The Lost Soldier

by Jen Talty

  Every time Scottie had brought up Chad’s psychic powers, his body tensed, but he didn’t argue. He didn’t deny his talents, nor did he call her a freak, liar, or any other thing he’d accused her of in the past.

  But the bitterness he projected in his silence said it all.

  The barely paved road weaved through the jungle on the outskirts of Seoul, heading north toward Paju, where they’d be stationed until they could pinpoint the location of the missing team and bring the men home. The further they got from the city, the thicker the brush and the bigger the bugs. Growing up, she’d loved the outdoors, but she’d never seen insects the size of her hand.

  An hour into their journey, she could no longer take the silence.

  “You look good,” she said, rolling her eyes. What a lame comment. Not even a very good icebreaker. Her parents always told her to lead with a question when starting a conversation.

  “So do you.” He turned his head. “How’s the shoulder?”

  “It aches.” She rubbed the muscle near where the bullet had torn through the outside of her shoulder, tearing through her skin. It was more of a graze than a wound, but it hurt none-the-less. “The glue stuff the medics put on it seems to be holding it together.”

  “You’re lucky the bullet didn’t do any real damage.”

  She nodded, glancing out the window, the sun still high in the sky. Small talk was just as bad, if not worse, than the deafening silence. Only she had no idea what to say. Their love affair had lasted only a few months, but it had been filled with intense heat and passion. Deep down, she knew Chad to be kind, loving, sweet, even though his rough exterior projected a bad-ass military man with a chip on his shoulder. He’d kept her at an arm’s length the entire time. At first, she thought maybe another woman had hurt him, or that he just didn’t give his heart freely. But as their desire deepened, she realized he blocked his powers and was afraid of hers.

  “How’d you get tangled up in all this?” he asked.

  “I was used by the North Koreans to find a missing kid, who was really an operative. I came across the SEAL team when I went looking for the kid. Once I was kidnapped, I realized I was being used to get a location on the team. I tried to keep the team safe, but obviously, I failed.”

  “You didn’t. I did,” Chad admitted, taking a turn onto a pebbled road. According to their GPS, they were a few miles from the remote cabin. “They were my responsibility, and I lost them.”

  Instinctively, she reached out, curling her fingers around his strong biceps. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but they homed in on my remote viewing abilities, tapping into my view, and I think I ended up leading them right to the team.”

  He glanced in her direction with an arched brow. “If I believe that, I have to believe that you can project your mind to places far away and all the rest of it, and I don’t.”

  “You’re here, working on this special project that is all about psychic abilities, and you’re going to tell me you don’t even think it’s possible?” Pushing his buttons had never gone well in the past. It only served to make him defensive, angry, and closed off. “After everything that has happened in the last couple of days, you’re going to continue to ignore what is staring you in the face?”

  “I’ve been ordered to be here, with you; if I refused, I’d be court-martialed.”

  “That’s the only reason you’re doing this?”

  The Chad she remembered questioned authority, though always respectfully. He loved the military. Loved serving his country. However, he didn’t give blind orders, nor did he follow them. He’d gotten where he had in his career because he thought and walked outside the box. He took risks. Challenged the status quo.

  But he never once accepted the idea that physics were an integral part of his world both personally, and professionally.

  “I have a bad feeling that most of my men are dead or dying,” he said flatly as he pulled the Jeep in front of a small cabin. “When I close my eyes at night, I can hear the thumping of a faint heartbeat. I don’t know if it’s just one, or many, but I need to find whoever is still alive out there and make sure we bring them home.” He rammed the gearshift into park, shifting in his seat, stealing her gaze. “I’m not saying that I believe entirely that this psychic shit can help save whoever is out there, but I’m accepting that right now, it’s all I have to work with, and I’ll do anything to get as many of my men back as possible.”

  “Fair enough,” she managed.

  His eyes held a world of pain and suffering behind the blue-grey swirl of his irises. They were also a gateway into his lonely soul. A man who pushed everything and everyone away.

  But why?

