I studied the people around these simple, A-frame cabins, and again, wasn’t expecting what I couldn’t deny. They were in as much need as those in the city were, but their eyes! Everyone I met had that tell-tale pink tinge upon noticing me, and I instinctively tightened my grip on my owner’s waist, sensing the danger. These women were desperate.

  We stopped for a river crossing a few minutes later, and the feeling of menace grew as we pulled into line. There were dozens of women here, all staring at me with a glare of madness. Candice and Angelica apparently felt it too, because they stood on the bikes and drew their guns. At that point, I began to understand the trouble it would be to have me along for the run. I would attract attention and maybe even fights.

  At their quick display, the others went back to what they’d been doing, but their stares only grew harder the longer they were forced to be around me. I tried to shrink into the seat and disappear.

  The river was out of my sight, we were that far back in the line, but I could hear a motor of some sort and wondered briefly how we would cross. In the past, they’d had clever boats to shuttle travelers. Those days, along with the old bridges, were gone now. As far as I knew, swimming or a sinker-line were the most commonly used now, but I hadn’t ever crossed even a pool of water and I wasn’t looking forward to getting wet.

  I froze as a lanky form in grime-covered clothes slid toward us. “How much for an hour?”

  I cringed, grabbing for my new weapon, and Candice’s hard hand on my shoulder stopped me.

  “No.”

  Her steel tone had the filthy woman moving back with ugly mutters, and I waited anxiously for the battle to start. I had no idea what to do.

  C

  Those closest were Changelings like we were, but these were also Roamers. The ones who would steal you blind and then slit your throat while you slept if you were dumb enough to do so within 50 miles of them.

  I took the safety off my gun openly and heard Angelica do the same.

  The Roamers worked together, attacking all at once and grabbing the male or coveted item during the chaos. One would take off and hide it while the others slowed the owner or killed her. We had the only males in sight, and their dirty gazes never left us. The sense of blood about to spill was impossible to miss.

  D

  “Move on!”

  The call of the Network guard had us rolling a few spaces closer, and I was distracted from the tension by the sight of the river. Crystal clear, it looked nothing like the dingy bodies of water we had studied in the faded magazine pages when the Den Mothers were busy. This was beautiful, uncorrupted, and I smiled at the sight of it. “It looks so clean!”

  At the sound of my excited voice, time slowed for an instant, highlighting my lethal error….

  C

  I thought he knew not to speak!

  Angelica’s thought mirrored mine, and then we were turning to defend our males against three dozen furious Changelings.

  I jerked Daniel from the Rover and shoved him behind me as Angel and my Mother moved to the flank. My Father already knew to get in the middle and he yanked Daniel down as we opened fire.

  Unlike us, these women weren’t armed and they lunged at us in vain. Blood splattered before they could get within reach, steady fire coming from our three-sided formation. Four on the right side, three on the left, none of the red-eyed females reached us.

  Two more hairy Changelings shoved my Mopar out of the way and dove at my ankles, clearly only seeing Daniel. I pulled the trigger with little remorse.

  The gunfire only lasted for a minute. A dozen of the Roamers lay on the ground and the rest were fleeing. Even during the rages, self-preservation was there. I looked down to see that Daniel and my Father were okay, and then swung my head back to the battle scene.

  The Network guards were rushing our way, and the remaining Changelings vanished from sight. At my nod, Angelica and my Mother holstered, but didn’t move out of our defensive formation.

  “Hands up!”

  I slowly put my gun away and lifted my hands. “My ID is in the top pocket.” I gave my Games grin, hoping to be recognized. “Along with a payment for the mess I’ve made in defense of my mate.”

  Their eyes went over Daniel and my Father cowering between three well-armed females and the guard in the middle stepped forward.

  She wore the same uniform and gear of a Network Defender, but I sensed a sleaziness about her that kept me from attempting to sway her to our side. Building friends and contacts was a natural part of our career, but we chose not to align ourselves with snakes… unless we had to.

  The guard looked like it had been a long day, and I forced the rage back to give a half apologetic look. “I can have my males roll them into the water for you…”

  “Shut up!” The woman ordered harshly, staring at Daniel with clear intentions.

  I snapped back without hesitation. “I enjoyed the Games. Be very quick.”

  That garnered an instant response from the guards behind her.

  “Pruett.”

  “She’s a Pruett.”

  “All Pruetts.” I stated pointedly and the Network Defender became very businesslike.

  The pink also faded from her eyes, and I allowed myself to breathe. There were only a dozen guards here, but in a riot, I would be sure to lose either my mate or my father, and I couldn’t tolerate either. Guards were much better fighters than Changelings - usually because they’d won a Games challenge that earned them the current job.

  As I was patted down and then officially identified, my mind began to fill with more of those disturbing thoughts about the Network… and stopping them. Because of their rules, I had just killed to keep my mate. It shouldn’t have to be this way. I had no animosity towards these suffering females just looking for a relief from the torment.

