Danger Mine: A Base Branch Novel (7 page)

She steeled her jittery nerves and exited the car. The mud immediately sucked at her feet, swelling around the edges of her black pointy toes. “All to pot.” She kicked the excess goop and stamped off the rest. Shoulders back, gaze down, she avoided the biggest of the mess. Her steady strides gave no hint of the turmoil receding to the background. Thick drapes covered every window along the front of the house. As she walked her eyes tracked back and forth, covering her own six…even though Street had her ass covered at the very least.

A clubby electronic beat shook the asymmetrical walls. She took the stairs in one step and beat her fist against the door. Heavy voices cackled. One guys said, “The stripper is here.” Their whoops and hollers grew two fold. She discerned at least seven different voices in the mix.

Every bit of unease vanished. Khani’s body prepared for a confrontation. Her muscles loosened. Her breathing evened. Her senses honed to a needle’s point. A needle didn’t seem very vicious. Often the best offense was the one no one saw coming. The innocence of a needle vanished when you shoved it into someone’s eyeball.

“Brava!” A young guy with brown floppy hair and a short beard opened the door wide.

Inside, seven men between the ages of eighteen and twenty or so held beer bottles in various stages of consumption. The oldest of them, presumably Isay Polzin, held a bottle of whisky in the crook of his thumb in the opposite hand that rested on the doorknob. He pinched a joint between his thumb and forefinger around the glass’s red-waxed neck. The stench of it curled into the murky air of the cabin.

“Come in, pretty. Take off your clothes and we’ll reward you sweetly.” Isay hollered and slurred his words like a street beggar.

“Izzy?” she cooed.

“Yeah. Who’s asking?” Isay’s gaze hung on her still open buttons.

She felt a little bad for the guy. There wasn’t much to see. “My name is Khani.”

“Zdravstvuyte, Khani.” He swept his arm encompassing the posse. “We’re having a celebration. Come in and join us. We’re really nice guys.”

Khani jammed her hands into the back pocket of her slacks, pressed her meager breasts against the material of her shirt, and twisted in place. “I’d like to talk to you in private.”

“Hear that, she wants my privates,” he announced to the room. All the daft pricks laughed. One exceptional fool cupped his pitiful excuse for a dick and shook it at her. Their gazes flew from the lewd act to her, expecting a reaction of some sort.

Playing the hard-up cougar—not too far off if she considered Street—Khani’s gaze dropped the Isay’s crotch. A smile tickled her lips, but not for the reason he thought. If he knew what she’d planned for his goods, or if he didn’t cooperate, he’d weep. “So, are you coming?”

“Oh, I’m coming.” A moose-sized boy’s hips thrust in an obscene display of alcohol and testosterone induced foolishness.

“We want to come too,” the youngest—by looks anyway—shouted.

Two of the young men stood and started toward the door. Her patience vanished as did her playful demeanor. “Isay, this is your last chance to step outside and have a civil conversation with me.”

“I don’t even know you,” the guide—to what, being an asshole?—contested.

The room collectively balked. “What are you, his mom?” the largest of the group derided.

“No. I’m not yours either, but I’ll teach you a lesson,” she purred.

Macho-man spread his arms in the doorway, nearly hitting Isay in the head with his fat hand. “Oh, I’d love to see you try.”

Take out the leader and the rest will fall in line.

Khani struck so quickly no one gasped until she had Macho’s limp cock and balls in her fist and twisted to face the back of the room. The big guy screamed like he’d yet to reach puberty. It only took another second for shock to subside. He scrambled back. Well, he tried.

The room erupted. The more horrified chaps clambered away, while his best friends surged forward. Too bad for Macho he only had two good friends in the bunch.

“Come any closer and I’ll rip them off,” she said in an even tone.

Macho’s eyes bugged. With an impressive surge of adrenaline, he stopped trying to escape and lunged forward. His hands wrapped around Khani’s neck. She dragged in a breath. When he squeezed she tensed the muscles in her neck and held it. Khani winked at the dummy and amplified her hold in proportion to his grasp on her throat.

“First time with your nuts in a vise,” she squeaked. “Don’t worry. With practice comes expertise. I’ve been in more choke holds than I can count.” She relaxed the muscles in her neck, and then sucked a quick breath. Before his hands clamped on her wiggle room she stiffened her neck. “I can do this all day. Can you?”

