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Cruel Summer

copyright 2001-2004 by Imagineer.

comments to 
imagineer 47: yahoo green eggs com ham
but without the green eggs or ham

http://www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/Imagineer/www/


// 36: Crushed


  Ear buds blared the bits of a personal audio stream...

  Always tease tease tease
  You're happy when I'm on my knees
  One day is fine, next is black
  So if you want me off your back
  Well come on and let me know
  Should I stay or should I go?

  Andrew stared at the screen. His lips tightened.

  Ginger was trying to fuck him.

  The trail was obvious once he knew what to look for. As it would be
for investigators after the fact, but by then it wouldn't matter. And
it was too late to clean it up; some of the records went back several
weeks; they'd already be copied to offsite tapes by now.

  Should I stay or should I go now?
  Should I stay or should I go now?
  If I go there will be trouble
  An' if I stay it will be double
  So come on and let me know

  The low-frequency noise of an opening door shook through his music;
Andrew popped the buds out of his ears with a sharp tug.

  "Hey, stud. Whatcha doin'?"

  Stud?

  Andrew turned away from his notebook to look over his shoulder at the
doorway.

  Ginger stood there, leaning up against the doorjamb.

  Hair down, an endless rain of brushed curls framing her artfully-made
face and spilling onto her shoulders.
  Filmy black robe, open in front, little more than a shadow on her
skin.
  Black lace basque with little black satin bows holding up black
stockings. 
  Black heels, the kind with the little puffy feather things above the
toes...

  And a string of big blue sapphires around her neck.

  This vision was not his boss. It wasn't even his lover. This was a
succubus, dream demon made real, come to claim his soul in an agonizing
blissful exchange.

  Ginger was tempting enough when she was dressed for the office. Hell,
if he wasn't constantly reminded what a bitch she was, she could give
him a hardon if she was dressed for yardwork.

  But *this* threatened to shut down all voluntary muscle control, to
say nothing of cognitive functions.

  Andrew forced himself to look away. He quickly closed the windows
he'd been working on.

  "Doing some research of my own," Andrew finally answered, clearing
his throat. "Chuck and Mikey are good, but..."
  "...but they're not as good as you." Ginger crossed the room with a
seductive swagger Andrew couldn't help but notice in the reflection in
the mirror above the desk/dressing table. Andrew's boss and
sometime-lover moved behind his chair, her hands on his shoulders,
gently stroking up and down his biceps and around his shoulders.
  Andrew fought to keep his voice steady. "I just want to make sure
we're not missing anything. This isn't exactly a standard scenario."
  "I appreciate you watching out for me, Andy." 

  Oh, *fuck.* She'd only called him Andy when she wanted him to fuck
her. 

  She leaned over him now, breasts pressed to either side of his head,
her hair spilling over his face, her arms stretching down his
submissively-slumping torso, her fingers expertly undoing buckle... and
button... and fly . . .

  Agent Dean struggled to stay focused on the incriminating information
he'd gathered, but his swollen dick was more insistent than the
evidence.

  What the hell. He could let her fuck him now, and confront her about
trying to frame him later, couldn't he?

  Ginger moved around him, pushing his chair away from the desk and
straddling him. He felt a nauseated thrill not unlike the anticipation
of riding a new roller coaster. Maybe she wasn't going to frame him;
maybe she just wanted to make sure he wouldn't do anything to hurt her.
Maybe when this was all over his life would return to normal, and their
relationship with it.

  She lifted up, pelvis rocked forward, back arched, pulling his face
down into her lace-sheathed tits as her hot hatch hooded his turgid
rod. The roller coaster's bar was pulled down; he was locked in place,
helpless to do anything but ride it out. And he had a feeling he wasn't
going to make it.

  A voice came from the doorway. "Hey, boss! Glad I found y... oh."

  She stopped riding Andrew, coming to rest in his lap, his dick still
lodged deep within her. She kept him on the boil by rhythmically
squeezing her vaginal muscles around his cock.

  "Can't you see I'm busy?"
  "Sorry boss. Just wanted to let you know we figured out how to get
Detective Aquino. Johnson called in an anonymous tip to get him out to
the convention center gardens; we'll hit him there. But his kid's a
little trickier; apparently his dad sent him off somewhere. We're still
working on it."

  "Fine!" Ginger said, exasperated. "Just let me know when dad's iced
and you've got junior in hand." She felt Andrew's body stiffen in
surprise under her. "Relax, honey, Ginger's taking care of everything,"
she cooed in his ear. "Now get out!" she yelled at the intruder.
Footsteps beat a hasty retreat down the hallway.

  "Now, where were we? Ahh, yesss..." Ginger lifted slowly, pulling her
younger lover's head back down to her breasts. Andrew's mouth found a
nipple through the delicate lace, and began nibbling and suckling
fervently. "That's it, baby... that's right... Unghh..." She squeezed
the tip of his member, almost pushing it out of her before relaxing and
falling to sheath its entire length once again. Andrew grunted
involuntarily.

  His synapses struggled to fire in a useful pattern. Aquino? The first
cop assigned to the Avenging Angel case. He didn't seem to know
anything. What was Ginger killing him for? Wouldn't that just make a
bigger mess? Maybe that was the idea. She would probably pin that on
Andrew too. Something like the cop getting too close. And the cop's
kid? What did she want with him? Was he connected to Angela somehow?

  Ginger found a slow, undulating rhythm that demanded all of Andrew's
attention. Agent Dean's lip curled and his eyes rolled back into his
head. His mind whithered as blood packed up and headed south for sexual
spring break. His dick swelled and drove into her more deeply.


  Fuck, but Andy was good. She'd forgotten how good. 

  And how unlike Eric.

  Eric and Ginger were close enough to peers in the sack; sure, she
always had the upper hand, but Eric always knew exactly what to do and
exactly which lines should and shouldn't be crossed. His experience
with her took just a little bit of the edge off. With Eric, Ginger
always knew she would be satisfied, and that was itself somehow
unsatisfying. Eric was so practiced; Andy was just ignorant enough,
just rough enough around the edges that she could feel the sense of
achievement in every good fucking he gave her.

  It was almost too bad this would be the last time. Well, almost the
last time. As she felt Andrew's grip tighten on her stocking-clad
thighs, pulling her back onto him with almost savage intensity, she
wondered briefly if she might have picked the wrong man.

  Girl, what are you thinking? Who has to settle for just one man?

  Ginger shuddered as the orgasm took her.


  "What are you doing, baby?" Ginger cooed.
  "Describing what just happened, so when I read it later I'll believe
it wasn't just a dream." It sounded kind of dumb, but Ginger was still
coming down and didn't seem to notice. In reality he was queueing up a
message to the SMS gateway address for Eric's old cellphone:


------------------------------------------------------------------------


  GINGER GOING AFTER SAPPHIRE COP NOEL AQUINO AND SO
  N RICKY. COP LURED TO CONVENTION GARDEN. GINGER AL
  READY KILLED THE BLACK WIDOW AND HAS HER STONES. I
  'M TRYING TO GET THEM FROM HER NOW.
  Eric had probably dumped his old phone, but Andrew was betting his
old mentor had the sense and the skill to get SMS and call notices
cloned. It was easy enough to get such taps made nowadays...
   
  Andrew's lover traced her fingernails up and down his chest. "That's
sweet, baby, but why write about it when you can just do it again?" She
squeezed his now-flaccid member; it squished out of her. The
little-girl pout was priceless. She reached around behind her, tugging
his hands away from the keyboard and guiding them to her asscheeks,
prompting him to give them a squeeze.

  He broke away from the screen to give her a quick downward glance.
"You'll need to help me recharge." 


  Ginger flashed back to the first time she'd gone after Andrew. "I
always did," she recalled. Her mouth clamped his, her hands gripping
either side of his head, ripping a kiss out of him. Their tongues
danced a lingual lambada. Long moments passed before she broke off,
leaving her lover gasping. He might not be hard yet but he was
certainly hungry. Ginger uncoiled her expert tongue, flicking and
slicking and teasing her way from chin to ear.


