Runner: Fringe, #3

Chapter One

Reputation is a double-edged sword.

––––––––

Planet Corona, city of Borealis, 2478

Never-Fail Nash peered through a rip in the ratty motel curtains. Visual implants allowed him to see one person curled up in the lone bed. He found it odd that apprehension gripped him even after twenty years as a bounty hunter. Adrenaline surged from the moment he located his target to the moment he tossed them into a cell on his ship.

Hyperaware senses and attention to detail ensured his survival. That, and the fact he didn’t trust anybody. He didn’t become a triple-platinum Runner by being a nice guy. Or an idiot.

Slipping the illegally acquired and therefore outrageously expensive keycard into the holodoor, he passed through the deactivated field and reactivated it behind him.

The room smelled musty and stale from old smoke and sweat. All of the furniture was beat-up-dusty. Typical cheap Fringe motel with craptacular decor beyond expensive holodoors. It took a nanosecond to orient himself to the layout of the room. He approached the narrow bed.

Wow.

Jynx Brennan looked way better in real life. He checked his palm unit again and shook his head. His package looked about as dangerous as a hangnail.

Looks could be deceiving.

Razor-sharp, his enhanced gaze scanned the body below the threadbare covers. Despite x-ray and infrared, all he could see was a wicked dream personified. The blankets clung to a voluptuous female form, leaving no place to hide a weapon.

Except between her legs.

He frowned and took a step back.

His last package flashed in his head. Scary Mary had looked like a wayward kitten, but she’d turned out to be the most dangerous criminal he’d ever captured. Scary Mary almost shattered his balls, then attempted to amputate his finger with her teeth. Jynx Brennan looked twenty times more harmless.

Won’t be fooled again.

Favoring his injured finger, Foster readied his Shantun stunner, flipped on the light and hauled his alluring package out of bed.

* * *

Hands up.

Groggy, sleep deprived and suddenly vertical, Jynx struggled to awareness. Cold metal settling against the back of her head brought her instantly awake, but terror held her immobile.

Hands in the air or I blow your head off.

The voice behind her, clearly male, rumbled with authority, uncompromising yet oddly seductive. She trembled as she lifted her hands. With a no-nonsense grumble, he pulled her wrists down behind her back and then slapped on a pair of plastimetal cuffs.

For a medic, you’ve given the IWOG a good run for their money. He checked her restraints by yanking them hard.

She yelped. Her whole body hurt in ways she’d never known. Three weeks of little food and less sleep blurred her mind.

Please, let me go. She tried to turn her head, but he wouldn’t let her.

He grunted as he slipped shackles on her ankles.

I’m not the local law’s problem, am I? She paused. Processing me will take up a large percentage of your budget, especially if you must transport me off-world. How far had reports of her gotten? What had he heard? Silence stretched past her words, driving her to desperation. "I’m not your problem, am I?"

Still he said nothing.

She couldn’t help herself. She spoke again, knowing her quavering voice gave away her growing fear. Wouldn’t it be easier for you and your government to just let me go? Not a chance the OuterWorld Alliance Group, WAG, wanted anything to do with a fugitive of the InnerWorld Government.

The man behind her uttered a bored sigh.

Just when she opened her mouth to say more, he snarled, I’ve never lost a package, Sweets. Why in the Void would I start with you?

Adrenaline surged when he called her a package, not a prisoner. You’re a Runner!

He spun her around.

Her heart skipped a beat when she saw his face.

Expecting a grizzled monster, she found instead a man about her own age with sandy blond hair and wicked azure eyes. Definitely not the local law. The Runner looked like any boy-next-door grown up. Way grown up. Into a very big man. He didn’t look like a monster, but then again, neither did Roberts, the one who’d orchestrated her capture.

Roberts will kill me, she blurted.

That’s your problem. He nodded and winked. I’m strictly the delivery man.

You’re no delivery man. Jynx made her breathless words part observation and part plea. He was huge. Not only tall but wide as a door. Rippling muscles were barely confined by a pale blue strex shirt that matched his faded motton jeans. He also wore a frightening array of weapons around a wide black leather belt, slung low, drawing attention to the fact he was a very big man in many ways. His eyes did not match the rest of him, nor did that boyish, biting grin.

