Veil of Justice, Shadows of Justice Book 3

by Regan Black

  They’d rehearsed the answer and outlined the plan countless times. Simon's brief hesitation set Kristoff’s teeth grinding.

  "I use the casino hideout for two months. After that, I can enjoy one kill a month. If I’m caught, I use my Keris on myself."

  "That’s right." Kristoff beamed like a proud father. "So why worry for me?"

  "I don't want you to die. I would miss you," he confessed on a whisper.

  "Who told you that nonsense?" Sheer willpower kept him from screaming the words.

  "My sister."

  "Who?" Kristoff felt completely at sea.

  "My sister, Petra."

  Kristoff pushed to his feet, but there was no escape, no outlet for the waves of anger pulsing through him. He yanked up his sleeve and smacked another pain patch onto his arm.

  Petra! The woman continued to thwart him at every turn.

  Seeing the complete sincerity, the utter belief in Simon’s eyes, Kristoff stifled the tirade burning his tongue. He couldn’t argue against fact, but how had she known he’d used Burkhardt genes to create Simon in his fertility lab? He could only surmise that the common source had made it easier for Petra to plant seeds of emotions that Simon would reach for.

  "You let her use you," he pointed out.

  Simon studied his shoes. "I let you use me."

  Kristoff felt something completely foreign skate down his neck. Fear.

  If Petra had managed to tap Simon’s humanity, nothing was beyond her reach. And if Petra started reaching for the truth, his plan could crumble. Nathan had been a vital pawn which had been snatched from him by a virtual unknown. He was still waiting on solid intel regarding the woman who’d liberated Nathan.

  Kristoff rubbed at the knots in his neck and considered how to rein Simon back in. "You and I have an understanding. You’ve always been free to go, as long as you don’t speak about our association. This sister you claim used her gifts to suppress you."

  "Only for her survival," Simon insisted as if that was somehow a credit.

  Kristoff dismissed that with a wave. "Enough. Are you with me or do we part ways here?"

  "Always," Simon stated, "I’m with you."

  "Then let’s move on." He had an impatient client to satisfy. Not to mention his own curiosity.

  "You forgive me?"

  The ridiculous words irritated Kristoff. "Yes. You’re like a son, Simon. I want you with me to the end." Kristoff breathed easier when the younger man nodded. The familiar glint of mad anticipation lit Simon's eyes, going a long way to soothing Kristoff.

  "What next?" Simon asked.

  "Let’s see if we’ve any news." Kristoff dragged a chair toward the bank of computers on the long wall of the room they were hiding in. As his lieutenants checked in via secure weblink, he’d learned his primary Chicago refuge was compromised. One by one, he ordered his team to the casino on the Ohio River while he waited for the news from the team he'd sent overseas.

  If only Petra hadn't eluded him, he might already know how the mission progressed. Refusing to wallow in past mistakes, Kristoff scanned news and government links for any word on the search for Nathan.

  Dubbed only as the Leavenworth Escapee, Nathan had yet to turn up on any of the routes Kristoff expected. He tried to use what he'd gleaned from his confrontation with Petra to find some lead on Nathan, but he gave up quickly when a surge of pain lanced his head. When he caught up with Nathan, he’d be sure to ask how they dealt with the effects of extra-sensory mental tasking. Grudgingly, he admired their strength, even though they wielded it against him – for now.

  "Dr. Leo?" Simon’s call wrenched him away from his daydreams. "This message says the team is stateside."

  "At last!" Taking Simon's seat, he keyed in the message sequence guiding the group to the casino. When he finished he turned to Simon. "Use the janitor’s code to file a break in report and then find us new transportation."

  "Yes, sir."

  The tension alleviated, Kristoff felt generous. "When we get to the casino, you can kill a local or two."

  Simon's content smile was reassuring. Soon all would again be right with Kristoff’s world.

  * * *

  The whole story. Kelly sighed. It wasn't that simple. Sharing the whole story would be a mistake worthy of severe punishment, if her father were still alive to mete it out.

