The Heist (23 page)

“
Let me tell
you a story, and then we’ll have movie night yeah? I had been on a
mission in Venezuela, and word had got to me that there was a
supernatural that was more ‘special’ than usual — a female who
wasn’t gifted anywhere near as much as you are — but she was very
different from the other species of vampire.  She was a hybrid
witch.” Seeing the confusion in Alicia’s eyes he explained. “She
had a vampire father, and a witch mother.”

Alicia
scoffed to herself quietly. “Witch skank deserved it. Shame about
her vampire father having to grieve for his daughter though.”
Alicia had a deep hatred towards witches. She could never place how
this came about, she just knew they made her skin crawl and she
wouldn’t share the oxygen she breathed with them.

Xavier was gripping the
remote in his hand as he spoke, hating that he had to do this to
Alicia, but in order to protect her he knew it was necessary.
 “So anyway, this female had been tracked down to where she
was hiding in Venezuela and before she knew it she was on every
Hunters list from this dimension to the next. As I say, I was
on a mission there and it just so happened that I’d set up video
equipment deep in the jungle. When I reviewed the footage, I
had captured this. Watch and see how things played out for her when
she was caught, yeah?”

Xavier pressed play,
still crouched beside Alicia, but he was watching her reaction to
the images on the screen. He had seen this footage too many times,
and each time it chilled him to the core.

The young
female was around Alicia’s age, but was stocky and self-assured.
 As she was chased through a forest, she soon became
surrounded by a group of male vampires who called her out for her
blood.  She fought like a lioness. She used every trick she
could think of but each time she was thwarted. Eventually, she was
overpowered and the males pinned her to the ground and drank her
dry. The last shot of the footage was of the female, drained, torn
apart and unrecognisable from the vibrant, confident and alive
being she had been just moments before.

The whole
scene played out in less than ninety seconds. When it finished, he
switched the screen off, and lowered his voice.

“
Now do you
see why I need to train you, Sweetcheeks — I can’t have you ending
up like that. It’s just not fucking acceptable.” Xavier lowered his
head, almost in defeat, but it was the haunting screams of the
female that rang in his head like a warning bell for
Alicia.

Alicia had
drawn her legs up to her chin, her arms had wrapped around them to
the point where she was almost hugging them, her eyes were glued to
the screen. The horror that had just unfolded had her frozen,
unable to move. She hated to admit it but Xavier was right about
this, she needed him…just to train her of course she didn’t need
him for anything else.  “Alright, I’ll behave and let you
train me.” It was a whisper but the words had been said.

Without
saying a word, Xavier stood up and offered his hand to Alicia,
helping her up off the ground.  The atmosphere had changed and
when her small hand was enveloped in his, his wolf snorted
triumphantly, and it seemed as though they were glued together in
that one moment, before he tore his hand away from hers and threw a
long length of cane towards her.  “First lesson — try and hit
me as hard as you can with the cane. Anywhere on my body.”
Standing with his feet apart, he held a cane in his right hand and
stretched his arms out by his sides. “And the word to remember here
is ‘try’, yeah?”

Taking the
cane in her left hand, Alicia went straight in for the kill and
missed, resulting in the cane snapping as it connected with the
wall. “What the hell?”

Xavier
nodded, and walked nearer Alicia, he could feel her breath ghosting
on his chest as he placed his cane in her hand and manoeuvred her
body to stand correctly, legs slightly apart, feet firm and waist
slightly twisted. “Don’t grip it too hard, and try and loosen your
limbs so you are able to move more fluidly. Now try again, yeah?”
Stepping back, he resumed his pose and watched Alicia as she
calculated her next move.

“
You know my
next move right? You’re trained in this and know what to look out
for so may I propose something to you?”

“
No.”
Sweeping his foot forward to catch with her ankle, Xavier watched
as Alicia hit the decks hard. “Get back up, and fight - or are you
too chicken shit?” he smirked as he taunted her, but knew it was
the best way to get her moving.

