by Jade Kerrion
“Why…” Zara frowned. “The eighty-seven deaths in Barcelona seven weeks ago—it wasn’t a gas leak.”
“The Spanish government hushed it up, but you’re right. It wasn’t a gas leak. It was the final release of Cortez’s empathic power.” Alex shook his head. “It’s no surprise to you, I’m sure, to learn that Cortez and Faraji were both emotional train wrecks.”
“Alpha empaths usually are,” Zara agreed, no irony in her voice.
“They are rare, and their unchecked powers tend to get them killed as infants or young children. Few make it to adulthood, and those who do are inevitably scarred mentally and emotionally. In Danyael’s case, physically too. Their painful past fuels their empathic powers, and when they die, it…” Alex clasped his fingers together and then yanked them apart sharply. “It explodes out of them—escalating, amplifying, driving people to suicidal madness.”
Alex sighed. “Cortez’s death and the subsequent emotional meltdown weren’t contained quickly enough. It was a little better with Faraji. By then, we knew someone was targeting empaths, and two alpha telepaths always accompanied him, just in case.”
“And it came to pass.”
“They were able, for the most part, to telepathically contain Faraji’s empathic meltdown until his powers faded away. Only thirteen lives were lost that day. But if Danyael…” Alex’s grimace set up a resonating ache in his chest.
“If Danyael dies?”
“It all depends on where. Like Cortez and Faraji, Danyael’s a defense-class alpha. His powers can’t penetrate walls or physical structures. If he died in a fully enclosed room with no one present, it would be all right, but if he died out in the open in a crowded city like Washington, D.C., his empathic release would drive anyone with an unshielded mind or anyone not safe within an enclosed structure to suicide.”
“How far would his powers spread? A city block?”
“Ten miles, at least.”
“Ten miles? But that’s practically the whole of Washington, D.C.”
“And that’s the minimum expected range for Danyael. It could be a great deal farther. It would be a disaster beyond anything we’ve seen. Danyael is fully capable of it. You know what he did on July 4th.”
“They were terrorists. He single-handedly killed the Sakti terrorists who were attacking the city.”
“Yes, the key words being killed and single-handedly. Danyael is more powerful than both Cortez and Faraji, and in many ways, far more damaged. When he dies, the empathic backlash will be horrific. Our only chance at mitigating the damage is to contain his powers until they fade away. That’s why aid came so quickly when he was shot. In addition to the people you had protecting him, we assigned nine alpha telepaths to Danyael. They stalk him in overlapping eight-hour shifts. He is never truly alone.”
“And they never sensed the assassin either?”
Alex shook his head. “Nothing.”
“But Danyael did.”
“It…appears so.”
She turned away. Her gaze appeared fixed on the far wall, yet Alex, himself an alpha telepath, sensed her mental turmoil. Her voice, however, betrayed nothing. “Is Danyael in recovery yet?”
“Yes, he should be settled by now. I’ll take you up to his room.”
The well-equipped surgery and recovery rooms, located in a quiet and secured section of the Mutant Affairs Council building, had played host to Danyael Sabre far too many times. Zara was surprised Danyael’s name wasn’t permanently displayed on the door of the recovery room assigned to him.
No windows. A door that automatically slid shut within moments of opening. A room perfectly designed to contain an alpha empath’s power—should he die.
The lights in the room had been darkened but for a dim glow over the bed. The machines monitoring Danyael’s heart rate and blood pressure registered steady readings. Zara trailed her fingers along the steel bed frame—the seemingly languid motion belied the anxious swirl in the pit of her stomach—before reaching for the electronic tablet containing Danyael’s medical report.
She frowned as she studied the photograph of the extracted bullet. .338 Lapua Magnum. If that bullet had struck Danyael’s chest, it would have killed him. As it was, it shattered his right shoulder into bone splinters.
