The Huntress

  THE HUNTRESS

  by

  Dorothy McFalls

  Jump to Chapter One

  THE HUNTRESS

  Copyright (c) 2006 by Dorothy McFalls

  Cover art and design (c) 2012 by Razzle Dazzle Stock

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Ebook 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 person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to BN.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

  * * * * *

  THE HUNTRESS

  * * * * *

  Dedication

  For the strong women I've been lucky enough to know and, sadly, the world has since lost. I have been forever changed.

  Without them, I would have never had the courage to write. God bless you.

  * * * * *

  Acknowledgements:

  I'd like to give a special thanks to Tracey West and Luisa Pugliano for helping this book finally make its way into publication.

  And to Judy Ashley for helping revise this book and giving me the encouragement to stick with it!

  Chapter One

  Vega Brookes sighed and let her head sink deep into Butch Polsen’s pillow. She couldn’t think of a better way to spend the afternoon.

  Butch was a hulk of a man with edges rougher than shattered glass, but damn, he knew how to touch a woman’s body. Stripped nude, he balanced on top of her with his battered, leather cowboy hat sitting at a crooked angle on top of his blond head. His blue eyes sparkled. He liked to be on top. It was a power thing for him.

  Today, she wanted him on top, too. She’d spent most of the previous night chasing a drug pusher with an arsenal of guns who got his jollies putting nasty holes in people and didn’t think bothering to show up for his own jury trial important. The slushy Detroit alleyways she’d chased him through had nearly ruined her favorite lace-up boots. And they weren’t cheap.

  So when Butch pushed her onto his bed and climbed on top, she didn’t complain. Let him do all the work, she was tired.

  At the moment, he was tracing a line with that hot tongue of his around her breasts until her nipples turned hard before working his way up her neck.

  “Butch,” she whispered on a weighty breath, “do that thing with your fingers. That thing that makes me crazy.”

  He raised his head and smiled. He had that look in his eyes, that sharp, assessing stare. Vega knew what it meant.

  “Let me tie you up.” His hot breath caressed her neck.

  “Butch--” The shrill chirp of her digital phone cut everything short, including her need to lose herself with him no matter how rough he liked to make things. With a push, she rolled him off her and slipped from the bed.

  “Ignore it,” he growled.

  “Can’t. Told Jack I’d be available.” She pulled her leather jacket from the chair, and her phone from its inside pocket.

  “Jack!” Butch punched the bed.

  “Yep?” she said into the phone. Standing in the middle of Butch’s one-room apartment not worrying about the uncovered windows or her lack of clothes, she scribbled a barely legible name and court date into her small notebook. “He’ll be easy to get. This is what, the third time I’ve had to bring him to court? I feel like a freaking nanny or something.”

  But as long as the money was good, she’d happily bring in Lionel every day.

  Lionel Wahl, aka “The Great Wall” because of his massive size, followed a rigid routine, including his attempts to give the law the slip. If she worked quickly, his pickup would bring her an easy paycheck. She uttered a quick goodbye to Jack--the owner of the bail enforcement agency that signed her paycheck--before snapping the tiny silver phone shut and jamming it back into her jacket pocket.

  “You’re going to leave? Just like that? In the middle of...of...? Hell, Vega.” Butch punched the bed again just as Vega leaned under the kitchen table to grab her panties.

  “Jack expects all his hunters to do local jobs when we’re in town. It’s good PR.” She stood and slipped her black t-shirt over her head. The word “Goddess” blazed in gold letters, letters that strained across her chest thanks to a malfunctioning coin-operated washer in New Mexico that shrank an entire load of shirts by practically boiling them. The small shirts had worked to her benefit, though, by giving her fugitives a distracting view while she cuffed them.

  She gave her lace panties a little shake before stepping into them, and then wondered where her skirt had landed.

  “Jack takes advantage of you. He sends you on all the high-profile hard-to-find cases. That’s good enough PR.” He pulled himself from the bed. He was a good seven inches taller and at least one hundred pounds heavier. He liked to use his size to his advantage. “You don’t need to do this local shit for him, too.”

  She laughed and gave his washboard stomach a light slap. “Don’t be a jealous ass. Jack’s my uncle.”

  She found her skirt on the sofa under Butch’s jeans. “The longer I wait.” She inched the supple leather over her hips. “The harder it’ll be to find my quarry.”

  Butch growled but tugged his pants on. He hastily buttoned them, and then straightened his cowboy hat. Sometimes the guy could put on quite a show.

  “Look.” She gave him a hard kiss square on the lips. “This shouldn’t take all day. I can get back by six or so.”

  “Maybe I won’t be here.” His rough expression hardened into a stare frightening enough to melt any woman into a quivering mass of nerves. But Vega wasn’t just any woman. She thrived on tangling with dangerous men.

  It was her job.

  She was a bounty hunter.

  “Guess I’ll have my fun without you tonight, then.” She checked the clip on her Glock 9mm semiautomatic pistol and snapped it back into place.

