Broken Wings (23 page)

He couldn’t resist. “Oh, I like Vegas
a lot.”

A faint, sensual light passed between
them. He felt it. By the look on her face, awkward reticence, she
had too. She glanced away shyly, dragging her fingers through her
hair. He wouldn’t mind tangling those red curls—

Eddie evicted that notion right away.
Flirting with her, charming her into divulging information was one
thing. But getting involved with her was not smart. Not even on a
lustful level. Thinking about it probably wouldn’t hurt, but he
couldn’t afford the distraction.

“What made you decide to leave
Phoenix, anyway?” she asked, dragging his mind in another
direction.

She’s good at diversion
. A fine
quality for a cop. Now, if he could only direct her away from her
present line of questioning.

“I just needed a change of scenery.”
He spoke the words, vague and illusive. He didn’t know any other
way to explain his presence in Vegas. Somehow, he’d always known he
wasn’t going to find what he was looking for in Phoenix.

“Well, I’ve got to run.” She stood and
draped her hand over his in a wistful gesture. “I’ve got to get our
reports done.” She backed away with a devastating, irresistible
grin and moved toward the door.

He wished she wouldn’t tease him but
since she had, two could play this game. “Mouth to mouth,
Laraquette.” He pointed an accusatory finger at her. “If you look
on the chart, I’m sure it’s there.”

“You’re so bad.” She giggled and
pushed the door open with her backside. Tilting her head, she
glanced at him with dreamy eyes.

“Yes, but you like it.”

She disappeared into the hallway and
he continued to stare at the door. Thoughts of Rio Laraquette, his
undisclosed mission, and how close he’d come to dying swirled
together, tangling inside his head. Damned if it wasn’t enough to
give a guy a headache.

He pushed the near-death experience
out of his mind, preferring the other two, more pleasant, musings
remain front and center.

Rio had earned her place, fondly and
rightfully so, in his book of respect. After what she’d done for
him, he hoped she wasn’t his target.

The door opened, pulling his ramblings
away from the mission. Temporarily.

His coworker Chris Bradley stepped
inside the room, and Eddie checked his surprise before it had the
chance to crease his brow.

Bradley greeted him with a firm
handshake. “It’s good to see you awake and alert. How are you
feeling?”

“Restless,” Eddie said. Bradley backed
into the same chair Rio had used. “My injury was nothing more than
a flesh wound. I don’t know why I’m still here.”

“I’m sure you’ll get released in due
time.” Settling into the chair, Bradley folded his arms across his
chest. “Melody was released. Want me to find her? Unofficially of
course.”

“Melody?”

“The hooker that got you
shot.”

“Nah, let’s put Melody on the
backburner for now.” Eddie could think of a hundred different
reasons to let the hooker think she was safe. She might prove
useful later.

Right now, he was more troubled by
Bradley’s presence at the hospital and his so-called concern. They
weren’t friends. Eddie wasn’t friends with anybody here. Hell, he’d
only been in town ten days. Nobody makes friends that
fast.

Nevertheless, whatever Bradley was up
to, Eddie would find out. In the meantime, he’d jump on the guy’s
hook and reel him in close. “Did you see what Laraquette
did?”

Bradley’s head jerked toward him.
“What’d she do?” He was way too interested to suit
Eddie.

“From out of nowhere, Bellmore had a
gun in my face and she kicked his ass.” He relayed what inevitably
sounded like a tall-tale. “If she’d hesitated one second, he
would’ve blown my head off.”

A smile, distant and lonely, crossed
Bradley’s face and he relaxed. “Well, that’s Laraquette. She thinks
quick on her feet.”

“Tell me about it.” Thoughts of what
might have happened had she not reacted so swiftly knocked at
Eddie’s mind. Again, he didn’t understand why nobody wanted to work
with her. Hell, she was his hero. “It’s amazing how she did that.
The whole thing was remarkable, surreal but remarkable.”

“Incredibility and Laraquette seem to
go hand in hand these days.”

“How so?” Eddie gave him a lead in,
always curious to know more about his new partner, the ever-elusive
Rio Laraquette.

“She’d been investigating Turner
Atkins for well over two years, relentlessly. Never gave up.”
Bradley’s disdain for the Las Vegas mob boss seeped out in his
voice, his gaze, his demeanor. “When she finally got inside his
organization, he sent her up to Carson City to be part of some con
he had going on. She ended up taking a bullet for one of his
marks
—” Bradley’s cell phone chimed, drawing his attention
away from the story. He glanced at the device, studied it, then
turned back to Eddie. “Duty calls. I’ve got to run.” He rose and
extended his hand to Eddie. “Let me know if you need
anything.”

Eddie didn’t pay much attention to
Bradley’s departure. Instead, he let his thoughts wrap back around
Rio Laraquette.

Law enforcement officials professed to
uphold the “
protect and serve
” motto, but how many of them
really meant it? Very few, as he was coming to learn. She actually
proved it, and that elevated her in his eyes.

Every day it was something new. Either
she delivered some awe-inspiring deed, or he’d hear some incredible
story about her past exploits. He had to admit, he found Rio
Laraquette utterly fascinating and puzzling and too good to be
true.

* * *

Mission Impossible
jingled on
Eddie’s cell phone, pulling him out of a light slumber.

He’d fallen asleep. When did that
happen?

The meds
, he thought, waking.
That’s why he’d fought against taking them. He didn’t like losing
control to anything or anyone.

He reached for the phone on the nearby
stand. A text message. He flipped up the phone and punched a couple
of buttons to bring the message up on the screen.

