One Wrong Move

by Shannon McKenna

“You know these two?” He petted her belly, freezing her impulse to slap his hand away before her muscles could do more than jerk.

  “You see, I understand how you feel about your son,” he told her. “Because this, see . . .” He held up Sasha’s picture. “This is my son.”

  Her eyes fixed on the photo, then on his face. To catalog his features: eyes, mouth, jaw, ear, hairline. It was quite a job of forensic excavation, to find the resemblance the young, handsome Sasha bore to him, in his current age and disease-ravaged state, but it was there.

  He studied her SMS. “Aaro,” he murmured. “My first wife’s great-great-uncle from Minsk bore that name. Does he use it as a surname?”

  The stress of resisting hurt her, and might very well hurt her baby. Stupid girl didn’t know what was good for her. He clicked through her other messages. “Ah, look at this,” he murmured.

  “From a Davy McCloud, two hours ago. ‘Sean arr. Denver eight ten rent car, will be there ASAP, attached aerial view of Greaves Convention Center. Working on floor plan.’ My, my! Let me see what happens when I plug Spruce Ridge and Greaves Convention Center into the same search, hmm?”

  Tears of helpless rage flashed down Lily Parr’s cheeks.

  He hit gold instantly. A gala event, to raise funds for the future Greaves Institute, Spruce Ridge, Colorado. He glanced at the map.

  “Colorado,” he said, staring at Lily. Her eyelids twitched, and his heart exulted. Twenty-one years he’ d waited. “Everyone is converging upon Spruce Ridge. Miles, Aaro, Nina, Sean? Glittering earrings to dazzle the fat cats? Makeup, hair trimmer? To clean up for the party?”

  She gasped for breath. He put his hand on her belly again.

  “You did not tell me the name my son is using, Lily,” he said softly. “Give me my son . . . and I will give you yours.”

  Her eyes blazed. He didn’t genuinely need to push her any farther, but her defiance reminded him of Sasha’s. He pulled her onto her feet. Grabbed her upper arms, and clamped down.

  Harder . . .

  She shuddered, doubled over, and a rush of blood-tinged water flooded down her legs, over her feet, spreading around his shoes.

  He stepped back, dismayed. Oh, for God’s sake. She’d broken her water and probably gone into premature labor, the stupid bitch. Just didn’t know when to give in. An epidemic of poor judgment going around.

  Lily slid to the ground, sagged onto her side. Fainted. Maybe the child had shifted down in her womb, with the rush of water.

  Damn.

  It didn’t happen often, but Oleg knew defeat when he saw it.

  He took a moment to pop her SIM card out, wipe her phone down and toss it back on her bed, and walked briskly out, leaving the door ajar.

  He hobbled down the hall, considering his next dilemma. It was not unlike the one he had faced in the hospice. But he was not as angry at Lily Parr as he had been at Tonya. And he did not want to deprive the world of a luscious strawberry tart, or her little son.

  At reception, he put on a concerned expression. “Excuse me, nurse?” he said, to a snub-nosed brunette in flower-spattered scrubs. “I think the lady in the room second from the end of the hall needs help. I saw her through the door, and it looked as if she’d fainted.”

  “Thanks for saying something, sir! I’ll have someone check it out!”

  Oleg smiled his thanks, and forgot Lily as he hurried to the elevator, his mind buzzing with plans. Obtain a tuxedo, donate money to the Greaves Institute, and organize the flight plan to land his private jet as close to Spruce Ridge, Colorado, as possible.

  Thaddeus Greaves leaned and looked at the detail of the architectural model of the proposed Greaves Institute that Rudd had brought. Rudd forced himself not to swallow nervously as he watched the man do so. If he did say so himself, the model was stunning. Twelve feet square and three feet high, from the mas-314

  sive, knee-height display table. Every detail picked out. God knows the thing had cost enough.

  Rudd watched Greaves pluck a tiny fir tree out of a grove that straddled a greensward, the one that led up Library Hill. He peered at it, heavy dark brows beetling. Greaves was in his early fifties, but looked younger. A fine figure of a man, tall, trim, powerfully built, with olive skin and a shock of gleaming hair that shone a snowy white.

  Anabel’s moist, mooning gaze annoyed Rudd. That innocent, milkmaid glow made him twitch. Rudd didn’t like to imagine what was going on in her fertile, self-serving brain. She was under orders to keep her mouth shut unless directly addressed.

