Semi-Human (Harper Hall Investigations Book 2) (13 page)

Shit. Harper wasn’t going to like that.

The look she shot Romeo was incredulous and furious and threatening all in one. He’d never met anyone in his life who could pull off a look like that.

God, she was amazing.

“No rules at all?” she said in a low, controlled voice that—Riddick knew—meant she was barely keeping her temper in check. “So, kicks to the groin and biting and breaking bones…that would all be legal?”

Romeo nodded. “Encouraged even.”

Harper shook her head, mumbling something he didn’t quite catch under her breath as she typed out another text.

“No way for anyone to get weapons in?” he asked Romeo.

He shook his head. “You’ll be scanned before you go in. The crowd is checked, too. Someone once snuck in a shiv that wasn’t made of metal, but they made an example out of that guy. It won’t happen again.”

Harper looked up from the phone. “Did they make an example out of him before or after he killed his opponent with that shiv?”

Romeo averted his eyes and went back to taping Riddick’s hand, his silence answering Harper’s question better than words could.

“That’s just great,” she grumbled. “I swear to God, Romeo, if we all live through this, I will make it my life’s mission to fuck with every little bit of your life and ensure you never know a moment of peace. Mark my words, dickhead. You will suffer.”

The phone beeped, indicating an incoming text. She glanced down at the phone and smiled an evil smile that reminded Riddick of the Grinch cartoon Harper made him watch at Christmas. “And let the suffering begin,” she said.

She tossed the phone to Romeo who caught it, glancing at the screen. He tipped the screen upside down, looking confused. “What is this?”

“That’s my cousin. She always had a crush on you, so I texted her and told her you were single. That photo is her reply.”

He still looked confused. “So, what is this supposed to…”

Suddenly, absolute horror dawned on his expression, and he dropped the phone with a screech, sounding like a little girl who’d just seen a big hairy spider.

“Looks like she bought a thong,” Harper said matter-of-factly. “She’s real flexible now that she’s been doing yoga twice a week.”

Romeo pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes. “Sweet Christ, I need to bleach my brain.”

And with that, he turned on his heel and left the locker room.

“Your cousin sent him a nearly naked picture of herself?” Riddick asked.

“Yep.”

“Which cousin?”

“The smoker with the skin like a handbag. The one you call Skeletor. The one that groped your ass at the last family dinner.”

He grinned. “Nice.”

She smirked. “I thought so. Tomorrow I sign him up for free samples of every erectile dysfunction drug and adult diaper I can find.”

“Remind me never to get on your bad side.”

“I wish I could do more, but petty torments are really all I have for him right now.” Her smile faded as she shifted so that she was sitting on his lap. She wrapped her arms around his neck and rested her forehead on his. “Promise me you’re going to be fine,” she said quietly.

“I promise,” he answered instantly.

Which would be great, except both of them knew damn good and well he could promise her no such thing.

The Arena itself appeared to be built by the same crew who recreated the Coliseum for the movie
Gladiator
. The space was huge and open with a sand and dirt floor. There were enough harsh fluorescent lights overhead that Harper was pretty sure she’d get a tan if the fight lasted the full ten minutes.

The seating was stadium-style, with each chair upholstered with lush red velvet. The fight floor was surrounded by a tall cement wall that was splattered with blood and various other… fluids.

Harper tried not to dwell on those walls as she and Romeo found their way to their seats in owners’ row, right up front.

She glanced across the pit and caught Archer’s eye. He gave her a mock salute and raised a cup of blood to her. She gave him a curt nod and purposefully turned her gaze into the crowd.

“Why is Archer’s body guard giving you the stink eye?” Romeo asked.

She glanced back over toward Archer and saw that indeed, Sparky the vampire was glaring rather sternly in her direction. She shrugged. “He’s just pissed because I stole his sword.”

“Okay, Riddick told me you’d disarmed the guy, but why the hell would you steal his sword?”

“I like it. I’ve named it Katy Perry.”

Romeo blinked. “Dare I ask why?”

“Because it’s very pretty, yet deadly.”

“Katy Perry is deadly?”

