DRAGON SECURITY: Volume 2: The Complete 6 Books Series

by Glenna Sinclair

  “It meant lots of travel. It meant living just below the radar. I thought ... I don’t know what I thought. I guess I was drawn to the spiritual side of it because it offered the sort of solace that religion might have provided if I didn’t feel like a damn hypocrite every time I walked into a church.”

  “You’re a thief and you feel guilty for it.”

  “No.” I reached up and pushed hair out of my face. “I’m a thief. A damn good thief, if I say so myself.” I glanced at him and caught a flash of amusement in his eyes. “But I don’t feel guilty for what I did.”

  “Then why the need for spiritual healing?”

  “I hate that I don’t feel guilty. I hate that my own family pushed me into this thing. I hate that when I was done, they wouldn’t let me go. And I hate that a part of me still wants to go back to that life that I found it easier than living a good, honest life.”

  Kasey was quiet for a moment, soaking that in. I stole another look at him and studied his handsome face—at least the parts that weren’t covered by the tilt of his head and the curtain of his long hair. He wasn’t looking at me. He was studying the floor, the wheels turning in his mind. When he did look up at me, there was no judgment in his eyes. Just a desire to know more.

  “Who is that man? Who stole from you? Who took Rosalie? And why?”

  “I don’t know why.” I sighed. “When I walked away from that life five years ago, there was a close-knit team. It was me and four guys, each of us with a special skill. I could open almost any kind of lock. I could crack a safe in ten seconds flat, and I could disarm almost any security system man could devise.

  One of my partners worked with computers to move money from one bank account to another. He never left the apartment where we had our base of operations. Another could get into any building, no matter what the security or how many men stood guard out front. Another was the getaway driver. He drove semi-pro racing and he could maneuver a car anywhere, through anything. And he could get away from the cops before the cops even knew what was happening.”

  “And the mastermind.”

  “Yeah, the mastermind.” I reached up and touched my nose. This didn’t feel too mastermind like. “He thought that, because the cops hadn’t even come close to catching us, we could keep going forever. I wanted to take my cut and disappear. I thought I could live in the Bahamas and pretend that none of it had ever happened. But he wouldn’t let that happen.”

  I stood up because the memory of it agitated me. How dare he tell me I couldn’t leave? I had no choice in joining the group in the first place. I was fifteen years old! I didn’t know any better. And when he told me that it was the only way for our family to survive, what was I going to do? Say no? But I was finally an adult and I wanted my own life. I wanted to survive on my own. And he wouldn’t let me.

  “I had to sneak away in the middle of the night. I had to change my name and hide. That’s why I chose the Society and this life. I needed a place to disappear.”

  “But someone found you.”

  “Yes.” I ran my fingers through my damp hair and lifted it off my neck, shaking it to relieve the heat that was suddenly building there. “Rosalie called me. I was in Phoenix investigating another sighting and she asked me to come here. She said she’d met someone and she wanted me to meet him. Rosalie and I had become friends and I was happy for her. She’d talked about her frustrations in the past and how her illness kept her from finding love. So this was big news. And then I got here and she introduced me to Jake and I knew it was all over.”

  “But you stayed.”

  “I wanted him to leave her out of it, but he refused. Then she disappeared and I couldn’t leave until I knew what happened to her. He’d gone, too, but I suspected he’d be back. And he was. Today.”

  “And today we found her body.”

  Tears burned in my eyes. “I can’t believe he would do that,” I admitted out loud to myself for the first time. “We did some bad things, but never anything like this. And the tattoos ...”

  “Did you ask him about her?”

  “I didn’t get a chance.”

  “You saw him. He came to you.”

  “He was convinced I was going to turn him in to the police. He beat me to shut me up.”

  “But he didn’t mention the fact that he’d just murdered your friend? That he tattooed her body and left her exposed in the woods?”

  Tears spilled from my eyes. “No.”

  “Then what makes you think he did this?”

  “Who else?”

  And that was the thing. That was the issue that couldn’t be overcome. There were no other strangers around, no one else Rosalie had allowed to grow close to her. No one she would have trusted to walk her out of that hotel room the way that man did. I saw the security footage. The man was the right height, the right build. I mean ... there was some difference in carriage, but he would know that I would look at the footage. Maybe he had consciously changed the way he moved and added the limp to throw me off.

  I shook my head, tears still falling.

  “I knew he was angry with me for leaving. I knew he wanted to hurt me. But I never imagined ...”

  “How well do you know him?”

  “Better than I know myself.”

  Kasey grabbed his clothes and began to dress quickly. Then he started shoving things into his bag, packing.

  “You’re leaving?”

  “We have to go find this guy.”

  “What?”

  “I can’t just walk away and leave you alone with this guy on the loose.”

  “He could be anywhere. He was here today, but—”

  “You have friends in common. You can find him.”

  I inclined my head slightly. “I can. But I don’t know if I want to.”

  “He found you once and knew enough about your life to get close to Rosalie. Do you really want to wait around and see what he does next?”

  I shook my head.

