Page 9 of Repossess My Heart

“Shit…” The word escapes my lips on a breath, but the man’s head snaps towards me as though I’ve just screamed at the top of my lungs. Icy blue eyes cut across the room to the guard bots, now well on their way to remove both of them before returning to me. A sinister smirk graces his lips as he tilts his head… watching me. Waiting for me to do something. What would I do? He’s completely unbothered by the whimpering, shaking man combing through his drives for whatever he wanted deleted. The man’s pale hair slides across his forehead where it hangs into his eyes, displacing just enough to see the heavy outline of the tattoo on his forehead. My breath leaves me all at once as I sit back on my heels, battling against the instinct to run. One that’s been drilled into me since I was a child.

Run, run, run, run, hide.

“You have violated establishment policy thirty-six. No personal use photography devices, including implants. Leave now.” Somehow, the monotone voice of the bots sound warmer than the whispered command of the man. It takes me a fat minute to realize they’re talking to the now wounded patron as the heady smell of Crace’s cologne fills the air. Chemical and spicy, I’ve always hated it. The pale-haired man tears his eyes from me before he releases the patron, who sags as if his muscles had been made of jelly. A startled cry leaves the limp man as he’s wrenched up by the guard bots, followed by his attacker. His badly fucked arm hanging loose at his side, the angle all wrong. Everyone stills as the pale-haired man lifts his arm, hovering his wrist over the patron’s temple. I hadn’t even paid enough attention to the patron to notice the implant, one of the only ones I’ve ever actually wanted. The ability to recall everything you experience like a movie… feel, taste and smell what you did in the moment. No drone or backup bots needed. It’s all in you.

The patrons’ eyes haze before the smell of burning flesh fills the room, so pungent it makes my measly breakfast work its way up the back of my throat. My hand instinctively clutching my stomach as if that’ll hold the food in place. Everyone watching in either sick curiosity and others in horror as the bots hold the patron in place as the man fries his implant, and the implanted ocular tech that comes with it. Not even Crace has a smart-ass comment or smooth words to quell the alarm in the room as the pale-haired man… theRepo Manrenders the patron blind as if he’s folding laundry. My palms are slick with sweat as I sit there gawking like the rest of the room. My pulse fluttering.

“Thank you for your service, sir. It’s not often we see… those like you out for enjoyment.”

“I thoroughly enjoy what I do, mask on or off.” He snaps a warning edge to his voice. It’s enough to send even a Mig’s heart into a frenzy.

“You’re always welcome in my club.” Crace all but croons as the Repo Man releases the unconscious patron, leaving him like a sweet wrapper to be blown away with the wind, or in this case, carried out by guards. Even I can see the sweat beading on Crace’s artificially tanned skin from here, the way he keeps swallowing, bobbing up and down like the bulb in the back of a toilet.

The man gives me another glance over his shoulder, the action not lost on Crace as he turns to me, clapping his cupped hands loud enough to make me jolt, “You’re being paid to dance, so dance! The show is over.” He ends it with a scalding, greasy look at the rest of the club.

I roll my eyes, using the pole to help me to my feet as they tingle, pins and needles prodding my skin. I shift my weight back and forth, trying to wake them up. They’d fallen asleep underneath me pretty soon into the ordeal, but I couldn’t force myself to shift my weight from them, not even an inch. Under the same spell as the rest of the club. I wonder how long I’ll be allowed to dance before the Repo Man drags me outside and guts me. Maybe he’ll make me finish my shift. I sigh at the prospect of spending my last moments here. Repo Men don’t… go out and if they do, it's never without their masks. I can’t think of a single story of a Repo Man revealing his face, not one that wasn’t utter bullshit, anyway. I’d heard stories of their faces being branded with numbers, but-

My pulse spikes as Crace opens his fucking mouth again. “Want her? We’ve got private rooms… on the house this time for taking care of that situation for us.” The room spins as I climb the pole, shifting my weight so it carries me in a circle. I’d entirely zoned out on the fact that he’s still staring.

Fuck, did he even blink?

I spin again, catching Crace gesturing towards me in some vulgar motion I don’t understand.

Here it is…

“Not interested.” The man spits as he heads for the door.

The blood in my veins chills as I lose my grip, dropping quickly, my badly bandaged calf making painful contact with the ground. I hiss in pain, my hands flying out to cup the newly throbbing area.

“For fuck's sake, Reverie!” Crace snaps, jerking my eyes from my leg, then from the retreating back of the man.

“Your eyes are wrong.”

He’s not even limping. No sign I had hurt him at all.

I ignore Crace as I scramble to my feet, clambering down off the stage as ungracefully as I’ve ever done as his incensed voice follows me, but I’m fast, even in nine-inch heels. My heart pounds in my chest as I shove past a man leading a core bot to a back room. The man holding the bot by the dick curses me, but I ignore them too. The double doors of the club barely fall shut behind him before I burst out of them into the grimy alleyway, the cool air nipping at my exposed flesh. Making it pebble and my nipples harden. My eyes dart wildly around, avoiding the confused and heated stares of those walking past me.

He’s gone, but then again…

I knew he would be.

“You might not know it yet, sweetling, but I fucking own you. There's a price on that pretty heart of yours and it's mine to collect!”

That voice… sounds so much clearer from outside a mask. I hadn’t imagined he’d be so fucking handsome. Not that his appearance matters for what I need him for. What he needs me for… he wants me. He wants to killme. A shamefully sick thrill floods my belly as I drag air through my lungs. Suddenly the lace of my top is too heavy. Grating on my sensitive skin. I nearly smile stepping back towards the club, away from the bustling, crowded alley, “Okay Nine… Next time you see me, make good on that promise.”

4

A Problem

Nine

“Okay, Nine… Next time you see me, make good on that promise.” Her soft voice taunts me from where I’m perched above her, just behind the flashing holo sign of the club. Having hauled myself up here the moment I heard the hoof like clomping of those stilts she’s pretending are shoes in pursuit. I suppose her snapping her delicate-Delicate? What the hell?Her very normalunremarkableankle would only make her easier to kill. Her taunt settles in my blood, flooding me with a heat that’s far more distracting than I can afford right now as I scale towards the back of the building, my drone hovering silently above. My fists clench until my knuckles pop as I pull up the scan of the building, finding her just in time to see her boss grip her arm tightly, jerking her out of the public eye. I adjust my hardened cock inside my pants as he yells at her, his thick finger gesturing wildly.

“Leave one bruise on that pretty bronze flesh and I’ll open you mouth to ass, prick.” I seethe annoying even myself.

That’s never mattered before. I’ve never gotten myself into a situation like this before. Haven’t seen eyes like hers in so many years I’d nearly forgotten how much they bothered me.

I exposed myself, another cardinal sin in my line of work. My fingers are still slick with the man’s blood from where I crushed his wrist. Idiotically derailing my piss poor decision to slip inside… just to watch. When the fuck have I ever given a shit about watching a girl dance? His tech flashed as he started recording, his eyes trained onher. I could feel the hum of it in my system as his low grade, off market implants came to life. There was no rhyme or reason to what I did next, only that the idea of the fucker jerking his cock to the video later bled that familiar red mist into my vision. That at the time, the idea was unacceptable to me, so much so I exposed myself.

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