Jax held up the blanket, it was black with volcano ash. "It's an old soldier's trick. Doesn't always work, and if it doesn't then you're a sitting duck. But when you're fighting religious guards rather than proper soldiers, well, it seemed worth a chance we took."

"Show me," I said.

Gage pulled the blanket over him like a hooded cloak and then lay down on the volcano's slope. Knowing where he was I could make out the edges of the blanket, but if I hadn't been looking then he would have blended in perfectly.

"The fact that the volcano slopes are all ash helps," said Jax, adding, "you can get up now, Gage. A uniform surface to blend into. Plus, the ash is very easy to apply to the blankets."

One by one, Killian had ushered Norren soldiers passed him with their blackened blankets. When the coast was clear he had given a bird call and they stole a few feet up the slope then lain still till the next signal. They had stayed there, stock still, for hours, waiting either for the time to attack, or discovery.

"You could have told me," I said, pointedly.

Jax shook his head. "You'd have looked for us. We couldn't chance it."

I nodded. Truth be told, I didn't care how it had worked, only that it had.

In the back of a cart, appropriated from the abandoned Sudder camp, Sadie and I curled up together and slept. It was a sleep like none I had ever known, a sleep of honest happiness and contentment. I had done it. I had saved my friend - and all of the Chosen - and I had become an official citizen of Norren. I had a lifetime ahead of me of freedom and happiness. And love? What did I feel for those four men who had been my captors, my saviors, my friends and my lovers? Now, I had the chance to find out.

Back at Holm's Rest, we disembarked. I helped Clementine from the cart.

"I suppose you expect me to say thank you?" she said, snidely.

"No," I replied, smiling. "I expect you to be a total bitch. It's all I ever expect of you."

Why should I care? She would find herself a good Norren man who found her attitude appealing and maybe he could make a nice woman out of her. She wasn't my problem anymore.

"Where are we?" asked Sadie.

"We're home," I replied.

With Gage leading, I showed Sadie to her new room, right next to mine in the keep.

"Am I allowed to sleep?" she yawned.

"You're allowed to do anything you want."

Sadie considered this. "That'll take some getting used to."

I grinned. "You might think that, but, actually, it won't."

"Nice girl," said Gage, after we had left Sadie to sleep.

"She's the best person in the world," I said fervently.

We entered my room. My room. It was mine now. It was my home for as long as I wanted it. The whole thing still seemed like a dream.

"What will happen with the Sudder?" I asked.

Gage shrugged. "Who knows? We dealt them a blow today. Maybe that'll be enough for them to leave us alone and let us live our lives in peace. And if it's not, then we'll be waiting."

"What about all the people who still aren't free?"

"One thing at a time."

I nodded. You couldn't fix the whole world in a night. The manacles beneath the Sudder skin would not be so easily struck off. But I swore that I wasn't done trying. Everyone deserved to live the life the Norren offered. If that was what they wanted. That was the point, really; it was about choice. Here, you had one. You could do what you wanted.

Gage turned to leave.

"I don't have to wait outside the door this time." He smiled.

"Why don't you wait inside the door?" I suggested.

Gage looked at me, perhaps knowing what I meant or perhaps fearing that he was guessing wrong. To make things clearer, I looped my arms about his strong neck and kissed him, gently at first, then harder as I felt his mouth open in response.

"This is what you want?" asked Gage, as we edged closer to the bed.

"This is all I want."

I'm not sure when we undressed, if we undressed each other or ourselves, but somehow our clothes were gone and as I lay down on the bed I felt more naked than I ever had before. That seems stupid - naked is naked - and yet, somehow, I felt I had shed more than my clothes for Gage. I was finally free of all dissembling, all worry, and could be with Gage in honesty and love, without thinking about tomorrow.

Perhaps it was because of his size and strength that Gage was as gentle as he was, or perhaps there was simply a very gentle man hidden behind the rough, tough facade. Whatever the case, my body blossomed with a suffusing pleasure as his fingers and lips crossed my skin, lightly but intensely, making me whine with bliss. As his face disappeared between my spread thighs, I gasped at the touch of his tongue feathering across my Devil's Doorbell. How had I ever been content with rubbing it in the privacy of my bed, when there was all this it could do?

Gage teased me to a sweet orgasm and then, as I lay, my skin still tinged pink with arousal, he crawled up me, his cock, hard, long and very thick, hanging heavy beneath him and swinging side to side under the momentum of its own weight. I took hold of the thing, enjoying the excited feel of the blood pulsing through it, and guided him to my mouth. I sucked awhile, loving the salty virility of his flavor, then released him.

"Please," I begged.

Gage needed no more urging. He edged down my body and then lifted my legs so my ankles rested on his broad shoulders. In this new and interesting position, he pushed down the shaft of his erect member and plunged into the wet heat of my core.

"Oh..." I sighed as Gage stretched me beautifully about his thick member. He pushed in to my limit, his hips pressing against the upturned cheeks of my bottom - I gasped. He drew out slowly, seeming to take part of me with him, till just the pulsating head remained in my sweet tunnel - I moaned. Then back in at the same slow steady pace. With confidence and skill, Gage stuck to his slow rhythm, letting me feel and appreciate every inch of him within me. I lay back and basked in pleasure. It was different again. I had learned that sexual pleasure could be hot and fast, and fun and sharp and now I was learning it could be slow, so deliciously slow, filling you from the toes upwards until you could take no more.

I have no idea how long Gage made love to me like this, the strength of his cock never in doubt. But as my noises of indulgent satisfaction became keener and more despairing, he pushed my legs down from his shoulders and leaned down over him, his pace increasing. I wrapped my legs lightly around his undulating body as he took me to the crest of ecstasy.

"Oh, Gage, come with me."

And he did. It was the most undemonstrative orgasm I had enjoyed in my short sexual career, but was nonetheless blissful for that, as we seemed to dissolve into each other.

"Hey, Aleah, where've you... Oh." Adrien entered my room, followed by Jax and Killian.

Gage rolled off me, pulling a sheet over him while I turned red from embarrassment at being naked in a room with the four men who had introduced me to the joys of sex.

But the men just laughed.

"I wondered how long that would take," smiled Adrien. "Now, you've got the set."

"Well, we're not the only men in Holm's Rest," pointed out Killian.

"Aleah is a free woman," said Jax with a dark but determined look. "She is free to do what she chooses."

"I don't want any other men," I said. "I want... Well, this is Norren, where anything goes. I want all of you."

I did. I knew it now as surely as I knew my own name.

"When you say all of us?" Jax frowned.

I swallowed hard and then cleared my throat. "Shut the door." It was about time I took control.

The men looked about at each other for a moment. They were soldiers, they were used to living together, sleeping together, washing together. They had no qualms about seeing each other naked. What I was asking was something else.

Was it a step too far? Or would their love for me carry them.

Jax was first. He walked across to where I knelt on the bed. "You're sure this is what you want?"

With him this close I was surer than ever. "It is. Although," I took his hand and guided it to my ass, "it is very wicked of me."

Jax nodded. "Well, then."

In a single movement, he sat down on the bed and flipped me over his lap.

"Wow!" I squealed delightedly as his hand smacked against my backside.

I didn't care if what I wanted really was wicked or not, as long as it gave Jax a good excuse to spank me. Somehow, it mattered that there was a reason.

After six wonderfully painful strokes, Jax stopped and I felt a pang of disappointment. But I needn't have worried.

"Don't go easy on her," said Jax as he passed me across to Adrien.

Adrien followed that instruction well, his spanks coming in from a lower angle, targeting the soft undercurve of my bum.

Killian had already shed his clothes when I was deposited in his lap, his impressively long cock already hard. He went easier on me than the others, but he still made me squeal as he targeted those areas Jax and Adrien had already turned to burning scarlet.

After Killian's six, I crawled across the bed to lie across Gage, who held back nothing, spanking the wickedness out of my red bottom.

"That's twenty-four," said Jax, as Gage delivered a last stinging smack. "Let's round it up to twenty-five." He walloped by blazing rear end with all his might.

Part of me wanted him to round it up to fifty - a nice round number - but I was now surrounded by three very hard cocks - Gage was still in recovery - brought to full arousal by the spanking, and there were other things on my mind. I was not sure exactly how this would work, but I was eager to experiment.

I dived for Adrien's cock as he stood by the bed, sucking hard. To my delight, I felt someone coming up behind me, gently parting my legs. Moments later, Killian slid into me, setting up a strong thrusting rhythm. On an impulse, I abandoned Adrien and switched to Jax, gulping at his cock with long, deep strokes. I began to alternate between the two men, while Killian drove my hot tunnel towards its next orgasm. As the orgasm hit, acting on another impulse, I grabbed Adrien's cock and pulled it into my mouth alongside Jax's. The fullness of the two men's cocks inside my mouth pushed me over the edge and I came violently, writhing on Killian's still-pumping member.

As I let the two men go, I looked up and saw smiling surprise on their faces. I grinned back. Killian pulled out of me and I grabbed at Jax, pulling him to the bed, straddling him and sliding down his hard cock. As I began to ride him, I wondered how best to involve the others, but Adrien was ahead of me.

"You game for something new?"

"Always," I gasped as I bounced up and down on Jax's impaling cock.

"Go easy, Adrien," said Jax. His hands, which had been on my breasts, were now on my backside, prying the cheeks apart. I gave a little start as his finger invaded my bottom, but it was not an unpleasant sensation. Then, I felt Adrien dribbling saliva down the crevice of my backside and I realized what might be going on.

"Oh? Really?"

"If you don't want to..." Adrien began.

"No, I just didn't know you could... I didn't know you should..." Forbidden didn't come close to describing how the Caretakers would have regarded such an act. But that just spurred me on. "Go ahead."

Jax withdrew his finger and pulled my cheeks apart as I slowed in my bouncing rhythm to allow Adrien access.

"Ahh." Adrien gritted his teeth as he pushed against the tight entrance, and for a moment I could not imagine how this would be possible, but then, with a discreet pop, he was deep inside my ass.

"Ooh." I wasn't sure how it felt, at first. There was a stab of pain, the strange sensation of something going in through an out hole, and then. "Go on," I sighed, as wicked pleasure poured into me.

Based on the grunts and groans from behind, it wasn't easy work for Adrien to get all the way in, but he seemed to be enjoying it. I damn sure was. With Jax in my front and Adrien my back, I had never felt so wonderfully full, or so deliciously wicked in my life.

"Killian." I didn't need to say any more. Killian angled his cock down to my lips and I soon had his lovely, long shaft in my mouth.

"Looking good," said Gage, and from the corner of my eye I could see that his cock would soon be ready to join in. There were three men inside me, and the sinful ecstasy of it was making my toes curl. I wanted to test my limits. I wanted to test those of my male companions, as well.

I released Killian from my mouth for a moment. "Spank me."

I gulped Killian back in instantly, but the men had heard. Jax unleashed a stinging blow against my left cheek, managing to avoid Adrien's pumping hips. Adrien, better positioned as his cock sawed in and out of my stretched asshole, spanked the right, and I sucked furiously at Killian, driven on by the increased pleasure.

Jax came first and Adrien not long after, spurting their seed into both my holes. Their orgasms triggered mine and I writhed on my twin impalements, riding out the tidal wave of ecstasy.

Killian withdrew from my mouth as we all disentangled. I eyed his cock, still hard, and then Gage's, now back to fighting form. I had every right to be exhausted, but instead found myself exhilarated.

"Lie down, Killian."

Killian did as he was told, his swollen cock sticking up in the air. I clambered onto him, facing his feet, and guided his member to my bottom. We both gasped as his thick column pushed into my bottom.

"Gage."

Kneeling between my splayed legs and to either side of Killian's, Gage pushed inside my core and I kissed him as his broad member rubbed against Killian inside me. I giggled as he pushed forwards, so I lay back flat along Killian's body, with Gage on top of me, sandwiched between the two men. I twisted my head about to kiss Killian, then up to kiss Gage.

"Come on, boys, what are you waiting for?"

As the motions of love began again, I saw, off to one side, Adrien and Jax stroking themselves ready for the next bout. It was going to be a long, lovely afternoon.

Several hours of indulgence and excess later, we all lay on the bed, sated and exhausted. The number of permutations that can be achieved with four men was impressive and I figured we could keep going through the evening without repeating ourselves. In fact, we could probably keep going through the next week.

Or the rest of my life?

It was easy to focus on the sex because it was brilliant and so new and exciting. But the more time I spent with these men, the more I knew there was more. Love was as new to me as sex, but it was much more frightening. You put your whole self on the line with everything to lose. But there was no doubt in my mind that I was in love. With all four of them.

Was that allowed? In Sudder, no. But in Norren…

“I love you, you know,” I murmured. “All of you.”

“And we love you,” they responded as one, without pause, as if it was a given.

I’d known it. I shouldn’t have needed the words, and they shouldn’t have moved me as much as they did, but my throat went tight.

Looking back over the last few days, everything they had done had been a message of love. They were everything I wanted.

Well... Almost everything.

A gong rang outside and Jax lazily lifted his head. "Dinner. Better get some food onboard, otherwise, we won't have the energy for tonight."

He kissed me, and then Killian, Adrien and Gage followed suit.

As my men got up off the bed, I rolled over onto my stomach to look at them. "You know, Sadie is just next door."

They all looked round at me.

"She's as naive as I was when I came here. More so, probably. I want someone to teach her... All this. The wonderful reality of all the stuff she's been taught to fear."

"What are you saying? You want one of us to go with her?" Adrien looked genuinely hurt, and I shook my head furiously.

"No way in hells. You guys are all mine." That seemed to appease him, and I pressed on with a grin. "But if you’ve a mind to take on a new mission and help me find her some strapping young companions, perhaps…"

The men looked at each other, then at their commanding officer. Jax drew in a long breath.

"This squad has never turned down a mission. But if Sadie is anything like you, those poor bastards are in for the ride of their lives."

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Sonja Parish is the most lethal, ruthless vampire left on earth, and she's determined to use both of those attributes to find the men who took her foster sister and make them pay...precarious truce between humans and blood-drinkers, be damned. But when the Lawkeepers- a group of human males genetically engineered to match the strength of vampires- are sent to stop her by any means necessary, she will be faced with a terrible choice.

Kill the men she's growing to care for, or risk losing Layla forever?

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A con artist has to be flexible, able to think on her feet, and ideally, have nine lives. That’s why I make sure I’m always the cat and never the mouse. Until now, that is…

I’m walking down the street minding my own business—okay, fine, running down the street with a fat guy named Hank chasing me after a hustle gone wrong—and suddenly, I get pelted in the back of the head by a frog.

You read that right. Frog. Like…ribbit.

Trust me, I was as shocked as you are. And that amphibian-sniping was just the opener to a major shit-show starring yours truly as a modern day Joan of Arc and three sexy-as-hell demigods insisting that it’s up to me to save the world from the gods of old who want to see Earth razed and human kind wiped out.

What’s a girl to do besides saddle up and try to make this quest her bitch?

Chapter One

"I'm a cat person, myself."

I looked up from the pool table at the hulking man who had spoken and gave him my most polite “I've never heard that line before” smile.

To explain; my name is Caterina. I go by Cat. In my entire life, or at least since the age of sixteen, I have never been in a room full of guys without at least one of them stating that they were 'a cat person', usually in a tone of voice that suggests that they think this line alone should be enough to seal the deal with me.

I should probably have been grateful that none of them had mentioned ‘pussy’ yet. These are the everyday tribulations of a woman called Cat, and you might think I was showing admirable restraint by not breaking the pool cue across the head of this particular guy—whose name was Hank. Actually, I was kind of glad that Hank had said such a douchey thing, because I was about to cheat him out of his money, and I felt a lot better about taking money from a jackass than a nice guy. So, instead of smacking him over the head and kicking him in the gonads—I knew how to take care of myself—I smiled teasingly like I had never heard such a witty line, and was actually a little turned on by it. I had to keep Hank and his pool-playing mates onside by making them think that they had a chance with me. Keeping them distracted, and making out that I was dumb and ditzy made them overconfident.

All part of the grift.

“I hear you, Hank. I like a nice pussy myself."

Annnd, there it was. I barely managed to keep my eyes from rolling into the back of my head.

Hank’s rat-faced best friend was named Leon and he had the physique of an emaciated clothes horse. He wore a ridiculously tight T-shirt, apparently designed to show off a chest that looked like a bunch of wire hangers in a sack. I had taken a dislike to him on sight, which is something I don't like to do—you shouldn't judge people by their looks. It was a relief to learn that he was as dickish as his looks suggested.

Still, I smiled back as if this was the most romantic thing I had ever heard, and in my sexiest, most sultry voice, I whispered back, “I bet you do."

You wouldn't think that any man would be dumb enough to think I was actually flirting, but men have a blind spot when it comes to attractive women. If a good-looking girl pays attention to them then they will believe every word she says…a very useful thing to know in my line of work.

It probably sounds arrogant to describe myself as attractive, and it's not something I would have done when I was younger, but after spending the past ten years conning men on a daily basis, there was no denying that they seem to like the way I looked. Since I’d had no part in determining the symmetry of my facial features and my appearance was just the result of my parental units’ melding of cells or whatever, I was no more proud of it than I would be of inherited money. I had been fortunate enough to come out on the better side of the luck of the draw but I’d done nothing to earn it.

That said, I couldn’t deny that it made my work a lot easier, and for that, I was grateful. No point in looking a gift horse in the mouth.

I bent low, making sure both Dumb and Dumber had eyes on me, and took my next shot.

"Damn!" I muttered, then stamped my foot petulantly as the ball rebounded off the cushion. "I suck at this."

Hank scooped up the bundle of notes from the edge of the table and put an arm around me, sending up a waft of BO that made my eyes tear a little. "Never mind, sweetie. I bet you make up for it in other ways."

“Oh yeah? Like what?" I asked innocently.

Hank gave a knowing look to his mates around the table. “Maybe you can show me later."

They all chuckled, their expressions as oily as their hair.

Sometimes it was almost too easy.

That said, playing pool that badly is a skill. Being bad at pool is one thing, but you have to be very good to pretend to be convincingly bad.

Especially when you're as good as I am.

I downed a shot of tequila from a row set up along the bar, and tottered convincingly on my heels. Two other things you have to be good at when grifting; holding your liquor and pretending to be drunk. I’m pretty good at both, but I wish I was better at the former. Always room for improvement.

"You're not going to take more of my money are you, Hank?” I ask, wheedling. You've got to time the moment right; don't leave it so long that they've lost interest, or have become more interested in you than in the money. That could be dangerous.

"Sorry, darling," said Hank. "I know you've lost a lot this evening but a bet's a bet."

"My daddy's going to be so mad at me." I don't why the 'Daddy' thing works, but it does.

"I hope you learned something then," said Hank, playing the big man.

"That I suck at pool?" I sighed. "Give me one more chance to win my money back?"

"You got anything left to bet?"

I shrugged. "That depends. I don't have to bet money…do I?”

I watched Hank’s eyes to see the 'sure thing' bulb light up inside his head.

I sidled closer to him to seal the deal. "This way; whether I win or lose - I still get to win."

It's important to know that if you try this grift one on one, it doesn't usually work, but in a group of a certain type of man, it works one hundred percent of the time. And here's why:

"Hank, if you don't take her up on this, then I'm gonna!" Leon laughed.

I turned unsteadily to look at Leon. "For how much?"

Just like Hank's a minute ago, Leon's rodent eyes lit up and he fumbled for his wallet.

"Now hang on..." Hank began. “The lady asked me first.”

But the other men were now joining in. "I'll take a piece of that action."

"Count me in!"

I pretended to look concerned. "Guys, I'm starting to think you're taking advantage of me and my lack of skill."

Immediately, they all rallied round to reassure me; it was just in fun, just a bit of a laugh, and besides, I've been losing all night, I'm bound to win eventually and, really, I'm taking advantage of them for encouraging them to bet so much on a pool game that could clearly go either way and from which they didn't stand to win any money.

"Well..." I bit my lower lip, turning the matter over. "Okay."

The men cheered and a pile of money went down on the table. I had to wonder what they thought was going to happen if they won. But they were all drunker than me by this point and this was apparently fulfilling some nasty little fantasy for them.

"Rack 'em up," I said with a practiced, nervous giggle.

This was where things got tricky.

The most difficult thing in pool hustling is the final game. How do you make it look like anything other than hustling? The short answer is, you probably can't. No matter how accidental you make it look—and I'm pretty good at making a win look like an accident—they are still going to be suspicious. A lot of the time the men just don't want to admit that they've been hustled in front of their friends—especially by a girl—and so they let it go. That was best-case scenario and what I was counting on here.

Worst case?

I’d cross that bridge when I came to it.

The next twenty minutes went by in a blur of missed balls that mystically left my opponent without a clear shot of his own, peppered with a handful “lucky” shots that resulted in me winning the game.

I straightened as the eight-ball slipped neatly into the pocket and squealed with as much excitement as I could fake-muster.

"Look at that! I won! This is so cool."

I scooped the money into my bag then grabbed a bar napkin—because there is one thing you can do to make proceedings marginally less painful for a male mark. I scrawled a phone number on the napkin—I always use the number of a guy I knew in school who grabbed my boobs at a party one time—then kissed it, leaving a vivid impression of crimson lipstick.

I stuffed the napkin into Hank's hand and gave him a fleeting smile.

"This was really fun. Big fun, but I gotta go,” I added with a pout before holding my thumb and pinky to my ear in the universal sign for ‘phone’. “Call me."

I took another shot of tequila and headed out. Leaving the number and telling him to call me was always my exit strategy because it soothed the sting of things if they got to save face in front of their boys some. That said, in my experience, the effect wore off pretty fast when you've just taken a lot of money from them. Usually I had time to get to the end of the block, and that was all I needed. In my home territory of Brooklyn I have every escape route mapped out in my head. I knew the back alleys around the bars like I was brought up in them and I can lose anyone.

But this was the Flushing end of Queens and, while I did a scout around beforehand to get the lay of the land, it wasn’t the same. My foster brother, Remi, who was also my occasional partner in these ventures, told me it would be risky coming out this way, but I didn't think we had much choice. You can only grift the same area for so long before you get known. I'd been banned from half the bars in Brooklyn, and the only reason I hadn't been banned from the other half is because my marks hadn’t complained to management. They wanted to get me in the door so they could have a frank conversation about where the hell their money went.

I had told Remi that Queens was a risk worth taking, and based on the bulge in my bag, I was right. It was still only half of what I needed for the month, but that was a problem for another day.

It started to rain, the light pitter-patter on the ground oddly comforting on a dark night in a strange place. But then I heard a different patter, mixed in with the rain, and coming up behind me.

Footsteps.

I quickened my pace, mentally calculating the distance to the next subway.

If I was lucky, then it was Leon rolling up behind me. I tried to stay in shape and took half a dozen different self-defense classes. If it was Leon, he was going down.

Hard.

"Hey! Wait up, bitch!"

Hank.

Shit.

I could hold my own in a fight, but Hank was built like a bus. He probably wasn't quick, but if he laid a hand on me then...

Then all I could do was hope that he would take the money and leave me relatively unharmed.

"I said, wait up!"

I should have listened to Remi. Well, I was going to take some of my foster brother's advice now. Remi’s favorite mantra was, 'If you can't beat 'em, run'.

I broke into a sprint, tearing ass down the street. I might not have been as strong as Hank, but surely I was quicker?

On an impulse, I turned down an alleyway, hoping to lose him. At the far end was a chain-link fence. That wouldn't have happened in Brooklyn. I'd have known where I was going. On the other hand, I could climb chain-link like a monkey and I was betting that Hank couldn't. He might plow through it like a rhinoceros, but it would at least slow the bastard down a bit.

"You better stop or else…”

Or else what? I might get away from him?

What an idiotic thing to say. Unless...

I glanced back and saw Hank reaching into his jacket. It occurred to me that he hadn't taken that jacket off all night, even in the sweaty heat of the bar.

Holy shit, did he have a gun?

From nowhere I found a new turn of speed, racing for the fence. I was only a foot or two away when something hit me in the back of the head and down I went. He shot me. He fucking shot me! In the panic of the moment I hadn't even heard the gunshot. Maybe that was what it was like when you were shot. There wasn't much pain but that wasn't much relief.

It wasn't fair. It wasn't fucking fair. All I did was cheat him out of a bit of money - not really all that much. I'd misled him, sure, but I hadn't actually stolen anything. Plus, he had behaved like a total sleaze, didn't I deserve some payback for pussy jokes and groping hands?

It wasn't grifted money, exactly. It was more like a tax on guys who behave disrespectfully towards women. And even if none of that was true, I still didn't deserve to die for it.

Remi was going to be so pissed.

And yet, under all that, under the panic and the fear and the will to fight and survive like I'd been doing my whole damned life, as I closed my eyes to a welcoming darkness of oblivion, I felt an odd sense of relief.

At least now I could stop running.

Chapter Two

A few moments later I heard a nearby 'ribbit'. I opened my eyes and found a frog staring back at me. On a list of things that one associates with Heaven, frogs very seldom feature. Which did make sense - I probably hadn’t made the cut on the guest list into Heaven. No surprise there. On the other hand, what on earth did a frog have to do to get itself condemned to Hell? I wouldn't have thought they'd last long in the heat…

Somewhere alongside my musings on the presence of amphibians in the afterlife came the realizations that; a) I probably wasn't actually dead; b) the presence of a frog in an alley in Queens was almost as unlikely as one in Heaven or Hell; and c) the footsteps coming up from behind me had stopped.

I sat up, touching the back of my head as I did so. My hair was wet where I’d been hit, but when I looked at my fingers there was no blood. So, definitely not dead, probably not shot, and with damp hair. I had been hit in the head with something wet. What the fuck was going on?

I tipped my head up to find Hank staring at me in confusion a few yards away.

"Did you just throw a frog at me?" I demanded incredulously.

Hank, who was holding a mobile phone in his hand which was presumably what he had been reaching into his pocket for, wore a stunned expression that was actually not that dissimilar to that of the frog’s.

"What? No. I was..." He gestured with his phone, still dazed and clearly taken aback. "I was going to call the police."

That made more sense. I had taken his money under false pretenses and calling the police was a more appropriate response than hurling amphibians, but that didn’t explain the frog.

"I was calling the police and then..."

He paused, scratching his stubble. “Something did hit you in the head. I think - I think it was..." His eyes seemed to be drawn inexorably to the frog, still sitting inoffensively on the ground beside me. Hank looked to be teetering on the edge of sanity, and I didn't much like how close I was behind him. "But I didn't throw it."

The frog began to hop away, presumably in search of a nice pond to rest up in after a traumatic experience.

"Then who did?" I argued. We were alone in the alley, a fact that should’ve been more concerning to me considering our history but had dropped off my danger radar after I’d been pelted with in the cranium a frog.

"It... It just dropped from the sky."

He was starting to develop a twitch over his left eye that had me fearing he might stroke out or something.

"You're seeing things," I said dismissively, waving my hand in hopes of calming us both the fuck down. "Frogs do not just drop from the sky. If I was hit by a frog then someone threw it. And since there's only you and me here..."

“Look, I didn't throw it! Why would I even be carrying a frog?” he demanded gruffly, still holding his phone as if unsure what to do with it now.

That was a reasonable point and I was about to counter it as best I could when a frog fell from the sky and landed a few feet away from me with a splat. Without the benefit of something slightly more forgiving to land on such as my head, this one did not survive the landing.

“Guh!” Hank blanched, shuddering with disgust. "What the-”

"There's a perfectly rational explanation for this," I cut in, clinging onto my sanity by a thread.

Hank was less successful with that endeavor as another frog went careening by him at warp speed before exploding a few feet away from his left shoe.

He screamed at a pitch usually reserved for bats and five-year-old girls, then yelled at me. “You’re sick. Taking my money wasn't enough? You gotta scare the shit out of me, too! Not cool, man. Not cool!"

And with that, he took to his heels with a speed I wouldn't have credited to a man of his size.

While I managed not to scream or run away, I was least as freaked out as Hank was. I'd heard urban legends about rains of frogs, but they weren't actually true, were they? Rain comes from clouds - you can't have a cloud of frogs. A crack of thunder rent the air and I looked up just in time to catch a face full of frog.

This time I screamed because its cold little foot actually went into my mouth. I hurled the offending creature from me in as ladylike a way as possible then took to my heels running.

As I was feeling a bit shaken, as well as achy and scraped from my fall, I decided to spring for a cab back to Brooklyn, even though money was tight. The cabbie gave me a pleasant smile as I got in and rattled off the address.

"You alright?" he asked, seeming like he might actually care.

"Yeah. Sure," I muttered. "I... Can I ask; have you seen anything weird tonight?"

The cabbie nodded fervently. "Hell yeah. I'm a cabbie in New York. You want weird? You've come to the right place."

"I meant; weirder than normal," I pressed.

"I don't know about that," the cabbie shrugged. "I had a hooker with a broken heel - her actual heel, not her shoe. There was a guy with a teddy bear tied to his head - apparently it was an art thing. Don't get art these days. Oh, and some jackass made me call him ‘Sir’ the whole ride and requested that I come up to his apartment and give him a taint massage for a fifty percent tip.”

"Not really what I had in mind," I said, interrupting to stop him before he said something I couldn’t un-hear. "I meant weird for New York."

"Weird for New York?" The cabbie blew a long whistle. "No. I can't even imagine what that would look like. That's a pretty damn high level of weird shit, you know?"

As he continued to muse on what might constitute weird for NYC, I leaned my head out the window, enjoying the faint dusting of rain on my face, and staring skywards in search of any other falling frogs. I saw none. Had I imagined the whole thing? But, of course, it hadn't just been me who'd seen it. Something had scared Hank off.

My train of thought slowed. It had scared Hank off, hadn't it? I had been thinking about this in a very negative way - something that had scared me, weirded me out and set me questioning my own sanity. But it had also been something that had potentially saved me from... well, the worst-case scenario didn't bear thinking about.

Not that it wasn't still weird and scary.

Reaching my apartment block, I paid the cabbie, thanked him for his help, and then raced up three flights, eager to be back once again in the safety of my home.

Remi looked up from a Thai take-away as I barreled in.

"What's wrong? You look like you just saw a ghost.”

I suppose that most people would think it weird for a twenty-eight-year-old woman to be living with her brother, but Remi and I were more than siblings. Also, less - we were both fostered by the same family. But although there was no blood between us, we had always been full siblings in each other's eyes, and we had both always felt that we had been destined to end up together. Whatever bad circumstances had landed us in the foster system, all that badness had been, to some degree at least, mitigated the day we met. Remi was my best friend in the world and my partner in crime. He was every bit as good at manipulating marks as I was, using his blonde-haired good looks and trim, fit body to his advantage. It was a perfect partnership, and because we had grown up as brother and sister, and had never seen each other as anything else, it was a partnership unencumbered with the awkwardness of a relationship that torpedoed many a husband and wife grifting team.

I flopped down on the couch and looked across at Remi. "Did you get me anything?"

"Pad Thai. What's wrong?” he asked again, not missing a trick.

"You rock,” I said with a happy sigh as I scooped up the white carton.

"Obviously, but tell me what's wrong."

He fetched me a beer and, as I ate, I told him about the events of the evening. He stopped and held up a staying hand right where I expected him to.

"A frog?"

"A frog,” I repeated.

"You're sure?"

I rolled my eyes. "You think I don't know what a frog looks like? You think maybe I mistook it for something else?"

"Probably not."

"You believe me?"

"Of course I believe you."

I shook my head. "There's no 'of course' about it. I just told you I was snipered by a falling sky frog. I wouldn't believe me. Hell, I’m not even sure I do believe me."

Remi edged closer, suddenly concerned. "What do you mean?"

I focused my gaze on my noodles. "What if... You know."

"What?"

"You know,” I hedged.

"I don't know. That's why I'm asking."

"What if it's all in my mind?"

Remi shook his head firmly. "You said there was this guy there."

"What if I imagined him, too?"

He could hear the fear in my voice and he knew what I was thinking without me having to say it. This was how it had started for my mother. Hallucinations, memories of things that had never happened. It had all seemed innocent enough at first - to a child it had just seemed like a game we played. But the happy images had become voices, steps on a path that had led to the mental institution in which she remained, drifting in and out of lucidity.

"You know what probably happened?" Remi tried to bring me back from the dark thoughts into which I was sinking. "The guy threw something at you - a rock or something, or a bag or something - it knocked you out, and the rest was a concussion hallucination. Just an after-effect of a bang on the head."

I nodded, without really thinking it might be true.

"There's a protocol."

"A what now?"

"A concussion protocol," Remi explained. "Like tests you've got to do after you've got whanged on the head, to make sure you've not done any permanent damage. How many fingers am I holding up?"

He extended his middle finger at me and I laughed, returning the gesture. "I'm not sure that's one of the steps."

"I'll Google it."

I watched as he got his phone out, trying not to think about strait jackets, padded rooms and electro-shock therapy. I should visit Mom more often, but that place…

I barely repressed a shudder.

Desperate to think about something else while Remi wondered out loud how one spelled “concussion”, I tried to isolate a niggling feeling at the back of my head that I had read about rains of frogs somewhere.

"Google raining frogs," I said.

"I think we should do the protocol first," Remi replied.

"I'm fine. I'll get some ice for the bump. Just Google it."

Remi shrugged and did so while I got an ice pack for my head and band aids for my skinned knees.

It would be too much to say that we regularly get physically hurt but there are risks to the job. Getting beaten up is always a possibility and we've had some close calls, but minor injuries sustained while running are more common. There's a reason that Remi and I are both gym bunnies - we keep super fit, and it's not to look good. You need to have a turn of speed in this profession, you need to be able to climb or jump obstacles. From time to time, in headlong flight from an angry man with a much lighter wallet than he had minutes ago, you are going to trip up and fall down. I've always thought Remi has it easier because he can wear pretty much whatever, while my standard grifting uniform required me to show some skin. It’s great for distracting men, who are looking at my boobs when they really should be looking at what my hands are doing, but is terrible for running away and worse for falling down. Skinned knees are an occupational hazard.

When I got back, Remi passed me his phone, somewhat reluctantly. "You shouldn't read anything into this. There's shit all over the internet that isn’t true."

I looked at the screen and gasped as I finally digested what was on the screen in front of me.

Raining frogs is a sign from God.

The word “apocalypse” shimmered and waved before my bleary eyes as I sat back with a gasp.

“Holy shit.”

Get the rest of now!

Other Books by Savannah Skye

Her Demon Harem 1 (Succubus Chronicles)

Her Demon Harem 2

A Witch’s Harem

Kidnapped by the Dragon Harem

Her Howling Harem 1

Her Howling Harem 2

Her Vampire Harem

Her Immortal Harem 1

Her Immortal Harem 2

Her Deadly Harem

Axe to Grind

Breaking Colt

Better to Eat You

Hard Lesson

Hard Sell

Bad Boy Next Door

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