Touch of Danger
Vol. 1 of the Three Worlds Saga
by Carol A. Strickland
Contents
Part One
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Part Two
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Epilogue
About the Author
Part One
Chapter 1
White fear washed through her like ice, and once again Carolina O’Kelly asked herself if now wasn’t a good time to take another step back from life. She couldn’t think straight. This was all getting too real, and if she got flustered she’d die.
The hotel was burning down around her.
Wishing wouldn’t stanch the smoke. She shivered in the heat of the tropical morning.
Come on, do something! she ordered herself through the numbing daze. Focus on goal A. Okay, this is me now, doing something. She sat frozen on the bed.
The hotel posted no fire instructions on the door that allowed tendrils of smoke to curl into the room, despite the wet towels stuffed under it. No fire trucks had yet shown up here in the middle of nowhere.
Hard reality was that no matter how anxiously she wished, the ParaNet was probably on the other side of the world stopping some war or another. The harder reality was that Lina O’Kelly was too damned unimportant for even the most minor of ParaNetters to care about.
It was up to her to save herself. As usual.
“This is not funny, God,” she muttered, and the flames of righteous indignation blazed through her inner freeze.
She jerked the knot on the sheets in her lap tighter, letting out an “umph!” for her efforts. It didn’t feel secure to her. She stepped on one sheet and pulled up, testing—and the knot slipped.
Damn.
So she reknotted it and pushed the thought of failure away as if it were a physical thing. It was five long stories to the ground from this rapidly-crumbling firetrap someone had advertised as a hotel. A bitter, dark fume oozed out of the electrical outlet next to her.
She set to work on the next sheet, tying it to the thin blanket with renewed determination. All she had to do was plan and take action: one, two, three, like all the Zig Ziglar motivational speeches she listened to.
Goal A? Get out of hotel. Alive.
Dying was not on her list of life goals. Sure, she might break a leg on the way down, but if she did, she’d still be able to crawl to safety.
She tugged on the new knot. This one held—good. Hope bloomed within her. Gathering up her prize, she ran to the balcony and threw it over the railing. It unwound down the side of the ugly cement structure—less than halfway. The bloom soured into a tight ball in her gut.
**You’ll need more sheets,** they told her.
“I noticed,” she replied. She closed her eyes, took a deep, cleansing breath and tried not to notice the burning taint that came with it. Squaring her shoulders, she hauled the liferope back up. She looked around her room desperately. Long locks of dark hair still wet from her shower slapped against her face as she turned. The room’s curtains were already ripped; they’d never begin to hold her. Where could she get some more sheets? How much time did she have?
Damned cheap hotel! She should have paid more and stayed down the road in St. Catherine, at one of the nice, nonflammable hotels there. Trying to save a few bucks—stupid! Stupid! Lina cursed herself as she dragged her chain of sheets back inside.
She grabbed some clothes, her wallet and her iPad, and stuffed them into her beach bag before she paused to stare at it. What was she doing? Having something to wear besides this nightgown was a B goal at most. This was not survival.
She was getting rattled again. Remember Goal A. Everything was expendable except herself. Still, the bag was packed; no need to waste it. She tossed it onto the balcony to grab on the way out.
She fumbled at sneakers, but her hands shook too badly to pull the laces into any kind of bow or knot. Get hold of yourself, Muttbutt! she berated herself. She hurled the shoes out over the balcony, venting her rage and frustration. Put the shoes on once she was down and safe.
Lina wanted to kick the walls and scream. This damned cardboard hotel didn’t offer much for survival. Hell, the fire alarm hadn’t even peeped yet. She’d used up all her room’s resources. What was left? Oh—other rooms. Behind a chair stood a connecting door to the room next door.
Of course it was locked. Nothing in this life came easy. She hurled herself at the door—yowch!—did it again—and it gave. One more heave and it crashed open.
The cloud of dark gray smoke hanging in this room whirlpooled from the disturbance. After she pulled her nightgown’s bodice up to cover her nose and mouth, Lina yanked one corner of sheets and blankets off the bed there as quickly as she could. Still she had to pause to cough out the bitter smoke.
Suddenly someone pounded at the hallway door. The sound stopped. She heard male coughing in the corridor, then the pounding resumed. Please, God, let it be a fireman!
“Hold on!” she cried as she unlocked the door. It stuck. The person on the other side threw himself against it. As it finally slammed open, a new, darker cloud of smoke followed. Heat poured in like a wave. Lina doubled over in a paroxysm of coughing. The blind sound of man-coughing echoed her. He wheezed as he shoved the door closed behind himself and then pulled Lina closer to the balcony and fresh air.
She gasped it in and rubbed her tearing eyes.
“You okay?” the man asked.
She blinked against the blur. Tall. Brawny. Dark hair, medium-brown skin. A familiar, chiseled jaw line and even more familiar black clothing. Valiant? Awright, Valiant! Yes!
Valiant of the ParaNet.
Valiant equaled safety. Lina’s shoulders sagged with relief.
