To Protect and Serve Ch. 10

"That's the question, isn't it? But I've got to do something."

Samantha hugged her sister. "You will." She was interrupted by a phone call from their parents, who was wondering when she'd be back. Seeing as Samantha had no real excuse for being gone all night, they both realized that she needed to go.

"I wish you hadn't had to see this," Shamira said as she escorted her sister back to the house. "And I know you don't want to hear this, but it might be good if you just called for a while. Things are getting kind of hairy right now --"

"I refuse to not be there for my sister!" Samantha said obstinately.

"Sam, you can't help me heal this. You can still be my moral support, and God knows I need it, but you can do that safely over the phone. Please, this is dangerous shit." As if to emphasize the point, she looked at her wheel chair.

"But --"

"I'm going to get back to work, and I can't be worried about you getting involved and leaving my nephews as orphans."

"I know you! Who else is going to keep you from sinking into some weird noble depression?"

"What? I don't always --"

"Yeah, you do," Samantha interrupted.

"No I --"

"Yeah, you do," Clara said from the doorway.

"Hey Clara," Samantha said, Clara being one of the few of Shamira's new friends that she actually knew. "Please tell me that at least YOU can keep an eye on her and keep her under control."

Much to Shamira's amazement, Clara kept a stoic expression. "I keep trying, but she's a stubborn bitch."

"See?! I like her," Samantha said, pointing her thumb at the Native American. "You need more friends like her."

Shamira looked at Clara, who simply shrugged. Shamira had a desire to come clean, since she seemed to be running out of last chances. "Samantha --" Her voice stuck.

Her sister realized this was probably important. "Yes?"

"Clara isn't . . . just . . . a friend."

Samantha stared. "She's a good friend?"

"A very good friend. Samantha, she and I . . . what I mean to say is . . . sometimes when two women really like each other --"

Samantha cut her sister off with a grin. "You're gay, aren't you? Damn! I win the bet with Darin!"

Shamira looked stunned. "I'm not gay!"

"Bisexual would be the technical term," Clara said. "Not that I really need to get involved in this conversation."

Samantha held her sister's hands. "I actually wondered if the reason you never seemed to find to find 'the right guy' was because maybe you weren't looking for a guy at all." She looked at Clara. "You could've done a lot worse." She directed the next line directly to Clara, "Don't hose her over like the guys you had in the past. Or like my ex. Vampire or not, I'll hurt you."

Clara tried to look terrified. "Not in the face!" she added, throwing her hands up protectively.

"You . . . you really suspected . . . and you don't care?"

"Shamira, I got over you being dead, a vampire, and I'm now trying to get over the fact that you were tortured. Your lesbian tendencies are really not high on my priorities. I'm just glad you found someone who had BETTER appreciate you."

"Oh I do," Clara replied vigorously.

Samantha kissed her sister on the cheek and then headed to find Clyde so she could return to the parents' house after eliciting a promise to call every damn day. Samantha also told Shamira to extend her apologies to everyone she had "roughed up."

"Well, that went well," Shamira said as she and Clara headed back to Shane's office. He was looked far too amused to pull off a hurt expression, but he tried. Renata was still massaging her scalp.

"My sister apologizes for her behavior. She was a bit stressed."

"She'd make a good were," Renata said with a grin. "Protective instincts are in the right place."

Shamira bit her lip, then just blurted out what she wanted to say. "Shane, I want to go back to work."

Her boss was suddenly serious. "Are you sure?"

"Yes. I know I can't do what I used to," she said, "but I can't sit by on this. Whatever I can do to help. And . . . and I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"For being difficult. For ignoring the rules until it almost killed me. For putting myself in a position where Renata could have gotten killed rescuing me."

"We're family," the Brazilian woman replied. "Dysfunctional sometimes, but family. You would've done the same or more for me."

Shane smiled. "Shamira, everyone who has worked with you or known you at all since you arrived has reminded me that the very things I was angry with you for are the very things I valued about you from the start. I tried to blame my actions on how powerful you were, but I think that you would have been just as pig-headed and stubborn as ever. And if you weren't all these things, there would be a lot more people dead or injured, and I would then have only myself to blame. I will not waste your talents by having you sit here."

