Dark Queen’s Quest

by I. T. Lucas

  38

  Yamanu

  With his distinctive appearance, Yamanu wasn’t the best man for a recon job, but then he had tricks up his sleeve that humans could only dream about.

  Not the good kind of dreams, though. Nightmares about the invisible boogeyman were more likely.

  The thing was, he couldn’t vanish from sight while someone was watching him, and everyone in his vicinity was doing that.

  It took him a while to find an isolated spot with no joggers in sight, and the moment he did, Yamanu cloaked himself in a shroud, sound and smell included.

  As far as humans were concerned, it was as if he entered a bubble of nothingness. The only exception to that was if someone bumped into him. But that wasn’t a problem either. First of all because he was careful to skirt any passersby, and second because he could thrall the bumper to forget that he or she had hit an invisible man.

  Shrouded, he went back to where Mey was getting ready for her shoot and sat on a bench across from the spot.

  It was fun watching her unawares.

  She was a little tense, probably because of the possibility of someone following her, but other than that she was friendly and easygoing with her crew of two, and they seemed fond of her.

  Not that it was a big surprise.

  Mey was awesome. She didn't have an ounce of prima donna in her, which for a beautiful woman like her was uncommon. Especially one who was a bona fide beauty queen and worked as a model. Not only that, Mey was the most understanding and accepting person he’d met.

  Most women would have been weirded out by his celibacy vow, or would have asked a ton of questions, but she’d asked only one, accepted his answer at face value, and hadn’t walked away.

  As the sense of someone focusing on Mey filtered through Yamanu’s awareness, he had to stop his pleasant musings and concentrate on the job he’d come to do.

  There was no malicious intent in that focus, so it could have been just someone stopping to look at a beautiful woman getting her pictures taken, but just in case that was about to change, Yamanu went on high alert.

  Scanning the area, he couldn’t see the watcher and wondered whether the guy was using a scope. It was a man, that much was obvious, and his focus on Mey was tinged with a dose of attraction, but it was mild and not something to cause Yamanu’s hackles to rise.

  Still, when several moments passed and that focus hadn’t wavered, Yamanu pushed to his feet and went to investigate.

  Circling the shoot area, he checked the bushes and trees, but there was no one hiding nearby. Walking in ever increasing circles, Yamanu added his nose to the search, but there were so many different smells around that it proved to be of little use.

  Regrettably, the sense of someone watching Mey wasn’t the kind that increased with proximity, so the only way to catch the watcher was to spot him.

  Yamanu got lucky when the cloud cover cleared, letting the sun through. For a moment, the angle was just right to bounce off a lens someone was using about five hundred feet away.

  Breaking into a jog, Yamanu closed the distance in two minutes. The guy was sitting up in a tree and watching Mey through a scope that had a mic attached to it.

  What he hoped to hear through that was questionable. Yamanu’s super hearing could pick up some of the conversation, but other noises interrupted.

  Perhaps the guy wasn’t trailing Mey but was there for another reason, and he just happened to spot her and couldn’t take his eyes away?

  Easy to find out.

  Yamanu didn’t even have to climb the tree and touch the guy to do that. He could reach into his mind from where he stood. Which was good because he wasn’t sure the branch the dude was sitting on was strong enough to hold both of them.

  Besides, if the guy was there to do some bird watching and had stumbled upon Mey by chance, there was no reason to wrestle him down and scare the shit out of him.

  It was a free country and watching a woman in a park wasn’t a criminal offense.

  Except, when he reached into the guy’s mind and tuned into his thought stream, it quickly became obvious that he was there specifically to watch Mey.

  He was enjoying the view, but he was sure that he was wasting his time because he thought that there was nothing special about the model except for her killer legs. She hadn’t done anything weird or unusual yet, and he didn’t expect her to. But he was getting paid to watch a hot woman, so what did he care.

  Yamanu frowned. What exactly was the guy hoping to see Mey do?

  And who’d sent him?

  Those were questions Yamanu couldn’t get answers for without getting closer. The guy was a hardheaded fellow, and he was resistant to thralling, but he wasn’t immune. A closer, more intense thrall might unlock the hidden memories that would give Yamanu some answers.

  Or he could just beat them out of the dude.

  Sometimes the more mundane methods of interrogation worked better for loosening tongues.

  Instead of climbing the tree and jumping down with the guy, Yamanu sent a suggestion into his mind—an urgent need to take a piss.

  “Damn it,” the guy grumbled. “I just went.” He used the strap attached to the scope to hang it on a branch and then climbed down.

  Yamanu was waiting for him at the foot of the tree, and the moment the guy was within reach, he wrapped his arm around his middle and dragged him down to the ground.

  The dude struggled without making a sound, which marked him as a pro, but he was no match for Yamanu’s superior strength.

  In seconds, Yamanu had him face down on the ground, arms pinned behind his back and legs pinned under Yamanu’s knees.

  When it became obvious to the watcher that he wasn’t getting out from Yamanu’s grip, he stopped struggling. “You can take the money. My wallet is in my back pocket. Take it and leave the wallet. I need my driver’s license.”

