Bloody Heretic by Emily Barker Read Free Book Online

against the wall of the booth.
        “ What ’ s wrong, mate ?” Adam asked.
        “ I feel old,” Dom answered truthfully.
        Adam scoffed . “ Well, if you ’ re old then what am I?” He asked.
        “ Decrepit,” Ethan said. Adam flipped him off still looking at Dom.
        “ How can you feel old already? You ’ re what? Three hundred? Three fifty?”
        “ Three hundred and eighty-eight this fall,” he answered blandly. The re was a blur of pink spinning across the dance floor and he was bound and determined to stop watching it before it materialized into Jeanne.
        “ So almost four hundred. That ’ s still young.”
        “ Young-ish,” Ethan added.
        “ Young-ish,” Adam agreed, “ Too young to look so melancholy. ”
        “ I ’ m not melancholy. I ’ m tired. I feel more obsolete with each passing decade, and it ’ s not just technology. It ’ s with people. I don ’ t understand this,” he motioned to the mass of sweating bodies.
        “ God, man,” Ethan w hispered, “ You can ’ t be talking about Breaking already.” He looked horrified at Dom.
        “ Is Breaking finally fee ling like an old man? Hating every new thing around you and wishing for the good old days?” He asked, looking at Adam.
        “ I don ’ t know why y ou ’ re asking me,” he said. Dom rolled his eyes at the deflection.
        “ Hold that thought,” Ethan said, getting up. They watched as he marched away, getting swallowed up by the crowd. Adam looked at Dom, and he shrugged. Dom scanned the crowd looking for E than over the heads of the dancers. A full minute passed before he came back, brushing blood off the knuckle of his right hand.
        “ Sorry about that,” he apologized.
        “ You didn ’ t kill the bloke, did you?” Adam asked.
        “ Of course not. He ’ s not goin g to be happy about what I did to his nose, but otherwise everything is fine.” He looked back out at the crowd smiling.
        “ Is Victoria with her?” Adam asked, going to stand up. Ethan grabbed his arm and pulled him back down.
        “ Yes, you ’ ll be happy to know I saved her the trouble of clocking the grabby bastard.”
        “ Where ’ s Jeanne?” Dom asked.
        “ Not with th em. I assume she ’ s finding her own brand of fun already,” Ethan said. Dom realized he had barely registered the girls in the cages above them. His preoccupation with spotting Jeanne had distracted him from the mission. Once again Jeanne was doing his job and doing it better. He glanced up again at the metal contraptions that he ld the dancing girls above the dance floor. No wonder they were having a hard time identifying the girls. They were so caked in makeup and glitter he doubted their own mothers would recognize them.
        “ What were we talking about? Oh, yeah. Dom is going shit house,” Ethan smiled evilly
        “ I am not. Aren ’ t you guys tired o f working all the time? This case especially,” Dom said.
        “ If you are finally reali zing that you work too hard, the n there is a God.
        “ Amen,” Ethan agreed. Dom took a deep breath, and released it slowly.
        “ I know I work too much,” he said. He gla nced around casually, noting the armed guard hovering twenty feet away. Switching to Archaic French he tried to explain his frustrations. “ But aren ’ t you both tired of there never being one clear and present enemy? It ’ s always some shadowy organization or crack pot radical we have to clean up after. For once I ’ d like there to be someone standing in front of me, one enemy, with one goal. No fucking henchmen, no fucking loose ends. It ’ s never ending. Once we finish up here it ’ s going to be heading to Asia to do it all over again. I ’ m sick of it.” He stopped ranting when he realized the guys were staring, aghast.
        “ You knew what you were in for when we got on the plane for