The Missing

by Shiloh Walker

  He shook his head. “Don’t talk,” he ordered brusquely. “Don’t talk.” He pulled her off the couch and turned her around, crowding against her body until she was bent over the upholstered back. His hands went to her waist, freeing the button of her jeans, lowering the zipper. In one motion, he shoved her jeans and panties to her knees, and then she heard the rasp of his zipper. Taige twisted around to push her clothes the rest of the way off, but he fisted a hand in her hair and said, “Be still.”

  Then he was pushing against her. With her jeans and panties tangled around her knees, she couldn’t spread her legs, and it made his entry rougher. She gasped and arched back, squirming against him as he pushed in, deep, slow, burrowing his way through her tight muscles until he had buried his length inside her. He slid an arm around her waist, pulling her back against him. He muttered in her ear, “Tell me that you love me, Taige.” His voice was low, hoarse, and so tormented it made her heart clench painfully.

  “I love you.”

  He rolled his hips against her, and Taige groaned, pressing against him, trying to ride the thick length invading her, but the awkward position made it impossible to do much more than squirm and rock against him. Cullen shifted her again, urging her upper body forward, once more bending her over the couch. Then he braced his hands on her hips, held her steady. He withdrew and then slammed into her, deeper, harder, stealing her breath away. She didn’t even have time to gasp for air before he did it again, and again, taking her hard and fast.

  There were no gentle kisses, no lingering touches, just his barely reined-in fury and the desperation that bled over into her as well. He held himself back until she came, and when Taige started to scream with it, he dropped even the pretense of control, battering her with bruising force, his fingers digging into her hips. The sound of his ragged breathing, her strangled moans, and the slap of flesh on flesh were the only noises, and then he came, his cock jerking viciously inside her snug heat.

  And just like that, it was over. He stepped away. Taige rolled her head on the back of the couch, staring at him through her lashes as he readjusted his pants. Slowly, she straightened. Her muscles felt like wax, and her legs wobbled under her as she pulled her panties and jeans back up. Between her thighs, she ached, and she could feel his semen on her.

  “Did I hurt you?” he asked hoarsely. He was standing by the window, staring outside.

  Taige shook her head. She was a little uncomfortable, and she’d probably be sore later, but she wasn’t hurt. “No.”

  He nodded. But still, he wouldn’t look at her.

  She wanted him to. She almost said it out loud, Look at me, Cullen. But she didn’t.

  “You need to leave, Taige.”

  His flat, unemotional words did a lot more damage than the roughness of the past few minutes, but she tried to understand. He hadn’t been expecting her, probably had a house full of family, and other than his dad, none of them knew her. She wanted to be there, though. Wanted to be there for him, and it hurt that he didn’t want that from her. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” she said softly.

  Finally, he looked at her. He turned his head and met her eyes and said, “Please don’t. I don’t want to talk to you, Taige. I don’t want to see you again. Ever.”

  FROM the window, he could see her, striding out to the Jeep parked at the far end of the drive, her head low, her arms wrapped around her middle. It was chilly out. She hadn’t been wearing a jacket when she came in. Did she have one in the car? he wondered.

  “Fuck her like that, kick her out of your house, and now you worry she might get cold,” he muttered. “Dumb ass.” He kept watching her, hoping she’d look back at him just one more time.

  But she never did. She climbed into the Jeep and didn’t even get the door all the way closed before she threw it into reverse. He heard the faint squeal of the tires even from here. He kept watching, even after she disappeared around the bend in the road, and for a long time after. He had no idea how much time had passed when his father knocked on the door. It could have been minutes, or it could have been hours.

  Probably somewhere in between, because most of the cars in the drive were gone, and night had completely settled.

  “Did I see Taige?” Robert asked softly.

  Cullen nodded.

  “She didn’t stay long.” Robert didn’t ask any questions, and Cullen was glad of that.

  How could he answer, anyway? Mom’s dead, and Taige should have been able to stop it. No, that wasn’t going to work. He hadn’t told either of his parents about the weird things that Taige had been able to do, hadn’t ever figured out how to explain it.

  When Cullen stayed quiet, Robert said, “Pretty long drive for her to make just to come by and say hi.”

  “Leave it alone, Dad.”

  Robert opened his mouth to speak, but then, as though he’d thought better of it, he closed it and sighed. “Taige lost both her parents young, didn’t she? I bet she knows all about hurting and grief. Knows how it can make you do or say things that you don’t really mean.”

  “What about things you do mean?” Cullen blurted out. He turned away from his dad and rubbed his hands over his face, wished he hadn’t said anything. “Can it make you say things that you do mean, even if you shouldn’t?”

  “Go after her, Cullen. You’ve lost enough right now. You don’t need to lose her, too,” Robert said gently.

