“Stay down, agaph. Please.” He watched the flash of another shot brighten for a moment in his rearview mirror before something dinged the side of the car.
Apparently shooting was necessary to slow the traffic, because now the second car back slowed down, and Theo zipped into the space. Only one car between them now.
Kallan hung in the passing lane, waiting until the last possible second, then veered across the right lane—his rear bumper far too close to the front bumper of a tractor trailer—and onto the exit ramp as the truck driver blared his horn, the sound almost loud enough to drown out his thudding heart.
Too late for Theo to follow them. He breathed a little sigh of relief and randomly chose a direction at the bottom of the ramp.
“We did lose him finally, right? Who is it?” Andrea asked after they’d driven around in the city for nearly half an hour. “I was trying not to distract you in case he managed to keep up.”
“Theodore. He’s a west coaster. He’s out of his usual territory.” Kallan had to wonder why. And when had Theo developed the ability to cloak his presence? And how many other cousins could do it too?
“If he’s here, then he’s not alone.” His Medusa was smart. Only one of the reasons he loved her.
“A fair guess.” His gut told him Ari had called in some extra help. Which meant that whoever tracked them to Scotland knew when they returned. Probably Phillip. He was a serious computer hacking genius. Obviously, they knew when he left his house with the tracker in the phone and probably one in the car too, so they could find him no matter what. And with Theo in Philadelphia instead of Reno, he would have brought his brother Sebastyen and their cousin Kosmo with him from the other end of the country to bolster the Philly crew. Which meant Stavros was still in Maine. Waiting for them.
He swallowed. His Medusa was in a lot of danger, and he hadn’t done enough to keep her safe.
“I think I’m going to want to pick up a gun when we get to Maine,” Andrea said from the backseat.
Kallan laughed, a tiny bit of tension escaping with the sound. “I think that might be a good idea, agaph. But I think we may need the big guns, and those will take a little too much time to track down.”
“We’re still heading to New York, right?”
He considered that. It would be a gamble now, with his cousins so close, plus all of the rest who were normally in New York. The question was would they expect him to try something else and focus their attention elsewhere now, or would they figure he’d stick to his plan?
His family knew him well enough to know he always had a plan, and most often his plans were direct, rather than roundabout.
“No, I think we’re going into Harrisburg instead.” They wouldn’t have figured he’d detour so far off plan.
He hoped.
His Medusa’s life depended on it.
Chapter Thirteen
Andi woke with a start, then winced when the sudden movement pulled a muscle in her neck painfully. She’d clambered into the front seat while they were still in Philly last night, and Kallan refused to let her drive—his foot heavy on the accelerator when he steered the car onto the Pennsylvania Turnpike.
Now, though, he’d stopped the car, which had wakened her.
She looked around them and found not much of anything.
He smiled a little when he met her gaze. “It’s time to rent another car.” He pulled out his new cell phone.
She nodded and shifted in her seat. He’d driven well beyond Harrisburg. Around Harrisburg, actually, for the remainder of the night. She craned her neck to see the road sign ahead.
They weren’t too far from the capital now. It just looked like they were in the middle of nowhere.
She sat back, twisting and stretching as much as she could in her seat. Sleeping sitting up in a moving car left a lot to be desired.
But it beat being dead.
She curled her fingers into fists. It looked as if Kallan’s great-uncle had called in the troops. Just for her. How lovely. But not the sort of lovely that made one feel all tingly and happy.
Kallan must be exhausted. Dark smudges marked the skin beneath his green eyes, and she wanted to drag her fingers through his mussed hair to try to make it neater. Or just to touch him.
She gave in to part of the urge, setting one hand on his knee as he finished his phone call.
He smiled over at her, though strain bracketed his mouth. “Good morning.”
“Why don’t you let me drive?”
He looked as if he wanted to argue, but he shifted his gaze to the field beside the road. “After we get the new car. We should get some breakfast. Check the laptop for a tracking device too.”
She shut her eyes. That hadn’t occurred to her last night when they were destroying his old phone and abandoning his car.
“I should have thought of that earlier. I’d hate to have to ditch it, but if we have to, I will.” He covered her hand with one of his. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of that before this morning. They may know exactly where we are right now. Or when we boot up the system, depending on what they’re using.” His other hand slid up the side of his face to his rumpled hair. “Okay, this is our current plan. Get the new car, find somewhere to eat, then head north.” His bright gaze swung back to hers. “And we’ll find somewhere to spend at least the next night. I’m beat.”
She leaned over to kiss him lightly. “If you weren’t such a guy, you would have let me take a turn driving last night.”
A ghost of a smile touched his lips at her teasing, as she’d hoped. “You like that about me.”
“Most of the time.” She squeezed his knee. “How long are we going to drive before we stop?”
“Depends on what I find in the laptop.” He pushed his door open and climbed out slowly, then stretched.
Andi watched him root through the backpack for his computer before he returned to his seat. He pulled a multi-tool gadget with a tiny screwdriver from his pocket and undid all the screws holding the laptop case together. He held out the screws, and she opened her hand for them.