Many sniper rifles could fire that particular caliber, but she would bet on a H-S Precision Pro Series 2000 HTR, or possibly an IDF Barak. But why would the U.S. military or the Israeli military want to kill Danyael, or all empaths, for that matter? Killing mutants openly wasn’t on any government’s agenda. Governments had better ways to control alpha mutants and make use of them.
Why kill empaths?
Zara set the tablet aside and walked up to Danyael’s bed. She braced herself, but even so, it wasn’t enough to ward off the swarm of conflicted emotions. Anger. Guilt. Confusion. They spun like a compass set on a magnet, never pointing true north.
It didn’t matter, she supposed. There was lots of anger, guilt, and confusion to spread around.
Danyael stirred as if he had sensed her fluctuating emotions, but his eyes did not open. The machines beeped a warning at his accelerating heart rate and rising blood pressure. Zara shook her head as she swallowed the rueful laughter. I’m not good for you, Danyael, but we both already know that.
His face turned toward her, and his eyelashes fluttered open. His eyes narrowed, struggling to focus through the haze of painkillers. “Zara…”
She did not touch him. “What was out there?”
“I don’t know.”
“You sensed something.”
He nodded. “Not a psychic shield. Different.” The words dragged out of Danyael between slow, labored breaths. The bruised shadows under his dark eyes—the inevitable effect of exhaustion and sleep-deprivation—made him seem even more vulnerable than his most recent injuries warranted. His pale blond hair, cropped close to his skull, accentuated his symmetrical features and the slash of his cheekbones, sharpened by weight loss.
Danyael was in better shape than he had been at ADX Florence, the supermax prison in Colorado, but not by much. What little weight he had regained during his interlude with Elysium and then with the Mutant Assault Group, he was steadily losing.
Zara knew what he needed.
He needed to sleep, and he needed to eat, and he need time to do both without the nagging burden of laboring at the free clinic at less-than-minimum wage to pay his rent, loans, and bills.
He needed someone to take care of him.
And you think that someone is an assassin? Her mind mocked her.
Zara bit back the exasperated growl.
Danyael flinched, almost as if she’d struck him.
In a way, she had, and she knew it.
She had no psychic shields, and possessed neither the talent nor patience for emotional discretion. He was an alpha empath. It was the worst possible combination for any two people in close proximity.
Danyael’s jaw tensed. The muscles in his cheek twitched, and he looked away. His left hand curled into a fist, clenching tightly before slowly relaxing as he worked through the backlash of her uncensored emotions.
She waited until some of the tightness around his eyes eased. “What did you feel?”
“The psychic imprint was like a ghost. Flickering in and out…not quite there. It was so fleeting, so insubstantial, I wondered if I hadn’t imagined it.”
“And it was not a psychic shield.”
“Definitely not,” Danyael confirmed. “I know the difference.”
“Maybe one day you’ll explain it to me. And how do you feel?” She shifted her attention to his right shoulder, swathed in bandages.
“Luckily, it wasn’t my left shoulder, or I wouldn’t be able to walk.”
“So you intend to go around with a crutch for your left leg, and your right shoulder in a cast?” The mental picture was so ludicrous, she almost laughed.
“I intend to get out of here as soon as I can. I can’t afford charity from the Mutant Affairs
Council. The price is always higher than I can pay.”
And here she thought she had cornered the market on cynicism. “How are you going to take care of yourself?”
He met her eyes, and to her surprise, smiled without rancor. “I can manage. I’ll be all right.”
She did not doubt it. “Help me” simply did not exist in his vocabulary—not because he did not know how to ask, but because he had been trained not to expect an answer. Nevertheless, he kept going, fought on. She had never met anyone as stubborn on life as Danyael Sabre.
Always bet on Danyael.
“I doubt they’ll discharge you before noon,” she told him. “Your clinic will just have to get by without you for half a day. You’re safe here. Get some sleep.”
She knew his gaze followed her as she strode out of the hospital room.
Was he wondering why she was even here?
