Too Close to the Sun (The Sun 1) Read Free Page B

getting there.”
    She was tempted to keep the money but pride made her toss the bundle back to him. “I don’t need it. I’ll be fine.”
    Dugan walked around the desk and shoved the stack of bills into her jacket pocket, being careful not to touch her injured side. “Don’t be so damn stubborn. The Felineans will be here soon. For political reasons, I won’t stop them, but I sure hate the thought of you dying, so I think it’d be better if you weren’t here when they arrived. I’ll ship the stuff from your room to you later.”
    “That won’t be necessary.” Angel learned long ago not to accumulate more than she could carry. So her “stuff” included the clothes on her ship, the locket hanging around her neck (a gift from her mother) and the Nguyen V-500 resting in her holster (a gift from Dugan). Everything else could be replaced.
    “How bad is your side? Do you need Martin to look at it?”
    “No, I’ll be all right.”
    “Then you’d better go.”
    And just like that, the moment of her departure from Skeeter's and the life she'd been living for two years had arrived. It didn't matter that less than an hour ago she'd decided to leave, it still hurt to be told to go. Sometime over the past two years, despite her best efforts to remain distant, she’d developed a fondness for Dugan, Martin and the others who worked and lived at Skeeter's . They’d become her family.
    It shouldn’t be this hard to leave family. After all, it wasn't like she hadn't left family before. As she looked at Dugan, a feeling of such loneliness stole over her, the weight of it was nearly suffocating. Emotion rose unbidden to choke any words she might have muttered into silence.
    As she struggled to compose herself, a commotion in the outer room distracted her.
    Curious, Angel joined Dugan behind the desk. The feed from the various security cameras showed six men, weapons in hand, standing in the front room, looking serious and extremely dangerous. Everyone else in the room had moved to crowd the outer walls, no doubt hoping to stay clear of the line of fire.
    “Terrorists?” Angel asked hopefully.
    “Felinean Avengers,” Dugan corrected.
    “Damn.” This just wasn’t her day. She could see Martin with one hand under the counter, no doubt with his mini-Mag trained on the group. He’d only be able to take out two, three at best. The rest of the patrons wouldn’t interfere and, as Dugan had warned her, neither would he. That left three of them to one of her. She didn’t like the odds.
    “Take my private exit,” Dugan said, pressing a button under the desk. To her surprise, the wall beside her seemed to evaporate and an opening appeared. “This comes out two doors down.”
    Angel stepped into the opening, but couldn’t bring herself to just walk off. She had brought trouble to Skeeter’s and her friends. She couldn’t just leave them to fend for themselves.
    “Dugan…”
    He nodded as if he understood, then reached into his own jacket and pulled out an impressive Smith and Wesson Destroyer. He gave her a slow grin. “Better hurry.”
    She knew then that despite what he’d said, Dugan wouldn’t make the Avengers’ job any easier. No one came into Skeeter’s to start trouble without getting a little in return.
    She went swiftly through the tunnel and once outside, skirted the side of the building so she could get a look across the open stretch of tarmac separating her from her ship.
    There were no Avengers outside waiting for her, but it was a long way to her ship. The hairs on the back of her neck started to prickle as she made her decision to run for it.
    She hadn’t taken three steps when the explosion came.
    The shock wave caused her to stumble and nearly fall. Gravel rained down on her, peppering her head and back. A few short meters away, the tarmac had been turned into one big scorch mark. If someone had been aiming for her, they'd missed. That seemed unlikely for Avengers, so then - who was