FORSAKEN: THE SYSTEMIC SERIES by K.W. CALLAHAN Read Free Book Online

“How was the trip down south?”
    “Okay,” he said.  “Ran into some tough guys outside Jacksonville, but we took care of them.  Other than that, everything was cool.”
    “You get the information I asked for?” Ava said.
    “We got it,” the blonde man nodded.  “How’d you know those guys would be down there?” he tilted his head, giving her a quizzical look.
    “Call it my female intuition,” Ava said.  “They were pretty badass back in the day, so I figured the flu – if they lived through it – would have them thriving after it passed.”
    “Yeah, they seemed to be set up pretty good.  Here,” he handed her an envelope.  “We wrote down everything you wanted in there.”
    She took the envelope and handed him a half-full baggy of white powder in exchange. 
    “We all good?” the man grinned at her.
    “Yeah,” she nodded back. “We’re all good.”
    “You want to stay and party with us?” he asked, looking her up and down as he handed the bag over to his buddy who immediately moved to a nearby table, sprinkled some of it out, tasted it, and then divided it into neat, thin, three-inch-long lines.
    “I’ve got a little extra time to kill.  Why not?” she shrugged out of her jacket.
    “Holy shit,” the blonde guy said, staring wide-eyed at the weapons strapped to Ava’s chest.
    “Come prepared or not at all is what I always say,” smiled Ava.
    “ I guess ,” he said.
    Ava ditched the jacket, but not the guns.  She walked over to the table. 
    “Ladies first,” the handsome blonde gestured to the lines of cocaine laid out on the table. 
    Ava knelt, sniffing a white line up her nose.  At the end of it, she twitched, shook her head, and wiped her nose with the back of her hand.  “ Damn that’s good shit,” she said. 
    The two men giggled goofily and then eagerly followed suit.
    “Time for some tunes!” said the blonde, sauntering over to a stereo and flipping it on.
    Soon all three were naked together on the sofa.  Ava let each of the men take his turn with her, then both at the same time.  Being with them made her remember how nice it was to be with men who focused on her rather than solely upon themselves during sex.  She had to admit, it’d been such a long time that she’d nearly forgotten what it was like to truly feel pleasure.  She was so used to concentrating on the needs of the other party that she had to remind herself to relax a little bit, sit back, and enjoy the ride.
    After they were done, Ava got dressed while the two men lounged in sex and drug-induced ecstasy.  They looked half dead.  Ava felt alive, invigorated.  As she pulled on her pants and laced up her boots again, she looked over at them, “Thanks boys.  Stick around; I might need your services again.” 
    And with that she left.
    The two men looked at one another, unsure when Ava said “services” exactly what she meant.  Either way, they were fine with it.
    * * *
    Back at the pump station later that afternoon, after Jake and the boys had returned from their raid and stashed their accumulated loot, the men gradually filtered upstairs to the building’s makeshift lounge.
    “Hang tight before you start celebrating,” Jake told the men who had already selected their choice bottles of booze for the evening’s consumption.  “We need to go over some stuff.”
    While the men sat, booze in hand, impatiently awaiting their leader’s speech, Ava spent five minutes reviewing their next move with Jake in private before they rejoined the men.
    Jake of course started the meeting, talking big and taking all the credit for Ava’s ideas.  Then he turned it over to Ava to handle the specifics.  This had become their usual routine, mainly because Jake either didn’t know or couldn’t remember all the details and intricacies of the plans.  But Jake didn’t care since he figured his men didn’t know any different.  They thought he was calling all the shots, and that’s all that