Don't Be a Hero: A Superhero Novel Read Online Free PDF Page B

couldn’t own the space inside a building, not really. The night belonged to the shadows, and the shadows belonged to Niobe.
    Niobe signalled with her fingers and crept forwards. Solomon’s footsteps came behind her, only slightly louder than hers. Battle Jack would’ve been useless in this line of work. He tended to get confused when confronted with a situation he couldn’t either punch or shag his way out of.
    Bed springs creaked. Niobe threw out a hand, gesturing for Solomon to stop, but he already had. Something scraped against carpet in the next room.
    Niobe padded silently to the corner of the hotel lounge. We were so quiet . She’d once had an entire fist fight with Black Collar five feet from two of his security guards, and they’d never heard a whisper. So how the hell had this guy heard them?
    A walking stick appeared from the open bedroom door and rested on the carpet, followed a moment later by a foot.
    “I know you’re there,” the man said, “so your options are to leave or try to fight me.”
    The accent was American, educated. Interesting. Not many Americans came out to this part of the world. Not since the AAU was formed, anyway. She breathed, calming her heart.
    The man took another step out. He saw the Carpenter first, silhouetted as he was against the balcony doors.
    “Well?” the man said. He spread his legs and raised his cane.
    Niobe flicked on the lamp in the corner of the living room. The man squinted and blinked against the sudden glare, but he didn’t let his guard down. His hands didn’t even shake. Doubly interesting.
    She put him in his sixties. His cheeks sagged and the top of his head held nothing but liver spots. The little hair he did have clung to the sides of his head, a ring of black and grey. He hunched a little as he stood, but not, apparently, from fear.
    “You’ve got keen ears, Frank,” Niobe said from the corner, recalling the name Gabby had given her. “Or is it Mr Frank?”
    The man kept his walking stick aimed at the Carpenter. Solomon could rip that stick from the man’s hand and beat him round the head with it, but he wouldn’t. Not unless the man attacked first.
    Frank’s startlingly blue eyes caught a flash of light. “What is this? Have you come for me too, now?” He was soft-spoken, but his voice didn’t tremble.
    “We haven’t come for anybody,” Solomon said. “We hear you’ve got a missing person.”
    Niobe nodded. “We’re in the business of finding missing people. Amongst other things.”
    Frank narrowed his eyes a little, his gaze darting between them. “You’re metas?”
    “Nah,” Solomon said. “We’re a pair of wandering freelance circus clowns. You don’t like the outfits?”
    “I’m Spook,” Niobe said, “and the smart-arse is the Carpenter.”
    “The Carpenter,” the man said. He lowered the stick a fraction. “I remember your name.”
    Solomon grinned at that, but she cut him off before he could get too excited. “Time’s an issue here, Mr Frank.”
    “Frank,” he said. “Just Frank. Frank Julius.” He dropped the cane to his side, but he didn’t seem to put much weight on it.
    “Frank, then,” she said. “We like to stay under the radar. That means we want to be gone before dawn. Now, do you have a case for us? Or were we mistaken?”
    He studied them for a moment, then turned his gaze to the purple veins running across the backs of his hands.
    “The people I talked to said they would get the word out,” Frank said. “I just expected a little more notice.”
    “And miss all this fun?” she said.
    The man frowned. “Couldn’t you have called first?”
    “That’s what I keep telling her,” the Carpenter said. “But does she listen?”
    “What my partner means to say,” she said, shooting him a look, “is that we like to know who we’re dealing with. Keeps us safe.”
    The man nodded slowly. He seemed to be weighing his options. It didn’t surprise Niobe. He looked out of his element, conducting