  The guy was scared, but he wasn’t terrified.

  That was going to change soon.

  “I don’t want your money. I want to know why you were watching the model.”

  “She is hot.”

  “You were waiting for her to do something weird. In what way? And don’t lie to me because I’ll know, the same way I knew what you were thinking.”

  The guy resumed his struggles.

  “It’s not going to work, buddy. The only way you are getting away is if you talk. So, I’ll ask again. Weird in what way?”

  “I don’t know. I was told to watch for anything unusual, but they didn’t tell me what exactly to look for.”

  “Who are they?”

  “I don’t know. The assignment was emailed to me and money was deposited into my account. I don’t ask questions. That’s why I get the jobs.”

  He was telling the truth.

  Damn.

  “Were you following her?”

  “On and off. All I need is to catch her doing something unusual. I don’t need to watch her all the time.”

  That was only partially true.

  “Did you plant surveillance cameras in her apartment? And don’t you dare lie to me or I’m going to pull this arm out of its socket and it’s going to hurt like hell.” Yamanu demonstrated with a yank but let go before the joint did.

  The guy hissed in pain. “Yes.”

  “Where. Tell me the exact locations of each one.”

  “There is one in the living room attached to the curtain rod and one in her bedroom.”

  Pervert.

  Yamanu gave another yank.

  “I swear it wasn't because I was going peeping Tom on her. But if she were to do something weird, like chant curses and stab voodoo dolls, I figured she would do it in private.”

  He was telling the truth.

  “How about her phone?”

  “It’s tapped, but not by me. I was told to leave it alone because they got it.”

  Again, he was telling the truth.

  Holding the guy down with one arm, Yamanu reached into his pocket and pulled out the wa
llet. Going through the slots, he found a business card and pulled it out. Placing it and the driver’s license on the guy’s back, Yamanu got his phone out and snapped a picture of both.

  When he was done, he returned the things to the wallet, the wallet into the guy’s pocket, and then flipped the dude around.

  Reaching into his mind, he erased the memory of what had just happened. “You needed to take a piss and you slipped and fell down. You are going to wake up in two minutes and feel sore all over because of the bad fall.”

  With the suggestion planted in the watcher’s mind, Yamanu let go of him and resumed his shroud.

  He was definitely missing an important part of the puzzle. Whatever Mey and her sister were into had courted the interest of the government or some other powerful organization with lots of money.

  The question was what?

  The other question was whether Mey was going to tell him, and if not, did he have justification enough to reach into her mind and get it that way?

  And the third question was what was he going to tell her about the watcher?

  He needed to warn her because the guy would keep reporting to whoever had hired him, and she needed to be aware of that. Getting rid of the guy was not an option either. Whoever had hired him would just send someone else.

  At least with this one, he had a name and a driver’s license. Perhaps William could hack into the detective’s email and try to trace it to the client.

  39

  Mey

  “Can we take a break?” Mey asked.

  Yamanu had been gone for a long time, and when he returned his expression was troubled. Had he found the guy following her?

  Derek sighed. “Fine. But no more than five minutes. The sun is out, and I want to take advantage of it for a few more bright shots.”

  “Maybe ten? I want to take a short walk.” Hopefully that would do.

  He shook his head. “You know that I can’t say no to you.” He waved her away. “Go. I know you want to hang out with your guy.”

  “Thanks. You’re awesome.” She kissed his cheek and hurried to her satchel to pull out her flip-flops.

  After more than an hour in the high heels, her feet were killing her.

  “Let’s go.” She threaded her arm through Yamanu’s and waited until they were about ten steps away before asking, "Did you find him?”

  He leaned to whisper in her ear. “Wait. I want some background noise.”

  When they reached one of the fountains, Yamanu sat on the lip and pulled her down beside him. “Now we can talk.”

  “Who was he? Was he just a creep? I hope you didn’t beat him up too badly.”

  Yamanu laughed. “I didn’t beat him up. And whether he’s a creep or not depends on your definition of one. He is a private investigator hired to spy on you. He’s watching you through a scope with a mic attached to it. That’s why I wanted us to talk here. The fountain’s noise will cover our voices.”

  “Why is he watching me?”

  Yamanu shrugged. “I hoped you could tell me. Once I figured out that he is a private investigator, I didn’t want to alert him to the fact that we are onto him, so I couldn't ask him.”

  “Then how do you know he is a private investigator? A creep can have a scope too.”

  “I overheard him talking on the phone, but what he said didn’t make any sense. He told whoever was on the other line that you didn’t do anything unusual so far. He said that if you weren’t such a looker, it would have been a total waste of his time. Do you have any idea what he was talking about?”

  As Yamanu’s eyes bored into hers, reaching down into her soul, Mey cringed. Should she tell him about her and Jin’s special abilities?

  But what if the comment the detective had made wasn’t about that?

  Suddenly, it occurred to her that Yamanu had showed up in her life shortly after Jin had left. What if there was a connection?

  What if he’d been sent to befriend Mey and get her to talk about her ability?