There was nothing simple about loving an alpha empath, especially not one she had betrayed multiple times and who had every reason to hate her. She could have asked him how he felt about her, but—not yet. Besides, whatever his reply, it wasn’t going to change her decision about him.
About us.
Zara drove to Anacostia. The predawn darkness in a crime-ridden neighborhood did not unnerve her any more than it scared Danyael. Not only could she shoot faster and straighter than anyone in Anacostia, she was also far more likely to shoot without provocation. Those who knew Danyael avoided her, and everyone in Anacostia knew Danyael.
The person who had shot Danyael was, without doubt, a stranger.
She stood at the street corner where Danyael had been shot. The blood he had spilled was invisible in the darkness, but she could smell it. No special senses or psychic powers required—just a hunter’s instinct for wounded prey. Zara turned, her gaze traveling over the facade of the building across the street and specifically, an open third-floor window. Jackson, like all the men she hired for Three Fates, were munitions experts. He could have been wrong about the source of the shot, but by only a yard or two either way.
Less than two hours had passed since Danyael had been shot.
The assassin’s still here.
She knew it for a fact. Hunters recognized the presence of other hunters, especially when they stalked the same prey.
Zara crossed the street to the mixed-used building. The first floor, occupied by a mini-mart and a pawnshop, had separate doors and windows that faced the main road. A locked door between the two stores led into the building. A quick twist of a lock pick secured her entry.
The solitary naked lightbulb did little to punch through deep pockets of shadow in the dingy gray corridor. Zara pulled out her Glock from its concealed holster and pressed close to the wall as she made her way to the stairwell. She paused outside each apartment door on the second floor. Most apartments were quiet. Within one of them, she heard a woman crying, a man shouting, glass breaking.
She continued on her way.
The air stank of sweat and cheap perfume. Dirt and cigarette ash blended with wads of spit-out chewing gum to layer the cement floor. From another apartment, the sound of husky laughter almost concealed the soft sobs of a child.
Zara moved on.
Still here. But where?
The third floor was as quiet as the second. The oppressive sense of being watched was even more acute. Was the assassin still within the apartment? Unlikely. Her men had checked, hadn’t they?
She paused outside the apartment door and tested the handle. It twisted without protest and the door swung in slowly. She flicked the switch; nothing happened. Moonlight ghosting in through the open window concealed more than it revealed. Close scrutiny betrayed thick layers of dust covering mismatched pieces of furniture, and the blur of footprints on the linoleum floor. Idiot, she mentally cursed Jackson for inadvertently destroying evidence. The problem with working with psychics was that they tended to ignore physical clues like—
She squatted to examine a boot print, scarcely larger than her own.
Damn it.
Zara walked to the open window.
Jackson was right about the source of the shot. The small patches of non-dust showed where the stock of the sniper rifle had rested. The assassin had a clear line of sight to where Danyael had been standing. If Danyael had not twisted away a fraction of a second before the trigger was pulled, the bullet would have drilled through his heart.
The Three Fates mercenaries and the Mutant Affairs Council telepaths skulking around Danyael had acted quickly. They had entered the building, searched the apartment, and found nothing.
Yet the small boot print had been turned to the right, toward the last apartment along that corridor.
The assassin could not be far away.
Zara strode down the corridor. To hell with social niceties. Standing to one side of the door, she fired a bullet into the lock.
In a perfectly timed retort, a flurry of bullets shredded the wooden door and pounded into the apartment across the hallway. Zara dropped into a roll. Prone against the concrete, she squeezed off a shot. A slender, hooded form darted from the shadows toward the window. The assassin leaped toward the window, turning in mid-motion to fire repeatedly at Zara.
The window shattered into a spray of glass. The assassin tumbled out.
Zara rushed to the window. Far below, the woman landed in a crouch and dashed into the darkness lining the road.
Zara launched out of the building, somersaulting in mid-air to land in a battle crouch. Glass fragments crunched beneath her boots. She straightened and sprinted in the direction the assassin had disappeared. Several hundred feet away, the metro station—despite several flickering lamps on its dirt-streaked facade—was a beacon in the darkness, casting light upon a running figure.
