Chapter 2

CHAPTER2

Aline was in trouble. More trouble than she’d ever been in before, and to be honest she had gotten into a lot of scrapes in her twenty-five years. But this time… she was really scared.

No matter how she tried to find a solution, the only conclusion she could reach was that she was entirely screwed—and not in a good way. The worst part was that she couldn’t even blame this on anyone but herself. She’d been warned, repeatedly, not to get involved with Lev and his crew. They were into shady stuff.

Everyone knew that.

But the rent was due, and her fridge was empty. When Lev offered her a hundred cash to make a delivery for him, she’d pushed aside all her doubts and worries and took him up on it. Even as he’d handed her the backpack in the middle of the brightly lit garage, she’d known it was a mistake.

She could feel it down to her bones. Only what choice did she have? Her life was rough enough without getting her ass kicked to the curb, and she had to eat.

It seemed simple enough. Take the bag across the city, deliver it to one specific person, unnamed but described. Lev emphasized the importance of this twice already, but he gave her one last warning. “Don’t leave it with the doorman. Don’t leave it with one of his thugs. You ask to see him, and if they say no, then you walk. Got me?”

She’d frowned. “Are you still going to pay me if I come back because they wouldn’t let me give it to him directly?”

“You’ll get half for your trouble. But he should be expecting you.”

She slipped the backpack on, noting how heavy it was. “Any reason why you can’t send one of your guys over? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I want the money. It’s just…”

“You ask a lot of questions for a broke bitch.” He laughed and shook his head, but his tone said he was amused not annoyed. “Just do the job. You’ve got the address. That’s all you need to know.”

“Yeah, yeah, fine.” She sighed. That feeling of regret was already weighing on her, but not as much as the gnawing hunger in her belly.

The sooner she dropped the bag off, the sooner she got to eat. She headed for the open bay door, skirting around a fancy car that was half in pieces. Lev had come into a lot of cash in the past couple of years, but he still had his people out boosting cars. Maybe it was just a habit for him now.

“Hey kid,” he called, just as she stepped out.

She winced, but blanked the expression before she turned back. “Yeah?”

“What’s in that bag ain’t your concern. Leave it zipped. You’ll regret it if you don’t.” It was a warning, and there was no humor in his voice this time.

A shiver rolled down her spine. “Okay.”

“Don’t ‘okay’ me. I’m serious. Not even a peek, got it?”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it Lev. I don’t care what’s in it. I just want to get it done so I can eat. I’m starving.” Maybe a slight exaggeration, but she hadn’t eaten all day, and it felt like it.

“Here” He grabbed something from the desk behind him and tossed it across the garage.

She grabbed it instinctively and then grinned. It was a bag of krendl bread. Not exactly a meal, but it would take the edge off. “Thanks, Lev!” She was already ripping into the bag.

He shrugged and waved her off. “Get going. If you’re fast, I might throw in a few extra bucks.”

That was enough incentive to send her out into the dark. She stuffed a handful of the sweet bread into her mouth and took off running. The whole job would have been a simple matter if she had a car, or at least a bike, but she didn’t.

By that time of evening, most of the buses had stopped running, but she knew where she could catch one of the all-night lines. It would mean transferring twice, but it would get her there without too much hassle.

Or, at least, that had been the plan.

The bus showed up late, as usual, and she missed her transfer. She should have waited half an hour for the next one to come along, but that promise of extra cash made her impatient. She decided it was worth the risk to walk a few blocks through one of the sketchier parts of the city, to catch a bus on the other side.

That was the second mistake of the night, and if it had been her last, she might still have salvaged everything.

In books she might be described as slender or willowy, but really she was just tall and skinny. She wasn’t exactly flat as a board, but men tended to be unflattering about the size of her boobs. That might have bothered her if they were men she was interested in, but the opinions of guys who shouted at women across the street couldn’t have mattered less to her.

The truth was passing as a boy was useful in her part of town. If she dressed in an oversized hoody and hunched her shoulders a little so that it bagged in front, she could usually walk around safely at night.

She was banking on that when she decided to cut over to the next bus stop. And it did work, sort of. It wasn’t her that caught the attention of a group of guys hanging out in the alley, it was the backpack.