“
Me, chicken
shit? You just assaulted a female and to call me the shit? HA! I
think not Commander.” Alicia sprang back up to her feet, facing up
to the giant and with a swing of her wrist whacked the cane but
instead of hitting her target she was hitting thin air like a bird
freefalling through the air.

Whistling
through his teeth, Xavier reached down and hauled Alicia up,
patting her down for injuries — a strange thought occurred to him
and without warning the punched the small of her back. Alicia
didn’t flinch, rather she started to laugh wondering why he was
tickling her. “You mean to say that didn’t make your kidneys want
to implode, Sweetcheeks?” When Alicia looked perplexed he got the
answer he didn’t want. “Tell me, and I want the fucking truth,
yeah. When was the last time you felt pain?”

Standing deep
in thought the laughing swiftly wiped from Alicia’s lips as she
processed what he was saying, “I don’t know! I never feel pain,
nothing hurts me.”
You could emotionally
though,
shaking her head, hoping the words
weren’t spoken out loud.

Xavier’s brow creased
into a frown as he processed that information.  If Alicia
couldn’t feel pain, she wouldn’t be able to judge when she was
severely injured and that could potentially be a problem.  Not
wanting to worry her just yet, he made a mental note to have the
Doc check her over once the Belcastro situation was dealt
with.

“
You might
not feel pain, but you’re not invincible, yeah. Although I wouldn’t
be opposed to you wearing a Supergirl outfit to training.” Smirking
as he turned his back to her he added, “just putting that out
there, Sweetcheeks.”

“
Is that the
same as this Spiderman character Hugh talks about?” Alicia lowered
her head to look over her form, her arm was starting to bruise yet
she felt nothing. “I know I’m not invincible, let’s resume this
training shall we? You seem to know what you’re doing and maybe
just maybe I do need you.”

Xavier and
Alicia continued training in silence for the rest of the morning,
and he was impressed by how quickly she was picking things up. She
even managed to hit him with the cane on a couple of occasions.
Finally, as the sweat dripped down his spine, darkening the muscle
vest he was wearing, he held his hands up and called time, quickly
grabbing the cane back from Alicia. “Don’t want you sneaking in any
late moves, now do we Sweetcheeks?” He gave her a wink as he
smiled, then pulled his drenched vest over his head and grabbed a
towel to pat himself dry.

“
You never
did tell me what weapons you favour, Sweetcheeks. Feel like
sharing?” His green eyes were staring at her, and he barely
realised that he was on the verge of ogling her, before he turned
his attentions back to drying off.

Alicia's mouth had went
dry, like her tongue was stuck to the roof of her mouth dry, her
brown eyes were probably midnight black with the full dilation of
her pupils as she stared at the sculpted torso of Xavier. “Guns…”
She croaked out.

Turning his
head, giving her a quizzical look. “You alright there,
Sweetcheeks?” Shrugging it off as he threw the towel in the bucket,
and put his arm around her shoulders. “So, you’re a sharpshooter?
I'll take you out to the range in a few days, yeah? But tomorrow we
should concentrate on the hand to hand stuff again. Maybe let you
loose on a few throwing stars?” Xavier’s deep baritone laugh
reverberated in his chest as he walked Alicia towards the doors of
the gym.

“
Oh um, yeah
sure let’s do that.” Alicia was rambling as she was escorted to the
door. “I’ll go um so stuff… see you later!”

Alicia scurried off in
the opposite direction, destination was a very cold shower. What
the hell was happening to her?

Watching
Alicia go, Xavier sniffed his pits then made a face as he realised
it was probably his stink that had made her so eager to run off.
Shrugging, he slowly meandered back to his quarters. She really had
impressed him today, and he felt they had made real progress which
felt damn fucking good. Well, his wolf was damn smug with itself at
least.

The shower was long and
cold but at least that racing pulse had went away and left Alicia
well alone.

It was the smell that she
first noticed.

