“Then why did you lie to her in the first place?”
Another shrug. “As I said, I needed objectivity. Let’s just say that given your involvement with the woman, I wasn’t certain I’d get it. I didn’t set out to deceive Ms. Pembroke, however. But when she misheard—”
“You took advantage of the situation. Of her.”
The former Dare could understand, though barely. The latter, however, pissed him off. Completely. Nevertheless, now was not the time to take this man to task over either, because the lady in question had stirred a second time and this time she was beginning to wake. Unfortunately, the same horizontal buffer of photos that helped him sleep at night by dulling the latent emotions of the surrounding high-rise dwellers prevented him from knowing just how awake Abby was now. Was she lying on his bed, acclimating herself as she was wont to do most mornings? Or was she heading for his bathroom to splash off the effects of her deep sleep and the morning’s exertions before heading out here?
Relief flooded Dare as he caught the sound of his shower starting. He’d earned a five-or ten-minute reprieve at least. “All right, Agent Brooks. You’re here now—as yourself. What the hell, we both need answers. I go first. I’d like you to identify a few of the other players.” Starting with that knife-wielding bastard. “Who stabbed Van Heusen’s driver?”
Brooks shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Then what do you know?”
The man’s lips thinned. “A hell of a lot less than I’d like.”
“Then why waste time stopping by? You could have just punched in the number I left on your voice mail and played twenty questions over the phone.”
Dare stiffened as something flickered in the man’s stare, as well as in the portion of his aura bleeding around the frame. Brooks might not know as much as he’d like, but he knew something. Something he wasn’t anxious to reveal because he wasn’t sure the information would be welcome.
He who seeks to destroy your heart also seeks you.
Dare stiffened as the rest locked in. The glasses they’d used to consume the cognac. Two glasses. Glasses Brooks had taken. Unlike the NYPD, the FBI now had access to both Abby’s DNA and his, as well as to top-notch genetics labs. And genetics was a topic Brooks himself had initially broached. That had to be significant. Like Pike, Dare had assumed that thug had been lying in wait for Abby outside A very Fisher Hall.
But what if the bastard hadn’t been after her?
What if that thug had followed him to the concert?
“The DNA in that syringe—was Pike wrong?”
Hell, for all he knew, Pike had lied to make his case. It wouldn’t have been the first time.
Brooks shifted his grip on the Everest frame, resting his hands atop it, drumming his fingers along the brass edge almost as an afterthought—or was it? Either way, the glass cover was still positioned directly between them, still obscuring the majority of the agent’s aura. “No, the DNA in that syringe matches the blood she left on that cop’s handkerchief. I also ran samples off both those glasses against the syringe. Hers matched, yours didn’t.”
The whisper of aura bleeding over the top of the frame confirmed it. But it still didn’t make sense. Why would anyone want to blackmail Abby? Dare spun around and stalked the length of his living room to stare out of the French doors that connected this side of the penthouse with the wraparound balcony. He spun back around as Brooks turned. The man appeared to be absently shifting the oversized frame along with his body in an effort to maintain eye contact. But for a split second, the man was completely exposed.
The truth punched in.
Dare cursed. “You know why they want her.”
By the time the agent’s dark brow shot up, the frame was firmly in place—and the impression was gone.
“Now how could you possibly—”
“Cut the crap, Brooks. I know you’ve got an ulterior motive for showing up here. One that has nothing to do with your case. You want proof, want to check out your entourage—or lack thereof. We both know that if you were here in an official capacity, you’d have some NYPD dick in tow, just to make sure you weren’t stepping on anyone’s jurisdictional toes. You don’t. Ten to one your Feebee boss has no idea you’re in my home, either.” A home that due to his own recent pacing—and the new, relative position of those glass-covered pictures—Dare could no longer clearly pinpoint Abby within. But he could still hear the shower. Dare kept going. “As I see it you have a choice. You have exactly two seconds to explain why you’re here or—armed or not—I’ll drag you through those doors by your ankles, hang you over the side of my balcony and shake it out of you.”
