“Oh, they built it. Just not here.”
“Jesus, Rowan. You’re telling me the Masters are alien to this world?”
“Straight up, Gage. They brought vessels like this one along with them. Then later, the Ra split. One side didn’t like what the other was doing, hooking up with the aborigines.”
“You mean one side didn’t want to pollute the indigenous population and the other side didn’t care.”
“Don’t jump to conclusions, Gage. It goes deeper than you know, mate. Trust me; this isn’t just about someone’s petty anthropological bent. This is about survival.”
“Survival, huh?” Gaged watched the slowly spinning globe.
“The Universe can be one inhospitable bitch, Gage. There are some things you just don’t want to lose, and you’ll do anything, anything it takes, to hold on to them.”
29
I was wondering how long it was going to be—” Ethan breathed heavily with Ty wrapped in a heated embrace over the top of him. Ethan’s lips danced seductively over Ty’s. “—before you couldn’t resist.” Their leather pants unzipped but still on and their jackets opened to their bare chests. Ty rocked slowly, slickly now over Ethan, their passion well spilled between the two of them.
“God. Ethan.” Ty gripped Ethan’s leather-covered ass breathing heavily. “You’ve got to stop wearing these. You’re killing me with how these look on you.”
“Me? It was your idea to get the riding gear.”
“Yea. Bad idea.” Ty grinned lifting himself from Ethan and then rolling to lay beside him with his riding pants unzipped and his jacket pulled open and away from his thick wide pecs and abdominals to cool the heat they’d generated between them.
His own jacket and pants open as well, Ethan pulled some tissue from the table to clean both his and Ty’s skin of their excitement.
“Thanks, Ethan.” Ty was still taking some deep breaths.
“I wonder when Rowan is going to show up?” Ethan asked.
“I’ve been thinking about that myself,” Ty agreed. “It’s been weeks since we left Orlando. I thought he’d have shown up by now.”
“Maybe he got sidetracked.”
“Or maybe the Seven got to him. Karma might have finally caught up with him.”
“You need to give the guy a break, Ty. You know, like Henry said.”
Ty sighed. “It’s hard, Ethan. It’s like giving Hitler a break. You just want to make the guy pay for what he’s done.”
“But he’s not still doing those things.”
“He’s still killing people.”
“Ty, you and I killed people; back at my apartment. Before I met you I’d never even punched anyone, let alone killed them.”
“They would have killed us.”
“Which is why I don’t have a problem with what happened. Seems like Rowan is just doing the same thing now. Taking out the bad guys.”
“I guess. I’m trying, Ethan.”
“You’re still worried about Sofia.”
“That too. I just want to make sure she and my son are safe.”
* * * * *
Several bright flashes and the sound of hot ions crackled through the room. Brad fell to the floor, hard, his eyes still wide open with surprise. The rest of the room was littered with smoldering bodies and bullet-riddled surveillance equipment. Several armed halfblood agents stood around in dark glasses keeping watch.
Rigel handed one of the agents back his sleek ion weapon. He looked down at Brad’s still smoking body. “We no longer have need of your services, Brad. Thank you for your exceptional work and expertise. Do have a nice day.”
30
S avannah was suddenly standing on one of the many catwalk levels in the ancient vessel’s large planetary cartography expanse. The massive scale globe of the Earth illuminated the football stadium-sized expanse as the image turned slowly. She could feel that Gage was somewhere in the—whatever this place was.
“Oh, wow,” she said to him empathically as she walked along the wide catwalk looking at the ancient architecture. “this thing is old.” She finally found him on an upper level on the other side of the colossal room, both in their typical undressed Kir casual. Gage leaned onto the railing, his thick chiseled thighs, rounded ass, broad shoulders and muscular chest still held their exceptional allure for Savannah that never failed to give her a warm sensual twinge every time she looked at him like this. She tried to ignore how he looked but her attraction to him was still uncanny.
“I thought I’d find you here.”
“Yea.” Gage breathed still looking at the immense model of the illuminated Earth floating in front of them.
“Rowan and Paige left this morning.”
“Oh? A hunting trip?”
“Yes. I tried to talk him out of it.”
“Yea. Good luck with that.”
“He’s going after the Seven, Gage.”
“You mean the Thirteen, now.”
“Right.”
“Is Paige ready? She’s only had a few weeks with you.”
“I think so. She’s got gold irises, Gage. There’s some real ability behind those.”
“Yea, that’s a little unusual; a halfblood with gold eyes.”
“Ah, I wouldn’t call her half-anything. She could pass for a goddess in my book. Rowan must have some really nice genes, either that or they both do.”
“Good. Going after the Seven, he’s going to need that kind of backup.”
“She’s a little more than just backup, mister—” Savannah half mumbled her sarcasm.
The two of them watched the globe move around within its slow spin. Savannah noticed some points of light moving above the globe. Like illuminated tall stick-pins that hovered just above different points all over the world and moved with it as it turned.
“What are those lights?”
“Markers; each one is a tower used by the Sentinels.”
“Why are you marking their towers?”
“I don’t know. Just wondering why the Masters put them where they did. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason for where they got stuck.”
