by Rachel Caine
“Some of the nicest cops I’ve ever met,” he said, and only at the very last of that did he throw a lightning-fast glance Katie’s way.
Alex and Justin continued to stare at him, then looked at each other and did that invisible communication that the best couples seemed to share. Justin shrugged and took a key from his coat pocket.
“Shouldn’t they have somebody here?” Stefan stage-whispered as Justin inserted the key into the dead bolt of the apartment door.
“Who?”
“The management company? An apartment manager?”
“You watch too much television,” Katie said. “Trust me, the apartment manager is too busy right now worrying what made the FBI show up with a warrant. She’s probably scanning the contracts, looking for a way to terminate Prichard’s lease.”
“That’s terrifying,” he said.
She snorted. “Not as terrifying as some of the things we actually find in apartments,” Katie snapped back.
“So this is all you do? You just pick up a key and walk in? No wonder people are scared of the government.”
Justin eased the door open. Alex was right beside him, sidearm drawn, and Katie had a flash of something— not a premonition, more of a subliminal recognition, and saw the same thing snap Alex’s head around. Alex grabbed Justin by the collar and yanked him backward just as Katie bodychecked Stefan out of the way into the bushes and dived for the ground.
The world erupted in a wave of heat and pressure, and a split second later, an eardrum-rattling roar. Katie finished rolling for the cover of the stairs and felt debris hitting her. Some of it was on fire. She couldn’t hear anything except a violent ringing in her ears, but she could see—razor-sharp detail etched by adrenaline. Stefan was lying on the ground, eyes open, staring upward in shock at the cloud of smoke rising into the night sky.
Katie scrambled up and lunged for Alex and Justin. Justin was on his side, lying half-across Alex, who was trying to get up. He looked as if he was out, but as Katie pressed her fingers to his throat his eyes fluttered open, dazed and unfocused.
A hand fell on her shoulder, and Katie looked up to see Kayla Ryan mouthing words.
…hear me?
Katie shook her head. Kayla spun away, grabbing a radio from her coat pocket. Calling for emergency services, certainly. It seemed, miraculously, that none of them would need the paramedics; even Justin, who’d been closest to the blast, was shaking it off and starting to look more angry than dazed. Alex lunged for the doorway, kicked open the bent, smoke-blackened metal, and leaned in. Justin grabbed her arm and held her back when she would have ventured inside, and he was right, Katie thought; whatever was in there, it wasn’t worth Alex’s life. Fire alarms were going off all over the apartment complex; she could hear them now, dimly, as if they—or she—were underwater. It wouldn’t take long for the firefighters to arrive.
She reassured herself about Alex and Justin, then went to check on Stefan. He was still on the ground, lying very still, staring at the sky. She felt a pulse of alarm—had he been hit? Spinal injury of some kind?
“Holy shit,” he said, or she thought he said. “That was much, much worse than on television.”
She almost laughed, but somehow managed to control herself. Inappropriate humor: sometimes, it got you through the crisis. Stefan slowly levered himself up to a sitting position.
“You okay?” she asked him.
“Apart from almost getting blown up? What kind of a psychic am I, if I didn’t see that coming!”
This time, she had to bite the inside of her lip to keep from bursting out into a full hysterical giggle.
“Stay down,” she said. “I think you have a head injury.”
“I don’t think so. I’m pretty much always like this,” he said, and rolled to his hands and knees, then up to his feet. “We’d better get people out of their apartments in case this wreck goes up.”
He was right. She sent him to the left, and she took doors on the right while Alex and Justin went down to the next cluster of doors. By the time they’d evacuated the residents—and pets—the fire trucks were rolling up into the parking lot, sirens blaring and lights blazing. The police were only seconds behind.
“It’s going to be a long night,” Stefan said.
If that was a psychic prediction, he wasn’t wrong.
Chapter 8
T wo hours later, crime-scene technicians were allowed to begin sifting through the sodden mess of Sheila Prichard’s apartment. Katie left it to them, Alex and Justin, and grabbed Stefan on the way back to the car.
