Maybe they were already too drunk and too stupid to consider the danger I posed?
Maybe they only saw a woman with a piece of glass in her hand. It would be their mistake if they did.
“I’ll give you one more warning. All of you leave.” I pointed the broken brown glass at the one who’d started it all. “Or I start with you.”
Someone stepped forward and flicked back my hood. The group seemed to relax as they caught sight of my soft eyeshadow, the gray green of my eyes, the pale pink lip balm I preferred when out on a job.
Frida Kahlo once wrote, She’s not fragile like a flower. She’s fragile like a bomb. These idiots were about to figure out I wasn’t even a bomb. I was a damn grenade—power in a small portable package.
I jabbed my weapon toward Pete, or Chip, or whatever his name was. The entire group jerked away from me. Cowards.
It didn’t take them long to recover and crowd around me again. As they closed in, I glanced over to my target and he slipped out the back door.
I threw down the glass, and the frat boys scattered back, hands to their face. While they were distracted, I bolted to the front door hoping to intercept him in the side alley.
Nothing but cold biting wind and gravel out there.
Damn.
I spun on the ball of my foot and got back out as fast as I could. The man wasn’t at the mouth of the alley or down any of the side streets that I could see. I took a deep breath, let it out slow, and let my intuition guide me. I made a sharp right and took off running. I caught the edge of his black coat going around the corner and raced after it.
“You are not getting away from me, you bastard,” I said, even though the bastard in question wouldn’t be able to hear it.
I kicked up dirt as I rushed down the sidewalk, my hood flapping against my neck as I ran. No doubt anyone looking at me now would think I was a crazy person. And they might be right.
“You will not lose him, Zoey,” I grumbled to myself, pushing my body to run faster despite the distinct burn already taking root in my lungs. The guys at the office always joked I needed to work out more. I hated to admit that they were right... but I hated running. I didn’t look like a pretty gazelle doing it, and it never didn’t suck. Runner’s high? Ha. Never fe
lt it in my life. And I’d chased down a lot of men who had tried to outrun me.
My target sprinted down a side street. I couldn’t tell if he knew I was behind him, or if he just ran in general. The man hadn’t glanced back at me once.
I shouted, “Stop! You prick!”
Not that yelling at them ever made them do as I said.
I made it to the corner and caught my hand on the brick edge of the adjacent building to swing me around it faster. He kept going in his ugly leather coat which hung two sizes too big for him. A string of profanity stuck in my mouth as I ran.
I huffed and puffed around another corner and kept going. We’d gone five blocks and he showed no signs of stopping or any sign of knowing I was there.
I kept going even when my thighs began to register their protests along with my wheezing respiratory system.
I rounded another corner, and unease began to filter in behind the pain. Why would he run in the first place if he hadn’t known I was at the bar watching him? Or why all this chasing when he hadn’t even glanced back to see how close I was? Nor did his twists and turns along side streets seem anything but random. As if he wasn’t trying to get away from me.
Then he was gone. Vanished like magic.
“What the hell...”
Something grabbed me by the hair and dragged me backward. Pain shot through the crown of my head. My feet left the ground for a second before I got my balance once more.
What the fuck? It’s the dickhead from the bar. My target. How’d he get the jump on me?
I glanced up under the dirty black fringe of his hair.
“Oh, good, we stopped running,” I wheezed.
I spun, letting my hair twist around his hand, and punched him hard in the chest. He released me in surprise while I clutched my hand to my breast. Punching people sucked as much as running.
“What is your problem? First, you run me around the city and then you pull my hair. Most men have to buy me dinner before I allow them that privilege.” I tossed my hair back behind me so he didn’t get any more ideas about it.