Trouble In Mind (Interstellar Rescue Series Book 2)

by Donna S. Frelick

  “No, damn the gods. The boy is not here. By which I mean, he has not been returned here.”

  Trevyn met Kinnian’s dark gaze, wondering in the depths of his mind why his brother’s rage was not burning hot enough to scald them all. “So, now what?”

  “We may have an opportunity to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, brother.” Kinnian’s voice was like oil over wet ground. “As these humans screamed out their deaths, I caught the echo of a long-lost voice in the back of my mind. It was as if this ghost saw my handiwork from afar and despaired. I felt it distinctly. I’m sure I could not be mistaken.”

  Trevyn fought to control his body’s reaction, knowing Kinnian was watching for it. “What ghost would haunt you, my lord? And how?”

  Kinnian grinned and came closer to put a hand on Trevyn’s shoulder. His fingers closed in a grip as tight as an orphyl’s claws.

  “Why, none other than our lost brother, Gabriel. In my mind, watching. All caught up in our little drama without the least invitation. It appears he is here on this planet, hunting this boy, as we are. The bastard, as always, seeking to take from this family what is rightfully mine. As to how . . .” His grip tightened. “It is no secret to me that you disdain my methods, brother. You think to hide your weakness from me, but I see it. I feel it. And so, it seems, does Gabriel. Perhaps he used you to get to me.”

  Trevyn pulled away from Kinnian’s hold. “You think me disloyal?”

  “If I thought you disloyal, you would be dead.”

  “I serve you and no other.” Trevyn kept his voice steady, his gaze unswerving, hiding his turmoil. Were his shields so weak he’d reached out to Gabriel without knowing it? If so, it was the first time it had happened. “But my mind is my own. If you ask me to tell you what I think, then I’ll share my thoughts. Until then, I’ll keep them to myself.”

  Kinnian’s face came so close, his beard brushed Trevyn’s clean-shaven chin. “See that you do. You understand that we must control our link with Gabriel? Perhaps it is our new proximity to our long-lost brother that has drawn him into our circle. Still, I can’t have him tracking us through you.” He bared his teeth in a smile that could not be misinterpreted. “Your efforts to leash me would be ill-served from the confines of the ship’s brig, would they not, Commander?”

  “My lord.” Trevyn acknowledged his brother’s meaning—and his power—with a slow nod.

  “For now, it is fortunate that we have established a link with Gabriel, no matter how it happened.” Kinnian turned and led the way back to the rented SUV. “His unguarded mind has given me a name. It may be enough to lead us to the boy.”

  Trevyn made sure to reinforce the shields in his mind before he followed his sibling to the back seat of the vehicle. With a thought, he activated the computer network connections wetwired into his brain.

  “What is the name?”

  “Asia Roberts. And the boy is called Jack, now.” Kinnian seemed pleased that Trevyn was already settled in to work. “There was some anxiety around this knowledge, but I was not connected long enough to detect exactly what it was. When I have time to explore, I intend to find out more.”

  “Of course.” Trevyn began a search for the name in all the local databases he could access.

  Doors slammed as the other members of the landing team returned. Trevyn heard his brother give the order to move, felt the SUV roll over the gravel drive as they left the farm behind.

  It was not long before his search produced results. “There is a reason for the anxiety you detected.” He glanced up at Kinnian. “Asia Roberts and her son Jack have been reported kidnapped. The governing police authority for this sector of the planet has posted a special alert regarding their disappearance.”

  Kinnian’s face reddened. “Someone else has the boy? Who?”

  Trevyn shook his head. “If the answer even exists in the information matrices of this world, it will take more than a few minutes to find it, my lord.”

  “Portol’s balls!” Kinnian slammed a hand on the back of the seat. “Ditch this fucking kidney crusher and get us back to the ship. I want them found now, Trevyn. We’ve spent too much time in this ass-end of space.”

