Cloak Games: Rebel Fist Read Free Page A

efficient way to do that. I wanted Russell to have a good life, a better life than me…
    Basically, I didn’t want Russell to become anything like me.
    “Good for him,” I said, putting my keys into the bike’s ignition. 
    “What about you?” said Russell.
    “Did James and Lucy have the talk with me, you mean?” I said. They had not. When I had hit puberty, one of Morvilind’s tutors had given me a prescription for birth control pills, followed by a lecture from Morvilind about how I would become useless to him if I was pregnant. “I think I would have preferred that, actually.” 
    “So you do have a boyfriend, then?” said Russell.
    My startled twitch knocked my hand off the keys. “Um. What?” 
    “Well,” said Russell, and I could hear the smirk in his voice, “if you can ask if I had the talk with James and Lucy, I can ask if you have a boyfriend.”
    “I don’t have a boyfriend,” I said. 
    “Have you ever had a boyfriend?” said Russell.
    I hesitated. There had been on serious boyfriend, one man for whom I had fallen head over heels in love. His name had been Nicholas Connor, and he had been brilliant and strong and handsome. 
    He had also been the leader of a Rebel cell, planning to set off a bomb that would have killed tens of thousands of people in Los Angeles…and he had set me up to take the blame. I had defused the plot, wrecked his Rebel cell, and escaped scot-free back to Milwaukee, much sadder, but much wiser.
    “I don’t have time for that kind of nonsense,” I said.
    Russell laughed. “Do you know what I think?”
    “I think,” I said, turning the key, “that we should shut up and ride.”
    The engine roared to life and I fed the throttle, drowning out Russell’s answer. He whooped, his arms tightening around my waist, and I grinned and gunned the bike into motion. We took off down the streets, going a good twenty miles over the speed limit, but there wasn’t much traffic on a Saturday morning and the Homeland Security traffic patrollers kept to the main streets and the freeways. 
    I whooped in turn, and I heard Russell laughing. I had to admit that I loved motorcycles. I loved the speed, the sense of power and freedom as I gunned the throttle. Of course, that sense of freedom was an illusion. Morvilind only had to crook his finger and I would come running, since the consequences of ignoring his summons would be dire. I wasn’t free, and I didn’t have anything remotely like the power I needed to free myself.
    Not yet, anyway. 
    Today, though, I would enjoy myself.
    Russell wasn’t that heavy, but his weight did affect the motorcycle’s handling, so I kept off the freeways and stayed to the surface streets. We left Milwaukee, made our way across Wauwatosa, and ended up in Brookfield. Most of Milwaukee’s super-rich lived in mansions along the lakefront or in high-rise condominiums downtown. Those who were merely rich lived in Brookfield, in new houses with big lawns and two-car garages. So there were a lot of shops selling fancy electronics and skis and tennis rackets whatever other expensive crap rich people needed. 
    The Ducal Mall had a lot of stores like that.
    From what I understood, there had been a shopping center there centuries ago, but it had been destroyed during the Conquest. Later Duke Tamirlas of Milwaukee had given his approval to build a new mall there, so the county and city governments made it happen. Over the centuries it had grown into a four-story monstrosity of glass and steel and concrete, with concourses and walkways and restaurants and even a little amusement park with a couple of roller coasters. It had its own dedicated off-ramp from Interstate 94, which I avoided, circling instead to the eastern side of the Ducal Mall and using the back entrance. 
    “Why are we parking so far from the doors?” said Russell as I brought the bike to a halt in the outer reaches of the parking lot.
    “Because,” I said, putting the kickstand in place,