Shamira felt a tremendous weight lift off of her powerful shoulders. "Thank you, sir."

"Now, let's go to the garage," he said. "I had something brought in just in case."

They all headed to the garage, joined by other members of the house. There was a new van there, with smooth black sides, tinted windows, and a sense of heaviness. It also had a wheelchair lift. The inside of the large vehicle had several cages towards the back and some bench seats toward the front. There was enough room for Shamira to maneuver her wheelchair forward and get into the driver's seat, where all the controls including acceleration and breaking could be hand-operated.

"Right now," Shane explained, "we're keeping any of the captives that Banshee doesn't kill first in a warehouse in Macon. I'd like to get them up here so that the Representative could . . . well, have a few words with them."

Shamira looked at Alessandra, whose face was as calm as the moment before a storm. She saw what Lacroix's house had been up to and its involvement in what had happened to Shamira (a vampire of her line) as a grave affront, and had appointed herself the local magistrate for the Tribunal. That meant that she could try, sentence, and execute violators of Tribunal law.

Shane ran his hands over the side of the transport. "The entire thing is armor plated, heavily warded against magic, and there is even a magical command . . . this was Coramen's idea . . . that will fill the inside with total darkness, making it very much your domain. There is a holster on the side of the seat for a sidearm, and you could use the window as a brace for the sniper rifle that is currently disassembled and in a case beneath the seat."

Shamira looked over everything. "How did you get this ready so fast?"

"I had it rush ordered a week ago. I know some people who owed me a few favors. Honestly, I figured it was going to take meeting your second death to keep you out of this hunt, so --" He stopped when he saw Shamira wipe a tear from her eye, but it was not sorrow so much this time. She was happy that someone still had faith in her. "Pick a co-pilot, and you can get back to work as soon as you're ready. And no, you can't pick Clara, because she's not an enforcer."

Shamira looked around. "Bunny."

The blond sex-kitten looked surprised that her name had been brought up. She was the only enforcer that was not currently assigned to duty down in Savannah. She had freaked out big time after the first trip to Macon, where the gunfight that had started Shamira's and Shane's downward spiral had taken place. She was tough, but she felt she had blown everything.

"Me?" the gorgeous nineteen year old baby vampire said. "But --"

"You've already ridden with me," Shamira said. "You know how I operate. Besides, I'll probably have to make a lot of trips, and I want someone who can help keep me awake."

"Are you sure?" Bunny asked. She was obviously torn between pride at being asked and fear of screwing things up.

"Yeah. Besides, with you in the car, I think any prisoners are a lot more likely to behave."

Clara, not normally one to seek out Bunny, was grinning. Shamira was already thinking of how she could help others again. This was the woman who had caught her attention. "Shamira is still going to have difficulty getting around. She'll need some help."

Bunny nodded. "I can do that." Her brilliant smile returned. "When do we start?"

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The next night . . .

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Bunny, as it turned out, could talk for at least an hour without stopping. She was the verbal equivalent of the world's longest run-on sentence, but Shamira did not seem to mind anymore. The girl was just too damn happy to stay annoyed with. And she was certainly easy on the eyes, sitting in the passenger side of the van in tight-white denim shorts that barely covered her ass, a tied-off pink-and-white checkered shirt, and her wheat-blond hair pulled back in a pony-tail. She enjoyed flirting with passing truckers, and watching her lean out the window to talk to or yell at other motorists made Shamira grin.

"Hey, can we stop and get a soda?" the bubbly young woman said. "I'm totally parched and would kill for a Diet Doctor Pepper."

"Yes, I'm sure that flashing your tits at the guys in the Ford F-150 with a rebel flag sticker must have been exhausting."

"Just helping highway safety by keeping guys awake," Bunny replied, leaning over and checking the security of the AA12 automatic shotgun she had strapped to the other side of her seat. When Shamira had suggested she ride "shotgun," Bunny had taken the suggestion seriously.

Shamira pulled the van into a gas station off the side of the highway, looking mighty nervous as she did so. Her life had changed forever on a road just like this one. Bunny got out and started pumping the gas, then sauntered over to the store for snacks. Shamira loved watching her walk.

