The Hollows Series Books 1-4. Kim Harrison

I passed out.

       Thirty-Two

      “Listen!” Francis shouted, spittle flying from him in his fervor. “I’ll tell you everything. I want a deal. I want protection. I was only supposed to do Brimstone takes. That’s all. But someone got spooked and Mr. Kalamack wanted the drops switched. He told me to switch the drops. That’s all! I’m not a biodrug runner. Please. You gotta believe me!”

      Edden said nothing, playing the silent bad cop as he sat across from me. The shipping papers Francis had signed were under his thick hand as an unspoken accusation. Francis cowered in a chair at the end of the table, two chairs down from us. His eyes were wide and frightened. He looked pathetic in his bright shirt and polyester jacket with the sleeves rolled up, trying to live the dream he wanted his life to be.

      I carefully stretched my sore body, my gaze falling on the three cardboard boxes stacked ominously at one end of the table. A smile curved over me. Hidden under the table and in my lap was an amulet I’d taken from the head assassin. It glowed an ugly red, but if it was what I thought it was, it would go black when I was dead or in the event the contract on my life had been paid off. I was going home to sleep for a week as soon as the little sucker went out.

      Edden had moved Francis and me into the employees’ break room to stave off a repeat of the witch attack. Thanks to the local news van, everyone in the city knew where I was—and I was just waiting for fairies to crawl out of the ductwork. I had more faith in the ACG blanket draped over me than the two FIB officers standing around to make the long room seem cramped.

      I tugged the blanket closer around my neck, appreciating its minor protection as much as its warmth. Spiderweb-thin strands of titanium were woven into it, guaranteed to dilute strong spells and break mild ones. Several of the FIB officers had yellow coveralls made out of a similar fabric, and I was hoping Edden would forget to ask for it back.

      As Francis babbled, my eyes ran over the grimy walls decorated with sappy sentiments about happy workplaces and how to sue your employer. A microwave and a battered fridge took up one wall, a coffee-stained counter took up another. I eyed the decrepit candy machine, hungry again. Nick and Jenks were in the corner, both trying to stay out of the way.

      The heavy door to the break room opened, and I turned as an FIB officer and a young woman in a provocative red dress slipped in. An FIB badge hung around her neck, and the yellow FIB hat perched on her overstyled hair looked like a cheap prop. I guessed they were Gerry and Briston from the mall. The woman’s face scrunched up and she whispered a derisive, “Perfume.” My breath puffed out. I’d love to explain, but it would probably do more harm than good.

      The whispers of the FIB officers had lessoned dramatically after I’d ditched the old lady disguise and turned into a battered twenty-something with frizzy red hair and curves where they ought to be. I felt like a bean in a maraca, and with my sling, my black eye, and the blanket draped around me, I probably looked like a disaster refugee.

      “Rachel!” Francis cried urgently, drawing my attention back to him. His triangular face was pale, and his dark hair had gone stringy. “I need protection. I’m not like you. Kalamack is going to kill me. I’ll do anything! You want Kalamack; I want protection. I was only supposed to do Brimstone. It’s not my fault. Rachel, you’ve got to believe me.”

      “Yeah.” Tired beyond belief, I took a deep breath and looked at the clock. It was just after midnight, but it felt like nearly sunrise.

      Edden smiled. His chair scraped as he got to his feet. “Let’s open ’em up, people.”

      Two FIB officers eagerly stepped forward. I clutched the amulet in my lap and anxiously leaned to see. My continued existence was in those boxes. The sound of ripping tape was loud. Francis wiped his mouth, watching in what looked like a morbid fascination and fear.

      “Sweet mother of God,” one of the officers swore, backing away from the table as the box opened. “They’re tomatoes.”

      Tomatoes? I lurched to my feet, grunting in pain. Edden was a breath ahead of me.

      “It’s inside them!” Francis babbled. “The drugs are inside. He hides the drugs in tomatoes so the custom dogs can’t smell them.” White-faced behind his stubble, he pushed his sleeves up again. “They’re in there. Look!”

      “Tomatoes?” Edden said, disgust crossing him. “He ships them out in tomatoes?”

      Perfect red tomatoes with green stems stared back at me from their cardboard packing tray. Impressed, my lips parted. Trent must have wedged the vials into the developing fruit, and by the time it was ripe, the drug was safely hidden inside a faultless fruit no human would touch.

      “Get over there, Nick,” Jenks demanded, but Nick didn’t move, his long face ashen. At the sink, two officers who had opened the boxes were violently scrubbing their hands.

      Looking like he was going to be sick, Edden stretched to pick a tomato up, examining the red fruit. There was not a blemish or cut on the perfect skin. “I suppose we probably ought to open one up,” he said reluctantly, setting it on the table and wiping his hand on his pants.

      “I’ll do it,” I volunteered when no one spoke up, and someone slid a tarnished table knife across the table at me. I picked it up with my left hand, then remembering my other hand was in a sling, I looked for some help. Not one FIB officer would meet my gaze. Not one was willing to touch the fruit. Frowning, I set the knife aside. “Oh well,” I breathed, raising my hand and bringing it down on top of the fruit.

      It hit with a sodden splat. Red goo splattered over Edden’s white shirt. His face went as gray as his mustache. There was a cry of disgust from the watching FIB officers. Someone gagged. Heart pounding, I took the tomato in one hand and squeezed. Pulp and seeds squirted from between my fingers. My breath caught as a cylinder the size of my pinky pressed against my palm. I dropped the mass of pulp and shook my hand. Shouts of dismay rose as the red flesh splattered against the table. It was only a tomato, but one would think I was pulping a decaying heart by the noise the big, strong FIB officers were making.

      “Here it is!” I said triumphantly, picking out an institutional-looking vial gooped in tomato slime and holding it aloft. I’d never seen biodrugs before. I had thought there’d be more.

      “Well, I’ll be,” Edden said softly, taking the ampule in a napkin. The satisfaction of discovery had overwhelmed his abhorrence.

      A wisp of fear tightened Francis’s eyes as his gaze darted from me to the boxes. “Rachel?” he whimpered. “You’ll get me protection from Mr. Kalamack, right?”

      Anger stiffened my back. He had betrayed me and everything I believed in—for money. I turned to him, the gray edging my sight as leaned over the table and I put myself in his face. “I saw you at Kalamack’s,” I said, and his lips went bloodless. Grabbing the front of his shirt, I left a red smear across the colorful fabric. “You’re a black runner, and you’re gonna burn.” I pushed him back into his chair and sat down, my heart pounding from the effort—satisfied.

      “Whoa!” Edden said softly. “Someone arrest him and read him his rights.”

      Francis’s mouth opened and closed in alarm as Briston pulled her cuffs from her hip and snapped them around his wrists. I reached into my sling and awkwardly unhooked my charm bracelet. I tossed it to land next to her—just in case Francis had something nasty in his rolled-up sleeves—and at Edden’s nod, she laced it on Francis’s wrist as well.

      The soft and certain pattern of the Miranda flowed out in a reassuring cadence. Francis’s eyes were wide and fixed to the vial. I don’t think he even heard the man at his elbow.

      “Rachel!” he cried as he found his voice. “Don’t let him kill me. He’s going to kill me. I gave you Kalamack. I want a deal. I want protection! That’s the way it works, right?”

      My eyes met Edden’s and I wiped my hand free of the last of