by Jaime Rush
He regarded her but didn’t push her to reveal any of the reasons. “That’s probably a good thing,” he said at last. “Because we’re going to be stuck together until we get rid of these two.”
“Stuck?” That word shot comfort and something she didn’t want to explore into her.
“I’m taking you to my place. You’re staying there until we figure out what to do next.”
Chapter Eight
FORTY MINUTES LATER, Del and Tucker pulled onto a street that seemed to be at the southern edge of nowhere in Hendersonville. She’d never ventured this far south in the Las Vegas Valley. There were a couple of short, paved streets off the main road, each with one or two homes on it. All around them were miles of scrubland and low mountains in the distance.
He swung the car into the driveway of a two-story hacienda-style home that looked well kept—pretty, even. There were four cars parked in the driveway. The sun had set, leaving a color-splashed sky to fade into night. Del tried to find comfort in that very ordinary sight as she stepped out. As if she didn’t have enough to deal with, she was about to meet Tucker’s comrades. She was afraid to ask how much they knew about her.
“It’s nice,” she said, walking beside him up the flagstone path to the front porch. The yard, like many in the area, was a sea of rocks interspersed with sculptured planting beds. “I like it.”
“I found it a few months after I left your place. It was abandoned then, and the other house wasn’t there yet, so no one noticed or cared that I was living here. I wasn’t running drugs or anything.” His voice lowered as they reached the front porch. “Just becoming a monster in the shadows.” He glanced at her, maybe to see her reaction to that.
She kept her expression neutral as she took in the place. “So this is where you went.” No air conditioning, no soft bed, but he’d had a roof over his head. She looked out over the miles of vacant land. “I can see why you chose the area. Lots of room to . . . run. I’m assuming you now live here legally.”
“Bought it as soon as I could muster up a down payment.”
He had a home. When he opened the door and gestured for her to walk in, she saw that he had a family, too. Three men—one in a wheelchair—and one woman sat in the living room, breaking out of what looked like a tense conversation.
The woman, close to Del’s age, launched to her feet and threw herself into Tucker’s arms. “You’re okay.” She squeezed her eyes shut, as though absorbing him. Then she leaned back and took him in, brushing her fingers over the scrapes on his cheek. They disappeared. Completely, magically disappeared. Del stared, but no one else seemed to think it was miraculous or even out of the ordinary.
The woman’s eyes were way too big for her small features, fringed in thick lashes, and she wore not a stitch of makeup. Her long, blond curls were clipped up in a ponytail, and her sweats hung on what appeared to be a small frame.
Del felt a twinge of . . . well, it couldn’t be jealousy, but it was a damned uncomfortable feeling as the girl smoothed her hand over every scratch and healed it. “I was so worried when Greer told me about your call.” Only then did she turn to notice Del standing there. Her expression changed, shuttering. “Who are you?”
“Did you . . . heal him?” Del asked instead of answering, because she couldn’t get her mind around what she’d seen.
She shifted her gaze to Tucker, as though checking with him before answering.
He nodded. “This is Delaney. Her mom’s the one who took me in for a while and told me what I am.”
They seemed to know at least that much. Maybe he hadn’t told them he’d been kicked out.
He squeezed the woman’s shoulder affectionately. “This is Shea. She can heal, though she’s not supposed to waste it on bumps and bruises.” He gave her an admonishing look. “She psychically takes on the injury herself. Speaking of, Del, you were hurt, too.”
She waved it off, her wrist stinging at the movement. “I’m fine. I’ll wash up later, put some stuff on it.”
“You’re sure?”
“Absolutely.”
He gestured to the guy in the wheelchair. “That’s Darius. Next to him is Greer. And that’s Cody with his hand in the potato chip bag, which is where it usually is.”
Cody, with his teen-idol looks, smirked at him before nodding to her.
“Is she one of us?” Greer asked, coming closer, his gray eyes an odd juxtaposition to his warm Native American coloring as she’d expected. Tucker’s half-brother then.