'Well, my whole body may not be able to get into the game, but my brain still appreciates a good thing when I see it.' A couple of guys at the pumps scoped her out too, and the guy working the register actually fondled himself through his jeans when the blond was not looking. She was whistled at heavily as she sauntered back over to the car, and she turned to wave at all of the boys.

"They're going to be masturbating well tonight," Shamira chuckled.

"I do what I can," Bunny beamed. She handed Shamira a coffee through the window, which she had bought without the driver even needing to ask. Then she went and topped off the tank. "I love corporate credit cards," she said, grabbing the receipt before clambering back inside. "This thing guzzles gas."

"It's a van. Heavily reinforced, magically warded . . . it's bound to drink a lot." She looked at the receipt. "Damn. That's just three hours driving?"

"I needed to get out and stretch my legs anyway," Bunny said, tucking her bag of snacks between the seats. Then her head shot up and her eyes opened wide. "Oh my God, that was incredibly insensitive of me," she whimpered, looking at Shamira's legs. "I'm SO sorry and --"

"Bunny, it's okay. The thing that's going to make it harder for me is if I know that everyone is walking on eggshells around me." She grabbed a pack of Hostess Twinkies out of the bag.

"So you're really okay? I know I shouldn't say this, but I could never deal with what you've gone through," Bunny said sadly. "I can barely handle one little-old gunfight without freaking out. I mean, I've done karate since I was like twelve, but --"

"But tournament fighting is different, right? I've heard that a lot. You just need some seasoning is all. And you're better at being a vampire than me by a long shot." Shamira ripped open her snack food. "You're not the one who got herself locked up for ignoring the boss. You aren't the one that pissed off just about everyone at one time or another."

"But that's because I just kind of go with the flow," Bunny said as the van started up again. "You . . . I mean, you just take on everything. And maybe you get moody or angry or piss some people off, but you always get back on the horse. Usually, you beat it into submission. And Clara loves you," she stammered a bit. "She doesn't even LIKE me --"

"She does too like you," Shamira said, her heart warming at what Bunny had said. "She may not want to, but she does," she added with a grin. "You and she are just very different personalities."

"You think so?"

"I'm pretty sure."

Bunny smiled. "You DO spend more time with her than anyone else. What's being in love like?"

"I . . . I really can't explain it," Shamira replied, getting on the highway. "It's new for me, and this is kind of my first time for it."

Bunny looked starry eyed. "A love virgin?" Her bottom lip actually trembled, and she lunged across the seats to hug the driver, almost sending them hurtling off the road.

"Bunny . . . need to drive!" Shamira said as she disentangling herself from her young partner.

They drove in relative peace for the next hour, but never in quiet. Bunny simply had no conversational off switch that Shamira could tell. Shamira felt this would have been a great girl to have slumber parties with back when she was younger, if anyone had ever invited her to such things.

Shamira pulled the van into the warehouse dictated by the van's navigation system. No sooner had she pulled up that the van was surrounded by Shane's people, some remote and some from the house. Yosyp and Sebastian were the first two to reach through the window and hug her. They did not say anything at first, and neither did she. She was tempted to cry a little though. She had been a pain in the ass to this house since she had arrived, but it was still home. These guys were family, even the ones she had known for less than a month.

She got into her wheelchair and wheeled to the side-door, finding Bangaly and a couple of Shane's remote personnel were standing there. Bunny got out of the car and gave the big black enforcer a hungry gaze. Shamira grinned. She and Bunny had talked some about what each woman most fantasized about if they could pull it off . . . sexually speaking . . . and Bunny's idea were quite elaborate, athletic, and involved a number of muscular Nubian gods and goddesses.

"So, who we got for transport?" Shamira asked.

Sebastian looked over at the van. "We'll get them loaded on and give you a manifest. This group is low level operatives for the most part. It took us a bit before we could get Banshee to stop killing the more important personnel."

"I heard she took . . . stuff . . . kind of personally."

"That's like saying that a hurricane is kind of windy." Sebastian hugged Shamira again.

"What's going on in Savannah?"

Bangaly sat down next to her on a stack of crates. "The enemy has gone to ground. He managed to sneak in supplies through the docks, but we have since closed that avenue of approach."

"Lacroix can hide out for months at least, even if he were at full staff," Yosyp added. "Which he is not."