  Of course, if she knew the whole story it would help. In truth, she was just as baffled as Nathan. She hadn’t decided how best to deal with the murderous thieves and she suspected Nathan didn’t know how to recover or solve the mystery of a group of missing prisoners.

  She risked a sidelong glance. He’d rolled the window down. Aside from his shabby appearance he looked content. A bath, a haircut, and a couple weeks of decent food and he’d be back to the man she’d met just a year ago.

  As long as the virus didn’t strike again. Setting the Mira theory aside, she’d feel better hearing him declared fit after a real hands-on physical.

  * * *

  Nathan was dreaming again but he may as well have been shouting. Kelly assumed it was the proximity that had Nate’s thoughts coming so fast and clear in her own head. She spared him another concerned glance. Sound asleep, he couldn't know he was telegraphing so much. Since she had a particular and personal aversion to telling him any secrets, she did her best to ignore his visions of rats, fear, and absolute loss.

  She checked the clock on the dash and confirmed the time with a glance to the sky. Out here in the wide-open plains, it was easy to see they were only about an hour from dawn. She kept the car aimed toward her uncle's place but they needed to find someplace closer to rest and hide soon. Though the authorities hadn't resumed the chase, she didn't want to press her luck by pushing on through the day.

  Nathan said he'd be well in the daylight, with fresh air and space. So far she wasn’t convinced he was making any steady improvement. He'd had breakthroughs…she glanced at him, thinking about that kiss…but she hoped the setbacks –

  Hope vaporized as an invisible fist cinched her throat, cutting off her air and pressing her to the driver's window. She stretched to keep her hands on the wheel while she eased her foot off the gas. If she could just get safely to the shoulder.

  "Nathan?" Her voice didn't work; her larynx useless under the crushing pressure. She tried again, mentally this time, "Nathan!"

  He twitched.

  Kelly fought panic as her vision hazed red with black around the edges. The car rolled on, slower, but she couldn't move her foot to the brake. Whatever had her pressed harder, hard enough to break the seat.

  She didn't get it. They were in the middle of nowhere. Alone. Kristoff couldn't have this kind of reach. Bracing for whatever nightmare plagued Nathan, she reached for their mental connection once more.

  Her vision went black and it took the nasty stench to clue her in. He was back in his cell and he'd brought her with him. A feral growl built and morphed into a scream. She wasn't sure if it came from his memory or her present.

  Oddly, she thought the car was still moving, but all she could see was a distorted man at the end of an impossibly long arm. Either she was going insane, or she was playing the rat role in Nathan's post traumatic stress nightmare.

  "Nathan," she begged as the man pressed her chin to an impossible angle.

  FIVE

  Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak;

  courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen. Winston Churchill

  Jaden watched the first edge of the sun warming up the horizon while frustration rode her hard. In the helicopter they'd borrowed from the Marine Corps, they continued their hunt along all the main roads leading away from the prison. Three days of searching still hadn't shown them even a glimmer of Nathan's Mustang. She wanted to follow Petra's example of unrelenting hope, but her cynical side was telling her this was a lost cause at best, a trap at worst.

  Beside her Cleveland smacked the receiver against his leg. "I don't get it. I put that tracking tag on m
yself. This should've been a cakewalk."

  Jaden thought he sounded rather like her husband with the retro clichés. Maybe she shouldn't let them spend so much time together.

  "There!" Jaden pointed to a car slumped into a ditch. "Is it running? Are they alive?"

  In the pilot's seat, Petra's husband Gideon dipped his chin. "Affirmative. Two warm bodies and a hot engine."

  Jaden looked at Cleveland's display. No reading that this was the right Mustang, but what were the odds?

  She slid back the helicopter door, ready to repel down, but Cleveland grabbed her collar. "Give him a minute. They aren't going anywhere."

  Gideon fed them more details as they popped into his head's up display. "Driver's heart rate is racing. Passenger is nearly comatose."

  "Set us down!" she barked. Gideon was adjusting for wind and safety, but her patience, always in short supply, evaporated with each additional ray of sunshine. "We've gotta get out of here before daybreak."

  "Working on it," Gideon barked back.

