Her frown deepened. “Come with me.” She hurried us not through the parlor door, but through another more heavily fortified one behind the counter. It led to their office, and to the stairs leading to their suite above the shop.
The office was, as usual, a cluttered mess. A familiar face looked up from his desk as we entered. “Mini got tracked,” she said to her husband, Wally.
His look of welcome faded in an instant to one of concern. “That’s a problem.”
“Can’t you dig it out?” I asked.
“The new ones explode if messed with,” he said. “Know someone who got taken out by one two days ago.”
I swallowed. This wasn’t good news. I’d like my butt to be smaller, but not evaporated.Thank you, scaly bastards.
“We can try a blocker.” Wally’s eyes dropped to my breasts as if hoping the tag was shot into one of them. It was a good guess, as they were at least as prominent as my butt. “No guarantees it will work if they come close, but it’s the best I can do.”
“Do it,” I said. I had no intention of letting them get close, ever again.
“It’s not cheap,” he hedged.
The price he named would clean out a good chunk of my savings. My heart sank. That money was earmarked for getting me off this planet, but I couldn’t do that anyway if Drakes were tracking me.
“I’m sorry,” Maisie said.
“Can’t be helped.” These two had been good to me over the years, but nothing in this life came for free. “Go ahead.” I lifted my cloak and then my shirt to get to my money belt. I extracted the right amount and gave it to him.
This had turned out to be a very expensive night.
“The Drakes also saw through the eartag,” I stated as he rose and placed the money in his safe.
“How close were they to you?” Wally asked.
I swallowed. “Pretty close.”
He glanced at me. “You were lucky. Nothing stands up if they are within thirty feet of you. The real tags have special magnetic chips inserted that the Drakes can sense. I can’t duplicate those.”
Well, that would have been good to know ahead of time.
Wally dug around in a drawer and approached with a tiny disk of metal. “I’ll place this over top of the tracker. It will distort the signal, at least at a distance. Now, where did they nail you?”
I gritted my teeth. His eyes widened when I told him. Maisie’s lips pulled straight.
“You’ll have to bend over the desk,” she stated as she swept papers and other junk off a corner, and then surveyed her husband with narrowed eyes.
He swallowed and stood back as I pushed my fake tail to the side and tentatively lowered my leggings just enough to expose my ass cheek. Leaning over the desk corner, I presented my butt to him.
There was a frozen kind of silence as he maneuvered into position. The best vantage point was directly behind, but that put him between my legs in a rather classic dog humping orientation…
My face flamed as Maisie cleared her throat and he moved to stand beside me instead. He dipped a cotton swab into alcohol and wiped away the blood. It stung, and his fingers were shaking.
The injector Wally used to numb the area also stung, particularly as he seemed reluctant to touch me in order to brace it. I kept my eyes closed as he worked. A few minutes, no more, passed before he lifted the ancient cell regenerator he’d set on the desk beside me, and pressed it to my skin.
“All done.” One trembling hand smoothed the skin over the wound.
“I suggest you stop fondling her ass,” Maisie said through gritted teeth.
The hand rapidly withdrew. When I slid off thedesk and yanked up my leggings, I deduced that his face was as red as my own. Maybe a little sweatier, though.
His voice was hoarse as he stated, “The disruptor will last about three months and then need to be replaced.” I noticed he was studiously avoiding looking at his wife.
“Thanks, Wally,” I said.
