by Jade Kerrion
They had been her teachers. After Seth, she did not know anyone else better than Arlene and Henry. “And what—” Did she really want to know?
“They’re dead.”
She would rather not know how. “Okay.”
Wimp. Jessica sneered, but the insult lacked conviction. The smile on her face widened when Dum walked into the room with a pint of chocolate chip ice cream and two large spoons.
He arched an eyebrow, his only greeting for his sister, handed over the ice cream and spoons, and left the room.
“He’s going to get another spoon,” Jessica explained. She flipped open the cover and dug enthusiastically into the ice cream.
“It’s a good thing you’re here,” Dee said dryly. “I wouldn’t know what he was doing otherwise. Does he ever hesitate when he talks to you mind to mind?”
“No, of course not. It’s just a regular conversation like I have with others.”
Dee sighed. “He still doesn’t speak.”
“He will when he’s ready.” Jessica did not seem concerned, but then again, she had alternative communication routes with Dum. Dee did not.
Since talking about her brother made her miserable, Dee changed the topic. “Zara says Danyael is going to be all right.”
“I should hope so, considering the frantic scramble and extraordinary efforts that went into saving his life. Marcia’s wiped out from keeping him alive until the doctors could get enough blood into him so that he could keep himself alive.”
“Did they get his blood back into him?” Dee asked.
“No, they used donated blood that they keep in stock here. They never found his blood.”
“What?”
“I heard Xin say that the cooler of Danyael’s blood was never recovered.”
Dee’s brow furrowed. “It’s dangerous, isn’t it?”
“Well, it depends on what you do with the blood. One transfusion of Danyael’s blood isn’t going to do anything to anyone. It would be a blood transfusion just like any other. The only problem is that science is accelerating all around us. No one knows if a single-dose of a non-live blood transfusion can be engineered to be as life-changing as a constant infusion of a live blood transfusion.”
“Seth seemed to think he could do something meaningful with it.”
“Yeah, and it is what worries the council. All in all, everyone would feel happier if Danyael’s blood was back in Danyael.”
“Is the council out looking for the cooler?”
“Yes, of course. They’ve even assigned a case number to it.”
“What does that mean?”
Jessica shrugged. “It means that Alex really wants to track it down. The case will stay open until the council figures out what happened to the cooler.”
“It’s not safe, is it?” Dee asked, uncertain as to whether she was referring to the cooler or to Danyael.
“Very little about Danyael is safe.” Jessica’s matter-of-fact statement did not offer peace of mind. “But then again, Danyael is a problem that is too large for any one of us to solve. It’s more like a team effort, and even on the best days, it feels like we take one step forward and slide two steps back.”
“I think Danyael did most of the forward steps on his own.”
Jessica smiled. “Those who know him best know that for a fact.” She shook her long blond hair back as Dum returned to her room with another spoon. She held out the carton of ice cream. “So, are you all set for your concert tonight?”
~*~
The dance party was an extravaganza that had to be seen to be believed. The Verizon Center had been transformed into a standing-room-only dance club. A few seats were scattered around the edges of the stadium, but the reports that filtered back to Dee indicated that those seats were ignored. It was hard to sit when the music compelled you to dance and celebrate.
She knew that Lucien Winter was in a private booth, and on the other side of the stadium, Jason Rakehell and the leaders of Purest Humanity occupied another booth, but as for everyone else—
Dee peeked out from behind the curtains that surrounded the soundstage. Wide grins greeted her. Jessica and several enforcers from the Mutant Affairs Council clustered around the soundstage. Dee also caught a glimpse of her friends from Anacostia, recognizable only by their gang colors. In every other way, they blended into the dancing, celebrating mass of humanity.
The turnout, as Clarissa reported to her, was massive. The tickets had sold out before the doors opened, and apparently, there was an impromptu dance party happening in the streets as well. “It’s amazing.” Clarissa beamed. “I never thought I would see clones and in vitros dancing alongside pro-humanists, but it’s happening everywhere your brother’s music touches.”
