Thieving Women Always Lose

  THIEVING WOMEN ALWAYS LOSE

  TALES OF THE UNDEAD & DEPRAVED

  ADRIAN J. SMITH

  EREKA PRESS

  Copyright © 2022 by Adrian J. Smith

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover by MiblArt

  CHAPTER 1

  The smooth white pill left a chalky texture as it slid down Jerry’s throat. The thing was barely bigger than a squash seed, but it was all she needed to keep her head in the game to get more. Gripping the wooden wheel tightly, her knuckles white, she spun it hard to starboard, her small ship turning through the air under her skilled command as they hovered meters above the poisoned sea.

  Azar stood at the second wheel, his tall, muscular form holding firm, steering with her as they maneuvered Yarrow. Jerry’s heart pattered a steady thrum as she followed the ship in front of them at close range. The sleek white medical vessel was rumored to have exactly what she wanted.

  Gritting her teeth, she took a sharp turn to port when the vessel they followed tried to out-maneuver them. If Jerry’s mouth hadn’t been so dry with the flavor of ass, she would have laughed. She was one of the best self-taught pilots out there, and she had been flying the seas far longer than any pilot who had gone through the government’s training program.

  Azar grunted when something in their engine chugged loudly before sputtering. Scrunching her nose, Jerry scanned the dash to see if she could quickly figure out what had made the noise and if they were going to be able to continue the chase. She didn’t want to lose another shipment of drugs. She needed them. Hell, her crew needed them more.

  “What is it?” Jerry called to Azar, knowing he was staring at the same readouts she was.

  “Don’t know yet. Hoping a loose screw.”

  “Screw loose.” Jerry sneered. A screw had been loose in her head since she was conceived. Hats off to her mother for that one. “We can’t lose them.”

  “Pick up speed.”

  Jerry leaned forward and gripped the thruster, forcing Yarrow’s engine to work overtime. Again, the medical vessel tried to twist out of their way, but Jerry easily followed them. “Do they think they’re really going to get away?”

  “How are you going to board them?”

  “Wait until they’re dead in the water.”

  “Chase them until they run out of steam? What if we run out first?”

  Cursing, Jerry glanced at their fuel stores. They didn’t have much left. They’d gotten the tip on a whim when they were working their regular job, and she hadn’t waited a second to call her crew of two back so they could take a shot at finding exactly what they needed. “Fine. Get on top then, and I’ll jump.”

  “You’re insane. If you miss—”

  “Then I guess you’ll get to be captain.” Jerry turned Yarrow, guiding her ship above the medical vessel and bearing down. It forced them to slow their speed since they had no idea what she was planning. Jerry ordered, “Take the helm.”

  Goal One—get on the ship.

  Swishing her black leather jacket behind her, Jerry raced out to the deck then the edge of her ship. She looked down, her stomach in knots as she stared at the distance below her.

  “Shit.”

  “Shit is right!” Azar’s voice reached her from the wheelhouse.

  Jerry jerked around to glare at him through the front window. She would never live this down if he was right. “Lower us down!”

  Azar did as he was told, even though she knew he disagreed with her. She was the captain, and he worked for her, her second only because she allowed it. It had been much that way for the last year since they’d become infected with the virus that was the bane of her very existence. Gritting her teeth, Jerry leaned over the edge of Yarrow and held on as tight as she could to a rope.

  When they got closer, she let go, pushed off the ledge with her feet and spread her arms and legs out as she dropped. Her stomach rose into her throat, and it was next to impossible to take a deep breath. Clenching her jaw, Jerry waited to be able to reach the boom of the medical vessel below her, flying through the air. She thanked the heavens they hadn’t moved or jerked to the side yet.

  She wrapped her arms and then her legs around the large boom, sliding down it to the first lookout for the mast that was never used anymore. At one point in the past, it had been useful. Now it was just for show. Jerry relaxed in relief as her feet touched the surface. She’d made it.