  Gabriel woke to the sound of heavy pounding. At first he was sure it was inside his head, where the pain was still a dull weight swinging around the inside margins of his skull. When he heard his name being repeated with some urgency he realized it was the door, and he staggered out of bed to answer it.

  “Hey.” Lana pushed past him with a huge, flat cardboard box and a pack of six chilled aluminum cans in her hands. “I thought I was going to have to call 911.” She put her burdens on the table in the corner of the room and turned to look at him. Her eyes widened and her mouth fell open. “Oops.”

  That was when it occurred to him that he was dressed only in his boxers. He mumbled something apologetic and reached for his pants.

  “I took a shower and thought I’d lie down for a minute. Guess that was about an hour ago.”

  “Don’t blush on my account, GQ.” She stifled a grin and turned to pull a beer from the pack. She handed it over once he’d zipped up. “Just think of me as one of the guys.”

  It was the last way he wanted to think of her. “A gentleman always dresses for dinner.” He set the beer aside to pull on the same soft white shirt he’d been wearing all day. Lana had exchanged her collared shirt with the FBI logo and practical pants for something much softer and more feminine. He thought instantly of touching her. “Did you go shopping?”

  She laughed. “On my salary? No, just the value of foresight. I always keep some things in the car—for emergencies.”

  “Smart.” He tipped his beer in her direction.

  A smile lifted the corners of her mouth. “You must be feeling better. Headache all gone?”

  “Mostly.” He felt like he’d been on a three-day bender, but he was damned if he’d admit it.

  She examined him a minute longer, judging the depth of the lie, then turned to open the pizza box. “Eat. Something on your stomach will help.”

  He was ravenous and wolfed down two pieces of the strange flat bread covered with meat and cheese before he thought to speak again. He paused to take a breath and looked up to see Lana watching him in amusement.

  “This is good!” No wonder Sam raved about it.

  “It’s Pizza Hut, all I could find. You must be starving.” She squinted at him as if he had sprouted antennae. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

  “I’m fine. I think you’re right. I just needed food.” He took another piece of pizza, but he ate this one slowly, savoring it, appreciating the way the flavors blended in a riot of sensation. Tangy. Salty. Satisfying. There was nothing subtle about it.

  He glanced back at Lana just as the pink tip of her tongue came out from between her lips to collect a tiny dribble of red sauce before she dabbed at her mouth with a napkin. Gabriel’s breath exploded from his chest as his groin tightened in painful response, and he was forced to bite down on a groan. For no reason he could explain he had become acutely aware of her, of the way an errant curl escaped from her pinned-up control and teased her neck, the way her creamy skin was flushed with the color of ripe aluria fruit. His senses were wide open, picking up every thread and nuance in the room. It could have been an aftereffect of the psychic overload he’d experienced earlier, but—

  “You know you scared the crap out of me with your little performance this afternoon, right?”

  The way she was looking at him set off any number of alarms. The spark of concern he saw in her eyes just didn’t match the bite of anger in her voice.

  He opted for honesty. “You weren’t half as scared as I was.”

  Oh, hell. Now the concern had morphed into something deeper, and her gaze was sharp, full of hooks to catch the unwary.

  “Okay. So what’s your explanation?”

  “I’m not sure.” He shook his head. “All of a sudden it was like my head was caught in a vise and someone was turning the
crank.”

  “Uh-huh. And this has never happened to you before?”

  “No.” That, at least, was the truth. He and Kinnian had never come so close before, and his brother’s power had grown since their last, brief encounter.

  “This, uh, attack. It wasn’t accompanied by any, say, visions or anything, was it?”

  He met her eyes and found both knowledge and certainty there. “Why would you think that?”

  “Gabriel. You have talents. You admit it. And you forget I was on the outside, observing this attack of yours.” She leaned closer. “You saw something. You were watching it happen. And it was horrible.”

  She got up, leaving Gabriel shaken and staring after her. She paced for a moment, then turned back to him.