  Fuck me, she remembers all the little hot spots. If she wasn't a
dangerous psychotic with a borderline God complex sanctioned for dirty
work by the most powerful nation in the world, she'd have made a
killing as a high-priced escort.

  Andrew found it difficult to concentrate. "You're certainly
feeling... [gasp] ... randy this morning... I thought you'd be..." Oh,
yeah, that's the spot right there. "...ice-cold pissed after
Rosewood... [grunt] ... killed your hostage." He regretted the comment
as soon as the words left his lips. Dick was angry at Brain: hey,
Mister Smarty Pants, the girl's with me now. Ask your questions *after*
I shoot. 

  Way to kill the mood, Romeo. You just don't know how to keep a good
thing going, do you? His heart skipped a beat as he waited for her
reaction.

  Ginger was undeterred; her lips and tongue extracted unbelieveable
sensations from the area around his collarbone. Who knew the body had
so many triggers? Well, she did, obviously... The seductress answered
between flicks and gentle nibbles. "Burnett and Cooper and the Johnsons
are out getting a replacement. [lick, lick, suckle] "The cop who's
supposed to catch her?  [nibble, flick, bite] His son is her
boyfriend." Andrew felt sharp nails drag a trail of sweet pain across
his chest. "Isn't that ironic?"

  "Is it [moan] serious between them?"
  "A tragic [kiss, tickle] love story. He draws [nibble, gasp] comic
book pictures of her exploits. [graze, lick] It's so sweet, it makes me
all gushy inside."
  "And killing his dad? Is he a threat?"
  "Of course not; that's just to show her we're serious." Her tongue
flicked in and out of his belly button. "And it's something else to pin
on her in case she gets feisty. [nibble, flick, bite] Mostly it's to
test Burnett and Cooper -- they looked [lick, suckle, smack] a little
pale after the mom bought it last night."

  Andrew felt a cold chill rush through him. Ginger was worse than
Valerie. She was going out of her way to kill innocents now. A police
officer, no less. He looked down at her bobbing and weaving mane of
hair. It sickened him that despite his horror she still kept a rise in
him.

  Ginger's tongue had reached the end of the teasing trail. She swirled
it up around Andrew's rising staff before taking its tip between her
wet red lips.

  "Why do I get the feeling you've been hiding things from me?"
  "Shhmf... [swirl] Don't be silly. [suck] You were out getting the
ammo."
  "Why didn't you [groan] tell me when I got back?"
  "You looked so tired. [flick, dive] It didn't matter. [stroke,
squeeze] I was gonna tell you this morning. [tickle, swirl, suck] An' I
jus' did." The last words came out muffled around a stiff cock;
Andrew's pelvis jumped forward, short spasmed thrusts shoving the head
of his helmet against the back of her throat. Ginger knew he was close
and pulled away, much to his disappointment. "You were supposed to fuck
me again, remember?" She stood facing him, leaned back against the
desk; her arm shoved Andrew's notebook to one side and she wriggled her
ass up onto the desktop, stretched out, her fur-tufted toes just
touching the floor. Two fingers spread red folds wide to let a third
flutter a bared clit. "Now," she commanded.

  Andrew stood, his dick waving back and forth as if blindly searching
for a target.

  "Wait," he stopped just short of his goal. "On the bed." He leapt
over the chair and onto the bed, kneeling like a guitar god, still
fully dressed but for his wagging wang, looking for all the world like
it simply pierced his pants. Somewhere in the back of his mind Andrew
praised the creator of the velcro fly.

  Ginger came down from the desk, crossing the room to stand in front
of him, her exposed sex red and glistening from round one. She rocked
her hips back and forth before hiking one foot up on the edge of the
bed, still clad in its dainty powderpuff mule and sheer black stocking.
Damn, she's still plenty flexible for a thirty-six year old. She
dropped her foot and placed her stocking-sheathed knee where her foot
had been. A hand on the bedpost hauled her up to kneel on the edge of
the bed, heels hanging off into space behind her. Ginger leaned
forward, crawling up his torso, feet held high, until her knees nestled
his feet and her nether lips nuzzled his wood. She reached down to
guide his shaft into her, pulling herself up onto his lap, splaying her
legs to rest her weight on his thighs. Andrew cupped her ass in his
hands, holding her to him, his grip the only thing keeping her from
sliding down his thighs and off his engorged prick.

  "Come on, loverboy, fuck me."

  She didn't have to ask twice.

  Andrew gripped her hips tightly, using his arms to pump her back and
forth over his lap, feeling the edge of her stockings tickle his hips,
looking over her shoulder to the mirrored closet door, its reflection
showing the curves of her delicious backside under the dancing curtain
of her sheer robe, her feet in the high-heeled mules making little
circles in the air to either side of her tight little ass.

  He was fucking the naughty housewife. It was one of his favorite
fantasies, and Ginger was using it to make him pliable.

  No. He wasn't going to let this bitch use him one more second.

  Andrew froze in mid-stroke, waiting until Ginger's eyes showed that
he had her attention. He grabbed one of her wrists and twisted it up
into her back, threatening to rip her arm out of its socket if she
tried anything. Andrew leaned forward, pressing his chest into hers,
forcing her back at an awkward angle, only the gentle pressure of his
forearm on her back keeping her from toppling over backwards -- and
from tearing her shoulder.

  "What the fuck is wrong with you, Ginger? I know we're allowed to
break the rules to get the job done, but killing innocents to test your
soldiers' loyalty isn't getting the job done, that's just sick. We're
supposed to make the sapphires disappear. There's nothing in the
mission parameters about blowing up suburbia, or killing cops for shits
and giggles, or a hundred pounds of C4 in a warehouse." Ginger's eyes
went wide. "Yeah, I know about that. You weren't just gonna make the
stones disappear, you were gonna go way overboard and blame the mess on
me." She struggled feebly, turning her head one way and then the other,
looking for a way out of his hold. "What did I ever do to you? I always
did whatever you asked me to, even when it felt wrong. Jesus, Ginger, I
fucked over Eric Lockwell because you asked me to. And you're gonna let
me swing for it? It's not enough to do your duty to your country one
last time, you've gotta cut a swath of destruction so wide the
Chairman's *afraid* to cut you loose -- and you're gonna fuck me in the
process? I don't think so, Miss Hartwick."

  Her vaginal muscles clamped down on him cruelly, as if her grip on
his member would be enough to keep her upright. "This isn't about duty
to country, you naive little boy. I'm not recovering the gemstones so
they can sit in a fucking Pentagon warehouse gathering dust. This is
world-altering technology. Get your head out of your ass and think
about it. An assassin who can't be killed. An army that can't be
stopped. A hand that can't be trumped. Look what two stupid girls who
stumbled on something they couldn't possibly understand managed to do.
Imagine what a smart, motivated, committed team of professionals can
accomplish. This isn't a mission, Andrew, this is a calling. Do you
trust the bureaucrats not to fuck it up?"

  Jesus. Ginger was mental. 

  Andrew had often thought Ginger would retire a thief of convenience
-- there was just too much creative financing in this business not to
take some off the top or go out with ill-gotten gains; in fact it was
almost expected, considered by many just another job benefit, the
unofficial retirement package. If you didn't do it you must not have
been any good.

  But this went way off the deep end. This wasn't a parting shot; it
was a death blow.

  Andrew grabbed the sapphire necklace and pushed the demon off him;
the clasp popped, leaving a string of large blue stones in his hand.
Ginger fell off the side of the bed with uncharacteristic awkwardness;
he could only see her legs, stuck up in the air like a pair of palm
trees grown askew.

  "Spare me the recruiting speech," Andrew spat, "and find yourself
another patsy."

  The data-hound-turned-field-agent considered himself officially
resigned. He'd heard enough. He tucked and zipped. (Well, pressed.)
Five seconds to grab his notebook and his gun and he was gone.

  Click! "Woah, Cowboy." 
  Andrew turned his head to stare right down the barrel of Ginger's
absurdly-large pistol. Now where had she hidden that monster? His brain
skimmed through their morning tryst. She certainly didn't have it on
her.

