My Delicate Destruction: Book One of the Wolfegang Series
Read My Delicate Destruction: Book One of the Wolfegang Series Online
Authors: Jillian Ashe
MY DELICATE DESTRUCTION
By Jillian Ashe
Smashwords Edition
Copyright
©
2014 Jillian Ashe
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
ISBN:
9781310638268
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, locations, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the imagination or are used fictitiously.Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
This series is dedicated to my brother, Brandon.
Who is also one of my best friends.
This first book is dedicated to Mike.
You spent the last decade helping me perfect it.
And for my kick-ass readers
Who without you, all of this is meaningless.
"I think he's alive."
"How? This place is a disaster."
He heard voices, but they were so far away.
"Let's crack it open, maybe there is something valuable inside."
"Like what?" That guy sounded annoyed.
Kris got the sudden feeling he should open his eyes, but he wasn't sure how for some reason. Everything was so fuzzy and disconcerting.
"What he might know," he replied. "Knowledge is a valuable thing, Gus."
A noise like a gunshot rang through Kris' head. His eyes snapped open, eyelashes ripping apart, and he still couldn't see. Everything was white, his breath forming into icy mist. There were two dark shapes behind the white film. God, why couldn't he remember anything? His mind was sluggish and processed everything so slowly. He couldn't even get his body to move.
Another gunshot and the white sheet cracked and splintered. The cracks connected and formed an intricate web. Slowly Kris realized the sound wasn't a gun, but someone hitting the glass in front of him, and it was breaking.
The frosted glass in front of Kris shattered, and revealed two men a little older, maybe in their mid-twenties.
"Oh shit," one of them said. "He's awake."
The air was a slap across his face, and suddenly Kris felt so cold.
Quickly the men cut at the bonds holding him in place. Straps bound his wrists, and ankles. He fell as they cut at the last one across his chest, his body shaking and shivering. It was so cold he felt like he was burning. It hurt. The strangers helped him sit up, and they eyed him with concern. Kris' eyes fell on something and the air was punched out of his lungs. He remembered.
Pushing off the two men he fought to get to his feet, and then staggered across the room until he was touching the glass to a cryogenic pod that was a mirror to his own. "Kat," he whispered, knowing she would never hear him.
"Hey, are you okay?"
Kris didn't answer. He wiped the fog from the glass so that he could see her face. Her vitals were on a holographic display, and he could see that her heart was still beating. She was still breathing. "Katerina," he said. Rarely did he use her full name, but he used it now. "I think we're in trouble."
Someone's hand touched his shoulder.
Kris wasn't stupid, the men who had let him out weren't doctors, and the room they were in looked like it went through a holocaust. "What year is it?" he asked.
The men shared a look before answering. "2510."
They were in so much trouble. "Five hundred years," he muttered under his breath.
"Who is she?" one of them asked, it sounded like it might be Gus.
They helped him to stand. The burning cold had reduced to an unpleasant tingling across his skin.
He would figure out what was going on, and he would come back to wake her up when he had a plan. They would figure this out together, like they always did.
Kris splayed his fingers across the glass, wishing he could touch her to convince himself she was alive. Her face glittered like a thousand diamonds in the snow. "She is my twin sister."
The streets of L.A.'s underworld pulsed with neon colors. I leaned against my car, and watched the people roam around as they waited. They waited for him, the man I wasn't sure I wanted to see, but I needed to. I couldn't deny his pull.
Surrounded by abandoned warehouses and empty streets, the orange and blue lights cast an eerie glow. Cars were parked and lines were drawn. A few people nodded and acknowledged my arrival, others came over and talked shop or talked trash with good humor while music pounded the street.
My partners and best friends, Trent and Victoria smiled at me. We happened to be a well-known trio among the underground elite.
Victoria left to prowl around, looking for someone to keep her company later that night. She found a dainty little girl in a skirt shorter than her own, black hair in a pixie cut and pretty blue eyes, and they flirted shamelessly.
Trent headed over to some of his buddies and joined them as they went around inspecting engines and trading insults and compliments.
Everyone was in their element. I almost felt jealous - jealous of their complete confidence and surety in their place in the world. I never felt like I quite belonged, no matter where I was. Sighing and crossing my arms, I tried not to brood.
Victoria was there when I’d gotten the call earlier that day from my mother. My twin brother, Kris, was back in the hospital. His leukemia was in full force again, and the doctors didn’t like his odds. Ever since then, Victoria kept me busy to keep my mind off Kris as much as possible until we knew for sure what was going to happen.
I missed the old Kris, the one who wasn’t run down by his sickness, the chemo, and all the setbacks. Before the cancer, he had been on every sports team at our school. He was top of his class and quite the ladies’ man. I didn’t approve of the latter, but I would take that over his constant bitterness any day.
Somehow, despite everything, he still managed to look after me. My brother and I had a deep connection, something that went further than the natural twin bond. Maybe it was how we grew up.
I asked my brother why he did it once – why all the girls – and he told me that he didn’t trust any of them, so he might as well have fun. He was completely serious. When our parents got a divorce, he whispered during one of their in-numerous fights that he thought love was impossible. He helped me so much with the divorce, the moving from house to house, the subtle asking to take sides. It drove me crazy, but Kris was always there for me.
The roar of a particular engine snapped me out of myself and I instantly knew whose car it was. I tried to keep from smiling.
He parked right next to me and got out of the car. The way he moved: that grace would give anyone pause. His girlfriend Crystal was at his side as always.
She looked trampy, par for the course, and her micro-miniskirt and barely there top disgusted me. Crystal flipped her bleach blonde hair over her shoulder and shot me a look of contempt.
I held on to my temper, reminding myself that it wasn't worth it, and took a deep breath.
Kevin smiled at me and winked. I gave him my quirky half smile in response but didn't move from where I was. He had gorgeous black skin with large shoulders that rippled with muscles and was showing them off with a wife beater. His full lips seemed to catch my gaze every time he spoke, and his warm eyes looked like melted chocolate. He came over, leaving Crystal behind. She scowled at his back. His two wing-men, Derek and Anton, stayed behind with her.
"Hey, you."
"Hi, Kevin," I replied.
"You look amazing."
"Thank you." I was nervous, and wished he would stop looking at me like that.
"You racing tonight?" he asked, standing close enough to touch.
My skin tingled at his proximity and I tried to ignore how long his eyelashes were and how good his arms looked in that shirt.
"Of course," I answered, my voice teasing. "I'm bound to beat you eventually."
His face broke into a wide grin. Kevin and his S2000 had beaten me twice already. Third time's the charm, I figured.
"You really think so, honey?" he asked. Our legs just barely touched and I concentrated very hard on the ground to keep my head straight. It didn't work.
I looked up into his eyes, a dire mistake. They were smoldering and hard to read. It was extremely frustrating. I stepped back and promptly ran into my car, which pushed me closer to him. I realized I was staring into his chest and looked up again. Somehow I always forgot how tall he was. I was taller than average at five foot eight but he still towered over me at six-foot-five.