I could pay you. Barely were the words out of her mouth when he rolled his eyes and laughed.

You couldn’t even afford a decent room. He glanced around the ratty room he’d found her in.

She followed his gaze.

A single dim bulb dangled from a wire in the center of the stained ceiling above them. Against the tightly shut, threadbare drapes, the bulb cast a meager pool of light on tattered wallpaper and filthy carpets. A kindness, really, as the dim light helped to hide the stains on the carpet, bed and walls. Sadly, it glaringly illuminated the stains on the ceiling, whose origins were better left uncontemplated. The only modern amenity was the holodoor, and clearly, that had not kept him at bay. Renting the tacky room had taken the last of her script. She thought she’d be safe for at least one night. Just one night of sleep.

I could match what Roberts is paying you.

He laughed again with a softer roll of his intense azure eyes. You couldn’t even get yourself off-world. Silky hair fell into his eyes when he shook his head. He brushed the seductive strands away with an impatient swipe of his hand.

She opened her mouth, but he spoke again before she could say anything.

Save it, Sweets. He winked. I’ve heard it all. He lowered his hand to his gun. You’re dead in the Void. Whatever you had in the bank is frozen. Your bonafides are locked. You don’t exist but for me.

Who are you?

He bowed without taking his eyes off her face. Foster Nash, at your service.

Heaven help her, she knew that name. Never-Fail Nash.

He nodded, saying nothing, his hand on his gun.

Jynx not only knew him but feared him. You are one of only six triple-platinum Runners in the universe.

He nodded again and offered her a smile so menacing she gulped.

Before her stood a living legend from a thousand IWOG tales. He always delivered his package. He had a reputation for being ruthless, brutal and vicious. Her heart sank. Even if she had the money in her hand and offered it to him on a platinum platter, he wouldn’t take it. Never-Fail Nash would deliver her or die trying.

Recovering her composure, she injected disdain into her tone. At my service? No. Roberts owns you.

He smirked as if he were proud to be a hired thug. Roberts paid high. That’s why you’re valuable to me. Casually, he shoved her shoulder.

Shackled hand and foot, she spun and hit the bed face-first. Dust surrounded her with the stale stench of frantic sex. She shifted to her back.

He flipped her facedown again with a yank to her waist. He made a quick circuit of her entire body, touching everywhere lightly, professionally. He rolled her over and did her front with the same detached coolness.

No weapon? His eyebrows drew a dark line across his brow.

Disappointed or surprised? Jynx sat up with all the dignity she could manage.

A little of both.

I am not a common criminal, Mr. Nash. She scowled. I am a doctor.

Roberts told me. He failed to look impressed.

I don’t think you have the right person. If you’d—

He pushed her down, flipped her over and pressed her right thumb against a smooth bit of plastic.

Jynx didn’t have to see what he pressed her thumb to. All her life she’d hit such panels going in and out of the hospital.

You are thirty-four-year-old Jynx Brennan, epidemiologist for the InnerWorld Government. IWOG military class E. No living relatives. No living associates. Five seven, one-thirty, blonde, violet.

He flipped her over and frowned. Inspecting her hair by sifting the strands through his calloused fingers, he shook his head. Interesting dye job.

I thought so. She’d cried when she’d hacked her waist-length hair to her shoulders and used her brown mascara as a temporary dye to make her roots appear dark brown against the natural light blonde.

It’s been done. A sly grin slid across his face. He bit the smirk off with his upper teeth. I guess I could always confirm by checking the color of your hair south.

His gaze dropped to her hips.

Jynx wished her spring lilac dress, once crisply laundered and pretty, didn’t cling so closely to her thighs. He looked like he might just yank her skirt up in the line of duty.

Lifting only his gaze, his eyes settled on hers. I like the contacts too.

She had the gray-blue contacts in her purse by pure coincidence. Apparently, such feeble attempts hadn’t fooled him for a moment. Even in her wildest nightmares, she never thought Roberts would send a Runner after her. Certainly not the notorious Foster Nash.

You don’t look like a monster, Jynx said softly. You don’t look anything like the monster IWOG tales hold you to.

I could say the same of you. Nash tucked his scanner back to his belt.

Indignant, she defended, I don’t know what Roberts told you, but I’m not a monster. I didn’t create the Tyaa plague.