It
instinctively made her skin crawl and she shrunk back, hoping that
the darkness of the corner she and the other three girls were
huddled in would envelope and hide them. She thought it strange
that a smell could invoke such fear, but that smell was the first
indicator that he was approaching.

Petra’s large
eyes scanned wildly as she hugged her partially clothed body
tightly. The deafening beat of the music and the muffled male
voices and jeers made her shiver to her very bone
marrow.

She knew she
couldn’t run — he was coming for them and there wasn’t a damn thing
they could do about it but wait, and pray to whatever God existed
that the night would pass quickly.

****

Shuggie had been keeping
a close eye on Snr Belcastro, Martinez and the others on the
Commanders’ orders.

He had
followed them when they left the dockside, and it sickened him to
find out just how many humans were being trafficked by this cold,
calculating bastard. He had wanted to go back and free the
women the moment the coast was clear, but that would have just left
them stranded and vulnerable to being round up — or worse, punished
for trying to make a bid for freedom.  It would also alert the
Belcastros that they were under surveillance, and although he hated
to admit it, he absolutely couldn’t jeopardise his
mission.

Shuggie had
followed Snr Belcastro and his entourage from his mansion, to the
dockside, and now some seedy backstreet venue…a strip
joint.

“
Classy
fucker,” he muttered under his breath as he paid his entrance fee
and made his way down the steps into the club.  He was met
with the usual smoke, sweat and alcohol infused air.  Bad
music pumped out the speakers too loudly as bored vacant women in
various states of undress performing for the mostly leering,
overweight men who used their money as a form of Viagra.

Taking a
seat, Shuggie called over a waitress and ordered a bottle of beer.
 His vampire hearing was more defined than a human’s and so he
could hear over the mangled music and voices to hone in on his
target.  Two hundred feet away sat Snr Belcastro and his
companions. Drink was flowing, cigars were puffed and egos were so
inflated they were in danger of exploding. Settling back in his
seat, he started to concentrate on their conversation.

After a few
minutes, Snr Belcastro stood up and spoke to a couple of men at his
table, telling them they had earned the right to take their pick of
the dancing whores tonight. After much back slapping and
self-congratulations, they walked to the back of the club. He could
just about make out some of the girls from the container in the
dockyard, their big bambi eyes and cowering demeanour told him all
he needed to know. Belcastro was keeping a few of his ‘cargo’ back
for his own use.

As the girls
were selected and dragged to the back of the stage, Snr Belcastro
and his acolytes sat at the front, the lascivious look in their
eyes almost making Shuggie want to pierce them with the heel of one
of the strippers shoes and then force feed it to him along with
their broken teeth.  Keeping his mind on the job, however,
Shuggie drank his beer and listened in as Snr Belcastro entertained
his companions — and hoped that tonight his loose tongue and
showing off would give him all of the information he and the
Commander would need to help Alicia bring him and his empire
down.

Petra felt
ill.  The large man, the one who everyone treated like Royalty
had picked her out himself. The other men with him chose their
‘victims’ and soon the four of them were hauled over to the
changing rooms where a harsh looking woman shouted at them,
gesticulating. Petra and the others couldn’t understand the
language, but they had learned that certain words meant that if
they didn’t please the man, they were as good as dead.

Petra glanced
over at the girl standing to her right, and offered a reassuring
smile.The girl was shaking more than she was, and Petra hoped for
her sake that she would overcome the nerves long enough to remember
the dance that had been beaten into them to learn over the past few
weeks.

As the lights
start flashing and dry ice filled the stage, Petra stood tall, and
walked out onto the stage with the other three girls. They
were all dressed in partial pinstripe ‘suits’ that barely covered
their breasts, hips and thighs — fedora’s and umbrellas. As the
routine started, Petra kept counting in her head so that she could
keep in time with the music. It didn’t matter if the others got the
dance wrong, she wasn’t giving anyone the excuse to give her
another punishment today. The girls swayed their hips until they
reached the front of the stage, turning their heads to the crowd,
and plastering on a smile as they gyrated to the music.