Fractured Read Free Page A

anyone else. “But we might not find anyone—”
    “There is no reason not to be cautious.” He clipped the knife, complete with a sheath, onto the belt, and then tipped my chin up with his fingers. “If the Mazikin ever did catch you, it would be quite a prize for them. Even before Sil and Juri knew how much you mean to me, even before you were appointed our Captain, they wanted you. And I don’t want to think about how they might celebrate if they did get you. Please .”
    Without further argument, I wrapped the belt around my waist, pulled my fleece jacket over it, and got out of the car to join Malachi on the sidewalk. “So …” Now that the moment had arrived, I didn’t have any idea how to actually patrol.
    Malachi swung the backpack onto his shoulders. His attention was already traveling up and down the street; his body was already tense with awareness. “It’s all right, Lela. In the dark city, we often had to roam the streets, looking for suspicious activity. Sometimes we went days without seeing anything. This is as good a lead as any.”
    “Should we split up?” I knew he’d often patrolled by himself, and I didn’t want to be deadweight.
    Malachi sighed. “As Captain, you will make this decision. We could cover more ground separately. However,” he said, stepping close enough to touch, close enough to make my heart speed, “I’d feel much better if you let me stay with you.” He kissed my forehead, the feel of his lips on my skin causing heavy warmth to curl low in my belly. “And as your suitor, I’d appreciate being able to keep my promise to your foster mother.”
    “My … suitor ?” I couldn’t hold back a giggle.
    Malachi looked really confused and kind of embarrassed. “I’m sorry. I know I’m your Lieutenant, but I—I just thought we were—”
    “No! No. That’s not what I meant. Malachi, are you saying you want to be my boyfriend?” I’d never had one before. But … I kind of liked the idea.
    “ Boyfriend? ” His WTF look only intensified. “I would never presume … but we haven’t … I wouldn’t want people to think you were a …” He cleared his throat and stared at the sidewalk, and I realized we might be having a bit of a translation problem. Or a growing-up-in-different-centuries problem.
    “That I’m a what? I don’t know what you’re thinking, but ‘boyfriend’ just means we’re …” Crap. This was like the blind leading the blind. “It means we’re together. That we’re, um, going out. With each other. And … not anyone else. But not seriously,” I added quickly, my cheeks hot.
    Malachi gave me a smile laced with uncertainty. “You can call me anything you’d like, as long as it means I can touch you.” He brushed my cheek with the backs of his fingers.
    “Okay.” I had to tear my eyes away from his mouth. Focus, Lela. This is your job now . “The sightings were about six blocks that way,” I blurted, pointing toward Hope Street. My body temperature dropped to a slow burn.
    “So what do the Mazikin want?” I asked Malachi as we set out. “If we know that, we might be able to predict what they’ll do here, right?”
    “I don’t think their desires are very complicated,” he replied. “In my interrogations of the Mazikin we captured in the dark city, they all said the same thing: they wanted out of their realm. All of them. They consider their homeland a prison.”
    “You think they’re trying to relocate their entire population?” The shudder that rolled through me wasn’t caused by the cold, but I hugged myself anyway. “How many of them do you think there are, in all?”
    “I asked Raphael once. He said that there were originally only two, so it’s clear they are breeding, and by now there could be hundreds of thousands of them. Maybe a million. And that was many years ago. He wouldn’t tell me much else.”
    “Huh. He’s usually so forthcoming.”
    “Indeed,” Malachi said with a laugh. He gave me a sidelong