  And then there was Daniel. I had only felt safe bringing him because of the strict training the bachelors got from the Network, but he knew almost nothing. Why hadn’t he been taught these things like the other bachelors? It was as if they had never intended for him to blend into the outside world at all…

  Those who hadn’t attacked had cleared the scene, and we’d been as careful as we could to only hit targets, not civilians. As usual, our aim was good, but our luck wasn’t. Two shots had found innocent targets, and we paid the farmer for both hogs. The extra bit of gold dust my Mother pressed into the older woman’s hand also gained us another ally.

  Now, the woman could justify eating the two animals and still have something to show for it. Here in New America, surviving was the best most people could hope for. Getting ahead was only for those in New Network City, and the Pruetts never forgot that.

  Sure he was a wreck inside over what he had unintentionally caused, I motioned Daniel back toward the Mopar that Angelica now had upright - without the punishment he probably felt he deserved. None of this was his fault. It was a result of the War, of past mistakes, and… the Network.

  D

  I was too shocked to enjoy crossing the wide river on the ferryboat. I didn’t care that it was my first ever or that the feel of it could have been incredible. Those women had died because I had made a careless mistake and there was no way I could take it back. I wanted to curl up and hide. I kept my head down against her back and struggled to keep from crying in shame. More lives lost, for me. When would it end?

  C

  I knew Daniel was upset, but I didn’t realize how much until I stepped from the Mopar and turned toward him. He didn’t move, just stared back, waiting for the blows to begin. My heart broke for him.

  “Come with me.”

  I moved us into the shadows, choosing my words. He didn’t mean to be reckless, and until I had time to train him properly, I wouldn’t blame him any more than he deserved.

  As soon as we were out of sight, he went to his knees at my feet, trembling. I understood that he wanted me to give him a punishment, or he would torture himself over it.

  “What would the Network have done?”

  His eyes shot to mine and his voice held a tremor I loathed.

  “Speaking… is a serious rule. I’ve heard they use the whip.”

  I scowled. There was no way I would do that, and I chose to try a different tactic. “I am not the Network. If I thought you had broken a rule and needed to be punished, do you believe I would do it?”

  He nodded quickly, forehead wrinkled in that familiar way. I struggled to sound angry when I really wanted to comfort him. “Speaking is not against my rules, Daniel. Those women could have controlled themselves. We do.”

  I was seeing fresh signs of my Daniel, like the way the middle of his forehead squeezed together when he was frustrated or when he was hurt and couldn’t find a way to express what he was thinking. There was no way I would let him regress into that shaking form I’d first been given. “In my household, you are a person, not a slave to be punished, and my rules stand before the Network’s. If you plan to stay with me, you’ll accept that.”

  D

  She left me standing there, waiting for pain that wasn’t coming. I didn’t understand why she wasn’t upset, but I was grateful and tried to put it out of my mind – mostly because I knew she wouldn’t like it if she caught me dwelling on it.

  The images I’d seen, the snarls and the screams, the claws I’d felt, those wouldn’t go away anytime soon, but I had gotten good at hiding my thoughts from the other bachelors and Den Mothers. I would use that skill now. I wouldn’t be separated from her. Not after all she’d done for me.

  C

  We had chosen not to rest, but to take an energizer instead and get this run cleared up. It had already become worthless in the terms of UDs. The Network would have huge fines waiting for us, to balance the mess their employees had to clean up.

  Despite it being Spring, only small areas of the eastern half of the country were in bloom. The Western half was a desert with little to recommend it besides the leftover tools of mankind.

  I watched Daniel stare at the stars, the moon, and even the blowing leaves as if in a trance, and I shook my head at Angelica’s quick look to him. He wouldn’t get an energizer. He needed some sleep, and he could doze, tied to me this time, while we rolled to Jericho.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Old St. Louis

  D

  The City had a wall around it!

  I stared in amazement as we crested the rise, unable to see any gaps in the ten foot barrier. Made from boat planks and entire slabs of concrete, the sheets of wood and houses were covered in vivid graffiti, much of it anti-Network. Inside those filthy walls was more of the same. Jericho would be like wandering through a labyrinth.

  “Looks like they’ve fixed the south wall,” Candice stated, looking through a pair of expensive Network binoculars. “Not the north side, though. We’ll slide in through the fence and head for the Square.”

  The Square was in the very center of the city, where they thought Baker had a hole-up. During our only break in the twenty hours it took to get here, Bruce informed me that St. Louis had been one of the first Midwestern towns to be rebuilt. Its citizens had erected the wall in order to keep others out. The Network had put a quick, harsh stop to that, but left the wall and turned the city into their final outpost before the borderlands of Arkansas. Everything beyond that point was ruled by the West Coast Outpost, sister to the Network council we currently served.

  C

  He was here. What the hell was Baker thinking? If we caught him, we would turn him in. He knew that, so what the hell was he doing standing outside his hole-up?

  I studied the surrounding area and found too much debris and stacked furniture to be sure he wasn’t alone. Likely he wasn’t, and I gave the signal for my parents to drop back and send in a sighting alert. We would then move straight in and snatch him up.