The razor edge returned to the man’s stare. “You really think you could take me?”
“Are you willing to take the chance?”
The most unexpected of emotions simmered around the edges of the Everest frame as Dare waited.
Amusement.
A moment later it faded. Seriousness returned as Brooks nodded. “I’m pretty sure they want Ms. Pembroke, if only to eliminate a potential witness. But initially I think they only wanted her because they needed her to get to you.”
His shock must have shown.
Either that or Brooks was as skilled at reading emotion as he usually was, because the agent offered up a wry smile. “It’s not as hard a leap as you think, Sabura. She’s got nothing the man I’m after wants. You, on the other hand, are a different story. Unfortunately, you’re also a near-total recluse. One who guards his personal space so zealously that even your own doorman doesn’t remember ever shaking your hand. On those rare occasions when you do appear in public, you show up late and leave early, to the point of rudeness. You live alone, you dine alone. Hell, you even climb alone. You have no friends to speak of. Your adoptive mother died when you were a teenager. Despite your recent visit to your adoptive father’s town house, you’re completely estranged from him, too. You don’t even socialize with your associate, Charlotte Dennison. In fact in the forty-eight hours I’ve been investigating you—which is usually enough for me to uncover a man’s entire life, mind you—I’ve been able to identify a grand total of one person on this earth you’ve let inside your world.”
“Abby.”
Brooks nodded. “Abby.”
It was true then, because of him, the woman he loved had nearly been killed. Twice. “Who’s after me? What the hell does he want?” More important, if he gave it, would that knife-wielding thug leave Abby alone? Unfortunately, Dare already knew the answer. He didn’t need to attend the FBI academy to know Abby was now firmly in that bastard’s crosshairs. He’d told her so himself just last night.
Dare cursed—darkly.
Brooks nodded. “It’s worse than you think. The guy behind the designer drug is a major black-market player. His home base is in Europe. Recently, however, he began a stateside expansion in the regular illegal drug markets, presumably to finance the research on his designer, one-shot, one-hook narcotic. He goes by the name Titan. Ever heard of him?”
“No.” But Dare wished he had.
Brooks shifted his grip on the Everest photo, withdrawing a square of paper from his suit pocket with his free hand. He passed it over the top of the frame. Dare accepted the paper and opened it. Someone had drawn a charcoal sketch of a guy in his mid-fifties on the sheet. His face was slender, though not overly so. Definitely refined. Genteel. The man’s close-cropped hair was sleek, though it had heavy silvering, as did his goatee. His eyes, cheeks and mouth were the most intriguing elements, though, because they were faintly Italian. Unfortunately, none struck a chord.
Dare memorized the man’s face, then passed the sketch back. “Sorry, I haven’t seen him.”
He didn’t need his intermittent sense to feel Brooks’s disappointment. The man’s deep frown revealed it for him. The agent sighed as he drummed his fingers atop the frame. “Can’t say I’m surprised. If I’ve learned one thing in the three years I’ve been tracking the bastard, it’s that Titan doesn�
�t like to reveal himself until it’s too late.”
Dare stepped forward. “That’s it? You’ve been tracking the man for three years and all you have is a half-assed sketch and a one-word moniker?” Bull. He knew the agent was withholding something. If he had to drive the man into the wall to get it out of him, he would.
A split second later Brooks released it. It came in the form of a wave of pure unadulterated rage, searing around the edges of the glass—but the agent’s fury wasn’t directed at Dare. Before Dare could gain so much as an impression of who it might be focused on, the rage was gone.
No, make that contained. Completely.
The thin twist of lips Brooks offered was constructed of the same steel as the lid he’d slammed over the top. “No, I don’t have more on the bastard. I wish to God I did. I do know Titan doesn’t want money. Not from you. What he wants is you.”