“Hey, what’s in the bag, man?” One of them called out.

She ignored them and kept walking. There was the sound of laughter, but there was no amusement in it. It was harsh and cruel. She picked up the pace without quite running.

It was quiet behind her. She wanted to look back and see if they were following, but she was scared. Orpheus, in the Greek myths she’d always loved in secondary school, had looked back and had regretted it.

This wasn’t the underworld, but it was a bad neighborhood, and that was just as dangerous. In her case, maybe she should have gone ahead and looked, because a second later a hand landed on her shoulder. “What’s the hurry, bro? Going somewhere important?”

She was wrenched around, and then pushed into the arms of another guy, who held her against his chest. “Just trying to get home, guys. C’mon it’s late,” she said, pitching her voice low. Maybe in the dim light she could keep up the masquerade of being male.

“Home, huh? Too good to stop and talk, I guess.” He was clearly the leader, and the largest of the four guys who surrounded her now.

“Not too good, just tired. Look, I’m broke. There’s nothing in the bag but dirty laundry,” she assured them.

The big one looked familiar and after a second, she realized she’d seen him before. Lev’s goons were always fighting over scraps with a rival car ring from across the city. This one, she was sure, was part of that. It made her nervous.

It wasn’t that she was worried about him recognizing her. Aside from doing the occasional courier jobs, she was mostly clean. Well, clean-ish anyway. She kept her face out of most of the illegal activities that surrounded her on a daily basis.

The bigger issue was that whatever she was carrying on her back was likely to be a big deal and these guys were the type to take whatever was in it gleefully. And then she’d owe Lev a lot of money, because whatever it was, had to be worth a chunk of cash.

“Just dirty laundry huh? You won’t mind us looking then.” He jerked his chin at one of the others and they tried wrestling the bag off her shoulders. The straps were too tough to rip off, so the one holding her let her go, just for a moment.

It was the chance she’d been hoping for. She wrenched loose with all her strength and took off running. This time there was no temptation to look back, it would only slow her down. They shouted, and she could hear their heavy steps as they ran after her, but she was in much better shape than they were, and fear had given her a useful shot of adrenaline.

Being unfamiliar with that part of the city made it hard. She got turned around but kept running. By the time she stumbled to a stop, bracing herself against a stone post as she panted for breath, she realized she had no clue where she was. None.

That was when she also realized she no longer had the backpack. During her escape, it must have been pulled off her back, and she’d been too desperate to get out of there and hadn’t even felt it.

“Fuck!” she shouted. And then she repeated it and as many other curse words as she could think of for good measure. Her head thumped against the stone, and she stayed like that, not even caring that the rough block was pressing into her skin painfully.

There was a low rumbling chuckle behind her. “Well, sounds like someone is having a bad night. What’s wrong, princess?”

She froze. Running wasn’t an option, but why they’d bothered to chase her when they had the bag, she couldn’t imagine. “Please, just leave me alone.” The whispered words weren’t even for them. It was more of a prayer.

“Is that what you really want? Because from what I can see… you look like you might need a little help.” The voice was smooth as silk and made parts of her throb unexpectedly.

She straightened and turned slowly; her mouth dropped open and hung there as she looked him over. It wasn’t one of the men who’d chased her, but that wasn’t a surprise. His voice had been too cultured for that. Too… elegant, but somehow infinitely more dangerous.

He was dressed way too well for this part of town. He should have looked out of place… but somehow didn’t. There was a sharpness to his gaze that reminded her of a predator. A shiver rolled down her back, and only some of it was from the chill air.

“I-I don’t need any help. Thanks.” She hadn’t missed the fact that he’d called her princess. Obviously her disguise hadn’t worked on him, probably because she was right under a bright street lamp.

“No? You sounded like you might be having some trouble.” He folded his arms across his chest and leaned against a matching stone pillar about six feet away from her.

It wasn’t enough distance to make a run for it, and she was still catching her breath, so she just kept her eyes on him. “No, I mean I am, but it’s nothing you can help with.”

“I can be very helpful, when I want to be. Why don’t you tell me what happened? Can’t hurt, right?” His voice was at odds with the predatory gleam in his eyes. His voice, with its smooth low tones, said she could trust him.