  It was a standard plan we used, but thanks to our hunting skills, the prey often thought we were much farther away. Right now, the Snake Tracers were passing the word that we had stayed a night in the Forests of Kentucky. We shouldn’t be expected so soon, but the convict shouldn’t be out in the open, either.

  Baker turned suddenly, hand dropping to his lean hip, and I stared as the memories flashed over me at the sight of that body. I’d use it many times, in many ways.

  I’d found him hiding under a house a year after Daniel was gone, too exhausted to pay the local runaway gang leader for the night’s room and board after evading Network guards all day. Our friendship had come easily because of our common hatred of adults and authority. Back then, when the change was just starting to show signs, I hadn’t cared that Baker was male. I only saw his strength and his friendship. As the feeling grew out of control, he’d eased me into the pain and pleasure… the cool relief that came after one of our sessions.

  Those first few years had been awful for me. Daniel hadn’t been gone a month before the Change was already lighting my small body up from the inside. It didn’t usually come until the age of puberty, but my grief at losing him had sped things up until I was burning alive all the time. Then I’d found a substitute…

  Baker wore earrings in both thick lobes, an onyx circle with an indecipherable symbol in the center and a silver chain around his neck that I thought might be made of titanium. In all the times we’d slept together, it had never snapped under my Changeling strength.

  He moved with an arrogance that said he was on his own and surviving it. That was another part of him I had been taken with. Even as a homeless teenager, he’d been sure of himself, and I had needed that for what I was planning. We’d spent time working on my strength every day. He was the reason I had made survived the Games.

  When Baker made the Network’s wanted list, we had been lovers for half a decade. I’d turned him in before, but it was something I didn’t think I could do now, despite accepting the assignment. The Network would get someone else when I let him go. I hadn’t agreed for the UDs or for the chase. I needed to see him… feel him. I had to know if he still affected me so strongly. I had to let go of Baker to have a real future with Daniel, and after the month we had spent together in the very den he was holed-up in, I wasn’t sure that was possible. Before I’d signed up for the Games, I had feared I might be falling in love with Baker and I now needed to know if it was true. If I loved Baker, too, there were different choices to be made.

  I joined Angelica and Daniel at the Mopars we had left just outside the walls, my parents guarding from nearby. “You ready?”

  Her curt nod told me she was jumpy, and I gave her a look of recognition. “Why don’t you hang back, have a ride ready?”

  She understood what I wanted without having to be told. If there was trouble, she would take Daniel out of harm’s way. I’d rather have her at my side, but my Mother would be concerned with her own mate, and I was the leader. Daniel had to be protected.

  I waved us forward with a sense that things were about to go wrong, but I didn’t call it off. Besides needing closure, I was also hoping the Convict might have some information on the Ring. That fury was also still burning hotly.

  We spread out in a V-formation that put Daniel in the center and walked into Jericho with our hands hovering over our guns. I knew instantly that Baker was watching us now…watching Daniel. I could feel it. He was close.

  Minutes after easing inside the walls of Jericho, we moved through the alley where he’d been standing and the tension crackled. Crates and old garbage littered the narrow dimness, the debris a foot deep and flattened down, but not lifeless.

  I waved us forward with a bad feeling in my gut. Was Baker setting me up? He had to know I’d never allow that to pass, lovers or not. I wondered how he saw me now. I’d asked him once, what he was drawn to when he could have his choice of Changelings in the breeding programs. He’d surprised me and won a chunk of my affection with his answer.

  “You represent a kind of freedom and strength that I would do anything to have. When I’m close to your fire, I’m sure I’m alive, and there’s hope.”

  Now, I was ending that and I thought maybe he was seeing me differently. I was no longer his tattooed mistress. I was someone’s legal mate.

  C

  “Stop there.”

  I moved closer to Daniel, feeling waves of male menace aimed his way. Baker wasn’t happy to see my new mate along for his capture.

  “Comin’ in.”

  The voice failed to stun me, and I grinned. We would be on equal terms this time. “Slowly.”

  My warning was heeded, the shadow moving away from the wall with careful movements. I hadn’t even known he was there.

  A big hand raised black goggles and those glinting silver orbs regarded us coolly.

  “Baker.”

  His shined eyes flashed at the sound of my voice. “Candy.”

  He wasn’t expecting my reaction, and really, neither was I. The blade spun by his head and sank deep into the molding wood he’d been camouflaged by. “No more.”

  He nodded, not taking any new offense that I could see. “I had to be sure.”

  “This is Daniel. My mate.”

  The two males took an instant dislike to each other.

  Baker’s voice rumbled insultingly. “That weakling?”

  Daniel’s anger flared, and his hand dropped to the weapon on his hip. “Can I shoot him now? It said preferred dead.”

  Okay, maybe it was more like instant loathing. I listened to my instincts and kept quiet as my lovers glared at each other.

  D

  I hated him on sight. He was unkempt and unclean, a smirking threat to my place. I wanted her away from him the instant he appeared. This heathen had been with her. Baker knew my Candice intimately, and the jealousy, the absolute fury, made me fearless. “Mine!”

  Baker’s laughter was salt in my open wound. “Not likely. Just a new toy.”