The MORE Trilogy

by T. M. Franklin

  He let her stew for a moment, taking another sip of the cooling coffee, then he nudged the chair across from him with the toe of his shoe in invitation.

  Emma relaxed ever so slightly and took a seat.

  A waitress approached, and Elias fought off a scowl of irritation, instead ordering his daughter a latte and chocolate chip cookie with an indulgent smile.

  She didn’t speak, simply kept her head bowed and hands folded in her lap.

  Elias waited until the waitress delivered the order before he addressed her. “How have you been, daughter?”

  Her eyes flashed up in surprise. “F-f-fine. Thank you, Father.”

  “You’ve been enjoying Billings?”

  She couldn’t keep the frown off her face, but she tried. He had to give her that.

  “It’s . . . nice. Quiet.” She hesitated and he waved a hand, gesturing for her to continue. “It’s just difficult,” she said. “Being away for so long.”

  “I see you every week,” he said. “I do have other commitments, you know?”

  “Oh, I know, Father. I’m not complaining,” she said, the words tumbling out. “And I appreciate you taking the time. It’s just . . .” She rubbed her forehead.

  “Ah, poor thing,” he said, clucking his tongue. “Is it painful?” She straightened, putting on a brave face, and a rush of pride made Elias smile gently.

  “It’s not so bad. I only want to be useful. I could help, Father. If I was here, I could—”

  “Shhh,” he said, reaching across the table to sweep the hair out of her face. “Hush now.”

  She leaned into the touch, her eyes fluttering closed, and he pulled his hand away. She whimpered.

  He arched a brow. The girl needed to learn more control.

  Emma blushed and dipped her head.

  Better.

  “The time away was for your own good,” he said. “Time for you to contemplate your actions and learn from them.”

  She nodded, eager words falling from her lips. “Oh, I have, Father. I’ve learned. I promise, I won’t let you down again.”

  “Your actions in relation to your sister have had serious repercussions. I’ve had to adjust my timeline and make other changes to compensate for your failure.”

  Emma’s shoulders fell as she curled into herself. “I know, Father. I am so sorry.”

  He heard the tears in her voice and felt her anguish through their link.

  “I swear I’ll do better if you’ll give me another chance.”

  He studied her for a few minutes, allowing her to wallow a bit in her guilt and regret. They were powerful emotions, especially when it came to Emma. Finally, he eased closer and cupped his palm over her head. “Relax, daughter,” he said, giving her what she needed.

  She sighed, relaxing as the pain retreated, relief oozing into her muscles and nerves . . . the very cells of her being.

  It didn’t take long after all these years. He knew her so well, and she accepted his help so easily. Thirty seconds, maybe less, and he leaned back and picked up his cup to finish his coffee.

  Emma’s eyes fluttered open, glazed and dreamy, until she blinked a few times and focused on him. “Thank you, Father.”

  “You’re welcome, Emma. You know I’d do anything for you.”

  “I know.”

  “And, of course, you’ll do anything for me.”

  “Yes, Father.”

  “That’s what family’s all about, after all.”

  “Yes, Father.”

  He set his cup on the saucer and smoothed his napkin in front of him before leaning back in his chair. “Speaking of family, I think it’s time you remedy the Ava situation.”

  She stiffened and attempted to cover it, but little escaped his notice.

  “Is there a problem?” he asked.

  “No.” She cleared her throat and shook her head. “Of course not, Father. What do you want me to do?”

  “Your sister is quite stubborn,” he said, a little fondly. “I’d underestimated what would be necessary to persuade her to join our cause.”

  “It wasn’t your fault. It was mine.”

  Elias waved a hand, feeling generous. “That is neither here nor there. It’s in the past, and it’s time to focus on the future. Our future.” He reached across the table to pat his daughter’s hand. “And you’re—” His phone buzzed, bouncing slightly on the table, and he frowned at the name on the screen.

  He knows better.

  Holding up a finger toward his daughter, Elias answered the call. “What is it?”

  “The cryo is gone.”