It was encouraging, soothing. It made her want to talk, and before she realized what was happening, she’d blurted out the story, part of it anyway. More than she should have, but not enough to get her in trouble with Lev. Not that she could be any deeper.

“So, you were innocently walking by, and these men grabbed you and took your bag?” He tilted his head, checking to see if he’d gotten it right.

“Yeah, my backpack.”

“I guess you’re lucky that was all they did. You were smart to run. Things can be replaced, but people are a little more difficult.”

She sighed. “You don’t get it. The bag had important stuff in it. Not my stuff, someone else’s stuff and losing it is… bad.”

“Ah, that’s a different issue then. This… important stuff, are you going to be in trouble for losing it?”

Her stomach lurched. She’d been trying hard not to think about that. “You have no idea. So much trouble.”

“Sounds like you need help after all. You need your bag back, so you can complete your job.”

“How… how did you know it was a job?” She wiped her sweaty palms on her jeans and wished there was a little more distance between them.

He shrugged. A lazy smile tilted his mouth up at one corner. “Let’s just say, I’m good at seeing the bigger picture. So, you were being paid to deliver this bag, but you got robbed, and now you’re not going to get your pay, which I’m guessing you badly needed, and you’re also going to be on the hook for whatever was in the package, right?”

Aline gaped at him. “How—”

“Let’s skip the how questions. They’re boring and you wouldn’t believe me anyway. Why don’t we worry about fixing your problem instead, princess. Like I told you, I’m a helpful guy.”

She closed her mouth, swallowing a couple of times to wet it, before she shook her head. “Nothing you can do. I don’t even know who they are, and by now they’re gone with the bag. I’m sure they’ve already opened it and sold—” she paused. “—whatever it was.”

“You’re assuming drugs but pretending not to be sure.” It wasn’t a question.

She drew a deep breath in through her nose and then let it out slowly. “I just get paid to deliver, not to ask questions. I don’t know what’s in it. I didn’t look.”

“But you assumed, right? And you were still going to deliver anyway?” There was a vaguely disapproving note to his questions, though she might have been imagining it.

It annoyed her and she narrowed her eyes. “What are you, politsiya? Some kind of cop?”

He snorted. “No.” His clothes were too nice for that anyway, so it was probably the truth.

“Well, maybe you don’t get this, in your expensive uptown clothes, but some of us have bills to pay. I’ve got no food in the house and rent’s due, so yeah, I was still going to deliver it anyway.” She didn’t bother to soften the anger in her voice. All of it was true.

His smile widened. “I’m not judging you, just clarifying that you knew you were doing something illegal and accepted it anyway. Formalities and all.”

“What does that even mean?” she asked, as she took a step back, wondering how much distance she could put between them, and if it would be enough to give her a decent head start.

“I have a good people sense and you don’t strike me as a criminal, but you were engaged in a criminal activity, so naturally I’m curious.” He straightened suddenly and in the blink of an eye was somehow right next to her.

Literally. She blinked and he was right there.

She caught her breath and stumbled. If he hadn’t steadied her, she might have tripped over her own feet. “How did you—”

He pressed a finger across her lips. “Those types of questions are boring, remember? We have more interesting things to talk about.”

“But—”

“What would you say if I told you I could get your bag back?”

Her brows drew down as she stared into his intensely blue eyes. She had a good view of them since they were nearly the same height, though he somehow still seemed to loom over her. There were only inches between them now. No chance of running.

She had to fight to keep from shrinking away. Never show weakness it just excites them, she reminded herself. “I’d say you were crazy. You don’t even know who did it.”

“Let’s say I could find out. Let’s say I could track them down, get the bag back and deliver both of you to your destination safely. What would you say?”

The last thing she wanted to do was play a game of pretend. There was zero chance of those things happening. She sighed. “I’d say ‘thank you’ but it’s not possible.”

He regarded her quietly. There was an aura of introspection that made her feel like he could see her. Really see her, all the way down to the DNA. It was an uncomfortable sensation.

“I’m a man who can get things done. You might say I have a lot of power, which makes things like this fairly simple to solve. But…”

There was always a but. “But what? But I have to give you something first? Maybe a quick blow job for your trouble and then you’ll go fix all my problems?” Derision dripped from every word.