“Where are we going?” he asked.
“We’re not going anywhere, you are,” she said. “This is turning dangerous. I want you out of here. Catch a plane, go back to California. Leave.”
“Whoa, whoa, wait!” Stefan pulled free of her grasp and stopped. “I don’t think that’s exactly your choice. Or mine. So long as I’m hooked into Teal with these visions…”
“You haven’t had one in the last couple of hours. Maybe she’s cut the connection.” Or something worse had happened. “It doesn’t matter. Alex is right. I don’t take civilians on investigations. It’s not safe.”
“I’m not going to sue.” He sounded offended. They had to dodge out of the way for some passing firefighters, carrying hose, who were trudging back to their truck. “Come on, Agent Rush. Don’t shut me out. Not now, when it’s really starting to get interesting.”
“Interesting? You call that interesting?”
“Well, it isn’t boring.”
“Look, Mr. Blackman—”
“Once you’ve been blown up together, you’re on a first-name basis, don’t you think? Call me Stefan.”
Katie gritted her teeth. “Stefan. Fine. The point is, you are a civilian, and I am an FBI agent, and I can’t endanger your life by keeping you involved in this investigation. Clearly, this is going places we never anticipated, and while I appreciate the help you’ve offered, I don’t think—”
“It’s not your choice!” Stefan gestured helplessly, anger flashing in his dark eyes like lightning in storm clouds. “I didn’t ask for this, but I’m not turning my back on it, either. I can’t. That girl out there, she reached out, and she reached out to me. If I back off now, I let her down. I’m not going to do that, Katie. I’ll do whatever it takes. If I can do that with you, fine, but if I can’t, then you’d better get used to seeing me in your rearview mirror because I’ll be right behind until this is over and those girls are safe!”
She wasn’t used to direct challenges, not like this; FBI agents typically commanded more respectful disagreement. But there was something insidiously wonderful about his passion, even misplaced as it was; she worked with witnesses every day, and she knew how few of them were capable of that kind of caring. She knew she was stretching the legal definition of witness, but hadn’t he been a witness, really? As much of one as Jazz Ryan?
How many men do you know who wouldn’t take the opportunity to bail out and leave this in the hands of others?
None who weren’t already in law enforcement, she thought. Certainly none who were vagabond street magicians/psychics/television consultants.
He kept surprising her. She couldn’t remember the last time someone who hadn’t been in handcuffs had done that.
“Katie.” He took a step forward, and they were suddenly close, very close, and she could see the scrape he’d gotten on his forehead when she’d pushed him out of the way of the explosion. “How did you know?”
“Know?” she echoed. “Know what?”
“About the bomb.”
“Oh. I just—knew. So did Alex.”
“But not the other guy. Justin.”
She shrugged. “I guess so. Why?”
“Just curious.” He gave her an odd, considering look. “Does that happen to you often? Sensing things ahead of others?”
This was going into territory she definitely did not want to cover, especially not with someone who was proving as insightful as Stef
an Blackman. “No,” she said shortly, and reached out to snag the arm of a passing patrol officer. “My friend here needs a ride to the airport. He’s going back to California tonight.”
“He’s not,” Stefan said flatly. “It’s still a free country, I haven’t violated any laws that I know of, and I’m not going home.”
“Fine. Dump him at the nearest motel where they won’t knife him for his jacket,” she said. The officer looked as if he was tempted to smile, but too wise to succumb. He just nodded, stone faced, and turned to look at Stefan.
“Let’s go, sir. You heard the lady.” The officer gave the badge hanging around her neck a fast glance. “The agent.”
“I heard,” Stefan said, unmoving. “You’re sure you want to do this, Katie?”
She felt a funny little kick start every time he said her name. And why had she let it get informal? This was way out of hand, and she had no idea why. She wasn’t like this. She never let men walk into her life like this, especially not during cases.
