Star Assassin Read online

  Star Assassin

  A Lori Adams Novel 01

  Author: D. R. Rosier

  Copyright 2018. This is a work of fiction. Names, Characters, Places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Afterword:

  Other erotic fantasies by D. R. Rosier:

  Non-erotic Fantasy titles:

  Book Description

  Chapter One

  It was a cold and miserable night in Portland, Oregon, with the rain and wind whipping against my body as I laid prone on the sixteenth-floor balcony of a hotel. I ignored it. It was uncomfortable, but also afforded me better cover. No one else would be going outside on the nearby balconies with this squall.

  Behind me, in the suite and on the bed laid James Winters. I shook my head at the brief thought of regret that I didn’t sleep with him first, not a good idea, especially on a job. Still, he’d been confident, respectful, and despite being about fifteen years older he was quite handsome. Under other circumstances, our brief time together would have been much different, and far more pleasant.

  I was rather picky with my one night stands, it was just that James had the misfortune to be my type but not on the right night. It wasn’t that I preferred one night stands to a relationship either, it was simply that I wasn’t allowed one. A relationship that is. And… a girl had needs.

  James was fine, asleep, and drugged to forget he’d ever met me. He’d wake up tomorrow morning a bit confused, and get on with his life. Or… he’d be answering questions he had no answers to, for the police. In truth, I doubted the authorities would successfully back trace the shot, but it was possible.

  I’d picked him up at the bar, or more accurately, I had allowed him to pick me up, to avoid any trail that could possibly lead back to me. Others at the bar might remember the older gentleman picking up a blonde at the bar, but I’d been wearing a wig. My real hair was light brown, and I’d already wiped off the caked on makeup, and removed the inserts I had in my cheeks to modify my face.

  In short, I wasn’t worried about it. This way was a much cleaner way of dealing with it, rather than trying to use a fake ID and check into the hotel myself. When I was done, there’d be no sign I was ever here. I even made sure to wipe down every place I’d touched, and had worn gloves ever since.

  A tremor went through my body and I clenched my teeth. Now wasn’t exactly the best time for that issue to rear its head. My target was due to leave any moment now from the building across the street, and just over a block away. I’d done my research on my target, John Burns was a real piece of work. Not that it mattered, I worked for a black ops group that didn’t officially exist. It didn’t even have a name that I was aware of, and I killed whoever they pointed me at. Luckily for my sense of justice, that usually turned out to be someone in desperate need of killing.

  But… not always.

  I considered reaching for the syringe in my bag, but dismissed it, I’d last long enough to do the job. I wasn’t exactly normal, more of a freaky genetic experiment really, and while the scientists had been mostly successful, I had issues. I’d long come to terms with that, it was who I was, and what I was.

  A perfect weapon.

  My proprioception was off the charts, my spatial awareness was without peer, and as a bonus they’d managed to make me a genius, as well as beautiful. I was as limber as a gymnast, and strong for a woman but not absurdly so. My beauty wasn’t the kind that would draw every eye in the room no matter what, that would be dangerous for a woman in my work, but with a little effort, and the right dress, I could easily do so, or I could choose to blend in and be just one more nameless face in the crowd.

  It was useful, for times when I needed to seduce my way into a hotel room. I looked like any nineteen-year-old on the cusp of twenty, long light brown hair, light brown eyes, long eyelashes and full lips. Attractive face, olive skin, but not without flaw. My body was athletic but still curvy enough to catch a man’s eye, or go unnoticed if I dressed in loose clothes.

  In short, the enhanced proprioception meant if I knew where it was, I could hit it with a knife or bullet without even looking. It wasn’t that I didn’t have to aim, it was more that I aimed the gun or thrown knife with my body. The enhanced spatial awareness meant I always knew what and who was around me at all times, even if I couldn’t see them, my other senses could map out a room and the positions other people were in. Which meant I always knew where stuff was.

  Those two abilities combined together were formidable.

  The strangest part of it, was my intuition was enhanced as well. I wouldn’t say I could see the future, but I was highly successful at guessing what my opponent would do next. My martial arts instructors had hated that, since it usually meant a short five foot seven slip of a girl was kicking their ass. Of course, I’d filled out since then.

  It wasn’t all perfect though. There was the downside to the genetic design which made me a perfect killer. Some kind of imbalance in my body chemistry, that led to tremors, which would eventually lead to full blown seizures. If it went on long enough, coma and death would follow. I had medicine from the doctors in the program that managed that issue, and I was regretting not taking care of it an hour ago when I still had time. When I took the shot of medicine, I knew I’d be worthless for a couple of minutes, as my body reacted violently to the shot. It wasn’t fun, but I accepted it. Not that I had a choice, it was either accept it or lay down and die.

