“This is me,” he said. “Look fast. I’m putting it back on now.”
She gaped. It was him. The Lord of the Citadel. Unmistakably him, with that hawk nose, but so different, with that hot glitter in his eyes, that lean, feral face. Thinner, darker, harder than she remembered from her heated fantasies. “It’s . . . it’s you,” she squeaked.
“Last I checked. Miles, remember? Come on.” He whipped the mask back on, reached for her. “Fast.”
She stiffened when his hands gripped her elbows, lifting her effortlessly. He dragged her past Hu’s prone body, and out of the rat hole. Anabel sprawled in the corridor in a pool of blood.
The man crouched down at Anabel’s feet, tugging at them.
“What are you doing?” Her voice was so thin, raspy, creaky.
“Shoes, for you. Quiet!” Miles shoved blood spattered white athletic shoes at her.
She flinched back. “Is she dead?”
“Do you care?” He pushed the shoes at her again, and shoved at the small of her back when she finally took them, propelling her up the stairs. “Dudes, that diversion would be really awesome right about now,” he muttered under his breath, and shoved the door open. They heard shouts, running feet, getting louder.
“Oh, shit,” he muttered. “Get behind me!”
The running footsteps amplified. It happened fast, and she saw very little from the stairwell, back flat to the wall. The masked guy lunged through the door. There was a shout, grunts, a few sharp thuds.
One of the men on the security staff tumbled past her down the stairs. He sprawled halfway down and lay, unmoving.
The masked guy’s leather-gloved hand yanked her out into the corridor. She clutched Anabel’s shoes to her chest, trying to keep her bare feet under herself and somehow keep up.
A faraway gun cracked. Glass shattered nearby. Again, and again. Huge, shattering sounds came from different levels of the building. Someone was shooting out those huge picture windows. More shouts.
“About fucking time,” Miles said sourly.
He slapped a door open. They ran out into the dark grounds.
She’d forgotten how big the sky was, how loud. Sighing with wind, leaves swishing and bugs clicking and humming. The rocky, thorny ground bit her feet, but she lurched stupidly along behind him, dazzled by the darkness that was not darkness. It was immensely deep, painted in a million textured qualities of blue and gray and black. Wind petted her skin, countless caressing hands. She dragged in chestfuls of the cold, complicated air, so rich in oxygen and earth, plant and sky perfumes. It made her dizzy. So different from the dead, stale air she’d breathed for months.
The ground sloped sharply beneath her stumbling feet. A chain-link fence reared up. Miles veered to the left, leading them sharply downhill, pulling her behind him, so swiftly that she plowed right into his hard, crouching body when he stopped.
He pulled metal bolt cutters from somewhere on his belt, and sliced through the bottom of the chain-link fence with feverish haste.
Floodlights snapped on, illuminating the grounds with brilliant light, making the shadows sharper, blacker.
“Shit,” he hissed. “Now! Go! Slide under! On your back!”
She wiggled on her back, feet first, under the fence. The cut ends brushed across her face and her naked chest, claws raking, just hard enough to sting. Rocks and dirt tugged at her trailing hair. The hill got abruptly steeper on the other side of the fence, and the moment she was through, she lost her bearings and her balance and tumbled, rolling and bouncing down a steep, jagged gully, along with a generous shower of rocks. She landed with a gasp on the nearest place flat enough to break her fall, and clung there, bruised and disoriented.
He landed like a cat beside her a moment later, so gracefully, it was as if he had floated down. “You okay?” he whispered.
She dragged herself up, taking stock. “Not sure yet.”
His hands moved gently over her, assessing the damage. He’d taken off the gloves, and his bare skin was warm, calluses rasping, but his touch was very delicate and careful, sliding over her bare shoulders, goose-bumped in the chill. “You’re cold,” he said.
“I’m okay,” she said, and realized from the wobble in her voice that she was shivering violently.
He peeled off his jacket and his black sweatshirt. “Here,” he whispered. “Take these.”