But... but he wasn’t doing anything. He wasn’t putting out the fire with his parapowers, wasn’t sweeping her up in his arms to fly her from this horrible mess. This had to be someone dressed like the famous parahero.
But no. The right sleeve of the costume might be in shreds, but the face was definitely his.
“I’m, I’m fine. Thanks,” she managed to say. One step farther back; this wasn’t reality, was it?
“Oui, I’m the real thing,” he assured her, and his voice held Valiant’s French-Canadian accent, the rich timbre. “But non, maintenant I have no powers. Sorry. Don’t worry. We’ll get out.”
He scanned the area outside the balcony, assessing the situation much as she’d done. Then he turned back into the room to circle the place as he kept low out of the smoke, checking what was in drawers, searching for tools. Valiant tried the phone but put it ba
ck when someone told him no one was answering downstairs. Oh—she had. Her body was talking while she numbly stood somewhere behind herself. Too far from reality, Lina. Come back. Don’t forget the fire.
Valiant without powers! How had that happened? And a helluva time for it to happen. God was certainly having a good belly laugh at her expense today, but He had no business laughing at Valiant. Valiant was one of the good guys. He was Important.
Valiant went out to the balcony again.
“There’s no way down out there,” she told him. “I think we have to make our own rope. Help me with these sheets. Please?”
He grunted his acceptance of her plan and together they wrestled the final sheets off the bed. While he dragged the bundle to her room she retrieved towels out of the bathroom.
Once back, she wet the towels and stuffed them around the connecting door as... Valiant... snapped the TV off. CNNi had been airing PanRand, with that spectacular footage of Valiant towing a transatlantic jet on his back to a safe landing. The powerless version here and now sat on her bed and knotted cheap sheets together.
He nodded with his chin at the sheets she’d already worked. “They’ll never hold,” he declared. “Watch.”
He made some kind of sailor’s knot with his sheets: over, over and through. He gave it an ineffectual tug and frowned.
“I’ll get used to this,” he muttered, and then jerked the knot tight with more force than was necessary. He displayed the result to her before starting on a new sheet.
Lina quickly undid her knots and retied them the way he did. When she pulled on the two ends, the connection was definitely stronger.
Her guides’ warning cut through Lina’s concentration. **Get out now.**
“You could have given me a little more warning,” she griped.
“Warning?” Valiant asked.
“Sorry, not you,” she said quickly. “Um, we’ve got to get out now.”
He fished inside his black vest. “I have some twine we could add to these knots. You have a scissors or knife?” he asked.
“Sorry,” she told him, trying not to panic at the stream of **hurry, hurry, hurry,** in her mind, “but we’ve got to get out now, ready or not.” She knotted her first sheet to the balcony railing. Throwing the line of sheets over the edge, she caught the last corner. “Come on, give me yours,” she demanded.
“Not yet. We’re in enough trouble as it is. We have time to make this safer.”
“No, we don’t,” she told him. “They say we have to get out now. Hurry!”
“Qui? Who says?”
“My guides. Please don’t argue with my guides; they’re usually right. Usually.”
He sat there on the bed, frowning at her and not moving.
“I know it sounds weird, but please. Please! We’ve got to hurry. Now, they say.”
**Tell him to roll when he hits.**
“And they say to roll when you hit,” she added as she grabbed the sheets from him. He opened his mouth to say something when she held up a warning finger. “Tell me I’m crazy once we’re down. Please, we’ve got to get out now!”
He shook his head in surrender and worked the final knot himself. “It should be more secure,” he warned, then shrugged. “The cards we’re dealt,” he said as if that decided things.
Lina watched the line of sheets and blankets fall. The final length was close enough to the ground; good. “Okay, you go first. I have to get my—”
But he was already lifting her up, swinging her over the railing as if he’d done this a million times before. “You’re first. Make it quick.”
She jerked away from his invading touch and overbalanced. Grabbing the balcony rail, she took an instant to steady herself, then started down.
“Toss me my bag!” she called to him and hoped he could hear her over the bass roaring of the fire. By now it crooned like a high wind. Currents of scorched, super-heated air clung to the sides of the building. Tiny square pieces of smoky soot swirled upward around her.
Lina shimmied down the fragile lifeline as fast as she could in the thickening haze, but it took forever. The flimsy fabric started to rip already. As soon as she thought it was safe, she jumped off the sheets to save them for Valiant’s trip. No broken leg!
“Go!” she shouted up at him but he was already scrambling over the railing. The sky hung black with smoke above him. Was that a lick of flame on the balcony curtain?
It really was him, she decided in wonder. The most amazing man in the world. The hero constantly in the news, battling all kinds of para-criminals, clearing out natural disasters. Flying through the sky, a leader among Earth’s paraheroes, the pride of Canada and New York City.
But he was having trouble handling the shifting make-do rope shredding from above him. The rip began with him still up high.
“Roll when you hit!” she frantically reminded him. Pressing her hands against her mouth, she begged his angels to protect him as she watched him fall in slow motion. The sheets disintegrated under his weight. Too high! He twisted stiffly and landed hard on his left shoulder.
