“It’s my turn,” he said with steely resolve. “What’s your favorite sexual position?”
“Really?” I asked, shaking my head, my frown in full effect.
“Really.”
“I don’t want to talk about anything sexual with you.”
He shrugged. “Then guess we’re going to have a quiet walk through the woods.”
“You’re such a pain in the,” I started before catching myself and swallowing the remainder of my words.
If you don’t play by his rules, Dulce, he’s not going to answer your questions, I told myself and immediately recognized the truth in my own thought.
“Missionary,” I ground out.
“Boooring!” Jax responded, wrinkling up his nose like he’d caught a whiff of something bad.
“Hey, you asked,” I barked back at him.
“I was hoping you’d say doggy style.”
“Well, I didn’t. So, getting back to my original question: are you expecting to ransom me?”
“No,” he replied while shaking his head and moving forward again. “And unless you start following me, I’m not going to answer any more of your questions.”
I sighed with annoyance, but decided to follow him a little longer, just until I got all of my questions answered. “Okay, I’m following you now, so answer the question.”
He glanced back at me, apparently to make sure I was behind him, and then offered me a wide smile. “I was told to get you away from Headquarters in order to keep you safe.”
“To keep me safe?” I repeated. Now he’d lost me. “Why would anyone from a potions ring want to keep an ANC Regulator safe?” I demanded when the first raindrop splashed against my nose. He was right; rain was in the forecast. Great.
Jax shrugged as he faced me with curiosity in his eyes. “I can’t answer that, baby. That’s a question you’ll have to ask yourself, or you can ask my boss.”
“I have no intention of coming face-to-face with your boss.”
Shrugging, he picked up the pace, ostensibly feeling the raindrops as well. “Then I guess you’ll have to be okay with never getting the answer to your question.”
“I guess so,” I said with tight lips. “Unless you’re just bullshitting me again,” I slammed back at him, narrowing my eyes.
“I’m not,” he pleaded with an expression of sincerity before wiping a few drops of rain off his forehead. “On this point, I’m being totally honest.” Seeing my skeptical expression and visible disbelief, he laughed. “I thought it was weird to take you out of harm’s way as well, but I don’t question my orders, I just follow them.”
I frowned at him, irritated that he thought I was so stupid to buy his ridiculous explanation. “Okay, let’s put aside, for the time being, my opinion that your story has huge holes in it,” I started. “And let’s just say I believe you, for the sake of argument.”
“Okay.”
“So let me ask you what’s going on that your boss would tell you to keep me safe in the first place? Keep me safe against what?”
“That, I can answer,” he said with a wide grin. Eyeing the sky again, he began heading northeast. I followed him obediently. “But first, it’s my turn to ask you a question.”
“Ugh,” I grumbled, having hoped he’d forget we were playing tit-for-tat. “Hurry it up.”
He glanced back at me and nodded, his grin wide. “When a man’s penetrating you, are you loud?”
“What do you mean?” I snapped.
He shrugged. “Are you loud? Not sure how more direct I can ask it. Do you moan? Are you a talker?”
I felt heat rushing through my cheeks as embarrassment stained them. There was no way I wanted to answer this question. Not when it was so personal.
So just lie about it, I thought to myself. There’s no reason Jax should know such personal information about you. If anything, if you make yourself seem boring in the sack, maybe he’ll leave you alone.
It was a novel idea so I ran with it. “No, I’m not loud,” I said with authority. “I don’t moan and I would never even dream of talking!” I paused to take a deep breath. “There, are you satisfied?”
“No,” he answered.
“Well, I don’t care because I just answered your question so now it’s my turn again,” I managed. I cleared my throat and tried to remember the question I’d last asked him before he sent me on this most recent tangent. “You said you were ordered to keep me safe. Just what is it that you’re keeping me safe against?”
“Crossbones teamed up with a few other organizations; they intend to take control from the ANC,” he admitted.
