KNIGHT
Chapter 2
Alexia Raine stood frozen from fear or shock or disbelief, unable to move or scream as she stared down at the bloody heap that was her fellow surgical intern and boyfriend. For all of her training, she couldn’t even reach down to feel for a pulse. She only gaped at his eyes staring back—fixed, dilated, glassy.
Dead eyes.
Like him.
“Out of my way, kid.”
The disturbance jolted her out of that horrific memory and back to the present. She might’ve even thanked the obnoxious Cretan cutting in front of her in the Starbucks line for it, except the bulky, smelly man nudged in front of a teenager as well.
“Hey, you can’t cut in line!” the boy protested.
“I was here just a minute ago.”
It was the end of a grueling week medical assisting for her uncle who had a general practice in the outskirts of San Diego. She was just grabbing a vanilla latte before heading to her apartment a few blocks away. Now she wished she hadn’t even stopped at the coffeehouse.
“No, you weren’t,” the kid said.
“I was, and now I’m back. Get over it.”
Alexia might’ve let it pass like everyone else in line. Until the boy nudged his way ahead of the man who then physically shoved him aside.
“Hey, jerk face, leave the kid alone and go to the end of the line,” she yelled at him.
The man snarled back at her. “Shut up and mind your own business, girl.”
Her eyebrows shot up. “Look, Bad Grandpa, if you don’t step back, I’ll give you a shove in the right direction myself.”
“Just keep your godda—Arrh!”
His arms shot out as steaming coffee splashed down his polo shirt as a four-pack of Grande drips was dumped onto him.
“Oh, I’m so sorry!” the lady who lost her load raced out, frantically dabbing his shirt with a bundle of napkins. “Really, I don’t know—!”
“Just get off me!” he shot back, pushing her away.
Alexia should have felt bad for him, but the guy really deserved it. The look on his face was priceless too, making her snicker.
He splashed her with a rough shake of his arms. “What, you think this is funny, bitch?”
One of her worst traits—she didn’t take insults well. And no one called her the B-word who didn’t want to pick his dentures out of the glass entrance door.
Fury prickled her eyes and ears as heat flooded her face and radiated all the way through her veins and down to her fists now clenched at her sides.
“Have a nice fall on your way out,” she stated hard and deadly through gritted teeth.
Instantly the old man was airborne.
There was a thud and airy “oof” as he landed flat on his back in a puddle of coffee. Two seconds later he was yelling bloody-murder.
The baristas went into action, two picking up phones as the others circled around the counter. He thrashed about in his liquid mess like an overturned turtle while threatening legal action as a few do-gooders tried to help.
Panicking, Alexia shoved through the crowd as fast as she could, then locked herself in the restroom. Within seconds she vomited everything but her socks, the dry heaves leaving her flushed and sweaty.
Slightly better, she splashed icy water on her face, rinsed the sour bile from her mouth, then breathed deeply several times as she gripped the edge of the porcelain sink.
“Just a coincidence, Alexia. Not your fault,” she whispered.
Not that it alleviated her guilt any. Not that she had even touched the guy. So, of course, it wasn’t her fault. Of course not.
Just because she wanted to humiliate the old man for being such an obnoxious, entitled jerk and hot coffee happened to dump all over him at that very moment, it didn’t mean anything.
And okay, she also wished that he would fall on his butt after that nasty crack, and he did, hard, it didn’t mean…He probably just slipped on the wet floor. Just a coincidence, that’s all.
Unfortunately, Alexia Raine didn’t believe in coincidences.
And this hadn’t been the first time.
She squeezed her eyes shut for a long moment, then reopened them to look up at her reflection in the dim mirror, gasping at the swirling kaleidoscope of color in her irises—blue, green, gray, lavender, pink. She blinked hard and pinched her eyes until the weird prickly sensation calmed down. When she checked them again, they were light gray as normal.
Okay, what the Sam frigging Hill was that?
An optical illusion maybe?
Probably. Of course.
Brought on by stress mixed with bad fluorescent lighting and the dark walls all Starbucks stores insist on painting themselves to appear trendy.
Alexia leaned closer to the mirror for a better look when spotting another dark, silvery streak of hair, this one framing her right cheek. Added to all the recent others, it looked like she had highlighted her shoulder length blond hair.
The first one appeared six months ago, but the others started a few weeks back after her twenty-fifth birthday. Too minor an issue to ask her uncle about. Too weird to completely ignore though.
Her fingers touched the antique silver rose locket hanging on a thin tarnished chain around her neck, a family heirloom given by her mother on her eighteenth birthday.
“Always wear it against your heart,” Rebecca Raine told her when she opened the gift box. “Use it as a talisman, your protection from the blues.”
