“What?”
“There’s a picture where they used both your names.”
She chuckled. “I only have one name. Sylvia Daniels was a uniform I wore when studying them as children. They know who I am now. Did you find anything else?”
He’d never understood why she’d used a fake name anyway. “No. They cleaned the offices and apartments out, leaving just the furniture. They paid in cash for everything,” he added before she could start questioning him.
She sighed. “Well, I did create them to be brilliant, so we shouldn’t be surprised.”
Brilliant, his ass. Sure, they had been genetically created in test tubes by Isobel, but intelligence couldn’t just be created. “If you say so,” he muttered.
“Any clues there? We know it was some sort of detective agency,” she said, typing softly across the line. “But they didn’t register it with the state or county.”
“There aren’t any business cards or letterhead here,” he said. “I questioned the lawyer they worked with, and he didn’t remember a name.” Though gut instinct told Cobb that the lawyer had known more than he’d said. Apparently Heath and the boys had learned to create loyalty in the folks they met. “I could take another run at the lawyer but not if you want me to remain under the radar.”
“No need. My boys have left Wyoming, and we know that Heath is outside of DC.”
“The text I just received said that good old Daniel failed to bring in Heath,” Elton retorted. The supersoldier was Isobel’s pet, and he’d failed.
“Daniel will get the job done. Trust me. I will have those boys back here under our control by this time next year.”
So she could return them to the labs and force them to work for her—as well as provide genetic samples for a new generation of engineered supersoldiers. Cobb shook his head. “Okay.” He fully planned on killing them all before they could do shit. After he demolished anybody and everybody they loved. Isobel would just have to forgive him afterward.
“There are bigger issues at play than simple vengeance,” she said, reading him with impressive accuracy.
That’s what she thought. “They killed my brother.”
“I know.” She sighed. “But you and your brother shouldn’t have beaten them for so many years. They were bound to fight back. It’s in their very genes—I made sure of it.” A barely veiled pride whispered in her voice.
Cobb shook his head. Those assholes were lucky enough to have had a roof over their heads and food in their bellies. They deserved every beating they ever got. “Any other news about the DC op?”
“Barely.” Her voice had lost any semblance of pleasure. “Yes. Daniel said Heath protected a woman in the fight.”
A woman? Excellent. A weakness for Heath. It was shocking Daniel had even noticed a woman. He was one of the few people on earth who gave Cobb the willies. If eyes could be dead, Daniel’s were. “Where is Daniel now?”
“He landed at the Boise airport and should be arriving here at any moment.” Isobel’s new compound and lab were located several miles outside Boise, Idaho . . . a place where she could conduct her genetic experiments in private.
Cobb shrugged off unease about Daniel. “Who was the woman with Heath?”
“Her name is Anya Best, and she’s the sister of an FBI agent who was taken by some serial killer. Had a very nice news conference during which she announced she was Heath’s fiancée and they were moving to Snowville in Washington.” Satisfaction put a lilt in Isobel’s cultured voice.
His pulse rate picked up, and he sat forward. “We know where they’re going?”
“I find it highly unlikely. It’s possible she gave the location to throw us off track. It’d be the smart thing to do, and Heath knows we’re looking for them. With Daniel finding them in DC, Heath has to feel the time for our reunion drawing near.”
Cobb flopped back in the chair. “Good point. There’s no way Heath would allow her to announce their location to the media.”
“No. Unless it suits his purpose, which I can’t imagine at this point. He has to know how vulnerable a dalliance would make him.” Isobel chuckled the deep-throated sound that made Cobb’s entire body hum. “I had no clue I’d created such a group of romantic fools when I spliced their genes.”
Women made them weak, and Cobb would use that. “I take it you’re tracking down information on Anya Best?”
“Of course. I’ll know everything about her by tonight. She might have FBI protection since her sister was with the Bureau, so we’ll have to proceed very carefully.”
“If she’s with Heath, she’s not with the FBI,” Cobb returned. “I’m considering filing a report on my brother’s murder to get the entire U.S. law enforcement community after these assholes.” The only reason he hadn’t done so was because he wanted to extract revenge on his own without the court system. But after twenty years of searching for them, he was ready to let them just go to jail if that was the only way to make them pay.
“No. I need them for further research, and you need them to hurt for what they did to you,” she countered easily. “I promise you’ll get much more satisfaction from letting them live and suffer. Just think what you can do to their women in front of them.”
His dick hardened. “That’s a good point, my love.” God, she’d be frightening if she weren’t on his side. Hell, she scared the shit out of him sometimes, and he was a sadist. “How’s the new lab coming along?”
“So well.” Her tone evened out to pure pleasure. “About two weeks to go, and we’ll be up and running. I have a few genetic samples left that look viable and just need female surrogates, which we can discuss later. Right now I’m receiving the proper equipment, and Daniel will get back to training the soldiers. I have only five still loyal from the past.” Her pout sounded through the line.
“Five is a good number to start with,” he returned. Especially since those five had been trained from birth to fight and kill.
“I wish I could get all my boys back here,” she whispered.