  “Sophie?” The name came out in a near-growl, and he watched Emma freeze, her latte halfway to her lips. “What do you mean she’s gone?”

  “House was empty,” Sloan Bartok said, obviously just as frustrated as Elias. He didn’t handle failure well. “We missed her by an hour. Maybe two.”

  “What do you mean, you missed her? How could you miss her?”

  “She wasn’t at her last known address. She’d moved twice, and it took some time—”

  Elias cursed, his fingers digging into the edge of the table. “Who has her? The Council?”

  “Protectors were there when we arrived, but they didn’t have her.”

  “Did they see you?”

  “With all due respect, you know me better than that.”

  True.

  Bartok was nothing if not careful, and his training made him especially difficult to detect.

  “So Guardians, then,” Elias said, half to himself.

  Bartok murmured agreement. “There’s more.”

  “Oh, let me guess. Foster.”

  “And your little girl. Well, your other little girl,” Bartok replied.

  “Ava?”

  “She was all over the place.”

  “Interesting.” Elias pursed his lips, thinking about that. “I didn’t think they let her leave the Colony.”

  Bartok didn’t reply. He tended not to, when the answers were obvious. Instead, he asked, “What now?”

  Elias considered his next move, mind racing as the pieces fell into place. “We’ll need to move up the timetable. Obviously, my children are not as secure as I’d hoped.” He reached across the table to run a finger down Emma’s cheek. “Go after the boy, as planned.”

  “Are we going to move against the Colony?” Bartok asked.

  Elias scoffed. “Wasted effort. The Guardians pose no threat to our plans.”

  “What about Ava?”

  Elias eyed his daughter across the table. “Oh, I have a plan for Ava,” he said. “If she doesn’t come of her own free will, she’ll have to be convinced.”

  “How do you plan to do that?”

  “Easy enough,” Elias replied. “Hit her close to home.”

  Chapter 4

  Outside a nondescript brick building housing a nondescript high school in a nondescript town in the middle of nowhere, North Dakota, Tiernan Ross leaned against a scraggly elm tree and cursed his life.

  He could have done anything, really—moved to Europe, spent some time on a quiet beach, and ignored anything and everything that stank of politics and power plays and the ridiculous mess he’d gotten himself involved in.

  Katherine had said he was getting soft, and although he’d greeted the statement with his trademark glower, deep down he had feared she was right. He felt a strange sense of responsibility to the band of outlaws hiding out in the Canadian wilderness, and to the girl who pushed all his buttons, but still managed to get under his skin.

  Tiernan let out a heavy sigh and checked his watch again. School would be out in three minutes.

  Finally.

  It had been almost a month, and he didn’t know what he had been thinking, offering to be an ambassador to the Council on behalf of the Guardians. It was a delicate proposition, and Tiernan, as a rule, didn’t do delicate. Still, he’d been meeting with Council leaders, first Rafe and Naomi, to help ease the way, then Kaeden, for what good it did him. It was slow goi
ng, and Tiernan was going insane with the waiting, so he’d taken an assignment, in no small part to get on Madeleine’s good side, as Kaeden had suggested, which was what led to standing outside a high school, cooling his heels, and waiting for a Half-Breed. It was strange. A few months ago, it would have been business as usual, but now . . .

  A feeling of unease combined with a strange twist in his stomach he couldn’t identify left him antsy and riddled with—

  Okay, maybe I can identify it. Guilt. It’s guilt.

  Tiernan, as a rule, didn’t do guilt either.

  He’d been fine—doing his duty, living his life—until Ava came along and started to break down the walls that kept out irritating things like guilt and compassion and . . .

  Well—

  The bell rang, driving away the unsettling thoughts, and Tiernan straightened, eyes zeroing in on the door of the school and the blue Honda he’d already identified as belonging to one Isaiah Bennett.

  He scanned the uniformed teenagers streaming out of the building for the face he’d committed to memory from a series of recon images he’d received earlier.

  Tall, thin, dark-skinned with hair trimmed close to his scalp . . . there.