Her mom was always saying sentimental, Hallmark channel type of things like that. The locket was so old the two halves were fused together and wouldn’t even open. Still, it was kind of pretty, and it did give her a sense of security. She usually wore it underneath her clothing hidden from view, her secret armor against the monsters of this world.
Alexia stayed in the restroom a few more minutes until she heard the paramedics rush into the building. When she walked out and saw the man sitting upright on the ground, she almost felt bad for him. Until he angrily batted at the female paramedic, demanding only to be aided by her male partner.
Misogynistic old coot. Hope he broke his ass-bone.
The earlier crowd had thinned out now, the only reason Alexia considered still buying a latte before heading home. That’s when she spotted them—two very large, rough looking men, one redhead and the other with curly brown hair and a thick moustache. They were hovering at the furthest end of the store near the pickup counter.
She wouldn’t have cared much, but they were way out of place in their black leather jackets, black shirts, black jeans and biker boots. All they needed were the dark sunglasses to be classic Arnold Schwarzenegger Terminators. Sunny San Diego natives wore light, loose clothing, even in mid-April. Not that there weren’t tourists who soon reversed their error after sweating their family jewels off.
Somehow, though, they didn’t seem to be the typical Southern California visitors on a fun family vacay.
The two men continued to scan the crowd, their duplicate expressions serious, robotic. It was the redhead who froze when locking eyes with Alexia’s, and her stomach did an anxious backflip. He elbowed his partner, jutting his chin in her direction, and the other guy narrowed his dark eyes when honing in on her.
Just my imagination, Alexia told herself.
She looked over her shoulder, expecting to see someone waving them over to confirm her paranoia, but no one was there. She turned back to them. Both now had their bodies shifted away while carrying on a conversation.
Okay, fine. Maybe she had just imagined things. Wouldn’t have been the first time.
Her need for a latte vanished now. All she wanted then was to be home in her apartment a few long blocks away.
Quickly Alexia pushed out the front entrance, venturing a last look behind her shoulder. The two men didn’t move from their spot, both still talking, and she exhaled heavily, everything within her relaxing.
Good. She had enough drama for one night.
Quickly she headed down the twilight darkened street lined with various interconnected shops and cafés. Sometimes she walked to work as a way to force a little exercise on herself. Now she wished she had taken her car this morning, just wanting to be home. Behind a locked and bolted door. With a chair jammed against the knob.
She was only a few hundred yards away from the Starbucks when Alexia ventured a quick look behind. Her stomach dropped when both men exited and turned in her direction.
Swallowing hard, she faced forward again, picking up her pace.
Okay, no big deal. This wasn’t some cheesy action flick. They had every right to leave the building like everyone else. Even walk in the same direction. There were several pedestrians between them in any case, so no worries.
Still, her fingers lightly felt for the cellphone in her blue scrub shirt pocket, ready to call her Uncle Paul who was still at the office. She could casually double-time it back to the Starbucks and have him pick her up…
No. No, she really didn’t want to pull him away from the mound of paperwork he was rifling through before she left.
Plus, Aunt Carla would be majorly miffed at him for coming home even later than normal if he was forced to make a pitstop by her place. Alexia knew she was already a prime source of contention in their stormy marriage—his kid brother’s flaky kid he bailed out of jail and hired a lawyer for six months ago.
Things were better now that Alexia had moved from their place into her own apartment, but not by much. So she refused to inconvenience her uncle and possibly ignite another marital battle just to soothe her ridiculous imaginings.
Poor, sweet Uncle Paul. Alexia tried convincing him that he wasn’t responsible for her after her parents’ fatal car accident two years ago, but he took up the paternal mantle anyhow. Which is why after being forced to leave the intern program because of that horrific incident at the hospital, he took her in and offered her a medical assistant position that bored her to tears. Still, she didn’t look a gift job in the paycheck.
Alexia ventured another glance back.
Drat, those men were still behind her. Not far, in fact. Fewer pedestrians between them now as well.
“Stop it, Lex,” she murmured to herself.
This was so dumb. Logically she knew she wasn’t actually being stalked. She watched way too much television for her own good, the curse of being a single girl with a microscopic social life.
Fifteen seconds later, she checked behind her shoulder again. Red was now talking into his wristwatch, and Moustache held his right hand inside his half-zipped jacket like Napoleon Bonaparte.
Delusional or not, she decided to quicken her pace.
Mentally she went through a list of self-defense moves from a course she took last year—stomp on the foot, elbow in the gut, knee in the groin, thumbs in the eye sockets. If grabbed from behind, raise both forearms to break the attacker’s hold, then turn and go through the previous choreography of moves.
Then run like her eyebrows were on fire!
Of course, there were two guys, not one. How was she supposed to fend off both?
Great, how come those courses only practiced with one fake attacker?
Ugh, why didn’t she take her uncle’s advice and carry mace? She swore never to accuse him of being over-protective again.
