Black Of Wing: A Quentin Black Paranormal Mystery Romance (Quentin Black Mystery Book 14)

by JC Andrijeski

  Frowning at the thought, she shunted it aside.

  She focused on the seer infiltrators, instead.

  She now had seven of them on the line.

  The main ones talking so far had been Mika, Jorji, Larisse, Holo, and Kiessa.

  They’d been looking at the thing in the lobby––from the Barrier, that is.

  “The Barrier” was seer shorthand for the inter-dimensional space from which they derived most of their seer abilities.

  Since all of them were currently offsite, on private planes owned by Black Securities and Investigations, Yarli assigned them all of the surveillance, construct, and infiltration work. They couldn’t exactly help her here, on the ground, and presumably, they were safe under the mobile constructs she’d set up around both planes.

  Yarli tried to stay on the line with them while they worked, even as she got the team at the ‘Nest organized, packed up, and relocated off-site, mostly via the helipad on the roof.

  You’re sure that’s him, Jorj? Mika sent the words, her thoughts openly skeptical. I mean, I agree… physically. It looks like the same guy. But he doesn’t feel anything like him. Or look anything like him from the Barrier.

  Agreed, Holo jumped in.

  There was a bare pause, then he switched to his headset.

  “The Barrier signature is all off. I agree there is a physical resemblance––”

  “How is that possible?”

  Dalejem, that time.

  The older seer’s voice still made Yarli jump, after all those months of radio silence.

  Some part of her was still shocked to remember he was alive.

  “How is that possible?” Jem repeated, his voice harder. “I mean, look at him. Are we really going to try and convince ourselves that a being who looks that much like the thing that showed up in Hollywood somehow isn’t the thing we saw in Hollywood?”

  There was a silence.

  Exhaling, Jem added, “Has anyone tried to talk to him? Anyone other than the security guards down there?”

  Remembering the ping she’d heard, Yarli frowned.

  Then she turned, looking for the correct monitor on the security screen in front of her.

  “Where’s Black?” Mika said. “He and Miri left where you are, right Jem?”

  Yarli noticed Mika didn’t mention where Dalejem was.

  “Yes,” Jem said stiffly. “They should be there in approximately ten minutes, unless they encounter some kind of problem en route.”

  “What about you, Jem?” Kiessa said. “Are you going to––”

  “Black told us to stay here.”

  Again, Yarli noted the lack of specificity to the “us.”

  She also heard the faint note of aggression in Jem’s tone when he cut Kiessa off.

  Both things came through clearly enough that there was a silence.

  “What about the human faction?” Jem said, his voice subdued. “Where’s Kiko’s team? Or Dex? Are they on the ground yet? Either of them?”

  “Dex went to New Mexico,” Zairai said. “He’s not with us. We’re at the airport. We’re on our way back in.”

  “I’m on the flight with Kiko,” Mika added. “She’s in the other compartment… Black’s private quarters at the back of the plane.” She paused. “With Jax.”

  She said that a little funny.

  Yarli knew she wasn’t the only one to hear it, but she dismissed that, too.

  She glanced at the monitors again and noticed the helicopter was almost back.

  Abruptly, she switched channels, muting the one with the infiltrators.

  “Luric?” she said. “Your team’s up. Are you all ready?”

  The medical tech sounded flustered, annoyed, a little put out, but also relieved.

  “We’re here. We’re just inside the door.”

  “Good.”

  “Any word on where we’re going?” the male tech muttered.

  Yarli shook her head, once, seer fashion. “Don’t worry about that. Black has safehouses in a few points around the city. They’ll take you to one of those––”

  “You don’t know which one?” Luric said.

  For the first time, he sounded alarmed.

  Yarli sighed, sending a pulse of reassurance to her friend.

  “You’re going to be fine, brother. Black wants us to keep everything need-to-know right now, including the safehouse locations… at least until we know what this is. That includes not voicing them over the comms, or in the Barrier, if we can help it.”

