Chapter Eight
Denver, Colorado
The next day
Vixen slung her purse over her shoulder and hurried out of the staff room, bang on the nose at four o’clock. Annoyingly, Ice had been in the clubhouse and bar for most of the afternoon for some reason, and although she had mostly ignored him, she’d felt those wintry eyes trained on her. He’d tried to talk to her, but she’d given him a quick smile, then kept moving. She sensed that he’d be watching for her to leave now that her shift was over… and she was just as determined to make it out of Satan’s without having to talk to him any more. She was finder it harder than she’d predicted to have him around, so she was just in self-protection mode right now.
Her mind flitted back to his apology the day before – a totally surprising thing, if she were being honest with herself – and she felt herself weakening. Just a bit.
Maybe… maybe just talk to him?
She slammed the door on those traitorous thoughts, stomped hard on her stupid little heart that was betraying her. OK, yeah, the apology was nice; it was great , even. But she couldn’t seem to get past the sneer on Ice’s gorgeous face when he’d called her a whore, the way that the word had been spat at her in that tone of utter disgust. She was very much afraid that in that moment of stress and anger, Ice had revealed his deepest, truest thoughts about her. He might be apologetic now , he might be sorry about his behavior now – but that didn’t mean that he’d lied to her that day.
That stiffened her resolve, shored up all her defences again, and Vixen sailed down the hallway with her head held high and her chin up.
“Vixen! Hey, can you hang on a sec?”
She paused and turned. The voice calling her wasn’t Ice’s, it was Zoe’s.
Vixen watched the other woman walk over, holding Keira’s hand, and she smiled. Despite herself, she adored that little girl and to her utter astonishment, Keira loved her right back. Keira looked at her and looked right past the revealing clothes and bleach-blonde hair and high heels, and she didn’t care about what Vixen did or didn’t do in the bar back rooms. Vixen had no idea what she’d done to win Keira over, and she didn’t care: she was just so damn happy that she had. She was even more happy that Zoe had no problem at all with Vixen spending time with her daughter.
“Hey, Zee,” Vixen said, then turned her brilliant smile at the little blonde girl. “Keira cutie.”
“Hi Vixen!” Keira burbled. “Did you hear about the babies? They have names now? Hannah and Joe?”
“I did. It’s great news, huh?”
“Yes. Can you come to my party?”
Vixen stared down at Keira. “Ummmm. What party?”
“My birthday party!”
“Uhhhh.” Vixen felt her forehead wrinkle in confusion. “I thought your birthday was in May?”
“It is.”
“Oh. Oh, right.” She looked at Zoe and met her amused eyes. “So – so you’re just planning things a bit early?”
“ Yes ,” Keira huffed. “So can you come?”
“Of course,” Vixen said, deliberately ignoring Ice who’d just appeared in the bar. “I appreciate the super-early invitation, so I can write it in my calendar six months in advance.”
“You’re welcome.” Keira did a pirouette on the spot. “So can you help me go get Peach?”
“Ummm. Yes.” Vixen knew that she should be used to Keira’s lightning-quick changes in topics by now, but she still got taken by surprise every once in a while. “Where is she?”
“Over at Blue Dragon.” Zoe stepped in to take over the conversation, which Vixen knew would speed things up a bit, and make them considerably clearer. “That’s why I wanted to talk to you. Keira forgot Peach, and I need to talk to Scars about something before she and I head home. If you’re leaving and going that way anyway, would you mind taking her over to the tattoo parlour and getting her bunny? I’ll meet you out in the parking lot in three minutes.”
“Yeah, of course.” Vixen hitched her purse and smiled down at Keira, who beamed and took her hand. “Let’s go find Peach. What do you think she’s doing over there on her own?”
“Getting a tattoo,” Keira said solemnly. “She told me that she wants one.”
“Oh, really?” her mother said. “What’s she getting done?”
“It’s a surprise.”
“Ohhhhh, OK.” Zoe shook her head with affection, winked at Vixen. “Is it really fine to go over there, Vixen? You’re not in a rush to get home or anything?”
“Not at all,” Vixen said firmly. In actual fact, she was grateful that she now had an iron-clad excuse to not have to speak to Ice. She started moving towards the bar doors. “Let’s go, cutie.”
Keira giggled, and skipped beside Vixen as they crossed the parking lot holding hands. She was humming something that had very little real melody, but was beyond adorable anyway. That was the thing about kids: they were just beautiful in their lack of self-consciousness.