  "Motherfucker," Agent Dean exhaled coolly. She must have put her gun
under his bed last night before he'd gotten back. She was always one
step ahead of him. He bet even the awkward fall off the bed was staged.
"You knew I was on to you."
  "I knew you weren't stupid."
  "So, what, were you gonna handcuff me to the bed in the second round?"
  "I was hoping third, but you started asking questions right away. You
really need to work on your pillow talk, baby. Now, hand over the
stones."

  Out of the corner of his eye, Andrew spotted the motel-provided alarm
clock, it's big bright red LEDs silently screaming 8:29. The same kind
of clock he'd threatened to shove up Mikey's ass his first day in the
field. Angela had been nothing more than a handle in a chatroom back
then. It seemed like years ago. But he still remembered the piercing
sinewave wail of the clock's alarm like it was yesterday.

  And he remembered last night, when he'd set the alarm for 8:30.

  He'd get maybe half a second. He better decide fast what to do with
it.

  Notebook.
  Handgun.
  Notebook.
  Handgun.

  Hacker? Or Hero?

  The notebook had everything he needed to clear his name. The
devastating trail of meticulously-planted evidence that painted him a
disgruntled, disillusioned, diabolical double-agent. He could hardly
erase it, but given a day or two he could surely deconstruct it,
deflate it, divert attention back upon this deadly diva.

  But that wouldn't help Angela. Or her boyfriend. Or his father. Or
the city. Or the world. A bureaucratic victory was pointless. What good
was keeping your own ass out of jail if the world around it was
irrevocably changed?

  Besides, the gun was by the window.


  8:30.

  A single ear-scorching note rang out, a sonic concussion ripping
apart the heavy silence that had blanketed the pair of impassed agents.

  Ginger's body recoiled in shock, hands instinctively rising to
protect her head. Finger twitched, round expended somewhere into the
ceiling. Gunpowder trumped sine wave, reducing sound to an
above-the-threshold shush of white noise before fading to a dull ring.

  Andrew's fingers grasped his new best friend. His brain flashed
through a catalog of images of the motel, searching for a memory of the
space outside this window. Pool? No. Railing? No. Bushes? Yes.
Probably. A glance over the shoulder showed two shadows trisecting the
window. A half-step to his right put him between them.

  The door to the room burst open. Taggert stood there, eyes wide,
trying to understand what he saw: the lead agent by the window, pants
stained, gun in hand; the team's director next to the bed, dressed for
a Playboy shoot, her huge phallic automatic coming down to draw a bead
on her lover.

  Agent Andrew Dean suddenly leaping back, tucking and bracing,
curtains stretching from their rods, hollow thud becoming crack
becoming multiphonic crash, curtains popping free of their hangers,
crinkling around the departing Dean like a wad around shot, morning
light blasting into the room around the shrinking projectile of man and
material.

  Director Hartwick's gun reporting, shattering the air of the room,
bright muzzle flash but a pinpoint on the senses compared to the sonic
force of the shell's charge. Taggert couldn't help but cringe; as his
ears sent silent distress signals to his brain, he wondered how Ginger
could stand to fire such a beast.


  As a bullet's heat blew by his left temple, and the room receded from
him into relative darkness...

  ...Andrew Dean marvelled at the eroticism of a freshly-fucked woman
dressed for a boudoir photo session blazing away with a nickel-plated
hand cannon.


------------------------------------------------------------------------


  "A limousine belonging to local businessman Gerald Bates exploded
late last night on its way to Hackett Municipal Airport. Four blocks of
Lowell Boulevard are blocked off this morning as police investigate the
cause of the blast and search for survivors. It is not known at this
time who was in the limousine at the time of the explosion; police
refuse to confirm that it was the result of an attack on Bates by
Valerie Strain, better known as the Black Widow. Strain is wanted in
connection with over a dozen murders as well as a brutal attack on a
restaurant owned by Bates just two nights ago that left five men dead
and several people injured. We'll give you more on this breaking story
throughout the morning as we get it. Ken?

  "Thanks Barbie. An unidentified woman was found dead in the Strong
Oaks warehouse district just before midnight last night. Police on the
scene suspect the woman was caught in the crossfire of a violent
skirmish between two rival gangs. No suspects in the slaying have been
identified. When we come back, Skipper Pillonwed gives brides-to-be
handy tips to prepare for that special day. Stay tuned."


------------------------------------------------------------------------


  "We're sorry! The person you have called is unavailable or has
travelled outside the coverage area."

  Noel slammed down the phone in exasperation. It was the fifth time
he'd tried to call Angela since last night. Where was she? Why didn't
she turn on her phone? Why didn't she call him?

  Morning sun blazed into the robbery/homicide division office. Noel
regarded the couch in the corner with a sigh. It was plenty comfortable
-- he'd grabbed many a wink while burning the midnight oil on a hot
case -- but sleep had only come in fits and bursts last night. He
rubbed his eyes; trying to expunge the image of Gladys Barrett's
lifeless body in a pool of blood.

  "Man, for a guy with no cases you sure are workin' hard." It was Zito
from vice. "You seen Rubio?" Noel shook his head.

  Detective Aquino looked over the files spread out over his desk.
Photos of the Barrett's house (what was left of it). Photos of the
warehouse where Gladys was killed. Preliminary ballistics reports -- a
mix of weapons that suggested paramilitary operations, but not a single
match. Prints taken from all over the warehouse, from as many as nine
different people, and the only ones that ID'd were the janitor and
Gladys. And it was unlikely a match would be forthcoming -- at least,
not in time to be of any use. 

  Aquino recalled his earlier conversation with the lab tech. "These
guys must be from out of town. I'll run it against the national
indexes, but we're still running the GB's stuff trying to get a lead on
Sapphire. Talk about a needle in a haystack. Musta been a hundred fifty
people in that restaurant. And not a single fingerprint in Sapphire's
holding cell, just some footprints. Like she knew not to touch
anything." Like she was cuffed most of the time, and I wiped down after
she left, Noel thought. "I think Ramirez is just covering for not
processing her properly when she first came in. Biohazard protocol, my
ass. Anyway, it'll be another eighteen hours before the next case hits
the queue. I'd squeeze you in, but Ramirez said nothing runs until GB's
is finished." 

  Noel just sighed; it was pointless anyway. In eighteen hours, Gladys'
abductors-turned-killers would either be gone with Angela's power, or
they'd be killed by it.

  Noel worried about Angela. With the Black Widow murders, Noel could
help her. He knew she hadn't committed any of them; in the end, he'd
see her exonerated. But if Angela killed the people who took her mom,
she'd be on the run for the rest of her life. And unless he missed his
guess, the explosion last night wasn't Black Widow going after Bates,
it was Angela taking out Black Widow. The girl had obviously been
pushed over the edge. The sudden brutality of the attack surprised
Noel. The detective had little doubt that once Angela knew of Gladys'
fate, the powerful vigilante would show no more restraint in exacting
vengeance. Whether Noel considered such actions justified mattered not;
if he didn't stop her, the justice system would treat her no
differently than those who'd killed her mother.

  Where could she have gone?

  Noel's phone rang. "Detective Aquino. [pause] Yes. [pause] What kind
of information? [pause] All right. I'll meet you. [pause] The
convention center gardens. I'm on my way."


------------------------------------------------------------------------


  Eric Lockwell's tony new digs were a sharp contrast with the gritty
mess he was in.

  Some hero. The only person you killed was the person you were
supposed to save. And now the situation is completely fucked.

  They were on to him now. Picking them off one or two at a time would
be difficult. And Ginger had no doubt plugged her leak -- her cell
phone had been uncharacteristically silent since his raid on the
warehouse. 

  But even a banzai full frontal assault was out, because he didn't
know where they were holed up. Ginger had wisely kept the field agents'
lodgings from her own data-hounds, as if she'd known all along they'd
be compromised. 