He shook his head. “You’ll make more soldiers, Isobel.”
“Just find my boys for me. I need their sperm to start creating again.” She clicked off the call.
He slipped the phone back into his pocket. Sperm? Right. Once he was finished with them, they wouldn’t be able to produce shit—much less sperm. At that thought, he yanked out his dick and started stroking himself.
Might as well leave his mark on the office.
Dr. Isobel Madison kept her spine straight as she typed, her fingers flowing over the keyboard. Anticipation rushed through her. Changes were coming, and she could feel her creations drawing near, whether they liked it or not. Though once again she couldn’t help but wonder why they didn’t see their importance to science.
Her work was creating life in test tubes, and she’d nearly altered biology to get the boys she’d wanted. Then she’d studied those boys as they’d become men.
Several of her boys who’d created familial bonds—the bonds of brotherhood—had somehow escaped her. She would love to study them again and figure out how to break those bonds. To create truly unencumbered soldiers. It was her calling, after all.
A sharp rap sounded on the thick metal door. “Enter,” she said, sitting even straighter. Now in her early fifties, she had to remind herself sometimes to continue good habits.
Daniel strode inside, snow on his broad shoulders and thick boots. “Dr. Madison.”
She gestured toward a seat. “You failed.”
“Yes.” He stood at the back of the chair and made no move to cross around and sit. His brown gaze met hers evenly, the bruises cascading down the right side of his rugged face only enhancing his wolf-like good looks. He stood well over six feet, tightly muscled, and pleasantly relaxed most of the time. “Heath fought well.”
Made sense. From an early age, Heath had exhibited faster reflexes than many of her creations. “Are you injured?”
“No. Just sore.” Daniel flexed the bruised
knuckles on his right hand. The man had always had broad and beautiful hands, even as a boy. “Heath was protecting the woman fiercely. There’s something between them.”
“She’s his fiancée,” Isobel returned.
Daniel looked around the feminine office.
She tilted her head to the side and began taking mental notes, unable to stop studying him for even a moment. “Do you want a fiancée, Daniel?”
He lifted an eyebrow and focused back on her. “Why in the world would I want entanglements, Dr. Madison? They make you weak and give your enemy a way in.” He shook his head, and snow sprayed from his thick dark hair. “A soldier fights alone. You taught me that.”
Yet he was one of the few who’d actually learned the lesson. She loosened her top button to watch his reaction.
Nothing. Always alert and paying attention, but nothing. She’d seduced many a soldier through her years training them, but Daniel had never given her more than a second glance. Sure, he’d been trained like the others in every sexual technique, and she knew he’d been with many women, but he looked upon her as a fellow soldier. As someone he trusted and took orders from, not as a woman. That had peeved her for years.
“I understand about entanglements, but what about sex?” she asked.
His lip twitched. “I have companionship and sex when I want, and you know it.”
Yes, but what about sex with her? She eyed him. The man was hers and had been from the second she’d created him. He’d make a good ally should she ever need one, considering he could fight and kill easily. Could she get him to kill for her out of emotion instead of obedience? “I am rarely concerned with your private activities,” she said.
He just looked at her.
So she looked back, wanting answers. True, it’d be smart to align herself with someone so young and strong. And it would be nice to be desirable to such a masculine specimen. Yet, as always, finding the answer to a question was so much more important than ego or feelings. Daniel would be more than satisfactory in bed. He’d certainly filled out in his late twenties, and he’d been trained by the best. So long as Elton Cobb didn’t find out, why not have a good time?
“Do you think I’m pretty, Daniel?”
He studied her face for a moment, his gaze dropping to her breasts and back up. “Your beauty isn’t a matter of opinion. You’re just as stunning today as you were when I was a boy.”
True. She smiled. “Yet you’ve never made a move.”
He straightened even more, his eyes calculating and then veiled. “You’re also the closest thing I have to a mother. Lines must be drawn.”
Most women would feel old at the statement. She felt questions. Could she push him from that view into a different one? One from which he fought for her, for her affections, out of need and not duty? Or was he messing with her? Challenging her? She needed to spend more time in his head, because that was fascinating. The possibility of changing his mind, whether he liked it or not, aroused her.
One thing at a time, unfortunately. They had work to do.
“I’m pleased you find me attractive, and we’ll explore that issue later. For now, can you tell me anything about Heath?” It had been so long since she’d seen her special boy.
Daniel shrugged. “He fights well, especially considering he wasn’t raised and trained with us.” For the first time, a look other than confidence filled Daniel’s dark eyes. Curiosity? Yet he didn’t ask.
She leaned forward. “You can ask me anything.”
He paused. “All right. Why? Why did you have these other soldiers somewhere else and not with us in the compound? Not raised and trained like we were? Without the commander’s guidance and gift?”
Oh. The sweet boy was still feeling loyalty to the commander, who’d been Isobel’s partner for years. She’d handled the science, and the commander had dealt with the training and most of the discipline. Recently, he’d been killed by one of their own soldiers, and the wound was still somewhat fresh inside her breast. “All scientific research needs different parameters,” she started.
