He growled, rolling over, very aware of his morning erection. He closed his eyes, considering his options. Rub one off before he called her brother? Or call Jake while sporting a massive hard-on? Either way, it wasn’t going to be a comfortable conversation, but he had a few questions for Jacob Fallon, a.k.a. The Cobra, a.k.a. the man who knew every talented person in the Western New York area, maybe even the country, possibly the world. There was no way Jake didn’t know there was something special about his own sister. No fucking way.
He reached for his cell, scrolling through his contacts for Jake’s name. He pressed dial, then waited for the call to go through.
“We’re not going to talk about this,” Jake said in lieu of hello.
“I didn’t call to ask for your blessing. What’s her talent, Fallon?”
“You couldn’t figure it out?” Jake’s voice was mocking.
Cagey bastard, answering a question with a question. Cal could play that game too. “You don’t know, do you?”
“Why would I? I’ve never scened with my sister.”
“Reassuring, but not an answer. Seriously, Fallon, what’s your goal here? She thinks she’s a normal.”
“My goal is to keep her safe.”
“Safe from what? Herself? After last night, she knows she’s got some sort of power. You want her to experiment on her own? Ignorance is dangerous.”
“Not necessarily. So what happened?”
Cal wasn’t giving an inch. “You tell me her talent and I’ll tell you what happened last night.”
Finally, Jake sighed. “I think she’s a neutral.”
Yes. Wait— “What do you mean you think?” Jake practically made it his business to know everything about every talent he could find. Why not his own sister? “Why don’t you know?”
“Look, Audrey doesn’t remember our father…but I do. The less she knows, the better. She can’t protect herself. I don’t want her to get sucked into a world she can’t handle.”
Cal burst out laughing.
“What’s so funny?” Jake snarled
There was no delicate way to phrase it. “I pumped fifty thousand amps into your helpless sister last night. She begged for more.”
“I’m going to break your mind the next time I see you,” Jake growled.
“You can try, snake charmer.” With that out of the way, Cal continued. “I’ve never seen anything like it. She wasn’t affected at all. She said it didn’t hurt. I even kissed her.” There was wonder in his voice.
“Shut up.”
“Sam tried to shift her reality and couldn’t. Can you hypnotize her?”
“No. Hold it—when did she meet Sam?”
Overprotective big brother wasn’t going to like this at all. “I followed Audrey out of the Lair last night and saw some guy trailing her. She was about to get dragged into an alley when I caught up with them. The guy blew my arm in half before he ran. I called the Doc for roadside assistance, and I figured Sam could rearrange Audrey’s perceptions. No dice. You know the rest.”
“I knew I should have walked her out. No one thought to mention this to me last night?”
Cal grinned. “We had other things on our mind.”
“You’re really asking for it, Davis.” But he sounded worried, not angry.
“Whatever. You were her safe call. What did you think we were going to do? Watch a movie? Get over it.”
“Was Audrey hurt in the attack?”
“Her purse was stolen, but that’s it. We found it halfway down the block and it looked like everything was still in it.”
“Audrey’s a ninth degree black belt. Tell me about the fight.”
Cal told him.
“Hmm,” Jake said. “I guess the guy was a normal, then. Talent wouldn’t have worked against her. How come he got away?”
“Your helpless sister kept getting in my way. Then the asshole pulled some sort of energy weapon. I kind of lost my focus when my arm broke in half.”
“That’s because you’re a pussy.”
Cal ignored the gibe. “It wasn’t a gun or a Taser. I don’t know what it was—that’s the weird part.”
“Yeah, well, why don’t you get busy trying to figure out that mystery weapon and stay away from my sister?”
“No chance.”
Jake sighed. “Cal, I let her go home with you because she was going to do it anyway. You can’t stop Audrey once she gets curious about something, but I don’t want her getting involved with a talent. Nothing personal. She thinks she’s found our father, which is bad enough, but her getting attacked in the street makes me nervous, especially if the guy had an unusual weapon. I want her as far away from our world as possible.”
