All Roads Lead to Hell *Matt Murdock* (book three of Damned-3a)

5) Royal Dragon

The peculiar group of four people – a lawyer, a PI, an ex-con and a poor excuse for a businessman – stumbled into a Chinese restaurant. It sounded like a beginning of a joke, but no one was laughing. Especially not the owner of the restaurant who had closed the door behind his last customers, turning the sign to read 'closed' just few moments ago.

"We're closed!" he announced to the four people who had stumbled in.

"We need to kill the lights," the man with a scarf over his face pointed out, immediately earning a response from the only woman who had arrived with the group.

"How do you even know they're on?!"

"I said we're closed!" the owner repeated, nervous about the strange visitors.

"Look, we just need to stay out of the streets..." the blond explained as if it made the situation better. The scarf man drew the blinds.

"Then do it somewhere else! I'll call the cops."

"You can't do that, you'll put them in danger," the big black man interjected, causing the owner to snap.

"I'll put YOU in danger!"

"Duh. I'm done explaining this," the woman lost her patience as well, grabbing a cabinet at the windows, tipping it over and blocking the entrance. Only two of five people in the room looked honestly shocked at that.

"Whoa, she's very strong..."

"Sir, this is for your protection. We need this place to look closed," the scarf man explained.

At this point, the poor excuse for a businessman finally figured out he could use some of his skills and started negotiating with the owner in a different language. Hearing his mother tongue, the man actually started listening.

"You speak Chinese?!"

Just to be a show-off, the blond responded the woman in Chinese indeed.

"I still hear neon," the scarf man announced.

"Who hears neon?!" the black one wondered, not following.

"My blind and definitely more than just a lawyer..." the woman he knew – Jessica Jones – told him as if it explained something.

"Your what? What do you mean he's blind?"

"He just is... don't ask. I thought he was spying on me for some freaky reason, but now I'm not sure."

"Well, do you think he's on our side?" the big man – Luke Cage – demanded. Jessica gave him a look that spoke a thousand words, most of them being colourful curses.

"Our side of what?"

Luke had no response to that.

"Who's karate kid?" she asked, beckoning to the Chinese-speaking wannabe businessman.

"Danny Rand."

"Boy billionaire?"

"He's little off in the head, but he packs a mean right hook when it counts..." Luke admitted, a smile creeping to his face.

"So do you," Jessica smirked. The chemistry between them – either friendly or romantic kind – was undeniable. They clearly had a history.

"You okay?"

"Now, or in general?"

"Both."

"Well, I'm alive," she summed up, rather not going into details. She wasn't fond of what she would reveal. "You?"