  She wanted to palm his cheek, drawing him close, kissing his soft lips. The need to love him and hold him was so deep, it chilled her bones.

  “Let’s get to work.” She jumped from the Jeep, sprinting toward the door of a wood cabin that had seen better days with its faded and probably rotted wood exterior, and some kind of grass for a roof. She looked up, thankful to see power lines. They’d passed a small village about five miles down the road, so hopefully they also had hot water.

  She needed a shower, a change of clothes, and a strong cup of coffee before she started working with Chad. Developing dormant skills wasn’t as simple as pulling the top off a bottle and letting the liquid spill out. Psychic powers needed to be cultivated; it had taken her years to master hers, and she was still learning.

  Grabbing the door, she tried to push it back. “It’s locked.”

  “No shit.” Chad stepped next to her, a rucksack in his one hand, keys in the other. “Scottie had this place set up this morning for us, filled with comms equipment, computer, STATphone, food, and other supplies.”

  “Did he happen to supply us with shampoo, deodorant, and a change of clothes?”

  “I hope so, you smell.” He pushed open the door, waving his hand in front. “Ladies first.”

  She narrowed her eyes, but stepped into the cabin, stubbing her toe on the uneven floorboard. A couple of folding chairs were placed in front of a folding table that had all sorts of military equipment displayed, ready to be fired up and used. On the far side of the main room, a beat-up, old sofa and matching chair with a couple of end tables were perched over a rust-colored rug, which she couldn’t decide if the shade of brownish-gold was dirt or the original color.

  She opted for the former.

  A makeshift kitchen with a half-fridge and a gas burner that she’d seen people take on camping trips lined the back of the cabin next to the table. Next to the kitchen were two doors. One door was closed, but through the open doorway she could see a sagging bed with a couple of sleeping bags tossed on top.

  “I’ve seen worse,” she muttered, knowing she’d never seen anything this bad before in her life.

  “Hopefully we won’t be here too long.” Chad tossed the rucksack on the sofa, before making his way to the closed door. He pulled it open, exposing a dirty toilet and a tub and shower combo with no curtain. He reached in and pulled the lever on the tub. Water spit out between bursts of air. “Might take a minute. Looks like there are fresh towels in here and some soap.”

  “Clean towels?”

  “As clean as we’re gonna get out here,” he said, stepping back into the main room. “Go ahead and shower. There are clothes in the rucksack, and I’ll power up our equipment and see if I can find us some coffee.”

  She leaned against the wall, hands folded across her body. “How did you know I wanted a shower and coffee?”

  “I want a shower and coffee. It’s been a long forty-eight hours. I just assumed you’d want one too.”

  She shook her head. “You knew it because you can read my thoughts.”

  “That’s absurd, not to mention invasive.”

  “No shit. I can’t stand anyone who can read minds. Totally freaks me out to have anyone inside my head, poking around, so I’d appreciate if you didn’t do it again.”

  “Right, becaus
e what you do is any less disturbing when you follow someone around with your mind, watching everything that they do, making nothing private,” he said with an arched brow, daring her to push back.

  “You just admitted you believe in what I can do.”

  He shook his head. “I was being sarcastic.”

  “No. You weren’t. It bothered you last summer that my mind followed you. You felt me there, with you, the entire time and that scared you. Not so much because of what I could do, but because of the world it opened. If you accepted that I saw everything you saw, you’d have to admit you saw my presence there with you. Just like you saw my sister’s boyfriend, Brett, the other day when he remote viewed you, stealing your knife.” She opted to leave out the idea of the Collective Order and that Brett was one of his quadruplet brothers. Why bombard the guy with everything at once?

  “You’re only right about one thing.” He closed the gap between them, pressing his large hands against the wall on either side of her face. His lips inches from hers. His gaze burning her skin.

  She swallowed. “And what is that?”

  “You scare the shit out of me.”

  Chapter 2

  CHAD TILTED HIS HEAD, licking his lips, inching closer.