“And all he’s doing is spinning music,” Dee said as the track switched to another lively beat.
“Magic. He’s spinning magic.”
Perhaps he was. Dee smiled, watching her brother bop along to the music, quite oblivious to the crowd of twenty thousand dancing along with him. Dum’s attention was entirely focused on Jessica, who danced, quite badly, in front of the stage. His brown eyes glowed with adoration. Idiot, she chuckled, but the word was affectionate. I wish you could have seen this, Mom and Dad. He’d make you so proud.
“Quite a show,” Zara’s voice said from behind her.
Dee spun around and stared into Zara’s amused violet gaze for a moment before noticing Danyael in the wheelchair with Laura seated on his lap. “Oh, my God,” she squealed, throwing her arms around Danyael’s neck and hugging him until Laura, caught in between them, squirmed and pushed Dee away with an irritated huff.
Dee stepped back and studied Danyael carefully. He looked pale and tired, but his dark eyes were alert. “Are you okay?”
Danyael nodded. “The doctors didn’t think it would be a good idea for me to stand for more than a few minutes at a time, but I didn’t want to miss the concert, so we struck a compromise. Thank you. I owe you my life.”
Dee flushed. “Seth would never have gotten to you, if not for Dum and me.”
“He would have found a way, regardless.” Danyael’s gaze shifted toward Dum, a clear indication that the particular topic of conversation was over. “Your brother is amazing.”
“You’re not doing any of it, are you?” she asked, waving her hand over the crowd.
Danyael shook his head. “No, it’s all him.”
The music went on and on, a tiny ripple of happiness and joy that surged from the soundstage and carried across the entire auditorium, expanding as it flowed in all directions. Like a pebble thrown into a pond, Dum’s music subtly and irresistibly altered the landscape of human-derivative relations.
Cynics grumbled and said that the decades-long troubled relationship would revert to the status quo the following day. They were wrong. The relationship did not immediately change for the better, but from that day forth, all remembered the magnificent dance party in the troubled heart of Washington D.C. and recalled that for a time, mutants, clones, in vitros, and humans had celebrated life alongside each other.
Just then though, the future did not matter. Dum’s music reigned dominant, a celebration of life and love, of joy and hope that inspired feet to dance and hearts to sing. Dee glanced back over her shoulder and saw Zara lean down to whisper something in Danyael’s ear. A rare smile, dazzling in its unchecked beauty, curved Danyael’s lips. He reached out and touched her cheek, a gesture that was almost a caress. In that moment, Zara, who was also smiling, did not seem like a cynical, hardened assassin, and Danyael was not an emotionally distant alpha empath. With Laura in between them, they looked like precisely what they were, a family.
Grinning to herself, Dee returned her attention to the soundstage as Dum wrapped up the third and final round of songs. The last piece, a simple instrumental, began with the haunting melody of a harp but swelled in complexity and beauty as the flute, violin, and oboe layered upon the lonely tune.
Dee pressed her lips together an
d blinked the tears from her eyes. Her chest ached, throbbing as the music seared her soul. The wordless song pleaded for kindness even as it offered compassion and love.
“Who composed that music?” Zara asked, quiet awe in her voice. “It’s beautiful.”
Danyael shook his head. His eyes narrowed with confusion, as if he vaguely recognized the tune, but could not place it. “I…don’t know.”
Jessica’s voice whispered through Dee’s mind. It’s Danyael’s song. It’s the music Dum hears when Danyael uses his empathic powers to heal. Her mental voice caught on the edge of a sniffle. Damn it, there’s not a dry eye in the stadium.
Dee chuckled, the sound trapped between a laugh and a sob. Dum’s tribute to Danyael was the most amazing piece of music she had ever heard.
When the flawless harmonics of the harp faded away, the applause of the crowd rocked the stadium. The roar was deafening, but it subsided gradually when Dum held up his hand. Just as music had rippled from the soundstage, so did silence until the auditorium was utterly quiet.