He laughed. Sweets, you can talk at me until you’re blue in the face. It won’t help.

If you’d only listen.

No, you listen.

She caught a whiff of spicy aftershave when he sat on the bed beside her, his weight moving her closer to him. When he leaned over into her face, she caught a hint of bubblegum on his breath.

I don’t care what Roberts said. Truth or not. All I care about is my contract.

He paused, then stood, adjusting his equipment-riddled belt. He made a point of readjusting his bulge. He did so deliberately, proximately. Foster Nash settled his massive body with a detached coolness she’d never seen.

Whatever the deal is, it’s between you and Roberts. I’m just the delivery man. But I’ll tell you this—you talk at me too much, and I’ll gag you.

He dipped low and flipped her over his shoulder.

Please don’t do this. She burst into tears of fear and frustration.

Tears won’t work either. With a mocking gesture, he patted her butt. I’m a ruthless bastard. Got it? I do my job, get my script and move on.

Doom gripped her with a relentless fist. He didn’t care that she was falsely accused. All he cared about was his reputation. Her money could not buy him, nor could the truth. Never-Fail Nash would meet the terms of his contract, or die trying.

Chapter Two

Foster leaned back from the main console, stretched his arms over his head and groaned. What he wouldn’t give for a solid eight hours of sleep. Not that finding Jynx Brennan had taxed his considerable skills. But damn, he hurt.

He checked his finger and thought of his last package. When he’d been forced to gag her foul mouth, Scary Mary had chomped his right index finger. The wound had looked bad two weeks ago, but it looked a hell of a lot worse now. He shook his head. Another woman, like Laura, his ex-girlfriend. He began to think none of them could be trusted.

Using his unbitten middle finger, he tapped up the audvid to the cell where he’d left his current package. Jynx slept curled up on the top of the bunk. Her short-hacked blonde hair fell across her tear-streaked face, making her seem broken, vulnerable and very pretty. She’d clean up something spectacular.

You’ll want to do her when you see her, Roberts had insisted with gleaming eyes.

Foster shook his head. All I do is deliver for the agreed-upon price.

Nonetheless, Roberts put the bonus clause in the contract. Roberts wanted Foster to play Jynx Brennan. Roberts wanted him to bed her for sport and earn some extra credits. As pretty as Jynx was, and despite his thoroughly disreputable reputation, that wasn’t one of his contractible skills. He didn’t bed for bonus. That’s why he generally didn’t apprehend females—the temptation was too great.

Foster set his ship, the Damn You, on autopilot, then made his way to the galley. Tossing a premade dinner into the micro, he set the table and ate without tasting. He didn’t need a cook. He liked his solitude. He enjoyed not having to worry about anyone but himself.

Sometimes, when he didn’t have a package onboard, he talked to himself. On those days, he admitted to being lonely, and he thought about getting a dog, but he promptly dropped the idea. He’d have to disable the autofires all over the ship, and that would give any prisoner a clear advantage if they managed to escape the cells. He’d programmed the units to recognize him, but he didn’t want the hassle of reprogramming them to recognize a dog.

They didn’t recognize Laura as a dog. He considered. Well, more so a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Disgusted that he was talking to himself yet again, he yanked a beer from the pantry, popped the cap and sipped. He checked the kitchen audvid. Jynx hadn’t moved. She had nice legs. Her sandal-clad feet were grungy, but one quick shower, a fresh dress—she rolled onto her back. A long, low growl rumbled through his chest.

Nice rack.

Not too big, not too small, her breasts would just about fill his large hands. Lilac motton clung to her body like a drawn-out caress. Her lacy bra pressed against her thin layer of clothing like an inviting whisper.

Must be exhausted. Poor, evil IWOG doctor on the run for three weeks. Sipping from his long-necked bottle, he watched her sleep.

Jynx hadn’t gotten far from her lab on Banna. Hell, she could have traded one tumble for a ride off Corona on any trader’s ship.

Knocking back a swallow of beer, he decided she just wasn’t the sort to trade with her body. Regardless of what Roberts said, Jynx was a lady. Foster could tell by the way she spoke and carried herself. She might be an evil doctor, but she was still a lady. An IWOG lady.