  Savanah’s chest heaved forward, pressing her warm, soft breasts against his hard torso. She didn’t blink, nor did she say a word.

  “Everything about you terrifies me,” he whispered.

  Ever since the day Savanah had nailed Chad where it counts with a candle, walking out of his life, he’d been God-awful miserable. Nothing in his life made sense anymore. He hated everything and everyone.

  But finding her and begging her for forgiveness meant he had to accept that he was indeed a psychic, and he hadn’t been ready to do that.

  Didn’t think he’d ever be ready.

  Until Brett Radcliffe showed himself in a remote view. The cloudy vision, much like the light that filtered through the darkness from an old movie project onto the screen with its tiny particles, floated across the room, and Chad watched Brett take the knife off the desk. The metal object went from its solid form in one plane, to a foggy version of itself in Brett’s reality.

  It wasn’t just being able to see Brett when his body had been miles and miles away, but it was the real sense, deep in Chad’s gut, slicing him to his core, that he not only knew Brett, but they shared a common bond.

  The kind of connection he had with his brothers in arms.

  Times one hundred.

  Immediately upon seeing Brett in person, a vision-like dream played out inside his mind where Savanah, along with her three sisters, Hazel, Willow, and Alexis, were seated at a large table. Brett sat next to Hazel, while he was nestled between Savanah and Willow. Two other men also joined them at the table.

  Both he recognized, though he didn’t know either man well.

  One of them, Hunter Knight, was the demo man for the missing SEAL team. Chad had first met him two weeks after he’d let Savanah walk out of his life. Hunter’s team had just been assigned to Chad’s command and were prepping for a tour in South Korea. A couple of weeks ago, the team had gotten word about a group of unfriendlies crossing the border from the north to the south. That’s when Chad had lost contact.

  “You don’t fear me,” Savanah said, resting her hands on his shoulders, her fingers curling around the sides of his neck. “Your powers are strong, and you’ve never had anyone to help you develop them. The anxiety that must cause—”

  He melded his mouth against hers in a soft, tender dance they’d done a million times. His tongue searching and exploring her sweet nectar. Everything about Savanah turned him on. He tore his lips from hers, taking a step back. “I’m not anxious about being intuitive.”

  She cocked her head, the right side of her mouth tipping upward. “Intuitive? Okay. We can start with that.”

  “I often have to rely on my intuition when working in the field, making split-second decisions that could save or take a life. I have trepidation using that over other resources. We can’t save someone miles away unless we have boots on the ground, and even then, it might be too late.”

  “Our gifts can’t save or protect everyone, but they can make a difference.”

  He turned his back, running a hand through his nearly buzzed hair.

  You have a gift, son, and it’s not just football. You’re special. You know things others don’t. See things others can’t. I know it can be scary at times, and I wish I could tell you it would always be a good thing, but I can’t.

  His father’s words cut straight through his heart as they crashed into the barrier he’d built around the memories. It hadn’t been until he’d turned sixteen that he told his dad about the premonitions. His father had said his mother had the sharpest intuition of anyone he’d ever met. She always knew when he’d been feeling down, or something bad had happened, but she could also see his future, which was one of the reasons he’d adopted Chad in the first place.

  His grandmother had seen it in a dream and told him all the time of the boy that would come and make his life complete and how special the boy would be.

  Chad had never gotten the chance to meet his grandmother.

  “The water is running, and I suspect it won’t be hot for long,” he said, strolling into the kitchen. A dozen packs of dehydrated food lined the counter. “We’ll talk about our game plan over food and coffee when you’re done.”

  “All right.”

  He didn’t look in her direction until the door clicked closed. The ability to sense how someone was feeling was totally different from knowing what will happen in the future. Not all of his visions had come to fruition, and it had been a long time since he had one. His mind eddied with a mirage of images, and he couldn’t control them, nor could he separate them, but they all had to do with Savanah, and he needed to push those out of his head and focus on Hunter Knight.

  And Hunter’s team.