  All Eric could do was wait until they showed up for the exchange with
Angela. (Exchange wasn't really the word for it now that Gladys was
dead.) The convention center during the biggest party of the year -- it
was a shitty location. If he could find them there at all, it would be
too late. Angela would hand over the sapphires and Ginger would be
gone. 

  Unless he could get to Angela first. Like that was gonna happen.

  Dammit! He should have killed them at the warehouse. Taggert out
front -- the old Eric would have put a bullet in the man's brain, not
told him to be still. The men inside, probably Burnett and Cooper --
another thirty seconds inside and he could have killed them both.
Another minute to flush out the one on the roof, and Ginger would now
be working with two men instead of six.  He should have considered the
hostage expendable. Ironic that if he'd done that she might still be
alive. If he hadn't shot the sniper's hand, Gladys Barrett would be in
a hospital recovering from a flesh wound instead of in a morgue. In
trying to save her he'd managed to get her killed.

  It was an accident, he told himself. A freak accident. They grabbed
her, not you. They shot her, not you. You tried to help her. The old
Eric would have killed her just to take away Ginger's leverage. You at
least tried to do the right thing.

  The old Eric wouldn't have created this mess in the first place. The
old Eric would have simply taken the sapphires from Angela according to
plan and been long gone.

  The old Eric wouldn't have fallen for a sweet girl from the suburbs.

  Of course, if he *had* tried to take the sapphires from Angela, she
probably would have killed him. 

  If she held him as responsible for this mess as he held himself, she
might kill him yet. 

  He'd ruined Angela's life, blown up her house, and killed her mom.
The more he tried to fix things the worse they got.

  Women! Why'd they have to make men so stupid?

  *Penman has entered the room.
  PenMan: Got your message. You have info for Sapphire?
  Eric had absorbed everything he could from the Sapphire Exposed
website. But most of what he'd read from the site's main contributor
and webmaster, PenMan, had an enthusiasm that went beyond boosterism.
This kid -- he'd assumed it was a kid -- obviously had a crush on
Sapphire. It was certainly something Eric could understand. But the way
PenMan characterized his relationship with her suggested it was more
than idol worship, more than a crush. If his stories were true, this
young man knew her. And she knew him. At the very least, his glowing
posts and highly-romanticized drawings suggested he was either not
recognizing or not reporting the whole truth. He probably knew more
than he let on, and with PenMan's call for information about Black
Widow "to help Sapphire put an end to this scourge on our city once and
for all" -- man, who really wrote shmaltzy melodramatic cliche crap
like that? -- Eric had an easy way to draw him into a chat. 

  Scott8412: Maybe...u have a way to get it to her?
  PenMan: I'll worry about that. Do you want to help her or not?
  Scott8412: Yes.
  Eric felt shitty about Gladys. Was this really the way for Angela to
find out about her mother's death, through some starry-eyed
pimple-faced geek on a chat board?

  PenMan: Well?
  Eric looked down at the latest issue of World News Weekly on the
motel desk. He'd been in this town watching Angela for weeks, and in
the end he was learning about her from a trashy tabloid and a fan
website.

  EXCLUSIVE!
  VAMPIRE HUNTS AVENGING ANGEL AND BLACK WIDOW!
  Far-East "Angel Hunter" tracks Super Duo; Leaves Dozens of Bodies In
His Wake!
  Serial Rapist May Hold Key To Man-Haters Power!

  It was ridiculous. But then the whole thing was ridiculous. Magical
sapphires that could give a young woman an impenetrable forcefield and
powerful telekenesis? Once you accepted that, common sense got checked
at the door; anything else no matter how absurd was ushered into the
party.

  Eric's phone buzzed on the nightstand.

  NEW SMS MESSAGE:

  DEAN@216.239.57.99:
  GINGER GOING AFTER SAPPHIRE COP NOEL AQUINO AND SO
  N RICKY. COP LURED TO CONVENTION GARDEN. GINGER AL
  READY KILL
  So, Andrew Dean had turned. The man wasn't as dumb as he looked.

  Eric waited breathlessly for a second message, but none came. Fucking
hundred-words-per-minute geeks can't abbreviate for shit. Probably
wasn't thinking about the 110-character limit on some SMS networks. It
didn't matter; Eric already knew that Gladys was dead. Wouldn't Dean
have known that? Maybe not, if Ginger was keeping him in the dark.
Maybe he wasn't even with her anymore.

  Or maybe this was a setup. Maybe Dean was still on Ginger's team.
Maybe they were counting on Eric's new good-samaritan tendencies to
lure him out into the open.

  Well, just because he had a conscience didn't mean he was suddenly an
idiot. It wasn't like he'd go stand out in the open and be a target. If
it was a trap, it still told him where some of Ginger's men were going
to be, and that meant he could kill them.

  But if it wasn't a trap, if Ginger was going to kill Noel Aquino,
what was her interest in his son?

  The lad must mean something to Angela...

  But Angela was practically a recluse. (Well, if you didn't count her
adventures as Sapphire.) She hadn't seen anyone in weeks. There was
that boy she'd been out on a date with when Eric had first set up
surveillance, but that had fizzled soon after. Eric remembered the 4:30
A.M. visit where the kid had dropped off the "breakup bag." Driving
that big grey Mercury. 

  A cop's car.

  Of course. How could he have been so stupid?

  Noel's son Ricky had been Angela's boyfriend. She'd probably broken
up with him to protect him. So instead, he worshipped her from afar.

  From the Internet.

  And Eric was talking to him right now.

  PenMan. Ricky. Noel Aquino's son.

  And Eric wasn't the only one who'd figured it out. Indeed, Ginger was
one step ahead of him. Agents were certainly on their way right now.

  Scott8412: ricky I no its u - ur in danger
  PenMan: How do you know Ricky's in danger?
  Scott8412: g needs hostage, got glads but she died
  PenMan: G? Glads?
  Eric wished he'd taken typing more seriously.

  Scott8412: ginger, wants sappries. gladys, angelas mom
  PenMan: Angela's mom DIED?! 
  PenMan: How? 
  PenMan: What about Angela?
  Scott8412: go2 safe place no freinds or relativces
  Scott8412: go NOW
  PenMan: Wait, what about Angela? Who's Ginger? Do you mean Val, Black
Widow?
  Scott8412: NOW NOW NOW
  PenMan: Why'd she take Angela's mom?
  Scott8412: NOW NOW NOW
  PenMan: Shut up a sec
  PenMan: I'm already in a safe place.
  PenMan: Answer my ?s
  Scott8412: no time dads target ther coming 2 killlhim
  PenMan: Dad's a cop, he can take care of himself. What about Angela?
  Eric was incredulous. I just told him someone wants to kill his dad,
and he's worried about a bulletproof superheroine. Jesus, a crush makes
you stupid...

  Scott8412: ang fine has saphires w/her
  Ricky breathed a sigh of relief. If Angela was with Sapphire she
would be okay.

  Scott8412: wheres noel
  Scott8412: can u reach him
  PenMan: I've got his cell. Who's Ginger? Is Ginger the Hunter?
  Ricky was confused. Ginger's a weird name for a guy, but he is
Asian... who else could Ginger be? Val's alias? Another partner?

  Scott8412: call him tell him hes in danger
  Scott8412: tell him diner caller told u
  PenMan: No signal. Who's Ginger?
  Ricky was starting to get a weird feeling. How did he know this guy
was trying to help?

  Scott8412: u no where he is
  PenMan: How do I know you're not the one trying to kill him?
  Eric's hands froze while his mind spun. He didn't have a good answer.

  Scott8412: why would i tell u to warn him
  PenMan: You already know his cellphone. 
  PenMan: You're trying to find him by tracking it but he turned it off.
  PenMan: Now you're trying to get me to tell you where he is.
  Shit, Ricky was imaginative. But Eric couldn't argue with him.

  Scott8412: ok cant argue w/u
  Scott8412: get offline stay safe
  PenMan: Wait! Tell me what's going on!
  Scott8412: ill help ur dad
  PenMan: Who's Ginger? What's she want with Sapphire?
  *Scott8412 has left the room.


