Page 12 of Reaper
“Forzare!”I shouted, blasting him straight back across the coffee shop with a bolt of pure kinetic energy.“Stay down, Puss in Boots,” I said as he flipped perfectly to land on both feet with one hand down to steady himself.
Randy just growled and sprang forward, shifting completely into feline form as he charged.I braced myself for impact, but he pounced a couple feet before he would have barreled into me, springing over my head and raking lines of fire down my back as he vaulted me.
“Motherfucker!”I yelled, whirling around and calling more power.I spun a shield around my body, giving me a little protection from his claws, but also limiting my mobility, which I could ill afford when I was facing an opponent who was already faster and more agile than me.
Language,Becks said through our link.There are children around.
If there are still kids in here, their parents should be arrested.And I’ve got a little more to worry about than an errant f-bomb.But her mention of kids did get me to let some of my summoned magic flow back into the floor.I couldn’t go bringing the whole building down on Randy if there might still be civilians in the store.
Randy charged me again, this time rearing back on his hind legs to hug me with his forelegs and try to bite my face off.My shield protected me, but it stopped neither his rancid breath nor the face full of cat slobber I got, both of which just pissed me off more.But since he wanted to dance, I was now close enough to tango.I channeled fire into my palms and slapped them against his sides, filling the store with the stench of burnt fur and the howls of a werecat who had suddenly gone from predator to prey.
Randy thrashed in my grip and pulled away, sprinting to a far corner of the coffee shop by the front windows.He crouched there, glaring and spitting at me, then sprang at me once more, determined to have Harker entrails for dinner.I didn’t try to duck this time, just used my magic to anchor myself and reinforce my shield, then let him slam into me again.It was like running face first into a brick wall, only glowy and purple.
Randy let out a yelp and fell back onto his ass.I laid a punch across his head, ringing his bell once again, and he shifted back to his half-human form, the better to stand and beat the shit out of me with.I noticed that the burns on his sides hadn’t healed, so maybe he had to perform a full shift to heal.I filed that away, then kicked him right in his dangly cat balls.His mouth flew open and he made a gagging sound, like he was trying to cough up a hairball.Or maybe two hairy balls.
Either way, I took advantage and punched him right in the throat.Not hard enough to crush his larynx and kill him, but definitely hard enough to make it really hard to breathe for a few minutes.His hands flew to his neck, and my right hand jabbed for whatever passes for a solar plexus on a half-cat, half-human hybrid.He dropped to his knees, and I introduced the side of his skull to my knee, which was finally enough to send his eyes rolling back into his head and his body crashing to the tile floor.As he passed out, he shifted back to human form, leaving me standing over the unconscious body of a naked Black man in the middle of a Barnes & Noble.
This was not how I’d envisioned my night going.
9
We found Randy’s pants and managed to achieve something resembling decency, then got him a sweatshirt from the bookstore and Becks handcuffed him to a chair.The rest of the pack except for Rachelle had bolted, along with most of the store employees and all the customers but one weird guy sitting in the back reading a book calledDungeon Crawler Carland muttering “Goddammit, Donut” every few minutes.The manager stuck around to watch the weirdness, and one cashier with purple hair and a pierced lip hung out flirting with the barista, who said as long as there was anyone in the coffee shop, he had to stay, no matter what.I thought he probably would stick around as long as Lip Ring was giving him the time of day, but let it slide.
“So, Randy, you want to tell me why you went all Wakanda Forever on my ass?”I asked, dragging a chair over and sitting in front of the bound were-panther.
“You gonna make Black Panther jokes all night, or you want to find out who’s killing shifters?”Rachelle asked.
I looked up at her with my most innocent expression, which hovers somewhere between Charles Manson and Jason Voorhees on a good day, and gave her my most Hannibal Lecter smile.“Porque no los dos?”I asked.I turned back to Randy.“Talk, asshole.”
“I don’t know nothing about anybody killing shifters, man.I just got scared when I saw the fucking Reaper at our meeting.Everywhere you go, folks come down with a bad case of dead.These are my peeps, man.I don’t want nothing to happen to them.”
I leaned forward, letting red magic trail from my eyes.“You ever think that maybe people end up dead when I’m around because dumbasses think fur and fangs are worth a fuck against a guy who literally throws fireballs?You started this shitshow, Randy, not me.”
He leaned back, giving him a little distance from my glowing eyes.“Yeah, okay, I shouldn’t have started anything.But I heard you threw down with Saint’s crew a couple days ago, and those guys are tough, man.Anybody who’ll step to them wouldn’t have any trouble putting a hurt on some of our people.I was just trying to look out for them.”
“He’s telling the truth,” Rachelle said.“We had lunch with one of the North End Whiskers yesterday, and he told us what happened with Saint’s people.And something about blowing up Mort’s bar again, too.”
I threw up my hands.“For fuck’s sake!I left Mort’s place in better shape than I found it.We had a goddamned meeting there, that’sall.I didn’t even punch anybody.Not even Mort, and everybody knows how much I like kicking his ass.”
“Wait a minute,” Becks said, holding up a hand before I really got rolling.“Who are the North End Whiskers?”
This was a crew we hadn’t heard of.Not that I try to keep track of all the packs in and around Charlotte.It’s a decent-sized city, and most packs are just four or five people who hang out together, like an extended family.I was only really familiar with the larger groups, like Saint’s or Dex’s, or the ones that got into some really ugly shit.I usually didn’t let them live long enough to know their names, though.
“The Whiskers are a bunch of street rats that live up around Camp North End.There’s still a bunch of old industrial buildings around there, so they hang out in abandoned warehouses and dumpster dive behind the bars after closing,” Randy said.“You didn’t know about the Whiskers?Where you been, man?”
“Not going to trendy crowded bars with shitty chairs, loud music that sucked in the 90s, and overpriced domestic garbage beer.If I want to pay four bucks for a PBR, I’ll…never mind.I never want to pay four bucks for a fucking PBR,” I shot back.
“Well, the Whiskers been around for close to ten years now, and nothing goes on in the north side of town they don’t know about.You wanna find out what’s up in the cheap parts of town, you gotta be sure to bring some cheddar with you.And I don’t mean the kind you get at the grocery store.”
I glared at Randy, then looked over at Rachelle for confirmation.She nodded, and I turned to go, not before tossing a small fireball at his face.Not enough to do any damage, just a little puff of flame to remind him who the Alpha was.“Thanks for all your help, pal.I really appreciate it.”
“You gonna let me out of these cuffs?”he asked.
“Not my cuffs,” I said.“I’m not into that.Much.”I walked off with Becks right behind me.You’re not going to unlock him?I asked her as we got to the parking lot.
He did start a fight in the middle of a crowded store where children were present.That’s the kind of thing the local authorities frown upon, isn’t it?
You called the cops?