“Why are you trying to insulate her from what she is? Why not bring her in? Introduce her to some other neutrals?”
“There aren’t that many of them, and from what I’ve heard, their talents don’t work the same way as ours. Neutrals operate on instinct. They don’t know how they do what they do, they just do it. There’s no way to measure neutrality. I won’t risk her. She’s safer living as a normal.”
“Safer from what?”
“It’s not your business, Cal. Pick another sub. You never keep them long, anyway. Leave Audrey alone.”
“She’s different, Jake. I can touch her. Don’t pretend you don’t know what that means.” Cal couldn’t touch a woman safely, but Jake couldn’t even look one in the eyes. “I can’t leave her alone, but I won’t harm her, and I won’t let anyone else harm her, either.”
“You don’t know what you’re getting into, Cal.”
“Then tell me. No—tell her.”
“I’ll think about it.” Jake ended the call.
Cal rolled out of bed. That had gone better than he’d dared to hope. Audrey was a neutral. Electrons leapt inside him. He went into the bathroom and turned on the water. As he stepped into the spray, he hoped she would call him sooner rather than later. Cool water sizzled on his skin as he remembered the touch of her tongue against his.
It was a good thing he had a weapon to research while he was waiting for the phone to ring. Otherwise he might be tempted to call her first, using the cell number from her text message. He’d definitely lose coolness points for that. His instincts told him not to crowd her, but the energy swirling inside him was hard to ignore. He turned the cold water on full blast. Steam filled the room.
It was going to be a long day.
Audrey slept in Sunday morning, then showered and headed for Genecorp. If she hurried, she’d be able to get a couple hours of work done before she met Jake and…their father at the restaurant.
When she reached the Genecorp security desk, she fumbled in the side pocket of her purse for her lab ID but couldn’t find anything except Cal’s business card. A faint melody played in her head. Sensation rushed through her body like a current in her veins.
She had texted him last night home safely. He had replied thank you. She hadn’t quite known how to respond to that—thank you for the hot sex or thank you for texting him? So she hadn’t responded at all. Really, what was a guy like him doing with a lab rat like her? She’d seen the other women in the Lair last night. She bet a guy like Cal had his pick of them.
The guard cleared his throat.
“Hang on,” she said, flustered. “It’s got to be here somewhere.”
Damn, she hoped her ID wasn’t lying on the pavement outside Jake’s bar. She should have taken a more careful inventory of her purse last night. She began to pull items out of her bag and stack them on the counter.
The guard sighed. “You want to do this the easy way?”
Audrey nodded and held out her hand. He swiped her finger over the print scanner.
“Step over here, please.” He motioned her behind the counter. “And try not to blink.”
She ducked to rest her forehead against the bar of the retinal scanner, forcing herself to hold still. The flashing lights always made her want to hit someone. Decking the guard wouldn’t get
her into the lab.
“Just one last thing.” The guard pulled a box of sterile lancets out of a drawer and opened it. He selected one, laid it aside and stripped the foil from an alcohol wipe.
“You need blood?” she asked, perplexed. “That’s new.”
He shifted closer to her, reaching for her hand.
Audrey stepped back into a more easily defended position. “I don’t like needles.”
He frowned. “It’s just a little pinch.”
Not for her. Needles were torture. “Listen…” She glanced at his name tag. “John. Neither one of us is going to like what happens if you jab me with that needle. Trust me. You don’t need my DNA to identify me unless I’ve committed a crime, right? Last I checked, working on a Sunday wasn’t against the law.”
“But you don’t have your ID.”
“No, I don’t,” she stalled, trying to decide exactly how much she cared about the effect of dietary aluminum on fetal mice. Bad enough to risk her mental health and this guy’s life if he stuck her with that needle? Just as she decided no, the door to the lab opened and her boss walked out.