Harper nodded. “Her music makes
me
want to kill myself.” At his blank stare, she asked, “What? That’s just me?”

He shook his head and patted her knee fondly. “Yep, darlin’. That’s definitely just you.”

Harper shifted her attention to the crowd. The fight fans were a surprisingly diverse group of humans, vampires, and shifters. Every color of the ethnic rainbow was represented.

“It’s like a freakin’ Benetton ad in here,” she grumbled.

“Fighting is the universal language,” Romeo responded with a grim smile.

She’d always heard that
love
was the universal language, but judging by the crowds packing the stands, Romeo could be right.

There was
one
thing the UN ad of a crowd had in common, Harper noticed.

Money.

The whole place was full of Rolex-wearing, Republican-looking, luxury-car-driving, trophy-wife-having,
Lifestyles-of- the-Rich-and-Famous
types. She’d be willing to bet this particular audience could probably cover the national debt with pocket change they found in their collective couch cushions.

Most of them were sitting in their seats with little opera glasses, wearing their finest attire, looking like they were at
Madame Butterfly
, or some shit. All giddy at the thought of witnessing bloodshed and (fingers crossed) death.

Harper hated every last one of them.

Romeo nudged her with his elbow. “There’s our boy.”

Harper sucked in a sharp breath as the gate at the opposite end of the Arena was lifted and Riddick stepped out.

Her stomach flip-flopped as he moved to the center of the fighting pit with his usual predatory grace, eyes shifting over the crowd restlessly.

But then he saw her and their gazes locked. She leaned forward, hands clenched together so tight that her knuckles ached. Was he having second thoughts about this? Maybe Hunter’s meditation techniques, which she’d taught him earlier that day, weren’t working and he was afraid he’d lose control during the fight. Should they just try to make a run for it? Shit, what if-

Then, he somehow managed to smile up at her with his eyes, even though he didn’t move a single muscle in his face.

She released her breath. He was fine. His blood pressure probably hadn’t even gone up. Unlike hers, which seemed to be jamming to a punk rock concert only it could hear.

Suddenly, from the other end of the Arena, a gate opened and a burst of smoke machine fog puffed out, preceding the most flamboyant fighter Harper had seen since Apollo Creed strutted out to fight the huge Russian in
Rocky IV
.

He looked to be about Riddick’s height and weight, but was Riddick’s polar opposite in every other way. He had carrot-orange hair and milk-white skin dotted with so many freckles he looked like he’d been splattered with beige paint.

And while Riddick wore a beat-up gray t-shirt, faded, broken-down jeans, and his black shit-kicking boots, this joker wore what appeared to be Daniel-san’s fighting outfit from one of the
Karate Kid
movies. He even had the weird little headband on, for Christ’s sake.

The fighter moved toward Riddick, punching and kicking the air as if he heard
Eye of the Tiger
in his head. Every now and then, he’d pause and mean-mug Riddick, who stood stock-still, brow raised, one corner of his lip curled up in a smirk.

Even though the guy looked completely ridiculous to Harper, the crowd certainly seemed to appreciate the show. They were on their feet cheering as if he actually was Apollo Creed.

To each his own, Harper supposed. But this certainly didn’t elevate her already dangerously low opinion of the crowd.

When the two fighters were face to face, one of the most beautiful women Harper had ever seen strolled into the Arena from the same door Carrot Top had entered through. She was about six feet tall, with most of that height being in her legs, with white-blond curls that fell to her firm, rounded tush.

And Harper knew the woman had a firm, rounded tush because she was buck-ass naked.

Again, the crowd went wild.

“That’s Christy,” Romeo whispered in her ear. “The Arena’s equivalent of a ring girl. She’s neutral in all this. Her salary comes from both the Vrykolakas and Lykoi equally. She’ll bang the gong over there to start the fight.”

Harper had a few questions about why an underground fight club would need a ring girl, especially a naked ring girl, but she didn’t get a chance to ask. As she watched, Christy fell to her knees, bones sliding around and popping under her perfect, smooth skin, not stopping until the shift was complete.

Harper blinked. “She’s a tiger shifter?”

“Yep.”