“Yes, but she doesn’t have Darkness.”
How many of them had it? Del supposed she’d find out if she stayed around them long enough.
She took them all in. “Nice to meet you.”
“You, too,” Greer said, and then turned to Tucker. “So what’s going on?”
Tucker sat on the edge of the coffee table and filled them in. Halfway through, he realized she was still standing there and gestured for her to sit. Del took one of the chairs, a soft swivel recliner, and twisted back and forth as she listened to his telling of the events of the afternoon. All the terror and fear gripped her again. Her mother, gone. She felt so damned helpless, and she heard the same frustration in Tucker’s voice when he finished with how they had no way to find Elgin.
Shea’s eyes grew even wider, if that was possible. “They’re looking for us. All of us.”
Tucker nodded, and she wrapped her arms around herself. Greer put his hand on her shoulder, and for a moment she leaned into him. Then she shrugged away, getting to her feet. “What do we do?”
Tucker said, “We watch our backs. They don’t know about us—”
“They know about you now,” Del said,. “Because you helped me, Elgin knows you exist.”
Shea turned on her. “You put him in the line of fire?” She looked at Tucker. “Is that true?”
Del thought the little spitfire might tear her head off.
Tucker took Shea by the shoulders. “They have her mother. I couldn’t not try to get her back.” He looked at the rest of them. “But they don’t know about you. We want to keep it that way.”
Darius wheeled forward. “We’re not going to hide and wonder when they’re going to nab us. We have to get them first.”
“We don’t know where they are. There are two of them. One is my and Greer’s father. The other guy is named Bengle.” Tucker met each of their gazes. “He didn’t look like any of you.”
Del took them in: Darius with his tight, angry expression; Greer big and brawny; Cody, who looked like a teenager with his fresh face and long lashes . . . and Tucker, whom she’d seen take on one of those creeps without hesitation. She didn’t want to believe that any of them could have mauled that guy last night. But they could have, and she needed to keep that in mind.
Tucker said, “Shea, you should—”
“I know what you’re going to say, and no, I’m not moving back here. I love my place, which isn’t littered with dirty socks and towels and junk food. I can take care of myself.” She gave him a meaningful look. Maybe healing wasn’t the only thing she could do.
“Not against these guys,” Tucker said.
Greer flexed his big hands, ready for the fight. “How did you take on the guy you fought?”
Del had wondered that, too, and leaned forward to hear his answer better. In fact, he had all of their attention.
“I kept shredding his Darkness. I went ape-shit on him, just flipped out. I must have swiped a thousand times, and I kept seeing bits of him flake off. He would pull them back, and he was so busy doing that, he wasn’t properly fighting me. He made these sounds, like it hurt. I think it wore him down, weakened him.”
“How do you kill them when they’re in Darkness?” Del asked.
“We don’t know,” Tucker said. “We’re the only ones we’ve been around who have it. So far we haven’t wanted to kill each other.” He shot them a sheepish raise of his eyebrow. “Mostly.”
“We spar each other,” Greer said. “Out in the desert. Tuc
ker fell off a cliff once, hit a few rocks on his way down. He was kind of our test subject.”
“I stayed in Darkness as I fell. It hurt, tore into me, but I was able to heal myself.” Tucker faced her, probably seeing the horror of the picture Greer had put in her mind. “We’re just rearranging our energy when we Become. We pull from the deepest part of ourselves, from the Darkness we hold inside.”
He held out his hand, palm up, and that black spiral she’d seen him make earlier appeared. It writhed up like a quicksilver snake. He flicked at it, making it tremble. “I can feel it when I do this. It’s like this bit is part of me, part of my energy.”
Darius reached over and swiped it, making it go poof. “If you break off a part of it, it takes time to regenerate it.”
Tucker smacked him on the side of his head. “I can handle the demo.”