Zara raced after the assassin.
The woman leaped over the turnstile and slid down the escalator handrest, toward the deafening sound of the metro rumbling into the station. She cast a glance over her shoulder. Zara was closing the distance.
There was nowhere left to go—but forward.
The assassin sprinted toward the track. The glow of the lights from the incoming metro train framed her slender body as she leaped across the track. Then she was gone, concealed behind the train thundering into the station.
By the time the train passed through the station, the woman had vanished.
3
Zara strode into Alex’s office without even bothering to wave away the protests of Alex’s assistant. “I found her sniper rifle,” she announced. “IDF Barak.”
“Wait—” Alex rose to his feet. “You said…her?” He dismissed his flustered assistant and turned his full attention to Zara. “Where was she?”
“Hiding out in the apartment next door. Jackson’s losing his bonus for the year. He’s lucky to not lose his job or his life. My team is checking her gun for prints, but I doubt they’ll find anything. She was wearing gloves, and she knew what she was doing. She certainly made fools of the Three Fates and the Mutant Affairs Council.”
“Did you get a good look at her face?”
“No. Masked and hooded. About five-eight. Slim. Athletic. Jumped three floors without hurting herself and perfectly timed a leap across the metro tracks.”
Alex raised an eyebrow. “Possibly telekinetic?”
Zara matched him by arching her eyebrows. “I can do the same, and I’m not telekinetic. I just work out.”
“Why would she hang around the crime scene?”
“Because Danyael is stubborn and stupid enough to return to work—to walk down that same road several hours from now—and she’d have another shot at him.”
“Any clues as to who she is? What does the rifle tell you?”
“Israel Defense Forces, which in itself doesn’t mean a whole lot. There are enough stray weapons drifting around the world that it shouldn’t be too hard to get hold of a decommissioned rifle. My team will do their best to track it down, but I doubt you’ll be able to tie it to the Israeli
government.”
“Perhaps they’re going after Danyael as bait to draw you out. Have you irritated the Israeli government recently?”
“Not recently, but often enough. Using Danyael as bait is one way to draw me out, but why then kill the other empaths?”
Alex frowned. “You’re right. This is about Danyael—but not even him, specifically. It’ll be hard tracking down the assassin. People who act on principled grudges rather than personal ones are more difficult to identify.”
“And they won’t stop, which means that Danyael is in danger until the assassin is found.”
“We can keep him safe.”
“How?” Zara challenged. “By locking him up in the Mutant Affairs Council headquarters? He’s not going to sit and stay just because you’ve asked nicely. He doesn’t trust you.”
“It’s not safe for him out there, wherever he goes.”
Zara turned over Alex’s words in her mind. Her fingernails tapped against his oak desk. “I want you to release him into my custody.”
“He’s a class-five threat. We’re not releasing him into your—or anyone else’s—custody.”
“Danyael isn’t going to embark on a killing spree.”
“Not intentionally, no, but you know what can happen if he’s killed. He needs powerful alpha telepaths nearby to contain his powers until they fade away.”
“And how long can you afford to have those alpha telepaths out of commission while they babysit Danyael? It’s far more economical to hunt down the assassin killing those empaths.”
“And how do you propose to do that?”
“Bait.”
Awareness dawned; Alex’s jaw dropped. He half rose from his seat to glare at Zara. “Are you crazy? No, you can’t use Danyael as bait.”
“He’s the sole surviving alpha empath. That assassin’s job isn’t done until Danyael is dead. He is bait—regardless of whether he stays here or comes with me—and I’m your best chance of tracking down and killing that assassin.”
“You? Why?”
“Because I’m not psychic. I’m not handicapped by telepathic, telekinetic, precognitive, or empathic powers. I use two eyes, two ears, a nose, and my God-given talents for finding trouble. I’m the only person who can track down that psychic ghost of an assassin.”