  “Oh.”

  “I need to get back,” Yarli said. “Can you make sure Hamish is ready with the next group? He’ll have maybe fifteen minutes.”

  “Got it.” The noise in the background on Luric’s end got a lot louder. He must have reached the top of the stairs, and opened the door leading to the helipad; Yarli heard the heavy beat of rotors and a gusting wind. “They just got here. We’re going out to the helicopter now. I’ll ping you as soon as we’re inside.”

  “All right. Signing off.”

  Yarli ended the communication.

  As she did, her eyes glanced back over the row of monitors.

  A voice in the back of her head nagged at her, telling her she was forgetting something. She confirmed with her eyes that Luric’s team was now making their way across the rooftop, heading for the Blackhawk helicopter that just set down on the round circle of the helipad.

  She clicked over to Lawless.

  “Hey, make sure they have fueling on their schedule. Both pilots.”

  “Got it,” the older vet said. “Two more trips for this one. The one coming in can fuel up when they land. I’ll let Michelle know there might be a delay.”

  “Okay, great. Tell Hamish, too. Out.”

  Yarli’s eyes flickered back over the three rows of screens, a nervous tic she barely noticed she was doing.

  That time, something caught her eye.

  She stopped dead.

  Leaning towards the screens, she punched in to the elevator car’s speakers.

  “What the fuck are you doing?” she barked.

  She would have expected her boyfriend to jump a foot in the air, with someone yelling at him through the speaker like that.

  Instead, Manny didn’t move at first.

  When he finally turned, his neck and head craned slowly but deliberately towards the surveillance camera. His iron-gray hair hung down to his shoulders, recently cut out of its long braid, in part for the upcoming dual wedding.

  Manny’s mouth curled in a hard frown, in an expression she hadn’t seen on him before.

  He paused before he spoke, his shoulders tense above crossed arms.

  He seemed to meet her gaze directly, right through the camera.

  “I’m going down there.” Manny’s voice came out flat, totally unlike him. “He needs to talk to someone. Someone who knows things. The security guards aren’t helpful, and the construct is too dense… too foreign to his light.”

  Pausing, his affect still flat, Manny added,

  “You may listen. I will leave the channel open.”

  Yarli felt her gut go cold.

  Whoever was talking to her, it wasn’t her boyfriend.

  “Let him go!” she snapped.

  “I cannot.”

  “Why the fuck not?” Yarli fought a swell of panic. “Who are you? Why won’t you just talk to me? Talk to me… right now! You don’t need him down there for that.”

  “He wants to come. He is interested in me.”

  “No!” she snapped. “He isn’t interested in you! Let him go! NOW!”

  Her voice came out half-fear, half rage.

  The feelings in her clashed and swirled, settling on full-blown terror.

  “Please let him go. PLEASE PLEASE LET HIM GO. Dugra a’ kitre gaos… we have done nothing to you. Black has done nothing to you. This is a friend of his. A personal, close friend of his. He’ll flip the fuck out if you hurt him, if you scare him or harm him in any way. He won’t be happy about this at al
l…”

  Even as she talked to the thing inside her boyfriend, she had already split her consciousness, the instant she realized it wasn’t really Manny.

  She threw her mind at the construct in full-blown panic.

  She didn’t waste time trying to shield.

  WOLDON? ALICI? Feeling them flinch, feeling them hear her, feeling their presences grow more tangible in her light, Yarli went on even louder. TURN OFF THE ELEVATOR! TURN IT OFF! NOW! NOW! SHUT IT DOWN.

  The elevator? Woldon sounded bewildered. Isn’t it on the penthouse floor? I thought it was already switched off––

  Alici’s thoughts came through calmer, more clear on what Yarli wanted.

  We can’t do it, boss, she sent. Not until it reaches the bottom. It’s locked in with a security code, and we can’t stop it from the Barrier––

  The bottom is too late! Yarli snarled. Do it manually. Do it from the security console––

  We don’t have access. The humans run that side of things.