  Chad found a pot, filled it with water, and placed it on the gas burner. The coffee was instant, which was gross, but he got used to it in the field. Same with the dried noodles and beef that looked more like rabbit pellets than tiny pieces of meat. Food, while on an op, was never about taste, only nourishment.

  While he waited for the water to boil, he fired up the computer. Next to the laptop, he noticed a book titled: A Psychic’s Guide to Crossing Abilities by Riley Jacobs. He sat down, opening the book to the table of contents. He’d never read anything about psychics other than a few studies he’d come across here and there in the military. The government had all sorts of programs centered around the topic along with various top-secret projects. Ones that Chad had tried to avoid, even when being heavily recruited.

  This thing with the SEAL team and the Phoenix Agency, he hadn’t been given a choice. His commander gave him a direct order. Chad had tried to find a way to pull out of the operation to no avail.

  He flipped to the section titled THE COLLECTIVE ORDER.

  Four sisters.

  Four quadruplet brothers, separated at birth.

  Is it a myth? Legend? Or did the Collective Order exist and will it be reunited, helping to unify psychics all over the globe and keeping those from using the powers for evil?

  It’s believed that in the mid eighteen hundreds, a group of psychics, who referred to themselves as The Collective Order, were hunted by those who believed they were witches and burned them at the stakes. Those that survived disbanded as a collective group, but believed that one day, four sisters would meet four very special brothers. These quadruplet boys are direct descendants of one of the most powerful psychics known in our history: Dimitri Orgaloph.

  It was Dimitri’s oldest daughter, Helena, who foreshadowed the sisters and brothers coming together in the twenty-first century. Helena described the future as a place where people like them were called upon for help instead of rounded up and murdered.

  Hearing the door to the bathroom squeak open, he set the book down and glanced over his shoulder. “Fe
el better?” he asked, swallowing his breath as Savanah stood in the middle of the room, towel drying her thick, blond hair, wearing a white tank top that hugged her large breasts, heaving them upward. Cameo pants hung off her wide, voluptuous hips. He had always enjoyed the curves of her body. Full and firm. Strong yet so utterly feminine he couldn’t see straight.

  “Better enough.” She hooked the towel on the door, running her fingers through the long strands. “What do we have to eat?”

  “Just think nourishment, not food.” Setting the book aside, he stood.

  “Don’t get up, I’ll do it.” She raised her hand.

  “Just add a cup of water to each packet, shake, pour, and bam, we’ve got dinner.” He did his best to ignore the fresh scent of basic soap. Who knew that could be so sexy?

  “What are you reading?”

  He held up the book, not wanting to say the words out loud.

  “Well, I’ll be damned.” She clanked about the kitchen, making two bowls of slop before putting one in front of him, along with a cup of coffee that looked and smelled like tar. Tucking her hair behind her ears, she sat in the chair next to him. “Where’d you get that book?”

  “It was left here, I suspect by Scottie.”

  “He sounded like a firm believer, even if he doesn’t want me here.”

  “So are you,” he said with an arched brow as he stuffed a fork full of noodles, dripping with a watery, white sauce that tasted like a glue and paper mixture, into his mouth.

  “I’ve always believed in psychic abilities, but it’s only been in the last few years I’ve bought into The Collective Order.”

  “I opened to that chapter. Weird stuff.”

  “Let’s save that discussion for after we find the SEAL team.” She plugged her nose as she chewed her food.

  He laughed. “It’s not that bad.”

  “It tastes like armpits.”

  “Right. Because you’ve had your share of eatable armpits. Tell me, do you prefer them with or without hair?”

  “That’s even more disgusting.”

  He watched as she continued to inhale her food, all while keeping her thumb and index finger firmly planted over her nose. Her forehead crinkled with every swallow. Savanah had never been the kind of woman to hold back her thoughts. Strong-willed and stubborn didn’t do her personality justice. Her confidence seeped out of her pores, radiating a glow as if she were doing the catwalk. When they’d been dating, he could sit and stare at her for hours, enjoying the fluidity of her body movements.