  But Cullen couldn’t do it. Or rather, he wouldn’t. He’d seen the hurt in her eyes. Yes, he blamed her, she knew it, and he hated himself for it, but there it was. He couldn’t change how he felt. He imagined Taige would even put up with it. Put up with him and deal with the guilt he made her feel and the pain he could cause her.

  But, even though he was irrationally furious with her, he wasn’t going to do that.

  She didn’t deserve his misplaced anger, and he loved her. Even more than he wanted to hurt her for failing him, he loved her. Chasing her away was the only way he could keep himself from hurting her, over and over.

  His dad finally gave up trying to talk to him and went downstairs, leaving Cullen alone in silence. Feeling lost, he wandered around in endless circles until finally he stopped by the couch, touching the spot where he had been with Taige. He rested his hand against the padded back and murmured, “I’m sorry.”

  PART TWO

  FOUR

  May 2008

  TAIGE stalked into the kitchen, releasing the holster on her shoulder with one hand and holding the cordless phone in the other. “Damn it, Jones, I said no. I am tired. I just spent four months in hell because of you, and I’m not going back there just yet.” On her way past the table, she laid her weapon down.

  “Taige—”

  She took a deep breath as she opened the refrigerator, staring inside for something to drink. Her belly was an empty, aching pit, but she had no desire to eat. Just a drink. Preferably something strong enough to send her crashing into oblivion for the next eight hours. She wouldn’t even mind the hangover too much, provided she had a little bit of peace before it hit.

  “You aren’t hearing me, Jones. I’m not your lackey. I am not one of your agents you can send running out for coffee or to go spy on the neighbors. You want my help; you have to ask me for it. You asked. I just said no. Now leave me the hell alone.” She lowered the phone and disconnected it in the middle of Taylor Jones’s rant.

  Son of a bitch. She couldn’t stand him. He had tried to recruit her before she even got out of college, and when he didn’t succeed, he sent others to try their hand. Taige had refused all of them, unable to stand the thought of letting them stick her in some specialized unit where they’d use her like some psychic blood-hound and keep on doing it until she either dropped dead from the strain or burned herself out.

  Death wasn’t the issue for her. Most of the time, she felt more dead inside than alive. Even the burnout part wouldn’t be so bad—no voices in her head, no more nagging dreams—but the pace those bastards would work her at would have bee
n something akin to the lowest level of hell. Instead, she agreed to take part in special task forces where the workload was only on the first or second level of hell.

  This last, though, it had been the worst. Four months undercover in Chicago. And Chicago in February was cold. She thought she just might freeze her ass before she managed to infiltrate that child-porn ring. Three families, all of them upper-middle-class, all of them foster parents to troubled kids. Troubled kids they drugged and then sold to the highest bidder. Whoever shelled out the most cash got to do whatever they wanted with the kid, and for a little extra, they could even keep the DVD made of the event. Without that extra cash, that DVD might make its way onto the Internet, and God only knew who’d see it out there.

  It had taken four months and the overdose of one of the victims before Taige had been able to ferret them out, but finally, they were all behind bars. Whether they would stay or not was up to the judicial system, but at least Taige could close her eyes knowing she had done her part.

  It might even help her sleep for a little while. A few weeks, maybe a month or two. Then the guilt would start chasing her again.

  She didn’t realize she was standing in front of the refrigerator with the door open until she started to shiver. With a scowl, she grabbed a bottle of white zinfandel from the shelf and let the door close. She popped the cork and poured a glass, emptying it in under a minute. Then she filled it to the top again and made her way into her office, bringing the rest of the wine with her.

  She didn’t boot up the computer or turn on the radio. Instead, she turned her chair around so she could stare out over Mobile Bay and wait for the numbness to set in.

  But it didn’t come as quickly as it used to.

  I worry about you, baby girl.

  Often, in moments like these, when Taige was alone, she could hear the ghostly whisper of Rose’s voice. It wasn’t the woman’s ghost, Taige knew that, just memories. There had been long, endless nights of studying when Taige wouldn’t have slept at all if Rose hadn’t forced her into bed. Days when she would have gone without eating if Rose hadn’t sought her out around dinnertime and forced her to eat.

  You work yourself too hard. Why are you doing this?

  Rose had been dead for three years now, a victim of Katrina. She’d gone to New Orleans to visit a friend who had just lost her mother, one of those friends who hadn’t tried to leave until it was too late, and by the time it was clear they needed to leave, they couldn’t. Rose had stayed by her side. They had both drowned when the water got too high.

  Another one of Taige’s failures.

  You can’t help everybody, baby girl. Come on now, put the wine down and go get something to eat. Take a bath . . . go for a swim . . . you got to do something besides sit inside and brood.

