Crash Morph: Gate Shifter Book Two (3 page)

“I told you I was coming,” Jake protested.

“...And I told you
not
to come,” I said, cutting him off. “Weeks ago, in fact. And besides, I never in a million years thought you
would
come, brother-mine, even if I’d begged you. So again, I ask, what’s up, Jake? It’s got to be pretty big, if it dug you out of the well-fortified beaches of Italy.”

Gantry smirked a bit, raising an eyebrow at me.

I saw genuine amusement in his eyes as he looked from Jake to me. I knew he thought Jake was a doof, so to even see the two of them together was strange enough. I watched Gantry take a sip of his coffee, then grimace from the bitter taste of the high-octane brew Irene tended to favor.

“I forgot about you and this gasoline you like to drink,” Gantry muttered, the bare traces of his accent audible as he stared ruefully down at the cup. “Just how wired do you need to be, anyway, chica?”

I laughed, I couldn’t help it.

When I glanced back at my brother, I saw that Jake continued to stare at me, wearing his mortally wounded expression. The expression deepened when I didn’t react to it appropriately, in Jake’s twisted view of how I was supposed to react. He looked about to answer me, though, when both his and Gantry’s eyes suddenly shifted to the kitchen doorway.

I had my chair back facing that way, so I was the last to turn.

When I did, I couldn’t help but wince.

Nik stood there. Stark naked.

“Jesus, Nik,” I said, even as I turned away. “Put some clothes on, will you?”

There was a silence. It was deep enough that I knew he hadn’t moved. The floor creaked too much even for Nik to be able to walk away that super-stealthy.

When I glanced back up at him, Nik’s eyes were a pale blue.

“I was concerned,” he said.

“Well, you don’t need to be,” I said, a little sharper than usual. “These are friends, okay?”

“Who are they?” Nik looked harder at Gantry, as if sizing him up with his eyes. “I recognize that one. Who is the other?”

“My brother. He’s only marginally dangerous.” Seeing the wary look deepen in Nik’s eyes, I shook my head. “That’s a joke, Nik...sort of. It’s all right, I promise. No one here is going to shoot me. Although I make no promises about
me
not shooting Jake.”

I winced when I saw Jake staring pointedly at Nihkil’s genital area, right before Jake raised an impressed-seeming eyebrow at me. Probably for the same reason, I ended up speaking louder than I intended when I looked back at Nik a third time.

“Look. Go put on pants at least, okay? There’s coffee in it for you, if you do. And you can join us...and see for yourself just how unlikely they are to murder me. And that I’m only marginally more likely to murder them. Probably.”

Nodding that time, and managing to look more or less human as he did it, Nik paused just long enough to aim more intent looks at first Gantry and then Jake.
 

Then, without changing expression, he retreated back into the dimmer areas of the attached foyer and living room.

The second he disappeared, Jake burst out in a high-pitched laugh.

I’d expected that, of course, but it still made me grit my teeth.

I didn’t look at Gantry at all.

“What the hell was
that?”
Jake said, still giggling. “You pick up a new pet on your travels, Dakota, darling? You naughty, naughty girl...”

I winced at his choice of words, too.

They hit a little too close to the mark, considering Nik had been viewed pretty much exactly like a pet in that other place, meaning by the humans who lived in that dimension and owned morph as slaves. I’d just spent a not-inconsiderable amount of time trying to get myself
out
of that dimension and back to this one, so the reminder was still pretty raw.

In Nik’s world, people like him were called morph.

Morph weren’t human. They could shape-shift and travel the dimensional gates, but were kept on leashes by the local humans to be used as breeding partners, scouts, spies, workers, soldiers. Or pets, as Jake so helpfully put it.

They really were slaves, not even “as good as,” but the real deal.

So yeah, the humans in Nihkil’s dimension might have been more advanced technologically, with the space ships and the ray guns and the dimensional portals and whatever else, but their social policies hadn’t exactly been what I’d consider enlightened.

I found all of that out the hard way when I accidentally followed Nik home when he’d been sent on a scouting mission to survey Earth.

“Jake...” I began, more tired than angry.

“Why was he ‘concerned’?” Gantry said, his voice sharp. “What’s he so worried about, Reyes? There people after you two?”

I looked at Gantry, forgetting my brother briefly.
 

“He’s just jumpy,” I said, hearing the defensiveness creep into my voice. “We’ve had a rough few weeks. Months, really. Nik’s just looking out for me.” When Gantry seemed like he wasn’t going to drop it, I let a warning creep into my voice. “He’s got reasons to be cautious, Gantry...believe me. I’d think you’d want someone to have my back.”

Gantry frowned at that.

He looked about to say more, but before he could, Jake burst out, clearly unable to contain himself any longer.

“An extremely hot,
naked
guy just walked into your kitchen, Daks! Nude,” Jake added gleefully, glancing between me and Gantry, as if we both missed that critical point. Jake rubbed his hands together, still looking at me like he’d won a prize in some demented carnival. “...Like, completely, butt-naked nude.
Hung
nude. You really expect me to
not
comment on that? Where the hell did you dig him up? He’s positively
yummy,
sis...”

I leaned my forehead on my hand, sighing.

“He doesn’t have any money, Jake,” I said.

Gantry let out a low grunt.

Undaunted, Jake glanced at Gantry, as if remembering who Gantry was.

