Framing felipe, p.22
Framing Felipe, page 22
“About what?”
She shook her head. “Better you not know. Don’t worry about him. He’s got a plan. He
didn’t tell me what, but I sensed he has one. He’ll fix it for all of us…if he survives.”
He grasped her shoulders and bent so his eyes were on the level of hers. “I will find
him, and I will find him alive and well. You tell el negrero that if he asks you.”
“Felipe, please, I don’t want it to happen again. Not like—”
The sound of Sarah’s primal grunt followed by the cracking sound of breaking bones
punctuated the Gypsy’s warning.
FRAMING FELIPE – 146 – Holley Trent
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Sarah didn’t hear the burly man creep up. Recognition dawned on her as he
maneuvered through the shrubbery. It was that circus hand she’d seen the night she’d
visited Fabian.
“You look better without the get-‐up,” he said, pausing briefly to shift the heavy box he
toted to his other shoulder.
She shifted her weight and slowly inched her fingers toward her waistband. “I guess I
won’t wear that disguise again.”
“It wasn’t your face, princess. It was your boots.”
Shit. Sarah stole a peek down at the rugged things and swore again. They were men’s
boots bought in a woman’s size. Comfortable. She wore them ten months out of the year.
They always made the rare kick to a guy’s head feel that much more satisfying.
“Not that your face isn’t nice in all of its forms. I remember those eyes now.”
“What?”
“No offense, lady, but I’m starting to think you’re up to no good. Wrong place at the
wrong time just doesn’t happen that much.”
“No offense taken, because I’m damn sure you’re not up to anything good.”
Her right hand was wrapped around her Glock’s handle, but she didn’t draw it just yet.
Her silencer hadn’t been packed in that big bag of goodies they brought, and she didn’t
want to send the cavalry running in her direction for something she could handle quietly.
She was surprised no one had reacted to the sound of the bears, who hadn’t yet made it out.
But maybe that sort of noise was typical in RV Land.
Damned shame. She wished they could free them all—everyone who’d been taken
against their wills and pressed into this sick workforce, but they didn’t have that kind of
manpower with them. They’d gone in to rescue one man, and maybe the local shifters—not
the entire circus. For all she knew, maybe some of those folks actually wanted to be there,
though she couldn’t imagine why. Constant transience? Having no family? No home? She
willed herself not to look toward the shadowy spot where Felipe was gesticulating madly at
the old woman. Didn’t want to give him away to the man with the box.
FRAMING FELIPE – 147 – Holley Trent
“What are you, police? You keep turnin’ up in our business. Well let me tell you
something. We haven’t done anything wrong,” the man said, now setting the box down. He
rolled up his sleeves, and Sarah didn’t like the looks of it. It was aggressive posturing, and if
he thought she was going to back off just because he showed a little bulk—a little muscle—
he had another thing coming. Small and powerful, just like a nine-‐volt battery. If he pressed
her, he’d get a shock.
“I guess I’m sort of like the police, in a way.” She stood, slowly, and kept her gun’s
barrel pointed toward the ground. “But I don’t wear a badge and I’m not going to cuff you
or take you to jail.”
His features folded into crinkles as he scrunched his face with confusion. “Huh?”
“Come, now. You know as well as I do that this community is self-‐policing.” She slipped
her gun into its holster and rolled up her sleeves, too, smiling at him. No magic involved.
She didn’t want to make him comfortable. Didn’t want to make him talk. For once, she
wanted confrontation because there wasn’t a damn thing he could tell her she didn’t
already know.
“This community? What are you, besides a whore? Wolf? Bear?” He dropped the box
and lurched for her.
Whore? She dodged him easily, being smaller and far more nimble, and as he rounded,
preparing to swing again, she said, “I’m no one’s whore. If you want a label for me, how
about Shrew?” This time when she targeted her punch, she didn’t put emotion into it. This
time it was powered by pure physicality. It was the punch she perfected on the bag at the
office. It wasn’t an impulsive thing that stemmed from hurt feelings. This punch, even with
her weaker left hand, was a trained weapon, meant to cause destruction.
A loud crunch sounded as her fist cracked bone for the second time in a day, and before
the pain could register in her fingers, he fell hard to his knees, groaning. “Bitch.”
That punch should have knocked him out cold. The fact it hadn’t meant…
“Sarah!” Felipe shouted from the shadows. He was there, then he disappeared into the
air, likely coming to her aid.
