled even though she still had the weapon up and pointed at him.
And undoubtedly had another bullet in that chamber.
Across the snowy ground, his shooter was shaking her head. “Are you fucking crazy?”
Allhan glanced down at himself as he considered the question. Shifted his weight back and forth a couple of times. Shrugged.
“No? At least, I… I don’t think I’m crazy.
” He frowned. “Would I know, though? I’m not sure whether you should ask a person if they’re insane.
There’s an inherent conflict of interest in any response that comes back at you, and a high potential for self-delusion, especially if it turns out they are. ”
She blinked. “What… the fuck are you saying?”
Reaching up, he ran his fingers over his ear and then checked to see how much blood was on them.
Not a lot. “Is this what it feels like to get a piercing? I don’t have any piercings.
No tattoos, either. But then I don’t like needles.
I’m also just through my transition so I wouldn’t have gotten them before that anyway. Do you have pierced ears?”
The gun slowly lowered. “I don’t know.”
“Whether you’ve had your ears done?”
“No. I’ve never been shot in the lobe before so I can’t make the comparison.”
“So you do have pierced ears—”
“Can you… can you stop talking—”
“You have incredibly good aim.” He tilted his head. “Unless you were going for my frontal lobe instead of my earlobe. In which case, close, but no cigar.” He winced at the reference, thinking back to the males and where they’d been headed. “And yeah, sure. I can be quiet. I usually am, actually.”
The female stared at him for a moment. “Are you okay?”
Sadness swamped his fascination with her, sinking him back down into his reality. “Do you want the real answer to that.”
As he felt her eyes on him, he wanted her to take that hood down.
“You know… even though I shouldn’t, I think I do,” she muttered.
“Bad night,” he whispered roughly. “Very bad. You shooting me is the least of it, which is saying something.”
When she exhaled, her breath drifted toward him and he tried to be surreptitious as he inhaled it. When his whole body flushed, he knew it was because a little of her was inside of him.
“Why are you looking at me like that,” she said.
“I can’t see your face.” He made a circle around his own head. “On account of the hood.”
When she didn’t move or reply, he prompted, “How am I looking at you?”
“As if you know me.”
“That’s not quite it, actually.” His voice deepened. “It’s more that I feel like… I found you.”
From out of nowhere, a rhythmic sound vibrated through the night, and they both turned toward the view of the skyscrapers and looked up. Off to the south, a helicopter approached at a fast clip, its spotlight beaming down and sweeping from side to side over the snowed-up landscape.
“Any chance that’s for you?” he asked.
“No. None.”
“Well, it’s heading right for us. Might be a good idea to back into the trees. Maybe they’re just riding the course of the river, but what if you were not quite as discreet as you think you were. I’m telling you, security cameras are everywhere—”
“Are you sure you don’t always talk this much?”
“I’m an introvert. I swear.”
He measured the copter’s speed and direction. It was still at least a half mile off, and maybe it would divert to follow the road proper.
“Are you sure you know the definition of that word?” she demanded.
“Oh, Princess Bride reference. An oldie, but a goodie.” He nodded over his shoulder at the tree line. “I really think we need to go in there. I’d take your arm, but you still have a gun, and I haven’t heard anything like ‘Oh, Allhan, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do that.’ ”
“You are not an introvert.”
“I truly am. Quick question, did you really mean to shoot my ear—”
“Why the hell are you making an exception for me.”
Allhan glanced at the human who was lying in the snow like a slab of beef, his eyes open, his mouth lax. If it weren’t for the knife sticking out of his gut and all the blood in his lap, you might have been fooled that he was just really fucking drunk.
“I wouldn’t try to drive away.” Allhan went over and shut the truck up with his Converse. “Your best bet is to dematerialize out of here and leave your vehicle—I’m assuming that you’ve given a false address for the registration? If you didn’t, I could reset it if we had more time, but we don’t—”
He stopped. “Okay, now, why are you looking at me like that?”
“You can’t see my face. How do you know I’m looking at you.”
There was a long pause, and he played some kind of fantasy that the female was as taken with him as he was with her. Except he knew that wasn’t the case. And even if it was, he was the last person anybody should have anything to do with.
“You need to get out of here,” she shouted over the growing din.