Dread punched into Dare’s gut as the agent dropped his gaze—slowly, deliberately. By the time the man’s pointed stare settled on the sheet of glass still forging the emotional buffer between them, Dare’s heart had kicked into over-drive, sending a torrent of blood pounding through his veins. Adrenaline came with it. A dull roar filled his ears as the certainty pounded in. The placing of that frame was no absentminded accident. Brooks knew what glass did to him.
But did that mean the man believed? Pike hadn’t. The detective still didn’t. Not really. But that didn’t mean Pike wasn’t careful to keep his distance. Dare knew why. Years ago, when he’d been begging the cops to prevent Janet’s murder, he’d spilled the extent of his curse to the guy’s mentor. In his adolescent desperation, he’d even confessed that sometimes, if the connection was strong enough and the other person was subconsciously accepting enough, he could suggest things, much as he’d done earlier with Abby. His futile hope had been that if the cops got him there in time, he could convince Randall—
Abby!
Good God, he’d been so consumed with Brooks, he’d forgotten she was in the other room. Was she still in the shower? Was that why he couldn’t get a fix on her essence? Or had she finished bathing, noticed he had a guest and decided to wait on the balcony? Maybe it was the jolt of adrenaline surging through his veins, affecting him more than he’d hoped.
Dare forced his heart rate to slow long enough to ease the roar of blood in his ears. Relief swamped him as he caught the faint sound of running water, until he glanced at his watch. Surely Abby had finished by now—
“Well?”
He snapped his stare to Brooks. The man was still waiting. Watching. And to Dare’s utter shock, there was another impression swirling around the edges of that frame.
Brooks believed.
“You are an empath, aren’t you? You can sense the emotions of those around you.”
The shock still rocketing through him, Dare nodded.
“Do you have limits? Other than the glass, I mean?”
Again he nodded, this time numbly. “Distance lessens the effect. Though in a city like this, there’s always a latent crush. Touch strengthens it. But as you read in that report, it depends on the person I’m touching.”
This time Brooks nodded.
Still, how had the man known about the glass in the first place? Was Brooks an empath, too? That would explain how—
“No,” Brooks replied to the unspoken question. “I’m just good at my job. As for what you’re feeling now, it’s all over your face, Sabura. If you know how to find it. Changes in pupil size, subtle but visible pulse points, skin tone. As for the distance limits, I figured that out on my own once I realized you really weren’t doing a thing with the empty apartments below but for the occasional emergency guest, so to speak.”
Dare swallowed his comeback on that one. It was enough that Brooks had chosen to overlook his career. The agent was right. Some of the means he used to accomplish his goals were questionable. “What about the glass?”
Brooks nodded. “Hmm. The glass. That one did take a bit of digging. It’s all there, though. Starting with the contractor’s receipts. The remodeling specs are still on file with the city from when you applied for your permit. You have to admit that eight-foot-wide hexagonal shower of yours was a hell of an expenditure, even for a man of your means. More telling, though, is that it’s a damned luxurious item for a man who’s clearly not into—” Brooks lifted his right hand and swept it about the spartan room “—creature comforts. Let’s just say the suspicion was planted at the building inspector’s office. Then I show up here and find all these pretty pictures. Or are they just an excuse for more glass?”
It was all true.
Brilliant deductive work, too.
Unfortunately, Dare wasn’t the only one who’d heard the blow-by-blow account. The adrenaline surging through his veins had finally cleared enough for him to get not only a decent read on Abby, but a crystal-clear one. Dare turned his back on Brooks as Abby stepped all the way into the living room. She was still dressed in the blue tank-top and short set she’d worn that morning, and though her curls were loose and flowing down her back, they were still bone-dry, even around her temples. Her cheeks were still smeared with the dry sweat and dirt of her climb. She must have been standing directly behind one of those pictures. From the look in her eyes—the shock, confusion and horror reverberating through her heart—she’d been there the entire time.