Shamira felt better all of a sudden. Getting back to work was what she needed. "I really don't think Lacroix is the problem," she said, steel in her tone. "Jonas made it sound pretty clear that Lacroix is more like a figurehead. He and . . . that elf talked about him like a child or a dog that they had to keep track of."

"Regardless, Lacroix is a powerful warrior and if he's hyped up on morning star, he would still be dangerous."

"But what are they waiting for?" Shamira asked.

"I don't know," Sebastian said, standing behind her and rubbing her powerful shoulders. "I hate to say that he can't possibly win, but he CAN'T. He's surrounded, cut off from any source of supplies, cut off from finances, and no one is even remotely stupid enough to try and bust through the blockade. The guys from Florida and Alabama are looking to get in Shane's good graces thanks to his connections to the Tribunal, and they're pissed that this has been going on right under everyone's noses."

"I thought at least one or two of his men would have defected by now," Bangaly said in that deep, rich voice of his.

"Can he teleport out?" Shamira asked. "Magic?"

"No way. Even if he had anyone around who could cast something like that, there's no way to transport multiple people over large distances without one hell of a power source, and we've got the property warded on top of it all." Sebastian's hands were magical on Shamira's shoulders as he talked. "Face it, you're the only person who could cover any real distance anyway, and I'm willing to bet just about anything that they don't have a shadow jumper on their team."

She rubbed her temples, trying hard to remember something that Jonas had said in the bowels of the bleeding room. "Insurance policy."

"What?"

"Jonas mentioned something about an insurance policy," she replied softly, her mind attempting to go places that she never wanted to revisit.

Sebastian's hands slowed for a moment, but then started easing the tension in her neck. "Did he say what it was?"

"No. And even though he didn't see me as a threat, he didn't want me to hear him talk about it. What could they possibly have that would make them think they had a chance? What could they do? Are they all on the damn drug? No, Jonas seemed too rational."

Sebastian would have smiled if it weren't obvious how difficult it was for Shamira to relive her memories. Less than two weeks ago, she had been tortured unmercifully, and now she was here trying to reclaim what was stolen from her. Her life.

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Back in Atlanta . . .

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They crew had not had much success in divining Lacroix's (and by proxy Jonas's) plans, so Shamira and Bunny had hauled a load of prisoners back up to the house in Atlanta where the security team and the Representative's people took them into custody to "discuss" their wrongdoings. This time around, Shamira did not feel a great deal of sympathy for the captives, but Shane had still promised to be much easier on them than Daniel had been to her.

"Where IS Shane?" she muttered as the werelionesses Barbara and Kira . . . "Hey, your name is Kira!"

"So nice of you to notice," the supple blond noticed with a smirk.

"No . . . sorry, I mean . . . One of my donors is names Kira. I just . . . it's not THAT common of a name," she continued. "I'll stop talking now."

"It's okay. We haven't really had much chance to spend time together since we got here. Things have been . . . busy."

"Yeah, I suppose. I just feel so out of it."

THIS Kira roughly threw the last prisoner to the ground, then shoved her forward with one shapely leg. "You have had a lot on your mind. Oh, you mentioned Shane. He said he wanted to see you as soon as you got back. He's down in his studio."

'Crap,' Shamira thought. For once, she was not annoyed because she thought she was in trouble, but rather because Shane's "studio" mean that he was entertaining a submissive, which she was not sure she could handle despite her claims to Clara. It also meant navigating a wheelchair down a spiral staircase. "We really need an elevator," she muttered as she made her way into the house. She got to the door and found a note on it.

"Look with your Shadow Sight," she read aloud. She concentrated, peering through all the shadows of the house. At the bottom of the stairs, there was another wheelchair in the darkened antechamber just outside of Shane's playroom. That room itself was lit, so she saw nothing in it. Shamira rolled back to her chambers and parked her current chair in the bathroom, locking the door and turning out the light, then jumping downstairs to the waiting chair.

She rolled up to the door and started to knock, but Shane's voice telling her to come in cut her hand off before it even swung. So Shamira's hand came to gently rest on the door handle. She did not want to open that door. Yes, she did. Did she want to see what he was doing? No. Yes. Participate? She was not ready. But she wanted it. She opened the door, and her jaw almost fell off of her face.