His face reddened, while Isay’s paled. A tear seeped from Macho’s big brown eyes and slipped down his cheek. His hands fell away from her neck. “Please,” he whimpered.

She shook her head. “Only if your friend agrees to speak to me outside.”

“Izzy, fuck! Come on, man.” Macho’s blood-shot gaze sliced to his friend.

“Just let him the hell go.” Isay put both hands in the air, his bottle and joint now dangling in each.

“Remember this the next time you’re in the presence of a young woman, and show some respect. You never know what she’s capable of.”

“She’s capable of getting her ass beat,” one of the young sheep in the back hollered.

“If you’re the man to do it, please step forward.” Khani stood her ground, ignoring the throbbing of her head. No matter how many times it happened, it never got painless. When none of them made their play she turned to Isay and hiked her thumb toward the lawn. She eyed the group. “If any or all of you get the big idea to step outside and prove yourself a man, I’ll make sure Izzy never reproduces.”

She closed the door behind her and shoved the kid in the direction of the largest truck in the lawn. “Just in case your friends get any big ideas, we’ll talk behind the truck.”

The kid raised the bottle to his lips. Khani snatched it away and poured the remaining liquid onto the dirt. “What the…what do you want, lady?”

“Who is your employer?”

“Alaska Adventure, why?”

“How was your last excursion?”

“Great. I got head while the girl’s parents slept in the next tent.”

Khani ignored the crudeness. “When was that?”

“I don't keep a calendar of all my sexual interaction.” His mouth screwed into a cocky sneer.

“Surly you remember the dates of your last guide excursion.” She sharpened her gaze, and then let it drop to the front of his pants.

“Khorosho. Khorosho,” he said, flailing his arms.

“I’m English, not Russian, you rat-arsed piece.”

“All right. All right,” he shook his hands again. “I guided the first week of this month.”

“What about last week?”

“Ah.” The kid shooed it off. “It got canceled.”

Khani stepped forward. “By whom?”

“Chill.” Isay treaded backward. “The big guy, the one I was supposed to guide, canceled.”

“What was his name?”

“Hell, I don’t know. Why does it matter?” He widened his hands toward the sky.

“Because you want to have full function of your penis, Isay. That’s why.”

“His name…” The kid pushed the heel of his hand to the bridge of his nose. “His name was Killer…something…I can’t remember. I’m really lit right now.” His swollen pupils begged off.

“You’re about to be lit in a whole new way, bloke.” Khani dropped her hand from her hip.

He jumped back. “Jesus, his name was zzz…Zeke…Zeke Slaughter. He wanted to go by himself. He paid me in full, and then took off on his own.”

“Why hold out on me, Isay?”

His head shook side to side. “I could lose my job for letting him go alone.” He dropped on the joint, and then placed his palms together. “You can’t say anything. Please.”

“Where did he go?”

“I don’t know.”

“When he told you he wanted to cancel where were you?”

“At the campground at Copper Landing near Kenai Lake and the Russian River.”

“Where would he have gone?”

“There are over a million acres in the Kenai Refuge. Fuck if I know.” Isay rubbed his forehead. “Are we done yet?”

“What about the others in the group?”

“The family of five due to tour canceled. Half the family started puking the day before they were going to fly out of wherever the hell they were coming from.” The kid flicked his wrist as though a family of five matter no more than a speck of dirt.

“So, you let him wander into the middle of nowhere all by himself?”

“It’s not like he was helpless. He looked like he could handle shit.” His scrawny shoulders rolled in a near boneless sway.

He had a point. She’d trust Zeke to do a better job navigating the wilderness than she would this shit. “How the hell did you get to be responsible for people’s lives?”

“I grew up roaming these parks.”

“And?”

“My uncle owns the company.”

And there was her answer. She sneered. “Get out of my face, Isay.”

“Yeah, all right.” He teetered across the small dirt lawn, his feet leaving deep prints in the mud.

Khani looked down at her ruined shoes. The disappointment that had nothing to do with boots weighted her more than the extra muck. She stamped the few feet to the SUV and flung herself inside without looking at Street.

“What were they celebrating?” he asked.