  “I don’t believe you saw Asia and Jack. You wouldn’t keep that to yourself. But whatever you saw, it has you tied in knots. You pretended to be asleep, but I could tell you sat in that car all the way here trying to solve some kind of problem. Now, I risked my job to bring you here, knowing what I know about you. I could be risking lives to keep you here. You need to trust me. Tell me what you saw.”

  Everything in him wanted to respond to what she asked of him, to give her what she needed. The words were at the tip of his tongue, ready to spill out of his mouth into the air between them, changing what she knew of the universe forever. But he couldn’t trust her yet. And worse, he knew better than to trust himself. It was far too early for the truth, if the truth could ever be spoken between them.

  He gave up a part of the story. “What I felt was an interrogation,” he admitted, “but not of Asia or Jack and not by the people that hold them. There’s another group out there looking for them.”

  Lana regained her seat across from him and raised her eyes to his. “I hardly know where to start asking questions, Gabriel. I haven’t figured out yet why one group of kidnappers would want to snatch this woman and her son. Now you’re telling me there’s a second bunch out there that wants them? And this second bunch is ‘interrogating’ people in such a way that you can feel it psychically somehow? You do know that Mulder and Scully don’t really work for the FBI, don’t you?”

  Gabriel considered half a second, then dismissed the last question as rhetorical. He was getting used to Lana’s sense of humor. Behind her sarcasm, he sensed her frustration. She didn’t want to believe that Ethan was involved in the kidnapping of a wife and son he so obviously loved, but she lacked alternative explanations. Knowing he shouldn’t, he decided to give her one and see how open her mind might be.

  “On the other hand, your colleagues believe Ethan is the reason Asia and Jack have been abducted.”

  Lana’s eyebrows lifted. “What do you mean?”

  “That’s the usual motive, isn’t it? The husband’s involved in something illicit. The loved ones are held for collateral until the kidnappers get what they want from him. But there’s a problem—you haven’t been able to dig up anything suspicious in Ethan’s background.”

  “Doesn’t mean it’s not there.” She couldn’t meet his gaze. “Give us more than 24 hours to look and God knows what we might turn up.”

  “You don’t believe that.”

  She blew out a breath. “If you have another theory, I’m listening. Right now, I’ve got squat-all else.”

  “What if Asia was of interest because she is unique in some way?”

  Lana stared at him. “You’re thinking psi talents? Telepathy, maybe?”

  Gabriel shrugged. “It’s a possibility, at least.”

  “Ethan has been hiding something.” Lana got up to pace again. “Maybe that’s it. Asia had been his patient . . . could have been one reason she came to him. And the boy . . . just scooped up with her, you think?”

  “Probably.” But the scene he had witnessed told him Kinnian had been sent for Jack, not Asia. His brothers had somehow found Jack’s relatives—something Rescue had been unable to do—most likely with information provided by the Grays. And thank God for that, because it meant they knew nothing of Ethan.

  The FBI agent in the room was still working out her own investigative problem. “Who would be so interested in psi talents that they’d grab a woman and a child and nearly kill a man? In broad daylight.”

  “Trust me, Lana, the list is endless if the talent is great enough.”

  She rubbed a hand over her face. “That’s not much help. This little theory of yours needs some evidence if I’m going to convince my people. Maybe I should run it by a guy I know in military intelligence.”

  “No.” He stood up, as if he could physically stop her. “Some of these groups could be operating deep inside your government.”

  She threw a sharp glance in his direction, and he cursed himself for the slip. But she missed the “your” and focused on “government”.

  “You mean black ops? If we suspect that, then I definitely should brief my boss.”

  He touched her arm. “Lana, it’s too early to share this. You don’t want to tip your hand before we’re sure.”

  Her lips thinned in anger. “Asia and Jack wouldn’t say it’s too early. In fact, they’d say we need to get up off our asses.” She turned again to take up her agitated pacing. “We need a break, Gabriel. I feel the time slipping away from us.”

  He caught her by the shoulders. “We’ll find them. We’re only a step behind; I can feel it.”

  She pulled back to look up at him, her eyes locked on his. She trembled under his hands, vibrating with what he thought at first was the frustration of the case, but quickly realized was something much more dangerous.