“Even though you swore up and down that they weren’t interested in doing that?” I couldn’t help grinding my teeth because it seemed he’d pretty much lied to me on all accounts. And now? Now I didn’t know what to believe.
“Well, it’s not like I was going to give away all my secrets to a cop who works for the ANC!” he rejoined. I didn’t fail to miss the “duh” expression on his face as well as in his tone of voice.
“What’s the difference between then and now?” I asked the obvious.
He looked back at me with a wide grin. “Now I’m no longer your prisoner,” he pointed out. Even though he didn’t bother saying I was now his prisoner, the hint of the comment hung in the air.
I chose to ignore it. “Go on.”
“So Crossbones collaborated with a few hundred of our closest friends, and agreed the best way to ensure our desires and needs got considered in this new regime was by attacking the ANC from the back door.”
“What does that mean?” I demanded, my heartrate racing again. I had to take more than a few quick steps just to keep up with him. And I did notice that he was purposely keeping his voice very low, specifically so I wouldn’t tarry too far behind him.
“It’s simple,” Jax replied. “The ANC is so concerned about what’s going on inside the Netherworld, they stopped worrying about what’s going on outside the Netherworld.”
“So?”
“So, if you’d let me finish, you’d have your precious answers a lot sooner,” he answered with a lofty expression.
“Ugh, continue then!” I snarled, throwing my hands on my hips and giving him as much attitude as I could muster.
“I liked you better in your panties,” he said, running his gaze down my front before frowning at me.
“And I liked you better behind bars.”
He chuckled and then winked at me, as if to say, touché. “Apparently, everyone is focused on trying to control the potions industry within the Netherworld. But no one ever stopped to consider how potentially damaging it would be to control all the arrivals and departures of every portal that leads to and from Earth.”
“So your plan is to take control of all the portal crossings in Earth?” I finished, hoping I understood what he was saying. “In order to … what?”
“Yes,” he finished with a curt nod. “To take the ports; that means there won’t be anything traveling to or from Earth unless we deem it okay.”
“So what?”
“So, that’s where the true power lies,” he explained. “One of the largest sources of revenue for the Netherworld is in its imports and exports to and from Earth. Not just contraband, but also automobiles, food, travel, you name it. If we control the ports, we control everything. Think of the profit! And that’s without even including the proceeds gained from exporting street potions.”
I swallowed hard because his plan made sense. It was well thought out. And it scared me to death. “And you think you can actually accomplish that? Controlling every Earthly port?”
“You’ve asked me a ton of questions,” he announced flatly. “It’s my turn again.”
“Fine.”
“Have you ever been with a woman?”
“No,” I answered immediately, thinking I’d gotten off relatively easy on that one. “So you think you can accomplish taking over all of the ports on Earth?” I repeated my previous question before
he could ask me another ridiculous one.
“I told you it was only a matter of numbers. And the gangs already have those numbers. Granted, we probably don’t have the manpower yet, but that’s just a matter of time.”
“Until you can take over every portal from Earth?”
“Yes! And once that happens, we can work back retrospectively, returning to the Netherworld. Once we control all of the commerce to and from the Netherworld, we can determine what comes in and what goes out.”
“Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out,” I said glumly as I worried about everyone in the ANC in Splendor, and then everyone in the ANC in the Netherworld.
“Another big benefit in taking all the ANC offices at each port is that it provides us with plenty of weapons to use against anyone who tries to resist or come against us.”
“I still can’t figure out where I fit into this,” I replied, frustrated. “If you intended to take Headquarters in Splendor, why not just take it? You had your chance way back when.”
“Because that wasn’t my mission at the time,” he replied immediately. “My mission was to get you out of there before it was overtaken.”
“Does that mean your people are in the process of taking it over now?” I asked. My voice cracked when I thought about Sam, Elsie, and Wally. The clouds overhead suddenly exploded with cold, hard drops of rain. They seemed to be reflecting the storm that raged inside me.