Ten more seconds and another glance behind made Alexia’s heart jump to her throat. The distance between them had tightened again, their long strides fast and hard.
A blue van with darkened windows slowly trailed them along the now deserted street as well. Although that was probably just a coincidence.
But she didn’t believe in coincidences.
And she wasn’t about to become fodder for the ten o’clock news.
Fortunately, she knew her stomping grounds well and turned left down the next street, making a quick right at the second cross street. This led to the rear of an Italian restaurant parking lot that would circle around the stucco building and onto another lesser known avenue. You had to know it was there or would miss it entirely, and neither one of these guys looked local.
One thing you could say about San Diego—they never built anything in logical, intersecting lines.
Alexia exhaled heavily when reaching and jogging across the empty parking lot. The building had a hidden side walkway, and she pushed through the draping vines towards the entrance.
Breaking through the jungle, she relaxed when reaching the front of the restaurant, then ventured a thorough scan up and down the dark, quiet street. No sign of those men or anyone else. Great.
She was a little out of her way now, but she just needed to detour a few new blocks to reach the main drag that would take her home. And tomorrow afternoon she planned to drive to the local Army-Navy surplus store for a can of mace. Lesson learned.
She debated heading inside the restaurant for a while, somewhere public in the rare case of sighting those guys again, but the red neon sign read closed as were the rest of the nearby shops backlit by dim streetlamps.
Dang it, how late was it anyhow?
Headlights blinded her for a second as a car rounded the far corner. When the vehicle came into view, Alexia nearly stumbled off the curb. It was the same van with the darkened windows. Now driving straight towards her!
She double-backed around the walkway, viciously clawing vines out of her way. Once she was out, she sprinted across the parking lot.
Her right foot snagged a pothole, throwing her face forward, spread-eagle onto the rough, broken concrete.
“Ow, dang it!”
Groaning, she rose, wiping grit and blood off her stinging chin, hands and forearms. Her scrub pants were ripped and ruined as well, her knees skinned and bloody. So were her arms and palms that braced her fall.
One last glance over her shoulder, and she limped quickly across the rest of the lot, gaining speed until she reached the end.
At the same time the two Terminators rounded the street corner.
Gasping, Alexia drew up short, skidding and landing hard on her backside. She started to scream, but couldn’t find her voice.
“Good evening, Miss Raine. Could we have a word with you please?”
Red spoke with a quiet, clipped accent Alexia couldn’t place. That didn’t bother her as much as the fact that he knew her name, and their stalking her was no longer in doubt.
Wide eyed, she crab-crawled backwards until collapsing on her side.
“Do not worry, little one. We are all friends here. We will not harm you.”
Moustache’s snort confirmed what Alexia already sensed, that Red was a big, fat liar.
“You are hurt. Please, let me help you,” he added, his black gloved hand reaching out as he approached.
“One step closer, and I’m screaming for the cops!” she yelled, clamoring to her feet.
Moustache grinned. No one was around to hear her. Not that anyone was brave enough these days to help a damsel in distress.
She turned to run back towards the restaurant, then froze when another Terminator pushed through the walkway vines where the van must have dropped him off. Which meant she had been expertly herded. And caught.
Right then she knew exactly what prey felt like just before its hunters circled in for the kill.
Well, she wouldn’t go quietly into that great, good night, anyhow.
Alexia turned to Moustache. “Hey, pervert, if you’re so hard up to get a date, go swap STD’s with the pros walking the corner on Main Street!”
Red hiked his brows, smothering a grin. Moustache glared at her, gripping harder on whatever he held inside his jacket, muttering in what sounded like Russian or something similar.
Alexia’s stomach sank. Another bad trait of hers—she didn’t know when to keep her big, fat trap shut.
“Dimitri,” Red stopped him, raising his hand to halt whatever Moustache was about to do. He then turned a gentler expression to Alexia with half-raised hands. “We are all friends here, Miss Raine. No need to fear us.”
That’s what he thought, the dirty, stinking Ivan.
“Oh. Okay, thank goodness then. You kind of scared me there,” she said, feigning great relief.
“My apologies,” Red said, relaxing his posture. “If you would—”
Alexia turned and took off on a dead run towards the opposite alley.
Not a smart move in the movies, but she knew this one ended at an arcade that would still be open this late on Friday night. If the back door was propped open by an employee having a smoke, she could dart inside and dodge around the maze of noisy video games to the front entrance that let out onto a very public drag.
Red barked an order in Russian to the walkway Terminator as he and Moustache took off after her.
Only a couple of dim porch lights shadowed the dark alley, while their splashing footfalls and heavy panting echoed off the walls. Alexia screamed for help, but no one heard or bothered to open windows or doors to see what was going on.
