Dark Swan

by Showalter, Gena

  “I know that,” she snapped, fighting past a wave of hurt. I don’t want him either, remember? “But it happened. It’s done, and I don’t know how to undo it.” She threw her arms into the air. “So congratulations. You’re now married to me. Husband.”

  “Like hell. Consider yourself divorced, effective immediately.”

  She blew him a kiss using a single finger. The middle one. “Yes, because that’s exactly how it works.”

  Fury blazed in those arctic eyes. “How does it work, then?”

  “I told you I don’t know.” She drew in a heavy breath, held . . . held . . . certain of only one thing. “Unless one of us dies. Then the other will follow.”

  Wait. Wait! An exception to the rule teased the back of her mind—but though she concentrated, that exception remained hidden in the shadows of Dallas’s deluge.

  He bared his teeth in a scowl, and suddenly all she wanted to do was rip away his clothes, one passion exchanged for another. She wanted to claim his mouth in another savage kiss, wanted to bite and suck on his tongue, his lips . . . wanted to grind on him and crawl all over him. To take and take and take some more. To be the bad girl—the evil one—the doctors had always considered her.

  Lady Wicked wants her man.

  Maybe Dallas desired something similar. His hands clenched and unclenched at his sides, his chest rising and falling quickly but shallowly, his nostrils flared.

  “Why would you do this to me?” he demanded.

  “Like I had a choice,” she snapped. Did I? Then she repeated, “It happened. Get over it, move on.”

  “Move on? Please, enlighten me. How am I supposed to do that while details I never learned bombard me?”

  “What kinds of details?” she asked, though she already knew the answer.

  “When the Falle mate, the heart of the male and the heart of the female click together like puzzle pieces, their lives forever entwined. If the two fail to consummate their union in a timely manner, they will devolve into a monstrous state until they think of nothing but copulation, until they will do anything to screw each other—until they will slay anyone who tries to stop them.”

  Yes. She’d read those things in the files at the lab. And for the first time, she worried she might turn on her sisters. Just to get naked with him!

  No. No! She would have sex with Dallas, and soon, so her head would remain clear. Then, despite the bond, she would figure out a way to save Trinity from him.

  So. Okay. All right. She had a new mission. Seduce the prick.

  He scowled and tapped his ear on his shoulder. “What?”

  She bristled. “You did not just speak to me like—”

  He held up a finger, looking preoccupied, indicating he needed a second. “Jade,” he said—but not to her, she now realized. “What’s her connection—never mind. The answer just came to me.”

  “Jade? What about her?” Lilica rushed over, fisted his shirt, and shook him. “Tell me!” But there was no need. The information filled her head. Walsh had attacked IOT. Jade was injured. An agent named John had saved her.

  The front door of the apartment slammed open, jolting them both. Without hesitation, Dallas shoved her behind him and grabbed a pyre-gun from somewhere underneath the kitchen counter.

  Protecting and shielding me?

  Shock and pleasure battled for supremacy.

  Concentrate! The apartment had an open concept, allowing anyone standing in the living room to see directly into the kitchen, and vice versa. Horror slashed her forced calm to ribbons when she spotted Dr. Walsh. He was a monster. His once sun-drenched skin was now gray and oozed pus. His thick cap of hair had fallen out, half his scalp hanging down one side of his face.

  Here to kill me?

  “Don’t move,” she shouted, using compulsion as she stalked forward.

  He moved, baring crimson-stained teeth in a parody of a smile. He lifted a skinny arm to point a gnarled finger in her direction. “Mine.” Even his voice had changed. It was deeper than before, harder, as if it had been forged in the bowels of hell.

  Dallas gripped her bare wrist and yanked her back into place, as if he didn’t want another man to see her in her bra and panties. “She’s mine.” He aimed the gun and fired off a shot, a beam of blue light nailing Walsh in the chest. The former doctor—former human!—merely stumbled back a few steps, the new gaping wound sizzling and steaming.

  I’m his? “I just need to touch him,” she told Dallas. “I’ll tell him to die, and our problem will be solved.” Except that Walsh no longer had a life force. He was already dead. Would compulsion ever work on him again?