The big man scrambled to his feet, and as he moved, his skin rippled over his bones and
every part of him suddenly seemed bigger. More dangerous. His fists reshaped into clubs.
FRAMING FELIPE – 148 – Holley Trent
His teeth elongated, and capped with deadly points. A long tail tipped with razor-‐like
protrusions coiled around him. “We’ll take you next,” he rasped. “Shrew. Whore. Whatever.”
“Go ahead and fucking try,” she said, grabbing her knife’s handle and crouching into a
defensive stance. She let her eyes flit away from the Visa for just a moment, trying to spot
evidence of Felipe in the fray, but there was no hint of him.
Don’t step on my toes, Felipe.
The Gypsy’s little dog barked madly and hopped at her feet, straining against its leash
to run toward…Sarah? The Visa? Sarah couldn’t tell, and didn’t care.
Another loud roar echoed into the night, followed by the creak of a metal door being
forced open, and then Sarah knew in her gut. The bears were out.
Focus.
She turned her attention back to the Visa right as one of his heavy club appendages
arced toward her face. She fell into a backward roll to dodge it, immediately sweeping her
leg out toward his, hoping to knock him off his feet. The kick was unproductive. In his
current form, he was just too solid. Too heavy. It didn’t matter how much torque she had
and how good her angle of attack was.
While he paused there, likely planning his next move, she sliced her knife as close to
him as she could get without coming too near one of his massive arms or the tail he’d just
deployed. He whipped it around like a cat-‐o’-‐nine-‐tails.
She leapt over it as if it were a very deadly jump rope, and had a revelation. He couldn’t
control all those appendages at once. He was making shit up as he went along, morphing
into whatever he thought would hurt her most. He didn’t have practice in that form. He
couldn’t use arms, legs, tail, and brain all at once. He wasn’t a fighter. Not even a thinker, for
that matter. He was just a circus hand on a power trip.
Keeping her eyes on his dark, narrowed stare, she took an educated guess of its
whereabouts, then and dropped her knife point-‐down on his tail.
He bellowed as the sharpened Ka-‐Bar pierced his flesh, and the tail, pinned to the
grassy ground, writhed as he tried to constrict it—draw it back into his body.
“Nice try, sucker,” she said, drawing her gun. “Let’s all chill the hell out, and I’ll
demonstrate just how nice we Shrews are. I don’t really want to get blood on these jeans.
They cost me a hundred bucks and my boyfriend likes them.”
FRAMING FELIPE – 149 – Holley Trent
He didn’t think it was funny. He bent to reach for the knife, but Sarah forced her knee
up to his chin. Another satisfying crack.
“Hey, hey. I’m on a roll today.”
That sent him toppling backward and blowing out blood through his lips, but still, he
retained his consciousness.
Sarah reached in quick and grabbed her knife, sighing. “Why don’t you just take a little
nap, big guy? And when you wake up, we’ll be gone.”
“No way,” he said, spitting more blood on the ground, and transforming again. He got
rid of the tail, and he shrank smaller, and smaller, until there was a man—a man she’d
hoped she’d never see again—standing in front of her. Smirking.
Her ire mounted, teeth ground, and on reflex she drew her gun and fired a shot into his
shoulder.
He stumbled backward, slapping a hand over the bleeding wound, and grinned. “Oh, it
hurts so nice,” he said in that sinuous voice he’d cooed into the microphone at the strip club
so many times.
She fired again, this time into the other shoulder.
He laughed before he fell to his knees. “What, you really thought we only handle
weirdos? No, human flesh is pretty fun to trade in, too. I liked that gig. That was a reward
for me from Jacques. Gave me something of my own to run, and you had a part in fucking it
up, right? Makes sense now, why the FBI didn’t haul your ass off with the rest of ’em.”
“How would you know? The moment they stormed in, your cowardly ass disappeared.
You shifted, didn’t you? So they didn’t spot you?”
Oh, he deserves killin’.
But, it wouldn’t be at her hands. It wasn’t just the Shrew code of ethics, but her own
personal one as well. Only kill in self-‐defense. He hadn’t pushed her there yet.
She aimed her barrel at his left kneecap, and squeezed her index finger on the trigger,
but didn’t pull just yet. Shoulders were one thing. Visa or not, knees would put this guy out
of commission for a long while. If he was going to spend the rest of his life locked up
somewhere, she wanted it to be with him standing on his own two feet, and not being
pushed around in a wheelchair…like that one girl he’d pushed down the stairs at the club.
