by Nancy Gideon
“Because I know her.”
“That simple?”
“Yeah, it is. So why are you making it so complicated?”
Before he was forced to come up with an answer, the lights went on in the body of the club. Jacques twisted around, groaning at the effort, surprised to see some of his crew righting furniture and sweeping up broken glass and bullet casings. Amber and Jen went to work on the bloodstains with buckets and brushes.
“What the hell are they doing here? I didn’t ask—”
“Must be worried about their job security. Can’t think of any other reason, can you?”
Jacques gave her a look. “I can think of one, sitting over there looking annoyingly smug.”
“And I can think of an even bigger one, sitting over there looking irritatingly clueless.” She sighed. “Life goes on, boss. Time to get back among the living.” She turned just as MacCreedy entered the room. “Hey, lover. Great timing, as usual.”
Jacques had no real reason to bristle up with resentment just because Nica’s mate looked freshly showered and ultracompetent after the grueling twenty-four hours he’d just put in. Time Jacques had spent licking his own physical and emotional wounds instead of seeing selflessly to others.
When Nica stepped up to him, MacCreedy folded her easily into his arms and just for an instant, he leaned.
“Get everyone buttoned in tight?” she asked as her hands pushed inside his cheap sport coat to rub over his crisp white shirt.
“I think so. Philo’s been a big help rounding them up. Think he needed something to keep him busy. He’s pretty broken up about losing so many of his friends.”
And MacCreedy was there for him. Where Jacques should have been.
“How’s your partner holding up?” Though her tone was conversational, her touch soothed and comforted.
“Getting ready to go solo on the Rambo warpath.” His cool glance went to Jacques, then quickly away. “Maybe you can talk some sense into her, Nica, before she does something ill-advised.”
Nica snorted. “You think I could be talked down if they’d taken you?” She revolved in the curl of his arms to look at the figure still slumped on the couch. “Jacques, you talk to her. She listens to you.”
“I don’t think she has much use for any of our kind anymore.” His voice lowered. “And I don’t blame her.”
“Then let’s see if we can change that by getting Max back for her.”
Jacques stared at her blankly. “You gonna just head north and start knocking on doors?”
Her expression grew cunning, making Jacques all kinds of uneasy. “No. That’s not what I had in mind.” Her smile made him even more nervous. “Go down and thank the troops, boss. I need to talk to my man for a minute.”
Cautiously, Jacques hoisted himself off the couch, clutching his rib cage as if to hold himself together.
MacCreedy’s brow puckered. “You all right?”
“Fine.” He growled, knowing he didn’t look it. The left side of his face and scalp was a latticework of faint scars. He still wore his bloodied clothing, mainly because he couldn’t manage to lift his arms high enough to shed his shirt. His breaths were small and shallow lest they incur painful retribution from his mending ribs. In short, he was a mess inside and out and not pleased to have that pointed out. Even if Nica did it so much sweeter.
She stretched up to hug him about the neck, murmuring, “You look like hell, boss. Just go home. Shower. Eat something. I’ll say your good-byes for you and take care of things here.”
“No. I’ll do it. You can lock up.”
“Got it under control. See you in about an hour.”
And he needed to do the same with himself, was her insinuation. If MacCreedy had made that suggestion, Jacques would have tried to prove him wrong with both fists. But it was hard to stay angry with Nica when she was kissing him softly.
“No tongue,” MacCreedy growled dangerously enough to make Nica smile.
Jacques straightened, unwilling to provoke the man who’d saved his life. He gave MacCreedy a steady stare. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Having my back.”
“No problem . . . as long as you take a step back from my woman right now.”
The quick grin hurt Jacques’s face but was worth it. “She’s all yours.”
Nica waited until Jacques had left the room and was making his way gingerly down the stairs to the main floor before cocking an eyebrow at her mate. “Your woman? Could you be any more Neanderthal?”
“Yeah,” MacCreedy drawled, hands fitting to her waist and tugging her up against him. “You got a problem with that?”
“None whatsoever.”
Their kiss was slow and searing. Finally, MacCreedy leaned back and placed his palm on her midriff.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” His voice softened. “Worried about the timing?”
Her eyes filled up with emotion, glittered like sapphires. She shook her head. “You?”
“No.” He grinned wide, and his hands cupped her face. “Our own family. I couldn’t be happier.” His tone deepened. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I was worried about other things. That’s one of the reasons I brought Susanna here.”
Alarm tightened his features briefly. “You’re afraid something might be wrong with the baby.”
“Not afraid. Cautious. I’d feel a lot better if she was still here. I was thinking maybe we should bring her back along with Max.”
He touched her hair in a soothing gesture. “Would she come willingly?” His somber gaze said he might consider the idea in either instance.
A secret smile. “Oh yeah. In a heartbeat.”
He kissed her brow and murmured, “What’s on your devious mind, woman?”
“To find out where Max is, I’m going to have to use you.”
“How?”
“I need you to make a collect call.”
Industry stopped the second Jacques’s crew became aware of him. His chest clogged up with more than just pain as one by one they smiled determinedly.
“I want things ready for doors to open tomorrow night. You don’t think I’m gonna pay you all out of my pocket change, do you?”
