Barefoot, Mari ran.

Heels were no good for this sort of running, so she’d ditched them. She had hard feet. She’d survive.

Adrenaline coursed through her body as she fled, pushing bystanders aside. Her heart hammered in her chest, and everything in the Glory Strip became hyper-real as time seemed to slow before her very eyes.

The lights were brighter.

The music was louder.

The air was charged with wild, frenetic energy.

Disappear.

She had no choice. If he caught her…

She was screwed. She understood that now.

She’d fucked up. Miscalculated. Maybe desperation had scrambled her instincts. The weird looking guy with the mysterious disguise was dangerous, possibly even more dangerous than the usual criminals and cutthroats that lurked in Darkside.

His grip had been unbreakable, and the ease with which he’d detected her subtle, thieving hand…

Scary.

Even though she’d used all her powers to try and distract him, he’d caught her. Even though she’d felt his massive erection as she rubbed up against him, he hadn’t lost control.

Those strong fingers had closed around her wrist like a steel clamp, and she got the feeling he could have snapped her bones if he wanted to.

She shuddered.

Her marks usually didn’t know what had hit them until she was gone, but this one was different.

As sharp as a fucking blade. As hard as Jentian stone. Swift. Angry. His voice ringing with authority. Who the hell was he?

No, scratch that. She didn’t want to know. Guys like that, you left alone.

Mari slipped the pendant into her belt-pouch as she ran, weaving and darting between startled onlookers. What kind-of stupid impulse had made her take the thing, even after she’d been caught?

Desperation, that’s what. She might never get an opportunity like this again.

The risk she’d taken had to be worth it. As soon as she spotted the necklace, she’d known it was valuable.

Black metal. There was nothing like it on Earth. This was alien metal, and so finely wrought. A ripple of anticipation shot down Mari’s spine. Alien artifacts were hot commodities on the black market, some selling for astronomical prices at auction. Maybe this was the score she’d been waiting for; an item so valuable she could pay off her inherited debts and get the Collector off her back.

But first, she had to get away from the scene of the crime.

Hurry! Get out of the way!

A man swore in English as she accidentally elbowed him in the side. A woman yelled profanities at Mari as she knocked a porter-bot, sending a box of fruit crashing to the ground.

She didn’t care. She had to get out of here and into the Dust Alleys. Once she entered the slums, nobody could catch her, because she knew that place like the back of her hand.

Mari risked a quick glance over her shoulder. Behind her, there was a slight gap in the crowd. A tall figure was closing in on her.

Shit. Are you fucking serious?

She lengthened her stride, her long legs eating up the pavement as she sprinted past Entropy, the Glory Strip’s most notorious club. Deep bass beats reverberated from within its walls, mimicking the frantic staccato of her pulse.

Keep moving.

Mari leapt over a pavement-crawling surveillance-bot. She dodged a low-flying camera-drone. She blinked as a holo-advertisement for some sort of weight-loss remedy played above her head, the animated figures seemingly suspended in thin air.

Her breathing was rapid and shallow, and her chest felt like it was about to burst, but she didn’t slow down.

Keep moving.

All she had to do was find an exit.

There.

Mari made a hard right and shot down a narrow alley. Her bare feet splashed through a puddle of something cold and foul smelling, but she didn’t relent. If her memory served her correctly, this alley led to a street full of loud-mouthed food vendors serving a wide and mouth-watering selection of Earth cuisine.

A side-route would take her through the Offcuts Market, and from there, she’d find the western edge of the Dust Alleys.

For fear of slowing down, she didn’t dare look back again. Somehow, she just knew that Mister Tall, Dark, and Brutal was behind her.

And if he caught her…

She shuddered and tried not to think about it as she fled through the crazy, winding backstreets of Darkside, where life balanced on a knife’s edge, and everything was unpredictable.