That bitch is dead
!

~~~~

** Thank you for taking a look at this
free preview of VEGAS, BABY. If you’re interested in reading the
book in its entirety it’s available at Smashwords, Amazon’s Kindle
Store, BN’s Nook Store, and various other outlets.

Please keep reading if you’d like a
taste of my latest release, STAKED (Time Brokers: Book One). It’s a
paranormal tale about vampires, time travel and a little romance.
**

~~~~

STAKED

Time Brokers: Book
One

By

Sandra Edwards

~~~~

Chapter One

New York City

Tonight

Ava Valentine scooped up the last of
the Sun Stones and closed her fist around their lingering glow. She
held tight, ignoring the sting, and absorbed the pain before it
sheathed her apprentice Mickey. Ava had long since developed a high
tolerance to the physical suffering that came with brokering time,
and that made her bounty hunting services invaluable.

Mickey cleared his throat—his way of
pretending that traveling through time didn’t hurt. He was getting
stronger, but not yet capable of handling the raw side-effects
alone. Someday he’d have to absorb the full impact, but not today.
Today he remained under Ava’s protection.

The stinging subsided as Ava dispensed
the pea-sized gems into a pouch no bigger than a teabag. She
tightened the drawstring and secured it on her belt loop before
tucking the little purse into the waistband of her blue
jeans.

An uneasy silence spilled across the
cool night air and swirled around Ava and Mickey. She scanned the
darkened, desolate alley and eased the MPD from her back pocket.
Not that the
Micro Placement Device
, a Blackberry-type
gadget, could offer much support in the way of protection, but in
these electronically-underdeveloped times it’d do three things
well. One, verify when and where they were. Two, allow Mickey and
her to communicate over a secured connection if they got separated.
And three, confirm they’d landed in the same time period as their
fugitive.

Another glance around the alley and Ava
beckoned Mickey to follow her.

“
I think the jump was easier
this time.” He shivered and tucked his fingertips inside the front
pockets of his jeans.

“
Soon enough it won’t bother
you at all.” Okay, so that was a lie. As far as Ava knew, she was
the only broker who’d ever developed a tolerance to the pain of
transporting passengers through time—the only thing that kept every
Karellian within traveling distance of the galaxy from swarming
Earth and selling their services to the highest bidder.

The pain—she’d heard some describe as
excruciating—kept the number of Brokers to a minimum. It took a
certain kind of person to step inside the bowels of hell for mere
money. Some handled it better than others, but most didn’t even
want to try.

“
When do you think I’ll be
ready to broker?” Mickey was one of the few willing to bear the
pain for justice.

“
Baby steps, my friend. Baby
steps.” Ava had been sharing the pain with him lately, but at a
rate of less than ten percent. It’d be awhile before he was strong
enough to handle even twenty-five percent, much less broker
time.

Booze was just the medicine Mickey
needed. The nagging ache often dwindled within half an hour after
entry, and by her calculations they had another twenty minutes
before he was one hundred percent. A stiff shot might hurry that
along.

“
You want to get a beer or
something?” Truth be known, Ava could go for a drink too. Maybe
it’d help settle her nerves; they hadn’t been right since the new
contact entered the picture. He was someone she’d never met, and
that saddled her with a whole new set of problems when it came to
chasing bounty.

“
Can we?” Mickey licked his
lips, anticipating a cold one, and quickened his step, skipping
sideways alongside her. “Do we have time?”

“
Sure.” Besides, she’d
arranged to meet the new guy at a familiar pub. She didn’t have a
problem mixing business with pleasure. In fact, she combined the
two whenever possible. It also helped that twenty-first century
bars were a favorite pit stop for those she chased.

They turned left at the next corner and
headed for a little bar called Louie’s. Thoughts of the neon-blue
sign hanging over the door and the pink and green palm tree in the
window brought a smile to her lips. Louie’s was always one of her
first stops when tracking bounties to the early twenty-first
century.

For some reason, twenty-ninth century
criminals thought the twentieth and twenty-first centuries were
grand hiding places. Why, Ava had no idea. The period’s urban life
had its charms, like the music, but she wouldn’t want to live in
this time. Most things had to be done manually and the technology
was rudimentary.

A chill clawed up Ava’s back as they
turned another corner. Somebody was watching her. Who, she didn’t
know, but she tagged a mental note to keep tabs on her
shadow.

Seeing the pub’s sign all lit up in
neon-blue brought back memories, both good and bad. “Ah,
Louie’s...here it is.” She paused at the door and her mood
lightened a little inside.

“
You know this place?”
Mickey asked. She was pretty sure he’d thrown it at her more out of
curiosity than nosiness.

“
Indeed, I do. Very well.”
But she didn’t want to talk about it. More to the point, she didn’t
want to talk about
him
. And she didn’t want to give him a
heads-up on their location, either.

They could always sense when one was
talking about the other, Ava and...
him
. It was a lot like
amplified ESP. Another Karellian gift. Although, and she hated
admitting it, his tracking ability was stronger than hers because
he was full Karellian. She was only half; the rest of her was
Mortal. He blamed her Mortal side for their differences.

That’s rich
. She could’ve sworn
the problem was his greed and thinly veiled ethics.

Mickey asked, “Is this another one of
those places with a story you’re not talking about?”

A chuckle charged up Ava’s throat and
she silently thanked him for the mental rescue. She didn’t like
thinking about those days. The effort was fruitless.

Lingering aggravation from her past
made her fling open the door harder than she’d meant. But it didn’t
rattle her composure. She was too much of a control freak for
that.

Mickey followed her into the near-empty
tavern. “Is this where we’ll find Cole?” he asked, over the music
pouring from the jukebox. ‘Take it Easy’ from The Eagles, one of
Ava’s all-time favorite bands, flowed from the ancient
machine.