“Peter! Thank God. Would you vouch for me? Please? I don’t have my ID and the guard won’t let me in.”
Peter grinned. “Good job, John. She’s dangerous.”
Audrey rolled her eyes. “Only if you’re a mouse.”
“Ain’t that the truth.” He nodded at the guard and put his arm around her shoulders.
Gratitude warmed her as he led her toward the lab, but it struck her as odd that he didn’t release her. Peter usually wasn’t a toucher, and his friendly embrace raised prickles of alarm. He stroked her hair and she craned her neck to look up at him. She saw sympathy in his eyes.
She rushed to the empty shelf where her cages should have been.
“I put them in the cooler,” Peter said quietly.
“All of them?” she asked, stunned.
He nodded. “What were you working on this time?”
“Nothing I thought would be fatal.” She opened the cooler and stared at the stiff bodies of the still-gravid rodents in the bag. She had planned to share her hypothesis about aluminum with her co-workers when she had some measurable results. Death wasn’t the result she had been expecting.
“Want to go get something to eat?” Peter asked.
Yum, dead mice make me hungry! She silenced the frustrated retort that crossed her mind. Peter was just trying to cheer her up. It wasn’t his fault. She gave him a smile instead. “No thanks. I think I’ll do the autopsies.”
“You can’t. The cleaning crew is here.”
“What?”
“Sunday is the best time to schedule maintenance, given that most folks aren’t here. Just freaks like us, who work all the time.”
“Are you sure I can’t…” She heard a vacuum go on.
He shook his head. “No dead animals on display when the crew is working. It’s in the contract. Change your mind about lunch?” he asked, looking hopeful. “My treat.”
She almost said yes, but then he put his arm around her again and gave her a squeeze.
She forced herself not to pull away. “I had a late breakfast. I think I’ll just go home and work on some things, maybe see if I can find my ID.” She knew she was babbling, but what the hell was going on? Peter had never shown the slightest interest in her, and she would have noticed because she’d sneaked plenty of looks at him. He was everything she admired in a man—hardworking, dedicated to science and low-maintenance. Like her, he was wearing a T-shirt under his white lab coat and jeans with his tennis shoes, showing they also shared an appreciation of function over fashion.
She never felt awkward around him, so why did her face suddenly feel hot and her palms sweaty? Why was her heart racing? Classic symptoms of adrenalin rush. Last week she would have assumed she was excited he was paying attention to her. Today, he made her skin crawl. What had changed?
Calvin, a variable who smelled like smoke and made music when he touched her.
She cleared her throat and edged away from Peter. “See you in the morning?”
“Sure,” he said easily. “I’ll walk you out.”
It was easier to say yes than no; he was her boss, after all. “I’ll just grab my laptop so I can go over data.” She hurried into her office but her computer wasn’t sitting on her desk. Had she brought it home with her last night? If she had, it was still in the car because she hadn’t carried it into her house last night or used it today.
She left her office. Peter was waiting with his own laptop bag slung over his narrow shoulder. “Ready?” he asked.
She nodded, still trying to retrace her steps last night. Maybe Cal had shifted it under the passenger seat? They reached the parking lot. “Thanks, Peter, see you tomorrow.”
She slid into her car and shut the door, automatically fastening her seatbelt. He waved, but didn’t move toward his own vehicle until she drove away. As soon as he was out of sight, she reached under the passenger seat. No laptop. Shit.
She wasn’t worried about losing her work; her data was stored online. She could get to it from anywhere, but the laptop was an expensive piece of equipment, not something that could be quickly or easily replaced without a lot of explanation and groveling. If it wasn’t in her office, her car or her house, she was going to have to assume it had been stolen—and tell Peter. Why would anyone want a laptop that was password and fingerprint protected? Could they wipe the hard drive and start over?