  Of course, it was the middle of the afternoon, so he couldn’t just grab the kid and make a run for it. Instead, Tiernan started the motorcycle he’d liberated from a Walmart parking lot in Bismarck and waited as Isaiah waved to his friends and tossed his backpack into the car before climbing in. He knew where the boy lived but tailed him anyway, hoping for a detour along the way that would make it easier to apprehend him.

  Take him. Kidnap him.

  Tiernan’s jaw clenched, and his fists tightened on the handlebars, the motorcycle engine revving in protest. He took a deep breath to steady his nerves.

  It’s just an assignment. Another job. Grab the kid. Take him to the Council. Let them deal with the rest. Like dozens before.

  It was all part of maintaining the peace. Rafe had said it would be a show of goodwill to the Council.

  Tiernan wasn’t convinced.

  The Half-Breed—Isaiah—pulled into the driveway of his suburban home, and Tiernan let the bike slow to a stop across the street.

  The neighborhood was quiet, but not empty. The hum of a lawnmower two doors down mingled with the swish of a woman sweeping her porch at the end of the block and the incessant yapping of a small dog that Tiernan couldn’t quite pinpoint.

  Isaiah hitched his backpack up onto his shoulder and turned to walk toward the road.

  Toward Tiernan.

  “Crap.” He yanked the phone from his pocket and looked down at it as though he was texting, or GPS-ing, or something other than stalking a teenage boy. He almost dropped it when it buzzed in his hand with an incoming call.

  Gideon.

  He debated answering, casting a quick glance toward Isaiah. The boy was looking directly at him, so he took the plunge and hit the call button, hoping it would be make him a little less conspicuous. “Yeah?”

  “Any progress?”

  Tiernan feigned interest in the sky, watching the boy out of the corner of his eye and only letting out a relieved breath when Isaiah turned to check the mailbox at the end of the drive.

  “Everything okay?” Gideon prompted.

  “Yeah. Yeah,” Tiernan replied. “Sorry. Kind of in the middle of something here.”

  Isaiah tucked the mail into the crook of his arm and walked back to the house.

  A little of Tiernan’s tension eased. “What about there? How’s the relocation going?”

  Gideon sighed. “It’s taking some time to find the right places,” he said. “We’re splitting up the group, placing them in different safe houses, all relatively close to New Elysia so it’s easier for them to move once the Council gives the go-ahead.” There was a heavy silence. “They are going to give the go-ahead, right?”

  This time it was Tiernan’s turn to sigh. “I’m working on it. You know how politicians are.”

  “Yeah, that I do.” Gideon chuckled. “There’s been another development you probably should know about.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Caleb and Ava rescued a woman before Protectors could get there,” he said. “We thought she was a Half-Breed. Turns out, we were wrong.”

  Tiernan stiffened and kicked his boot against the motorcycle tire. “You’re kidding.”

  “Yeah. Ava’s got another sister.”

  A low growl escaped from deep in Tiernan’s throat before he could stop it. “Do you have her locked up?”

  “She’s not a prisoner, Tiernan. She’s given us no reason to distrust her.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s what we thought about Ava’s other sister,” Tiernan snapped, still a little—

  Okay, more than a little.

  He was still incredibly angry that he hadn’t acted on his suspicions when it came to Emma. “Do I have to remind you of how that turned out?”

  “No. You don’t,” Gideon said curtly. “But we can’t penalize Sophie for what Emma’s done. They’re two different people, and as far as we can tell, she’s had no contact with Borré or any of the Rogues. She only came into her powers a f—”

  “What powers?”

  “Nothing that can influence others,” Gideon assured him. “She’s a cryo. Seems to be her only ability, at this point. Although, we’ll know more once her block is fully lifted.”

  “Who’s going to do that?”

  “Not sure yet,” Gideon admitted. “We don’t have anyone with the necessary skills here. I think we might have to wait until we get to New Elysia.” He took a deep breath. “Ava’s fighting us on it.”