  Ignoring the fact that Azar would likely yell at her for it later, Jerry flipped over the lookout and jumped to the main deck of the medical ship. As she stood up, she grabbed her gun in her left hand and her short sword in her right. She didn’t hesitate as she dug her boots into the white deck and ran for the wheelhouse.

  Goal Two—take control of the ship.

  Two officers guarded the wheelhouse. Jerry kicked open the side door and pointed her gun at one and her sword at the other.

  “Surrender and you’ll live.” Cocking her head to the side, she gave them each a hard, determined look.

  One put his hands up, but the other continued to maneuver the ship, losing Azar for a brief second, but Jerry trusted him to find his way back to her. In the past year, they hadn’t been just crew mates. They had become family. Jerry trusted him and his sister, Yafe, with her life.

  Jerry fired her gun, shooting the captain in the shoulder. He collapsed onto the ground just as the other one came at her. Ducking down, she swiped her sword across his belly and sliced into his skin. He cried out, falling to the deck. Glancing around, Jerry found a rope and tied them quickly so they couldn’t move, though she’d have to go back and make sure it was better as soon as she had a minute.

  She grabbed the thruster and jerked it hard, stopping the vessel dead only feet above the water. Azar brought Yarrow around and tied the two ships together while Jerry went belowdecks, knowing Yafe would follow soon.

  Each person she met was medical, and instead of fighting, they put up their hands and surrendered. She tied them as she went, Yafe joining in and taking the deck below. The ship was filled with patients and medical staff. The tip they’d received hadn’t been about a large shipment of drugs, only a small one, but it would be enough to help her crew last a week—maybe two if they were able to stretch it out and not take as much.

  That chalky flavor of ass in her mouth was a strong reminder of exactly what she was looking for. As the tension calmed from the initial sting of attack, Jerry rolled her shoulders. They brought everyone topside and lined them up. Yafe watched over them, walking back and forth with two guns holstered on her hips and one in her hand.

  She had changed so much in the last year. They all had. The lessons Yafe and Jerry had learned while in Joab, a supposed rehabilitation center for criminals, came in very useful since the world had turned on them. Azar came aboard after tying the vessels together. His dark skin glistened in the fading sunlight as he eyed Jerry.

  “We’re going to need a new manifold.”

  “Fuck,” she muttered. Turning to Yafe, she nodded at her. “You good here?”

  “Yeah, Cap.”

  “Good.” Jerry jerked her head toward the wheelhouse while staring at Azar. “Come with me.”

  Goal Three—find the fucking drugs.

  They went through every single room, combing through to find the drugs rumored to be on the ship. They found nothing. Her heart ached at the thought of all that work for zero results. At least they could pillage what they could from the rest of the ship, but without those drugs, they wouldn’t have long to enjoy what they reaped.

  In one of the medical storerooms belowdecks, Jerry kicked a cabinet door shut as anger boiled in her belly. What the fuck was it all for anyway? Sometimes she wondered if it would be better to die than to live, but the thought of death scared the living daylights out of her.

  Azar leaned against the doorframe. “Nothing.”

  “Same here.” She wrinkled her nose. “Take what we need and what we can sell. I’m going topside to see if I can wring it out of one of them.”

  Azar said nothing as Jerry stalked out of the room. She left him to work as she climbed the steep stairs level by level until she reached the wheelhouse and went out again. They were outside the border of Raegina, meaning the authorities had no jurisdiction there. Jerry found the captain and put her sword under his chin, raising his gaze so he had to look at her as he cowered while bleeding from his shoulder.

  “Where are you coming from?”

  He didn’t speak.

  “Where are you going? I assume Raegina.”

  The captain didn’t respond, just stared at her blankly. But the first officer’s eye twitched, which told Jerry he might be the better of the two to interrogate. Still, she stayed with the captain, really hoping she wouldn’t have to kill him in order to get the information she wanted.

  “Why bring them to Raegina? It’s not like our healers are any better than healers elsewhere.”