Shit. Harper hadn’t even known there were tiger shifters. Bears, rats, wolves, coyotes…sure. But tigers? That was a new one.

And Christy was as beautiful in tiger form as she was in her human shape. She had snow white fur and big blue eyes that scanned the crowd as she ran a quick lap around the Arena.

She paused as her big blue eyes latched onto Romeo.

She hissed, then tossed her head and finished her lap.

Harper glanced over at Romeo, who had the grace to look a little embarrassed.

“Did I mention it was Christy who got me invited to Archer’s table in the first place?” he asked.

Harper pursed her lips, not bothering to respond. Given the tiger’s reaction, she imagined it hadn’t been a friendly breakup. Shocking.

Christy shifted back into her beautiful, long-legged self by the large, ancient Chinese gong and hip-bumped it to signal the start of the fight.

Riddick fell into his usual easy, loose-limbed fighting stance. Daniel-San, on the other hand, unleashed a flurry of kicks and punches and mid-air acrobatics, all while making weird Bruce Lee noises.

Romeo snorted. “Talk about
Enter the Dumbass
.”

He wasn’t lying, Harper thought. Sentry had taught their slayers early on that fancy tricks and aerial maneuvers were fine for the movies, but utterly useless in a street fight.

She glanced back at Riddick, who didn’t even bother to move away from the flailing fighter. His eyes just tracked his every exaggerated movement until finally, he was within arms’ reach.

When Daniel-San stopped moving for a split second, Riddick hit him with a right hook to the jaw that sent him sailing comically through the air, back at least six feet. He landed on his back, releasing a huge, wheezing puff of air as he hit the ground.

And he didn’t get up.

One, two, three, four, five…yep, it was over.

The crowd went so silent, Harper could hear the steady, low hum of the fluorescent lighting in the Arena.

Riddick glanced down at the fallen fighter, then up at her. He shrugged.

And with that, the crowd found their voices and went absolutely wild, cheering and screaming and waving their arms.

“Sev-en, Sev-en, Sev-en,” they chanted.

Riddick shook his head in disgust and turned his back on the crowd, walking back to the locker room.

His obvious disdain for some reason excited the crowd even more, and Harper had to cover her ears to block out the dull roar of the bloodthirsty fight fans all around her.

“Will all the fights up to his last one be this easy?” she yelled in Romeo’s ear.

His answering smile bordered on pity. “No. The real fights start tomorrow.”

Well, shit.

Romeo could be a despicable bastard, and he’d lied to her a million times. And
now
was when he started telling the truth?

Mischa stepped into the elevator at Dresden Labs and lifted her glasses to rub the bridge of her nose.

Damn, but being nice to Leon had zapped her energy.

Hunter stepped in beside her—way too close, in her opinion. She subtly inched away.

“Why the hell are you cowering away from me?”

Shit. Apparently she hadn’t been subtle enough. “I-I’m not. I was just—”

“You’re just cowering, as if I’m going to throw you against the wall and drain you dry.”

If you ever throw me against a wall,
dry
won’t be a problem
.

She blinked. Shit, where had
that
thought come from? Even Harper would’ve found that thought completely classless.

When she didn’t reply, he grabbed her upper arms and hauled her up against him, close enough that she could see a tangled mess of anger and hurt and frustration in his eyes. “I’d never hurt you, for Christ’s sake. If I wanted to, I could have done it twenty years ago. When are you going to realize that I’m not a complete bastard who doesn’t deserve you?”

Oh, boy. How to explain that she already knew he’d never hurt her, and that
she
was the complete bastard in this scenario?

But then again, he’d just argue with her. Maybe it was better to leave him with his delusions.

She sucked in a deep breath, purposefully not looking into his beautiful eyes, and said quietly, “Never. I’m never going to realize that. There’s no way I could ever be with you.”

The silence that followed was absolutely deafening. Mischa could hear the rush of her blood, could feel the lie burning on her tongue. After a thousand years or so, he let her go. Then he calmly turned away from her and…punched a hole through the elevator wall.

The second his fist pierced that wall, the elevator ground to a halt and was tossed into pitch darkness. Mischa stumbled forward and had to brace herself against the door to remain upright.