  Sure, he could do things to her body that made her wonder if she might explode. That talent didn’t make him indispensable.

  Butch was her lover. A convenience. Jack was family. In her life, family came first. She shrugged on her leather jacket, quickly braided her hair into a cord that hung down her back, and made a straight path to the apartment door.

  “I hate your hair like that,” he muttered. He leaned his head against the doorjamb and frowned. He looked almost endearing.

  For a moment, she felt guilty about leaving him and his bed. “Look,” she said, “I promised Jack I’d help him out.”

  “I know. I know. You always keep your promises.” He sounded pitiful. “Call me?”

  Outside, snow fell in those large globs that stuck together, promising that the streets would soon get muddier and icier. She let the damp bite revive her. She’d always loved how the winter and the cold could clear her head and make her feel acutely alive. It invigorated her and made the chase all the more exci
ting. Her jeep, an ancient four-wheel-drive she’d revived from a pile of rust, took her down a bumpy street deep into one of Detroit’s forgotten neighborhoods.

  The depressed area, with its sprinkling of abandoned and burnt-out shells of houses on every street, would never make its way into a glossy tour book. The row houses dated back to the nineteen forties and probably hadn’t seen a repairman for decades. Several shabby characters sat on a front stoop. A few others stood on the sidewalk. For the most part, everyone ignored her.

  A twitchy little man with a permanently broken nose and missing most of his teeth gave Vega a wide gaping smile, though. He waved her over to the curb.

  Monroe.

  Just the man Vega was hoping to find.

  Monroe was a homeless drug addict. But he saw just about everything that happened in Detroit’s underbelly and would share his knowledge...for a price. He limped over to Vega’s Jeep and leaned heavily on the door.

  “Hey baby, what’cha got for me today?” Monroe rubbed his red, swollen hands on his threadbare coat, probably to warm them.

  Vega leaned forward in her seat. “Where’s the coat and gloves I bought you?”

  “Got expenses, baby, lots of expenses.” He’d traded the coat for drugs if his glassy eyes were any indication. The sharp stink of urine drifted through the window. That was a new low for him. “New guy invading the streets, you know. He’s a real expensive shit. Gotta do what’cha gotta do, you know?”

  She pressed a twenty into his freezing hands. “Buy something warm with this.” She peeled a second twenty from her money clip but held onto it. “Tell me, Monroe. Who’s The Great Wall seeing lately?”

  He eyed that second twenty like a kid would a forbidden sweet. “She’s not some ho. Not this time. He’s getting it for free this time, the lucky bastard.”

  Vega drew the twenty back when Monroe reached out to grab it. “Where can I find her?”

  “Some apartment in the West Vernor area. Don’t know the street, exactly.” His hand was snaking out for the twenty again. “It’s in one of them brick buildings. Can’t go anywhere near there anymore. Rich bastards invaded the area. The cops hassle the hell out of me whenever I step foot on one of those streets.”

  She held tight to the money. “Her name?”

  Monroe had to think for a moment. He kept his swimmy gaze trained on the twenty. “Lila...Lila Crafter, I think.” He snatched the money and hobbled away.

  Still parked on the side of the road, she made two quick phone calls while keeping an eye on a group of young kids wearing gang colors who had suddenly taken an interest in her.

  The first call was to Officer Ford, a local cop she trusted. With a little prodding, he agreed to pick up Monroe before that forty dollars of hers could be used to purchase heroin. Ford was pretty sure there was a charge pending against Monroe somewhere, which was good. Monroe would get a warm bed and a solid meal tonight.

  With that handled, she punched in the phone number for Fiona, her younger sister. Much to hers and her mother’s alarm, Jack had recently hired Fiona to work for Skip Tracers.

  Of course Fiona had thrown the fact that Jack had offered Vega a bounty hunter position at Skip Tracers four years earlier in their faces as a defense. But that was different. Vega had been a cop at the time with the Detroit PD. And unhappy as hell.

  Fiona was the family’s golden child. An innocent. Fresh out of college. She didn’t know the world of violence and crime like Vega did. And Jack had no right to put her in their world.

  Vega was only still speaking to him because he hadn’t let Fiona do anything more than serve as research assistant to the team of active bounty hunters, much to Fiona’s chagrin. As long as he kept her tucked safely behind a desk, Vega was forced to admit having her sister around was proving useful.

  In less than a minute, Fiona had matched an address to a Lila Crafter living in the West Vernor area.

  Number forty-five B on Green Street, Fiona had said. It took five minutes to navigate through the snowy streets and find a parking space across from the three-story brick apartment building.

  Vega watched from her jeep while a bleached blonde, wearing a frilly flower print skirt and a pink coat with a white fur trim, climbed out of a shiny new Mercedes SUV and hobbled across the icy sidewalk in three-inch heels. Each step turned into a painful lesson in patience for Vega as the woman took her time, testing the concrete for slick spots.

