Nick was stunned. "What are you doing?"

"Shut up!" Alan snarled, pul ing out a gun. "Al right, grandpa.

Give us your money or the old ho gets it right between her eyes."

Nick felt the color drain from his face. This couldn't be happening. They were mugging two tourists?

And I'm helping. . . .

For a ful minute he couldn't breathe as he watched the woman cry and the man beg them not to hurt her.

Before he even realized what he was doing, he grabbed Alan's hand that held the gun and knocked it away. "Run!" he shouted at the couple.

They did.

Tyree started after them, but Nick tackled him to the ground.

Alan caught him by the col ar of his shirt and jerked him back. "Man, what are you doing?"

Nick shoved him. "I can't let you mug someone. That wasn't the deal."

"You stupid ..." Alan hit him in the face with the gun.

Pain exploded in Nick's skul as he tasted blood.

"You're going to pay for that, Gautier." The three of them descended on him so fast and furious that he couldn't even see to fight back. One minute he was standing and the next he was on the ground with his arms wrapped around his head to protect it from the gun Alan was beating him with. They stomped and beat on him until he lost al feeling in his legs and one arm.

Alan stepped back and angled the gun on him. "Say your prayers, Gautier. You're about to become a statistic."

CHAPTER 2.

Nick wanted to lash out so badly he could taste it. I won't die like this. Not beaten in a gutter by people who're supposed to be my friends. Guys I've known and played with my whole life. I won't.

Yet here he lay.

Helpless. Weak.

Defeated.

Not only were his taste buds drenched with blood, he felt like he was suffocating on it. His mind ached to fight until they were begging him for mercy-it wanted him to get up and make them eat their teeth, but his body refused to cooperate.

Nothing was listening to him. Heck, he couldn't even keep them from hitting him.

Unable to do anything at al , he glared his hatred at Alan and hoped that the look alone would haunt the rat for the rest of eternity.

Alan laughed as he squeezed the trigger.

Holding his breath, Nick waited for the sound that would end his life.

Out of the darkness, a blur rushed in at the same instant Alan fired the gun. One moment, Tyree, Alan, and Mike were laughing at his pain while they insulted him. In the next, they were flying through the air and hitting the ground near him hard enough to break bones.

Nick froze as he tried to figure out where he'd been shot, but his body hurt so much that he couldn't tel . Maybe it missed me. . . .

Lying on the street, he caught a flash of blond hair and black clothes as someone attacked his ex-friends.

Alan cried out and the gun landed on the ground beside him.

The blond man tsked. "Shame you're too young to kil . But in two years, I catch you doing this c.r.a.p again, you won't live long enough to rethink it." With one hand, he threw Alan into the street like a rag dol .

In a swirl of black and a flash of silver, the man turned to face Nick. He didn't know why, but the guy reminded him more of a rich stockbroker than someone able to take down street-hardened g.a.n.g.b.a.n.gers. And he wasn't al that old either.

Maybe his late twenties.

Maybe.

Nick could barely draw his breath as the man came forward with the walk of a vicious predator. He was dressed al in black. An expensive leather coat draped around a body that was lethal. But it was the flash of silver on a pair of black boots that caught his attention.

One of them had a knife protruding from the toe. A knife that retracted as he came closer. The man knelt down, his brow furrowed into a deep frown. "They made a mess of you, kid.

Can you stand?"

Nick slapped at his hand as the man reached out to touch him. He didn't need help from anyone. Especial y not a stranger.

He tried to push himself to his feet, then everything went black.

Kyrian Hunter barely caught the skinny kid dressed in a foul y orange Hawaiian shirt before he hit the street. That hideous thing had saved his life. So bright it practical y glowed, it'd cal ed out to him as he'd been walking by and had alerted him to the fight.

From what he'd seen, the kid was a tough little sc.r.a.pper.

He'd give him that. And the boy could take a vicious beating without begging for mercy. There weren't many adults who could have gone through what he had without crying.

That alone made him respect the kid.

He glared at the other punks, who were running down the street as fast as they could. The ancient warrior and predator inside him wanted to hunt them down and kil them for what they'd done.

But the man in him knew this one, the one who'd put his life on the line to save the elderly couple, wouldn't live if he did.

The cowards could unfortunately wait for another b.u.t.t-whipping.

He tilted the kid's face so that he could see his features.

The short brown hair was saturated with blood, and a huge cut would most likely leave a scar right above his left eyebrow. His nose was broken and by the looks of it, his jaw might be too. If not broken, they'd pounded it real good. Blood poured from his shoulder where he'd been shot.

Poor kid.

Picking him up, Kyrian carried him to his car so that he could get him to the hospital before he bled out and died.