Then he carefully lifted the bottom off.
She leaned closer to look. She didn’t see anything that looked like the device in his cell phone. Nothing blinking that it was sending out a signal.
His mouth turned down. “So when we boot up then.” He sighed, sliding one hand over his eyes.
“If it’s a tracking program, we can disable it.”
“If we had a computer expert. I can do what I need to, Andrea, but I’m not a computer geek.”
She didn’t like the defeat in his eyes. “I know one.”
He lifted one eyebrow, a little of the disappointment leaving his face.
“Give me the phone.” It was early, but this was life or death. She traded the screws for the cell. She punched in Thalia’s number and held her breath.
Four rings. Five. Finally a click. “Hello?” It sounded as if her cousin had just rolled over in bed and snagged her phone.
Andi shut her eyes, relief welling in her middle. “It’s me.”
“Andi? Where are you?”
“Never mind. I have a problem you can help me with, though.” She explained quickly, offering only details pertinent to the laptop issue.
Thalia was silent for a long time. “If booting up the system triggers the tracking, you won’t have much time to disable the program. Unless you can scramble the signal.”
“How can we do that?” Her heart pounded in her ears, much too loudly. She shot Kallan a quick smile when he set his hand on her thigh, squeezing lightly.
“Let me think for a minute. I’m still not awake.” Thalia yawned, and there was rustling from her end of the line.
Andi dropped her head back against the headrest.
“We?” Thalia asked after a minute.
Andi laughed. “The laptop, T.”
Her cousin hummed, clearly dissatisfied with that response. “How close to an airport are you?” she said finally.
; “Not very far, actually.” Andi sat straighter in her seat.
“Get there and call me back. I’ll be awake, I promise.”
“Okay.” She clicked the off button. “We need to be at the airport.”
“Lucky for us, we were heading there.” He handed her the laptop and restarted the car. “We’ll do this first and then get the car, I think.”
She nodded, her mind racing. If Thalia could fix this, they would still be able to access things they might need, like email. She hoped Aunt Lydia had finally spoken to Celosia.
Her stomach rumbled, interrupting her pondering.
“And breakfast immediately after we get the car,” Kallan said with a grin.
She didn’t even protest his teasing. There was too much to worry about now.
Kallan watched with his heart in his throat when Andrea booted up the laptop while they sat in the middle of the airport, his new cell phone tucked against her ear. Her fingers skipped over the keys at her cousin’s instruction, her forehead creased with worry.
He kept an eye on the surrounding crowd, but he didn’t spot anyone who looked familiar, or feel any other Harvesters nearby. Not that that meant anything, since Theo could evidently cloak his presence.
Frowning, he turned his attention back to Andrea, who was looking at a screen full of gobbledegook.
“Okay, I see it,” she said into the phone. “It does have…yes, it says on the tenth. What does that… Oh. Okay. I see that, too… Yes.”
He watched her type in a command after a second, his gaze flitting away to keep an eye on the people around them. They needed to get out of here. His gut knotted with tension.
“Okay, it’s gone.” She shot him a thumbs-up and a quick smile. Then she frowned. “Wait, I see it again.”
He groaned softly.
“Okay. Tell me what the other one looks like.” She scrolled through the lines of code on the screen. “Got it.” She waited for instructions, then typed in something that looked like a two-year-old’s attempt at writing words. “It’s gone. They’re both gone… Okay, rebooting.” She shut the system down, then waited before restarting it.
Kallan felt like he could puke, if only he’d eaten something since supper last night.
When Andrea executed the steps her cousin described, her shoulders sagged with relief. “It’s gone. Thank you so much, T.”
His breath rushed out, and he unclenched his fists. Thank Goddess.
Andrea said her goodbyes to her cousin as she packed the laptop into the backpack. When she held out the phone, she looked wiped out. Still paler than usual—she had dark smudges under her eyes from lack of sleep. He guessed he had them too. “Let’s get the hell out of here, Harvester.”
He nodded his agreement and steered her to the rental counter downstairs where he signed the waiting agreement and took the key from a slow-moving young man who looked as if he needed a caffeine injection.
“Can you wait until we get onto the interstate?” he asked when they climbed into the new car. “For breakfast? And to check email?”
She nodded as she settled into her seat. “Yes. I just want to get away from here before someone who was able to catch the signal before we disabled it comes looking for us. Whoever installed the tracking program activated it just before we went to Scotland.”
He didn’t find that shocking. Not since they’d found the device in the phone. But he didn’t like it. He floored it when they hit the highway, guiding the car northeast, away from Harrisburg. No car appeared to be following them, and he forced himself to relax a little bit as he drove. “Your cousin is a genius.”
Andrea’s smile was tired, but still affectionate. “She is. Good thing, too. Who knew someone could create a tracking program that would replicate itself if you tried to delete it without catching the second portion?”
He didn’t have to imagine who. Ari had his fingers in all the pies of the searches for the Medusa. He encouraged his nephews to use the most advanced technologies available to them, and to hone their individual skills. But Kallan had never imagined his great-uncle would use those same tools against his own family. Then again, he supposed Ari didn’t trust any of them to do the job properly. Which made him wonder why.