  “We’re going home.” A small woman, with bright blonde curls and bright baby blue eyes stared up at her. She was young, far too young to be traveling on her own, especially with what the world had become. Though before the virus raged, women rarely traveled alone even though they had the same right to do so as men did.

  Jerry spun on the toes of her
boots. “Home? From where?”

  “Potelia.” The woman looked scared, but she was answering questions, which Jerry appreciated.

  She hated the scoundrel she’d become–hardened, thieving, nothing better than what she’d been born into–no matter how hard she’d tried to escape that role of her life. An unsightly creature to the bone. “Where is the vestigen?”

  The captain’s face didn’t change, but the woman’s did. One of the healer’s eyes widened, and he shook his head as he softly spoke, “We don’t have any.”

  “I know you do. Don’t lie to me.”

  “We don’t.”

  Jerry jerked her wrist, digging the edge of her sword into the captain’s jugular. She could so easily kill him. One swift flick of her hand and he’d be lying at her feet, bleeding out. She could leave these people stranded, with nothing, with no hope of getting home to Raegina. Except, she wouldn’t do that.

  Pursing her lips, Jerry walked over to the healer who had spoken. “I know you have some.”

  “We don’t,” he whispered. “I swear. We didn’t bring any because no one here was infected.”

  Tightening her grip on her sword, Jerry eyed Yafe, giving her a silent jerk of her head. The two of them walked toward the wheelhouse, lowering their voices so no one could overhear them.

  “What if he’s telling the truth?” Yafe asked, her sweet voice filled with worry.

  “I suspect he is about the vestigen. I doubt he is about no one being infected,” Jerry answered. “Go help Azar. We’re taking what we can sell but keep looking for the vestigen. I want it if they have it.”

  “Are you going to leave them?”

  “I haven’t decided yet, but I won’t kill them.”

  Goal Four—steal what they could to survive longer.

  Yafe reached up and squeezed Jerry’s arm, a silent gesture of approval before she vanished belowdecks to help her brother. Jerry stayed put, crossing her arms and leaning against the wall as she stared at each of them in turn. Some of them looked so scared but the trained officers didn’t. They were as bad as the authorities, thinking they had all the power in Penum to do whatever they wanted.

  Jerry watched the captain for any sign he might try something. She suspected he wouldn’t. The training had changed since the virus rampaged through their planet. The protocol now was not to fight, especially if they had nothing to lose. And he had put up very little resistance.

  The woman with blonde curls moved, shifting in her seat on the hot deck. Jerry swore her eyes turned a cold steel-blue instead of baby blue, that her face morphed from round to longer and thinner, her lower lip plump and her upper lip thin. She was so small sitting there, wrapped in the traditional garb for a coming-of-age woman that would no doubt be too hot to wear topside for long.

  Jerry swallowed, blinked, and closed her eyes while drawing in a deep breath. It wasn’t her. This woman may look like her, but she wasn’t. She was someone else entirely. Her hair wasn’t long enough. Her face was round, not thin. She was far too young, younger than Jerry herself instead of more than a decade older. And even sitting, Jerry could tell she was far taller than her Arloa.

  Opening her eyes again, Jerry stared straight at the woman, seeing her for who she truly was. Not Arloa. She just had to keep reminding herself of that. Azar and Yafe went back and forth taking crates of what they wanted to keep and bringing them on board Yarrow.

  It took close to two hours before Yafe stopped and whispered, “We’re nearly done. Still no sign of the vestigen.”

  “All right. Tell me when you’re done, and tell Azar to knock out the ship so it can’t move.”

  “Got it.”

  Jerry stayed put, eyeing her captives. They didn’t move or speak, but the woman kept oscillating before her, changing from the one who was there to the one Jerry wanted to see. She had to stop doing that, she had to see her for who she truly was.

  Perhaps the sun and lack of vestigen and water in her own blood stream was affecting her. She’d taken a pill, but it had been her first one in days as she’d tried to ration their store, and still she couldn’t function without it. Glowering, Jerry held her place as she watched them.