  Get on with it, Vega could barely keep herself from screaming. This woman, clad in her fashionable Prada helpless-wear—spiky shoes and matching leather handbag, couldn’t really be Lila Crafter? Surely, a fashion-conscious woman like that wouldn’t slum around with some gruff, occasionally dangerous criminal like Lionel Wahl.

  Vega exhaled a long breath. The woman fiddled with her keys a moment before unlocking the door marked forty-five B.

  That pink powder puff was Wahl’s new girl. Go figure.

  Vega stepped out of the jeep and crossed the street. A passing patrol car slowed. West Vernor was becoming trendy. Just down the block, a popular Mexican restaurant’s parking lot looked like a luxury car sales center. The cops wouldn’t appreciate a commotion with a takedown, not in this neighborhood. Great.

  After circling the building and checking all the exits, Vega knocked on the front door. The powder puff answered.

  Vega took it nice and easy, giving Lila a gentle smile. A girlfriend harboring her fugitive was always considered dangerous, and she had no interest in getting sucker punched by this one, powder puff or not.

  “Miss Crafter?” Vega said, making no attempt to step into the apartment. “I’m looking for Lionel Wahl. I’ve got a package for him. Is he around?”

  Lila’s eyes sparkled with confusion. She started to push the door closed. “I don’t know who you mean.”

  “The Great Wall?” Vega stuck her boot in the door. “Your man, Lila?”

  “Wally?” Lila flicked a nervous glance over her shoulder. Vega would lay good odds that Lionel was hiding inside.

  One of the perks of being a bounty hunter rather than a cop was that she could go anywhere she believed her fugitive to be hiding. No warrant needed. No worry about civil rights. Lionel gave those up when he signed his bail bond. By not showing up for court, he was officially an escaped prisoner. And fair game for any means necessary to bring him back.

  “Look, I’m a bail enforcement officer,” Vega said, wanting to avoid strong-arm tactics. Though is was perfectly legal to force her way into the apartment as long as The Great Wall was inside, she didn’t like to scare the civilians, like Lila. In fact, she’d called herself a bail enforcement officer, hoping it sounded more benign than a gun-slinging ‘bounty hunter’. “Your Wally didn’t show up for court today. I’m here to take him to the police before the cops get testy.”

  “That’s impossible. You’ve got the wrong house.” Lila threw another glance over her shoulder. “My Wally has never been arrested.” She tried again to close the door.

  Vega slipped inside the warm foyer before the door could snap closed. “Then you wouldn’t mind if I had a quick word with your Wally?”

  Lila’s hands trembled as she brushed a few strands of hair from her face. “I suppose not.”

  Vega followed Lila up the stairs, into a living room furnished with a brand new tan and white sofa and matching overstuffed chairs. Lionel was sure moving up in the world. The last time she picked him up, she’d found him sleeping on a broken bed in an abandoned fleabag motel used by the really cheap hookers. A rat had been crawling across his bare back.

  “Wally, tell this woman she’s mistaken about you.”

  His eyes met Vega’s. He rose from the sofa. At nearly seven feet tall with broad shoulders to match, he lived up to his name, The Great Wall. Seated, he’d taken up nearly the entire sofa. Standing, he dominated the room.

  “This is a nice place, Lionel. Don’t ruin what you’ve got here. Just come with me peacefully.”

  He sucked in a quick breath. His pric
ey sweater stretched, his tailored pants rustled. “Didn’t know you were back in town, Vega.” His low voice rumbled. “Heard you were in New Mexico chasing some gun smugglers the feds couldn’t keep their hands on.”

  “Caught them three days ago. It was all over the news. Sorry you missed it. You going to come with me downtown, right?”

  “What does she mean?” Lila’s voice grew shrill.

  Lionel shrugged. “It’s okay, Lila. I gotta go out for a while.”

  Vega eased out a breath. Another easy pickup, she thought. She was congratulating herself too soon, though. An explosion from downstairs shook the room and wiped the smugness from her face.

  Shit.

  Fate seemed to hate it when she got too full of herself.

  She drew her gun and spun toward the foyer stairs just as Butch, cowboy hat jammed low on his head, charged into the room. A nasty short stock shotgun was locked in his grasp. “You’re under arrest! Move a muscle asshole, and I’ll blow your ugly head off!”

  Lila started screaming.

  Vega nearly dropped her Glock. “What the hell?”

  Butch swung around, his shotgun aimed squarely at her chest. “Vega?” He lowered the barrel.

  “Damn.” Vega jammed her gun back into the hostler. “This is the second time the Tyler Bonding Company has contracted with two agencies.”

  “It’s the new secretary.” Butch locked the shotgun’s aim on Lionel again. “I said don’t move!”

  Lila’s screams grew louder.

  “She can’t keep her records straight.” Butch kept his gaze trained on Lionel whose face had closed down into a blank street-tough hardness. “Wait a minute. What in the hell is Jack thinking? This scum is five times your size.”

  Telling Butch that size didn’t matter would be a waste of breath. “I was here first,” she said instead. “This is my pickup.”