About an hour north of the capital, he finally pulled off the interstate and into a truck stop so they could eat. Andrea returned from the ladies’ room with wet hair and pink in her cheeks, and slid into the booth across from him. “I am starving.”
“Good. I ordered you a huge breakfast.” He smiled at the arch of her eyebrow. “I didn’t think you’d want to wait any longer than absolutely necessary.”
She sighed. “You’re right.” Her gaze skittered around the restaurant, over the truckers and the tourists before returning to him. “Do you think we got everything now?”
“I hope so.” He didn’t tell her he’d searched through his backpack after she headed to the bathroom, just to make sure.
Her dark head bobbed once. “Would you reconsider waiting just a little longer?”
He laughed. “You are persistent, agaph.”
One of her shoulders lifted. “I really think it would be the most effective way to deal with them.”
He rested his forearms on the table and leaned toward her, searching her face for a few seconds. “If you’d let me, I’d take you somewhere far away right now,” he said, low. “I can keep you safe.” Now that no one could track them, that was.
Her expression softened, and she leaned forward so she could reach his hands, clasping them with hers. “I know. I appreciate it. But we can’t run forever. And you hate running as much as I do.”
He couldn’t argue that. “I want you alive more than I hate running,” he said finally.
The waitress rushed up to their table, nearly dropping a big plate on his head. “Oh, sorry. I’ve got your breakfasts. You wanted the farmer’s platter.” She set one of the plates in front of him when Andrea released his hands. “And the same for the lady. Can I get you anything else?”
He shook his head, and the woman hurried away.
Andrea touched the back of his hand when he reached for his fork. “I love you too.”
Warmth spread up his arm from her fingers, and expanded in his chest from her words. Smiling, he lifted her hand to his mouth, briefly.
After breakfast, they drove north. He set the GPS to avoid New York, since he imagined his cousins would be waiting there—watching, expecting him to want to blend into the crowds. And he let Andrea drive, both to stop her arguments and because he truly needed a nap.
“We should find somewhere not too far off the interstate to stay,” she said after they’d been on the road a while. “But not too near a big city. Unless you know you have cousins in some little town north of New York.”
He shook his head, trying to relax into the seat. “Not that I’m aware of.” He eased the seat back so he could stretch out his legs a bit. Much better.
“Okay. Then when I see some likely spot, we’ll get off. You should try to rest in the meantime.” She patted his knee, then put her hand back on the steering wheel.
“I’m sorry, Andrea.”
Her bright gaze slid away from the road and onto his face. “For what?”
“For not realizing just how much danger I was putting you in.”
She turned her attention back to the road, frowning. “You had no idea what you were in for when you came hunting me, Harvester.” Her tone was light.
He set his hand on her thigh. “I mean I didn’t know how desperate Uncle Ari is to kill you, desperate enough that he doesn’t trust any of us apparently.”
“He’d take the credit, too, wouldn’t he? The miserable old bastard.”
He inhaled slowly. “Probably. He’s shepherded all of us over the years. Everyone looks to him for guidance.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry.”
“We all have relatives we’d rather not acknowledge.” She sent another smile toward him.
Reluctantly, he smiled back.
&n
bsp; “Now get some sleep. You look like hell,” she teased.
He shut his eyes, but his mind was whirling in too many directions for him to possibly take a nap.
Andi hated to wake him when she stopped the car at the little motel off the highway—especially when it had taken over an hour for him to actually get to sleep. They’d left the interstate behind hours ago for a state highway, and this motel sat just outside a tiny town whose exit sign boasted “the best hot cakes in the state”. She hesitated, then put her hand on his shoulder, lightly.
He jerked upright instantly, and guilt lanced her belly. “Are you okay?”
“Fine. But I found us a place to spend the night.” She let her hand rest on his shoulder, feeling the tension in his muscles ease a little.
He sighed, rubbing his face with one hand. “All right.” He pushed his door open and got out.
Andi climbed out too, glad to stretch her legs. Upstate New York was pretty in the summer, she thought, scanning the area surrounding the motel. The trees shaded the property but weren’t so thick they would hide anyone. That was a plus. And one of the reasons she hadn’t stopped at the motel she’d seen directly off the highway. The trees and shrubs there were too thick for her liking right now. If she were home and safe, she’d be perfectly happy on her wooded mountain.
But she wasn’t safe, and it seemed best not to give her enemies any help reaching her.
They checked in as Mr. and Mrs. Reece Levine, though she doubted the man who took their money cared what names they used, as long as their money was good.
Kallan relaxed a little more once they were locked in their room at the far end of the long, low building, the car parked directly outside their door.
Andi sank onto the foot of the bed, her gaze skimming the room. It was clean, though outdated. She didn’t care as long as she could sleep. She was beyond tired.
He checked all the locks, door and windows, went into the bathroom to inspect it, and then came back out to sit down beside her. “Looks good.”
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