She shrank back, but he shoved the sweatshirt over her head anyway, wrestling it down until she lifted her arms to help.
It was huge, the neck dangling loose over her bare shoulder, the hem hanging to mid-thigh. So warm. Like being hugged. The back was damp with his sweat. It smelled like a man who’d been running and fighting. Imbued with his vital energy. Shudders racked her chilled body, and her nipples tightened. Tears started into her eyes.
He tried to put the jacket on her, too, and she batted it away.
“No way!” she whispered fiercely. “You use that!”
He muttered something impatient, and yanked the jacket back on, then took her arm and pulled her to her feet.
The first step she took, she stumbled with on the sharp rocks, and fell onto her knees again. He crouched down and touched her bloodied feet with a hiss of dismay. “Shit, Lara!”
“Sorry,” she whispered.
“What happened to Anabel’s shoes?”
Lara shook her head. “Dropped them when I fell.”
Miles looked around. She couldn’t imagine what he could see in the pitch darkness, but after a few seconds he crouched, grabbed her arms and turned, draping them over his shoulders. “No time to look for them,” he said. “Grab on. Legs around my waist.”
She opened her mouth to protest that absurd idea, but the shouting voices swelled, getting closer.
“Lara.” His voice was gravely with exhaustion. “Please. I don’t want to die here.”
That jolted her into movement. She wrapped her arms around his huge shoulders, fingers tingling. He hoisted her legs up.
She hung on with all her strength. It felt so strange, to touch someone again. His contracted muscles were steely hard beneath her face, her hands, her clenched thighs.
She’d never held anyone that desperately close, not ever. Not even ex-lovers. It had been so long, since anyone had touched her at all, other than to slap or yank or kick.
Miles ran headlong down the steep hill in pitch darkness. The rays from the floodlights from above did not penetrate the thickets of foliage below, and he kept to the shadows, zigzagging deftly across the wide, deep gully. Every footfall was light and sure, even on the broken tumbled boulders and the steep rocky hillside.
Her voice jolted jaggedly out of her throat, broken by his thudding footfalls. “How do you see to run so fast?”
“I can see in the dark,” was his reply.
Oh, please. “How?” she demanded. “What, are you a vampire or something?”
Miles’ chest vibrated. “Like I don’t have enough problems. Can we talk about it later? I promise I won’t suck your blood.”
“Sure.” She hid her face against his neck, abashed. His sweaty hair was salty against her lips. He had a hot, animal taste. She liked it.
She hung on, as tightly as she could, her hands locked over the taut muscle and hot, naked skin that his open jacket revealed.
His hair tickled her nose. His body felt so vital, wiry and dense, so intensely concentrated. The bodies of her few ex-boyfriends had not felt remotely like this man’s body. He was a whole new order of being.
His flying strides created a headwind, as if she were galloping on a horse. They tore through thickets, boughs thwacking against their faces, her arms, his chest. She buried her face against his neck. His hair dripped with sweat.
Tears leaked out of her eyes. She tried to stop them, but she shook inside. Something frozen inside her was starting to melt. Just because she was touching another human being.
The first twinge of pain was like a tension headache. It intensified quickly, like a band of steel around
her skull tightening.
The fear that was her constant companion ballooned. Darkness rose like a tidal wave, rushing up to swallow her.
Her blood pressure dropped. The pull began. Her arms and legs trembled, then went slack.
Miles caught her arms as she slid off his body, and crouched down to hold her. “Lara? What’s wrong?”
“Greaves,” she gasped. “Doing something. To my head. Pulling.”
“Lara, get inside! Of my mind, understand? Like you did before!”
She could barely speak, with that huge fist squeezing inside her head. “You . . . don’t feel it?” she croaked.
“My shield is really tough,” he said. “So get inside! Come on! Find a way, before he fucks you up!”
Blood was trickling from her nose. Pain filled her consciousness. His pleading voice faded. Get inside. Like before. Get inside! Lara!
