by J. R. Rain
John had a bone to pick with Orlenda. He was certain that she’d been in cahoots all along with Simms. They had made them their experiment. They wanted an ultimate weapon. They wanted to reverse what he was capable of as a healer and turn him into a real killer. Lying in the prison that Simms had set up for him, where he’d been chained, John recalled every word the man had spoken to him. The cell was dark, dank, and meant to drive John a little insane. Simms visited regularly as the “doctors’” he had on his payroll administered the poison into his veins while there was nothing he could do about it.
“You’re a good man, John Herrel. Too good. When we are done with you, you’ll be the most valuable asset a country could have. Orlenda has assured me of that.”
“Orlenda?” John sputtered. “You’re in cahoots with her?”
Simms paced the cell floor, arms crossed. “I know we do seem an unlikely partnership. She has the scientists who can create the perfect balance of chemicals to turn you into a weapon of mass destruction. Once we see that it works on you, I have a whole army of children who I can turn into perfect little soldiers.”
“You’re sick and twisted just like that bitch is.”
“Yes. Orlenda is a bitch, and possibly sick. Me? I like money and I like power, and you are going to help me get it.”
John sighed heavily as he recalled Simms’ story. He now had to wonder if Orlenda had double-crossed Simms. Did she know that the serum they’d dripped into his veins wasn’t going to work exactly the way Simms thought it would? Had Orlenda planned to turn John into a former shell of himself for her own sick and twisted means? John didn’t have those answers. However, eventually he would. He would find Simms and he would get to Orlenda again, too. He would not give up until he was once again the man he’d formerly been—the one who had been able to hold Kylie in his arms.
Although revenge would be nice, John needed answers at this point, and Orlenda had them. He would make her talk about the trade with Simms. In particular, what the components were in their serum that had not, in fact, turned him into their ultimate weapon, but rather had turned him into a caricature of his former self—a monster, as far as John was concerned.
But he needed to talk to her on his terms, and alone.
There had to be an answer, a way to reverse the effects of the serum. There had to be a way that he could touch another human being. To touch Kylie again. To tell her the truth and have her believe it.
If there were any answers, Orlenda would have them.
Either way, she was going to die.
John stepped out of the taxi a block from the safe house. He took in a deep breath and began walking. He’d come for answers and he aimed to get them.
Chapter Twenty-three
“Thanks,” I said, climbing off the back of the bike. “Guess you figured out where I was.”
“You’ve got one helluva direct line to the Sister. Once she told us you were in trouble, we all dialed in. Sorry if I got to you a little late.”
“Better late than never.” We stood on a cliff overlooking the crystalline waters of the Dead Sea. On any other occasion, the scene would have been serene and romantic, with the azure sea balanced against the crisp sand, and edged rock formations that grew into cliffs. My mind reflected back on the image of the man behind the wheel of the truck that had knocked into the guys trying to kill me. He had looked like John. But he couldn’t be. Surely my mind was playing tricks on me.
The early evening sky cast a glow of purple and rose around us. “Where are they? The others?” I asked.
“Sister Marie-Luce has a plan. I was sent after you, of course.” He smiled. “We worked it out. We know that we have to get Hope to the caves as soon as possible. That nun is a bad ass. It’s how I got the bike.”
“Say again?”
“Apparently, she’s got some underground connections and there is a whole system beneath the city—roads and paths and ways to make sure people who don’t want to be noticed aren’t noticed,” he said, reaching out and pushing a strand of hair that had come out of my ponytail back behind my ear. “Noah’s there now with Hope.”
“I see you’re trusting Noah again.”
“I’m not sure that I have much of a choice.”
“I trust him and I definitely trust Sister Marie-Luce,” I said.
Ayden took a step closer. “Kylie,” he said quietly.
I held up my hand. “No. Don’t. We have to stop what we started in Morocco.” I was, of course, referring to something other than Dead Sea Scrolls and psychic spies and secret underground networks.
“I don’t want to stop it, Ky. And I don’t think you do either.”
“It’s not that easy.”
“Why not? Let’s make it easy. Easy is good.”
“There’s Noah...”
“You have feelings for him,” he said.
“I do. And there’s a part of me that died with...”
“John. I know. And I know you have feelings for Noah. I’m not worried about it. And I definitely can’t worry about a dead man and neither can you.”
“Ayden,” I said sharply.
“I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.” He held up his hands. “But he’s gone, and you have to consider his loyalties, Kylie. John betrayed us.”
I couldn’t speak. Mostly because I knew he was right.
He took both of my hands in his. “Look, it’s my plan to make you realize that I’m the one you’re thinking about before you fall asleep each night. In fact...” He took another step closer. “It’s my plan to have you falling asleep next to me every night. And, you won’t be thinking about anyone else.” He took my face in his hands, and an undeniable tingling warmth traveled from my cheeks all the way down to my toes.
“I don’t even know what to say to that, other than we have to make things right here...with Hope and everything, before my mind can even go anywhere personal.”
He pulled me into his chest. I let him hold me, needing the comfort for just a few minutes before we figured out our plan. His lips pressed against the top of my head and I clutched the front of his shirt. “It’s going to be okay,” he said.
