Chapter 8

Rurick

Sneaking out of a building surrounded by mobsters with a cockstand in your pants was not exactly easy, but somehow I managed. The scent of my mate's arousal still filled my senses, overpowering the nasty scents of the trash-laden alley in which I'd parked my hovercycle. I had a feeling I knew exactly how they'd figured out where I was and it pissed me off big time. Nobody messed with my bike, and nobody was allowed to mess with my mate either.

The sensor data coming in on my com device told me the two heat signatures that had been guarding my vehicle had left. Since I didn't think Agosta's goons would give up that easily, there were only two options that made sense. Either they'd been pulled away to observe from a distance, hoping to draw me out. Or they were about to do something really bad and they'd rather not stick too close and risk getting caught in the fallout. My credits were on the latter option so I hustled Lexi out of the building in front of me, keeping her much smaller body sheltered with my own.

"This way," I said, and I rushed us to my bike. She recognized it immediately and rushed for the safety it provided. At the last moment, I caught her wrist and yanked her back, "Wait, I need to check if they didn't booby trap it." The shielding on my hover-cycle was very good, but you never knew. In my line of work, it paid to be extra cautious.

It was the work of a moment to run my scans and then disable the explosive device hooked up with a motion sensor just in front of the bike. It was a clever way to take me out without actually messing with the shield on my bike. It worried me a little more that I'd also found a tiny tracker, this wasn't a cheap device either. It was again made to circumvent the tamper shielding on my vehicle. Instead, it was given a target and then hovered after it. It only worked up to a certain speed and they'd banked on me staying within the city limits to stay under it.

"Clean," I declared when both devices were gone. I helped her onto the seat, stowed her bag, and then the two of us were rising into the air. I swung us in a wide circle around her apartment building, keeping my lights off and our speed low to avoid detection. My scanners worked overtime to record everything, my eyes piercing the dark to see where those dirty Gracka had scuttled off to.

A sonic boom shook the building and rocked our ride. Lexi gasped and clutched her fingers into the arm I'd curved around her middle. She wasn't used yet to my hover-cycle and its shielding, didn't trust that she could never fall. "I can't believe it, I think they blew up my apartment…" she muttered, and pointed at one of the windows along the side of the derelict building. Smoke and flames were billowing out of it but no alarm was ringing.

"Good way to destroy evidence. They are covering their bases in case you hid those files in your home somewhere." I might have done the same if I'd been in their position, but these two bombs explained why they'd moved away. Just to be sure, I'd take the long scenic tour around the city before I took Lexi to my ship.

"Do you think everyone will be okay?" Lexi asked, and her question startled me. I had not even considered the collateral damage but there was sure to be some at a location like this. People in hovels such as these were often stacked far too close together, with no safety features or working fire exit and suppression systems. It would take a while for the fire department to respond too, if they even would.

I shrugged, "Probably not. They wouldn't care about such casualties." Because I sensed that my answer upset her, I added more quietly, "I'm sorry." I doubted she knew a single person in that building or had even wanted to interact with any of them. Lexi was still far softer and kinder than I was, I should take care to remember that.

She was quiet the rest of the ride, and even the sight of my ship did not really spark her interest. Too bad, Striker was a magnificent little ship, and it had been home for the past couple of years. I felt the odd urge to check if I'd left any dirty laundry out when I'd parked the hover-cycle in the hold and started leading her into the living area. My lips firmed as I checked the urge, she was my mate, she wouldn't care about a little mess.

Inside the small living space, located directly behind the pilot area, Lexi stopped in her tracks and spun around to get a good look. "So this is how a killer for hire lives?" she asked, her eyes lingering on the racks of weapons on one wall and the training dummy set up in the middle of the limited floor space.

I huffed as I tossed her bag of things onto my bunk at the back of the space, "Assassin, thank you very much." I grinned to soften my words and she smiled, as I'd intended. Then her eyes dropped down to the rumpled sheets on my bed and lingered there. I really hoped she was imagining us tangled together there like I was. At this point, my balls were turning blue and that was quite the feat considering my golden skin.

To distract myself I moved to one of the wall cabinets and started mixing us some drinks. Then my stomach rumbled and I figured I'd heat up some meals too, all this excitement had left me famished. I was dishing it all out on the fold-out table when Lexi came over to help. "We should turn those files over to the police. If that mobster wants them so badly, they are probably incriminating."