She forced the words out, fighting to stay conscious. “Leave . . . me,” she whispered. “Can’t. He’s got me. Can’t . . . go farther. Run away.”
“No.” He lifted her right into his lap and cradled her, arms clamped around her body. “I can’t run anymore. I’m not leaving you.”
Why? She wanted to ask, but words were gone.
The last part of her mind that functioned at all came into focus. The grim concentration she’d earned and honed, in those long, dark months of captivity. She’d struggled every day to find her calm center. A place that lay beyond fear, anger, and crushing boredom.
She floated back from the pain, the clutch of compulsion, to that Lara behind Lara, who could not be controlled . . . and the vortex seized her like it had been waiting for her. She took off.
The momentum flung her wide and fast into chaos. She raced through inner space, exulting. Sensed the Citadel, with perceptions that were completely apart from her normal senses. The wall, its massive grinding gears and moving parts. Her dance. Swaying, unerring steps. Over, under, through . . . and she was inside.
She gasped in relief. The pain was gone.
So strange, though. She was still conscious. She was not in a trance. Her vision was still doubled, as if the Citadel were a waking dream, but she was acutely aware that a big, gorgeous, terrifying man was cuddling her on his lap while melding minds with her.
She felt raw, naked, exposed. Confused.
The feedback loop of feelings made her body hot with shame. She was inside his mind now. He had to feel everything that she felt.
“I’m in,” she whispered.
“I know.” His strangled tone said it all.
She was embarrassed by the giddy sexual awareness. All those sex dreams. Months of them. For her, it was as if they’d already had a blazing affair. God knows what it felt like from his side.
He turned his back to her again. “Mount up.”
She gripped his shoulders, which she could barely fit her fingers around. Her inner thighs, wound around his waist, felt every detail of him through the shapeless jersey fabric of her pants, right down to the holstered gun at his side and the studs on his pants. She was still weak and hollowed out from Greaves’ attack, but Miles ran faster than ever.
All she could do was hang on. Try not to disgrace herself.
Thaddeus Greaves surveyed the ruins of the dining room. Coffee carafe overturned. Fresh orange juice, hurled across the pristine white tablecloth. His ham steak, grilled to perfection, was stabbed through with multiple shards of window glass. Glass glittered in the bread basket, the fruit salad, the black truffle and mushroom omelet.
Had he not shielded himself telekinetically the instant he heard the gun, he too would be full of those shards. It had been a question of nanoseconds, or perhaps a touch of precognition. His telekinetic abilities could stop bullets, so he stood in the middle of the shattered window frame, in silent invitation. No bullet that came his way would ever reach him, but the muzzle flash would be a useful indicator of where the attacker was located, saving precious time.
The shooter did not take the bait. After a minute or so, Greaves walked down the stairs, to the sound of various other windows shattering. He stopped at the corridor on the first floor, startled by the still body and bloodied face of Briggs, a member of his personal security unit, sprawled across the corridor. Briggs was a telepath, quite a strong one. And even he had gotten no warning of the attack to come.
In the security center, Dexter lay moaning on the floor. Yeats was unconscious on the ground. Useless idiots. Not a peep from his current telepathic sentinel, either. His staff was worse than useless.
Anabel’s sprawled body downstairs was a distasteful sight, if not unexpected. He stepped carefully around the blood, not wanting to soil his loafers, and peered into the gaping door of Lara’s cell.
Only Hu lay inside, wheezing and whimpering.
Greaves ran upstairs and out onto the grounds, by now lit by floodlights. His remaining staff ran around, frantically trying to give the impression that they were doing their job. It was too late to maintain that fiction. But there would be time enough to express his displeasure later.
He sent his perceptions ranging. Wide and diffuse, like ripples in a pond. On, and on . . . approaching the edge of his range.
