Page 4 of Harmless
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RORI
Ihobbled out of the bedroom, my feet still tender and aching from my day-long trek through the desert. I went to rub an itch on my nose and winced. My sunburn was peeling, which made my skin itchy as hell, but the new layer underneath felt tenderized and near painful to touch.
My two cousins, LJ and Carter, oh-so-helpfully watched me wobble from their guest bedroom to the kitchen table like a newborn gazelle.
“How do you feel?” The question came from Carter, the older of the two brothers.
“’Bout as good as I look. Did you leave me any coffee?”
“I’ll get it.” LJ jumped up from the table, rounding the kitchen counter to grab a mug.
He was always a sweetheart, the sunshine to his brother’s brooding dark cloud. I didn’t know what Carter’s deal was. Maybe my aunt Noelle and uncle Lark were stricter with him, since he was the first-born and all. They all seemed happy when our families got together, though.
LJ placed a mug of coffee and two slices of slightly-burnt buttered toast in front of me, and I beamed up at him. “Thanks, LJ. Did you know that you’re my favorite cousin?”
“Aww, you’re mine too, Ror.”
Carter just rolled his eyes as his little brother plopped back down in his seat. “So what the fuck’s going on?”
The single bite of toast I’d taken turned to sawdust in my throat, and I swallowed it down with lukewarm coffee. “I’m gonna need your guys’ help. Probably the Valkyrie Network’s help too.”
“I gathered that. But I need to know what exactly I’m helping you with.”
I swallowed again, steeling myself as I recalled everything that had unraveled so quickly in the last few weeks. My eyes lifted to the window at the sound of fluttering wings. It couldn’t have been very loud, but I was attuned to that infernal bird and couldn’t do shit about it. Sure enough, Astarte, the goddess inhabiting a white dove, peered at me from the windowsill.
“Torr and I came upon something terrible that’s being kept secret. We went undercover and it’s…”
“WhereisTorr?” Carter pinned me with a hard stare. “Why were you alone when we picked you up?”
“He got…” I tried to force another breath through my closing throat, “…captured.”
LJ reached out, putting his hand on my arm. “Captured where? By who?”
I went for the glass of water on the table, gulping it down with the realization that I was probably still dehydrated. My cousins waited patiently as I took my fill and recomposed myself. Torr needed me to have my shit together. So did Santos. I would never be able to get them out if I was a blubbering mess, so I zipped it all up and breathed until I was calm enough to speak.
“There’s a resort hidden in a canyon in the desert. The super-rich pay a lot of money to go there, I’m talking Blakeworth elite types.”
“Rich people doing shady shit, what a surprise,” Carter drawled.
“What are they doing there?” LJ piped up.
I took another calming breath, making sure not to close my eyes, or else I would see nothing but the carnage of the gladiator pit, the abuse that had been done to Santos, and Torr being dragged away from me.
“They enslave people,” I choked out. “Mostly men to fight as gladiators. The, uh, attractive men are also pimped out to the female guests as sex slaves. There are female staff there too who could use help.” I rubbed my forehead, as if I could wipe away my maid Paige’s look of terror when she first talked to me, all becauseshebelieved she talked too much. “Basically, these ultra-wealthy folks get to do whatever they want to those beneath them.”
“Fuck,” LJ breathed, eyes sliding toward his brother.
Carter only cracked his knuckles. “So we’re fucking up some rich assholes’ playground and getting Torr out? I’m in. What do we need?”
A smile pulled at my lips for the first time since my cousins had picked me up. No, longer than that, probably. The last time I smiled was probably when Torr and I were naked in that suite.
But I loved that Carter was a man of action, always ready to go. He and LJ were the right people to call for this job. Carter wasn’t even 30 years old, and yet he was one of the most accomplished riders of the Valkyrie Network, an organization that smuggled people out of oppressive territories, like Blakeworth, and brought them to safe havens like Sevier and Four Corners.
I shook my head as I smiled, waving my hand in anogesture at him. “Not just Torr. Everyone.”
Carter lifted one dark eyebrow. “And how many people iseveryone?”
