Now Available for Pre-Order: Reflections
Reflections, this month's second short story title is now available on pre-order. This novelette-length science-fiction short story takes us to an operation set shortly after the Wolves of Alpha 9, and puts Cutter and Agent Delight together on a desperate mission to save another Odyssey operative...and a missing child.
What's it About?
When Odyssey Agent Catriona Delight is called from hunting a renegade to undertake a mission to rescue a child, her salvager, and another missing agent, she finds herself working with Cutter, Mack and Tens, all ex-Odyssey and antagonistic. Can they work together to reach their target in time, or will their differences bring the mission to failure on a hostile world?
You can find links to where it is available on this Books2Read page: https://books2read.com/u/m2JyWr, and subscribers to my ReamStories page at the Perimeter Surveillance level and higher can begin reading it straight away.
How Does It Start?
Katriona Delight slid into the shadows, scowling as she watched the slender figure dart into an alley ahead of her.
“That’s not going to save you,” she growled, softly to herself. “You had your chance to…”
A flare of silver had her cursing afresh, but she didn’t turn and fire, even as Captain Mackenzie Star of the Shady Marie laid a hand on her shoulder.
“I thought we had an agreement, Dee?” he murmured.
Delight managed a small smile.
“We do, Mack,” she admitted, “And now you’re here I can go. I do have more important things to do than fetch your errant apprentice.”
“Then how about you go do them?” Mack challenged, cocking an eyebrow. He gestured down the street where the tall lithe figure of his communications expert cut into the alley in the woman’s wake. “Tens and I can handle Cutter.”
Delight arched an eyebrow and didn’t bother cutting the snark from her tone.
“Which is why I was here twenty minutes before you.”
“And only twenty minutes,” Mack reminded her, “Despite your best efforts to block her signal.”
“Are you saying I’m cheating?” Delight challenged.
“Each and every time,” he drawled, and she rolled her eyes.
“I don’t have to stay and listen to this,” she declared, and palmed the signal for her own teleport team to pick her up.
Mack’s reply wasn’t lost to her as she vanished in a swirl of silver light.
“You always were a sore loser.”
The man had a point about that, but Cutter had been a thorn in her side ever since the girl had made it clear she didn’t want any part in Odyssey’s enforced recruitment.
“Ungrateful little shit,” Delight muttered as the light faded, leaving her in the center of the teleport mat.
She looked around, relieved to see the room was mostly empty and very few witnesses existed to her latest defeat. Of those that were there, though…
Delight stifled an internal groan.
“Mack beat you to the punch, again?” Pritchard asked, smirking at her discomfort.
She scowled at him, striding for the door and the ready room.
“I swear that man is in love…” she growled.
“Or he just doesn’t approve of someone being spaced because they refuse to be shanghaied,” Pritchard suggested, with a sly smile.
“Not my decision,” Delight told him. “HQ says the girl’s a threat to security if she ever gets off the leash…and I’m inclined to agree.”
The big marine leaning against the wall smirked.
“And yet you keep missing her.” He pushed off the wall as she passed, and Delight’s heart lifted at the sight of him.
“Your point, Jeremy?” she growled, as he fell in step beside her, because he had a point, and she didn’t understand why the girl kept slipping through her fingers. None of her other targets did. Jeremy, smart man that he was, changed the subject.
“Aw, but aren’t you glad to see me?”
Delight glanced sharply at him, but he wasn’t fooled. She was glad to see him and he damned-well knew it. Instead of answering, she continued along the corridor, glad to have him at her side.
She barely even noticed when Pritchard did his usual trick of fading into the background. If she was honest, Pritchard was the perfect agent…and the fact he’d chosen to keep his appearance at the mid-forties marker he’d been on when she’d had Odyssey recruit him only helped with that.
It wasn’t that the man couldn’t bust away from the appearance of staid middle-age…and his bounty hunter persona was living proof he had a dark side…but in a universe where he could have appeared at his prime, it barely made sense.
“I was more noticeable, then,” he’d told her on the one occasion she’d dared to ask. “This way, I’m just ‘some old guy,’ ignored by most of the mercs in the younger age bracket.”
But not by the older, more experienced ones, she’d wanted to point out, Not them. They’d take one look at you and know to put a solid right between your eyes, before you had the chance to ruin their day.
There’d be no point in telling him what he already knew. He’d been in the security business a lot longer than she had…even if she’d risen to become his superior. However, while she’d chosen him as her partner, she knew the company had agreed to keep him on her team because he was the only person she respected enough to listen to on an op…and because she needed a handler to stop her going off the rails.
Disadvantages of old age, she thought, ignoring the fact that both Jeremy and Pritchard were older and neither of them had been assigned a handler.
And there was no point in saying she respected Jeremy, because while that was true, he was rarely on an operation with her. And that left just Pritchard to temper her temper when Odyssey let her loose. She’d slipped the leash on this one, but the fact he was in the teleport center, meant he hadn’t been too far behind her, if Mack hadn’t showed up.
Apparently, not everyone wanted Cutter’s tail kicked until her nose bled.
“Something else she thoroughly deserves,” she grumbled.
Jeremy chuckled and draped an arm across her shoulders.
“Now, now,” he said, “As much as Cutter doesn’t appreciate the fact she’s landed on her feet, it doesn’t mean we get to kick her ass every time we see her.”
“Why not,” Delight muttered, and it wasn’t a question.
“Because we have better things to do with our time?” Pritchard suggested.
“Oh?” Delight’s mood lifted a little. “Such as?”
“Well, you know that smuggling operation we’ve been tracking…”
Delight gave him a sharp look, trying to hide the excitement sparking in her eyes. “Oh?”
“Well, our little friend might have done us a favor in that back-handed way she has.”
“Ugh, way to ruin a bit of good news,” Delight grumbled.
Pritchard gave her a sidelong glance, his gray eyes twinkling.
Great, Delight thought. Now, he’s teasing me.
Jeremy squeezed her. “It’s not like you don’t deserve it.”
“Don’t you start,” she told him, then paused, “And how do you know so much about it, anyway?”
“I thought you’d never ask!” Jeremy grinned, waving a hand in front of himself to draw her attention to the fact he was wearing fatigues. “I think the higher ups knew Mack was on his way, and decided you needed cheering up, so they assigned my squad to be your escort for the day.”
Delight stared at him. “They so did not.”
He pouted. “And there you go, doubting their good will, again…or are you saying you’d rather another squad went along with you, because I can always switch places with Sondak.”
Delight pulled a face. Jeremy knew exactly how she felt about Sondak’s crew. They were good, but they were definitely second string when compared to Jeremy’s squad.
“So, tell me,” she purred, “Exactly how difficult do they expect my job to be if they’ve assigned me Odyssey’s main trigger puller and his team of talented troublemakers as an escort?”
Pritchard stepped around them, pulling open the door to Briefing Room 8.
“You really want to know?” he asked, waving them through ahead of him. “That’s what this space is for. It’s called a briefing room, and we use it for discussing classified matters.”
Jeremy snaked out a hand to yank him inside, but Pritchard ducked under it, swung around the door and hit the control panel to close it behind them.
“There’d better be something to…” Delight began, then registered who was waiting for them…apart from Jeremy’s team.
One Mack, one Tens…and one mildly pissed-off Cutter.
“What are they doing here?” she demanded.
Where Do You Find It?
You can find this short story in Tales of Odyssey and Miss Delight, the ninth volume of the C.M.'s Singles series, or as a stand-alone short story on the C.M.'s Singles Books2Read page: https://books2read.com/rl/cmssingles.
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