“We’ll be ready,” Amber assured him from where she knelt over the dried stain of his own blood.
Mood darkening, he gestured to the floor. “Leave that one. A reminder.”
“Of what happened?” she asked in quiet empathy.
“No. Of what didn’t happen that should have.”
He wanted his patrons to remember every time they saw that discoloration that he’d lain unprotected and vulnerable at the mercy of their enemies while they’d done nothing.
The crackle of the sound system was followed by a bawdy blues tune. He smiled at Nica’s choice as Big Al Carson wailed, “Time to take your drunken ass home.”
Yes, it was.
And as he stood under the hot spray of his shower, he was grateful for that slight residual inebriation that dulled him to all the reminders Susanna had left behind.
His tangled sheets held the scent of their passion. Her new clothes were still strewn about the floor. The smell of floral shampoo filled his towels and twisted about his heart.
He’d grown so used to her company, to the sight, sound, and scent of her, her absence was achingly apparent. But once those reminders faded and were gone, he’d be alone again. Then what would he do with the emptiness?
He dressed in loose cargo pants and eased into a white button-up shirt, securing only the bottom few and leaving it untucked. Then he cleaned up the remains of his last meal with Susanna from what seemed like days ago, grateful to be interrupted by the arrival of his guests.
He buzzed them up.
Nica led the way inside. She took in his spacious apartment with an impressed nod. “Pretty upscale, LaRoche. I didn’t get a good look around before.”
She and MacCreedy had been too busy hurrying him out ahead of an arsonist’s flames.
“It’s big,” he agreed, and suddenly that didn’t seem like such a good thing. All that open, unoccupied space for him to ramble around in. Alone. His ratty old trailer on the docks, surrounded by activity, crowded by his work and his world, held more appeal. “Get you something to drink?” he asked automatically.
Instead of reminding him that he might have already had more than enough, Nica shook her head. “No, thanks. I’m abstaining for two.”
“Yeah?” The news was just the shot of optimism he needed. “Good for you, for both of you.”
“I’ll take hers.” MacCreedy’s typical buttoned-up reserve gave a notch as he loosened his tie and stuffed it into his coat pocket. A restless energy crackled about him. Something to do with the purpose of their visit, Jacques was certain.
He fetched two beers, raising a brow as MacCreedy took his down in several long, determined gulps before also taking the second one that he’d brought for himself. He carried it over to the couch, setting it on the wood-and-glass coffee table.
“So,” Jacques began warily, “what’s on your mind, Nica?” What’s got your mate so jumpy?
“Sit down.” You’ll be glad you did was implied.
He settled onto the yielding leather cushions with Nica at his side. MacCreedy paced over to the sliders to stare out into the night.
“We need to find out where they’re holding Max,” she began with a calm logic. “Until we know, we can’t plan any kind of rescue.”
“So, how are we going to find out?”
“We’re going to have to tap a friend on the inside for that information.”
An ugly suspicion stabbed through him. “No. You’re not putting Susanna in that kind of position. I won’t allow it, even if you did know how to get ahold of her. Phones are too dangerous. He’s going to be watching her.”
Nica smiled. “We’re not going to use a phone. We’re going to use a direct line. Mind-to-mind long-distance.”
Sixteen
Jacques took it all in without a blink.
Apparently, Nica and Silas weren’t what they seemed. Neither were Max and Charlotte. Their DNA was supercharged, granting them special abilities. Powers that included mind reading, astral projection, walking on water, and probably X-ray vision that would allow them to see he wasn’t wearing any underwear.
Yeah, and space aliens were going to fly out of his ass riding on sugarplum fairies.
He regarded Nica with a bland expression, hiding a smirk that said, Tell me another one. How stupid do I look?
Nica smiled. “I don’t know about stupid, but the rest of you looks just fine.” And her gaze lowered to his crotch for an appreciative assessment.
No, she couldn’t—
Slowly, he crossed his legs and scoffed, “You don’t expect me to believe all this?”
She pursed her lips. “It’s not like we’re claiming to be space aliens who can tell if you’re wearing boxers or briefs . . . or not.”
He drew a breath and let it out slowly. Okay, he knew the Chosen could do limited thought manipulations. Shifters could, well, shift shape. But the rest . . . that was myth, legend, fairy-tale stuff.
“You’re talking about the Ancients. Like I’m supposed to believe they’re real. Like you can just jump out the window and fly away.”
“Well, I can’t do that,” Nica drawled, glancing over at MacCreedy. “Can you?”
“I don’t think so. I suppose I could try if it would hurry things along.”
Jacques leaned back into the cushions, realization hitting home. “So that’s why they want Max.”
“All they have now is rumor,” Silas told him, impatient with his reluctance to just accept everything that had been shoved down his own throat. “If they start cutting him apart, they’ll have fact. And how long after that do you think it’ll take them to have a weapon?”
“And Susanna’s research?”
“Will get them to that point that much quicker.”
Nica placed her hand on Jacques’s knee, squeezing tight. “We need to get Max away from them. We have to convince Suze to help us. She trusts you. She’ll listen to you. She’ll come back here for you.”