Don’t think I’ve ever met one of those out here.

Tossing his head back, he polished off his beer and chucked the bottle to recyc. After shutting down the kitchen, he went to his bedroom.

Not a whole lot of bona fide IWOG ladies on the Fringe.

Not that her status mattered. He’d deliver his package in a week and be off on another job. Gods knew how he needed the money.

Foster lingered at the audvid in his bedroom as he cleaned his teeth. Would be interesting to make it with an IWOG lady. Just once. Just to see if she was any different from any other woman in the Void.

Frowning, he thought of Laura again. Not a lady by any stretch, but ex-IWOG consumer, like he was. Laura came on like gangbusters, then went suddenly, shockingly shy when he’d tried to close the deal. He wasted weeks on her. Even let her live on the ship for a while. He reprogrammed all the autofires to reassure her, and what had that bitch done? Robbed him blind. Laura swiped a fortune after balling him senseless. While he lay utterly spent, Laura removed everything that wasn’t bolted down on the Damn You, crammed it in a shuttle and took off.

To his utter chagrin, he liquidated all his accounts to buy back his own electronic tricks at auction, and his shuttle, but at triple what he’d paid originally.

Laura, forever after in his mind as That Bitch, stripped him so naked he couldn’t believe she’d left him a pair of boxers, let alone a pair of pants.

Because he’d trusted someone, he’d opened himself to a world of hurt. Never in his life had he called a woman a bitch. But Laura’s deliberate playing of him earned her the title of That Bitch. If he ever laid eyes on her again, he’d shoot first and ask questions later. Laura made him doubt the motives of half the population by sheer virtue of being female.

Laura reduced him from a major player with loads of cash to a man with a bare-bones ship and little else. After draining his accounts, he had the Damn You back at full-throttle and his reputation, but that was all. On the brink of retirement, he’d been forced to start all over with only his ship and his rep.

Anger and embarrassment flared. He took a deep breath to push the uncomfortable emotions away. Foster blamed no one but himself. He never should have trusted Laura. She lucked out and caught him at a low, lonely point.

When I was using the little brain. He glared down at his pants. Ain’t putting you in charge again, buddy, no matter how much you sit up and beg.

He checked the audvid again. Jynx Brennan was small, blonde, delicate and lady-like. She had the softest, sweetest, most honey-rich voice he’d ever heard in his life. She was everything he’d lusted after in his youth on Banna.

Won’t be fooled again. He undressed, shut off the audvid and tumbled into bed.

Chapter Three

Blazing lights startled Jynx awake. On her feet in an instant, she realized she didn’t have to run today. She didn’t have to worry about finding something to eat or a place to hide. Her mad dash for freedom ended after a disastrous three weeks.

Tears threatened as she slumped to her bunk.

Clenching her fists, she dug what remained of her chipped fingernails into her palms. Another pity party wouldn’t help one iota. Her face, raw from crying, couldn’t really stand any more salty tears. Nor could her self-esteem.

I’m a smart woman. I can find my way out of this.

Foster Nash. No hope there. Not a chance in the Void he’d let her go. It wasn’t about money for him; it was about reputation. Only a handful of men on the Fringe could lay claim to the status of triple-platinum Runner, bounty hunters who never lost their prey. He’d earned his rating, and he wouldn’t let anything interfere with keeping it.

Jynx hadn’t been living on the Fringe long, but it didn’t take long to understand a whole different world operated here. On her home world of Banna, everyone followed the letter of the law because every aspect of life was rigidly controlled. IWOG consumers gave up freedom for safety. Or that’s what she’d thought once upon a time. What she really gave up was her privacy.

Here on the Fringe, the local law was an amalgam of IWOG and WAG. Confusing, conflicting. Fringe players lived by their wits. Hustlers and whores, Runners and thieves, everyone looking for an edge. As a born-and-bred IWOG consumer, Jynx found her learning curve brutally short and nasty. Within days, she knew which way the wind blew. Still, even after three weeks, she’d been fooled by a fat innkeeper.

Reputation matters, girl. You? Nobody knows. No bonafides, no vouch, so I gotta charge you the higher rate. Into his greedy palm she slipped the last of her script. Man’s gotta take care of his own out here. He tucked the crumpled paper into his straining trouser pocket. His gut was so big he couldn’t see that he wore two different colored socks. She didn’t argue. She’d been so happy to find a room, she might have slept with the man in payment.