I wanted to believe him, but the odds were seriously stacked against us. “Is it?”
His fingers found the back of my head and he stroked the length of my neck. I closed my eyes and inhaled his unique scent, mingled with sweat and Holy Land dust. He gently cupped the bottom of my jaw, tilting my head up. I searched his eyes, and I stopped thinking altogether as his lips brushed gently against mine. My chest melted against his—or was that my heart—and I tightened my hold on his shirt. He tilted my head and swept his tongue across my parted lips, then slipped inside, gently probing my mouth. We shouldn’t be doing this, but I needed just one speck of comfort before my entire life spiraled out of control.
I was barely hanging on and Ayden breathed life and strength back into me. I clung to him and let him taste me. We’d always fit so well together and I’d come to rely on him so much. He always knew what I needed even before I did, and that was so true right now. He felt so good and solid beneath my fingers. I stretched them across his chest and slid them higher, linking them behind his neck as he deepened the kiss. He pressed against me and hungrily devoured my mouth as his hands traveled down my back.
I pulled back, breathing heavily.
His lips were still parted and he blinked. “You okay?”
I licked my lips and nodded. “Maybe we should get back to work.”
He pressed his forehead to mine and closed his eyes. “Yeah.”
I still had a tight hold on the back of his head. I couldn’t step away just yet, worried that my knees would give out and I’d slide to the ground.
“Yes. We should get back to work.” He took a step back and we looked into each others’ eyes for a long moment. “Wolf. I take it that you haven’t had a chance to call him.”
“Not yet.” I shook my head. “The first goon found me on the bus. Then, you can figure what happened from the
re.”
“There’s blood on your forearm.”
“Don’t ask,” I said.
“I never do.”
“I need to make the call. I guess this is as safe as any place might be, seeing that we probably have an army of various bad guys looking for us.”
“True,” he replied. “I’ll give you some privacy and see if I can check in and locate Hope and Noah. I suspect they should be arriving soon to the location we’d chosen.”
“Which is?” I asked.
He winked. “Cave four at the Qumran, of course.”
“Right. One of my guides reached out and I haven’t had much time to make sense of it, but I was shown one of the caves, which is likely cave four. The guide made a big deal around a specific area where there is an opening, almost like a window. I think there is something there. But there were also bullets flying every which way. We could be in some real danger.”
“Just another day at the office. That reminds me, I’m filing for hazard pay. Again.” He winked again and walked to the edge of the cliff where I knew he was going to do what he could to locate my sister and Noah.
I picked my backpack up off the ground and fished out one of the many disposable phones that the team carried between us. My hands shook slightly—a rarity for me. I dialed the secure line that I knew would lead me to Wolf.
The phone rang once, chirped, then warbled as it switched over to a safe line. Silence hung on the other end. Always silence first.
“Wolf, I need a favor.”
A bumbling of the phone on the other end told me that Grant had definitely told the rest of PSI something about us. I held my breath.
“Kylie! You’re in some deep shit. What did you do?”
“It’s lies, Wolf. I need you to trust me. I’ll tell you everything, but right now, we need your help.”
“We? Oh my God, Kylie! Are you in this with Noah and Ayden? Jesus, Ky. Grant said they’ve gone off the deep end.”
“They’re following my lead. Trust me, Wolf. Please. You know me.” I hoped that was true. We’d been friends forever, but we all knew that PSI and the mission came first. I was asking him to directly disobey orders. But I had a hunch that for me, he’d disobey anyone.
The handset rustled on his end. I suspected he was looking over his shoulder. “What do you need, kiddo?”
I let out the breath I’d been holding. “First, I need to know if you know where Simms is.”
“No.” His voice lowered. “People here are talking because he’s gone MIA, and there’s no clear second in command. You guys are out, and the only thing we’ve come up with here, internally, is that he’s looking for you.”
“Right. Next question. I need to know what Simms has been up to. There are going to be files that he’s kept outside of PSI. I need them. Can you access them?” I knew he could. He’d built every single bit of computer network since the inception of PSI. Wolf’s talents might not lie in the psychic world like mine, but they were no less critical to the success of PSI. We’d both been there from the very beginning, and, for a while, he had been my only friend there at the beginning.
I could almost hear him tossing his hands up in the air in the dramatic way that he has. “Ky, I think you need to come in. Ditch Ayden and Noah and get your ass in here. You know Grant will forgive you of anything. You can just tell him what happened and come home.” His voice lowered and I could see him clutching the phone and pushing his glasses up on the bridge of his nose with his middle finger.
“I can’t come home, Wolf. There are kids involved. Grant’s gotten PSI into some strange shit. I have to fix it first.” And if Hope was right, maybe even save the world on some apocalyptic level. “I have to go now. Wolf, can you help me?”
There was a long pause and I knew he was weighing whether or not he should keep begging me or if he’d finally realized that I wasn’t going to budge. “Some time ago, Grant did ask me to set up a cloaked folder.”
My fingers tightened painfully on the phone. “You have to find out what’s in there, Wolf.”
“How do I get it to you?”