  I was just nineteen years old, and had never been to school, forget the idea of me ever having any semblance of a normal childhood. I was a weapon, and I belonged to the United States government. Fortunately, I didn’t live in a lab anymore, I had my own apartment in sunny California, just outside of Los Angeles since I was sixteen, a nice house near the beach in Santa Monica. I was even able to get some hobbies and have somewhat of a semblance of a normal life, though relationships were forbidden, thus the one night stands.

  They shipped the drugs to me every month, and my bank account grew each time I took out a target. My targets came to me over twitter, using a complex code I had long ago memorized, I was able to translate rants against big brother into instructions on who I was to kill. The reason for my independence was obvious enough to me, even if they thought I didn’t know. If I was ever pinched, I’d be disavowed and sent to jail like any other independent assassin in the world.

  Except in my case, I’d die within a week without my drugs. Which is where the proverbial leash came in. I could never disappear and strike out on my own, not without knowing how to make the drugs. Sometimes I wondered if what the scientists had claimed to be a mistake, was also done on purpose, just like all the rest of my enhancements. A built-in control mechanism, and if I ever defied authority, they’d simply withhold the drug and let me die.

  In short, it was my life,
or the one given to me. I had no choice. It helped that John Burns was a crook, and had ties to terrorists. I had no qualms about killing men like that to keep myself safe.

  My greatest fear was that one day the black ops division I belonged to would be shut down, and the drugs would just stop. The last two years I’d been bending my genius mind towards biochemistry, in a secret lab I had in my basement, but so far, I had no idea how to make the serum. Although, I had been able to map out its molecular structure manufacturing it was a whole other issue to actually make it. If I ever figured it out, I’d retire and disappear.

  I looked through the scope, it was hard to see even with its light enhancing features, and the wind was a bitch. Still, the .338 slug was effective up to eighteen hundred yards away with this sniper rifle, the shot I had set up would only be about a hundred and eighty yards, even in the high winds I wouldn’t miss at so close a range, not with my intuition to help me out with the wind shear.

  My target stepped out of the restaurant, and I paused my exhale half way, then squeezed the trigger.

  Crack! Even with a silencer, the noise was loud. Still, over the wind and rain I doubted it was heard down on the street.

  The back of his head exploded like a watermelon at a Gallagher show.

  I calmly broke down the rifle and put it in the briefcase in pieces, careful to dry off each piece as it went in, with a light coat of gun oil. I went inside, and dropped the white robe on the floor, and dried off before I got dressed. I hadn’t wanted my clothes to be soaking wet. The towel, robe, and silver briefcase went in a duffel bag, and I walked out of the hotel room and toward the stairs. A teen with a duffel bag would be forgotten in moments, a teen girl with a large silver briefcase would have stood out in their minds.

  Everything went into the trunk of my car, which was two blocks away from the hotel, and I took my shot before I started south toward Los Angeles. My whole body trembled and shook, it was both painful and pleasurable at the same time, and I was unaware of my surroundings for several minutes.

  Several minutes every week was the only time I was completely vulnerable.

  It was a fourteen-hour drive to Santa Monica, not fun at all, but that was better than anyone knowing I’d been anywhere near Portland. As long as I followed the traffic laws, I’d be set. When I got home, I’d clean my rifle, and then put it in a hidden safe beneath the house. I’d prefer to eliminate all risks, but decided that was less of a risk than storing my toys elsewhere.

  As for the towel and robe, they’d disappear into a dumpster at a truck stop somewhere along the way.

  Plus, I’d just made a hundred grand, seemed worth the thirty-hour round trip drive, and a few hours in a hotel…

  Chapter Two

  I pulled my car into a homeless area of L.A. I’d mentioned I had hobbies, and this was one of them. I only got called on for my talents a few times a year, which left me a lot of time to kill. There was only so much television, book reading, and chemistry a girl could take. I couldn’t have relationships, and although I didn’t feel guilty about killing those that deserved it, I did feel like I should give back.

  I was hardly a saint, it was more boredom and this was an activity that was both good and would be underneath the radar of those that held my strings. No attachments, no relationships. It was a lonely life at times, but it was what it was. My only chance to escape it was to figure out the drug. Donating to a soup kitchen, or a homeless shelter, and handing out cheap jackets to the homeless was something I could do. It made me feel useful, while everything else I did made me feel selfish. In a way, I supposed it was still selfish, because it made me feel good about myself to help those even less fortunate than I.

  Everything else I did was about survival. The killing, the chemistry, and even the television and books were to keep me sane. I couldn’t just lay out on the beach all the time, though I admit it was something I did often.

  Well, almost everything, but a girl needed to scratch her itch every now and then too. Sometimes I wondered what it would be like to have a real relationship, but I couldn’t, so I’d have to settle for finding good sex on occasion. It was also why I usually chose older men. Men in their late twenties and in their thirties were usually a sucker for a pretty girl that still looked barely legal, plus they had more stamina, and better knowledge. For relationships, the age gap would be too much, but for good sex they were perfect, grateful, and very much not clingy when the night came to an end.