The one who wasn’t earning enough tips.
FRAMING FELIPE – 150 – Holley Trent
“You’re a despicable human being,” she spat, taking several large steps back to quell
her impulse to push him again. Kick him again—anything to cause him white-‐hot pain, at
least for the moment.
There was a third roar, and this time it was close. Sarah turned her head to find two
large bears hurtling toward her with the familiar big cat at their heels.
Why were they running toward her instead of the alley? That became clear when the
smaller of the bears leapt at the Visa, sinking its teeth into his throat and dragging him to
the ground.
Now he screamed, successfully frightened by the bear in a way Sarah hadn’t managed,
and he tried to shift—to gain some advantage. However, he seemed to have lost too much
blood and couldn’t manage it. Sarah was content to let the bear have its way. It’d save her
some work and a lot of guilt, but his saving grace came in the form of a were-‐mountain lion
knocking the bear off.
Patrick swatted the bear with one heavy paw, and pushed the bear with his forehead
toward the alley. The bear roared with indignation, but went, and the larger bear waited.
“No!” the Visa shouted, scrambling to his feet. “Not her! That one’s mine!”
Just enough stupidity for the larger bear—the male bear, Sarah determined—to stand
on his hind legs and come down on the Visa with all his weight.
With the Visa pinned to the ground, crying out in pain, Jacques’ camper door swung
outward and the ringmaster darkened the opening, holding a semi-‐automatic gun.
Mr. Tolvaj appeared, ashen-‐faced behind him, and there was Dana, creeping around the
camper from the back with her own gun drawn.
Jacques fired off a shot at the bear before anyone else could react. He missed, but it was
close enough to light a fire in the bear’s ass.
He let the Visa up, and looked to Sarah with a stare too intelligent for an animal. She
bobbed her head toward the alley. “Get the hell out of here. Get your revenge later. It’s my
turn now.”
And he ran, shifting back into human form as he went so Sarah could see his black hair
and tan backside as he disappeared around the corner.
Bryan. Some of Gene’s muscle. She hoped Bryan remembered who his rescuers were
when he got back to Swain County.
FRAMING FELIPE – 151 – Holley Trent
Now Sarah, with one eye on the supine Visa, and the other at the camper door, waited
for an opportunity. Where was Felipe? She noticed the little dog had gone quiet, and the
Gypsy cowered in the shadows, afraid to move. Was he there? She hoped so for his sake.
He’d be less likely to catch a stray bullet there.
“Drop your fucking gun,” Dana shouted at Jacques.
He startled, finally noticing her standing there, but didn’t do as she said. In fact, he
laughed. “Right! You think this is it?” He put two fingers in his mouth in the way Dana so
often did, and blew out a loud, shrill whistle.
Doors slammed, and four more men filled into the open central area surrounded by the
rows of trailers and campers. They mobilized, silently assessing the dangerous elements,
though incorrectly in one case. They had Sarah pinned, but not Dana. They must have
assumed Mr. Tolvaj was watching her.
“Drop your weapons,” a blond man, whom Sarah could now easily peg as a Visa, said as
they crowded her.
“Sure thing.”
She bent, winking as she knelt, knowing Dana with her enhanced vision could see it.
Instead of setting down her gun, she drew her other one too, and fired a shot into the two
Visas obscured from Dana’s view. Almost simultaneously, Dana neatly tagged the third in
the knee, being nowhere near as kind as her employee. Before Dana could pick off number
four, number four drew his own gun and pointed it at Sarah.
From there, things happened in a blur. Jacques targeted Dana, who dodged around the
corner of his camper before he could pull his trigger. Mr. Tolvaj delivered a stunning blow
to Jacques’ nose the moment he fired, and a Sarah saw the shadow looming behind her.
She’d taken her eye from the strip club Visa and hadn’t noticed him scrambling to his
feet.
Should have minced his fucking knees when I had the chance.
She turned just in time to see him kicking the now-‐open box away. From it, he’d taken a
large, full syringe, which he aimed it at her.
Damn. She knew instinctively what was in that syringe. It was filled with the same shit
he’d pumped into so many non-‐compliant strippers.
FRAMING FELIPE – 152 – Holley Trent
“No!” Mr. Tolvaj yelled. He ran down the stairs with his hands held up in a peacemaking
