False Prey: A Wildfire Novella (Wildfire Saga) Read Free Page A

proud, shot out a meat-hook of a fist that connected with Thomas’ jaw.
    He saw sparks and when he opened his watering eyes he found himself on the floor staring up at not one, but two cops and Mosby.   The knife had disappeared, but there was a wicked grin across the man’s face.   The cop that hit him did not wear a flu mask and smiled like Mosby, but the other one’s face was hidden behind a white mask.
    “Nice one, Billy!” someone hollered.
    “Thought you could slip out the back, huh?” mumbled the barefaced cop.
    “ Sacrilege! ” roared the priest.   “Assaulting a man in the House of God!”
    “Come on Cliff, give us some space, will ya?” mumbled the officer wearing the facemask.
    “Just make sure this sonuvabitch doesn’t infect you,” said Mosby.   He chuckled and happily stepped back, never taking his eyes off Thomas.
    The cop that had hit Thomas stooped and grabbed a fistful of his shirt.   “On your feet, spy.”   Thomas felt himself lifted into the air like a child’s toy.  
    Once on his unsteady feet, he was marched back down the hallway and shoved roughly into the side of the altar.   He cried out as the pain in his hip sent colorful sparks across his vision.  
    “You like that??” asked the cop, his lopsided grin twisted with hate.   The man was huge.   Thomas guessed he had to be at least six and a half feet tall—and most of it muscle by the way he stretched the fabric of his uniform.
    The remaining onlookers clapped and cheered at the spectacle.  
    “I didn’t do anything!”   Thomas turned and reached out to the vicious cop’s masked partner for mercy.   “Please, officer, you’ve got to help me—these people are—” Thomas’ pleading was cut off by an uppercut so strong, he was lifted off the floor by the force of the punch.   He collapsed to the ground, gasping for breath.
    “Resisting arrest!” said the boomed the mountain of a cop.   The crowd laughed.
    “Please…” whispered Thomas, clawing at the ground in agony.   His chest burned with the effort to bring in more oxygen.   Rough hands gripped his shoulders painfully and for the second time, Thomas felt himself lifted onto his feet.   He was spun around and his arms viciously pulled behind his back.   When the cold steel of the handcuffs touched his skin, he knew all hope was lost.   He was shoved off the altar dais.  
    “You don’t understand—” he gasped.   He tried to keep from stumbling into the small group of jeering onlookers.
    “Tell it to the judge.”   The cop who wore the face-mask pulled his nightstick from the wide leather belt at his waist.   “Move.”
    “Hang ‘im!” someone shouted as he was forced into the throng.
    Hands punched and slapped him as he was marched towards the still-open church doors.
    “I’ll get a rope—” a coarse voice replied.
    “Nah, let’s just shoot him—” suggested another.
    “Dirty Korean bastard—”
    “You will all pay for this sacrilege!” warned the priest in the background.   “The Lord God does not suffer those who—”
    “Ah, shut up!” someone else bellowed to the laughter of the others.   Through the press of people around him, Thomas saw a man roughly shake off the priest’s hands.   The movement caused the old clergyman to stumble backwards against a pew.   He saw the priest trip on the kneeler and fall to the ground.   The old man grunted in pain as he hit the floor.  
    Thomas tried to look back to make sure the priest was all right but he was carried forward in the stream of the crowd.   A strong hand shoved him outside and Thomas stumbled into the daylight.   He blinked and then gasped at the sight that awaited him.

C HAPTER 2

    Danny Roberts sat behind the wheel of his car and waited for the cell phone’s connection to be re-established.  
    “— are you there? ”  
    “I’m here,” he replied, glancing out the window as yet another local strolled past wearing a flu mask.   “Sorry about