“Scars gave me Peach, you know,” Keira said, announcing it as if she’d never told Vixen this before. “I don’t remember ‘cause I was only one, but he told me so.”
“ Really ?” As always, Vixen pretended to be enthralled by this information, as if it were her first time hearing it. “That was so nice of him.”
“Yes,” Keira agreed. “He’s very nice. I love him.”
“I bet you do,” Vixen said, glancing to their left to make sure that no vehicles were coming up between the parked cars. They were about sixty feet away from Blue Dragon by now, and through the front window, she could see Saint standing at the front desk talking on the phone. “He’s a good man. You’re very lucky.”
Keira was just starting to hum and skip again when it happened.
With a squeal of tires, the black van shot out of nowhere behind them, going shockingly quickly considering that it was in a crowded lot. Vixen stopped dead in her tracks, automatically gripping Keira’s hand harder, and turned around to look at the vehicle. For a few precious and blissfully unaware seconds, Vixen was just puzzled by what she saw – it didn’t make any sense that the van was going as fast as it was, nor that it was coming straight at them.
That was when reality jumped up and screamed in her face.
Holy Lord. It’s coming straight at us .
Vixen darted to the left and started to run in the direction of the parlor, dragging Keira with her, then a glance over her shoulder made her realize that the van was inexplicably changing direction. It was veering around a few parked cars and resuming its path, bearing down on them.
Without a second of thought, she picked up Keira and rolled out of the way, cradling Keira’s head in her hands, feeling the flesh on her knuckles split open against the icy ground. The van narrowly missed them – it smashed into a few cars, hitting Vixen with exploding glass – and then to her shock, it turned sharply and started to come around again.
“Fuck,” Vixen muttered, scrambling to her knees, knowing now for sure that this wasn’t a case of a driver having a heart attack or seizure, or even being drunk. This guy was gunning for them, and she needed to get Keira to safety. A sharp, piercing pain in her ankle made it impossible for her to get fully to her feet, so her running was out. “ Fuck .”
She put a screaming Keira down, gave her a hard push towards the parlor. Saint was already coming out the door, and Vixen exchanged panicked looks with him as the van approached, picking up speed.
“Run!” Vixen shouted at Keira. “To Saint! Go!”
“But –”
“ Keira !” Vixen heard herself shrieking; she sounded insane. “Do as I say right now !”
Thank Christ the little girl took to her feet, stumbling and crying as she ran. Saint rushed out to meet her, his massive arms open, but he was a good forty feet away from Keira.
Too far. She’s not going to make it to him .
Still on her knees, listening to the roar of the approaching van, Vixen fumbled in her purse. Blood was streaming down into her eyes, but she didn’t have time to even wonder where on her head it was coming from, or how bad it was. Her numb fingers found her gun, and as the van came up behind her – forty feet, thirty feet – Vixen somehow managed to roll again.
This time, she used the momentum of the movement to stagger to her feet and face the oncoming van. Without a second of hesitation, she stood with her feet wide apart, bracing herself on unsteady legs, adrenalin overriding the pain in her ankle. Her arms came up, she gripped the gun in both shaking hands, she took a shuddering breath, blinked through the blood almost blinding her.
And started to shoot.
She aimed at the windshield, dimly thinking that this was surely the best way to stop the fucker driving, or at least slow him down to buy Saint some time. The glass cracked, but didn’t break – and she kept shooting steadily even as the vehicle bore down on her, praying hard that Keira was clear by now, but not daring to look over her shoulder to check. She kept her eyes trained on the van, watched it get closer and closer, waiting for the perfect time to throw herself out of the way. From far away, she heard shouting, and for a second she thought it was Ice calling her name.
Suddenly, the van jerked to the right, turning towards the parking lot exit. Vixen exhaled hard and relaxed her arms, thinking that they were escaping and it was over… when the driver steered sharply to the left again, sideswiping Vixen as he accelerated out and away.
It was weird how there was no pain, at least not at first. Instead, all she felt was weightlessness as she was launched sideways, as limp as a rag doll; she was airborne and she was completely out of control. All she could do was fly through the air, a wingless, sightless bird, and listen to the voices all around her screaming and shouting Keira’s name, her name. Somehow, she twisted in mid-air, and when Vixen hit the concrete parking block, she did it face-down. She heard more than felt her bones break.
Then everything was just darkness and silence.