  “You’re not touching him.” In a single heartbeat, Dallas shot a circle around her. The floorboards, support beams, and insulation burned, ash swiftly rising up to choke her.

  His thoughts were now blocked. “What are you—” The floor gave and with a scream, she dropped with it.

  She landed inside another apartment, air gusting from her lungs, her knees buckling. She rolled out of the way, expecting Dallas to jump down and join her. He didn’t. But he did open his mind again, probably unwittingly, allowing his plan to crackle through the bond. He would stay behind, fight Walsh, find a way to free himself from Lilica, then kill Trinity.

  Well, good luck with that. Lilica leaped to her feet. The owner of the apartment raced around the corner, took one look at the damage to her home, and shrieked.

  Part of Lilica shouted: Dress, return to Dallas, help him. The other part demanded she leave now, now, now, while he couldn’t do anything to stop her. She would find Jade and make sure her sister was okay.

  Yes. That one. Lilica rushed past the woman. She entered the first bedroom she came across and grabbed two pieces of clothing from a dresser. Then, dressing along the way, she sprinted into the hall, down the stairs, out of the building, and into the evening darkness.

  5

  Monster-man pawed a bare foot over the floor, preparing to attack.

  Dallas had two options: stay and fight him, now that Lilica was out of the danger zone, or chase Lilica before she managed to drop off the grid.

  The problem? If Dallas found her, Monster-man could find her. So, no contest, really. Dallas would fight.

  “Mine,” the bastard repeated.

  The name Walsh drifted through Dallas’s mind, startling him. Another of Lilica’s memories?

  With a roar, the creature rushed him. No, not him. Monster-man had his gaze locked on the hole in the floor. He intended to follow Lilica through, didn’t he? Rage surged through Dallas. He dove at Walsh, shoving him in the opposite direction. They slammed into a counter, pieces of rotted flesh falling from the bastard and adhering to Dallas. Disgusting!

  Maintaining his grip on his gun, he stood and kicked Walsh in the stomach.

  “What’s going on?” Devyn demanded through the internal cell phone.

  The Targon had called to tell him about the other sister, Jade. Although Devyn didn’t yet know Jade was fruit from the same tree. Dallas wasn’t sure how, exactly, he himself knew. Or how he also knew that Monster-man used to be a doctor at IOT, responsible for the care and feeding of the eldest Swan triplet. Trinity, Lilica’s full-blood sister.

  No wonder she hoped to save the diseased girl.

  “Dallas. An answer, if you please.”

  Right. “I’m dealing with John’s problem. Give me a minute.”

  As Dallas pistol-whipped and kicked, more facts swam through his mind. Lilica had once commanded Walsh to kill himself and his colleagues, and the compulsion to obey had been so strong, he’d risen from his grave.

  I’m actually fighting the living dead. At least the creature wasn’t contagious like Trinity.

  “Why are you after Lilica?” Pistol-whip. “She isn’t your colleague.” Kick.

  Good old-fashioned vengeance? Or had his rotting brain gotten s
tuck on the kill setting?

  Walsh swung a meaty fist at Dallas. He didn’t even try to dodge, using the opportunity to shove the barrel of his gun into the bastard’s mouth. With a jerk of his thumb, he dialed the weapon to his favorite setting: play and spray. Then he squeezed the trigger.

  Whoosh!

  The back of Walsh’s skull popped off, splattering pieces of bone and bits of tissue across the kitchen. Unfazed, Walsh threw a punch. For a moment, Dallas saw stars.

  “So? Who’s winning?” Devyn asked, and it sounded like he was eating an apple.

  “Shut up.” Pain exploded through Dallas’s head as he took a blow to the cheek. “Tell me how to kill a zombie.”

  “Which do you prefer? Shut up or tell you? You can’t have both.”

  “Devyn!”

  “Fine. You have to eat his brains. Wait. Abort mission! That’s what you do if you’re a zombie.”