I glanced at my watch. “You’ll have to figure that out.”
“Where are you?” he asked.
I didn’t answer.
“Kylie, if I’m going to get you any kind of information, then I need to know where you are at the very least. What country? Something.”
I sighed. “Israel.”
“Okay. I can work with that. You won’t like the location you need to go to. But it’s all I’ve got.”
“I don’t have much time, but wherever I need to go, so be it.”
“Give me an hour, and then go to a bar in Lod called Micha. I’ll get a contact to deliver what I can.”
“Okay.” I hung up and walked over to Ayden. I knew where Lod was. It wasn’t exactly upscale Tel Aviv.
“Hey,” he said. “What you got?”
“We’re going to the ghetto.”
He grinned. “Like I said, hazard pay.”
Chapter Twenty-four
The bar was as I expected—dingy, small, and filled with a handful of misfits. I went inside while Ayden waited on the bike. He’d protested, but finally agreed that my rationale made sense.
“If we need to get away quickly, then we’re prepared to do so. I mean, we could switch. I could drive,” I said, smiling.
“You drive like you have a death wish,” he said. “No thank you.”
“Then wait here.” I climbed off the bike and sauntered into the bar. Heads turned and eyed me—some with suspicion, others with lust. I kept walking.
One guy, who had already had his fair share of his poison of choice, slid off the barstool and grabbed my elbow. A short, sharp movement later, and my free elbow cracked over his nose. He dropped like a rock, holding his face. I glanced around. The others turned back to their drinks. I really hadn’t wanted to make a scene, but so be it.
I ordered a beer from the overweight, bearded, unkempt bartender. He dispensed one from the tap, and set down a cocktail napkin underneath the beer.
I picked up the beer and then the napkin, and saw that what I needed was underneath it. It wasn’t any larger than a small button. I pulled out my phone and slid the contact into the device that Wolf had modified. We each had one of these special phones. I took a long sip on the beer and allowed time for the computer to go to work. Dammit. I could see that the file would take some time, so I downed the beer, headed outside and climbed back on the bike.
“Let’s go somewhere safe where we can read this thing,” I said.
“A hotel room?”
“Not that safe.”
Ayden grinned and started up the bike and soon we were headed back toward the caves. Fifteen minutes later, we stopped at a roadside café where I handed Ayden the phone. “See what you can figure out. Did you find Noah and Hope?”
He nodded. “They should be arriving at the caves very soon. They’ve remained safe, so far.”
“Okay. That’s good. I just want to check in with Hope myself.” I didn’t tell him that I was feeling something in my gut about my sister, that something, in fact, wasn’t right. I needed to hear her breathing or talking with Noah.
I went as deep as I could as quickly as I could. I used the chameleon as a guide to take me into a meditation that would possibly allow me to hear them. I’d chosen the chameleon because of their gift of blending in.
I found them. They were already at the caves near Qumran 4. “You must be quiet,” Noah said.
“Okay,” Hope replied.
“Get down,” he told her.
Then, I heard the sound of Noah’s gun being cocked.
The last thing I heard before the connection was lost was a gunshot and screams—my sister’s screams.
Chapter Twenty-five
John was shocked at the lack of security detail surrounding the safe house that Orlenda had been placed in. In fact, there was no security at all.
Something didn’t feel right as he climbed
the back stairs that led to the top apartment he’d “seen” her being taken to.
Orlenda would have had a full security detail. John had his weapons ready to go. Once he had dealt with Orlenda, he’d find Kylie and the team.
He came to the back door and again was surprised to find it unlocked. Was he being set up? Did someone know about him? Except he didn’t feel like that was the case at all. He actually felt like he was pretty safe at that moment.
His footsteps fell softly on the tiled floor that opened into a kitchen. No one was there. Not a sound—no movement. He had to have been wrong about where they’d taken her.
Then, John heard a door close from another part of the apartment and footsteps as if they were descending stairs. The front entrance. He ran to the window that overlooked the street and saw the back seat passenger door close on a black service car.
Not a set up...he had just been too late.
He knew he’d never catch her. Orlenda was gone.
He turned to walk back down the stairs, knowing the answers he needed had just walked out the front door. Answers that could possibly lead him back to Kylie if he could reverse the damage that had been done to him.
He took a few steps, making it to the back door when he heard a thud from another room. He whipped around, guns drawn, and walked to the rear of the house. Once there, he crept down the hall, looking into two of the three bedrooms, but saw nothing.
In the last room, he saw what had caused the thud. With her hands around her neck, there was Orlenda in a pool of blood—her own. Her throat had been sliced, and her eyes were now rolled back into her head. John shook his head and knew he’d need to get out of there fast. He first took a picture of Orlenda from his camera phone. He had a feeling he might need it. He shoved the phone back into his pocket. In a way he was amused by the irony of it all. Her own people had betrayed her. To John, it looked like Orlenda had been set up. This place hadn’t been a “safe house” at all. He figured that the Russians, in particular Ivan Propokensko, had come in and paid her top guys more than she’d been willing to. He was betting on her guy Geryon. That’s who had to have set her up. It was not good for John that she was dead.