Free Riding Shotgun (Mercenaries 3) by Anne Kane Page A

face was all hard angles and planes, with a faint scar running down one side of his temple. She could feel hard muscles pressing into every inch of her. There wasn’t a single soft spot on his entire body. Was he enhanced? One of the soldiers they’d fed those experimental drugs to during the provincial wars? That would explain how he’d managed to sneak up on her without her hearing him.
    As she watched, a mischievous light danced in the depths of his eyes. He certainly didn’t seem to think she was much of a threat. Maybe she could use that to her advantage
    “Looks like we’re going to join the party. Up you get.” He surged to his feet with an innate grace that told her he’d kept up his training after the wars. Holding out a hand to help her up, he still managed to keep that rifle pointed directly at her.
    “Fine. Let’s get moving.” She ignored the outstretched hand and stood. “Can I have my rifle back now, please?”
    “Has sentimental value, does it?”
    “Yeah.” She smiled sweetly. “I’ve killed three assholes with it so far, and it’s itching to loose a bullet on the fourth.”
    Shotgun snorted. “I think I’ll hang on to it for now.” Scooping the weapon up, he slung it across his back and gestured for her to move out.
    She would have been shocked and just a little bit disappointed if he’d actually given her the rifle. No decent soldier would be that naïve. She eyed up the path she’d used to climb up here, but an imp of mischief made her reject it. Let’s see how good that training was. Ignoring him and his rifle, she proceeded to follow the most difficult route to the valley floor.
    It took them twenty minutes of fancy footwork and a couple of controlled skids before they reached the bottom. She had to grudgingly admire the way he managed to keep up while carrying both of the rifles, one of them trained on her. The next time she managed to land herself in a fight she wouldn’t mind having him at her back.
    Shotgun was right behind her as she marched into the middle of the clearing. Heads swiveled and she saw more than one jaw drop in shock. She hadn’t been in close contact with any of her sisters since that last day in the labs, and they’d probably consigned her to the list of unfortunates who hadn’t made it out. She’d told herself it was better that way.
    Much as she wanted to forget, the memory of those labs was engraved on her mind. The scientist running them was truly mad. He convinced the government he could create super soldiers out of ordinary people. So, they gathered up a bunch of disposable kids for him to experiment on. She was one of the unfortunate children, as were most of the people in this clearing. In her case, the weird and extremely painful experiments had given her an affinity for anything mechanical. There wasn’t a car, a bike, or any other mode of transportation that didn’t respond positively to her touch.
    He’d expected her to be grateful. He’d expected them all to be grateful to him for the pain and suffering he inflicted on them. He’d watch them sometimes, while his assistants tortured them, his face as expressionless as if he were looking at a bug under a microscope. She still got cold shivers when she thought about his face.
    Some of the kids turned on their tormentors and others just refused to do what they were told. Add that to the fact that the costs were astronomical, it was no wonder the government decided to pull the plug on the program. The boys were put in the military where the government could keep an eye on them.
    The girls though, were a different matter. They had an unfortunate tendency to think for themselves, and when their hormones kicked in at puberty, their reaction to situations became wildly unpredictable. There was some concern that they might never be controllable so the government decided it would be best to terminate them all.
    Luckily for her and the other girls, that plan had gone extremely poorly for the powers