Ashes to Ashes

The toe of his right shoe got hung up in the pedal clip and his body jerked wildly sideways as the car pushed the bike forward.

The fence bit into his fingers as the bike tried to drag him. It felt like his arms were being torn out of their sockets, that his foot was being wrenched off at the ankle—then suddenly he was free and falling.

He landed on his back on the cracked asphalt, rolled, and scrambled up onto his knees, his eyes on the car as his bike went under the back tire and died a terrible death.

His only transportation. His livelihood. Gone.

He was on his own. On foot. And one foot was missing a shoe. Pain burned through his wrenched ankle as Jace pushed himself to his feet and ran for the buildings before the car could come to a complete stop.

The voice of his survival instinct screamed through his brain. Go go go!!!

He was young, he was fast, he was highly motivated. He set his sights on a half wall blocking the space between two buildings. He would hit it running, vault over the side, and be gone. Bum ankle or no, he could damn well outrun the asshole driving that car.

But he couldn't outrun a bullet.

The shot hit the Dumpster a foot to Jace's left almost simultaneously as he heard the report.

Fuck!

He had to get over that wall. He had to get over it. Get over it and run like hell.

Footfalls were coming hard behind him.

The second shot went wide right and hit a Dumpster.

A man shouted, “Fuck!”

Too close. Too close.

Footfalls coming hard behind him.

Jace launched himself at the wall and was summarily yanked backward as his pursuer grabbed hold of the messenger bag he wore strapped across his back.

He fell back into the man, and momentum carried them both backward, their feet tangling. The predator's body cushioned the fall as they went down. Jace scrambled to get his feet under him, to wriggle away. Predator hung tight to the messenger bag.

“Fucking little shit!”

Jace swung an elbow back, connected hard with some part of the guy's face. A bone cracked nearly as loudly as the gunshot had, and for a split second the bastard's hold let loose and he cursed a blue streak. Jace ducked down and twisted out of the bag's strap and lunged again toward the wall.

Predator grabbed hold of the back of Jace's rain slicker with one hand and swung at him with the other. The Dollar Store rain poncho tore away like wet tissue. The butt of the gun glanced off the back of Jace's helmet. Stars burst bright before his eyes, but he kept moving.

Over the wall! Over the wall!

He hit it running, scrambled up and over, and tumbled ass over teakettle as he landed, rolling through mud and muck and garbage and water.

The canyon between the buildings was pitch black, the only light at the end of the tunnel the dim silver glow of a distant sodium vapor lamp. He ran toward it, never expecting to reach it, expecting to feel the thump and burn of a bullet passing through his back, tearing through his body, ripping apart organs and blood vessels. He would probably be dead before he hit the ground.

But still he ran.

The bullet didn't come.

He broke out of the alley, turned left, and raced along the fronts of the dark buildings, jumping shrubbery and low walls of tired landscaping. As he landed on the other side of a row of scrubby juniper bushes, the bad ankle buckled beneath him and he fell, gravel tearing at his hands as he tried to break the impact. He expected footfalls coming behind him, another shot aimed at his back, but no one was coming yet.

Panting, dizzy, Jace struggled once again to his feet and stumbled forward. At the next break between buildings, he ducked back into the cover of darkness to hide like a wounded animal. Halfway down the side of the building he stopped and fell against the rough concrete wall, wanting to puke, afraid the sound would draw his predator and get him killed.

Doubled over, he cupped his hands over his mouth and tried to slow his breathing. His heart felt like it would burst through his chest wall and flop out onto the ground, bouncing and twitching like a beached fish. His head was spinning. His brain felt like it was swirling around in a toilet bowl, ready to be sucked down the drain.

Oh God. Oh my God.

The God he didn't believe in.

Someone's trying to kill me.

Jesus H.

He was shaking violently, suddenly cold, suddenly aware of the winter rain pouring down on him, soaking his clothes. Pain throbbed and burned in his ankle. A sharper pain pierced his foot. He felt along the bottom of his wet sock and pulled out a sliver of broken glass. He sank down into a squat, hugged his arms around his legs as he leaned against the wall.

The two-way was still strapped to his thigh. He could try to call Base, but Eta was long gone home to her kids by now. If he had a cell phone, he could call the cops. But he couldn't afford a cell phone, and he had no faith in the police. He had no real faith in anyone but himself. He never had.

The dizziness was swept away by a wave of weakness, the wake of the initial adrenaline rush. He strained to hear past his own breathing, past the sound of his pulse pounding in his ears. He tried to listen for the sounds of pursuit. He tried to think what to do next.

Best to stay where he was. He was out of sight and had an escape route if his assailant did flush him out. Unless there were two of them—assailants, plural. One on either end of this tunnel and he was cooked.

He thought of Ty, who would by now be wondering where he was. Not that the kid was sitting alone somewhere, waiting. Tyler was never alone. A brainiac little white kid living in Chinatown and speaking fluent Mandarin sort of stood out. Ty was a novelty. People liked him and were bemused by him at the same time. The Chens treated him like some kind of golden child sent to them for good fortune.

Still, the only true family the Damon brothers had were each other. And that bond of family to Ty was the strongest thing Jace had ever known. It was the thing he lived for, the motivation behind everything he did, every goal he had.

Gotta get out of here.

Footfalls slapped on pavement. Jace couldn't tell from where. The alley? The street? He made himself as small as he could, a tight human ball tucked against the side of the building, and counted his heartbeats as he waited.

A dark figure stopped at the end of the building, street side, and stood there, arms slightly out to his sides, his movements hesitant as he turned one way and then the other. There wasn't enough light to make out more than the vague shape of him. He had no face. He had no color.

Jace pressed his hand against his belly, against the envelope he had tucked inside his shirt for safekeeping. What the hell had Lenny Lowell gotten him into?

The dark figure at the end of the tunnel turned and went back the way he had come.

Jace waited, counting silently until he decided that the predator wasn't coming back. Then he crept along the wall through scraps of trash and puddles and broken glass to the alley, and cautiously peered out. A Dumpster blocked his view. He could see only one section of taillight glowing like an evil red eye in the dark some distance down the alley.

His bike lay crumpled on the ground somewhere behind the car. Jace hoped against hope the frame wasn't bent, that maybe only a wheel had been mangled. He could fix that. He could fix a lot of damage. If the frame was bent, that was something else.

He could hear Mojo now, telling him the bike was cursed. Mojo, the tall, skinny Jamaican who had dreads down to his ass and wore the kind of black wraparound shades meant for blind people. Mojo was maybe thirty, an ancient among the messengers. A shaman to some. He would have plenty to say about that bike.

Jace had inherited the thing, in a manner of speaking. That was to say, no one else would touch it when it