“Not.” She smiled.
“I know, right? I just haven’t found why they put them where they did.”
“Maybe they pointed to something?”
“Yea, I’ve been thinking about that. But, I’ve been drawing lines from here to there, even trying to make them into letters or symbols. It’s nothing. Just gibberish and random lines.”
Savannah watched as one of the marker lines moved toward them. “It’s kind of pointing at us now,” she smiled as the holographic semi-transparent line flew slowly past them as it rotated geosynchronously above its point on the Earth.
Suddenly both Savannah and Gage looked at each other with wide eyes. “It’s pointing at us!” the said together.
“Oh, my God, Gage!”
“That’s got to be it! Savannah! Oh, your brain is just way too fucking hot!” He kissed her excitedly.
“Thanks? But, honestly, Gage, that just kind of fell out.”
“So?! The towers don’t point to anything on the planet, but,” Gage adjusted the controls showing their star and the orbits of the other worlds. “I bet they point to somewhere out here.”
“Gage, a star system is a really big place. I had a coach in school that also taught our science classes.”
“A coach, huh,” Gage chuckled. “I bet that was interesting ‘science’,” he snarked.
“It was,” she agreed. “Everything had a sports analogy. He said if the sun were the size of a basketball, the Earth would be the size of a small marble, the moon the size of a BB, and the Earth’s orbit would be a whole football field away from the basketball.”
“That’s pretty close to accurate, actually.”
“But then the rest of the planets were way further. Like somewhere within a mile or two further from the basketball.”
“Sure. The Kuiper Belt that Pluto is part of would probably be about two miles a
way from your basketball. And Pluto would be a little bit smaller BB.”
“And all of that distance is like way empty space. Between the sun basketball and the Pluto BB, there’s nothing out there. Nothing. Maybe a random comet or loose asteroid here and there. It’s just a really big empty.”
Gage was nodding. “Which is why—” he adjusted the controls to remove much of the empty space to make things within their star system much more visible. Suddenly the whole of the solar system lit up with all of its objects very visible and warmly colored, orbiting their sun.
“Oh, wow. That’s where we live? It’s beautiful.”
“It is. There’s a lot of empty space, Savannah, but there’s also a lot of places to hide things.” Both watched as the holo image of Neptune and the Saturn floated past them. “I’m willing to bet if we can figure out how or what the towers mean, what they pointed to—”
“If they pointed to—you mean.” She leaned warmly against him as they continued to gaze at the beautifully illuminated model of the slowly churning worlds.
“Sure. But. Well, I think we—” Gage looked at her snuggled against himself by the railing. Her breasts were always amazingly pert for as large as they were, like they defied gravity. With the way her blonde hair had grown full and long to flow over them and down her back, with her cute pink nipples, she always seemed to be able to draw his attention. “You know you’re not wearing any clothes?”
Savannah smiled. “Oh, you noticed that did you?”
“Hmmm,” he moved his arm around her and kissed the side of her head. “Yea. I always notice. I love the way you look.”
“I notice you too. I like it when you’re not wearing anything.” She danced her eyes over his beautifully cut male form. “Maybe we should do something about it.”
“Oh?” He pulled her softly to himself. “What did you have in mind?”
Savannah draped her arms around his neck. “Kiss me and I’ll bet you’ll find out.”
Gage lightly buried his warm lips into hers.
31
P atience, Paige. All in due time.” Rowan watched from a mile away. Both stood on the top floor of a short office building, looking out into a busy strip mall, the passive sensors on their sunglasses delivering a very clear and detailed magnification and other heads-up information about whom they were seeing. “You’ve got to learn from your prey. What they do. How they hide. What they like to eat. How they travel. What they—wait a minute. Well I’ll be damned.”
“Who is that he’s with?” Paige asked, her sunglasses delivering the same detailed magnification and heads-up information.
“Another member of their new council. That’s Hera. Been a long time since I spied her anywhere.”
“She’s—?” Paige watched the fifty-something looking couple kiss sweetly before entering the restaurant.
“—been mating with Hades.” Rowan finished.
Paige frowned at Rowan. “Do you always reduce people to animals?”
“Not reducing anything. It’s what they are. It’s what all of us are. Some are just smarter than others. But we all have the same—basic—instincts.”
“You make it seem like I’m watching some show on Animal Planet.”
The passive sensors on Rowan’s glasses automatically adjusted to watch the couple enter the building and then get seated at a table. “Probably kind of like that. This is their natural habitat. I wanna see what they’re eating; how the relationship is going. How they interact with the other species.”
“So we’re gong to be watching two people having dinner?”
“Relationships are important, Paige. I never saw this one comin’. Hera was part of the Sentinels and Hades part of the Seven. Both were supposed to be mortal enemies. Obviously that wasn’t the case. It could explain a lot about what happened between the Sentinels and the Seven and why they joined forces against Rion and his lot. Interesting. This evening’s just getting started, sweetheart.”
“You’re not seriously going to watch them all night?”
“I am; and so are you.”
“Great. I’m going from Animal Planet to the Playboy Channel.”
“I can think of worse entertainment.”