“I don’t know,” Jax answered in a softer tone. “All I do know is that I’ve got to get you out of here.” As if to prove his point, he sped up his pace. “And I’ve got to get myself the hell out of this rain,” he added. “I hate the freaking rain!”
When he said he had to get me out of here, I could only look around myself again. All I could see were the endless trunks of pine trees. Clearly, we were deeply ensconced in a forest somewhere. “Are you ready to tell me where we are now?” I asked, sounding hopeful.
“No,” he answered. He didn’t bother looking over his shoulder at me this time, but instead, increased his pace even faster.
“You do realize, don’t you, that I’m not going to keep following you all night?” I asked. Throwing my hands on my hips, I made a point of staying right where I was. I’d already followed him far enough. And who knew where he was going?
“Suit yourself,” he responded without bothering to slow down. “But you have no idea where you are, and the storm’s coming. You also have no idea what’s lurking inside this forest, because you don’t know if we’re still on the Earthly plane, or inside the Netherworld. Not to mention, you’re also unarmed.”
“So what?”
I could call his bluff on the Netherworld part since I was fairly sure I was still on the Earthly plane, or my magic would never have worked. The idea did cross my mind that maybe my magic could work in some locations of the Netherworld. Maybe it was like cell phone reception …
“So your chances of surviving are much better if you stick with me,” he answered with a shrug.
“I’m a survivor by nature,” I replied while shaking my head. “And I’d rather take my own chances.”
Of course, if I went my own way, that also meant that I would lose track of Jax, my prisoner. Not that he really was my prisoner any longer, considering he wasn’t behind bars, and his compatriots were probably gaining control of Splendor Headquarters right now. That, and he was right, I was unarmed. It was probably truthful to say that I was more his prisoner than he was mine …
EIGHT
It was at this point that I had a critical decision to make: either attempt to keep track of Jax, operating under the probably misguided notion that he was still my prisoner; or head back to Splendor to do whatever I could to keep Sam and everyone else I cared about safe.
It wasn’t a difficult decision to make. I didn’t know where Jax was going, much less to whom he was answering and, what was more, I didn’t intend to find out. I knew enough about his mission, as well as that of Crossbones in general, to take that information and make good use of it. My only priority at the moment was to protect Splendor Headquarters.
Whether or not Jax would simply allow me to go off on my own, however, was another story. It was fairly obvious that he wouldn’t. Especially since his express orders were to remove me from Headquarters and ensure my safety. Well, providing I believed him on that point anyway. And to make a long story short, I didn’t. I figured the truth was more along the lines of Jax absconding with me in order to demand a ransom from the ANC. Why? Because there was no way that anyone in a street potions ring would want to keep me safe. Dead maybe, but safe? No.
I took a few more steps forward, in Jax’s direction, even though I was still bringing up the rear. Luckily for me, the trees were so densely packed, the only way we could travel was in single file. At least it wouldn’t strike Jax as strange that I was following him, rather than walking beside him. The last thing I needed was for Jax to suspect my intention to escape, or that I was now finalizing my plan on just how I could successfully do so.
The rain relentlessly pounded us with plump and very cold drops, but nothing appeared to slow Jax down. Ambling steadily forward, he proceeded despite the uneven forest floor, which was strewn with dead logs, sharp rocks, and piles of pine needles. Some of the piles were so deep, they reached my ankles. So, yes, I did lose my footing on more than one occasion, although I did manage to keep myself upright and moving ever forward.
Even though the going was tough, I was grateful for the density of the trees. They provided some level of shelter from the rain. Not a whole heck of a lot, but definitely better than nothing …
Yes, I briefly considered magicking myself some shelter from the incessant rain but I wanted to conserve my energy and my magic since my escape attempt was going to take a huge toll on my magical reserves.
“I believe we are close to a road,” Jax commented over his shoulder. He slowed down to a more moderate walk before stopping altogether. Glancing up at the sky for the nth time, he studied it for a few seconds, cocking his head to one side and appearing to be in pensive thought.