  Jaden jumped out before the runners touched down, and raced to the car. Cleveland waited, but with his longer gait eating up the difference they reached the car simultaneously.

  Jaden held a hand up, signaling him to hold, then she moved closer, gun drawn. It was loaded with stunner shot, but Gideon had real ammo loaded on the helicopter's guns.

  Creeping closer to the car, which was still running, she saw Petra's former assistant, Kelly in the driver's seat. The girl was clawing at her neck, but even in the seconds Jaden observed, she was losing the fight.

  Confirming it was Nathan, albeit a pretty worn out version, in the passenger seat, Jaden put the gun away.

  Cleveland rushed forward and Gideon kept watch from the helicopter.

  "Something's blocked her airway," Jaden explained. "Wake him up while I work with her."

  Cleveland muttered about Nathan breaking apart, but he shook the shoulder once, then again. Finally the man in the seat blinked up at him. "Rough night?" Cleveland asked with a smile.

  Nathan only blinked.

  "This guy is nearly comatose," Cleveland said to Jaden.

  Jaden jumped back as Kelly suddenly reared up off the seat gulping air. Then she had to pull the smaller woman out of the car when Kelly started beating on Nathan.

  Jaden dodged fists and feet as Kelly flailed around, yelling about rats, telepathy and ungrateful bastards. "Give me a hand," she pleaded to Cleveland, but he only laughed at her predicament.

  Cleveland rounded the car, but before he reached the women, he tripped. His face pressed to the pavement, asphalt digging into his cheek, he couldn't move.

  Gideon's voice boomed from the helicopter's loudspeaker. "This is a rescue, soldier. Remain calm. The rose red city glows at sunset."

  Jaden assumed that last bit was a code phrase Nathan had left in his in-case-of-capture file. Gideon repeated the message twice more before Cleveland could finally peel his face off the road.

  Jaden gave up on the single-minded fury in her arms and resorted to pressing a nerve that rendered her unconscious. "Should've started with that. Damn, would you look at her neck?"

  Cleveland scooped Kelly into his arms and carried her to the helicopter. "I'll be back for him."

  Jaden crouched down to look at Nathan from the relative safety of the open driver's side door. "How bad is it?"

  "Beats the hole."

  Poor man. Jaden's stomach twisted. She'd spent too many lives in and around the flawed justice systems of the world. At least he seemed conscious now. "Can you walk?"

  "Not yet. Did I hurt your friend?"

  "Not as bad you hurt yours." She regretted the quip when Nathan struggled to make his muscles move. "Easy, soldier. She'll be fine when she wakes up. She seems to think you were choking her."

  Nathan groaned. "Where are we?"

  "About two hundred miles west of Leavenworth."

  "No pursuit?"

  Jaden nodded. "We're trying to keep it that way." When Cleveland joined her, they looped Nathan's arms over their shoulders, intending to drag him to the helicopter.

  "Hold up," Cleveland said.

  He looked pointedly at the ground. Nathan's feet were merely open wounds linked together by narrow strips of skin. Jaden's stomach rolled again and she silently cursed whoever had done this to him.

  They shifted, using a chair carry to hustle him to the helicopter where Gideon waited with a medical kit. Jaden and Cleveland stripped the remaining gear from the Mustang and stowed it while Gideon finished the first aid and got Nathan secured for the flight.

  With a little effort they got the car out of the ditch and back on the road, then Cleveland drove away and Jaden buckled herself back into the copilot's seat.

  She and Gideon made the trip back to Chicago in silence.

  * * *

  Gideon landed the helicopter at the pad reserved for military use at Chicago's Midway airport and shut down the systems. Jaden had yet to say a word. He didn't think it was a good sign, but then, the only woman he vaguely understood was his wife.

  "I gave the girl a sedative," he said.

  "I wondered. Good plan. ETA on her getting conscious?"

  He checked his watch. "Maybe an hour."

  She nodded.

  "Are the cars ready?" she asked.

  "Three. Inside, just as requested." Gideon flicked his thumb in the general direction of the hangar. He'd done all he could to assist the rescue and help her transport both patients to the safest place in town. "Did I forget anything?"

