Page 3 of Outfoxed

I blamed my unreasonable interest in the man on adrenaline, the aftermath of pure terror, and his sun-kissed skin, too dark to be American Caucasian but light enough I pegged him as an Italian, Greek, or some other flavor of Mediterranean European. “I’ll just call you Idiot for testing your luck with a swarm on the way, Idiot.”

“Sandro is preferable to Idiot, but I’ll give you that. It’s pretty idiotic to be outside during a swarm. Should I call you Queen Idiot? I wouldn’t have been out at all if you didn’t insist on taking morning strolls through the hot zone. Did you not pay attention to the forecast?”

His question pegged him as someone from Inner Tulsa or Asylum; nowhere else still had electricity enough to watch tv, use the internet, or otherwise pay attention to the forecast. I hadn’t touched a computer since I’d left the East and run to the Alley to avoid an arranged marriage. Had I known the Alley was just as bad as the rumors claimed, I might’ve thought twice about whatever asshole my parents wanted me to marry to meet their standards rather than mine.

With my luck, Sandro had been paid off by my parental assholes to drag me back to Buffalo, New York to do their bidding through marrying some twerp with better genes than personality.

“You think someone like me is welcome in Inner Tulsa?” I laughed at him, hung the lamp from the chain dangling from the ceiling, and went to work checking over the supplies. Everything was as I’d left it a few weeks prior when I’d prepared for the start of the tornado season.

The steel door and thick concrete walls dulled the storm’s fury to an unsettling rumble. Within an hour, if the swarm persisted, I’d feel the sound in my teeth and be headed straight for madness.

If it continued on for longer than that, I’d be tempted to smack my skull into the wall to make the sounds filtering down from above go away.

“Your work history is good and you’re reliable. You could find work in Inner Tulsa easily.” He looked me over, raising a brow. “All you’d have to do to be hired at a strip club is show up.”

“I’ll tell you what. You keep your bounty to yourself until the storm clears, and I won’t bust your balls for implying I’d make a good stripper.”

“I’m not implying. I’m telling you. You’d make one hell of a good stripper. A natural auburn vixen with a good complexion doesn’t come around every day. Hell, now that I’ve gotten my first real look at you, it’s no wonder you’re worth so much. You’re enough to tempt a man to forgo the cash to keep you.”

Had we been in the South, we’d both be at risk of spontaneous combustion. Then again, I wasn’t an elementalist.

I’d be a lot better off if I could convince metal to bend to my will. In a city in constant need of repair, everyone wanted a metal elementalist.

Then again, I didn’t want anyone knowing just what I could do, especially the hot ass bounty hunter ready to take me into his custody.

If he found out I was a witch on top of being a fully fledged shapeshifter, he’d be drooling all over me like I was a fresh bone up for grabs. I’d also crank his profits through the roof, as being a fully fledged shapeshifter would easily triple my bounty value, whatever it was. Being a witch on top of that?

I’d make him rich in a hurry.

“How about we just keep our hands to ourselves,” I suggested, doing my best to scowl without admiring the man’s lean, muscular body through his rain-soaked clothes. Any other day, I would’ve suggested he wear a coat to keep from getting cold when the storms kicked Tulsa in the face, but his shirt, when wet, did him a lot of justice.

“I’ll do you one better. Let’s call a truce. Once the storm blows over and it doesn’t look like another swarm will hit, I’ll give you a five minute head start. You escape me, you win this round. If I catch you today, you’ll come along quietly. I’d rather not have to hurt you to catch you.”

I could work with a five minute head start. I’d disappear so fast his head would spin, and he’d go home frustrated, alone, and without his quick profits. “Deal.”

The rumble escalated, and the lamp swayed on its chain, a warning one of the twisters passed directly overhead. Sandro frowned, his gaze locking on the light. “I wonder how much damage that swarm’s doing.”

People from all over the United States came to the Alley, and I’d joined everyone else in no longer caring where someone came from. He had an accent compared to the locals, but I couldn’t tell if he was deliberately hiding where he came from or if he always sounded like he could have lived anywhere in the world and magically fit in.

His question, however, told me a simple truth: Sandro hadn’t been in the Alley long. Those who’d survived through their first tornado season no longer cared about the damage ratings of a twister or a swarm.

It didn’t matter.

No matter how bad it got, like a weed in the cracks of a sidewalk, Tulsa endured.

Friday, May 1, 2043.

Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The Alley.

The twisters danced around Tulsa for over an hour before Mother Nature decided she’d toyed with us enough and moved on. As always, I’d wait at least thirty minutes, keeping an eye on my watch to make sure I didn’t emerge early, before I left the safety of the shelter. Mother Nature was a tricky bitch, and she liked adding lulls to her storms to lure out the unwitting.

She killed a lot of people that way, and I had no intentions of becoming the next victim in her little black book of corpses.

I spent the time checking the storage boxes and doing an inventory so I wouldn’t indulge in staring at the bounty hunter’s hot ass. He liked to pace, and every time something crashed overhead and made the cellar shake, his hand either went for the hilt of the sword hanging at his hip or reached for something over his shoulder. The shoulder habit baffled me.

What kind of weapon did he use that he strapped it to his back?