“Good, because it’s cold and miserable out here,” I replied with a nervous glance to my right and then to my left.
I wasn’t exactly sure what I hoped to find, or what I hoped not to find, but all I could see were trees. The tall pines deluged the landscape all around us, with no break or reprieve. But if Jax thought we were approaching a road, I had to believe him, seeing as how I didn’t know any better. Besides, a road going anywhere was very good news for me. Because I wasn’t the star navigator that Jax was, the street would serve me well. I was hopeful that I could eventually reach a town and then figure out where I was. And, more importantly, how to get back to Splendor.
Every way I looked at it, the time for stalling was over. I knew what I had to do, and now the time had arrived to accomplish it. However, running away wasn’t that simple. If I tried to beeline it in the opposite direction, Jax would run me down in no time at all. Although I was pretty fast on my feet for a woman, Jax would be faster. Of that I was convinced. But luckily for me, I had a little thing called fairy magic at my disposal.
Jax started whistling and then humming, the melody of the song something I vaguely recognized although I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
“…I want to feel you from the inside,” he started singing and I immediately recognized the song as “Closer” by Nine Inch Nails. “You let me desecrate you, you let me penetrate you,” he continued and I was more than sure his choice of song was by no means a coincidence.
I just shook my head, hoping and praying that I’d be taking my leave of him soon enough. I was even more hopeful that I’d never see him again.
“I’ve got no soul to sell,” he continued, his pitch completely off.
Looking over at him, I noticed he’d already resumed his quick pace. The back of his head was now fading fast in front of me, so I immediately began following him again. I didn’t want to give him any reason at all t
o turn around and check on me. And reprimanding me for not moving faster would definitely be a good reason. After he took another five steps without looking back at me, I figured he assumed I was directly behind him.
There’s no time like the present, Dulcie, I thought to myself.
Fisting my right hand as inconspicuously as I could, I shook it once. Maybe my attempt was a little too weak, or too hasty, because I couldn’t feel my magical dust taking form. Keeping one eye on Jax all the while, I shook my fist again; this time, with a little more gusto.
I had to resist smiling as soon as I felt the telltale sensation of ethereal dust filling my palm. A half second later, Jax began to slow down while looking up at the sky again. My breath caught as my heart climbed up and lodged in my throat and I wondered why we were slowing down. He paused several more seconds before turning right and resuming his quick stride. Like a dutiful dog, I obediently trailed him.
I allowed another few seconds to tick by, if only to make sure he wouldn’t check on me. Then, with my eyes riveted on his back, I held my hand out in front of me. Rotating my palm, I released the glittery particles, sprinkling them over my feet. Then I closed my eyes briefly and imagined my shoes taking on supersonic speed.
When I opened my eyes again, I double-checked and saw Jax still forging ahead. Time was the only factor now, especially since I could feel the soles of my feet heating up as my magic took its desired effect. Taking a deep breath, I stepped out with my right foot, pivoted on my toes, so I was facing east, and broke into a full gallop.
Well, “gallop” was an understatement. I was moving so quickly, it felt like I was flying. Cold air rushed against my face, blowing my hair out behind me in a horizontal plane. I traveled so swiftly, I couldn’t even feel the rain, although the smell of wet ozone tickled my nostrils, the scent natural yet clean. When I glanced down at my feet, they appeared as a blur, and the ground was no more than flashing splotches of green and brown.
After nearly slamming headlong into a tree, I reminded myself to face forward, lest I knock myself out and, thus, forfeit any chance I had of escaping. With renewed vigor, I raced forward, slipping between live trees and dodging the hulled out carcasses of long dead ones. After another few seconds, my feet began to slow down and I figured my magic was starting to wear off. Or maybe it was my body that was wearing out. Either way, moving at such a rapid speed was no treat for my legs, my heart, or my lungs.