Girl From Above #3: Trapped Read Online Free

dignity. “C’mon, you fake freak. I’m ready to die. Are you?”
    He stepped toward me and I bolted for the door. I managed to get halfway down the hallway before he slammed me against the wall from behind. I went down hard, sprawling face first, and then stilled as he leaned a knee into my back. The punch to the kidneys almost tore my consciousness away. A shock of cold sweat followed hot nausea. If I threw up and blacked out, there was every chance I’d die right here.
    “Where is she?”
    “Yah know …” I coughed and spat blood on the polished marble floor. “I’ve always wondered: Can synthetics even get it up—”
    “Is One Thousand And One worth more to you than your life?”
    “That’s a very astute question.”
    “Halt! Police! Refrain and desist immediately!”
    Thank fuck for that. I blinked through the haze of pain and sickness to find the hallway choked with Lyra cops, all armed with pulsers. I’d been on the pronged end of those weapons on a few occasions, and every time I’d vowed never again. The electrical pulses would make a synthetic think twice.
    The pressure of the synth’s knee lifted off my back, allowing me to breathe around bruised ribs.
    “Face the wall, sir.”
    The cops ventured closer. I stayed down as I watched the synth calmly oblige. His cooperation didn’t last. He broke into a run and burst through the line of cops at the far end of the hallway. They fired their pulsers, but the synth was fast—faster than they’d expected. Some chased after him. After that, I didn’t much care. He was away from me, and by some fucking miracle, I was still breathing.
    “We’ve got a body,” came a shout from my hotel room.
    I closed my eyes, willing unconsciousness to scoop me up and carry me away. It didn’t, which was fucking typical. So I suffered through physical agony as I waited for the EMTs to arrive. As for the emotional shit, I didn’t let it touch me. Not yet. First, I had to get the fuck off Lyra so I could take a timeout and think my way out of this mess.
    Jesse … Goddammit. I’d kill that synthetic bastard and make him realize there wouldn’t be a life-ever-after for him.

Chapter Two: #1001
    “ I t’s been too long ,” Commander Brendan Shepperd said, pacing the few short strides from one side of the cargo hold to the other. The sound of his boots on the grating echoed through the empty space.
    I’d returned to the late hours of yesterday evening with the credits I’d won, expecting to find Captain Shepperd inside. He’d been at the last table, watching me like the rest of the crowd, but he hadn’t made our scheduled meeting and had yet to return to Starscream . With every Lyra hour and every one of his strides, the commander’s anxiety levels spiked, and as if by proxy, so did mine.
    “He said to leave if one of us didn’t make it back.”
    The commander stopped dead. “Are you prepared to leave my brother here?”
    “It was an order,” I replied.
    He made anoise like a frustrated growl. “You know, better than most, that some orders are meant to be disobeyed.”
    Brendan loved his brother. He may not have acted like it whenever they were in the same room together, but it was there, in his tight pacing and quick glances at the exit door. They rarely spoke except to bicker, but apparently, that was normal behavior for the Shepperd brothers.
    “I got something,” James announced as he entered the hold via the internal door. He handed me a newspad.
    One man was arrested and another is still at large after a body was discovered at the Sharline Hotel yesterday evening. The deceased is believed to be a female escort with links to local property and business owner, Bruno Divalsh. The names of the victim and assumed perpetrator are not being released at this time. Reports cannot confirm or deny whether the man in custody has been charged with murder. Lyra Police have asked for anyone who may have overheard an altercation at the hotel to come