Darius reared up in an instinctive response. Even though he was in a wheelchair, he looked every bit as dangerous as Tucker. Which made her wonder: could he walk while in Darkness?
Tucker met his gaze, daring him. A few tense moments passed. Darius’s shoulders relaxed, and he turned away first.
Tucker held his ground for a few seconds longer, and then turned to Shea. He kept Darius in sight, though. “Shea, order a round of pizzas.”
“Please,” she said, with a tilt of her head.
He chucked her on the chin. “Please, doll.”
The endearment prickled through Del, as much as the obvious affection Shea felt for him did.
When Shea turned to go into the kitchen, Greer said to her, “You’d lay me flat if I called you something like that.”
Shea paused in the doorway, her fingers tightening on the frame. “It’s different with Tuck.”
Mm, there were some interesting dynamics going on here, ones Del wasn’t entirely comfortable with. Not that she was comfortable with any of this, or these people. And that especially included Tucker.
Chapter Nine
“WHAT DID YOU do to my daughter?” Carrie had been screaming that ever since the car had lurched away twenty minutes ago. She’d heard car doors opening, closing . . . engines racing off . . . glass smashing. She was insane with worry. Now the car had stopped, and a garage door closed.
He opened the trunk, and the question scratched out of her hoarse throat again.
“I tried to bring her to the party, but she obviously inherited your skill for telekinesis. She escaped, helped by her boyfriend.”
Carrie wilted in relief, barely fighting him when he carried her from the garage, through the kitchen, and to a back bedroom.
She knew there was no point in trying to escape. Not with him. If she cooperated, maybe he’d grant her one request: leave her daughter alone.
Carrie watched Elgin stalk around the bed where he tied her. It wasn’t the same house they’d shared all those years ago. From what little she’d seen of it, it was tidy and neutral.
He sat on the edge of the bed, hovering over her. “Torus ordered me to kill you when you ran off. But I didn’t.”
“No, you killed the man I loved,” she hissed.
He slapped her, the sting setting the side of her face on fire. “You are my wife. You belong with me, with our people. But you left us all, breaking the rules you promised to obey when you came here. It was my job to find you, and when I did, I saw you with him. Darkness took over. You brought on his death. You murdered him as much I did.”
She closed her eyes and rolled her head to the side. Yes, she had.
He pinched her chin and forced her to look at him. “I let you live, Nikkita. Or is it Carrie now? Do you like that name better?” His voice was a taunt. “Did that separate you more from what you are? You pretty fool. When you ran that night, I let you go. I told Torus I’d killed you, stashed your body. If I’d known you were pregnant . . .”
The mention of Del shot fear into her. “Don’t hurt her. She has nothing to do with this. I left you. I betrayed you; at least that’s how you see it. So punish me, not her.”
He sat back, as though considering her words. “Who was the man with her?”
Had she heard Del right? “I couldn’t see who was with her. I was in the trunk, if you’ll recall.”
“Your daughter came to rescue you, brave little thing. She tried to run me down. You must be very proud.”
She was, dammit—proud and scared for her reckless daughter.
“You know who she would ask for help.” He leaned closer, his voice low and harsh. “He had my eyes. My looks. Come on, Nik. Don’t tell me you have no idea who that kid was.”
“He’s your son; at least I figured he was. But you already know that.”
He gripped her face again, leaning so close she could feel his breath on her chin. “But who is he to you? To your daughter?”
“He’s just some punk. My daughter felt a draw to him, brought him home for dinner one night, years ago. When I sensed what he was, what he held, I sent him away. I didn’t want him near her.”
His mouth tightened into a hard line. “Because he’s like me.”
She nodded.
“A monster. That’s what you called me the first time I Became in front of you. Interesting that your daughter brought home my son.” He laughed. “That must have been deliciously ironic.” His smile faded. “But you rejected us both. Seems like you can’t get rid of Darkness. Because here I am. And there he was. Tell me everything you know about him: where he lives, what he does.”