I balked at that idea but fought down the urge to bark out a no. "No," I said and winced, so much for trying to suppress that. She didn't know my world and what she was proposing wasn't something you did, if I ratted out all my contacts I'd be out of work real quick. Not to mention that they could turn on me just as easily when they figured out what I'd done.

She glared from over her steaming plate of undecipherable stew, chewing fiercely while she stared back. "That mobster tried to have me killed, it's the least he deserves. Besides he's a really bad guy, he should be taken off the streets."

Her first argument almost made me agree but the second made the skin on the back of my neck itch. "I'm a bad guy, do you think I should be executed by your corrupt UAR police too?" I asked gruffly. I didn't really think that she'd say yes but a part of me feared it anyway.

I had no illusions about what I was, I didn't feel bad when I took out a target. I didn't feel bad about the collateral damage we'd left behind in that explosion either. I knew I probably should, but I just didn't have that capacity. My brother would have agonized about it, maybe run back into that building to try and save them. Not me, not unless I had a good reason… Like my mate asking me to do so.

I froze when I lighted on that particular thought and raised my eyes from the food I was holding to my mate's eyes. She shook her head, "I don't know if you're a good guy or a bad guy Rurick. I just know that you're good to me. I guess that's the important part, isn't it?" Damn right it was.

"I'll always be good to you, Lexi," I swore but this emotion-laden situation kept making me uncomfortable, which I hated so I deflected with a joke. "Why don't you come to bed with me and I'll show you just how good?" I pointed at my bunk with a grin, but while kind of joking, I fervently hoped she'd say yes.

She blushed and ducked her head, a curtain of her hair sliding forward over her shoulder to hide her face. I thought it was endearing that she was shy now, after I'd already made her sing for me twice. After she'd come on my tongue and my cock a few times, she wouldn't be this shy I imagined.

"I can't believe I'm sitting here, in the home of an assassin, being propositioned by him… What a crazy adventure." She mumbled the words to herself so I didn't think she wanted an answer, then she raised her pretty eyes to mine and said more directly, "You think I'm crazy to be here? That I trust you somehow?" She shook herself, "I feel like there's something wrong with me. Like my danger meter is broken."

I huffed out a laugh, not in the least offended. All her words just showed me that she felt the mate bond between us as much as I did. "You're ‘danger meter' is not broken because I would never hurt you, Tally." I was more deliberate this time in calling her my beloved mate in my native tongue, a word that did not translate properly by most translator implants. She'd find out why I called her that soon enough.

She stared at me with a frown on her face, and I met that look with my own calm one. I felt settled knowing she instinctively trusted me this much, and it helped that her body responded to my every touch too. "Okay, then do this for me. Anonymously drop off those docs at the police station. Maybe once Agosta is taken care of, I can return home."

It didn't really sound like she meant those last words, but they still made me bristle. "You are home. My home is your home." I shot to my feet and tossed my empty plate in the recycler with a clang. She was my mate, she shouldn't even want to leave. I had rescued her, and her home was blown to smithereens, why would she want to go anywhere but stay here with me?

"I'm not some stray pet you can adopt!" she shot back just as fiercely. My blood heated at the sound of that spark, it was sexy. Not many people liked to go up against me but Lexi did, even knowing what I was. When I turned to look at her she surprised me, she'd walked up on silent feet and had raised a hand to poke my chest. "If I want to leave, I'll damn well leave. You understand?"

I opened my mouth to tell her no, that if I had to, I'd tie her to my fucking bed to make her stay. But just as quickly my mouth clicked shut, and then what? If anyone did that to me, I'd hate their guts, and I'd find a way to end their life. Normally, I didn't really consider what my actions meant to others, at least, not whether they'd make them happy or not. But with Lexi, I did care. I couldn't keep her in a cage any more than I'd let another do that to me. Never mind the fact that I'd happily let her tie me to her bed.

"I understand," I finally said, which, as it turned out was the right answer. Her expression softened and that poking finger turned into a pat on my pectoral instead. Then she pointed at the folder of papers the mobster was after that poked out from her pink purse. She raised a single eyebrow and I sighed; she was going to keep insisting on doing the right thing. "Alright, but we'll do it my way. I'll give them to a contact at the press. Yeah?"