Chapter 3
Evan Hill looked over at his nervous wife, Rachel. She twisted her delicate hands in constant motion around the yellow coffee mug with the pink butterfly. She loved Bella so much it was etched on every surface of her face.
He reached across the cheap Lucite table in the stuffy FBI office, and touched her hand. “These guys are the best at what they do. Murt is not going to get away with this. We’re going to take him down hard.”
Rachel nodded and wiped the tears off her cheek. Her brown eyes were so sad, she looked pretty like that, she always looked pretty. Her brown hair was in a rarely seen disheveled state. Usually Rachel was very well put together and proper, she took pride in her appearance and he liked that about her.
He patted her hand and got up. “I’m going to go see what’s going on.”
Evan walked down the red carpet hallways, making turns without thinking. He finally ended up in the war room, as they called it. But it was empty.
With a sigh, he recalled everyone was down in the north end of the spanning square building where the primary conference room was situated. He wasn’t thinking clearly at all. Finally, he got down to the room, there were agents from several units milling around. They all looked at him and then averted their eyes. He knew what they were thinking. They were all afraid to jinx the situation with too many words. Or perhaps they were just afraid to acknowledge his situation because it reminded them all, it could happen to them too. Murt had stumbled upon Bella but it could have been any one of their kids.
Agent Rumi Rahandumar walked up to him. “Evan, how’s Rachel holding up?”
Evan shrugged. “Not well, Rumi. But I guess better than I expected.” He looked around the room. “Where’re we at?”
“We’ve got his demands in motion, we’ve got agents standing by and the sniper team is at the ready just in case.”
“What’s the next move?”
Rumi scratched his head. “Well, we want to get close to him so the NSA consultants—”
“Consultants?” Evan interrupted. “Do you mean those psychic mind benders? I told you how I feel about that garbage. We went over this and I thought we’d agreed to steer clear of them.”
“Evan, we had to try. We were running out of options.”
“Rumi, you know how I feel about that garbage. I don’t want them in this. I don’t want their farcical shenanigans involved.”
Rumi rolled his lips inward. “Look, Evan, I know how you feel. We’re all in the same boat on that one. But we need any edge we can get. Doesn’t it make sense to use any tactical advantage?”
Evan shook his head and laughed to himself. “Rumi, I catch scumbags for a living. We have to be able to out-think some thug without resorting to some ridiculous NSA pet project. A project, I might add, that failed miserably. You know as well as I do that no psychic has ever solved a case in the history of the FBI, it’s urban legend. It’s not real.”
“Evan, I get it, but it can’t hurt.”
“But it can hurt, Rumi. We can waste time on this hocus-pocus and miss something.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I need to be on this case, Rumi.”
Rumi shook his head. “This is not my call. Steen makes that call. He’s running this show and you were ordered to stand down.”
“Well it’s absurd. I’m the best there is, and she’s my daughter!”
“Yes, Evan. You are the best. And she is your daughter.” Rumi lowered his voice. “And that, is the reason you’re on the sidelines here. You’re too close to this, Evan, and you know it. If the situation were reversed, you’d be doing everything in your power to help one of us. And that’s what we’re doing for you. You just have to let us do our jobs.”
Evan sighed loudly. “Fine. Do your damn jobs!”
He stormed down the hallway. If Rumi wouldn’t convince Steen to dump these psychics off the case, he would do it himself.
Chapter 4
Kayci dried her hands and pushed through the door to leave the blue and white checkered bathroom. The small alternating colored tiles kind of nauseated her. Just as the door closed behind her in the hallway, she had a sudden need to go back inside.
She angled her shoulder into the door and reentered. Now that she was back in here, she had no idea why she wanted to come back in. Her mind was definitely not feeling cleared. Looking at herself in the mirror as she strode in front of the row of three sinks, she huffed. The neck on her blue V-neck T-shirt was all stretched out of shape. She didn’t even remember how it happened. There was a rip on the left thigh of her jeans, but that was old. Her black and red Reeboks were well worn, but she liked them that way.
Bending over she rested her hands on the middle sink and moved in close to examine her skin. Some rest would be good right about now. As tired as she was before this mess started, something told her rest was not anywhere in her near future. She tapped her foot on the floor. The acoustics in the place gave her a fit of déjà vu.
Closing her eyes for a few seconds, she felt around into the localized frequencies. There were none of interest except her and Jordan but something was pecking at her intuition. Something was afoot with this situation and it bothered her that it wasn’t becoming obvious.
There was a knock on the bathroom door, and it cracked open an inch. “Kayci, you okay?” