Shadows Past: A Rune Alexander short. Book 5.5 of the Rune Alexander series. (3 page)

The drive to her house was a blur—she remembered barreling down her street in a frenzy of fear, wondering if Jack, and oh please
God,
her Ellie, were okay.

Ben’s father had painted a horrifying picture of his son’s capabilities.

“If he hurts my people,” she told Ben’s father, “I’m going to rip your fucking head off.”

“It’s not my fault,” he murmured. “It’s not. It’s
not.
”

“Shut up.” Rune balled her fists and almost hoped he’d give her a reason to stop the car, turn around, and punch him in the throat.

He shut up.

And the rest of the way home seemed to take forever.

She drove through the tiny yard and almost to the rickety porch before hitting the brakes with such force that Z nearly went through the windshield.

“Ellie,” she screamed, running through her house. “Jack!”

When Jack answered, her legs weakened. Relief that Jack was alive, fear that Ellie wasn’t.

“In the kitchen,” he called.

He sat on the floor cradling Ellis in his arms. “He’s alive,” he murmured, looking at Rune. “Just unconscious and…burned. The kid burned him.”

“I know,” she said, and crouching on the floor, she pulled Ellie into her arms. “Ellie, Ellie.” She moved carefully, terrified of hurting him. His shirt was burned into the skin over his ribs, black and ragged, the flesh beneath red and raw.

He would live. He would fucking
live.

And at that moment she didn’t care about anything else.

“I called 911,” Z said, holding his cell. “They’ll be here in five minutes.”

“Where’s Raze?” Jack asked.

Rune looked at Z and frowned. “He was right behind us, wasn’t he?”

“He’s looking for the kid.”

“What the hell
is
he?” Jack asked.

“He’s human with a shitload of power,” Rune said. “He’s searching for a group to take him in.”

“Let’s hope COS doesn’t find him,” Z said.

“If we don’t get to him soon
someone
will find him, and that kind of power in the wrong hands…” Jack shook his head.

“Yeah,” Rune said. “And fucking Llodra is already on his trail.”

“He might lose his power if he’s turned,” Z said.

Rune shrugged, her stare on Ellie. “And he might not.”

Sirens sounded just as Ellis opened his eyes. “I’m burned, Rune,” he said, his voice calm.

“I know, baby. Paramedics are on the way.”

“Ben is dangerous. He grabbed me…I felt my skin just give. But it’s worse than that. When he touched me…”

“What, Ellie?”

He swallowed, and tears he didn’t even seem aware of slid down his face. “He was in my mind.” He tried to shake his head, then grimaced and stopped. “I felt him in my brain. I understood what it was like to be him. I wanted to burn people too.” Those last words came out in a whispered rush. “I needed to. He needs to. It’s like…touching, burning, is what he needs to feel right. Do you understand?”

The medics crowded into the kitchen, but Z held up a hand. “Wait.”

“Do you mean—” Rune started to say, but Ellis interrupted her.

“It’s like the best orgasm you can imagine,” he said, his voice low. “It feels so good. So
good.
”

“He craves it,” Rune said.

“And,” Ellis went on, as though she hadn’t spoken, “the more he burns, the better it feels. The stronger he gets.” He lifted his fingers, his face full of terror and regret. “I feel it in my hand.”

She grabbed his hand and pushed it against her arm. “Your palm is burning hot.”

He nodded. “He gave that to me. I don’t want to be like that, Rune.”

“You won’t, baby. He’s not that strong.”
Not yet.

“Rune,” Z said, kneeling beside her. “If he can learn to burn people without killing them…”

“He might make others just like him.”

“Shit,” Jack said.

“We have to find him,” she said. She looked at Z, then Jack, her gaze steady. “We may have to kill him.”

They nodded.

“Call RISC and have them send someone for Ben’s dad.” She looked at the paramedics and gently squeezed Ellis’s arm. “Take him in. And be careful with him.”

“You got it,” one of them answered.

“Merry Christmas,” the other one said, and he didn’t sound the least sarcastic.

Once Ellis was safely on his way to the hospital, Rune, Z, and Jack spread out on foot to look for the boy.

“Rune,” Z called, halting her as they started to split up.

She turned back. “Yeah?”

“Be careful.”

“I’m always careful.”

He hesitated, and his smile was a little too sad. “Sometimes, you’re
careful about the wrong things.”

“Call me if you see the kid,” she said, then turned and ran down the street. The most important thing was keeping Ben out of the hands of those who’d use him against the humans.

He couldn’t have gotten far. He was too weak, too injured by the rats.

And that made her wonder why he’d taped his power hand back up after he’d killed his sister. Why hadn’t he left it off and touched any enemy who came near him?

Maybe he’d been afraid to show his hand—literally—and face capture.

Whatever his reasons, Shiv Crew had taken care of the rat problem for him. And now, they’d take care of
him.

It’d be simple enough to keep him from touching them.

They had guns.

Unless he could throw his heat, the fucking kid was out of luck.

The streets and sidewalks were icy and nearly empty, with only the occasional wolf or vampire happening across Rune’s path.

She ran an ever widening circle as she searched, but as the minutes ticked away she knew she’d have to bring in help.

Three Shiv Crew members just weren’t enough to sniff out a human boy with Other powers.

She stopped running and pulled out her cell. “Sherry,” she said, when she got an answer. “Collar a couple of wolves and meet me at my house.”

“What motherfuckers are we after?” Sherry asked. Sherry was a floater Rune sometimes used when she needed an extra hand. She didn’t like the woman, but she’d use the hell out of her.

“A human boy,” Rune answered. “I need the wolves to trail him. Can you get them?”

Sherry hesitated, but only for a second. “Yeah. Be there in a few minutes.”

Rune searched the shadows of alleyways and dark corners of random backyards as she made her way back home. She wasn’t going to happen upon Ben without the help of some trackers, and the wolves were great at tracking.

Give them the scent and they’d find the boy with the death touch before dawn.

The wolves caught Ben’s scent from Rune, just as Gunnar had done. They found him exactly six minutes after they began searching. He hadn’t gone far—he’d pulled open the lattice at the bottom of her old porch and had crawled underneath to hide out until he healed.

“Really, Alexander,” Sherry said. “You didn’t think to search under your own fucking porch?”

“Go home, Sherry,” Rune said.

They taped Ben’s hand up and then cuffed both behind his back. He kept his head down and remained silent, once more in the familiar restraints.

She called RISC to report.

“Bring him to me, Rune.” Jeremy ordered.

“Are we taking him in, Rune?” Z asked.

“I have my orders.”

“When did that ever stop you from doing what you needed to do?” Jack asked.

So maybe killing a boy, no matter how dangerous he was, wasn’t something she really wanted to do.

Maybe.

“I wouldn’t trust Jeremy Cross not to sell him to the highest bidder,” Raze said, glaring into the distance.

She blew out a hard breath. “Give me a minute to think, will you?”

And in the end, she took him to Jeremy. Jeremy had connections. He could get Ben help—if he would.

The boy was different, and he was dangerous. He’d been born that way.

It wasn’t his fault.

She delivered the boy to RISC and watched as they shoved him, still restrained, into a glass fronted cell.

He stood in the middle of the room, his head down, but finally, he looked at her. His eyes were full of confused hopelessness. Rage. Fear. Uncertainty.

“I don’t know who I am,” he pleaded. “Somebody help me.”

He looked like the kid he was.

“Fuck me,” Rune whispered.

She went straight to find Jeremy.

“Find someone to train him, Jeremy,” she said. “Give the kid a fucking life.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “I’ll take care of it, Rune.”

“Fuck you. He’s not an
it.
”

He stood, brushing imaginary lint off his suit jacket, and then walked with leisurely intent toward her.

She’d be damned if she’d back away.

But she shivered.

He smiled, just a little. “Rune,” he murmured. “Why do you always have to make everything so hard on yourself?”

She held a hand up to stop him. “What are you going to do with Ben?”

He stopped walking when he was right in front of her, close enough that she had to tilt her head back to look up at him. “I can promise you I won’t kill him.”

She clenched her fists so hard her nails dug into her palms. The warm stickiness of blood comforted her. The pain centered her. “There are worse things than death.”

His voice was tender, and he reached out to lift a strand of hair from her shoulder. “You can trust me, Rune.”

“Damn you, Jeremy,” she whispered. He was a fucking liar. She couldn’t trust anybody.

He seemed to leave a path of burning flesh as he trailed his fingers across her shoulder and then up to her throat. He gripped her throat, very, very carefully, then squeezed.

“Tonight?” he asked. And then, not waiting for her answer, he leaned forward and kissed her. “Tonight,” he said, after he pulled away.

She took a deep breath, caressing her abused throat when he turned away. She shuddered. “Maybe.” And she heard the eagerness in her voice.

He sat down behind his desk once again, crisp and neat and bright. It was an hour after dawn, and she was disheveled and bloody and ragged from the fights of the night.

“Go home, Rune. Get some coffee and sleep. I’ll call you.” He began tapping on his computer keyboard, ignoring her.

“Jeremy.”

He looked up. “
What,
Rune? What is it?”

She put her palms on his desk and leaned toward him. “If you kill that kid, I’m going to rip your fucking head off.”

His eyes widened, just slightly.

“It might take me a little while,” she continued, “but I swear I will end you.”

His fear made him angry. He stood, pushing his chair back so hard it hit the wall. “Don’t threaten—”

“Boss.”

They both snapped their heads around to look toward the door, where Strad Matheson waited.

He stared back at them, his face bland, but his eyes…

Rune stepped back, and not taking her stare from the berserker, she strode to the doorway. “Move.” Her voice cracked, and she cleared her throat before trying again. “Move the fuck out of my way, Berserker.”

Without a word he stepped from the room to let her pass.

She didn’t turn around to look as she walked away, but she didn’t have to. Strad was watching her. She felt his stare like a physical thing, heavy and grim upon her back, until at last she was out of sight of those raging blue eyes.

“He couldn’t be all bad,” Jack said. “He made sure to re-cover his hands when he ran away.”

“If he deliberately killed the little girl,” Raze said, “he’s all fucking bad.”

“Go home and get some sleep.” Rune cut off a yawn and took a drink of the hot coffee Jack had handed her.

“You too, Rune,” Raze said. He folded his massive arms and stared down at her, and there wasn’t so much as a twinkle in his eye.

She sighed. Her crew could be a little overprotective. “As soon as I visit Ellie.”

Raze pursed his lips, narrowed his eyes, and then finally decided she was telling the truth. “I’ll go with you.”

“Raze, go the fuck home, baby.” She drained the cup and tossed it in the garbage can just inside the RISC entrance doors. “Both of you. Go.”

Jack yanked on the ammo belt draped across his chest and nodded. “Call me if you need me.”

“See you in a few hours.” She looked around. “Z took off?”

“Must have,” Jack said, and left the building with Raze.

She thought briefly of checking on the boy before she left the building, but in the end, decided against it.

The hospital was a familiar sight. In Shiv Crew’s line of work, splints and stitches were irritating little consequences of the job.

But that didn’t involve Ellis. At least, not often.

She stood at his bedside, her arms crossed, watching him sleep. The quiet did nothing good for her. Thoughts of how close Ellie had been to that greedy bastard, Death, made her want to huddle in a dark corner and moan.

“Ellie,” she whispered. “What would I do without you?”

“I don’t know,” he whispered back. “Probably die.” Then he opened his eyes and grinned at her. “I’m fine, honey.”

“Dammit, Ellie.” But she smiled.

He sobered and held out a hand. “Rune.”

“Yeah?” She took his hand, happy that she no longer felt anything other than his normal warmth. The heat Ben had left behind had faded.

“I promise never to leave you here alone if you promise the same to me.”

“I promise, baby.”

He squeezed her fingers. “Okay.”

But she’d have told him anything he wanted to hear, truth or not.

Living…that wasn’t exactly something she cared a whole lot about. Making Ellis happy was.

“Get some rest, Ellie. Call me if you need me.”

When she left Ellis’s room she spotted Z leaning against the nurses’ station, grinning down at a pretty brunette.

“Z.” She took his arm and pulled him away, ignoring the nurse’s pout of regret. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to check on Ellis.” He was still fully armed, his slender body weighted down with blades and guns.

People stared, some of them sliding to the side and finding something else to look at when Rune nodded at them. She and Z weren’t drawing stares because of how good they looked together. Shiv Crew had a reputation as stone-cold killers. They might protect the humans, but the humans didn’t really trust them.

“Did you get sidetracked?” she asked. “Ellie didn’t mention you’d been to see him.”

“I was there before you arrived, sweet thing.”

She frowned. “Z, you work for me. Don’t call me sweet thing.”