------------------------------------------------------------------------


  The convention center gardens. It was the spot he would have chosen.
Five high-rise buildings ringed a park built atop the convention
center's parking garage. The trees were few and far between, and little
more than saplings; there was no good cover. Long, meandering walkways
criscrossed the park, with only three entry points, one at the north
end, one at the south, and an elevator/stairway to the garage on the
west side.

  Eric knew how it would go. There would be three of them -- sniper,
spotter, and gopher. The spotter would alert the team of the mark's
arrival. The gopher would time his walk to cross the mark's path just
as he passed in front of the stairway -- and that's when the sniper
would strike. If he was good, the gopher only had to catch the body
before it fell and guide it down the stairway to a waiting van. If he
wasn't, the gopher would stop and hold the mark's attention, perhaps
asking him for the time, freezing the mark until the fatal shot could
be delivered.

  Knowing the drill should have made it easy to disrupt. But Eric
Lockwell was himself a wanted man. And he wanted to do more than
disrupt it. He was here to save a cop's life, sure -- the press
attention on the sapphire situation was hot enough already, it didn't
need "cop killer" added to the mix -- but the primary objective was to
reduce Ginger's number as much as possible. He probably wasn't going to
get another shot before the exchange tonight.

  But the urban environment wouldn't make it easy. True, there were few
civilians on the field of play in a business district on a Saturday
morning, but this still needed to be a clean operation. And the chance
of getting the sniper was nil -- even if Eric could trace the
trajectory to the building, there was no way he could get to it from
the park before the sniper got away. The spotter could be anywhere --
in the garage, at either end of the park, or even in another one of the
office towers. Eric would be lucky to even see him. That left the
gopher, who would be dangerously close to the target.

  Well, Eric wasn't about to go home empty-handed.

  Remember, they want you dead even more than this cop. And they don't
have to bother removing *your* body from the scene.

  Two hundred yards of exposed walkway. Eric didn't like his odds out
there -- he was good, but he wasn't bulletproof. He'd have to make his
play from the sidelines.

  So there were two ways this could go. 
  Eric could get lucky -- Noel could enter the park from the south,
where Eric could intercept him at the steps and get him to safety
before the team could react.
  Or Eric could get very lucky, and drop the gopher before he reached
his mark with one shot.

  Noel's precinct was some ten minutes away. He should be arriving any
minute. Eric once again thanked his instincts, which had him check into
the convention center hotel last night, even though it burned most of
his remaining cash. (He prayed that Ginger was at this point too busy
preparing for the exchange to look too hard for him.) Had he been
anywhere else, he never would have been able to get here in time.

  A click-snick sound marked the chambering of the first round.


  Noel checked his cell phone. Darnit, the battery was dead. He should
have checked it before he got out of the car. He'd left it on all
night, hoping Angela would call. And dreading what he'd have to tell
her if she did.

  He hoped she wasn't trying to call him now.


  There he was. Emerging from the elevator, police detective Noel
Aquino looked up and down the length of the park. The only person
sitting on the lawn halfway down the south walkway got up and walked
away. Coincidence. So where was the gopher?

  A man popped up from the north entrance stairs. Faded jeans.
Loose-fitting cream-colored sportcoat that was either a year ahead or
fifteen years behind the fashion curve. His pace was easy and measured.
He appeared to look at nothing in particular. Longish blond hair -- too
well-coiffed to be called a mullet -- bounced with each step.

  Burnett.

  Jesus, Aquino, don't just stand there.

  Eric kneeled and drew his weapon. As if on cue, Aquino stepped
forward and turned away, still searching for his mystery caller --
right into the line of fire. Eric slid to the far right of the path.

  A hundred yards to the cop; a hundred sixty to the agent. At this
distance, even Eric Lockwell was as likely to hit Aquino as Burnett. Or
hit nothing at all.

  Eric felt time slipping away. Any second now, Burnett would notice
him.


  Fuck.


  Eric leapt up the stairs, sprinting down the path, his sixth sense
dictating stutter-steps, jukes, feints, and dodges as whiffs of
concrete dust decorated the air around him. Fuck, the sniper was quick! 

  "Get down!" Eric screamed, his gun out ahead of him, trigger finger
twitching with lightning speed.

  Noel Aquino spun around and ducked, his hand already reaching in his
jacket for his weapon. After a moment's hesitation, the detective
realized he was in the middle of a firefight and dove toward the
elevator.

  First magazine empty, it slid out of the handgun and clattered to the
ground, a spent tool abandoned by its user. Practiced hands whipped out
a replacement, slamming it home and chambering up the hot barrel in a
single balletic movement.

  Burnett had taken cover behind a concrete bench. His weapon trained
meticulously, firing judiciously. Shoot. Wait. Wait. Shoot. 

  It seemed to take forever to cross the park, the distance emphasized
in no small part by the number of shots raining down around the lone
counter-assassin. Eric's lungs burned; the weapon reports echoing
across the canyon of glass and concrete rang in his ears. 

  Eric had closed most of the distance to his target; the elevator and
stairwell were only fifteen yards to the left, Burnett's bench twenty
yards up the path. Eric practically felt the heat of every bullet as it
whizzed by. Burnett knew he had the advantage, and he was taking it.
Eric had to hit him quickly; at this range Burnett wouldn't miss again.

  The sniper's next shot smacked the concrete path just inches from
Eric's left foot. The defender-assassin quickly rolled to his right,
coming up in a low crouch. He had a half-second, at best; any longer,
and the sniper would make his chest hamburger. Eric's eyes narrowed,
homing in on the bench where Burnett crouched. 

  Shot One.

  Between the seat and the back, scarcely a two-inch gap, slamming into
soft flesh underneath two layers of fashion history.

  Eric saw Burnett's gun barrel dip slightly.

  Shot Two.

  The tip of the collarbone shattered with the impact, paralyzing
Burnett's shoulder in pain.

  Time's up.

  Eric rolled to his left, feeling concrete dust splatter his cheek. He
came up in a run. Only ten yards to the stairwell.

  "Freeze!" someone yelled. Detective Aquino.

  Shit.

  Juke to the left, to the other side of the elevator.

  The sniper's last shot at Eric rattled the pavement behind him.

  Eric took a moment to catch his breath; hands busied themselves
snicking a fresh magazine into his Glock 20. "Aquino! [gasp] They're
trying to [gasp] kill you! [gasp] Get downstairs NOW!" He heard the
sniper take another shot. He was firing from the northeast; Aquino was
a sitting duck.

  The sniper shots stopped. Aquino was either clear, or dead.

  Eric peeled around the corner of the elevator, beelining for the
stairwell. He stuttered a half-step; the concrete cracked in front of
him. He dove for the handrail, pulling himself down to safety.

  "Drop it." Eric Lockwell felt cold steel pressed against his temple.
His shooting hand went slack; the Glock clattered to the step.

  "You're under arrest for murder," Noel Aquino began.
  "It'll take the shooter about ten seconds to relocate to the other
side of the roof up there," Eric said breathlessly, pointing with his
left hand up the stairwell to the office tower looming beyond. "And
then we're both dead. If you're going to arrest me, I'd prefer it if we
adjourned to the basement first."


  Aquino picked up the man's weapon. "All right, let's go." Noel backed
down the steps like a panther, snapping his head to check over his
shoulder for just an instant while keeping the weapon trained on his
mysterious attacker...

  When he snapped back, the black-clad assassin was standing to one
side, his hand grasped firmly around the barrel of the policeman's 9mm.
In another instant, he'd twisted the gun right out of Noel's hand. In
another instant, Noel's own Nine was pointed at him. Lord, this man was
fast. 

  "My piece, please." 
  Noel remained frozen; he felt the dangling Glock snagged from his
loose grip. "Down the stairs," the assassin ordered. Noel hesitated.
"NOW!"

  Noel's eyes took a moment to adjust to the meager sodium lighting of
the subterranean garage. The dark shape in front of him changed shape
in a way that indicated a weapon was no longer trained. "I'm here to
protect you. Those men were trying to kill you because of your
involvement with Angela Barrett."

