Page 6 of Stealing Jia

He wasn’t Coletti, but he did have some kind of psychic abilities. My eyes widened in alarm when I realized the warlords had vanished. Had they gone after Giovanni already? Or were they hunting me?

To my disgust, the old guy tottered over to my tree, whipped it out and urinated. So much for making a quick exit and who knew one old man could produce that quantity of urine. Very stinky urine. Where was his keeper?

A dark-haired woman in typical tourist garb hurried out of the shuttle. “What are you doing?”

“Taking a piss.” The old guy hollered. “You blind?”

The woman threw her hands up in the air. “There’s a perfectly good toilet onboard the shuttle and I only stopped so you could take pictures of those stupid ruins.”

I frowned. Her mental signature matched that of a Coletti warlord’s, and I was literally stuck up a tree. A chilling cold encircled my body and bam! I couldn’t move. Not a finger or a toe. My grip on the tree loosened. No matter how hard I tried I couldn’t stop myself from toppling off the branch. I smacked the ground hard. Oof!

“Oh, look. A falling songbird,” the dark-haired woman exclaimed.

Was that supposed to be funny?

The old guy grabbed my rocket launcher. “With a new Falcon rocket launcher.”

“Put it down before you blow something up,” the woman barked.

The old man scowled at her. “I know my way around weapons.”

Bang!Flames shot from the rocket launcher.Whoosh!The missile whizzed away.

“Fuck!” Armor engulfed the woman, and she knocked the old man to the ground.

Kablooey!The shuttle blew into a thousand tiny pieces.

The woman did her best to shield the old man and me from the flaming debris raining down on us. “Nothing like announcing our presence to the evil scientist,” she chided.

I had always heard the Coletti were awesome warriors, but these two were inept fools.

“It’s not my fault the controls are touchy,” the old man retorted.

The woman retracted her helmet. “It wouldn’t have been a problem if you hadn’t picked the stupid thing up.”

“Maybe.”

Envy swelled inside me. They were family. Idiots, but family.

A glittering blue light suddenly engulfed us. Merda!

Chapter Three

When the light faded, we were in an ancient dungeon complete with mummified human remains shackled to the wall. I did a mental happy dance. Not a rat in sight.

“Was that a transporter beam?” The old guy ran his hands over his body.

I wanted to know too.

The woman nodded. “It was.”

“It felt like my insides were being scattered about the universe.” The old guy blew out a relieved breath as he patted his groin. “But I’ve got all my parts.”

I would have rolled my eyes if I wasn’t paralyzed.

The dark-haired woman tapped her comm-link. “Damn, my bracelet’s not working.”

Hmmm. Giovanni must have set up an energy suppression field. Maybe he wasn’t as unprepared as I thought.

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