  At least someone at the Colony has some sense.

  “Maybe you should listen to her.”

  “That’s beside the point.”

  “Well, what is the point?” Tiernan growled, glancing toward the house again, irritated with the entire subject. He had things to do. Places to be. Alliances to negotiate.

  “The point is Sophie told us she has a brother.”

  Tiernan stilled. “Brother? You don’t mean . . . ”

  “Yeah, I do. Biological brother. They were in the foster system but were separated when the boy was adopted.”

  Tiernan cursed.

  Gideon echoed the sentiment.

  “So does the Council know?”

  “About the boy? I don’t know,” Gideon replied. “But I’m willing to bet that Borré knows we have Sophie by now, so we need to get to Isaiah before the Rogues do.”

  Tiernan froze, the weight of expectation heavy in his chest. “Isaiah?”

  “Sophie’s brother.”

  It was too much of a coincidence, and Tiernan didn’t believe in coincidences. “I don’t think the Rogues are who you need to worry about.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The kid,” Tiernan said. “Is his last name Bennett?” He heard nothing but the sound of soft inhales for several beats, and then the almost whispered question.

  “The Council knows about him?”

  “I’m standing outside his house right now.”

  Gideon’s tone turned icy. “And why would that be? I thought—”

  “I’m greasing the wheels with the Council,” Tiernan said, kicking the tire again as if it were the wheel in question. “Like I was supposed to. I’m trying to clear the way, but I’m no damned politician. I have to work with what I’ve got.”

  “So you’re going to turn a kid over to them? You know w—”

  “No, I’m not!” Tiernan shouted as he kicked his bike a little too hard and had to reach out to steady it. He took a deep breath to calm himself and spoke in a quiet, steady voice. “I’m not, but he’ll need a safe place.”

  “I can get you one,” Gideon said quickly.

  Tiernan scrubbed a hand over his shaved head. “The Council’s not going to be happy that I let him slip through my fingers.”

  “You sure you know what you’re doing?”

  Tiernan laughed. “
No. You?”

  He heard Gideon chuckle. “Not really, but one thing at a time. Get the kid, and I’ll get you the location of a safe house. You have to keep him out of the Council’s hands. At least until we get them on our side.”

  “I’m still not convinced that’s going to happen.”

  “Yeah, well. Hate to say it, but that’s on you, too. At least for now.”

  No pressure.

  “Thanks.” Tiernan glanced up and down the quiet street—even the lawn mower and the yappy dog had gone silent. “I’ll call you when I have him,” he said, jogging toward the house as he hung up the phone and stuffed it in his pocket.

  He would have preferred to wait for dark, but with this new development, he didn’t have the luxury.

  He just hoped Isaiah Bennett wasn’t a screamer.

  Ava wasn’t sure what exactly led her out to the playground so late that evening. The moon was full, lighting the path as her breath frosted before her. A cold blast forced her to huddle deeper into her winter coat, cramming her gloved hands in the pockets.

  The Colony grounds were all but deserted, everyone escaping the chill either in their own quarters or in the common room, laughing over hot chocolate and board games. Some had already left the Colony altogether, headed for safe houses picked out by Gideon personally. The rest would be moved within a week or two. After that, it was on to New Elysia, if everything went as planned. If everything went as they hoped. Nobody talked about what would happen if the Council refused them. They knew there really wasn’t any other option.

  Ava rounded a corner and was surprised by exactly how unsurprised she was to see a familiar figure on the swings, her feet dragging along the ground. Perhaps Ava had finally become accustomed to her Race intuition, or maybe she knew how Sophie was feeling. Ava had spent a lot of time on that same swing considering her life and her options. To find her half sister doing the same thing spoke to either the power of genetics or the simple draw of childhood comforts when dealing with adult problems.

  Nothing beats a swing for clear thinking.

  Sophie looked up as Ava took the swing next to her, watching as she pushed with her feet to twist the chain over her head.

  “How are you doing?” Ava asked.

  Sophie sighed. “Well, that . . . that’s a question.”