There were over one hundred and twenty types of jerboa in the desert and mountains between California and its surrounding states. None were venomous, and all were driven by two things—sex and hunger. Placid to a fault, most jerboa only mantled when threatened, although I’d seen one launch itself at a hawk hunting her young, piercing its skull with her sharp teeth as it swooped down close enough to grab one. This one was cute but not something I wanted pooping all night in the back of my car.
“Hold on,” I told it, unraveling myself from my covers and biting down a hiss when the cold air grabbed me. “Let me get you something nice.”
Dragging a dried pineapple slice from the bag Ryder got from the automat was easy enough, especially since he’d left it tucked in one of the cupholders in the aftermarket middle console I’d put in. Either the rattling of the bag or the scent of the fruit caught the jerboa’s interest, because its tail deflated a bit and it stretched toward me again, sniffing at the air.
Waving the ring in front of its twitching black nose, I made sure I had its full attention, then tossed it out of the open passenger door, grinning when the jerboa took off after it like it’d been shot out of a cannon. The pineapple possibly grazed the floor, but I doubted it. The desert rat snatched it up in a move that would have any raptor envious, ducking back under the Mustang to scuttle off with its prize and then darting beneath one of the station’s heavily armored trucks.
Watching the jerboa speed hop across the parking floor must have been guidance from Pele, because I caught the station doors sliding open, illuminating a long rectangle in Oketsu’s darkened glass. I’d parked nose in, so reaching for the shotgun probably would be hard, but after closing the passenger door just enough to turn off the interior light, I gave it my best effort. I’d mounted the holster to make it easy for me to reach while driving, and I was pleasantly surprised to feel it draw out smoothly, its shortened barrel clearing the gap between the seats without a hitch.
Even behind the shadowed glass, I could make out the silhouette of a man walking deliberately toward the Mustang, striding as close to the columns as he could to give himself some cover. Too broad for Ryder. And too short. He also moved human—more of a stomp than an elfin glide—and there was no reason for any human I knew in the station to be heading toward my car.
Especially since only Ryder knew I’d come out here.
While there were cameras, a quick flash of credits and a favor or two could turn them off. Hernandez wasn’t manning the desk, and he was the only one on staff I’d trust not to take a bribe. I was going to assume whoever was darting from shadow to shadow meant either me or the Mustang harm. Either way, he wasn’t going to like what he found.
A flash of light on steel and a crouch near my passenger back tire was all I needed to know, and I came up out of the partially open door, shotgun barking off a warning blast over the guy’s shoulders. The heat of the blast coiled over him, and he fell back, knife clenched tight in his hand and his face set into a wary stubbornness I remembered so very well, despite the years we’d spent apart.
“Hello, Jerem.” Stepping carefully all the way out of the car, I kept my aim steadied on his chest and shoulders. “Didn’t think I could lose any more respect for you, but screwing with a man’s car, that’s low. Even for you.”
To his credit, he dropped the knife.
The storm raged outside, battering at the bay doors, bringing a roll of thunder into the bay from the rattling steel. As chilled as I was, the cold on my skin was nothing compared to the chunk of ice in my belly. Samms had fallen a lot further in my mind, willing to strand me at the station for reasons I couldn’t imagine.
But I intended to find out.
“Slashing tires?” I asked, taking a step forward to kick the knife out of his reach. “Were you going to stop there or try for the brake lines?”
“Mind if I stand up?” He gestured elegantly with a callused hand, trying a sweet smile on to soften my stance. “Concrete’s cold as hell.”
“Mind if I blow a hole through you?” I drawled, moving back against the car, bumping the door shut with my hip. “Floor’s a good place for you right now, especially for a snake like you.”
“Just one tire. Maybe two. Enough to slow you down. That’s all,” Samms said, shifting forward to fold his legs under him. “I would never do anything to harm you.”
“You tried to cut off my ears,” I reminded him.
“They would have grown back.”
Snorting, I countered, “You don’t know that.”
“Your thumb did,” he replied, nodding toward my left hand. “You probably would have grown two good ears. Would have gotten rid of that notch you’ve got in that one.”
I considered his reasoning for about half a second, enough time to spit in his eye if I’d wanted to. It was still flawed, especially considering I’d have been earless for who knew how long, and that was if they grew back. There was a good chance they would have, but the notch was permanent, a clipped-out piece Tanic took great delight in snipping out, then rubbing iron dust into the edges every day until the flesh refused to fuse back together.
It was my punishment for catching and eating one of the salamanders he’d been using as an experiment. I had no regrets then. Just as I had none now for keeping Samms sitting on his butt on the cold cement floor.
“Don’t think so.” I resisted the temptation to rub at the triangular notch, a habit Dempsey tried very hard to break me of, but it never really took. “How big is this contract on Kenny that you’re willing to screw with my car to get to him before I can find him? Because that’s what this is about, right?”
“Truthfully?” He shifted, the cold probably eating away at any heat in his legs.
“Samms, you lie so much you actually change the meaning of the words coming out of your mouth whenever you use them,” I retorted. “You probably think you’re sitting on the sky right now.”
His mouth twisted into a grimace. “Okay, I probably deserved that.”
“You deserve getting shot for what you were going to do to my car.” It was a time-honored punishment for poachers, rustlers, and anyone stranding someone in the no-man’s-lands between cities. The West was wilder than it’d ever been, but its vigilante laws seemed to hold up. Even standing in a border station with more than two dozen officers nearby, I could have blown a hole through Samms’s head and his death would have been written off as justified. “I report this and your license will get stripped. You know that. The contract on Kenny so high you’re willing to risk that?”
“You tell me,” Samms said through chattering teeth. He named a number so high it stole the breath from my lungs. Chuckling at my shock, he rubbed his hands together, blowing on them to get warm. “Yeah, that’s what I said too. And I’ll trade you a piece of information for not reporting this. Something bigger than what they’re offering for Kenny. Something that will really make your head spin. Just let me get off this damned floor. I can’t feel my toes anymore.”
“Info first.” I gestured with the shotgun in case he’d forgotten about it. “I still haven’t decided whether or not I’m going to let you walk out of here without an extra hole in your head.”