Dark mission 04 - Sacrifice the Wicked

by Karina Cooper

  “How do you know?”

  “Put it together. I’m not the first witch in the Mission, right?” She flinched at his so-effortless use of the word. A witch. God help them all. “Peterson was only the first caught. You can count on at least half of your missionaries bought out or turned. The director is thorough. Nadia Parrish was a beast, but she knew the game better than Kayleigh Lauderdale ever will.”

  “Meaning I should just let this happen?” she demanded.

  “No,” he replied patiently. “It means that it’s already too late. The whole house of cards is coming down, and you’re on top.”

  Parker shook her head. “I don’t buy it. There has to be something I can do.”

  “Don’t bother. Everything’s linked up. The Coven of the Unbinding, Sector Three, the Mission.” Now he looked at her, smile gone. Eyes dark and filled with . . . sympathy?

  No, it had to be wishful thinking. She didn’t need sympathy. Couldn’t.

  “How do you think David Peterson got to be Mission director?” he pressed. “You can’t skate by the tests every missionary goes through, you know that. The labs in the Magdalene Asylum do all the Mission’s tests. Someone knew he was a witch.”

  The realization put a cold ball of fear in her stomach. And an angry swatch of stubborn impatience. “There’s always something to be done,” she said quietly. “Get me to the lower street offices, and I’ll prove it.”

  His jaw hardened.

  “We still have a chance,” she told him. “Jonas is trustworthy, and he can get word out to—”

  “Jesus fucking Christ.” The car spun wildly as he wrenched the wheel, sending Parker into the door. She clung to it as the car rocked. The sedan’s engine revved as the tires found traction. Brightly lit signs whizzed by, neon and lights.

  As the car stopped suddenly, forcing Parker to brace her hands on the dash in nervous surprise, his hand dropped to her seat belt latch. It snapped open. She registered his intent too late.

  Before she could argue, fight him off, anything, he caught a fistful of her jacket and hauled her bodily over the gearshift. Her knee slammed into the door, elbow hitting the window so hard it sent shock waves through her fingers.

  But her body settled over his like a warm blanket, knees sliding to either side of his hips. Parker’s breath caught—anger and something much less simple. Much more insidious.

  She tried to brace her hands against his chest, leverage herself as far back as the steering wheel would let her, but he captured them in one easy grip. Trapped her hands between his body and his hand.

  Right over the snug place where her legs framed his waist.

  Too much heat. Not enough air.

  His left hand caught her chin, forced her to stare down at his upturned face. Something angry and wild and focused turned his eyes to diamond facets in the neon glow of the club signs.

  “This isn’t a game,” he said, every word a soft promise of velvet menace. “This isn’t a popularity contest.”

  Parker’s mouth dried with fear.

  “I don’t have time to walk you through the steps,” he said tightly. “The only thing Lauderdale wants more than you out of his hair is the genetic sequence that’ll unlock his army. Everything’s all blown to hell, and I’m not letting you get caught in the blast, Parker.”

  Parker stared into his eyes, her pulse thick and fast in her throat. Too loud. “Why?”

  His index finger traced her lower lip. Killed with just a touch whatever words she might have scraped together.

  Damn him.

  Damn her own response to him.

  His finger slid from her lip. “Because you’re the one good thing the Mission has going for it.”

  Such brutal honesty. But it was a line. It had to be.

  Parker turned her face away. “Let me go, Simon.”

  “Say please.”

  She stiffened. But the act only ground her against his body. Sent shock waves through her own. She sucked in a jittery breath.

  “Too late,” he murmured, his fingers sliding around the nape of her neck.

  “But the tail—”

  “Lost him four blocks ago.” His voice thrummed through his chest. Seemed to lick a path across every nerve she possessed. Slowly, inexorably, he pulled her head closer. Tugged her toward him, undeniable.

  The man knew how to play the game, she’d give him that.

  Parker grabbed the denim ridge under her hands; felt his erection underneath his jeans, firm against her knuckles. His eyes flared, smoldered with awareness. With warning.