Paige didn’t ask.
32
T y and Ethan had changed out their leather for denim and t-shirts as each rode into the now warmer weather along I-8 out of Yuma, heading for San Diego.
“Now will you tell me where we’re going?” Ethan asked, as the two rode along the interstate.
“A place called Kona Kai. I have a friend who owns a charter boat there.”
“A charter boat? Are we going fishing?”
“Not exactly. She lives on it mostly.”
“She?”
Ty grinned at Ethan through his sunglasses.
By mid-day, the freeway they were on ended, leaving the pair on a main street ride through residential neighborhoods, then through a business district, and then out on to a narrow barrier island within the harbor. Ethan had never seen so many different kinds of boats in one place before. Fishing and sailing, sport and luxury craft; there seemed to be everything one could want, anchored within the large marina they were riding past. Ethan followed Ty into an upscale parking lot where they left their bikes and then made their way stealthfully onto a secured boardwalk that had several larger yachts moored.
“I thought you said your friend had a charter boat?”
“She does. That’s it,” Ty pointed to a huge three-story luxury vessel they were approaching. The two hundred foot personal ship had smoothly styled smoked glass windows, a radar mast and a wide lower aft deck with what looked like a small pool and spa.
“She rents out her yacht? To who? Heads of state?”
“Heads of companies, usually. Beverly Hills types for parties. C’mon, it’s San Diego. You have to be well-heeled to even get a small house here.”
With psionic stealth that mimicked a kind of invisibility, the two of them easily avoided a couple of armed plain-clothed security guards as they boarded the elegant ship. Ethan followed Ty who seemed to know his way around the large craft until they found a rather shapely, tanned, thirty-something, bleach-blonde with her hair in a ponytail making lunch in the galley. Ty quietly slipped into the elegant commercial-looking kitchen just inside the doorway and waited.
The woman turned with a plate in her hand and then all at once saw Ty standing not ten feet from her. The plate left her hand falling to the floor. In a blur of speed, Ty caught the fine plate and returned it and its contents to the counter.
“You might want to hold on to those, they break sometimes.”
“Oh! My God!” Was the only thing that left her mouth as if in a whisper. Ethan could see the expression of deep surprise on her face. The color had drained from it; like she was looking at a ghost.
“You’re alive?” she said quietly. “Oh my, God, you’re alive!” her hand went to her mouth as excitement began filling her watering eyes. She took hold of his hands bouncing up and down like a school kid. “Oh, Ty! You’re alive!” she wrapped herself around him her eyes welling as she hugged him tightly and his arms wrapped around her.
Through blurry, misty eyes she saw Ethan leaning against the doorway.
“Oh,” she pulled back from Ty, wiping her eyes. “I’m a mess. Look at me.”
“It’s alright, Sam. I knew it would be a bit of a surprise.”
“A bit!? Goddammit!” she slugged him in the chest as if she had a knife in her hand. “Why didn’t you tell me!?”
“I couldn’t tell any of you. It was too dangerous for me and for you. As long as everyone thought I was dead, I knew I’d be safer and so would all of you.”
She nodded, now finally regaining her composure. “Are you—the only one? Did anyone else—”
Ty shook his head frowning. “They’re all gone, Sam. Mom and Dad, all of them.”
Her hand went to her mouth again. “I’m so sorry. It’s just—I can’t believe. Dammit, Ty!” She hugg
ed him again. “I can’t believe it’s really you. We thought all of you were dead. How did you get away?”
“It’s a long story, Sam. Maybe we could talk about it later.”
She nodded and then looked at Ethan again. “Who’s your hunky friend?”
“Ethan, I’d like you to meet a friend of the family. Samantha, this is Ethan.”
“And what are you, Ethan?” she asked shaking his hand and looking at his unusual eyes.
“Confused,” Ethan smiled back to her. Ty had never really talked about what had happened to his family. At some point he’d ask Ty about them.
“Ethan is like me, Sam.”
“A confused Reborn.” She nodded. “That’s nothing new.”
“Tell me about it,” Ethan agreed.
“Oh, Jesus, Ty, I’m—I’m sorry, but I’m just still in shock. You’re like seeing a ghost. Tell me you’re staying for a while.”
“We can’t for very long, Sam. I need to see Thea.”
“Sure. After five years I’m sure she’ll be just as shocked. She was just here last week visiting.”
“How’s the Atlantica?”
“Right where all of you left her. It’s where Thea spends most of her time now. I try to drag her out as much as I can, but, you know Thea.”
Ty nodded. “Miss Introvert,” he grinned.
“Do you want to call her? I have a ring.”
“No. I want to surprise her.”
“Yea. Good luck with that,” Samantha mocked.
Ty chuckled his agreement. “Can you take us out there anytime soon?”
“I’ll check with the captain to see what kind of weather is going to be out there in the next few days. In the meantime you two are staying here. Let me get you a couple of cabins down stairs.”
“Just one is fine, Sam,” Ty assured.
“Oh?” her eyebrow went up. She looked at Ethan and then back at Ty. “Serious or just dating?”
“Serious,” Ty offered while Ethan said “Dating.”
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