  Then CALL them! Call Wu. Or Javier. Get one of them to do it. Tell them it’s a goddamned emergency. Tell them I need it right––

  WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?

  Black.

  Black’s mind, Black’s light, trembling the construct like a hard wind.

  Any other time, it might have made her wince.

  Now, she felt nothing but relief.

  IS SOMEONE GOING TO ANSWER ME? WHAT IS GOING ON?

  Boss, Yarli sent. I need someone to stop the elevator. To send it back upstairs. Now. Right now. How would I do that?

  Yarli? His voice came through in a hard growl. Why are you screaming in my ear?

  It’s Manny, she sent, hearing the panic vibrate higher in her thoughts. She tried to dial it back, couldn’t. That thing has Manny, Black! It’s got control of him somehow. It’s bringing him down to the lobby It wants to talk to him, read him… something…

  Black’s light went from angry to alarmed.

  BLACK! Yarli snapped at his silence. STOP THE FUCKING ELEVATOR! OR BRING HIM BACK… GET HIM FREE!

  Are you kidding me right now? Black’s mental voice grew furious. You’re his MATE. You’re a goddamned rank-10 seer. ORDER MANNY BACK TO YOU, Yarli. Right now!

  Anger rose violently in her light. Don’t you think I would have done that already, if I could? I can’t reach him! I can’t!

  YOU HAVE TO.

  Yarli bit her lip, so hard she tasted blood.

  Somewhere in her back and forth with that thing and then Black, she’d started walking. She’d left the conference room, walked through and past the bullpen, walked past reception and the lobby, out the doors of Black Securities and Investigations.

  Now she found herself standing in front of the elevator doors.

  Her thumb was pressing the call-back button.

  She had no idea how long, or how many times she’d pressed it.

  She was about to yell at Black again, when––

  Black’s voice rose on the elevator car.

  Yarli’s eyes jerked back to her headset, to the image of the security footage being projected through the virtual display. She had no idea how Black accessed the security system so fast, but she saw Manny jerk his eyes around to the surveillance camera when Black’s voice exploded through the speaker.

  “Mañuelito. Come upstairs. NOW. Or I’ll force the goddamned issue.”

  Manny stared up at the speaker.

  His expression didn’t move.

  His handsome face, her face, didn’t move.

  “Just let me talk to him,” the being said calmly. “I would like to talk to him before you arrive. So I am better equipped to speak to you.”

  “No,” Black snarled. “Let him go. NOW, goddamn it!”

  Manny… or whatever had Manny… didn’t answer.

  Just then, the elevator car shuddered to a stop.

  The doors gave a cheerful ping.

  19

  Hostages

  Black wanted to scream in frustration.

  Then he wanted to scream at Yarli to do what she’d already told him she couldn’t do, to stop Manny… push him or coerce him or wrestle him away from the being who had control over his mind.

  He already knew she couldn’t.

  He could feel her desperation, her panic, even more sharply than he could feel his own.

  He could feel her terror and powerlessness.

  Both of them just watched, silent, as the Manny walked through the opening between the elevator doors, casually entering the area of the main elevator banks in the building’s ground floor lobby.

  Black felt Yarli reach out with her light, trying to reach her mate.

  He felt her screaming in some part of her aleimi, trying to reach him and failing.

  He felt Miri’s grief as she accelerated through another red light.

  Black reached out with his own light, that time trying to help Yarli reach him, instead of just doing it on his own. He tried to boost the strength of her aleimi, to lend her his structure as she struggled to reach her boyfriend’s mind.

  Both of them hit a hot, dense, tangled wall of living light.

  Not Manny’s light.

  Not the construct.

  Someone else’s.

  BLACK! Yarli yelled his name into the Barrier. STOP HIM! PLEASE! PLEASE GOD STOP HIM BEFORE––

  I can’t get through.