After studying my ex-boyfriend’s expression, Jake smirked again.

“No wonder you two are on the outs,” Jake said. “I get it now. Dakota brought home a shiny new boy-toy.” He waggled his finger at me mockingly. “And here we were, thinking you’d been all serial-killered. You really should have left a note, sweetie...”

Rolling my eyes, I bit my lip, glancing at Gantry, in spite of myself.

Gantry’s expression remained completely unreadable that time.

I wondered what lay behind that look, but I knew I likely wouldn’t know until Gantry himself was good and ready to tell me. There was a reason he always kicked my butt in poker. Still, I considered him one of my best friends, so I worried a little.

Gantry and I had never been exclusive or anything, so I honestly had no idea if Nik being here bothered him or not. It hadn’t even occurred to me until precisely that moment. I couldn’t entirely squelch the feeling of guilt that arose, though.

Gantry looked
exactly
the same as I remembered, which didn’t help.
 

I felt like I’d changed so much over those months I’d been gone, while in that other place with Nik and everything that happened to both of us there.
 

Maybe I assumed everyone else had changed that much, too.
 

If Gantry was different, I saw no hint of it anywhere on his densely-packed form, however. From his short-cropped black hair to the dusting of beard and the jaguar tattoo that climbed up his muscular neck, it could have been yesterday that we sat here last, drinking coffee and shooting the shit with Irene.

His skin glowed with that unusual copper color I’d always liked, too, contrasting with blue eyes so light, they almost looked fake on that face.

He caught me looking at him then, so I averted my gaze.

“Yeah,” I said, sighing as I blew on the steam coming off my coffee. “...Whatever. So do either of you bozos have news? A job? Dire prognostications of whatever kind? What?”

“There’s someone looking for you,” Gantry said, blunt. “There’s a bounty this time.”

That got my attention.

I lowered my coffee cup, staring at him.

“Yeah,” Gantry said, giving an apologetic shrug.

“FBI?” I said.

“No,” Gantry said, blowing out his cheeks. He quirked a puzzled eyebrow at me. “I don’t think so. Why do you ask?”

I ignored the question.

“Then who, Gantry?”

“I honestly don’t know. But I’m working on finding out.”

Emotion bled a little more into his eyes that time. Gantry scrubbed a hand over his half-inch of dark hair, leaning back in a chair that looked kid-sized under his bulk.

“Whoever it is, I hear they’re not government,” he said. “You’re looking at a private interest. Regardless,
someone
will be knocking on this door relatively soon. I wouldn’t even know about it, but the client was casting around for private contractor bids and we got a call. They must not know much about you...personally, I mean...or they’d have known better than to ask for me. But they’ve got money. A lot of it. Too much, maybe.”

Staring at the floor, I didn’t answer. Those few swallows of coffee I’d gotten down seemed to be going cold in the pit of my stomach.

“Any idea what it’s about?” I said finally. “Is it a revenge gig? Ex-client’s property? Did they say
why
they wanted me?” I glanced at Jake then, remembering him. “And again, why is
he
here? Is anyone going to tell me?”

Gantry laughed a little. “Coincidence?” He shrugged at my skeptical look. “I ran into him downtown.”

I frowned, looking at my brother, who only stuck his tongue out at me, making it clear from his expression that he was still mad at me and not telling me anything.

“I brought him here,” Gantry added, ignoring me and Jake’s sibling thing. “I admit, I thought maybe Jake here could get you out of the country. Until I sort this out.”

I let out a disbelieving snort.

“No,” I said. “No way.”

Gantry gave me a level look.“You might not have a choice, chica.”

I shook my head, feeling a vein start to throb somewhere in the vicinity of my temple.
 

“No way,” I said more vehemently. “I didn’t spend the last six months or whatever to get back here only to go underground. Or to end up in some Italian sex scam involving one of my brother’s sugar mamas...”

“...Daddies,” Jake corrected me primly.

“...Whatever,” I snapped, giving him a scathing look. “Find out what they want, Gantry. Find out who’s paying the bills, if you can. But I’m not leaving here. Not unless I know for damned certain that I have to.”

“When would that be?” Gantry asked politely. “When you get shot?”

“Maybe,” I said, refusing to back down. “Why do
I
have to run, Gantry? Why me?”

“You want to risk being picked up by the FBI?” Gantry said.

“I thought you said it
wasn’t
FBI?”

“Some hit squad then?” Gantry pressed, undaunted. “Or worse. Some pissed off mark who saw you on the news, figured out it was time for some payback? They showed your face on the news, chica...you know that, right? That story they ran about you being found after the campaign we had going to find you? It was just a little personal interest thing, but I saw it. That means other people saw it, too...”

When I only grunted, frowning at the memory of that dumb reporter firing questions at me a few days after the golf course fiasco, Gantry pressed again.

“...What about that guy you set up the last night you were here?” he said. “The night you disappeared? He’s still around, you know.”

I looked over at that, my lips once more pressing together in a hard line.

At my expression, Gantry grunted. From the look on his face, I could tell he’d had some one-on-one time with my favorite Ted Bundy in training.

“...He’s a real piece of work, that guy,” Gantry said, confirming my guess. “I thought for sure he’d killed you, Dakota. For months, honestly. Chopped you up into little pieces and fed you into the Sound. I had someone on him most of the time you were gone. I was trying to nail him for going after other women, since I couldn’t find your body.”