Bones (Bones #1)

Prologue

The midday sun beat down on the desert sand.

A young girl covered in dirt and dried blood lay where she’d fallen, too exhausted to get up.

Above, a lone hawk circled. Two vultures had landed, stretching their fleshy necks to get a better look at her.

One of them squawked, but she didn’t move.

The hawk circled again, then dove. The scavengers hopped sideways with indignant screeches.

She pushed herself up, and the hawk changed course, soaring back into the sky.

The vultures lingered; she glared at them.

“Fuck off.” Her voice cracked. “I ain’t dead yet.”

The huge birds stared with glittering beady eyes. A flash of anger filled her, and she bared her teeth and growled, swiping in their direction like an angry cat. The vultures took off in a flurry of noise and dust.

Now alone, she struggled to her feet. Her chapped lips stung, and her throat burned with thirst. She started trudging forward again, not in any particular direction.

Just one foot in front of the other. Her stomach cramped.

The last thing she’d eaten had been a couple of small eggs she’d stolen from a nest two days ago.

The sun had moved halfway across the sky when a dust cloud appeared in the distance. She stopped walking, swaying as her legs trembled. Running was pointless; her pursuer could track anything. She took a deep breath and clenched her fists at her sides, steeling herself against seeing his face.

The ramshackle bikes skidded to a stop, and she squinted through the dust to see three strangers.

For a moment, she felt lightheaded with a strange mix of relief and disappointment.

It wasn’t him. The two on the sides revved their snarling engines, looking her over in a way that made her feel cold.

One was young, still a boy, and the other was a giant man who leered at her, flashing a crude gold tooth.

But she paid attention to the one in the middle.

Faded tattoos crawled up his neck, and he eyed her with a calculating gaze.

The other two kept looking at him as though waiting for instruction.

For a moment, she hesitated. She could try to run. She could cry and scream. She could even try to fight. But her brother had taught her too well for that. He’d trained her to survive.

You’re small, but you’re clever, Wolf had told her. Folks see a kid and assume they’re the smarter one. An’ maybe they are, but anytime somebody underestimates you, you can use that.

So she squared her bony shoulders and said, “I’m lookin’ for work. I’m…I’m a healer, and I’m lookin’ for work.”

The man on the left snorted with laughter, slapping his leg, but the one in the middle raised a single brow.

“That so?” he finally said in a lazy, dangerous voice.

She clenched her ragged shirt at her sides to keep her hands from shaking. “Yeah. That’s so.”

“Just when you think you seen it all.” The one on the left swung a leg over and knocked a wobbly kickstand down, his eyes on her. “C’mon, boss, we could use a little fun. How ’bout—”

A gunshot cracked across the dry, barren ground. She jerked backward, biting her tongue hard enough to taste copper. The man who’d dismounted glanced down at his bleeding shoulder in shock.

“The fuck—” he choked.

“Tell you what,” the leader said, holstering his pistol. “I’ve been dreadful bored. So here’s your chance. You fix Grip here, an’ you’re hired.”

“Juck—” Grip started, wheezing and clutching his shoulder. He collapsed on one knee, his eyes rolling between her and the man who’d shot him.

The third biker laughed with a sneer, and she knew they expected her to fail. She stood quietly for a second, then stepped forward.

“Juck!” Grip sputtered. “Juck, boss, I didn’t mean to—” He glanced at the young biker. “Vulture…help me, man—”

Both Juck and Vulture ignored him. Out of the corner of her eye, she could tell Juck’s gaze had locked on her. She approached the bleeding man and placed her hands on his shoulder.

“The hell—” Grip sucked in a startled gasp.

Nothing happened. At least, she knew that’s what it looked like.

But a second later, the bullet pushed itself out of Grip’s shoulder like a worm emerging from dirt.

She spared a glance at Juck to see shock and excitement creeping across his face.

The bullet dropped to the sand, and she staggered backward, somehow remaining on her feet.

She tried to hide the way her entire body shook with chills by clasping her trembling hands together.

In the silence, Grip stared open-mouthed at her, his beefy hand gingerly touching the fresh pink scar where the bullet hole had been.

Juck smiled. She held his eyes, unsure if she should feel relieved that she wasn’t going to die today.

“You’re hired,” Juck said. “Come here, girl.”

She didn’t hesitate this time. She left Grip where he sat, still gaping, and walked to Juck’s bike.

She lifted her freckled face and studied him.

He appeared to be in his late forties, hair and beard beginning to grey.

He had ruddy, wrinkled skin from the desert sun and a pleasant enough expression, but something about him set her on edge, something dark.

“Look at those eyes,” Juck murmured. “Never seen eyes that green before.”

Her stomach twisted, and she fought the urge to shift on her feet.

The third biker, Vulture, sized her up from behind Juck.

He looked a little younger than Wolf, maybe sixteen or seventeen.

His dark blond hair curled at the ends, and his face was handsome, but as he stared down at her, his nose wrinkled in disgust.

“Gods, she’s all bones,” Vulture mocked.

Her face reddened. She’d been skinny before, but two weeks in the desert with practically no food had reduced her to almost nothing.

“Without bones, we’d be nothin’ more than puddles of muck on the ground,” Juck rebuked.

Vulture flushed and scowled.

“What’s your name, girl?” Juck asked.

Her name stuck in her throat like a rock. The girl she’d been was as good as dead, so who was she now? “Don’t got one.”

“How old are you?” Vulture crossed his arms. “Seven?”

She flashed him a fierce look. “I’m ten, asshole.”

Vulture snorted, and she clenched her fists hard enough that her nails bit into her palms.

“Don’t got a name, huh?” Juck smiled. “Well, you do now, Bones.”

She tensed but didn’t fight as he grabbed her around the waist and lifted her onto his bike in front of him. He gripped the handlebars, his arms closing her in like steel bars.

“Let’s git,” he said, a triumphant smile playing across his face. He revved the bike, then took off with a jerk.

She clung to the cracked leather seat and didn’t look back.

“The gods sent an angel, all for me,” Juck said reverently in her ear.

She didn’t correct him, but she knew Wolf would have laughed himself sick at the thought of her being an angel. The wind whipped the tears out of her eyes and left them somewhere behind, along with her name.

She was Bones, Wolf was gone, and the only kind of angel she could ever possibly be was an angel of death.