  If Jin had been recruited because of her supernatural spying talent, whoever hired her would logically assume that her sister had some talent too. But if Jin kept it a secret and claimed that Mey was just an ordinary person, they might not have believed her and sent people to investigate.

  This whole setup might have been a trick to get her to talk to Yamanu. Maybe the other guy had been sent to scare her, and then Yamanu, the knight in shining armor, had come to her rescue, seduced her, and made her trust him.

  Except, he hadn’t seduced her and had resisted her flirting attempts pretty damn hard. If that had been all an act, then Yamanu was wasting his time working for the government. He could be an Oscar-winning actor.

  “Well?” Yamanu prompted. “Anything come to mind?”

  “I’m still thinking.”

  He might not have intended to seduce her, only to befriend her. And the reason that he’d made up the story about the vow was because he wasn’t rotten to the core and had thought that it was the decent thing to do.

  Except, that made her feel even worse. Not only would it mean that her perfect guy was a potential spy, but also that he didn’t find her desirable. Because if the vow of celibacy and the arousal suppressing medication had been a charade, then she’d failed to stir his desire.

  The thing was, she could find that out quite easily by listening to the walls in Arielle’s hotel suite. She could say that she needed to meditate in the living room because the bedroom was too cramped for that. She would also have to ask them to leave for a short while because she needed to concentrate.

  They would think her an ungrateful prima donna, but that was a small price to pay for knowledge. In the meantime, she needed to stall.

  “Perhaps he is working for the government. They might think that I know something because I served in Israeli intelligence.”

  That wasn’t a total lie. Mossad was a separate entity and worked on different things than regular army intelligence, but it was close enough without spilling secrets she wasn’t supposed to.

  He shook his head. “The guy was a hired private investigator. He wasn’t CIA.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because he talked about the money deposited into his account for the job of following you around.”

  “The government might have hired him. They could be outsourcing.”

  “That’s possible. But then what could they learn by having him observe you? I understand tapping your phone and putting surveillance cameras in your home. That way they can listen to your phone conversations and catch you talking about secrets from your time in the intelligence services. But something weird or unusual doesn’t sound like military secrets.”

  Mey shrugged. “He might have meant suspicious.” Then the rest of what Yamanu had said registered. “Wait, so they have my phone tapped and cameras in my apartment? Did you hear him say that?”

  Yamanu nodded.

  “Crap. I talked with my friend Shimon and asked him to help me find where Jin was. He’s from my intelligence days, and he’s still on active duty. Maybe that triggered the tail?” She stopped and calculated the timeline. “I called him on Tuesday, and then we talked again on Thursday. That was when I felt someone following me.” She looked into Yamanu’s eyes. “I think that the first call triggered it. My phone was already tapped, and when I started investigating where Jin was, they sent someone after me.”

  Yamanu shook his head. “Did Jin serve in the intelligence service as well?”

  “No.”

  “So, she is not connected to this and your call shouldn’t have triggered anything.”

  “But I called an active duty intelligence officer and asked for his help. They might think I’m some big shot with important connections.”

  His brows drew together. “Are you?”

  Mey chuckled. “Shimon was my boyfriend, and we parted as friends. That’s why I could call him, not because I have such great connections.”

  Yamanu lifted a finger. “Aha! It c
ould be the ex-boyfriend connection. Maybe they want you to make him tell you his secrets.”

  “Right. He didn’t tell me anything when we were together. He isn’t going to tell me anything now.”

  “But they don’t know that.”

  “Yeah, maybe you are right.”

  40

  Yamanu

  Mey was hiding something.

  Yamanu was sure of that now more than ever. It was possible that she’d been involved in something big during her time in the military, and the part she’d played wasn’t as insignificant as she was trying to make it sound.

  No wonder she wasn’t admitting it. She probably couldn’t.

  The problem was that without knowing what those people were after, he couldn’t help her. All he could do was try to protect her, but once Alena started shooting, he wouldn't have time to follow Mey wherever she went. And then he would go back home, and she would be left without a protector.

  That bugged the hell out of him.

  Perhaps she would be safer back in Israel where she had people who could provide her with protection.

  “Is there any way you can take a vacation and go back home?”

  She lifted a pair of questioning eyes at him. “Are you trying to get rid of me?”

  He enveloped her in his arms and set her in his lap. “If it were up to me, I would never let you go. But I can’t be with you every moment of the day to protect you. Not once Arielle starts working on Monday. I have to be with her. I was thinking that you’d be safer in Israel where you can get protection from your old buddies in the military.”

  “You’d be willing to give me up so easily?”

  “Not easily. But your safety comes before my wishes. Obviously, you can’t tell me what you’ve been involved in, so I don’t know how serious this is and what kind of danger you are in. I’m trying to find a solution without knowing what the problem is.”

  She rested her forehead against his, sighed, and then pushed back to look at him. “I asked Dalia for time off because I want to go looking for Jin. The problem is that I don’t know where to start. Besides, I need to finish this job for this very picky client before I can take time off, and then I can’t go anywhere until I know what’s going on with my sister.”