Deadly Desire (Riley Jenson Guardian 7)

"Sal," I said when she answered. "I need a safe house for a street kid. Nothing fancy, because he may well end up stripping the joint of anything valuable."

"Then why the hell are we bothering to protect him?"

"That's what I like about you, Sal. You're such a sweetheart." Although she probably would have been, if it had been a dog I'd been wanting to protect.

She snorted softly. "And you are a bitch. I'll send an address to your onboard. You going to be there to meet the team?"

"Ta. And no." I glanced at my watch. I was already ten minutes late for my meal with Ben and I still had to get the kid to the safe house. "And I'll need a magi team at my current location. I had to laser a zombie to stop him getting the kid, but the witch may be able to revive him with magic."

"Half a zombie isn't much good to anyone."

"When there's magic involved, I'm not taking a chance."

She grunted. "I'll send Marg and her team."

"Thanks, Sal." I pocketed my phone and walked on through the warehouse. Joe was still hiding in the shadows of the large bin that seemed to be leaking an oily liquid everywhere. The zombie lay near his feet, lifeless but maybe not entirely dead. We wouldn't know for sure until the magi got here to take care of him.

Joe rose as I approached, and his relief was evident.

"You got her?" he asked, wiping oil-stained hands across his already grubby jeans.

"No, she escaped." I stopped and crossed my arms. "You want to tell me why she was chasing you?"

"I don't know." His gaze suddenly wouldn't meet mine as he brushed sweaty strands of hair away from his forehead.

"Fine," I said, and turned on my heels and walked away.

"Hey," he said, voice confused. "Where you going?"

"If you can't be bothered telling me the truth, I can't be bothered helping you."

"But she'll come after me again!"

"That's your problem, not mine."

"Wait!"

I didn't. There was a pause, then footsteps as he ran after me. "Okay, okay," he said. "I think I might have called her."

I stopped and turned to look at him. Fear and defiance mingled in his eyes. "You called her?"

"Yeah. The first woman gave Kaz a business card, just in case something happened and she wasn't able to do the job."

"And you stole the card?"

He looked indignant, but the quick flick of guilt in his eyes suggested I wasn't far off the mark. It seemed the old adage of honor among thieves didn't always apply around street kids. "No. Or at least, only once she'd done the job. Thought it might be handy to keep if the job turned out to be real and Kaz made a lot of money."

Which she probably did, but she didn't live long enough to spend it. "So, after our little chat, you decided to ring the woman and tell her what, exactly?"

Again defiance sparked in his eyes. "That I'd seen her, like, and I wanted money or I'd go to the cops."

"And did Mike know about this phone call?"

He snorted. "No. He would have asked for his cut, wouldn't he?"

"He saved your life by calling me, Joe. Next time, take that into consideration when you're thinking about cheating him."

"It ain't cheating-"