  When Noel's eyes had returned to normal, he saw the butt of his
weapon extended toward him. The man held his Glock 20 in his other hand
down at his side.

  Noel slowly took back his piece.

  The defender-assassin's voice took on a calmer tone. "Are you all
right?"
  "Yeah." Noel took a deep breath.
  "Come on. I don't know whether they've been told to pursue or fall
back. We can't stay here."

  Noel followed his suspicious savior across the parking garage to the
corner stairwell, which took them to Brown Street. "My place is across
the street," the man pointed, then proceeded to head up the sidewalk,
away from where he'd just pointed.
  "Where are you going?"
  "The sniper's got a clear shot of the street there. We'll cross a
block down and go around to the back of the hotel."
  "Are you sure they don't know where you're staying?"
  "It doesn't matter. They're no match for me in an enclosed space."
  The certainty with which it was said was chilling.

  They entered the hotel from the service entrance.

  "Come on up. You look like you could use a drink. There's Heineken in
the minibar. Only $9 a can."

  It took him a moment, but Noel recognized the voice. "You're the man
who called the diner. Whose side are you on? Why are you here?"
  "A little birdy told me you were a target."
  "If I'm a target, that means... My son!"
  "He says he's in a safe place."
  "You talked to him?"
  "Online chat. Here." The man tapped at his handheld for a moment,
then handed it to Noel.

  PenMan: HI DAD :-) GLAD UROK
  Noel was at once relieved and perturbed. "I told him not to go
online."
  "If he wasn't online, you wouldn't know he was okay."
  "Look, I know you just saved my life, but who are you?"
  "Eric Lockwell. My old boss put out a hit on you. And killed Gladys
Barrett."
  "Who's your boss?"
  "A real bitch."
  Noel waited to hear more, but Eric wasn't talking. Noel prompted him.
"This is the part where you say, 'I'd tell you, but then I'd have to
kill you,' right?"
  "Something like that. The details don't matter. What matters is that
Angela has what they want, and I can't let her give it to them." 

  "You mean her power. Hers and Black Widow's."
  "Yeah, that." So he knew Angela's secret. "You help her, don't you?"
  "What do you mean?"
  Eric smiled. "Every superhero needs a contact in law enforcement."
  "It's not like that."
  "That's why you helped her break out of jail."
  "I didn't... oh, never mind." Noel gave up protesting.

  "You better go check on your son. He's still a target."
  "I don't understand."
  "Sure you do. Angela and Ricky, they're in love."
  "I wouldn't call it love."
  "But they would. And that's good enough for the people I work for.
Used to work for," Eric hastily corrected. "So keep an eye on your boy.
If you'll excuse me, I've got to go scout the convention center before
they set up, get my sight lines figured."

  "Wait a minute. Two people are dead." At least. "Someone has to
answer for that. Someone has to explain all of this."
  "Agency spin control will figure that out after the fact. They always
do. Don't ask too many questions or you might end up dead." Eric turned
to go.

  "Waitaminute! Let me help. I can get SWAT."
  "If I thought you'd do that, you'd be dead already."
  "Eric, please. With your help we can take these people down."
  "These aren't the kind of people you take down. You have to take them
out."
  "If it comes to that."
  "It's *already* come to that!" Eric was suddenly angry. "Look,
flatfoot, this is serious fucking shit. Angela and Valerie, they're
getting *real* press, not just fantastical tabloid articles. After the
GB's incident, lots of people, *important* people, *powerful* people
are going to start to think the science fiction aspects maybe aren't so
fictional. And they're going to send teams here. Recovery teams.
They'll tear the fucking city apart looking for these two girls, and if
they find them, they'll probably dissect them just to make sure they're
not missing anything. The people I work for -- worked for, fuck! --
they were supposed to destroy the... the things that make Sapphire and
Black Widow able to do the things they do. They're still trying to make
it look like they've completed their mission."

  "Make it look-" Noel trailed off in understanding. "So they can have
the power for themselves."
  "That's right. My only chance to make this right is to take them out
and finish the mission."
  "Destroy the sapphires." 
  Eric raised an eyebrow; so he knew the whole thing. Noel shrugged.
"After helping Angela at the police station, I figured it out." He then
gave the stranger a quizzical look. "So, how were you planning to pull
that off?"
  "I was hoping I could convince Angela to retire."
  "And the Black Widow?"
  "I think once Gerald Bates is dead, she'll fade into obscurity too. I
don't think she wanted all this attention."
  "Bates may already be dead. His limo blew up last night on the way to
the airport."
  Eric raised an eyebrow; there was something about the way the
detective had said 'may.' "You don't think it was Bates."
  "I think Sapphire completed *her* mission. The one your boss gave
her. Recover the stones."
  "Either way works for me."

  Noel was still struggling to put everything together.

  "If Sapphire and the Black Widow just disappear, won't people come
looking for them anyway?"
  "Not if they think the sapphires are destroyed. An explosion in a
remote warehouse with trace amounts of melted sapphire will satisfy
their curiosity. That was the original plan, anyway." That seemed like
a long time ago... "But it has to happen *now*, before too many people
start looking into it too closely. Information Management has to be
able to contain the situation."
  "Information Management."
  "It's another branch of the... company I work for."
  "They handle alien landings too?"
  "Very funny."

  Eric looked Noel straight in the eyes. "Tell me you're not going to
do anything stupid."
  "You can't expect me to just walk away and forget all this. Forget
Angela."
  "No. I expect you to contact Angela and tell her what happened to her
mom. And convince *her* not to do anything stupid. I just want her to
show up, draw them out, and let me handle it."
  "They killed her mom. I think she's gonna want to handle it."
  "Angela's no killer."
  "Family getting killed changes people."
  "All right, you're right, this is a teenage girl we're talking about.
We can't control what she's gonna do. All I can do is be there when
Ginger shows up."
  "Ginger."
  "My boss. And if Angela doesn't kill Ginger, I will."

  Noel thought back to the coordinated attempt on his own life, and the
volume of gunfire at the warehouse where Gladys was killed, and the
rubble that was once the Barrett house. This wasn't a single-shot
proposal; this was a guerilla war. 
  "You're sure you can do that?"
  "I'll drop her like a bag of dirt."

  Noel understood. "You were her assassin."


  "I was a lot of things." Assassin. Courier. Mentor. Lover.
Confidante. Coconspirator. Sucker.
  Eric blinked, returning to the present. "I just need to know you're
not going to interfere."

  "And what happens when these people don't get a hold of my son for
leverage?"

  Eric's face clouded. "Fuck." He let out a sigh. "She'll probably grab
people at random."
  "She-? Oh, your boss."
  "Former boss. She'll use innocent people as hostages, figuring Angela
will cooperate to save them. I'll just have to be quick."
  "Let me help."
  "They'll kill you."
  "I can take care of myself."
  "This is the big leagues."
  "And I'm sworn to serve and protect. It still means something to some
of us on the force."

  Eric gave Noel a wary eye.

  Noel made his case. "I can get access to the surveillance system. You
get me photos of these people, I can spot them for you. Look, the
convention center is huge. People get lost in there all the time. I've
worked security detail there. I know the layout."
  "Can I trust you? We can't have SWAT rappelling down from the
ceiling. If Ginger thinks anyone's on to her, there's no telling what
she'll do."

  "Can you trust me? I should be asking you that question."
  "Look, I'm willing to do whatever it takes. If you're gonna go 'by
the book' on me, I'll kill you."
  "You're just as bad as Ginger."
  "I'm worse. But thanks to Angela I *might* have a conscience. So, can
I trust you?"
  "You can trust me."

  Noel's expression was utterly guileless. Eric's gut told him this was
a man of his word.

  "Good." Eric's shoulders slumped, as if finally succumbing to the
great weight placed upon them. "Because I don't want any more innocent
blood on my hands."

  Noel looked at the floor; his tone was soft. "You really fell for
Angela, didn't you?"
  "So did you."


