dragonsdefenderâ:
Nowhere safer in Chinatown. Was anyone safe with the League? That was like trusting the Hand. You never let your guard down, it didnât matter if they were friendly with you, if they said they were going to let you walk away from a situation â chances were, there was no walking out of anything. And leading this woman into a place where sheâd likely get equal treatment that she was getting from the people who had tried to kidnap her in the first place?
He dodged the implications, and the woman beside them was none the wiser. And why would she be? Tarik had done nothing but show her kindness. Why would she look at him and think that she might be walking into a lionâs den? And Colleen, unfortunately, wasnât willing to rob this woman of the last ounce of hope she had in humanity, even if she couldnât bring herself to trust Tarik in any capacity.
(Maybe, just this once, sheâd be wrong. Heâd prove to them that he was good â that underneath all the bullshit, he wasnât the terrible person that Colleen assumed he was.)
If she didnât know better, she would say that Tarikâs words sounded like a threat. But once again, it sounded innocent to the woman beside them. She was nodding her head, looking at Colleen with a newfound hope in her eyes â like the end of the worst day of her life was rapidly approaching and sheâd be home by sundown. But would she? Colleen had lured enough people into the Hand and other places to know that even people who wanted to help might not lead her where she needed â or wanted â to be.
Tarik was gone and Colleen immediately started weighing her options. Was it worth it to fight Tarik in broad daylight? Or should she give him a chance? (And could she make a choice one way or another when this woman was looking at Tarik like he was some kind of goddamn hero?)
Five minutes.
That was all the time she had to decide.
âLetâs go,â Colleen said. She had only needed a few seconds to decide.
Five minutes.
Colleen took the long way. Carefully helping the woman duck out of eyesight and then to the safety of the doorstep of the safe house that Tarik claimed was safe. âAnyone inside?â
He half-expected them not to show up. Wing was no fool, after all--she had been in the Hand. She knew first hand the way that men showed up as wolves in sheepâs clothing, the way safety was dangled like a carrot to coax people down into something they didnât fully understand. Sheâd worked with one too many people who acted like him and been stabbed in the back for her trouble, and now sheâd made herself responsible for someone else, too.Â
But she shows up anyway, four a half minutes later, at the doorstep of his safehouse. Itâs a show of trust he knows isnât easy. But sheâs a hero--or tying to be, at any rate, and optimism comes with the territory.Â
âNope. My guys donât stay around here, usually.â He gestured the two of them inside, closing the door after the two women. The inside of the safe house is simplistic--most are wont to be, after all, meant to be easy to torch if need be, and the Leagueâs own aesthetic tendencies lend to simple arrangements. But itâs clean, and looks perfectly unassuming at first blush. ( The whole thing is rigged to blow, if itâs ever necessary, and thereâs a veritable armory hidden throughout the house, well out of sight. ) âThereâs a bedroom down that hall with a shower and some clean clothes if you want to change,â he told the woman warmly. âWe can figure out how to do whatever it is you want to do after you feel a little better. Iâll cook something up for you, too--I know adrenaline crashes always make me hungry.â When the woman disappeared down the hall, Tarik turned his attention back to Colleen. âMy mom always used to tell me that if I kept scowling, my face was gonna freeze like that. Might be too late for you, but better late than never.âÂ