  "Doesn't look like it." She smiled, and though it was a tired expression right now, it eased his mind some. "But I probably forgot to say thank you."

  He tapped his ball cap and gave her the wink that always worked on his wife. "You're most welcome. Now let's move some cargo. Slick Micky's waiting."

  * * *

  Nathan woke up feeling sluggish, but without the small-space panic he'd been dealing with. He prodded around his mind, took a swift inventory of his body and swore viciously to find himself trapped by the effects of Paracuron again. What the hell? Hadn't Kelly – Cali – whoever she was fixed all this?

  The encounter in the ditch had been real. He knew it! Either healing wasn't her gift, or something else was in play. Terror of the smart virus crept into his mind, but he banished it. Can't feed the negativity.

  He tested his responses, unreasonably grateful for cooperative eyelids. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. He did a quick tactile inventory and decided someone had padded the fall pretty well. The sheets were clean and soft under his fingertips and the clinical scent in the room was underwritten by the rich aroma of coffee.

  "Hello?" he called, pleased to feel his fingers and toes respond, though the rest of him felt lead lined.

  Footsteps responded, heels clicking on hard floors, in a purely feminine manner. Kelly? He was probably just wishing. She didn't seem the type for heels. Nathan shifted and failed, cursing Kristoff's chemistry that he still couldn't move any major muscle groups. Then the clean scent of vanilla teased his nose. "I've died," he whispered, "and gone to heaven."

  "You'll offend your host if you keep that up," the woman said, leaning into his field of vision.

  "Petra!" She looked amazing, healthy and a bit rounded around the edges. "Where am I? Where's Kelly? Your assistant," he clarified. "She saved me, but I might've hurt her. Is she here?"

  "Shh," Petra soothed, laying a gloved hand on his shoulder. "She's asleep in the next room."

  A dream or maybe a memory flitted at the edges of his mind. The cell, the rat, the screaming. "Did I – did I hurt her?"

  Petra shrugged a narrow shoulder. "She's sporting a few bruises, but I can hardly tell who did that."

  "So you didn't look?" Nathan knew his sister usually respected the privacy of others, but they were both curious people. It wasn't outside the realm of possibility that Petra had snooped through Kelly's memories.

  "Not past the aura," she confirmed. "Though that's hard to ignore. Do
you have any idea how much emotional baggage she's hauling around?"

  Ashamed he didn't know much at all about Kelly, Nathan gazed beyond Petra, studying the ceiling.

  "Relax. It will all be okay. Can I prop you up a bit?" She reached behind him, adjusting pillows, and he got a good view of her belly.

  "You're pregnant!"

  She stood up, patting herself all over and looking around. "What? Are you sure?"

  "You're not funny. I'll kill Gideon."

  "Neanderthal!" Petra punched him. "He's my husband, you idiot."

  "Fine. I'll reserve judgment until after."

  "After what?"

  "If the kid's ugly then I'll kill your husband."

  Petra pinned him with Medusa's look before she changed the subject. "About the poison. You're sure it's Paracuron?"

  "I'm sure." He didn't like the resulting frown on his sister's face. "Aren't you sure?"

  The frown eased a bit. "There's no reason to doubt you. Do you know which strain?"

  "No idea." Kristoff had been working on his chemistry cocktails for years. "It has to be new," Nathan pointed out, "because Kelly had me up and feeling normal just before –" whatever had happened in the car still wasn't clear.

  "Is there a Paracuron with an amnesia effect?" Petra asked.

  "I imagine that would be an ideal part of any Paracuron equation, though we've never found a soldier or inmate alive to discuss it." Those missing inmates, those who'd been soldiers, were the catalyst that forced Nathan's department to send him undercover. "Based on the lingering and alternating affects, it's obviously a smart viral.

  "Kelly told me I had a fever for a couple days. Then I felt completely normal for a bit." He left out the details in between. "Now I'm back to this."

  Petra shook her head, her brow furrowed as she thought. "We received a list of organics that might help, but I'm not sure if it's a cumulative list, or if I should try each item individually. Are you willing to help evaluate?"