“Ten-four.” Things moved around in Amos’s hidey-hole as he maneuvered his weapons.
I raised my voice. “Asshole!”
Jagger walked around the corner of the building, a warrior ready for anything. He drew his weapons and stood with his back to the side of the business office. I didn’t see the henchmen. Didn’t mean they were taking naps. Didn’t mean I wasn’t being targeted.
Cupcake appeared, Marty close behind. Mateo told me where the two tailers were planted, and I bent under the diesel’s running board for the first one and stopped at the rig’s back tires for the second one. I stared at Marty and rattled the tailers in my closed fist. “Marty, Marty, Marty,” I said, sounding sad, staring at him as I let my anger free.
Cupcake stepped into the cab and removed her handgun from the side pocket. Cats, sensing problems, came from everywhere. Two hurtled into the cab. The others scattered around, hunting, hiding.
Still sounding sad, I said, “You planned to use these tailers to track me? Take back all the items?” My voice got hard. “Go back on our deal? Maybe turn us over to the MS Angels?”
He raised his hands, all peaceable. “Ms. Smith, I’d never do such a thing. And I’d never do business with a gang.”
I caught a vision from Spy. The two armed men were on the roof of the storefront. They were pointing weapons at us. I sent back a vision of Spy and some of the clowder leaping on top of the men, clawing, and taking a bite out of what skin was available. Instantly my vision scrambled into fractions of activity.
From the roof, a gunshot and a human scream rang out. Cat yowls. More screaming.
Marty froze at the sight of my blaster, suddenly in my hand. I was holding on to the truck cab with my other hand, dizzy, but not showing it.
Two dogs came running, all teeth and attitude, slavering, mistreated, trained to attack. I didn’t have nonlethal weapons on me, but being pulled down and mauled wasn’t on my dance card today. With my free hand, I pulled a handgun and aimed it at the closest dog.
A cat soared from the truck cab onto the dog and clawed in, biting down on his ear. The other cat landed on the second dog’s nose.
I turned my extra weapon to Marty, who was, by now, pointing a semiautomatic at me.
The dogs raced off, yelping. The cats disappeared.
“Oh, Marty,” I made some littletskingsounds, my heartrate speeding, my breathing deepening.
The woman, Wanda, stepped from the office, quick like a snake, and shoved a weapon into Jagger’s side. In my exact tone of voice, she said, “Oh, Ms. Smith.”
They thought they had us.
Faster than human, Jagger stepped in a sinuous “S” shape around her weapon. He batted her gun away and snatched her in front of him, his nine-millimeter at her chest.
Marty swung his weapon to the woman and back to me, his mouth slightly open. Scant seconds had passed since the start of the attack. I smiled again, the nasty smile.
Spy sent me a vision of two men on the roof, scratched and bleeding, their weapons to the side. One of the men was crying, a hand over his eye. I figured he had lost it. Med-bays that could reliably regrow an eye were few and far between.
I sent Spy a vision of her shoving all the weapons off the roof. I heard a little chuffing sound, and a semi-automatic landed in the dirt with a soft thud. A fully automatic weapon followed. I flinched as it fell, expecting it to fire. It didn’t. More weapons joined them.
“Put it down, Marty,” I said when everything went quiet. Marty bent to the ground, placed his weapon at his feet, and kicked it over to me.
“Who told you my name?” I asked.
Over comms, Mateo cursed softly, putting it together. He hadn’t caught Marty’s mistake.
Marty’s face twitched just a hair. “I’ve always known your name.”
I walked closer and leaned to him, sniffing, wondering if I could smell his fear. “Until today you knew me as Ms. Smith. That’s all you’ve ever known me as. But a bit ago you called me”—I took a slow breath, my nose at his throat—“Shining.” His pulse pounded in his neck. The sweat stink in his clothes was potent. “Tell me about Clarisse Warhammer.”
He couldn’t help his intake of breath. My skin caught a faint vibration of foreign nanobots in his sweat. That was interesting. I hadn’t known I could detect them that way.
“Did Warhammer come by, looking for me? Ask you some questions?” He didn’t react. “Did…” I stopped so close I could feel the damp heat of his body. “Did you get an offer to capture my friend, Harlan, and send him to her?”
Marty flinched. Mateo’s cursing stopped. Jagger targeted Wanda’s head. She whimpered.
Marty’s eyes dilated and then constricted. Softly, so softly I wasn’t sure he’d hear me, I asked, “Did you give Harlan to Warhammer? Did you help her kill my friend?” My tone dropped lower. “Maybe give her my address? Send her after me?”