  So far, she had obeyed. But Anabel was always Anabel.

  Greaves peered through his reading glasses at the small tree, and put the pushpin base back, in exactly the tiny hole from which he had taken it. “Pretty. A lovely thought, Harold. Amazing detail. We’ll display it in the Great Hall, under the chandelier. It’ll look great as a foreground while I make the fawning speeches tonight.”

  “Yes, the detail really struck me,” Rudd said. “This artist specializes in incredibly detailed models. I’m a firm believer in the magic of visualization, and what could be a more potent way to manifest such a magnificent new reality then a facsimile of the new Institute . . . ah . . . Mr. Greaves? Those buildings are glued down. They don’t come loose.”

  “No? Don’t they?” Pop, Greaves cracked loose and lifted an exquisitely perfect model of what would eventually be the Swayne Chapel. White, simple colonial style. A sharp and perfect steeple.

  “Ah, yes, that will need to be glued down again,” Rudd said nervously. “They’re quite delicate, and if you . . . uh . . .”

  His voice trailed off, as the chapel crumpled in Greaves’s fisted hand, collapsing into a handful of sharp, painted splinters.

  The small bell tower snapped off, and fell to the Aubusson carpet.

  Greaves placed his heel upon the tiny steeple, bore down.

  Crunch.

  “Yes,” he said. “Quite delicate, Harold. Just as you said.”

  Rudd stared at the fragments on the carpet. “Ah . . . if you don’t like the model, I can take it back.”

  “Not at all, Harold! I like it very much!” Greaves assured him.

  “Even without the chapel, it’s a lovely thing. It’s a perfect visual focus for this event. Brilliant idea, really. I just wanted to make a point, you see. A large enterprise can function even if a key element is removed. The model is still beautiful. I will still display it, and only the donors who . . . now who is it who donated the money for the chapel?”

  “Milton Swayne,” Rudd said woodenly.

  “Oh, yes. Of course. Milton and his shriveled bitch of a wife, Dorothy. Only they will notice the omission. I’ll have to smooth their ruffled feathers. How tedious. Perhaps you’d be good enough to do that job for me? Come up with an excuse? Missing plans, an error on the part of the artist, a box left behind? Something clever like that.”

  “Of course,” Rudd said, his voice strangled.

  “Excellent. I’ll have it taken to the Great Hall immediately.

  But first, explain again, because it hasn’t sunk in yet. How it never occurred to you that I might like to observe Christie’s and Arbatov’s reaction to Psi-Max 48 for myself. Did you think that I would not be interested?”

  “I . . . I considered it a dead end,” Rudd said nervously. “I wrote the new formula off. The B dose is lost, and there’s no one left alive to ask where it is, so the A dose is useless. It was distracting my people, taking up time and resources. Those two were probed so thoroughly, I’m surprised they didn’t have cerebral aneurisms on the spot, and according to Helga’s timetable, the woman was doomed within hours anyway. It seemed like poetic justice, to inject the man. So I . . .”

  “Wrote Helga’s last formula off. The culmination of her life’s work. Injected the last existing A dose into Arbatov’s arm, for what? For poetic justice? Spite, pique? To stroke your inflamed ego? It was a childish impulse. Childish impulses are dangerous.”

  That calm phrase made his bowels turn to i
ce. “I am sorry if I—”

  “Karstow, you said? That’s where your man is taking them?”

  “Yes, but I will have Roy bring them here, if you would prefer—”

  “Yes, Harold.” Greaves’s voice was thick with irony. “I do prefer.”

  Rudd pulled out his cell, and inwardly crossed his fingers as he pulled up Roy’s number. But sure enough, like the last six times, he got a recorded voice. “Out of area,” he said, trying to sound casual. “I’m sure I’ll reach him soon. Anabel, try Dmitri’s number again.”

  Anabel pulled out her phone, tried, and shook her head.

  “Him, too.”

  Greaves appeared to notice her for the first time. “Keep trying.”

  “Certainly,” Rudd assured him. “Constantly.”

  Greaves’s gaze flicked back to Anabel. “What have we here?”

  Rudd turned, knowing what he would see. Anabel had begun to sparkle, against his very specific orders, the treacherous bitch.

  Watching Greaves give him a bare-ass spanking had turned her on.