  Eventually, Yafe reemerged. “This is the last, Cap.”

  “Take it over.”

  Yafe did as she was told, the beautiful woman always loyal even to the point of Jerry’s dragging her into piracy from the life track she’d been on. They’d both been on it, actually. Legal work, a ship all her own, no hints of ever going back to Joab. Jerry was pretty sure if she was caught now, she’d be skipping Joab and going straight to the death chamber.

  Azar showed up next, his hands covered in grease as he wiped them on a cloth. Jerry pursed her lips and looked up into his dark eyes. “Take the manifold by chance?”

  “Of course, Cap.”

  She loved that they could think like that, without words, and that they were on the same page. It made living, working, and stealing that much easier. “Get home then.”

  Azar left, and Jerry was on her own with the captive crew. She did hate to leave them so absolutely stranded, but her crew needed the time to escape, especially if that odd noise had been the manifold malfunctioning. Jerry straightened her spine, squared her shoulders, and walked the line, staring at each of them as she figured out which one she was going to untie. She’d already made up her mind, however, if she truly thought about it.

  As soon as the woman had spoken, Jerry had known she would be the one. She reminded her too much of Arloa to leave her stranded in the heat with no hope of escaping it quickly. Jerry walked back down the line of captives, then up it again, giving Azar the time he needed to untie Yarrow and get her ready to leave.

  When she heard Yarrow’s engines hum more forcibly, Jerry bent down in front of the young woman. She was at least twenty years younger than Arloa, only a few years younger than Jerry herself.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Whitney.” Her eyes were a definite baby blue, not steel-blue, no hints of gray and black flecks in there.

  Jerry nodded at her. “You’ve shown real resilience today.”

  Swiftly pulling her sword, Jerry held it to Whitney’s chin much like she had the captain’s, only she didn’t push in. She didn’t want Whitney to feel as though she was truly threatened. She would be scared enough after what had happened today.

  “Which is the reason I’ve chosen you to save this lot.”

  Jerry brought the sword down, cutting the rope at Whitney’s wrists and ankles. She stood up as Whitney stayed planted exactly where she was, her eyes wide as she stared up at Jerry. Sliding her sword into its sheath, Jerry backed away with her hands out to her sides and toward the far end of the ship where Yarrow was still docked waiting for her.

  “Don’t make me regret it.”

  Turning on a dime, Jerry raced for the edge of the vessel. She stepped up on the ledge and launched herself over it, landing squarely on Yarrow’s deck. Without waiting, Azar took Yarrow up and above the medical ship and flew straight south, back to where they had originally come from. Jerry went belowdecks, cleaning her sword on the edge of her jacket as she went to the galley, the place they always seemed to gather when they had down time.

  Azar wasn’t as good a pilot as Jerry, but they had a routine. They’d done this so many times in the last year that they knew what each of them needed. Yafe sat at the table, going through some of the smaller items they’d brought on board and taking an inventory. Jerry swiped a cold drink, downing half of it and getting rid of that awful ass flavor that was stuck on her tongue.

  She stared down at what Yafe was inventorying. “That at least made it worth it.”

  “Jumping off the side of the ship was quite a risk.”

  Jerry raised a single eyebrow in Yafe’s direction. “And an adventure.”

  “You don’t have to be so close to death to feel, you know. There are other ways—”

  “Yafe,” Jerry said, a warning in her tone. “We’re already close to death. We’re barely alive.”

  “But we are alive.”

  “You can believe whatever you like. But we’re not living.”

  “Perhaps you aren’t, but I’m not really sure you want to.”

  Jerry paused. Where had the meek woman she’d met in Joab all those years ago gone? The world had hardened her. Hell, the virus had hardened them all, which only proved Jerry’s point. They weren’t living anymore. They were surviving, and even then Jerry had to wonder what world it was they wanted to survive for. There wasn’t much left.