“They haven’t seen each other in years, so if he’s with her, I have no idea how or why. He was a kid the last time I saw him. How should I know what he does or where he lives?” That much was true. “Leave them alone. They’re no threat to you.” She didn’t want him to know that Tucker had lived with them. The less he knew of him, the better.
“But they are. Someone killed a man last night. Torus wants a clean sweep of any loose ends we might have left. My son is one. Your daughter is another.”
“My daughter certainly didn’t kill that man. Leave her alone.”
“No, she didn’t, but she holds our DNA. And your abilities, which could bring unwanted attention to her.”
Carrie couldn’t help the whimper that escaped her throat. She would beg, if she had to, but it wouldn’t matter. There was no reasoning with Elgin. But he wasn’t the cold man she remembered. Now she saw heat in his eyes. Anger.
He still held her face, but with less pressure. “The last time I found you, I watched you before I made my presence known. You never touched me like you did him. Never wanted me like that. No, you cowed away from me. Even before I tapped into Darkness, you didn’t want me like that. Why him and not me?”
Was he actually hurt by her rejection?
“You had no emotions. No heart. No tenderness. You wanted me but you didn’t love me.”
“You complained that I was cold. You were the oddball, with your feelings and desires. When I heard that Darkness brought passion, I tapped into it for you.”
She shook her head. “No. Don’t say that.”
He gave her a grave nod that sunk her stomach. How many ruined lives could she be responsible for? How many losses?
Now he stroked his fingers down the sides of her cheeks. “You were always mine. I feel you inside me. As angry as I am with you, I don’t want to kill you. The problem is you’re supposed to be dead. Others live nearby, and if they know you’re here, they’ll report it to Torus. He’ll kill you, and me, too. I’ve lost enough because of you.” He placed his hand over the front of his pants. “Do you want to know how Torus punished us for resorting to the company of human women? He castrated us, thinking that would kill our desire.”
She sucked in a breath, and yet, felt a sense of relief. But no, she didn’t see a lack of desire in his eyes. “I’m so sorry.”
Beneath his hand, though, she saw a bulge form. Was he lying? He looked smug.
“I discovered a new way to use Darkness. It’s amazing how it can be manipulated.”
Horror froze
her as she put it together. She tried to wipe it from her face, turning away.
He crawled into the bed with her, laying his leg on top of her, his arm across her chest. “I want to spend a little quality time with you. And if you beg enough, if you do everything I ask, maybe I’ll consider your request to let your daughter live.”
She turned to face him, trying to judge whether he was telling the truth. “What about Tucker?” As soon as his name was out of her mouth, she cringed.
“Is that his name? You’ll have to do better than that. You’ll have to give me his last name. In fact, you may be able to help me more than that.” He leaned closer, his mouth grazing hers. “Because I’m willing to bet that you’ll give me anything I ask for to save your daughter. Your body. Your cooperation. And even Tucker.”
Chapter Ten
TUCKER LED DEL up the stairs. He stopped when they reached the top, turning and taking her hand. A strange quiver passed through her.
He turned it palm up. “That’s more than nothing, Del. I should have asked Shea to—”
She shook her head. “No, that’s all right. It’s fine.”
“You’ve got bruises on your wrists.” Anger vibrated from him.
“I wasn’t being very cooperative when he was trying to bind them.” She gently pulled her hand away. “I’m fine. Really.”
He led her into the last bedroom on the left. His, she guessed. Big furniture was crowded into the small space. Otherwise, it wasn’t far from the way his room had looked when he’d lived with them: clothes draped over the back of a chair, Dean Koontz books here and there, and four decks of cards on top of the dresser. Several cards had spilled out of one box and landed on the wood floor. She saw pieces of paper and business cards with room numbers written in feminine handwriting.
She followed him to a large, luxurious bathroom. The granite counter had the kinds of porcelain sinks that sat on top like bowls. The large glass shower looked incredibly inviting.