He burst out laughing. “Oh, you are a fun one. I like you. You’re… spicy.” He reached out and pushed the hood back off her head.

“Hey!” Her chin-length hair tickled the sides of her jaw as it swung forward. The brown waves were frizzy and tangled from the hoody, and because she hadn’t bothered to brush it since the day before.

She shoved the unruly front strands back, tucking them behind her ears. “If you’re checking out the merchandise, don’t bother. I’m not going to fuck you because of a mythical fix. I’m not that desperate.” The yet was unspoken, because if she didn’t get that bag back, there was a good chance she would get that desperate and fast.

“I’m not asking you to trust me, Aline.”

She jerked and her eyes flew open wide. “How—” This time he didn’t need to cut her off, she cut herself off as soon as she started to ask and then fumbled trying to rephrase the question. “I mean… I-I never told you my name.” She paused, and then added, “Did I?” sounding unsure.

“You must have. How else would I know it?”

It was a fair question, and she couldn’t imagine any other answer. She had been fairly frazzled, so it was possible. “Oh. Yeah, I guess.”

He drew a deep breath in through his nose, leaning closer to her as if… smelling her. “Come on. After that long run, you look like you need to sit for a few minutes. We can talk in there.” He jerked his chin towards the large wrought iron gates behind them.

She turned, frowning. The columns they’d been leaning against were actually part of the massive gate, but she hadn’t noticed. “What’s in there?”

“It’s just a cemetery, but it’s quiet and we can talk.”

Sure, because going into a dark cemetery with a strange man was a good idea. Not to mention the creep factor of all those graves. “Uh, no thanks. I’ll pass. Besides, it’s locked.”

“No, it’s open, look.” He pushed and with no effort the gate swung inward smooth as butter and without a sound. “I give you my word I’m not going to harm you. I’m not trying to get you off alone so I can attack. I’d just like to be comfortable while we talk.”

Aline shouldn’t have trusted him, but somehow, she did. He was also right, her legs were killing her and she desperately wanted to sit. “Okay.” Besides, it wasn’t like the street was filled with people. If he really wanted to hurt her he probably could have just done it on the sidewalk.

He went through the gate, walking down the center of a wide gravel lane lined with gravestones. Apparently he was confident that she would follow, because he didn’t look back to see if she was. After a few more seconds of waffling, she did.

The atmosphere seemed to change the moment she stepped through the gates. Even the night air smelled different. There was a crispness to it that had nothing to do with the cool October temps.

She shivered. “It’s creepy in here. Pretty sure this is how a lot of horror movies start,” she said. Her voice came out low, almost a whisper, as if she’d been muted by the location.

“Maybe, but you’re safe with me.” There was absolute confidence in his voice, and somehow she knew it was the truth.

She looked around slowly. The path was fairly well lit with a series of ornate light poles. The smaller graves were closest. Beyond them were larger marble boxes and then further back, almost vanishing in the dark, were elaborate stone houses. Crypts? She wasn’t sure what they were called exactly.

She’d never really been in a cemetery before, and it was weird that her first time was on Halloween. Probably would have been a good night to avoid them “Is there someplace we can sit? A bench I mean.”

She eyed one of the long low marble boxes. She was pretty sure it had a body in there and sitting on someone’s grave had to be bad luck.

“Right here.” She looked over at him and blinked. He was sitting on a fancy stone bench. It was strange because she hadn’t noticed it there just a second ago. It was probably the stress getting to her.

She moved over and sat down, careful to keep some space between them. “This looks like a place to bury rich people,” she commented. Not that she’d know the difference, but it just had that fancy feel.

He looked around. “I like places to have a little touch of class. And the location seemed appropriate for the night.”

The implication that he’d chosen this place, instead of just finding her outside the gates by chance, raised goosebumps on her arms. She could feel all the little hairs standing up. “I think it’s creepier because it’s Halloween.”

He laughed. “Do you? The dead are harmless. It’s the living you have to watch out for. I would have thought you’d realized that by now.”

He… had a point. She’d never been bothered by ghosts or zombies but live people had caused her no end of stress. “Yeah, that’s fair.”