Her joy hadn’t lasted long. While she dozed in fitful bursts, Foster had suddenly been there, yanking her out of bed and handcuffing her. No doubt that self-serving innkeeper sold Foster her location. He had to. Where else would Foster have gotten a keycard to her room?

Jynx stood and inspected every inch of her cell. A common criminal might slyly work their way out. A surgeon turned general practitioner turned epidemiologist? Not likely. The problems she solved were medical, not criminal. No wonder he’d taken her into custody with hardly a struggle.

I could have just stepped from my lab into his ship and saved everyone a bundle of time and money. Frustrated, she wished she’d had a bit more time to acclimate to the Fringe. Wished she had just a bit more script in her purse when she’d fled. Wished she’d been wearing anything but a clingy dress and barely there sandals. With only the contents of her purse, she’d run for three weeks. All in one breath that seemed both long and short.

To her credit, she defied any woman to do better than she did with what she had. Three weeks on a paltry two hundred in script? Most days she spent that much on transport. The day she ran, she’d planned on meeting Brandt for lunch. A bit lost after their brief night of drunken passion, she wasn’t sure if she’d been embarking on the love of her life or a hey, things happen speech. Either way, she never got to meet up with Brandt. He was dead by the time she stepped from the shuttle trans to the industrial complex that housed the lab.

I saw them kill him. She bit her lip, still shocked at what her psi ability had revealed.

Brandt shared her rare and strange gift—the ability to project. While she sat in the trans, Brandt reached to her mind, she to his, and she found herself looking out through his eyes just in time to see an IWOG officer raise his gun and fire three rapid shots.

Horror flung her from Brandt’s mind. She hung in limbo for a few moments, trying to recover, then forced her way into the IWOG officer’s mind. She watched through his eyes as he systematically strode through the lab, killing everyone.

As the officer ran from the building, he set off a series of explosives. She felt a surge of sexual excitement in him as he watched the fire destroy the entire structure. His perverse pleasure so shocked her, she broke the connection and jumped back into her own mind with a disorienting jolt.

She exited the trans and immediately entered another going in the opposite direction. Terrified, she’d ridden to the commuter hub and boarded the first flight off Banna to Corona, a Fringe planet. While inside the IWOG officer’s mind, she’d found out his orders were very clear—destroy the lab and everyone in it. He’d succeeded. Except for Jynx herself. Her only hope was to disappear before anyone noticed she was still alive.

While in the bustling space port, she’d been horrified to find Roberts on every com unit, decrying the destruction of the lab as an evil terrorist attack. They will do anything to destroy our way of life, Roberts said.

For the first time, Jynx noticed something that those around her didn’t. They was a very vague word. They who? WAG citizens? Fringe players? Crimes like this were always blamed on the nameless, faceless they.

Frightened IWOG consumers were calmed by Roberts’s cultured, caring and carefully modulated voice. This vicious attack will not go unpunished. We will find the terrorists and bring them to justice. Roberts extolled the doctors and lab personnel as dedicated civil servants who worked tirelessly to cure the Tyaa plague. Their lives were not lost in vain. It is a credit to them that they managed to succeed in their mission. We now have a cure.

Spellbound, Jynx watched Roberts’s beaming face. Of course they had the cure. They’d discovered it months ago. They’d been refining a delivery system in an effort to inoculate all the civilized worlds in the Void. Reports of the plague were rare, but over ten years, it had slowly seeped from Tyaa to gain an ever-greater foothold in the surrounding planets. Quarantining entire towns had been the only way to stop the progress of the disease.

Jynx had left behind her general medical practice to focus her considerable talent on eradicating the Tyaa plague. Three years of her life for what? Why was Roberts lying? Why had Roberts ordered the destruction of the lab? Jynx didn’t hang around to ask. She’d fled Banna before anyone knew she was still alive.

So far she hadn’t hurt a soul. She hadn’t so much as inconvenienced anyone. She’d gone out of her way to slip by unnoticed until she could fully understand what a life on the run in the Fringe entailed.

Determined to escape, she made another circuit of her