  “Switch it off, Anabel,” he hissed. “You’re pissing me off.”

  “Well, well.” Greaves tilted up Ani’s chin, studying her glowing smile. “Look at that. Psi-enhanced beauty and sexual attrac-tion. A talent I have never encountered. And you said she was a telepath.”

  “I am,” Anabel said coyly. “A strong telepath. This is a bonus talent.”

  Greaves chuckled. “Bonus talent. Excellent, my dear, excellent. Can you do this under any circumstances?”

  “Yes,” she murmured. “Although it is much quicker and easier when I am, ah . . . genuinely stirred by someone.” Her lashes fluttered.

  Greaves glanced at Rudd. “What else can this delicious creature do?”

  Anabel licked her gleaming lips. “For you, sir, anything,” she said, in a breathless voice. “Anything you want. Right here, if you liked.”

  One of Greaves’s heavy, dark eyebrows lifted. Anabel drifted closer, imperceptibly, reaching boldly. She ran her fingertip along the bulge of his erection that tented out the cut of his elegant wool trousers.

  “Very well,” Greaves said coolly. “Let’s see what you can do.”

  Rudd groaned inwardly. Intemperate slut. What was he, the body servant, holding the hot steamed lemon-scented towels for aftersex cleanup? While his own personal, psychically enhanced assistant, in whom he’d invested millions in research and training, prostituted herself? True, her nymphomaniacal eagerness was handy in a pinch, but this situation did not qualify as a pinch.

  This was just Anabel’s pathological boundary issues, and he was sick to death of them.

  Anabel was on her knees. She’d undone Greaves’s trousers and taken out his rather large penis, and was already slurping away at it with unseemly gusto. Greaves glanced up and caught his eye. “Turn around, Rudd,” he said austerely. “I don’t care for spectators.”

  Well, at least he didn’t have to watch, but he did have to listen to the wet suckling sounds, and Anabel’s throaty moans made him want to slap her. He counted the seconds, hoping Greaves didn’t take too long.

  Greaves hissed in a breath. Anabel shrieked. Rudd spun around.

  Anabel was flying through midair. She slammed against the wall and hung there, legs dangling three feet above the floor, eyes wild with terror. She clutched her throat. Greaves was pressing it telekinetically.

  She clawed, making awful sounds, her face growing purple.

  “Your whore tried to probe me,” Greaves said, in a mild, conversational tone. “Did you put her up to that, Harold?”

  “No!” he said, horrified. “Of course not! Perhapes she did it by accident! Sometimes, when she is excited, she . . . ah . . . ah . . .”

  Ghostly fingers clamped down onto his throat, too. Greaves had no problem at all directing his talent in two places at once.

  Rudd could not speak, or breathe. His larynx burned, as if it were imploding. His eyes popped. His vision started going dark . . . the pressure relented, and he stumbled heavily onto his knees, coughing.

  “Do not vomit on my carpet, Harold,” Greaves said.

  Rudd managed, barely, to obey that command. When the impulse had subsided, he lifted his head. Anabel lay on the floor, whimpering.

  “Get up,” Greaves said. “I thought that you understood your place in my grand scheme, Harold. And to think that you aspire to the highest office in the land. Really. The mind boggles.”

  “But I . . . but this is just a—”

  “I did not give you leave to speak,” Greaves said. Rudd choked off, as the ghostly fingers tightened again. “I am angry.

  Losing Kasyanov was catastrophic. The publicity, the mistakes, your decisions as to how to dispose of Arbatov and Christie, it is a tremendous disappointment to me. I wish to know the instant you get in touch with that worthless cretin, what was his name?”

  “Roy Lester,” Rudd supplied, coughing painfully.

  “Yes. Roy Lester. I do not want him to stop to eat, sleep, or piss. Just drive. I wish to see what Kasyanov’s final masterpiece can do, even if it is incomplete. Information is priceless. And when he delivers them, I want him eliminated. He is not intelligent enough to be attached to this project.”

  “I already made arrangements,” Rudd agreed fervently.

  “Trust me.”

  “That’s difficult, Harold,” Greaves said. “You’ve made it so hard to trust you.”

  Rudd glanced at Anabel, wondering if she’d sustained serious injuries in her wall-smack and subsequent fall. He hoped not.

  For all her faults, Anabel was immensely useful. “I’m sorry,” he forced out.