“Being asshats. Please, just drive.”

The vehicle eased out of the drive and headed up the road. Relief, the tiniest bit of it, eased one of the cramps in her brain. She sank back into the seat and tried to think about what she knew, but a piercing headache blanketed all thought. Her eyes closed out the blurring lights. Two minutes later the car stopped. She blinked in the neon open sign on the low-key tavern.

“You need to eat. I need to eat.” Street shut off the engine and climbed out of the car.

She could sit here for the forty or more minutes it took him to eat or she could go inside and hope her appetite returned. Her door opened and Street stood there waiting with a reticence she truly appreciated. Her mud-caked boots slopped across the plastic floor mat, and then plopped onto the concrete sidewalk. He closed the car door and walked ahead, grabbing the handle of the pub’s door and opening it for her.

“What are you, some kind of gentleman?”

“Not a chance.”

On safe-mode so she didn’t totally flip her shit, Khani followed demurely behind Street to a four-seater booth. She slid in across from him and stared into his eyes, which reflected the green neon of a beer brand she’d never seen before.

“What’ll you have?” the burliest server in all the world grumbled.

“Two waters, two pints of the best dark you have, and a menu, thanks,” Street said.

The man grunted his compliance as he shoved off.

Street knocked the table with his knuckles, slowly at first and then faster and faster.

“Say what you have to say already,” she snapped.

“He was lying?”

“The waiter didn’t say anything.” She flashed an imitation grin.

“That’s not who I’m talking about and you know it.” He rested his elbows on the table.

She flattened her hands on the table. “You were in the car. You don’t even know what Isay said. So, how the hell do you know he was lying?”

“I read his body language.”

“Oh, you’re a good interpreter of drunken stumbles and higher than the sky gestures?”

“Reading people is what I do. That’s why I moved up so fast in the Branch office.” He dragged in a breath and his brow furrowed. “I’ve had specific training that allows me to tell with upward of ninety-percent accuracy whether or not people are telling the truth.”

“Even when you’re stuck in a vehicle and not talking to them?”

He folded his big arms over his chest. “It’s easier when I’ve talked to them for a while, identified a base-line, and questioned them for longer. But I’m telling you now, he was lying.”

“Isay didn’t want to tell me Zeke paid him to let him go into the fucking underworld by himself. If his uncle, a-k-a his employer, knew, he’d get fired.”

“And you believe that?” Street arched a brow.

“If something happens to their patron while on their roster, they could be held liable, especially if there was negligence on the part of the company.”

He lowered his head. “I want to talk to him.”

“There’s nothing he can do for us…me. He doesn't know where Zeke is.”

The server smacked down their foam-topped beers in tandem, stalked to the bar, and then headed back with two pints of water. He delivered them in the same brutish method. Khani nodded at him, liking his style. No nonsense.

Street took a long pull of creamy foam. “What did he know?”

“He last saw Zeke on the west side of the park, at the Copper Landing campground, close to where Kenai Lake and the Russian River meet. Oh.” She lifted a finger. “And that the Kenai Park is a million bloody acres around.” Khani chugged the first third of her frothy pint.

“How’s your neck?” That green tinted gaze caressed her tender throat.

“Fine.” She took another swig. “He was a pussy.”

“The clamp he had on you didn’t look too slight from my vantage point.”

“You didn’t see the clamp I had on him.” She pointed her finger at his chest.

His face contorted. “I saw enough to know he won’t walk right for a week.”

“He earned it.”

“Without a doubt. But it still hurts me.” He shifted in the seat and adjusted his trousers.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“For what, letting you get choked?”

“Yes,” she nodded.

“You’re nuts.” He laughed.

“Thank you for not charging into the middle of it. Thank you for letting me handle the situation.”

“If I’d thought you’d needed help, I’d have busted all their heads no matter how mad you got.” He leaned back against the seat. “Those kids were punks. You could have taken them all on at once.” He drummed the table with his thumbs. “I was actually kind of hoping they’d make a go at you.”

“I bet you were.”

“I was bored.”

“After we eat, we can head out to Kenai and—”

Street shook his head. “We’ll pack up tonight, get a few hours of sleep, and be at the campground by dawn. We won’t do anyone good by getting lost in the middle of blasted nowhere.”