Yes. There she was. He’d savored Lara’s distinct flavor on that exciting telepathic ride through her inner dreamworld. Amazing power. So like Geoff’s. Such potential, if only she could be reasoned with.
It was just a matter of time, of course. He would be charming, patient, and eventually she would bend. And if he could unlock her shield . . . the thought elated him. She was the only person besides Geoff who had ever blocked him. If he could penetrate her shield, learn its secrets, perhaps he could breach Geoff’s, too.
And there was the element of her sexual appeal. Her mental and emotional signature was delicious. Subtle overtones, delicate aromas.
He would have Lara Kirk, and power over the future. The power to put things right, at his fingertips. Geoff, too. All his.
Lara seemed to be alone. There was no other mental signature near her, but she had to have gotten help, given the shooter, the broken, bleeding bodies of his staff. How had she coordinated such an escape from her isolated cell? She must have powers she had hidden. She’d seemed so beaten. He’d caught no whiff of hidden weapons, hatching plots. He clamped down on her, adding coercion to the mix.
She was so strong. Sweat broke out on his forehead. He laughed. It felt good, to use his mind as it was meant to be used. Like a rousing game of tennis. Finally, something real to push against.
There was a delicate balance to be found. He did not want to damage her beautiful, unusual brain, but she had to learn obedience. He had to be a little cruel to get his point across. He pushed harder . . .
And she winked out. As if she had never been there.
His eyes popped open. What? He groped, lunged, swept feelers where he had been before, then in every imaginable direction.
Nothing. Gone. Hiding behind that fucking shield of hers.
He pressed further. To the limits of his range, and beyond, straining, until his heart thudded. A red haze of rage before his eyes.
Minutes went by before he could identify it, but only vaguely. It was more like an absence than a presence. A dark spot, denser than nothing, like a cloak of invisibility.
He could barely locate it, let alone breach it.
But he could fish for the others. There was the shooter, and the one who had attacked his staff. He would troll for her team.
He lunged, swept, reached. It was a broad area, but he was highly motivated. Back and forth, around . . . nothing still . . . yes!
Unshielded, on the hillside opposite. Male. Moving quickly downhill. This was the sniper who had destroyed his windows, and spoiled his breakfast. Who might have killed or maimed him, but for his telekinetic shield. The sniper’s mind was surprisingly difficult to grasp. It was so fiercely focused on the job at hand, it was empty of all else, rendering it elusive and transparent. But Greaves got a grip on him.
The gunman struggled, in vain. Greaves pinned the man with part of his mind, and ranged further. He found another, then two more. One had a well-developed psi talent, limited training, and a strong shield, but nothing on the order of Lara’s. The other two were like the gunman. Raw, undeveloped talent, but no defenses. Not against him.
It felt good, as angry as he was, to clutch them all and squeeze.
10
It took focus to lope through rough, unfamiliar terrain in the dark with a traumatized girl on his back and evil goons who may or may not start shooting at them. Being hyper-conscious of her body touching him did not help. There was no time for this juvenile shit.
Get down, he scolded. Later for that. He needed every available red blood cell for the big head right now.
The slope was leveling off. They were approaching the riverbank. He smelled motor vehicles, exhaust, gas, rubber. Men. Her face was pressed against his shoulder. Her lips. As if she were kissing him.
It occurred to him that his bandwidth had been getting progressively bigger, ever since he’d started talking to her. Now, with her clinging to his back, his augmented senses did not feel freakish and painful at all. They felt right, like he’d grown to fit them. It felt appropriate, to see in the dark, to hear so acutely. The tidal wave of constant data didn’t jar him. And the smell of her hair, oh God—
Whoa. Keep your nose on the job.
The wide creekbed stretched out before him. He saw the dim outline of two vehicles in the trees, on the other side. One was his own.
Something was off, but he didn’t nail it down until the dark figure came into focus not far from the vehicles, sprawled on the tumbled boulders. It was Connor, clutching his head. Trying to crawl.
10 Fatal Strike Page 12