Page 50 of Exhale
Glancing around, he walked a few feet and searched the area around the side of the building, but nothing.
Not a sound. Not a soul was nearby.
It was the most uncanny thing he’d ever experienced.
Fuck, he needed a hit. There in the alley, he fumbled, taking out his lighter. The H was already tucked inside a piece of foil, so he heated it up and sucked in the smoke, holding it deep in his lungs.
He never saw the avenging angel come up from behind.
And he went out of this world the way he preferred it.
High as a fucking kite.
Black studied the drug addict at his feet and walked away.
He scooped up Elliott from Micah and carried the boy through the alley, toward the boulevard ahead.
“Where we going?” Micah asked.
“Pegasus is looking for me, and you need to change your clothes,” Black said.
The men of Pegasus were tracking him, and he had made damned sure they would be able to ping his location.
“Can we find mommy?” Elliott asked, gazing up at him through a tear-stained face.
“We can find your daddy.”
“You know daddy?”
“No, but I know some guys that do, and I know your daddy is looking for you.”
“He is?”
Big wide eyes studied him as if they weren’t sure about trusting him.
Black got it.
He was low on the trust category himself.
The location on Black’s phone had been stationary for about ten minutes.
That meant one of two things, either Black was waiting for him, or he was wounded…or dead.
Black worked for Genesis, and with the assassin’s reputation, Jordan didn’t see anyone getting the drop on the guy.
The place he and the other operatives of Pegasus came to was a cigarette shop that butted up against the alley. The front of the building lit up with neon signs and advertisements in bold letters on colorful paper.
The bell dinged when he walked in with Link and Eagle following closely, while Creed stood watch outside the front door.
The clerk at the counter glanced up. He looked to be in his mid-thirties with waist-length scraggly hair that matched a long, bushy beard and eyebrows. The guy wore a tie-died shirt in orange and lime green and had beads and leather-strapped bracelets lining his arms.
The clerk took their measure and then nodded to the back room as if he’d been waiting for them…or he’d been told they’d be coming.
Jordan walked to the entrance to the hallway, through the beaded curtain that separated the front from the back, and down the narrow hallway beyond. He came to a rather large break room and stepped inside.
Elliott was sleeping curled up on a broken-down sofa against one wall.
The man who stood up from the table was nothing like Jordan had imagined. If this guy was, in fact, Black.