  A warning she needed. And a warning she wanted to ignore.

  But the heat uncurling between her legs told her she tread on dangerous territory. She rocked, once.

  Simon’s grip tightened on the back of her neck. With a low, muttered “Fuck,” he pulled her close enough to seal the space between them. His lips found hers, unerring in the neon-speckled shadows. Just as firm and confident and real as she could want.

  She leaned into his kiss, let her body soften. Tried to put a lid on it as her blood surged in wild answer to the rasp of his tongue flicking over her lower lip. It teased her. Tasted her.

  “Simon,” she whispered.

  She needed him to let go of her hands. Before the rest of her body forgot everything but the warmth of his skin against hers, the taste of his mouth.

  Sex with him would be so good. She could all but sense it, feel his leashed control as if it were a current running under his skin. He’d drive her wild. Take her in hand, mold her to fit him until she lost everything.

  And he was a witch. A killer. Even if he came from some godforsaken experiment, it didn’t change what he was.

  He was everything she was sworn to protect the city from.

  But he was also the only person who’d told her anything about any of it.

  Her eyes drifted closed, catapulting her into a realm of sensory overload as his fingers slid up into her hair. Pins finally gave, loosened by rain and his own insistence. The heavy mass uncoiled, tumbled down her back. As his mouth feasted on hers, as his lips coaxed hers apart and his tongue flicked against her own, he tunneled his hand into her hair and seized a fistful.

  She gasped against his mouth, eyes flaring wide.

  His other hand slid into her jacket, curved around her waist. Held her firmly against him, nestling her against the hard length of him beneath his jeans. So good.

  So dangerous.

  He tugged at her scalp, sent a shaft of raw lust straight to her core. Something wicked in her loved it. He was strong, demanding. The warmth of his palm at her waist, her ribs, pulled a breathy sound from her throat.

  His fingers slowly curved over her breast.

  She flattened her hands against his bare chest.

  “Playing with fire,” he chided softly, his firm mouth quirking up into a knowing smirk. His eyes, heavy-lidded but still so sharp, darkened.

  The heat of his palm saturated through her blouse. She could feel her nipples hardening, groaned with it as his fingers unerringly found the nub hidden beneath the beige fabric. Circled it. Teasing.

  Fire filled her veins. Need rose, overwhelming logic and anger and fear. He tugged at her hair, pointedly. Firmly.

  She sucked in a shaking breath as her body clenched, suddenly flooded with her own rampant craving.

  How? How did he know exactly how to make her wild?

  “You make my life difficult,” he whispered, angling her head to send his breath over her ear.

  She shuddered. “You started this.”

  “Oh, make no mistake. When you come to me, Director, it will be because you want it.”

  “Oh, God.” Parker closed her eyes, every word a razor across her nerves. Her embarrassment.

  Her want.

  As if aware, as if sensing it, his voice roughened. “It won’t be in a car, it won’t be rushed or hurried. I’ll draw out every second until you’re begging for me. Whenever you’re ready.” Slowly, deliberately, his teeth closed on
her earlobe, jolting a current of need through every part of her. “I’ll make you scream.”

  She was so ready now.

  And that was the problem.

  How simple would it be for him to take her right now? In the front seat of his sedan, her back tight against the steering wheel, her body cradling his. Letting him in. Riding him.

  From ice to fire. It was that easy.

  It was that dangerous.

  Simon’s hands closed on her waist, forcing a gasp from her lips as his fingers left her breast. Spots of color rode high on her cheeks, probably courtesy of the same genes all that red hair came from. It tumbled just past her shoulders, thick and straight; all but glowing beneath the neon lights.

  Redheads. So much trouble.

  “But first, we should get out of view,” he said into her ear. She shuddered.

  And then she stiffened.

  Simon didn’t bother hiding his laughter as he flexed his arms, lifting Parker off his lap and depositing her back into her seat. A few feet away, standing in the circle of light beneath a street corner lamp, a small group of club-rats cheered.