  “Good.” Greaves walked to Anabel. Nudged her with his toe.

  “I’ll get her out of your way,” Rudd said. “Anabel, get up.”

  “I will discipline her myself,” Greaves said. “Wait outside, in the hall. I told you, I don’t like spectators. They cramp my style.”

  Dismay clutched him. “I . . . I need her, sir. To work the party.”

  Anabel’s limp body rose up, suspended in the air, clawing at her throat again. Her bulging eyes pleading silently for help. As if he could. She had brought this on herself. Trying to use her psi on Greaves? Dear God, what a fucking idiot.

  “I won’t leave obvious marks on her,” Greaves said. “Give me credit for some practicality. Out with you, into the hall. This won’t take long. But you may be sure, Harold. She will never attempt to use her gifts on me again. And neither will you.”

  “Yes, sir. I never, ever did, sir,” he babbled, and suddenly the ghost hand pushed him on the chest, shoving him backward toward the door. He had to scramble not to fall. He was herded into the hall. The door slammed shut in his face.

  The screaming began shortly after. Rudd fidgeted, waiting.

  Members of Greaves’s domestic staff approached from time to time, but when they heard the shrieks, they slipped back the way they had come.

  It went on and on. At this rate, Anabel would need reconstructive surgery on her vocal folds. Not that he needed her to talk tonight. But still. At great length, the door flew open, and Anabel was tossed out, by invisible hands. She thudded to the floor and lay, naked, on the hallway carpet runner, her face wet, nose running. Mouth distorted by weeping. She sported a raccoon mask of smeared mascara.

  Greaves sauntered to the door, fastening his trousers and buckling his belt. He leaned on the doorjamb, and gazed down at Anabel’s shuddering body. “See?” he said cheerfully. “Not a mark on her.”

  Anabel’s clothes and shoes floated through the door, coalesced into a clot above her, and dropped onto her body. She flinched when they hit, sobbing harder.

  “Get her cleaned up,” Greaves said. “I don’t want her leaking bodily fluids on my carpet runner.”

  Rudd grabbed her arm, but it was like pulling a corpse. He kicked her in the buttock. For God’s sake, did the dumb cow have a death wish? He shoved at her with his mind, but it was like pushing his psi agai
nst a mountain of broken rock.

  He hauled her dead weight bodily to her feet, scooping up her clothes, shoving them against her chest, and dragged her down the corridor naked. No way to wrestle her into the complicated and complex underwear, or her pencil skirt and her silk blouse.

  Not in her current state. He’d drag her out to the car naked, and dress her there.

  Anabel stared back at Greaves, stupefied, mouth agape. He smiled from the door of his library. Waggled his fingers, in a playful farewell. She yelped, and dropped one of her shoes.

  The shoe floated up and followed them. Rudd grabbed it.

  “Thank you,” he muttered.

  “See you tonight. Be early for the meet and greet. See that she pulls herself together. I want her at her best. She’ll be working the room for me. With all of her talents.”

  Rudd looked at Anabel’s mascara mask, the snot running from her nose, her unfocused eyes. So this was to be his punishment.

  Making bricks without straw. “She’ll be great,” he promised.

  And indeed, she would. If it killed her.

  Chapter 27

  When Nina and Aaro finally checked into the hotel Miles had chosen in Spruce Ridge, the blaze of euphoria had faded. Nina missed it, sharply. It had made her feel like there was no stopping them.

  Now, she was feeling extremely stoppable. Fluttery, squirmy in her middle. Fear of Rudd, fear of Aaro getting hurt trying to defend her. Fear of that hospital bed, blinking lights, beeping machines. Clinging to Aaro’s hand as a drug destroyed her brain.

  Knowing that he’d soon face the same fate—except that he would face it alone.

  They’d spent most of the drive from Denver to Spruce Ridge holding hands, staring at the foothills of the Rockies rising up around them. Shields back up, in default mode. Aaro’s face was grim, but she sensed furious activity behind his shield, like he was coming to some momentous conclusion. God forbid he give her hell about going to the party. She didn’t want to have that argument again.

  They checked into the room Miles had reserved. She had nothing to lay down but her purse. Aaro had nothing but his phone and his knife. Down to bare essentials. No gear, hardly any weapons, just their own naked, nervous selves to pit against Rudd and his goons.