Dum turned his head to meet Dee’s gaze. He grinned, waving at her to make sure he had her attention, and then he leaned forward into the live microphone. “Thank you, Dee.”
Dee clasped her hands over her mouth. Tears streamed from her eyes.
The crowd cheered with delight.
Dum turned back to the audience. He threw both arms up into the air and grinned. “Thank you.”
PERFECTION CHALLENGED
An alpha empath, Danyael Sabre has survived abominations and super soldiers, terrorists and assassins, but he cannot survive his failing body. He wants only to live out his final days in peace, but life and the woman he loves, the assassin Zara Itani, have other plans for him.
Galahad, the perfect human being created by Pioneer Labs, is branded an international threat, and Danyael is appointed his jury, judge, and executioner. Danyael alone believes that Galahad can be the salvation that the world needs, but is the empath blinded by the fact that Galahad shares his genes, and the hope that there is something of him in Galahad?
In a desperate race against time and his own dying body, Danyael struggles to find fragments of good in the perfect human being, and comes to the wrenching realization that his greatest battle will be a battle for the heart of the man who hates him.
CHAPTER ONE
The bite of the wind was cold and cruel, unusual for late October. Like a thousand paper cuts, it chafed his cheeks, the discomfort blending into his exhaustion. Braced against the brisk gusts, Danyael Sabre paused outside the sliding doors of Providence Hospital and tugged up the zipper of his leather jacket before venturing forward. The limp on his left leg more pronounced than ever, he hobbled toward the bus stop, his single crutch tapping an erratic rhythm on the icy pavement.
Nelson Harris’s parting words tumbled through Danyael’s mind, but he set them aside. He could mull over his decision later. For now, his daily responsibilities took priority; functioning took priority. Assuming the bus ran on time, he would arrive at Anacostia before noon, in time to start his eight-hour shift at the free clinic. After work, he could take the metro to Georgetown to see Zara and—
A female voice, as sultry as black velvet, interrupted his thoughts. “You’re lucky you had a good reason for breaking our brunch date.”
Danyael jerked his gaze up to look into Zara Itani’s violet eyes. A smile toyed on the woman’s lips as a toddler barreled forward. “Daddy!” With a squeal of delight, Laura threw her arms around Danyael’s legs.
Pain lanced through his crippled leg and along the length of his spine. His breath caught and his vision flashed blinding white. Danyael reeled, and he sagged against his crutch, his knuckles white as he gripped it for support.
Zara’s arm, slender yet strong, snaked around his waist, steadying him until the pain settled into a dull grind. “Be gentle, Laura.” She leaned down and eased the girl away from Danyael.
Laura’s eyes, the same unusual color as Zara’s, widened. “You okay, Daddy?”
He breathed out, the sound jagged, and waited until he was certain he could keep his voice steady. His hand trembled upon her golden curls. “I’ll be all right.”
Apparently reassured, Laura skipped away from him, giggling as she slipped and skidded on the sidewalk. She had turned two a few months earlier and was growing fast. Her bell-like laughter charmed grim-faced passersby into indulgent grins. Danyael, too, relaxed into a smile as he watched her antics. The rush of love, so familiar now, warmed him.
Zara shattered his mood. “What are you doing here?”
He did not need his empathic powers to hear the suspicion in her tone. “Are you spying on me?”
The flash of her teeth was more sneer than smile.
Damn her. He shook his head and pulled away from her.
Her grip tightened briefly around his waist before she released him. “Are you sick?”
“I had an appointment with Nelson Harris. He’s an orthopedic surgeon here at Providence. He came in to see me since Sunday morning is the only free time I have.”
Delight danced across Zara’s face, startling him. “You’re getting surgery on your leg? That’s awesome. What’s the recuperation period? Will you need physical therapy after surgery?”
Questions without answers; he turned his face away.
She caught his wrist, preventing him from moving further. The pleasure slipped from her voice. “You’re not getting surgery?”