He walked her to her car. “I got you something for Christmas.”

“You know I don’t like that.”

He shrugged. “Still. I—” He paled and slapped a hand to his chest. “Oh shit.”

“What is it?” She opened her car door but made no move to get inside.

“My fucking jacket.”

“Ah. You left it at Wormwood.”

He nodded. “Your present is in the pocket.”

She grinned. “See? Fate intervened on my behalf. Don’t get me fucking presents.”

“I needed to, sweet thing. I’m going to swing by the graveyard before I go home. Maybe…” He shrugged.

“It’s gone, baby. Buy yourself a new jacket and move on.”

He sighed, his eyes dark and angry in the cold light. Not at her. “It wasn’t the coat, Rune.”

“I know.” She fiddled with the door handle, uncomfortable beneath his unfamiliar anger. “But Z, I really don’t want—”

He grabbed her shoulders, then leaned down and kissed her.

Hard.

She should have pulled away.

She didn’t.

For one moment, she let herself taste him. Feel him.

She was strong, but she wasn’t that strong.

Z.

She touched her tongue to his. One second. One heartbeat.

That’s all she would allow herself.

And then, she pulled away.

Z ran his hand through his hair and took a deep, ragged breath. “I always thought I’d have to get liquored up to do that.”

“Shit, Z
. Don’t.
”

“Why the fuck not, Rune?” His eyes were angry again, and this time they were angry at her. “Why the fuck am I not the one for you?”

She closed her eyes. “You will always be my Z. But you can’t be my Z that way. I would crush you. I would hurt you. And most of all, I would change who you are.”

He ran his hand over his face, then sighed. “I don’t get it.”

“No, baby. You don’t.”

And it broke her heart to speak that truth.

He nodded, slowly. “Okay. Okay.” He would let her go.

If he had pressed it…

Maybe she’d have said yes. And maybe she’d have destroyed him.

And she loved him too much to do that.

She knew herself. Z…Z loved women. His weakness was women.

His weakness was
her.

Yes, she’d have crushed him.

She snagged his hand. “Forget this, Z. I will.”
Because I have to.

He gave her a rueful smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, but at least the anger was gone. The hurt, it lurked like a monster, waiting to come out and devour them both.

She knew about monsters.

He’d have to let her go, but she couldn’t let him go. She couldn’t take him, but she couldn’t let him go.

She was selfish that way.

“My jacket,” he said, pulling his hand from hers and turning away. “I’m going to look for it.”

“Z.”

He looked back at her.

“What’s in it?” she asked.

He seemed to stiffen at the question, to straighten his spine and lift his chin as finality drifted like a curtain over his eyes. “Nothing, sweet thing. Nothing at all.”

And once more he turned to go.

“Z,”
she said, her voice too desperate.

He said nothing, just looked at her and waited.

“Are we good?” she said, finally.

“Sweetheart,” he said, his voice once more the tender voice of the Z she knew, the Z she loved. “We are always going to be good.”

And that time when he smiled, it was a real smile.

Her cell rang, and she fished it out of her pocket. “Yeah?”

“The boy is gone,” Jeremy said, and his voice was hard, so hard.

“What?” she asked. “What do you fucking mean, he’s gone? You killed him?”

Z narrowed his eyes, watching her.

“No, Rune, I didn’t fucking kill him. He was snatched away from me. I could have—” He cut himself off.

“You could have what?”

“Nothing. But he’s not mine anymore, the fucking boy with the death touch. But…”

“What?”

“He’ll be back someday, Rune. Mark my words. He’ll be the fuck back. Whoever has him is going to get a lot of use out of that particular monster.”

She shivered, his words sparking something inside her, something…horrifying.

Jeremy was so angry.

No, he wasn’t telling her the entire story.

But he was telling her something…

“I’m coming to your house in one hour. You be there, Rune. Don’t make me hunt you the fuck down.”

She slid her cell back into her pocket, her breath catching.

Z stood with his feet apart and his hands touching his shivs, as though some invisible monster were about to devour her.

Truthfully, it was.

But Z couldn’t defeat her monster.

“I have to go, baby.”

“Rune! What the fuck is it?”

“Someone took the boy.”

But she couldn’t care overly much. Not just then.

She had to get home.

Jeremy was offering her a gift she could not refuse.

It was Christmas, after all.

And she deserved a little something.

She
did.