“Yes, I’m sure I want to do this. I want you to go away,” she said and met his eyes. “Call me if you get more information.” She handed him her card, the one with her cell phone number penciled on the back. “I’m sorry.”
“Are you?” He put the card in his pocket, glanced at the officer waiting at his side, and shook his head. “You’ll come looking for me.”
“Is that a prediction?” She couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of her voice, and she saw it hurt him just a little.
“No,” he said. “It’s not a prediction. I’m not a prognosticator.”
He turned and walked away. Katie watched him go, frowning.
I almost got him killed tonight.
Odd that he didn’t seem to mind it much.
She dismissed the strange emptiness his departure left, and flipped open her cell phone to dial the Highway Patrol’s Captain Menchaca for an update.
“Not good news,” Alex Forsythe said as Katie dropped down on the gritty curb next to her. She had a bottle of chilled water and passed it over. Katie chugged three gulps and gave it back.
“Highway Patrol didn’t find the van,” Katie replied. “After this amount of time, they’re not going to. Too many roads, too many variables. We’re going to have to wait for another sighting.”
“Wait for a lucky break, you mean,” Alex agreed. “Where’s your special friend? The gypsy prince?”
“Gone home, I hope. It was a mistake bringing him here.”
“From the way he was looking at you, it was a mistake letting him go.” Alex favored her with a smile, then reached in her pocket and pulled out a small silver PDA. “I need to beam you some info.”
Katie pulled out her own matching device, watched as the screen registered a request and allowed the transfer. Data and photographs. She studied one, a mug shot, carefully. Sheila Richards Stanley, looking defiant and—unlike most people in mug shots—as if she’d been interrupted on her way to an important engagement. Perfect makeup, understated and elegant; perfect short blond hair, too. Big brown eyes. Her skin was a matte tan, and could have owed its shading either to dedicated worship at the altar of the tanning bed or her genetic heritage.
It was the latter, Katie saw, as she paged through the documentation. Sheila’s father, Timmons Kent, had married a Venezuelan woman named Socorro Almeida—a model, who’d bequeathed beauty on her daughter as Timmons had handed down his blond hair and bad attitude.
Something in the data caught Katie’s eye. “She’s got a brother,” she said. “Max.”
“Good catch,” Alex said. She unwrapped a protein bar and took a bite, then offered Katie a second; Katie shook her head. “Good old Max has a record. Petty stuff as a juvenile, escalating to aggravated assault, rape, armed robbery. He’s twenty-eight now. You’ve got his file, too.”
Katie changed documents and speed-scanned Max Stanley’s résumé. He was as bad as he looked angelic, in his mug shots. A chip off the old block. Dad must have been proud.
Aggravated assault. Rape. This wasn’t good. “Any location on Max?” she asked aloud.
“He hasn’t been seen for about a week. He’s got two louts he hangs around with, and they haven’t been spotted, either.”
“Three men,” Katie repeated slowly. “Sheila on the inside, gaining the girls’ trust. They had this planned down to the last detail. The only thing they couldn’t anticipate were the girls’ abilities.”
Alex looked at her quizzically. “What abilities?”
“Besides being faster and stronger than most? I think Teal may be telepathic.”
“You’re kidding.”
“The gypsy prince? He’s getting messages from her. Visual, not thoughts. So maybe she’s got more going on than anyone suspected, even at the school.” Katie paged through documentation, speeding along faster. She was good at picking important details from piles of dross, but Max Stanley’s life and sentences didn’t seem significant, other than to reinforce yet again the danger that Lena and Teal were in. “I think these guys know exactly what they have. Clearly, they’re not after ransom, or we’d have gotten some kind of message by now.”
“You think the girls are being sold?” Alex asked. “Highest bidder, maybe? For their abilities?”
“If it’s just random slavery, they were pretty stupid in their choice of victims. Hell hath no fury like Athena Force in defense of its children.”
“Amen,” Alex said. She looked thoughtful. “Your gypsy prince—can he help? Really?”