Daniel frowned.
She continued, “Heath, Denver, and Ryker were sent out into the world and then relocated together as boys to a home where I could study them. They found each other, as I’d hoped, and their skills developed naturally, much like yours did.”
“So we’re all specimens to you.” Daniel’s voice remained level and merely curious.
“No. You’re family to me—I created all of you.” She clasped her hands together on the glass-topped desk. “Plus, my entire life I shared with the commander. It was nice to have a project that was just mine alone. All mine.” Those boys owed her. Without her, they wouldn’t even have life, much less each other.
“And Sheriff Cobb? You were his lover even back then. The commander didn’t know about the good ole sheriff, now, did he?”
Isobel lifted a shoulder. “He might have—I’m not sure. We had an open relationship, as you know.” The love of her life had had no problem seeking out other women once in a while, so she had seen no need to deny herself. She studied her loyal follower. “You deserve something for yourself, too. Think about it.” With his training, he’d be amazing in bed.
His eyes flared for the first time, and he gave a short nod. “I will. After I hunt down Heath and return the beating, maybe I’ll find something for myself.”
Isobel smiled. “That’s my boy.”
CHAPTER
12
Anya jolted awake in the SUV and then winced as her neck flared in pain. “Ugh.” The masculine scent of leather and male filled her head, and she glanced down at the heavy jacket draped over her chest. She breathed in deeply. Heath Jones. All Heath Jones. Her skirt had bunched up a little, and she pulled it down. She turned her head to see him looking at her from the driver’s seat.
“You talk in your sleep,” he said. “Something about cupcakes.”
She blinked and sat up, focusing on a snowy parking lot in front of a ramshackle motel with worn red doors. Clouds covered the moon, expanding the sense of being alone in the quiet world. “Where are we?”
“Halfway.” He held up a key—the old fashioned kind. “I need a few hours of sleep.”
He’d already checked in? Man, she hadn’t heard a thing. The wind rattled sleet against the window, which fogged quickly. “I can drive,” she blurted out.
“No.” He softened the word with a smile. “Sorry.”
“Control freak.” She handed his jacket over and drew hers up from her lap to shrug into. Her brain was still a little muddled, so maybe it was good she wasn’t driving the big vehicle. She opened the door and dropped to the icy ground. A sharp, cold wind instantly assailed her, and she hunched inside her jacket.
She needed to change into jeans and get out of her funeral suit.
Heath jumped out and came around the car to grasp her hand and lead her through the storm to one of the cracked doors. His hand enclosed hers with a firm and definite warmth, which sent a shot of awareness to spark in her abdomen. He carried both her suitcase and a duffel bag in his other hand, while she kept a tight hold on her laptop bag.
Wait a minute. She drew back. “Um.”
He quickly unlocked the door and pulled her inside, snapping the door shut. “It’s freezing out there.” Releasing her, he moved for a worn heater stretched across the wall and started twisting knobs, dropping into a crouch.
One bed. The minuscule room held one bed, a rickety table with two chairs, and a television console circa 1960. The carpet was an avocado green and the walls were yellowed. A very tiny bathroom lay off to the side. “I, ah, have a credit card we could use for a couple of rooms in a hotel with newer carpet,” she murmured weakly. What kind of germs were hidden in the carpet?
He looked up and grinned. “This place takes cash and doesn’t require identification.” Heat blasted from the furnace, and he stood, dusting off his hands. Even in the dim light, he overpowered the room with the sense of maleness. Strength and masculini
ty.
“Why can’t we use identification?” She swallowed. The bed was only a queen. Not even a king. A man his size needed a much larger bed. At least the flowered quilt appeared fairly new. But they could not share that bed.
“The case I can’t talk about.” He rubbed the dark shadow on his jaw. “Sorry about the one bed, but you’re the one who challenged a serial killer and asked me to be your groom.”
She shook her head and tried to find reality. Why was she so tired? “I did not ask you to be my groom.”
He shrugged. “Same diff. We’re engaged, baby. That means one room and one bed.” His voice was a low rumble that caressed her already overexposed nerves.
She eyed the bed.
“I need a shower, sweetheart. We can fight about the one bed after.” He grasped his duffel and disappeared into the bathroom. Within seconds, water started running.
Baby, sweetheart, and darlin’. The guy loved endearments. “You know my name, right?” she whispered with an eye roll. Even worse, she liked the endearments said in his deep voice just for her. She had to get a grip. The idea of his spectacular body all naked in the next room made her skin feel too tight.
Okay. Enough of that. This was a job. Maybe it would help if she considered him a job.
Man, she’d like to work him. She giggled to herself.
She ran a shaky hand through her hair. After the funeral, the fight, and then sleeping for hours, she just couldn’t grab a thought. But a shower sounded nice. She lifted her suitcase onto the table and rummaged through it for yoga pants and a top. While she didn’t want to look like a disaster in front of Mr. Dark, Deadly, and Sexy as Hell . . . she also didn’t want to extend an invitation. They needed to get on track with the case and find the killer. Any complications would lead to problems.
Lethal Lies Page 10