He forced himself to meet Zara’s gaze. Her long dark hair was tucked beneath a furred hood, and her white leather coat, belted at the waist, cut off above her knees, displaying shapely legs clad in black tights. A Lebanese-Venezuelan, Zara was more exotic than beautiful, but standing beside him, they were, as a couple, captivating—dark against light, both stunning. The rapt attention of passersby confirmed it.
Danyael needed no such ego boost. All he wanted was privacy, and that he rarely received anymore. He had lost all claims on privacy when the world found out that his father, Roland Rakehell, had used his genetic code as the physical template for Galahad, the perfect human being created by Pioneer Labs.
His eyes narrowing, Danyael unleashed his empathic powers, turning the open curiosity of strangers into bored indifference. The attention faded, and he released his breath in a sigh of relief. It was easier to breathe without the flittering sensation of lust crawling against his skin. Only then did he pull his wrist free from Zara’s grip. “We can talk about it tonight.”
“If you’re not getting surgery—”
“I’m getting my leg amputated.” He slammed her with the truth. It was unkind, but she had worn his patience down.
“What?” Her jaw dropped. “No. No, you can’t. You said you were saving for surgery to fix your leg.”
Danyael glanced down at his left leg. Beneath the denim, his upper thigh and knee were swathed in bandages and athletic tape—neither doing much good in stabilizing the torn tendons and ruined muscles. His shoulders moved with the motion of a sigh. “I can’t save enough, and the condition of my leg is deteriorating. It’s better this way.”
She tilted her head, the gesture challenging. “Better, or easier?”
Trust Zara to make things difficult—even things that had nothing to do with her—and damn her for forcing him on the defensive. With effort, he kept his voice steady, though Zara’s attitude could have driven a saint to murder. “It’s wearing me down—”
“So you’re giving up?”
“I’m choosing not to be in pain. I would have thought that you’d be thrilled to realize that I’m not a masochist after all.” The icy fingers of the wind tugged through his pale blond hair, and he braced against its cold bite as much as he did against Zara’s stinging verbal attack.
Something flashed in her eyes—embarrassment, perhaps regret. For a moment, he wished he still knew what she felt, but no, it was better this way. Zara’s fluctuating emotions spun his empathic senses into confusion and spiked aspirin-resistant migr
aines. After Sakti’s terrorist attack on Washington, D.C., on July Fourth the prior year, he had erected a psychic barrier between them to keep himself sane. Where Zara was concerned, ignorance equaled peace of mind.
“But without your leg, you…” A deep flush stained the bronzed honey of her skin.
“Won’t be perfect?” He shrugged, the motion concealing the tension that tugged at his shoulders, and the deep ache that clawed in his gut. “I never was.”
“That’s not what I meant. Don’t put words in my mouth, damn it. God, you’re a bitter, self-pitying fool.”
If only she knew. He wasn’t bitter, just realistic. “I need the pain to stop. I need to know that there’s an end in sight. Now, finally, I can see it.”
Her throat worked, and she looked away. “When is your surgery?”
“Tomorrow.”
“So soon?” She looked at him, dismay in her eyes.
“There’s no reason to put it off.”
“How much will the surgeon cut off?”
“Under the hip.”
Her brow furrowed. “And you’ll be able to get a prosthetic.”
“Maybe, if the damaged ligaments in my hip can handle the pressure and if I can save up for it.”
“Save up?”
Danyael smiled without humor. “Harris agreed to accept a down payment of what I had saved toward surgery. The balance I’ll pay him over five years, and then I can start putting money aside for the prosthetic.”
“Danyael, I can—”
“No.” He shook his head, the motion sharp. His tone was more abrupt than he intended. “I pay my own way, Zara. No more favors. I can’t afford them.” He could not afford medical insurance either, not with child support and student loan payments consuming most of his income.
She sighed. “Can I at least give you a ride to Anacostia, or are you going to insist on waiting for the bus?”
He chuckled at the exasperation in her tone. “Yes, I’ll accept the ride. Thank you.”
Zara grasped his arm, steadying him as they made their way toward the parking garage. Laura trotted ahead of them on the grass, her small feet crunching on the ice shards.