------------------------------------------------------------------------


  Ricky couldn't believe his dad just left him out in the cold like
that. He hadn't heard anything from this "Scott" person either. He felt
like a fifth wheel. It was torture, knowing that something big was
happening with Sapphire, something that put Angela in danger, and he
was miles away and completely in the dark. And nobody on the board knew
anything either. He just wished there was something he could do.

  When Ricky couldn't do anything else, he drew. Energy flowed through
his hand into the paper before him. Sweeping curves, sharp lines, rapid
shadings. Moving the image from mind's eye to paper did more than just
vent frustrations, it helped him think.

  He'd been drawing Sapphire as Angela for so long, he was having
trouble separating the two. His eraser kept rubbing out the light ovals
and curves that were supposed to represent Angela cowering in the
corner, about to be saved by the mighty Sapphire. He just couldn't see
Angela that way. Helpless. Each time he tried to fill her in she came
out fragile but defiant and unwavering, daring the evil Ginger to do
her worst. After the fourth attempt, he left this stronger
Sapphire-like Angela intact and began filling in the details. Wearing a
simple skirt and a cropped sweater -- not unlike what she'd worn that
first day in his room, actually -- she looked like Sapphire's little
sister. No, twin sister. A pair of strong, beautiful women, allied
against the forces of evil, one bringing to bear all the power the gods
had bestowed upon her, the other relying on sheer grit and
determination and strength of character. Each willing to put herself in
harm's way to help the other.

  It was the first time he'd drawn both of them on the same page. In
the same universe. The juxtapositioning felt wrong. It forced him to
recognize just how strongly he wished the two women could be one and
the same. As if all of his previous work, keeping the two in different
worlds, somehow affected the real world and made it possible that
Angela was Sapphire. As if by making this drawing he'd somehow just now
forced them apart.

  He crumpled the paper and tossed it aside. Before the discarded
drawing hit the floor his pencil had already started another sketch. 

  The exaggerated proportions, impossible poses, and overdramatic
shadings took a break; this was a photograph from the mind's eye. A
beautiful young woman kneeled at the edge of a building, looking off
into the distance with a wary smile. Stray strands of long breezy dark
hair veiled one eye; the other sparkled with dazzling brightness. Short
flowing top, skirt, and sleeves added a contrasting sense of movement
to the stillness of the subject; adornments at wrists and feet lent an
air of authority; the small ornate hairpiece suggested regality.

  Ricky remembered the first time he'd seen Angela, himself a new
freshman, she a junior. She'd been kneeling at the top of the football
grandstands, looking not down on the parking lot behind the field but
out to the horizon, appearing so confident and contemplative and...
mature. He'd thought he'd stumbled upon a heavenly angel just touched
down for a moment of peaceful reflection. He knew not how long he'd
stood there, captured by her simple beauty, in awe of her. Then that
smooth-looking guy had called her down, given her ass a possessive
smack, laughed at her daydreaming, and driven her off to some unknown
adventure in his Mustang. Ricky couldn't have gotten a clearer message
that Angela was out of his league if it had come DTS-encoded on a DVD
via FedEx. At the time the early deflation had kept him from crushing
on her; instead he'd focused on his studies and his hobbies, and two
years later he was near the top of his class and only beginning to
think about girls. 

  But as his hand now worked its magic over pencil, it was obvious that
he'd never forgotten That Look. To recreate it now with only slightly
different circumstances was telling.

  Whether his intent had been to draw Angela in Sapphire garb -- the
real Angela as he saw her, not the stylistically-enhanced
manga/comic-book style of most of his art -- or to bring his
exaggerated Sapphire comic book heroine into the world of the real, the
result was the same.

  Now *that* looked right.

  Angela *was* Sapphire, if only in the world at the end of Ricky's
pencil. At least in that world, Angela would always be all right.


------------------------------------------------------------------------


  There it was again. A soft, metallic knocking.

  Nina crept quietly up to the door. One hand cupped around the
peephole to shield it from the light of the room; the other gently
lifted the piece of electrical tape down over it. Nina peered through.

  A haggard-looking man in a beat-up trenchcoat shivered in front of
her door. Some drugged-out shelter reject, no doubt, confusing her
apartment for that of his junk dealer. She turned away from the door...

  "Miss Nina! I have something for you." 
  What could he possibly have that she'd want?

  "It's from Valerie."
  Nina recalled only too vividly the nightmare that had been Valerie's
last visit. "Go away!"

  "She told me to give it to you if anything ever happened to her."

  Nina felt a chill of dread and loss race through her. Her heart would
not be denied.

  The door flew open. "What happened to Valerie?"
  The man looked down into Nina's eyes. "Bates" was all he said.

  It was all he had to say.

  Despite herself, Nina felt a tear slide down her cheek.

  "I'm sorry," the man said quietly. He held out a thick dirt-smudged
envelope in his hand. "Here."

  The envelope slid between Nina's outstretched fingers. The man turned
stiffly. The young woman's hands trembled with emotion as she broke the
seal. Inside was a stack of hundred-dollar bills wrapped by a note.

  The man's gravelly voice echoed up the hallway. "It's not often we
get a second chance in life," he said. "Don't blow it."

  Nina pulled out the note, leaning forward to catch the sliver of
early daylight creeping up the hall from the foyer.

  My dearest Nina,

  There's a lot I don't know, but I have figured out two things.
  You deserve better than me, and you deserve better than this.

  Go home. Give them another chance. 
  You don't have to understand someone to love them.

  I guess that's three things.

  -Val


  A rain of tears stained the page.


------------------------------------------------------------------------


  Wandering the streets. Time running out. Her objective as simple as
it is hopeless.
  The Black Widow is a ghost. Still, she searches.

  Stilettos stabbing the sidewalk with every step.
  Dark thoughts hammering at her already-withering confidence.

  Her mom held captive by shadowy figures, organized and ruthless.
  Killers on the loose. One with the ability to turn her only strength
against her.
  Her secret identity quickly unraveling.

  Walking past the newsstand. Headlines assault her.

  BLACK WIDOW: UNSTOPPABLE?
  SAPPHIRE STILL AT LARGE
  TWIN TERRORS DESTROY DOWNTOWN

  But one stops her in her tracks.

  LOVERS!

  One word, smeared across the top of the page in bold red ink, above a
shocking photograph of two women locked in a passionate embrace. Black
Widow and Sapphire. One horrifying moment at the restaurant, the moment
of her ignominious surrender, captured in vivid detail for the world to
see.

  A businessman bumps her, turning on his heel to give her a shameless
stare.
  She can't blame him. She's dressed like a tart.

  Someone bumps her from behind. She's thrust forward. Her
scarcely-restrained breasts jiggle. She catches herself, but not before
feeling her strained top suddenly shift. A button bounces down the
sidewalk, rolling to a stop at the leering businessman's feet.

  She has to be dressed this way. Doesn't she?

  She keeps moving. She has to keep moving. She won't catch Black Widow
standing still.

  "Mommy, look! It's her!" She doesn't dare turn to look.
  "Hush! She'll hear you!" a mother scolds.

  More people stop to stare as she walks by. Is it because they
recognize her, or is it just because she's dressed like a whore?

  A window reflection reveals a police cruiser behind her. She begins
to walk more quickly. She's conscious of the way her longer strides
make her body wiggle seductively.

  Another reflection. The cruiser is still there. Following her. 

  She sees herself in the next reflection. The white top and skirt are
almost see-through, and too short to fully cover her charms. She
catches a flash of her panties. The sapphires always seem to make her
flaunt her body.

  She turns the corner. Another police car. It stops. Uniforms get out.
They stare at her.

  She quickly reverses direction, stumbling in her sky-high one-strap
mules. The preposterous footwear seems particularly precarious now. She
wonders if her sapphires are somehow spent. Her heart beats faster. Is
it adrenaline or arousal? Is there a difference anymore?

  Footsteps behind her quicken. They close in. She breaks into a run,
scampering down an alley, barely keeping her feet. Her skirt dances
madly about her hips; her halter top threatens to burst open with every
step.