“I think he legitimately wants to help. Needs to, even.” Katie sighed. “I just can’t drag a civilian along on this. You understand.”
“I do,” Alex agreed. “I have a hard time involving Justin, and he’s not exactly a stranger. But just having someone dropped on you, out of the blue…especially some shady street psychic…”
“You checked him out,” Katie said and turned to stare at her in disbelief. “You did, didn’t you? That fast?”
Alex’s elegant eyebrows rose. “Didn’t you?”
Well, yes, Katie had. But she’d had a good excuse. And now, obscurely, she felt she needed to defend the man. “He may not have the best background, but he’s got a good heart, Alex. I can tell that much. He’s not just making up these visions—there’s too much cross-verification for detail.”
“Unless he’s working with them,” Alex said, staring at the asphalt beneath her feet. “Unless they’re feeding him the details.”
Again, nothing she hadn’t already worried over herself. Katie frowned. “How? He’s not wearing an earpiece—”
“Got that close, did you?”
Katie rolled her eyes. “And he hasn’t gotten any calls or messages.”
“That you’re aware of.”
“Is there something you know that I should know?”
Alex shook her head. “I’m just trying to play devil’s advocate. Actually, just from the few seconds I met the guy, I liked him. Of course, that always makes me suspicious.”
Katie laughed out loud, and just for a second, things seemed a little lighter…a little more absurd, if nothing else. But then a police officer striding through the parking lot adjusted his course straight for her, and she felt a little sinking sensation. Trouble.
“Ma’am.” It was one of the officers who’d been escorting Stefan off premises. “I think you’d better come with me.”
Katie stood up, hardly aware she’d done it. “What’s wrong?”
“Your friend,” he said. “I think he’s having some kind of a fit.”
Something wrong.
He woke up suddenly, heart pounding, aching in every muscle. Sweating from the stifling heat inside the van.
Afraid.
Voices, indistinct, coming from the front part of the van. Argument. The van swerved, sending him thumping against the metal side, and he saw that Lena was awake, too, staring at him with wide eyes.
Not you, some part of Stefan insisted. This is her, not you. Not you.
But it felt
like his skin, his bones, his flesh. Arranged differently, yes, but…
Fear. A sharp, hot surge of it, a spike through the back of his neck, and he froze. He could almost see, almost understand what she was thinking, but it was only emotion that came through clearly: fear, anger and frustration.
He looked through the back window of the van and saw headlights behind them. Police? No, there were no lights or sirens. But something about the car was making his—her!—captors nervous and edgy. Maybe it had been following for a while, or maybe they recognized it; either way, it was dangerous for whoever was in that car, trapped out here in the middle of nowhere on a deserted two-lane blacktop.
The van swerved again, and suddenly braked. The car following fishtailed, burning rubber as it tried to stop. The van backed up and slammed into the car with shuddering force, sending Stefan—Teal—flying to collide with Lena, and the van kept growling, pushing the car back, back….
There was a rending crash. Stefan fought his way upright to catch a glimpse out the back window.
It was a maroon car, the color vivid in the glow of the backup lights. It had fallen over an embankment, and lay on its side, rocking slightly. There was a woman behind the wheel, bloody and unconscious, hanging from the safety straps.
Someone shoved him down, and one of the three masked figures stripped off its mask and smiled down at him.
A woman, pretty, blond. He felt a strong pulse of recognition and anger—this was someone Teal knew, then. Someone she’d trusted.
The woman flipped open a black leather case, took out a hypodermic, and slammed it home in his arm. A bright white-hot spark of pain, and then he was falling….
“Stefan!”
Someone was calling his name. It sounded like a long distance off, but as he blinked and pulled in a breath—the air in his lungs had gone sour and stale—he saw that Katie Rush was leaning over him. Her face was tense, worried and pale.
He managed a weak smile. “Found her,” he said. His voice sounded strange and rusty. “There was a car catching up to them. Maroon. Woman behind the wheel, maybe one of yours, I don’t know. They ran it off the road—”