  Kasey grabbed my arm and led the way out of the room. He helped me into his rental car and took me back to the hotel. The manager was shocked to see the bruises on my face, her eyes wide and filled with concern as we walked up to the desk.

  “Can I ask a favor?” I said with a soft smile that made my sore nose ache.

  “Anything for you, Karma.”

  I glanced at Kasey. He encouraged me with a nod.

  “Could you tell me if the guy in 310 checked out?”

  “Jake? Yeah, he checked out about four hours ago.”

  That was about right. He must have checked out just after he left my room.

  We went upstairs to gather my things. I didn’t own a cellphone—it seemed to go against the whole communing with nature lifestyle I’d adopted. Instead, I had an answering service with which people could leave me messages. That’s how Rosalie had always gotten ahold of me. So I had to borrow Kasey’s phone as we raced out of town, dialing a number I thought I’d never have to call again.

  “Hi, James. It’s Erin.”

  Chapter 12

  Kasey

  Hearing her say her real name was surreal. It was like watching an actress I knew personally slipping into a new character. Even the tone of her voice was different.

  “No knows where he is. But he said he could track him.”

  “How long will that take?”

  “A couple of hours.”

  We drove to San Diego, taking refuge in the closest large city. Another hotel, this one a four star with room service. I hadn’t eaten in hours and the idea of having a steak brought to the room was just too much to resist.

  When I got back to Houston, I’d come up with an excuse for the expense on the Dragon card.

  Karma disappeared into the bathroom almost as soon as we walked through the door. I placed the order for room service and then tapped on the door, listening through the door to the sound of the bathtub filling with water.

  “You okay?”

  “You can come in,” she called.

&n
bsp; I stepped into the room and found her stretched out, her nakedness covered only by the water. Bruises had begun to purple along her ribs. There was a bruise I hadn’t noticed before on her throat. Her eyes were darker than they’d been just hours before.

  It hurt me to see the damage to her gorgeous body.

  “I just felt so dirty,” she explained.

  I sat on the edge of the tub after taking a wash rag from the stack by the sink. I wet it in and poured body wash from the little courtesy bottle, creating a nice lather before I lifted Karma’s foot out of the water and carefully began to wash her ankle and calf, loving the feel of her perfectly constructed leg.

  “That feels good,” she whispered.

  “It does.”

  She smiled even as her eyes slid closed, relaxing as I moved to her other leg, my hand slipping under the water to wash her thighs, her lower belly. I added more body wash before moving on to her ribs and her breasts, loving the way her perky nipples stood up straighter at my touch. She slid below the water as I moved further up, wetting her impossibly long hair. Then she sat up and let me wash it with the hotel’s shampoo brand, my fingers working her scalp until she was moaning with pleasure. I might have climbed into the water with her, clothes and all, if the room service waiter hadn’t chosen that moment to knock on the door.

  “Food,” I said.

  “Hmmm,” was all she had to say.

  I dried my hands and closed the door before letting the waiter in. He was polite and careful not to look around too much—not that there was much for him to see. As soon as he was gone, Karma came out of the bathroom, her sweet-smelling body wrapped in the heavy cotton robe she’d found hanging from the hook on the door.

  She sighed when she saw the food, taking a deep breath of the aromas wafting up from the steak and potatoes, the bruschetta and the fried mushrooms.

  “I didn’t know what you’d want ... you’re not vegan, are you?”

  “No,” she said with a little laugh. “Not this week.”

  We settled on the bed, the plates in our laps, eating like we hadn’t eaten in years. She leaned over and fed me a piece of the cheese and tomato covered bruschetta, the garlic almost overwhelming. I slipped a piece of mushroom into her mouth, loving the way she licked my finger as I pulled back.

  “Why paranormal?”

  She shrugged. “It’s really not as crazy as it sounds.”

  “No?”

  “The whole aura thing? That’s real. You’d be surprised how many people actually fit what they say about the colors of the aura.”

  “You can really see them?”

  “Of course.” She looked up at me, her eyes moving around my head. “Yours is beautiful.”

  I cocked my head slightly. “You don’t actually—”

  “I do. It’s a lovely, clear red. Full of power and charm and sexual prowess.”

  I laughed. “I’m sure.”

  “You don’t have to believe in it to believe me.”

  “What about the rest of it? Do you really believe in it all?”

  She shrugged. “I believe that the people who travel the country and look for evidence really believe it. And if they believe, why shouldn’t I?”

  “But if you believe too easily, you’ll believe anything.”

  “I’m not gullible, if that’s what you’re suggesting. I’m just ... we all need to believe in something.”

  “Do you believe aliens impregnate human women? Or that they come down here to do experiments on us?”

  “I think some people believe that. I’ve never seen evidence of it. In fact, I’ve done this for five years and seen very little evidence of much of anything. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t some proof to what people say.” She picked up a piece of meat and picked at it. “I believe there are things we cannot see, things working behind the scenes that explain the unexplainable. I believe there is a spiritual side to the human soul that people often do not embrace the way they should. And I believe Goddess is looking out for all of us in her own way.”

  “Goddess?”