  She turns another corner only to run headlong into something.
Someone. A man in a trenchcoat. He grabs her arm and wheels her around,
slamming her up against the brick wall.
  Pressing his body up against hers. Pinning her.

  She feels the rough brick wall up against her skin. Another button
pops loose.

  "You're under arrest." He's a police officer.

  Her hands are wrenched up over her head, pressed into the wall. She
leaves them there, afraid to move. A heavy boot kicks her feet apart.

  He begins to frisk her.

  Hands slide up her legs. Legs made taut and sculpted by her tall
heels. 
  She's wearing almost nothing, but her body overrides her protest of
the unnecessary search. Hands run outside over knees, around the thighs.
  Under the skirt.

  A palm runs up her side, flipping and dropping her skirt, fingers
reaching for quivering titflesh. She shudders at the touch.

  He's taking a long time to frisk her.
  And she fights with her body, searching for the will to resist.

  A hand smacks her ass hard; she squeals in surprise. Now it grabs her
asscheek, its kneading motion mimicking its twin's ministrations over
her exposed breast.
  The rough treatment inflames her.

  "That's enough for now."

  Wrists are yanked down one at a time and clipped together behind her.
He hauls her out of the alley, stumbling and swaying and gyrating.
  She crashes against the hot metal of a police cruiser's fender.

  A crowd has gathered.
  "Who is she?"
  "That's Sapphire."
  "Her real name is Angela Barrett."
  "I heard that she wasn't a good crimefighter at all; she could barely
control herself."
  "Half the time the criminals got away by bribing her with sexual
favors."
  "Just look at her; you know it's true."
  "What a slut."

  The rear door of the cruiser opens; she's spun around.

  "Why didn't you tell me?"
  The voice is familiar. She searches the crowd for the source.
  "I could have helped you."
  A young man steps forward. It is Ricky.

  "Oh, Ricky, I'm so sorry..."
  She leans into him, desperate to feel his loving touch, her
lust-addled body rubbing lewdly against him.

  He pulls away. "It's too late now, Angela." 
  Her cheeks burn red with shame; a single tear betrays her sorrow.

  She is pushed backwards, down into the car. Her ass bumps up against
the doorframe; she feels the seat of her filmy panties catch on
something sharp, tearing open and snapping free of her hip. She looks
down in horror; her flounced skirt is scarcely more than a wide ruffled
belt hanging low on her hips. Her bare engorged lips are in full view.

  A patrolman's boot kicks her feet inside the door and slams it shut.
  Faces press up against the windows. Faces of disapproval, horror,
smug satisfaction.

  "We'll take it from here." 
  She looks up to see an evil-looking woman in a tailored black suit
behind the wheel.

  "Indeed we shall." 
  The voice is hot in her ear; she turns to see The Hunter. His wicked
smile at once chills her and stokes the fire of her lust.

  His hand gropes her breast roughly through the straining top, cruelly
pinching a nipple through the worn fabric before tearing it open. She
struggles vainly against her handcuffs, succeeding only in pressing her
swollen mammaries deeper into his grasp.

  She desperately summons the power of her sapphires. They reward her
with a mind-blowing sensation of helpless pleasure. She collapses
against her aggressor, exhausted and exhilerated.

  She feels herself pushed down onto her back, her legs lifted sideways
onto the seat, then rudely parted. She sees the Hunter's eyes flash
with the thrill of her submission. His body presses down upon her, his
turgid staff angling up toward the junction of her thighs...

  She pulls him inside her with hungry desperation.

  He begins pumping in and out of her slick squeezing slit with long
but quickening strokes. She wraps her legs around him, urging him
deeper.

  She lets the Hunter defile her. She wants him to. She needs him to.
She needs him to cum inside her. She needs to cum.

  The Hunter's head is down now, focused resolutely on drilling his
helpless sapphire slut. Her nails dig into his strong back, holding on
for dear life, praying for sweet release.

  "You're mine now."
  She looks up, over the seat to the woman driving. The driver looks
back at her. She notices the woman's blue eyes begin to glow, brighter
and brighter. 

  They aren't eyes at all. They're sapphires, glowing brilling
blue-white light. The woman laughs maniacally as Angela reaches her
final humiliating orgasm, screaming in mindless terror and delight.


  Angela awoke to the sound of her own scream. Her whole body shuddered
in panicked revulsion as the nightmare orgasm ebbed. Her eyes opened
hesitantly, afraid that she would see her nightmare real.

  Morning sunlight streaked from a window across the floor. She was in
a strange room. What was she doing here?

  Her memory caught up with her. She bolted up off the couch, nearly
tripping over the fallen garment around her legs; she kicked the
obstruction free, heading unsteadily for the kitchen.

  There on the table was the phone. The phone that they'd given her.
Whoever they were. They had her mom, and they wanted the stones; that's
all that mattered now.

  And she was no closer to finding the Black Widow. Or freeing her mom.
Or ending this nightmare.

  She picked up the phone. Underneath was a note.

  Something came up -- another fallen angel in a bit of a jam. I should
be back in the morning. Stay as long as you like. There's some food in
the fridge, a towel on the sink, some clothes hanging on the back of
the door.

  --Faith

  She didn't have time for that. She struggled to remember Mr. Aquino's
number. Finally, phone shaking in her delicate hands, she dialed.

  "Detective Aquino speaking."
  "Did you find her? Did you find my mom?"
  "Angela, thank God it's you. Listen to me. You can't give Ginger the
stones. She's an evil woman. She'll use them to do terrible things.
Your sapphires will be used to kill innocent people. You can't give
them up, not for anything." Noel delayed the inevitable.
  "But my mom..."
  "Oh God, Angela, honey, your mom, she found out. She found out about
you and all of the good things you did with your gift, and she found
out that these bad people wanted to take that away from you, and wanted
to hurt lots of people, and hurt you, and... well, your mom couldn't
let them do that, she couldn't let them hurt her baby, so she..."
  "Mr. Aquino, what are you saying? What happened to my mom?"
  "She was so proud of you and she wanted you to do the right thing,
and she didn't want you or anybody else hurt because of her, so she...
she fought back, she was strong, just like her daughter, just like you,
and she tried to get away, but... but they tried to stop her, and they
shot her, and she... she didn't make it."

  Angela felt faint; she grabbed the edge of the table for support.
This couldn't be happening. "No," she choked. She suddenly had no
breath. Her eyes blurred with tears. The voice on the other end seemed
to retreat into the distance.

  "I'm sorry, honey, there was nothing we could do, but... She didn't
let them win. And you can't let them win. She said 'Angela can't give
up.' She said that. You have to be strong, Angela, like your mother.
Can you do that? Angela? Angela? Are you there? Talk to me Angela."

  The phone slipped free of the young woman's fingers. It seemed an
eternity later that it crashed to the floor, cheap plastic shattering,
buttons bouncing outward like rebound from a raindrop.

  Angela screamed.

  "Nnnoooo!! No no no! You killed her! She's dead and you killed her!
Why? Why?" She turned, running blindly to the couch, hands clawing
underneath, digging to find the source of her anguish. The tiara slid
across the room, careening off the baseboard and skidding toward the
door. Talon-like fingers gripped shoes and wristbands, hurling them
across the room in a fit of grievous rage. "I hate you I hate you I
hate you!" The sapphires' impact strobed the room blue.

  The destroyed girl threw herself against the couch, kicking and
swinging in tortured useless defiance and despair. "Why?" 

  There was no one to answer but herself. 
  No one to blame but herself. 

  Angry screams weakened in the face of overwhelming self-loathing
regret. "I hate you I hate you I hate you." The chant became a
desperate plea for relief from crushing sorrow, but none would come.
Violent thrashing became feeble tremors. 

  "I hate you I hate you I hate you I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry mom I
need you I miss you I love you mommy I'm sorry I'm sorry..."

  Words faded to quiet sobs.




__________________________________
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-- 
Pursuant to the Berne Convention, this work is copyright with all rights
reserved by its author unless explicitly indicated.
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