  Taige lifted her wineglass in a salute. “If it’s all the same to you, Rose, I’m just going to sit inside and brood.” She drained the glass and filled it a third time. She hoped by the time she had emptied a fourth, her brain would be getting fuzzy. Otherwise, she was going to have to drink that nasty merlot Dante had brought over when he came down at Christmas last year.

  You didn’t fail me, Taige.

  She closed her eyes and wished she could block out those annoying little whispers. Sometimes, it seemed like Rose had settled inside of Taige’s soul, instead of going on to be with the husband she’d lost when Dante was only two. But it wasn’t really Rose, just memories of her, just Taige missing her.

  But the real bitch was that Taige would have preferred a real ghost and all the nagging and mothering in the world over what happened if she managed to fall asleep before she was so tired she ached with it. When she was that tired, bone tired, she could fall fast and hard into a sleep to rival that of the dead. Dark, dreamless sleep.

  Over the years, training and regular use had given her a greater control over her skills, and as her control increased, those abilities had evolved so that she rarely needed to sleep for the visions to come. They came easier now, and she could recall them in fine, vivid detail. Now that she actively sought them, instead of waiting for them to find her, she had more control over them, and they rarely plagued her when she slept.

  Unfortunately, though, that left room for something that much more disturbing. The only thing that kept those dreams at bay was sheer exhaustion—or lots of liquor. She didn’t have the stomach for whiskey, hated the taste of it, and the smell of beer was enough to nauseate her. So that left wine and cocktails. Cocktails usually required a little more work than Taige liked, unless it was something simple like rum and Coke. It all added up to her drinking a hell of a lot more than she should.

  The rhythmic ebb and flow of the waves was having a hypnotic effect on her. She could feel her eyelids dragging down while her body sank into that heavy, drowsy state that came right before sleep. Tired . . .

  Her lids drooped low once more, and then she tensed, her body going ramrod straight in the chair. “Damn it,” she muttered. She set the wineglass down and scrubbed her hands over her face. Didn’t do too much to help. The fog of sleep was already clouding her brain, and nothing short of a caffeine injection or a cold shower was going to do the trick.

  Caffeine required too much work. Shoving her tense body out of the chair, she stumbled into the bathroom, stripping off her clothes and dropping them behind her as she went. She left the clothes wherever they fell, shirt, bra, boots, socks, and jeans forming a haphazard trail. Wearing just a pair of plain cotton panties, she flipped on the light in the bathroom and opened the door to the shower stall. She turned the water on full, not bothering to adjust it to a warmer temperature. After stripping off her panties, she climbed inside and let the cool water rain down on her.

  It soaked her hair, and Taige realized she’d forgotten to undo the thick braid. Too tired to care, she left it alone. She’d deal with it later. Even with the cool water spraying down on her, she felt like she was in some sort of fog. She gritted her teeth and adjusted the spray, letting the water go from cool to icy. Then she grabbed the mesh sponge from the hook on the wall and soaped it up. The familiar scent of the Molton Brown bath gel filled her senses. She breathed it in as she scrubbed the sponge over her body, hoping she could force herself into wakefulness for a while longer.

  By the time Taige finally turned off the water, her teeth were chattering. She decided that maybe coffee wasn’t too much work now. Especially now that she was freezing her ass off. She tucked the towel around her body and headed into the kitchen, kicking her boots out of the way. She’d pick them up later. Once she had rested, the whole house needed to be cleaned. It was dusty from her long absence and had that musty smell houses got after sitting empty for weeks or months on end.

  She got the coffee brewing and stood shivering in the kitchen as she waited for her first shot of caffeine. Hot coffee splattered on the warming plate and counter as she pulled the carafe out and filled her cup. Folding her hands around it, she let the heat seep into her palms while she took a sip. It scalded her tongue, but she didn’t care. She finished off the first cup and poured herself a second before she bothered to get dressed.

  As Taige shimmied into a pair of shorts and a tank top, she heard the annoying ring of her cell phone out in the kitchen. She knew that particular ring, and she blocked it out of her mind. There was no damn way she was talking to Taylor Jones anytime soon.

  Never would suit her just fine.

  By her third cup of coffee, Taige figured she was awake enough to sit down, maybe watch some TV or try a book. She picked up a trade paperback she’d grabbed on impulse at the airport in Birmingham, but instead of curling up on the couch, she headed out to the hammock in the backyard. She could read for a while, then maybe get some housework done.

  If she worked hard enough at that, did it long enough, she could exhaust herself to the point that the dreams wouldn’t come. It was either that or dig out the merlot.

  Taige was getting damn tired of drinking herself into oblivion.

  W
ith caffeine buzzing through her system, she settled down on the hammock. But she hadn’t even made it past the first chapter before fatigue came crashing down on her. Her mind started to wander away from the story, daydreams intruding on reality, and she never realized she was drifting off.