  “Funny.” He worked his legs up, flattened his booted feet on Walsh’s chest, and kicked. “Any other suggestions?”

  “You have to decapitate him.”

  Walsh collided with the kitchen counter again, but quickly jumped to his feet and tried to dive through the hole in the floor.

  “The zombie is my favorite sexual position, you know.” Ice clinked in a glass as Devyn paused to take a sip. “I just lie back and let myself get eaten.”

  Dallas fisted the back of Walsh’s shirt, stopping him. Barely. “Can the jokes wait? I’m fighting for my life here.”

  “But I wasn’t joking.”

  He tried to tug Walsh backward, but the shirt tore, and Walsh fell through the hole at last, crash-landing in the apartment below.

  Without a moment’s hesitation, Dallas followed him through.

  Monster-man was crouched on all fours by the time Dallas smashed into him. Walsh thumped against the floor while the impact did nothing but shake Dallas’s knees. Apparently zombies made excellent cushions.

  A human female screamed obscenities at them, her fear and distress only intensifying as Dallas pressed the barrel of his gun against Walsh’s shoulder and, in less than a second, fired off three consecutive blasts. The male’s arm detached.

  Walsh bucked him off and bolted to his feet. He swung around to throw another punch. But without his dominant arm, his body merely jerked. Frowning, he kicked Dallas in the face. Brain and skull went head-to-head, and skull won.

  Pounding footsteps echoed as Walsh raced to the door—and burst through it.

  Wonderful. Dallas pursued, the only person in history ever to run at a zombie. He caught up at the bank of elevators and jumped on Walsh’s back, taking him to the ground. He kept his arm extended, shooting at Walsh’s ankle as they fell. Upon landing, the foot detached.

  “Are you done yet?” Devyn yawned.

  “No! Why don’t you make yourself useful and hack into—”

  “Like I haven’t done so. I’m watching you through security cameras right now. You need to shower, by the way. In bleach.”

  Walsh lumbered to his feet—foot—and hobbled to the stairwell door to sniff. Did he smell roses and aged firewood?

  Dallas hopped up and threw himself into Monster-man yet again. They smashed into the door and ricocheted backward. This time, the gun fell from Dallas’s grip. Oh, well. Both hands now free, he gripped Walsh by the shoulders and rolled, slinging him overhead.

  Ding.

  The elevator doors slid open. The people inside caught sight of the pus-covered agent and his one-armed, one-footed victim and gasped with horror. Most smashed themselves against the far wall. One pressed all the buttons on the panel in an attempt to escape.

  Walsh leaped up and stomped on Dallas as he returned to the stairwell. But Dallas clasped his ankle, tripping him, and scrambled to his feet. He performed the only move available to him and kicked Walsh between the legs; slick with pus and bodily fluids, the creature slipped forward. Another kick, this one stronger, and Walsh slid across the floor until his head and shoulders were inside the still-open elevator, the rest of him outside of it.

  Dallas didn’t have to issue a command to Devyn. His friend knew him well, and had already guessed what he wanted. Click, click, click. The sounds of fingers tapping against a keyboard to override security settings filled his head.

  The elevator doors shut before Walsh was able to stand and, with the sensors now turned off, sliced him in two.

  Click, click, click.

  Ding.

  The door opened again, revealing Monster-man’s severed head . . . and the screaming people inside in the car.

  “Clean up on aisle five,” he muttered, kicking the motionless body out of the way.

  “I already called your boss,” Devyn replied. “She should be there any—”

  The door to the stairwell swung open, Mia Snow soaring into the hall, a pyre-gun aimed and ready. Her black hair was pulled back in a ponytail, nothing hiding her lovely features and the determination painted all over them.

  “Thanks for nothing,” he told her as he held up Walsh’s severed head. The small patch of hair couldn’t carry the weight, the follicles ripping free. The head fell to the floor.

  Walsh’s mouth continued to move, the word “mine” leaving him again and again.

  He still lived?

  “I told you. Mine.” Dallas stomped on the creature’s face. Rotted bones caved easily, leaving only fetid pulp. “What’s the old saying? Bad enough to gag a maggot.”