“So do you.”
“Just leave—”
“You first—”
“Go! Goddamn you!”
With a curse, she jammed her gun into her parka, jumped at him, and grabbed the front of his hoodie in two strong fists.
On a coordinated jerk, she swung him around and punched his chest. Just as he started paddling to keep his balance and failing, the beam from the helicopter flashed across the clearing, right where he’d been standing—
As he landed flat on his back in the snow, the female leaped out of the way of the light with a lithe surge, that brilliant flare clipping the heel of her black boot as she flew parallel to the snowy ground.
Time slowed to a halt as he suddenly wasn’t thinking about the inconvenience of humans showing up, as always, where you didn’t want them. Nope, he was thinking about how the female was coming at him, and it was easy to mentally protractor where her flight path was going to take her.
His own body.
God… he fucking loved math.
And the female’s impact on him was a branding, the imprint of her breasts against his chest and her leg falling between his thighs something he was never going to forget.
In response? A beast woke up inside of him. Sexual need exploded to life in his veins, his muscles, his very blood.
He needed to be inside of her. Now.
And he needed to come. So he could mark her.
Now.
The female lifted her head. In the darkness and with that hood, he couldn’t read her expression, but the change in her scent told him everything he had to know. She felt it, too. She wanted him… too.
At the front of his hips, a thickening gathered, his first erection ever preparing him—preparing them—for what this lick of electric promise inevitably led to. And even though he had absolutely no fucking idea what he was doing, he reached up and pulled the hood that covered her head back.
Allhan sucked in a breath. “You are… beautiful.”
Her black hair was plaited tightly in a series of braids and then let loose to flow around in a glorious profusion of curls.
With high cheekbones and eyes set with a tilt at the far corners, her dark face was utterly arresting, the kind of thing that he knew he could look at again and again and always find something new.
And then he focused on her mouth. As he did, her lips parted, like she was imagining them kissing.
That was when a pale green glow flared.
Her eyes changed color—
“—told you we shouldn’ta broke into no bank—”
“Fuck you, Charlie! You fucked us by opening that fucking door—”
As the copter panned around, two human men broke out of the trees across the clearing and stopped short in front of the truck.
They were both dressed in black and had balaclavas down over their faces.
With black backpacks strapped on, they seemed like they were trying to be professional criminals.
Except if they’d known what they were doing, they would have gone with white camo for clothing and not been arguing during their escape.
“What is that,” Not Charlie said through heaving breaths.
“A truck, you fucking idiot.” Except Charlie also seemed surprised. As he outed a gun, he lowered his voice. “Check for keys.”
The pair split apart and set on the Ford like the scavengers they were—
“Holy… shit.” Not Charlie jumped back as he saw the corpse in the snow. Then he looked up to the sky. “Maybe the copter ain’t for us.”
“What are you talking—” Charlie jogged around. “What the fuck is that.”
“It’s a dead guy.”
“No shit.” Charlie punched his partner-in-crime’s shoulder and stared down. “Check him for the keys.”
“He’s, like, super dead. I’m not touchin’ him.”
“Maybe they’re in the ignition.”
Not Charlie doubled back and got behind the wheel. A moment later, that big head engine woke up once more, but now the lights came on at all four corners of the vehicle, red in the back, yellow parkers in the front.
“It’s our lucky night! Fuck!”
“Not with you around,” Charlie muttered as he picked up the dead man’s wrist by the sleeve. “Oh, whatever. Wannabe Rolex. Fuck.”
With derision, he dropped that arm and wrenched open the passenger-side door. Just as he planted a foot on the running board, he recoiled.
“Blood! Goddamn, I ain’t sittin’ there.”
He moved to the backseat, got in, and then it was all about the combustible engine, that horsepower whipped hard in reverse, the knobby tire treads grabbing at the snowpack and chewing hard.
Unfortunately, Not Charlie couldn’t control the power under that hood.
A miscalculation slammed the ass end into a pine tree with a crunching metal sound.
“Jesus Christ,” the female muttered in a whisper. “They’re killing me over here.”
But she was stuck. The helicopter was returning, and undoubtedly it had all kinds of surveillance cameras happening. If she went out there, things could get dicey.
Dicey-er.