  “Assuming God is a man is egotistical. I believe that He or She is all knowing and all powerful, and that He or She transcends gender. So I refer to He or She as Goddess just to give equal time to both genders.”

  I smiled, wondering what my fiercely Baptist grandmother would think of that.

  “What else do you believe?”

  She bit into her piece of meat, thinking as she chewed on it.

  “I believe that you should be open to new experiences, that there is basic good in all human beings, and that we need to be kinder to one another. I believe that no matter how much damage we might have done in our past, it’s possible to find forgiveness.”

  “What do you need to be forgiven for?”

  She was quiet for a long moment, a sadness pressing down on her shoulders.

  “My grandfather owned a large corporation with many smaller businesses beneath one large umbrella. When I was a kid, I was taught that he was evil and that all the money being filtered in and out of those businesses was rightfully my family’s. But after we started taking what my mom and brother thought was ours, I began to hear things that made it pretty clear that the things we were doing were not victimless crimes.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “People who worked years and years at those jobs were losing their pension and getting fired. People were losing their health and life insurance. There was a trickle-down effect, hurting people worse off than we were. Yet my grandfather and his illegitimate son were completely unharmed by what we were doing. They were surrounded by a bubble made up of the working class people who took the fall for our actions.” She sighed, real pain in the sound. “It wasn’t right.”

  “Is that why you stopped?”

  “Partly.”

  “And this?” I gestured at the bruises and her battered nose. “Is this part of it, too?”

  “This is nothing new in my world.”

  “I kind of thought so.”

  “My brother ... he has a temper. And when I don’t do what he thinks I should, this is what happens.”

  “How often?”

  She shook her head. “I’ve put all that behind me.”

  “It doesn’t look like it’s behind you.”

  She snorted, tears filling her eyes. “I guess this just shows that you can’t outrun karma.”

  I laughed and, after a moment, she began to laugh, too.

  I climbed off the bed and gathered the dishes, setting them back on the tray in some sort of order. Then I undressed and crawled onto the bed, gathering Karma in my arms and tugging the bedclothes up over us. She sighed as she rested her head on my chest.

  “I want to kill him,” I confessed into the silence that hung over us.

  “No, you don’t. You just want to lash out for what he did.”

  “I’m pretty sure I want to kill him.”

  She sighed against me, her warm breath washing over me like a caress.

  “I don’t even know you,” I said. “I grew up hearing my grandmother, my mom, and my aunts talk about your family, about the saga going on between your father and grandfather. But I don’t know you. Yet I feel like I’ve known you for all my life.”

  “Soulmates.” I could feel her smile pressed against my skin. “I’ve always believed, deep down, that everyone has someone out there that they’re supposed to find, someone who will make their lives make sense and make them feel whole. But I’m not sure I really believed it until now.”

  “The lady who chases after aliens isn’t sure she believes in soulmates?”

  “Do you?”

  She propped herself up on my chest and looked me in the eye. I found it oddly reassuring to look into the depths of those lovely eyes.

  My mom used to talk about soulmates. She would tell me stories about my dad that I was always convinced were embellished because she wanted me to idolize him. But as I looked at Karma and lost myself in the blue depths of her eyes, I found
myself wanting to believe every damn word my mother ever spoke about my father.

  I brushed a piece of hair back from her face. “Yes.”

  She bit her bottom lip. “The hard, tough, former military guy believes in soulmates? This really is a surreal life.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. “What makes you think I’m so tough?”

  She ran her finger along the line of one, then two, then three of the tattoos on my chest.

  “Anyone who could sit still for all this must be tough. And this ...” She touched a tattoo on my shoulder, the emblem of the Navy SEALs. “I’ve seen it a few times. The SEALs, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And this ...” She touched another tattoo, one on my chest. It was a group of numbers. “This is the date of the helicopter crash in Afghanistan, the one that killed seventeen Navy SEALs.”

  “Four of them were friends,” I said softly, picking up her hand and kissing her palm lightly, trying not to let my thoughts go there. It was a dark place for me.

  “And this?” she asked, touching a monogram tattooed above my heart.

  “My mother.”

  “And this?” she asked, touching another and another and another, forcing me to explain each and every tattoo on my body. And I did, patiently, enjoying her reaction to these little snippets into my past.

  She was amused that I’d marked my body with a tiger which made me think of my grandmother, a heart that represented my aunts, and a sports emblem that represented a buddy lost overseas. She began to kiss them as I explained each one, her lips brushing softly over my inked flesh. It grew difficult for me to pay attention to her questions, to answer her with a voice that wasn’t breathless from an intense need that should have been satisfied long ago, but wasn’t.

  I pulled her to me, capturing her mouth with the same heat that had possessed our first kiss. And she responded just as passionately, her tongue coming into me before I could invade her. I slid my hands under her robe, my mouth sliding away from hers and over her chin, pressing against her throat, feeling the race of her pulse. Her need made mine build to almost unbearable levels, the idea that I could excite her this way almost an overwhelming understanding.

  I was about to flip her onto her back, almost ready to fill her in every way I could, when my cellphone rang.