Kyrian paced the waiting room, where several dozen other people sat in various states of agitation and il ness. It'd been almost two hours since he'd handed the teenager over to the staff and stil no word about the kid he'd found.

Was he even stil alive?

Was he even stil alive?

Checking his watch, he growled. He real y didn't have the time to stay here, waiting. ...

He had important duties to attend to and, with luck, more lives to save before dawn.

"What are you doing here, General?"

He froze at the deep, thickly accented voice. Since Acheron was an eleven-thousand-year-old omnipotent immortal, he was the last person Kyrian had expected to find in a hospital.

Not like the man could ever break a bone or get sick.

He turned around slowly to find Acheron just inside the doorway. At six foot eight with dark green hair and dressed in black Goth gear complete with a spiked leather motorcycle jacket, he was an impressive sight that made everyone who saw him swal ow in fear. But it wasn't just his height that gave people pause. It was the lethal aura of I'l -kick-your-b.u.t.t-so-hard-your-ancestors'-ears-wil -ring. Anyone who came near him could feel the unearthly power that bled from the pores of this particular ...

Being.

"What are you doing here?" Kyrian asked.

His eyes completely shielded by a pair of opaque Predator sungla.s.ses even though it was almost midnight, Acheron cut loose with a lopsided grin that antagonized him. "I asked you first."

If it'd been anyone other than Acheron making that smart-aleck comment, Kyrian would give him a higher dose of att.i.tude. But att.i.tude didn't work on Acheron. It just p.i.s.sed him off, which was never a good thing. "I found a kid getting a major a.s.s-whipping on the street. I don't know who he is but I don't want to leave him here without an adult to watch over him. He was pretty badly mangled in the fight and not old enough to be left alone."

Acheron tilted his head as if he was listening to voices only he could hear. Kyrian hated whenever he did that. It creeped him out to think what al whispered to the ancient being. Most of al , it creeped him out to think what al the man knew about him that Kyrian had never told him. ...

"Name's Gautier. Nick Gautier. He's a fourteen-year-old student at St. Richard's High School on Chartres who lives in the Lower Ninth on Claiborne Ave."

Kyrian was impressed. "You know him?"

There was no hint of emotion from Acheron. "Never seen him before."

"Yet you know his name?"

That c.o.c.ky grin returned to irritate Kyrian. "I know lots of things, General." Acheron held his hand up and a piece of paper appeared out of nowhere between his fingers. He held it out to him. "His mother's an exotic dancer named Cherise Gautier. You can reach her here. But be warned. She has a sharp tongue where her son's concerned and if she thinks you've hurt him or caused him to be hurt ... she's going for blood."

Kyrian took the paper from his hand. "I'd ask you about those Jedi mind tricks of yours, but I know you won't answer." Acheron tucked his hands into the pockets of his scuffed jacket that had two chains wrapped around the shoulder of it.

"No comment, but I wil say this." He paused before he spoke again. "Nick isn't Jason. It's a different time and place, General. Don't let the past ruin your future."

"Meaning what, oh great Yoda?"

Acheron didn't elaborate. "You take care of the kid. I'l take care of your patrol tonight. I could use the target practice."

"Thanks for understanding." After al , Acheron was his boss and could have easily reamed him for not doing his duties.

Acheron inclined his head before he made his way out of the room and through the double doors that led to the parking lot. And with him went that powerful charge in the air.

Yeah, Acheron was one scary SOB. But Kyrian wasn't exactly comforting himself. Acheron had trained him and he'd been a master pupil, especial y when it came to kil ing things that shouldn't be living in the first place.

Glancing at the number in his hand, he pul ed his phone out and cal ed Nick's mother.

Nick groaned as he blinked open his ...

Eye.

Uh, gah, what happened? His head was throbbing and one eye had something over it that prevented him from opening it.

Please don't tell me I've put out an eye. His mom would flip sideways. It was her biggest fear.

Don't play with that fill-in-the-blank, Nick. You could lose an eye. It was her favorite rant no matter what object he touched, and she'd kil him if he was now a cyclops.

G.o.d, I'll never get a girlfriend now. Women don't date freaks.

"Careful, kid."

Nick paused as he realized he was in a hospital room. He tried to sit up, but someone stopped him. His panic increased as he recognized the blond man from the fight. "Where am I?"

"Hospital."

"Real y? No kidding? And here I thought I was at McDonald's." Nick glared at the stupid answer. "I can't be here. We can't afford it."

The man ignored his rampant sarcasm, keeping his features completely impa.s.sive. "Don't worry about the price.

It's on me."

Yeah, right. "We don't take charity." Nick winced as pain tore through his skul and he realized his arm was in a sling.

Don't you dare break a bone, Nicky. I can't afford no doctor bill like that. Whatever you do, don't get hurt.

Nick felt il over everything that'd happened. "My mom's going to kil me."