  Black growled it at her in the Barrier, but his anger seemed to drain out of him as he watched his friend approach the end of the bank of elevators.

  The two security guards just stood there, watching him approach, and Black recognized the blank stare in their eyes, as well, and realized they hadn’t been stalling this Hollywood dragon fuck, but had been captured by him.

  Despite his dense shields, Black could almost see him now.

  He saw the other dragon’s glowing outline inside the Barrier.

  He saw those pale, gold eyes, the strange aleimic light.

  But his infiltrators were right, too.

  He didn’t look quite the same as what Black remembered from that studio backlot.

  It was definitely him, though.

  There was absolutely no doubt about that.

  Black tried again to get through that dense shell of aleimic light.

  He couldn’t.

  He was just as powerless as Yarli.

  Yarli, who was probably the most gifted seer on his team, apart from maybe Dalejem.

  At the thought, his jaw clenched.

  JEM! He half-screamed the male seer’s name. ARE YOU THERE? ARE YOU WATCHING THIS?

  Jem’s mind rose at once.

  Yes, he sent grimly. We all are. We’re all trying to get through. All of us. Nick contacted Brick. He’s hoping he might be closer. How much time before you get there?

  Black refocused his eyes enough to put more of his consciousness back into the road.

  Miri drove the car.

  He’d made her do it, so he could try to reach the guy in his building’s lobby. He knew he’d probably crash, given how much light he’d need.

  She sat next to him now, focused wholly on the road, her expression hard as she glanced briefly his way. He watched her blow through a red light approvingly. Still, he couldn’t help but flinch as cars blared their horns, swerving to miss them in the low-riding McLaren.

  He relaxed marginally once he realized Miri was pushing them in advance, getting the drivers to change directions, to brake, to begin moving out of their path… well before they actually saw the McLaren’s nose with their human eyes.

  Black caught a street sign as they flew past at maybe seventy or eighty miles per hour.

  Checking the map inside his headset, he grimaced.

  Maybe ten minutes, he sent to Jem, frustrated. Miri’s going as fast as either of us could possibly go. At least without seriously risking both of us ending up roadkill, or cracking up the car so badly we’d end up walking––

  Can you hear them talking? Jem sent.

  Bl
ack tried to listen through the Barrier, couldn’t.

  Surveillance? He spat the word. Yarli? Are you getting the feed from the elevator banks? I can see enough to know they’re just past the end of them… not far from the fountain.

  He gripped the car door, hearing the squeal of tires in some more distant part of his mind as Miri navigated them through the city.

  Realizing he needed his headset, he opened his eyes again.

  Without bothering to look at the road, he felt over his coat, then yanked the small piece of semi-organic metal out of his inside pocket and fitted it into his ear.

  He gave subvocal commands, getting it to the right channel as he kept most of his mind in the construct, listening for Yarli.

  He’s got them switched off, she sent, her voice half-incredulous. Woldon is working on it now… I’ve got Alici trying to get through to the security guards.

  They’re both human? Black sent. It’s just those two? No seers?

  Another too-long silence told him he’d been wrong about that, too.

  Who? Black growled. Who else is down there?

  There’s a seer in the lobby with them, Yarli admitted. I couldn’t see him, either. Not even through the Barrier. Woldon told me. They got him on camera before the… whatever it is… knocked out the system. I’m assuming he was compelled, like Manny. Maybe he’s too difficult to read, so the thing called on Manny, figuring a human would be easier––

  Who?

  Another pause, then Dalejem answered.

  It’s Holo, he said.

  Black cursed under his breath, even as he glanced briefly at his wife.

  He wanted to yell at her to go faster, but he bit his tongue.

  He knew she wouldn’t get mad, not now. He knew she’d know he was just venting. But he didn’t want to fuck with her concentration to that extent.

  He didn’t want to risk he might throw her off, even a tiny amount.

  He focused back on Yarli.

  We’re coming, he told her simply.

  It was all he could say.

  Holo stood frozen, right by the lobby desk.