He reached for her. “Abby—”
She flinched. “Don’t. Please. Don’t touch me.” Anger crowded into her eyes and into her soul as she stared up at him. “These past two weeks, that whisper I’ve been hearing in my head, the feelings and persuasion that weren’t really mine, the ones I was afraid meant I was going nuts…that was you, wasn’t it? Somehow. Inside me.”
“Yes.”
Betrayal joined the mix, quickly overtaking her fury. “You made me feel things I didn’t want to feel?”
He shook his head. “No. I swear. Abby, I can’t make you feel what’s not already there. I can only bring out the emotions that are—”
“Stop! You’re doing it now, aren’t you?”
Damn. He was.
Though not the way she thought.
It took more effort than he’d cared to admit, but he managed to pull his essence back into himself. To not share it, much less commingle it with hers as he’d begun to do without thinking. Maybe that was part of the mating ritual for men like him. He didn’t know. He’d never mated before. Not really. Not with his heart. Whatever the reason, Abby clearly didn’t want him inside her. That he could still feel from the outside.
“Abby, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you. And I certainly never meant to hurt you. All I wanted to do was help ease your fears. Your pain. But it—I—went too far.”
He’d also said too much.
At least in front of their now-rapt audience. Or perhaps she was simply too smart, because she figured out the rest.
“What about my brother? Did you help Brian, too? Is that why he can’t even remember me?”
“Yes. I did help him that night. But I screwed up. Brian was too traumatized by the attack. He wanted to forget too much.” Her soft gasp sharpened his perception of her pain.
His own, too.
“Are you saying Brian doesn’t want to remember m-me?”
“No. The memory loss is connected to the attack, but it’s connected to your father’s death, as well. He’s still not ready to accept either. You just got lost in his needs.”
She nodded slowly, as if she was desperately trying to hold herself together. Which she was. “And when will my brother be ready to remember? When will he remember me?”
“Honey, I don’t know. I wish I did.”
“But you at least know he will.”
He didn’t answer. He couldn’t.
It didn’t matter. She’d read his heart this time. She drew her air in again, slower this time. “I see.” The ache within his chest cut even deeper as she murmured something about heading back into his bathroom to turn off his shower. Then
she needed to leave. It was time for her to head to her apartment and call her brother…from Europe.
No, don’t bother accompanying her. He had a guest. Besides, she wanted to be alone.
Completely alone.
But as she turned and headed into his bedroom, around that damned row of makeshift glass, he was the one who was alone. Again. At that moment he’d have given everything he had to rid himself of the curse. To be the man she wanted. The man she needed. But he couldn’t.
God knew he’d tried.
Dare turned back to Brooks as the shower ceased, felt the compassion bleeding out around that damned frame. Normal human compassion. There was no way Brooks was an empath, because his own pain didn’t lessen. Not even a bit. But at least he’d finally figured out why Brooks had been shielding himself. Like Abby, the man was deathly afraid he would alter his perceptions before he had a chance to decide if they were his own. It seemed that neither of them were willing to believe that he couldn’t bend someone against his will.
It was ironic.
They were both willing to accept that he was a freak of nature, but neither wanted to accept that he wasn’t a magician.
At least he could give Brooks what he needed. It had to be what the agent had been waiting for. Why not? One of them deserved to be content. Dare crossed his living room, stopping within inches of the rear of that oversized frame, giving Brooks an up-close, unobstructed view of his pupils and whatever else the man needed to evaluate his heart. Only then did he voice what every cop—federal or not—needed to hear and judge for himself. “I did not kill Janet Randall.”
Brooks studied him for what seemed like an eternity. And then he nodded.
Accepted.
Once again, Brooks turned with that damned picture in hand, but this time he set it on the floor against the wall. He turned back and extended his hand. “Liam Brooks. It’s nice to meet you finally, Dare, to be able to expose myself in more ways than one, so to speak.” The man cracked a genuine grin for the first time since he’d stepped into the apartment.
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