She glanced at the clock on the dashboard and sighed, deciding she didn’t have enough time to stop at home before lunch. Her stomach tightened, both from worry over the missing computer and anxiety over possibly meeting her father. She wasn’t so naïve as to believe it was absolutely him without proof, especially since all of her communication with Michael Fallon had been via e-mail. Would he look like the pictures from her childhood? There weren’t that many of them, but she treasured every one, in spite of the fact he had abandoned them.
Audrey glanced at the numbers on the buildings as she cruised past them. She spotted Bonfire and slowed to check it out. She had expected something a little fancier. She could see through the front windows that the restaurant was nearly empty and it looked a lot like a warehouse, but not in the upscale, exposed beams and ducts way—more like in the underfunded interior decorator way. The street was silent and nearly deserted too.
She parked on the street and walked into the restaurant, surprised to see her perpetually late brother was already seated. She sat down at his table. “You’re early.”
“We need to talk.”
“Damn straight. Why didn’t you tell me there are other talents in Hudson?” She looked up at the approaching waitress. “Water, please.”
The server left and Audrey crossed her arms, waiting.
Jake fiddled with his wraparound shades. “I heard you got attacked last night.”
She glared at him. “That’s not an answer—wait, you talked to Cal?”
“And Sam. The Doc too.”
They both ignored the waitress who set a glass of water in front of her, then mumbled something about giving them a few minutes.
Jake raised his face. “You’re a neutral, Audrey. That’s why I can’t whammy you. I didn’t tell you about the other talents because I didn’t want you to find out you’re talented too.”
Betrayal made her feel hollow. She’d grown up feeling like an also-ran and he’d known she was talented the whole time? Jake’s eyes were hidden, but she hoped he could see the anger and hurt in hers. Her mind raced ahead, trying to connect the dots, but fury trumped logic. She reached across the table and punched him hard in the chest. His chair scooted back two inches and he grunted. “Guess you’re mad, huh?” he asked.
“Damn right I am.” If she hadn’t been sitting, that blow would have knocked him out of his chair.
“Don’t be like that.” Jake’s mouth was pinched, making him look like a pissed-off snapping turtle. “I’ve never shared your desire
to know the scumbag who left his family on Welfare—”
“That’s not what this is about!”
“Yes it is, and if you can the attitude for five seconds I’ll tell you why.”
She closed her eyes. It took effort to master the urge to hit him again. When she opened her eyes, his expression had softened. “I whammied Charlotte,” he said.
Audrey gasped. Their foster mother was going to freak.
“Only a little. She didn’t know I was doing it.”
“Why?”
“I wanted to know more about our father.”
She did too. “What did you find out?”
He shook his head. “Nothing. So I went to see Mom this morning.”
Audrey felt sick. “Oh, Jake, you know how upset she gets when she sees us.”
“She didn’t recognize me, Aud.” The sorrow in his eyes punched a hole in her heart. “And she doesn’t remember anything about our father.” Of course not—Alzheimer’s had stripped her brain, year by year, starting when Audrey was two and Jake was five. Even then she had been unwilling to talk about the man who had fathered her children, then disappeared into thin air. “Here, I stole her chart for you.”
“Jake!”
He shrugged. “It’s a copy.”
She opened to the first page, shaking her head, not wanting to know how many hospital employees he’d had to whammy to waltz into the nurses’ station and copy a chart that spanned twenty-five years. But she knew Jake wouldn’t have swiped it without a reason. “Aluminum?” she asked, with dawning horror.
“And lots of it,” Jake said.
“I’ve been researching the effects of dietary aluminum on mice.”
“I know. It’s connected, Audrey. Our father, your research, the attack last night. You need to back off at work, forget about finding our father and stay out of the way until I figure out what’s going on.”
Her laugh was harsh. “Fuck that. Why should I listen to you? You’ve been lying to me for—” Rage boiled through her again, but she kept her voice calm, reasonable, friendly even, as she asked, “Exactly how long have you known about my talent, Jake?”
Power Trip: Double Helix, Book 1 Page 6