  “Aw, hell.” She shook her head and stepped back.

  He couldn’t help himself; he followed her, closing the distance. “What’s wrong?” His voice came out lower, softer than he intended. He touched her face. She frowned at him. But those eyes . . . Dios.

  She held her ground. “I’m trying to focus here. You’re distracting me.”

  “Maybe we both need a little distraction.” He stroked her cheek. So soft.

  She allowed it. And, at last, she moved closer, bringing their bodies together.

  “Distraction can be dangerous.”

  “It can also be an unexpected pleasure.” He bent his head to her, his lips nearly touching hers. “Why not indulge yourself?”

  She brought her mouth to his, as he had known she would, and opened her lips to receive him, welcoming him with a taste that was sweet and hot and all her own. His tongue swept her mouth and withdrew, slipped again past her lips for a longer exploration, teased her, tempted her. Her mouth, her body melted under his assault, growing hotter, softer, her arms rising up to ring his neck and draw him closer, enclosing him in her spicy, ginger-cream scent.

  He couldn’t control his response. His body was on fire for her, his heart thrashing in his chest, his fevered blood filling him until he was heavy and aching. His hands wandered down her back and over the swell of her hips to pull her into him, and he shifted so that their hips were aligned, hard to soft, heat to heat. A gasp escaped her, and he groaned as he took her mouth again. Her taste—God, he loved the way she tasted.

  A subtle vibration shook him, something shared between them that sizzled like the flow of current along a circuit. Something was connected, completed in the press of their bodies, in the velvety tangle of his tongue with hers. His shields were under assault, but from her mind or his own needs, he could not tell. He could feel her need for him, her longing to surrender, beating against him like the waves of a sea storm against a sandy shore. And he was crumbling, sliding into her surging waters, wanting to open his mind and let her in. So he could feel everything about her. So she could know everything about him.

  But, suddenly, almost as quickly as it had begun, it was over. Lana pulled back, reluctance and something close to fear shadowing her green eyes. She licked her lips. Took a breath. Touched his face.

  “I think that’s probably enough self-indulgence for tonight, don’t you?”

  “If you say so
.” He kept the words light, but his heart battered his ribcage, wanting more.

  She shook her head, stepping back. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  And then she was gone.

  Jesus, what the hell was I thinking?

  Lana slammed the door to her room behind her and collapsed on the bed. She stared up at the dingy motel ceiling, her heart bumping so hard it rocked her entire body. She had broken so many rules today she’d stopped counting, but this one—God, this one took the prize. Not only had she let a civilian so far into this investigation she might as well have issued him credentials. Now she was ready to drop her pants for him, too? Holy shit!

  But, my God, was she ever ready! If she hadn’t run, she’d have been out of her clothes and in his bed in less time than it took for one of those slow smiles to spread across his beautiful face. She laughed out loud in the silence of the room at the ridiculous situation she found herself in. She was 32 years old, for chrissake, and she was mooning over this guy like a kid in braces. And all it had taken was one kiss!

  She jumped as the cell phone at her waist began trilling. She yanked it free and groaned when she saw who had broken the giddy spell Gabriel had woven over her.

  She hit the talk pad and spoke into it. “Hey.”

  “Hey, baby. Where are you? Thought you’d be home by now.” Mark sounded put out. “I felt bad about earlier. I was gonna stop by and apologize.”

  Lana knew all about Mark’s apologies. Once upon a time they’d been fun. Good thing she was a long way from home. She didn’t seem to be in the mood for one tonight.

  “Yeah, well, looks like you’ll just have to grovel over the phone tonight, babe, ’cuz I’m spending the night in Memphis.”

  “In Memphis? What the hell for?” He was pissed now, she could hear it.

  “I had to interview a witness on this case, and I was too damn tired to drive all the way back to Nashville, that’s what for.” Did she sound pissed, too? She thought so.

  “A witness? All the way to hell and gone in Memphis?”