“Why do you think I spent the last several weeks working my ass off eighteen hours a day to make that purse to your ridiculously demanding standards?”
The way he said it made her sound like a greedy harpy instead of a savvy businesswoman.
Luckily, the pang of guilt didn’t last long. “You’ll thank me for my high standards if I agree to do the job.”
“My offer is on the table. Do you want it or not?”
She wanted that purse and the knives. And if she was completely honest with herself, she wanted to kill every Fractogast she could get her hands on. Slowly.
The only downside was the risk. Not that she was risking much. The life she’d carved out for herself since Jeremy’s death hadn’t exactly been a happy, shiny place.
“Fine,” she told him. “I’ll help you. It’s obvious you’ll get yourself killed if I don’t tag along.”
Sarcasm honed a sharp edge on his tone. “I’m sure my death would cost you many sleepless nights.”
“I would mourn the loss of that purse. And the knives.”
“We can’t have that now, can we?”
“Nope.”
“So, you’re in?”
“All the way. But if you die doing something stupid, the purse is mine. Deal?” She held out her hand to shake on it.
Brighton wrapped his fingers around hers and held on tight. She felt warm, work-roughened patches of skin graze across nerve endings she’d thought long dead. A tiny little spark of feminine interest zinged along her palm and into her wrist, shocking the hell out of her.
How long had it been since she’d felt that? Too many years to remember, and every one of them had sucked.
Feeling like a dirty cheater, she jerked her hand away and wiped it on her thigh.
“I don’t have cooties,” he said, half grinning at her actions.
“You drive. I’ll follow behind on my bike.”
Well out of reach of Marcus Brighton and those magic hands.
Marcus spent the two-hour drive gathering his wits. Something he’d done had spooked Simone, and the last thing he needed was for her to be distracted on this job. Even if she did come up with some ingenious plan, they were still risking their lives.
He parked on top of a hill overlooking the industrial park where the Fractogasts worked. His windshield wipers cut through the fine coating of drizzle a passing rainstorm had left behind.
There were few lights below—only a red pool here and there dotting the darkness. Just enough for human eyes to function.
The passenger door of his RV opened and Simone glided into the seat next to his.
He made it a point not to look at her and distract himself with her beauty. Even so, the wild, spring-storm scent of her wrapped around him, demanding attention.
“This is the place?” she asked.
“Yes. I can feel the portal they’re building.”
“Handy trick.”
He spared her a quick glance. Her dark hair was pulled back and bound at the nape of her neck with a barrette. Power shimmered from the copper clip, but the trace was too small for him to figure out what kind of magic the hair adornment held.
“The device is nearly complete.”
“How nearly?” she asked.
“No way for me to be sure. Days? Hours?”
“Give me a minute to scout the place out. When I’ve found a way in, I’ll come back for you.”
She already had the door open before he grabbed her arm. Hot leather and firm, feminine muscles teased his hand, forcing him to fight the urge to let his fingers wander. He’d spent thousands of hours touching leather, enjoying its texture and suppleness, but never before had any surface intrigued him half as much as what lay beneath her biker’s jacket.
Simone stared at his hand as if she couldn’t believe he’d dared to touch her.
It took him a second to steady his voice so it wouldn’t come out as a prepubescent squeak. “Do you think I’m an idiot?”
“Your willingness to restrain an armed woman seems to support the theory.”
He lifted his hand, but settled it on the back of her seat—close enough to stop her if she tried to bolt again. “You weren’t going to scout. You were going in there alone.”
A smile twinkled in her smoky green eyes and curled at the edge of her mouth. “Guess you’re not an idiot.”
“We go in together. You’ll never be able to pick out the hammer from all the other tools. And what if there’s something else in there that’s important? Something powerful? Can you sense innate magic within an object?”
“My skills tend to lean more toward sensing monetary value.”
“Money means nothing to the Fractogasts. Only power.”
She glanced away, and he saw her slender throat move as if choking back unwanted emotion. “We should go if we’re going to do this. We need the cover of darkness. The human shells don’t have great eyesight, and slipping by them is our only chance at getting in undetected. If you’re going in with me, I’ll need to know how to hide you.”
He held out his hand, palm up. “Take my hand. When you activate the invisibility power, I’ll vanish, just like your clothes and everything else attached to you.”
“That’s it? That’s the big trick?”
Marcus shrugged. “Touch first, activate second. If you weren’t such a loner, you would have already figured it out by now. Not my fault.”
“Are you any good with weapons?”
“Just one. It’s in the back.”
“Then get it. If things go bad, you’re going to need it. While you do, I’m going to set up our safety net.”
“Safety net?”
She waved away his question. “It’s a need-to-know kind of thing, and you don’t.”
“Just hurry up. We’re running out of time.”
3
Simone couldn’t help but think of her dead husband as she scouted for the best entrance. The building below was crawling with human shells—those drained of life. They shambled about, shuffling on failing limbs. Zombie puppets controlled by the Fractogasts.
Jeremy had been a shell just like them, and no matter how many times she told herself what she’d done would have been what he wanted, she still felt sick every time she remembered the feel of her blade slicing into the body of the man she’d loved.
A deep sense of loss flowed over her, leaving behind a fresh layer of anger. No matter how much time passed since that night, her rage never faded. Time was supposed to heal all wounds, but her brain must have been defective, because losing Jeremy hadn’t gotten any easier to bear. All she’d managed to do was hide it better. Shove it down. Pretend she’d gotten over it.
It was the only way to survive in her desolate new world, where everything that mattered had been ripped from her. Who wanted to hire a thief who was always just one heartbeat away from snapping under the strain of her grief?
Then again, maybe those who were desperate, stupid, or slimy enough to hire a professional thief didn’t give a shit how unstable she was so long as she got the job done.
