Stealing Jia (Coletti Warlords #12) - Gail Koger Page 0,1

Mother of God! He had killed his own sister and no matter how many credits I stole for him, Salvatore wouldn’t hesitate to do the same to me. I quickly stepped into the waiting darkness and felt my way along the wall; grimacing when my hand touched mummified remains.

The beam of a flashlight played over frescos of forgotten Popes.

I ducked into a burial niche and tunneled beneath a long dead priest. His shadowy skull leered at me.

Salvatore called, “Come to me Jia and I will make your death an easy one.”

Sure he would, right after he raped me. I closed my eyes and silently prayed. Touch me, o Lord, fill me with your light and your hope. Cause I don’t want to die today. Dear God, please give me the strength to lie beneath this stinky-ass corpse. Give me the courage to face that monster. When evil darkens my world, give me light.

Salvatore’s flashlight swept over my hiding place.

Okay, forget the light. I froze as Salvatore stopped in front of my hiding place and made those horrible kissy noises. “Come bambina, no need to be afraid. I will make it good for you.”

Like I believed that.

“I can make your first time pleasurable or I can make it very painful. Come out now,” Salvatore commanded.

If I prayed hard enough, would God lead him into the catacombs? Maybe. But I couldn’t wait around for divine intervention. Before I could touch Salvatore’s mind a loud thunk reverberated down the passageway.

“Run little one, but I will catch you.” Salvatore moved away.

The nuns did say God worked in mysterious ways, but I never thought he’d use the rats. I took a cautious peek. The darkness swallowed Salvatore. I climbed out of the niche and ran into the night.

They found Mother Superior’s body the next day. A novice nun discovered the dead guy in her blood-soaked bed an hour later. The novice’s shrieks could have raised the dead. The ruckus brought all the sisters running. Ten minutes later, dozens of Polizia descended on the orphanage and when they located the bloody knife on Mother Superior’s corpse, they summoned the Bishop. The deaths were hushed up. The Polizia searched for Salvatore but he was never seen again.

His brother Matteo took over and nothing changed. I continued to steal and gained the nickname of La Veloce or the Flash. By the time I turned sixteen, I had saved enough money to leave the orphanage. I wanted to find out who I really was, and I was sick to death of stealing for Matteo.

Dodging Matteo’s goons, while trying to find a legitimate job, proved to be impossible. Sheer desperation drove me back to being La Veloce. I broke into Matteo’s headquarters, downloaded every document I could find on his organization and sent them to the Polizia. He’s doing life at Carcere Giudiziario, one of the worst prisons in Italy.

One of the chores at the orphanage had been helping Sister Sarah rescue injured animals. It was one job I loved. Critters were drawn to me. Why? I don’t know, but they helped ease my loneliness. With Sister Sarah’s assistance, I bought a small villa outside Rome and fulfilled her dream of running an animal sanctuary. It also allowed me to aid the street kids without drawing the Polizia’s attention. The children I gathered, became my family.

The dream of finding my clan had never wavered. In my heart, I knew my father was out there somewhere and one day I would find him. Then the Tai-Kok came and all my dreams died. The battle to survive changed me. I discovered my ability to manipulate electricity while fighting the monsters. I learned how to use it to kill. My talent to cloud minds worked on the Tai-Kok and Rodan too.

A part of me was envious of the tight knit Jones clan, the much-admired saviors of the world. What would it feel like to belong to a family like that? Pretty damn awesome. Another part of me couldn’t believe that halfwit Kaylee Jones had hooked up with a Coletti warlord. Her stunt brought Earth to the attention of Zarek, the Coletti Overlord. Once he discovered the Jones family’s unique psychic powers, and their blood’s ability to heal cellular damage, he promptly seized control of Earth.

The morons at Central Command decided an alliance with the Coletti Empire was a blessing from God himself. The Coletti warlords and their allies did do a great job of wiping the Tai-Kok from existence. But their protection came