  The advice they offered wasn’t as muffled as she probably wanted.

  The color in her cheeks spread to her forehead, her neck. “You’re despicable.” Her voice shook.

  Simon raised a slow, thoughtful eyebrow. “You don’t sound embarrassed.” He eased the car into drive once more and navigated through the parking lot. “Relax. Given the painted-on getup they sported, I doubt yours was the only show tonight.” He glanced at her, but she didn’t give him her face, staring out through her window. Her hands clenched in her lap.

  Simon relented, letting silence fill the car as he concentrated on navigating through the club district.

  The topside club sectors were similar to the ones in the lower streets only in that there seemed to be a prolific love affair with neon. The words spelled out in the wealthy upper stratum of the city were much more classy than the typical Girls! Girls! Girls! found below, and the interiors of the clubs tended toward dancing and dining rather than poles and naked flesh.

  But the amount of people filling the sidewalks, waiting in line, grinding in wide voyeur-friendly windows of some of the establishments were as familiar to him as breathing.

  A man could lose himself in this kind of crowd.

  Which was exactly the point.

  He glanced at his unwilling guest. Met her scrutiny with raised eyebrows. “Yes?” he prompted.

  “You’re a witch.” The word went sour in her voice.

  He couldn’t blame her. “Yes.”

  “You were made in a lab.”

  “I’m a genetic smoothie, created from a missionary and a witch.” A specific witch, but she wouldn’t know the difference. Heresy was heresy. When her fine red eyebrows winged upward, he shrugged. “Most of them are. There’s something about the way missionaries are cultivated that promotes higher survivability in the gene therapy process.” Assuming one ignored the fact that they all died sooner rather than later.

  He didn’t want to get into that now. It was enough that she was asking questions, that she wasn’t trying to get back to the quad and get herself killed.

  “How?” she demanded. “How do they get material from a missionary? What material?”

  “Yearly physicals. Skin, hair, and yes, even bodily fluids. They harvest the genetic material when we go in to the clinic.”

  Her eyes narrowed to blue fire. “The hell they do.”

  He shrugged again. “It’s the truth. That’s half the reason the Mission pulls from specific orphanages, you know. You’re all trained from the moment you show up, developed along very specific lines. It does something, helps the process along somehow.”

  Parker fell silent, her glance sliding to the windshield. The rain had tapered off, but summer in New Seattle promised it’d be back. It always did.

  He rather liked the summers. Not that he’d be around much longer to regret missing them.

  Damn. What a dismal train of thought.

  Within minutes, the neon haze marking the club district pulsed in the rearview mirror.

  He’d take her down to the lower levels. That was his prime stomping ground. There were a few safe houses there he knew of, a handful of people he could strong-arm into hiding them for a short time. Hiding her, anyway.

  “Who were your . . .” She hesitated. “Your parents?”

  “Donors.” This time, when she flinched, an answering pang of guilt kicked in his chest. “We don’t have parents, Parker. Not like normal people do. We have genetic samples from two donors.”

  “That’s awful.”

  He shrugged. “That’s the way it is. Missionaries don’t have parents, either.”

  “No, but we had—” She paused.

  “A real birth?” His mouth twisted into a hard smile. “You sure?”

  But to his surprise, she didn’t rise to his bait, admitting softly, “No. I guess not.” She clasped her hands between her knees, stared down at them for a moment. Then, oddly endearing, her gaze flicked sideways. Studied him in sidelong inquiry. “So who were your donors?”

  Now it was his turn to hesitate.

  What would it cost him? Not much. And in return, he’d tell her something to earn her trust.

  But she’d have more questions. He’d be disappointed if she didn’t.

  He sighed. “I’m patterned off of Matilda Lauderdale.”

  Her eyes widened. “The director’s wife?”

  “The same.”

  “Does he know?”

  The question earned a snort. He couldn’t help it. “I don’t know. Mattie did a lot of things I didn’t know about. Or understand.” Like drink poison rather than tell him what he needed to know.

  Like make him to begin with.