  “A-a-a-nd this is where I say good-bye.” The call with Devyn ended.

  As field agents got to work, calming the humans, cleaning up the mess, Mia looked Dallas over. Her eyes—as blue as Dallas’s own, as Arcadian as Dallas’s own—twinkled merrily. “I’ve always wanted to say this and mean it, and now I can. You disgust me.”

  “I disgust myself. I definitely need to be decontaminated.” He swiped up his pyre-gun. Every instinct he possessed screamed, Go after Lilica. Now! She could camouflage herself, and never be found. But he resisted. Others might not be able to find her, but he could. Any day, anytime. Just then her current location was like a beacon in his mind. She was headed to IOT to check on Jade.

  There was no place she could hide from him. And the fault was hers. She’d bonded them, becoming the author of her own downfall.

  The bond! That was how he’d known so much about Walsh, Trinity, and Jade.

  Well, well. The bond wasn’t such a hardship, after all. At least for now.

  Go get your woman!

  No. Not yet. First, he was going to shower. In bleach, as Devyn had recommended. Then he was going to do more research on the Falle. Then and only then would he track down his supposed wife. What he’d do to her when he reached her—well, only time would tell.

  Lilica blended into the night’s shadows as she made her way to the institute. The farther she was from Dallas, the more intensely her body ached, as if every cell already missed him. Which was pure craziness! But even worse was the pain that had just exploded through her cheek and jaw, as if she’d run into a wall. Not the pain itself, but the tormented thoughts that had accompanied it.

  Had she just experienced Dallas’s pain? Was he all right?

  Determined, she ignored the sensations and thoughts and increased her speed. Unlike her previous foray into this unknown world, when she’d shown herself to one and all, no one stopped to point or laugh at her . . . but only because they couldn’t see her.

  A few minutes ago she’d reached out to Jade, and this time her telepathic power had worked. But her sister had yet to reply.

  Fear bombarded her. If Walsh had slain sweet, tormented Jade . . .

  I will burn this world to the ground.

  She increased her pace yet again. IOT was headquartered at the far edge of No Man’s Land, where the air was so acidic humans couldn’t visit without wearing masks and bodysuits. Some al
ien races thrived there and lived within the surrounding buildings, but none of the otherworlders dared approach the institute. They’d heard the rumors. Go inside, never come out.

  On the outside, her home looked to be an abandoned warehouse with walls made of beat-to-hell metal. On the inside, everything was state-of-the-art, the interior walls made of an alien metal stronger than titanium. Nothing passed through the doors without permission, not even a slight breeze. Well, except Devyn. And Walsh. And someone named John, apparently.

  Lilica could withstand the acidic air, but not for long. Right now, too much of her flesh was exposed. She wore two short-sleeved T-shirts. One as intended, while the other was tied around her waist, pretending to be a skirt. Next time she needed clothing, she’d do a better job stealing.

  By the time she completed the palm-print ID, the front door sliding open to welcome her inside the purification sector of the building, her eyes, nose, and throat were raw and bleeding.

  The pain lessened as a cool, scentless mist sprayed every inch of her.

  “Purification complete,” an automated voice announced.

  Another door opened, this one leading deeper inside. Ah, home sweet home.

  There were only three floors. Trinity had been kept up top, Jade in the middle, and Lilica at the bottom. Their bedrooms had differed greatly. Trinity had enjoyed a luxurious suite fit for a princess. Jade had a bedroom with minimal comforts, while Lilica had a closet without windows. Her only furnishings were a cot and a bucket.

  The difference in bedrooms had been one of a million tests. Would living conditions influence a person’s personality?

  The doctors had concluded: yes.

  The bottom floor also contained the main laboratory and multiple cages, used for any other test subjects who had been brought in. A.k.a. the otherworlders the triplets had used to hone their superpowers.

  Simply more tests, Lilica now knew.

  The middle floor held the viewing rooms, where most testing had been done. The top floor had been reserved for bedrooms. Some employees had lived here while others had stayed for extended periods.