“Jesus!” Lina cried.
Between great howls of pain, Valiant let out a string of curses in English, French and some other language she’d never heard before—but at least that meant he was alive.
She ran to help him sit up. “Are you all right? I mean other than the shoulder?”
He shouted some more curses at the world. “Que je suis bête! I forgot to roll. It feels—” Valiant groaned as he tried to move his shoulder. “Dislocated? Hurts like hell and a half!”
A faraway look hazed her eyes. “Dislocated, yes,” she agreed. “Nothing’s broken. But there’s something terribly wrong. Show me, please.”
“Who—”
She held up her hand and listened to something he couldn’t hear. “I’m sorry. What is that? A microscope? Oh, okay.” Her eyebrows knit in concentration. She shook her head, disturbed at something. “What’s the cure?” she asked.
On top of it all, I’m stuck with a lunatic, Valiant decided. Talking to herself. The girl was bi-polar or something.
A beautiful lunatic.
“Your cells are in deep shock,” she told him, her brow creased with concern. “They say you need to rest and keep warm, treat yourself as if you were in shock and not just your cells. The longer you put off resting, the longer it’ll take to heal.”
Valiant hissed at the pain and glanced up to see flames founting from the fifth floor windows, the same room they’d just so hurriedly left. The girl looked back, too.
“Aw, shoo!” she cried. “My bag’s up there!”
Black smoke settled and coalesced to form a cloud around the building. Good thing they’d gotten out when they did. “I don’t think there’s much left of your bag now.” Valiant wobbily shifted to get up with a scowl and sharp intake of breath for his pain.
The girl eased him back down onto the lawn using just a fingertip. “Sit,” she suggested. “Enjoy the show, I guess. Rest while we wait for the fire department to show.”
“I’m in shock and I need to rest,” he condescended to repeat as he sized up their situation. Push the pain back and down. Keep Crazy Girl thinking that he thought she was normal so she wouldn’t freak out.
He needed to get her to safety—no, get both of them to safety. Time to start thinking like a norm and not a megapara. His sharp mind cut through the momentary uncertainty of his situation to formulate strategy.
He rolled to put his weight on his good right hand, and then gingerly stood up. He told himself he could ignore the shafts of pain ripping up his arm to the top of his head. He ordered his body to shut up. He had to hold his left arm with his right so it wouldn’t drag at his shoulder, but at least then he could think. Priorities and strategy: those were their only hope, his sudden humanity be damned.
“No,” the girl declared. “You’re not in shock, not on a level of your body being in shock in a holistic way. On a smaller scale—a cellular level—you’re in shock. Yo
ur cells can’t operate like they normally do. They’re sort of shut down or something.”
She gestured with her hands: big, then small, and he didn’t get any of it. In this situation it wasn’t important to understand a crazy person.
“So you don’t feel like you’re in shock even though you are,” she finished as if that explained it all.
He gave her a clear look of disbelief. “And just where are you getting all of this?” he asked her. “Are you some kind of psychic friend? Shirley MacLaine in disguise?”
“Who are you in disguise?” she asked archly. “The Valiant I’ve seen flies and doesn’t fall. Doesn’t get dislocated shoulders because he’s invulnerable. And he could put this fire out in a couple of minutes.”
Few people had l’audace to stand up to him. He could tell when she realized who she was talking to because she bit her lip and dropped her gaze.
“I’m, I’m sorry. I know what I say sounds funny, sounds loony tunes, but I really think it’s true.”
He gave her a half-frown. Even if she were crazy, it was difficult to be too frustrated with her. She had big, innocent green eyes and dark wet hair with reddish tints in it. If her skin had been brown, she could have passed for part Polynesian by the ovalness of her face, the wide cheekbones, the hint of a slant to her eyes. But the lips were full only by Caucasian standards, the skin a peach-tinged ivory.
She was tall and awesomely buxom, wearing only a little white nightie that came down almost to her knees, thin material trimmed in eyelet lace. “Don’t let a pretty face fool you,” Hal had taught him, but he’d always been a sucker for sexy women.
He couldn’t let himself be distracted from the mission at hand. Valiant turned and squinted at the fire, already down to the third floor. It moved like arson, feeding on something deliberate. “It would take me more like ten, fifteen minutes to put this out, especially since there’s no one to rescue.”
He turned back to her and took her measure from a more professional standpoint. Was there anything in her open and rather inept body language that disguised deceit? “Except you.”
“What? Where are all the others?” She snapped to attention, her gaze raking the windows and grounds of the hotel. “But just thirty or forty minutes ago, there were maybe six people in the pool, another fifteen or so just walking around: Americans, Asian tourists. I was surprised because it was so early. There was a big group of Australians or New Zealanders here, some sort of convention. They were all men. Creepy men. They’ve been running around drunk all night. I bet you anything one of them started this.”
Touch of Danger (Three Worlds) Page 1