A dizzying sense of hope soared at that suggestion, but reality grounded him. “She won’t leave her lab or her little girl.”
“Then we’ll have to move everything here, won’t we?”
Could they do that?
“What do I have to do?”
“We need to contact Susanna without them knowing it.” She motioned Silas to come over, noting the way Jacques’s eyes narrowed warily. “He’s going to channel your thoughts to hers.”
“And he can do that?”
“Sure.” She simplified, not sharing the fact that her mate would be using the strength of the bond forged between Jacques and his own chosen female as that joining link. That wasn’t her secret to tell.
MacCreedy sat on the edge of the coffee table facing Jacques. They exchanged uncomfortable looks until Silas told him to close his eyes.
“Is that necessary?”
“No. But I’ll be a lot less distracted without you staring at me like you’re waiting for me to suck your brain out your nose.”
When Jacques hesitated, Nica leaned close to whisper, “Relax. I can’t really see through your pants. Dammit.”
He chuckled and let the tension drain from his body and mind. And he shut his eyes. He gave a slight jump at the touch of MacCreedy’s fingertips upon either temple. The points of contact seemed to warm, until the heat penetrated through flesh and bone.
“Think of her, think of Susanna,” MacCreedy coaxed in a low monotone. “Focus on the way she looks, the way she smiles, the sound of her voice, her scent. Breathe her in and out. Feel her.”
Abruptly, everything fell away, sight, sound, sense, even his awareness of where he was. And from somewhere in that darkness a tiny light began to widen, growing bright, expanding. Even as his mind strained to embrace it, his physical being held firm, beginning to pull back, resisting.
The pressure intensified in Jacques’s head. He struggled against it, feeling as though MacCreedy was trying to pry him open like a nutshell to get to the meat inside.
“He’s fighting me.”
MacCreedy’s voice was far away. Jacques panicked, trying to find his way back to it, to the safety of his apartment.
“Let me.” Nica’s palm slipped inside his shirt to soothe over his bare chest, the sensation of warmth calming, comforting. Her breath blew in a teasing whisper into his ear. “Relax and listen to my voice. There’s nothing to worry about. I won’t let any harm come to you. Go to her, Jacques. Think of her. Say her name.”
“Anna.”
Susanna straightened from the lens of her microscope and rubbed at the back of her neck in an effort to relieve her sudden headache. It was late and she was tired, but determination drove her to continue well beyond her normal workday.
In the quiet lab, once her other coworkers had gone home, she turned her attention to her true focus, to applying data she’d planned to use in her serum for Mary Kate to a sample from her daughter. Almost immediately the divergent strands aggressively attacked and destroyed one another. Hours ticked by as she tried variations with no success. The right combination had to be there in front of her but her eyes were too blurry to see it. Chosen, Shifter, Ancient. It was like trying to re-create a recipe where none of the ingredients listed the proper amounts used. A pinch of this, a dab of that, too bitter, too weak, too strong. Where was that proper balance? The balance that would allow them all to exist together?
Her child was going to die and there was nothing she could do to prevent it.
She rested her head in her hands, perilously close to defeat.
“Dr. Duchamps, Mr. Frost sent me to drive you home.”
She glanced over at the harsh-featured automaton Damien had hired to shadow her every movement. He needn’t have worried that she might be tempted to seduce and run off with this one. Besides, there was no
where to run.
“I need to shut things down. I’ll be just a minute.” Her tone chilled. “Wait outside, please.”
Without a flicker of expression, the burly bodyguard stepped out into the hall. The lock engaged behind him. Damien was taking no chances.
Susanna quickly saved the core data on her thumb drive, then wiped the system’s memory before shutting it down. Tucking the flash drive into her bra next to the underwire, she gathered her personal belongings and tapped on the door.
And so ended the first day of an endless number in captivity.
The home she and Pearl shared with Frost was in a gated community in a northern suburb of Chicago. Those who lived behind the high private walls were others like them, Chosen living amongst human. Scientists, scholars, politicians, all figures of influence and affluence, pretending to be what they were not, for the good of all and not the one.
The house itself was ultramodern, of cold glass and steel. Lit up from within against the night sky, it made her think of incubation containers where the carefully segregated organisms living inside could be observed from a clinical distance. The same way Damien was watching her.
He was waiting for her at the door, attired in a charcoal-colored sweater and matching slacks, his composed features almost beautiful with their delicate lines and pale perfection. There was no warmth in his greeting or in his eyes.
“I trust your day was prosperous.”
“Yes, thank you.” As she stepped inside that sea of blinding white, she glanced up the stairs. “Is Pearl still up?”
“I sent her to bed a few hours ago. She barely picked at her meal.”
“I should go up—”
Damien’s hand closed about her upper arm, surprising her with the strength of his grip. “There are things we need to discuss first. Come with me into the parlor.”
Reluctantly, Susanna followed across the pale wood floors with their fleecy white rugs. The word parlor inspired notions of a cozy gathering place for friends to relax and converse. In truth, it was a frigidly arranged cluster of austere furnishings that had nothing to do with comfort, more aligned to interrogation than polite chatter.