The Darkness Beyond Read Free Page A

knowing his real name? “Okay, lady, so what should I call you?”
    â€œRuby will do for tonight.”
    He shook his head and downed the rest of his drink before standing up. “’Bye, Ruby.”
    She didn’t like watching him walk away. She tried one more time. “Why are you in such a hurry to leave?”
    â€œBecause I don’t have much use for cowards, Reggie .”
    She swallowed hard. “I said to call me Ruby.”
    The avatar shook his head. “You’ve been taunting me for weeks with your cryptic little e-mails. Now that I’ve found out your real name, you still want to hide behind your avatar. That hardly seems fair.”
    He started walking away again, but then stopped to look back one last time. “When you’re ready to really play, you know where to find me.”
    Then his avatar blinked out of existence, leaving both Reggie and Ruby alone and confused.
    D.J. shut off his monitor, feeling better than he had in ages. Nothing like confronting the enemy directly to raise the stakes in the game. He’d suspected for a while that the hacker who’d been chasing him was one of the avatars he’d encountered in the gaming rooms. Even now, he knew little more about the hacker than the name Reggie.
    This time the avatar was female, but that didn’t mean much. More than once he’d used either demon or female designs to hide his own identity. Reggie could’ve chosen the gorgeous redhead just to attract his attention. But now that he had a name to work with, it would be only a matter of time before he located Reggie in the real world. Of course, the name could be another fake, but his instincts told him differently. Now the real games could begin.
    He reached for one last piece of pizza, not caring that it was cold and a bit past its prime. After a couple of bites, he tossed the rest back in the box. It was definitely time for some shut-eye. Maybe if Lacey was right about the barrier remaining stable, he might even get to sleep in tomorrow.
    No sooner had that thought crossed his mind than his cell phone started vibrating and dancing across the desk. He picked it up without bothering to check the caller ID. Devlin was the only one who would be calling at this time of night. Grabbing his weapons bag, D.J. headed for the front door.
    â€œI’m on my way.”
    Ten hours later, D.J. fell back against the wall to catch his breath, grateful for the support of the cool stone. His legs burned with exhaustion, and his arms ached from swinging his ax for hours.
    The barrier that separated the tunnels under Seattle from the alien world of Kalithia had decided to prove Lacey’s predictions wrong in a big way. The damn thing had been flickering in and out like an effing strobe light at a seventies disco club.
    D.J. used a handkerchief to wipe the blood off his ax and hung his throwing hammer back on his belt. Now all he could do was wait to see if the barrier would finally make up its mind to behave or if he was going to have to wade through another river of blood before he could find a corner and grab some much needed sleep.
    Trahern staggered over to join him. The man sported a makeshift bandage around his sword arm, but otherwise looked sound. Besides, like all Paladins, he would recover from any wound far faster than a normal human would.
    Hell, even death only slowed them down for a short time.
    Trahern didn’t so much sit down as collapse. “Devlin said the guards would be around soon with food and water. I hope they get here before we have to dance again.”
    D.J. nodded, too tired to talk. At the sound of footsteps, he straightened up and braced himself to fight if it was another straggler being herded back toward the barrier. As soon as he spotted one of the older guards heading in his direction, he relaxed a bit but not entirely.
    Technically the Paladins and the guards fought on the same side, but lately there’d been a lot of