  I got off on a bit of a tangent there, but I was always horny as hell after a kill. I would wonder what that said about me, but I didn’t dwell on it. Jackets for the homeless.

  Even in winter in December and January, LA didn’t get much below fifty, but that was still cold enough if someone didn’t even have a jacket. It was late October now, so I thought a jacket giveaway would be well received. I also had several cases of bottled water. I usually did this once a month, except in the warmer months I’d do something different for them. Most women my age would worry about being in this part of town at dusk, but I didn’t worry about being attacked. I could meet any homeless threat, even without a weapon other than my hands and feet.

  So far, it’d never been an issue.

  I filled a large duffel bag full of them, and then headed toward the nearest people and started to hand them out. Not everyone accepted, and some flirted with me, but no one got out of hand.

  It was an hour later, and I’d moved my car and reloaded the duffel bag three times, when I found out a truth that should have been a joke, should have been laughable. A truth that deserved to be labeled as a nut job’s conspiracy theory.

  In the US alone, almost a million people a year are reported as missing.

  Thousands of those, are never seen or heard from again. They simply disappear and never come back. I was educated by my handlers, but I was also a genius and self-educated. I hadn’t given this mystery a lot of thought before. Cannibalism, murders from people who had a clue how to hide a body, and other rational explanations had occurred to me in the past, whenever I’d thought about the statistics for whatever passing reason.

  The truth was horrifying, and would have most shaking their heads in disbelief. The truth is these thousands that are never seen again, perhaps hundreds of thousands worldwide, are taken. I don’t mean by other humans either.

  It was just after I’d handed a nice old man a jacket, that the night sky was filled with light. I laughed at first, when I looked up at the bright oval light, that just hovered above us at several hundred feet. This had to be a hoax, right?

  Then I felt a thrumming through my body, and felt faint as I broke out in a sweat and my heart started to race. The part of me that held it together, identified it as some kind of sonic weapon. Then darkness…

  Chapter Three

  “Designation?” a harsh female voice asked.

  My skin felt clammy, and my head hurt. I felt like I’d been hit by a bus. I also wondered if I could have possibly just been abducted by aliens. I giggled, that wasn’t possible, was it?

  My second thought, was that I was going to die. I had no medication on me, and wondered how long I’d been out, it’d been three days since I’d taken the last shot in Portland, I only had four days to live if I couldn’t get out of this. My mind spun, my mouth was dry and nasty, and I felt dizzy.

  “What?” I brilliantly asked. Cut me some slack, I just woke up with the mother of all hangovers from whatever weapon that was, and I was quite possibly on an alien ship.

  “What is your designation?” the female voice repeated.

  “Lori, who the hell are you? And why do I feel like I’ve been wrung out. And… where are you?”

  Now that I could think, sort of, it sounded like the voice was close and omnidirectional.

  My full name was Lorelai Adams. I would swear the scientist that named me must have been addicted to Gilmore Girls.

  The female voice said, “I am your artificial assistant, and here to get you acclimated to your new life. I w
ill also perform translations for you in real time. Where I am, is inside your head in a bio-electric interface device. Welcome Lori, you are now a slave of the Stolavii.”

  I snickered, at least I knew who my enemy was, I’d start killing them as soon as we met. I took a look around, I was in a room with metal walls, and one door that looked quite secure. I was on a cot of sorts, and there was nothing else in the room. I was also dressed in a snug uniform of some type, it didn’t leave much to the imagination, but it was extremely comfortable.

  “Water?”

  Part of the wall extended out into the room, and water filled a small silver colored sink. I got up and put my hand against the wall as a wave of dizziness hit me. Then I walked over and sniffed the sink, no scent. I scooped the water with my hands, and licked it. It was cold, and water, so I drank.

  “Can you harm me?”

  She replied, “No.”

  I wasn’t sure if I could believe that or not, but I’d give her the benefit of the doubt, for now anyway. It wasn’t like I had a choice, she was inserted in my head.

  “What do I call you, and can you help me escape?”

  She said, “My designation is not set, you may call me what you wish. No, my function doesn’t allow for helping you escape. My function is to monitor your health and keep your body in peak condition. I am also your security access identification, only those consoles and systems the Stolavii decide you can access will respond to your touch, and will otherwise be locked out. I will also monitor your usage, and lock you out if I detect an action that would imperil your life or the lives of others.

  “I am also to keep track of your expenses and productivity, and report on that and inform you as well, so you can correct yourself. If your expenses exceed your productivity, you will be terminated by the Stolavii. If your production is high enough, there is a possibility of emancipation in a few hundred years.”

  I shook my head, this all felt so surreal.

  “Your designation is Ann. How long am I stuck in this room?”