  Parker’s fingers touched his forearm. Firm, warm. It sent sparks of awareness through his nervous system and soothed something he didn’t have a name for deep inside.

  Why?

  “You sound like you knew her well,” she said, and he didn’t kid himself. It was a prompt. A fine example of what made her a damned good leader.

  To his astonishment, he found himself answering. “Not as well as I wanted, but enough to know that she lived even after everyone said she’d died. Mattie was . . .” How would he phrase it?

  “A smart woman,” she offered.

  “Incredibly. And manipulative as hell.”

  “You almost sound like you miss her.” She removed her hand, and the spot on his arm tingled as if already missing her heat. Simon’s grip tightened on the wheel. “I liked her. She was a real bitch sometimes, but I liked her. Inconvenient as hell that she’s dead.” And if it came out rougher than he’d meant, she’d cope.

  He didn’t look at her, didn’t want to read whatever it was on her face. No right choice here. Guilt, sympathy, disgust—he deserved just about anything she had for him. And more.

  Because it was his fault Mattie died.

  “What about the witch half?”

  It took him a moment to follow her train of thought. “No,” he said slowly. “You’ve got it wrong. Mattie was the witch half.”

  “The hell she was.”

  He didn’t begrudge her the shocked revelation. “I don’t know who filled in the missionary sequences, I just assumed it was whatever characteristics she handpicked to suit her own.”

  Parker rubbed at her eyes. “Did Lauderdale know that, too?”

  “He knew of her gift. Something about the ability to see things as they are. But he didn’t know about me.” Simon didn’t know if that still held true, but he’d taken care of the paper trail.

  “What about Kayleigh?”

  A whole other barrel of very slippery fish. “Didn’t inherit the genome, far as I know. She’s never displayed anything useful.” Simon shrugged, squinting through the windshield. “Killer mind. Has Mattie’s intelligence, which might just kill her.”

  “Doesn’t that make her your sister?”


  “Only in the same way that dogs share a genetic makeup.”

  “Ouch.”

  Simon didn’t bother explaining. Kayleigh was a good kid, but beyond his reach. Or his help. One damsel at a time, and Parker was a bloody stubborn damsel to field.

  “You’re a double agent.” When he only tilted his head, Parker laughed. It wasn’t all amusement, but the husky note stroked across his skin like the softest touch; warm rain and sunshine. All the things he couldn’t have. “You’re an honest-to-God double agent. How do you keep it straight?”

  He didn’t. He just played the cards he was dealt and focused on the only thing that mattered now.

  The sudden chime of an incoming comm transmission startled them both. As Simon glanced at the vibrating unit on his hip, Parker jumped, turning in her seat to paw through her bag. “Maybe it’s—” She flipped her screen open, shedding pale blue incandescence over her face. Her features hardened. “Damn.”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s an all-hands transmission.” Her voice went arctic; he knew better. Without waiting for her to continue, he reached down and plucked the comm unit from his belt. Flicking it open, he skimmed the contents quickly.

  “Fuck.” The word wasn’t strong enough. “They’re calling all team leads to the Mission headquarters. Even the mid-lows. Eckhart’ll be on his way.”

  Her mouth curved into a smile that had nothing to do with humor. “It’s under my authorization. Needless to say, that’s false.”

  Simon curled his fingers around the wheel and spun it hard enough to pull a U-turn in the street. Horns blared as he peeled out from traffic, lights skimmed through the windows.

  Parker swayed, her fingers clamped so tightly around the unit that they whitened. Her eyes banked in hollow concern, stark with something else he couldn’t read.

  He could guess.

  “We can’t go to the lower streets,” he said, forcing himself to focus on the road. The problem at hand. Forcing his voice into even tones. “They’ll have the checkpoints manned and they’ll search every car, you can count on it.”

  She said nothing, staring at the now-dark comm unit.

  “We need to get you somewhere safe.”

  She shook her head. “All of my team leads are gathering at the Mission. I can’t leave them to face Lauderdale alone.”