Reaching the end, she skidded to a stop and yanked on the metal arcade door. Locked.
Panting hard, she wheeled around to face them. Both men halted a hundred feet away seeing that she was at a dead end, both thinly smiling.
For the first time Alexia finally understood the term “smelling fear.” It probably reeked off her from head to toe. She swore that both men lifted their noses and lustfully took it in, catching the acrid scent as sweet to them as maple syrup. An easy hunt with their prey cornered and helpless.
“As I said, Miss Raine, we only wish to speak with you,” Red said, trying again with the good-cop routine. “To give you information you would find very interesting. If you would please just come with us—”
“To your van with the blacked-out windows? Uh, no thanks.”
She dug into her shirt pocket for her cellphone, but it was gone. Must have slid out when she fell in the parking lot.
Her luck just kept getting better and better.
Red exhaled heavily, then nodded to his partner. Alexia’s stomach gripped at Moustache’s grin as he reached inside his jacket, this time pulling out an odd-looking gun. She was no weapons expert, but it looked like some kind of makeshift tranquilizer gun. Which meant…
Oh, holy crow!
Then something unexpected happened. Instead of being terrified as any smart person ought to be, something inside her snapped, and Alexia became inflamed furious.
Her eyes and ears and neck prickled with heat. Her hands balled to fists at each side as she gritted her teeth at them.
These guys had no right to do this, to chase her, terrorize her, kidnap her for whatever disgusting purposes she didn’t even want to know. It was evil men like them, like the Starbucks coot who thought they could bully and brutalize anyone weaker…
“Dimitri?” Red frowned at him, questioned something in his language.
Moustache growled obscenities as his hand holding the tranq gun vibrated harder and harder, rattling his gritted teeth as he slowly turned it towards himself. Alexia watched in morbid fascination as he seemed to fight against his own will, then yelled as he pulled the trigger, the dart jabbing him point blank in the neck.
The man blinked hard, staggered, then slumped to the ground, completely lights-out.
Red cursed, widening a stare at Alexia as he backed up a step. Three stunned seconds passed before he yelled into his wristwatch.
Alexia spun around and pulled on the steel door again. She pounded on it, screamed for help, then backed against it to face two more Terminators running towards them.
“Do not kill her!” Red yelled to them, hand raised to halt them. “We need her alive!”
They stood on opposite sides with Red at the spearhead. This was it. No way to escape these thugs, and Alexia was all out of options.
That’s when something…No, someone dropped from the night sky between them, blocking Alexia from her attackers.
He rounded his muscular shoulders, then widened a protective stance in front of her. The two men behind Red growled at him like vicious dogs.
“Walk away now!” her black-haired guardian warned in a dangerous tone that made even her spine tingle.
“Ah, Neil Duran,” Red shouted with a casual shrug. “We have not seen each other in many ages.”
“Not long enough. Back off, Talanov.”
“It is not as you believe. I am here to collect one of our lost strays. I am merely doing my job as you would under the same circumstance.”
“The woman isn’t yours to take. We have an inconvenient little thing here in this country called personal freedom. So back off now, I’m warning you!”
“You misunderstand,” Red said. “She is born of our pack and belongs to us as the law permits. You as well as I heard the council’s latest ruling in a similar case. Leave now, and we will forgive this political slight and remain friends, yes?”
Duran glanced back and locked stares with Alexia’s for a beat before turning back to Red with shaking head.
“She’s not going anywhere with you, Sasha. Leave before the rest of my enforcers take out your little collection squad. You’re well out of your territory, and it wouldn’t take much. Let’s not make this messy. I’d rather not do any cleanup tonight.”
Alexia peeked around her protector’s broad back. Red’s two followers checked around nervously.
“You are out of yours as well, Duran,” Red countered, stepping forward. “I think perhaps you do not have as many around as you claim.” He tilted his head, took another step. “I would wager on it, in fact.”
“Your funeral,” Duran said, shoulders hunched, body braced to attack.
“Or yours,” Red returned, jutting his chin to his men.
The two men tore off their jackets and hunched over, and their teeth enlarged into long, vicious canines that belonged to some lost species of sabretooth tiger. They growled as their eyes glowed amber and bodies shook violently.
Then they exploded into the most monstrous wolves in history and the thing of sweat-inducing night terrors!
On all enormous fours, they let out dual, vicious howls that dropped Alexia to her knees.
“Last chance, Duran,” Red warned, both his fists now sporting wicked-looking knives. “Give the woman to me, and no one will get hurt.”
Duran would’ve been wise to give in and hand her over to these monsters before his own life was endangered. Anyone would have. After all, he didn’t want to do any cleanup tonight, and no doubt this was going to get very messy if he didn’t comply.
He turned around and locked his dark gray eyes with hers, and for half a second Alexia thought he would do just that.
Then he smiled and winked.