Chapter 19

Akiss is a moment stolen from time. An all-too-brief moment, because time is jealous of anything that lets us slip through its iron claws.

"We should probably just..." I murmured.

"Hush." Noah kissed me back. "Hush."

If I was about to be tranked with some memory wipe drug, if I was about to lose this kiss...

I couldn"t stand the thought. I wanted to keep this moment forever.

Also, and I"m not gonna lie, I"d rather climb down under my own steam than get tranked and fall unconscious from thirty feet. The risk of career-ending injury was way too high.

On the other hand, we"d been holding our own better than anyone could have predicted. I hated the idea of just giving up and giving in. Why climb down into the open arms of an enemy we might be halfway to defeating?

When Noah slapped something into my open palm, my fingers curled around an unopened soda can. He"d cast his vote.

"You"re putting a lot of faith in me," I said.

"If you can KO two guys, you can do the hat trick."

The trouble was, neither of us believed I"d KO"d two guys. I"d maybe knocked out one guy. Something else was going on with the other one.

Also, the soda can had less than half the heft of the peaches. I rotated my arm like a pitcher winding up for the World Series.

But if Noah was game, so was I.

"It would help if we could bring him in a little closer."

"Sure. I"ll play kitten up a tree, afraid to come down." Noah was more like an owl in a tree waiting to pounce with claws out.

Our enemy didn"t need to know that.

"Guys, guys." When Noah raised his voice, he made it squeak like he was years younger. "There"s no need for all the threats."

"That thing about shooting you down?" came the callback. "Not a threat. A promise."

"See, that"s the thing. The very thing. There"s no reason in the world for that kind of thing."

"I"m not saying I want to shoot you down. I don"t. It makes my job harder if I have to drag your skinny asses down a tree and then down a fucking mountain. I don"t want to have to knock you out. You keep forcing me to do shit I don"t wanna do."

"What a prince among men," I said. "What an amazing moral code."

"All I"m saying is I never shot anybody who wasn"t crying out to get shot. And if there was ever a little shit crying out to be shot..."

"Stop. Please. Stop!" Noah was putting that squeak in his voice again. "Just stop already with the yelling. Listen." He took a loud (and, to me, rather fake-sounding) gulp. "I can"t climb down. All right? You happy now? You made me say it. I can"t. Not in the dark. It"s, um, all it takes is one wrong move. And now it"s all wet and rainy and all..."

"You proud of yourself out there?" I yelled. "You listening to this? He"s having a panic attack, and it"s all your fault."

"You have got to be fucking kidding me," came the voice.

"Pul-lease." Noah had a beautiful whimper. "All this shouting..."

"You hear that?" I yelled. "The more you scare him, the harder it will be to get him down this tree."

"These recriminations aren"t helpful," came the yell from below.

"Oh, did I hurt your feelings? Well, you know what? That"s too fucking bad. You"re the bad guy. You better get used to people saying nasty things about you."

"I do not accept that characterization of my actions. I"m not a bad guy. I"m a guy doing a tough job not everybody"s trained to do."

"Oh, for fuck sake," I said. "I"m not even believing I"m having that conversation with you. You"re a bad man doing a bad job. Give us a reason to come down this tree."

"I gave you a reason. If you don"t, I"ll blast you out. But it"s better for all concerned if you fucking cooperate instead of giving me all the college boy attitude."

"I want to come down, but I"m scared." Noah made another sexy little whimper. "Just set up a light so we can at least see what we"re doing."

"Right." The unseen man stretched the word into three syllables. "Let me get right on that. I"ll just set up a light right here so you fucking weirdos can see where to lob your fucking softballs."

"Fucking softballs." In no way was I sitting still for that one. "I play hardball all day long."

The guy snorted.

We had reached deadlock. In the silence, the rain started falling harder again. The pitter-patter of little raindrops was becoming a minor distraction here beneath the semi-umbrella of our broad-leaf tree.

I strained my ears. The other two guys continued to be creepily still. Maybe I really had knocked them out?

Noah started to whisper something, but I touched his bare shoulder. He went still.

We listened. The rain picked up even more.

Say I really had knocked out the first guy. Dropped him like a rock with a lucky shot. I still didn"t believe I knocked out the second. He"d screamed. Unconscious guys don"t scream, do they?

But he"d sure been quiet for a long time now. Had I broken something? A leg or even an ankle would keep him down for the count. So maybe his buddy gave him a painkiller, and now he was knocked out for the count too.

That might explain the weirdness, maybe?

It was raining harder again. Somewhere off in the distance, I heard a sound that might be thunder.

The night vision was probably getting shorted out again. I tensed as I scanned the area for a flash of light.

There.

Right there.

In all this dark, you couldn"t miss it.

I took aim with my final weapon.

And then the light swung up right into my eyes.

"Forget it, kid," he said. "Hit me again, and I"ll take you out right now."

I blinked against the light. Tried to tell myself he didn"t have a three-foot rifle aimed squarely at my center mass.

But he totally did.

"Recess is over, I"m tired of playing with you. Come on down. Nice and slow."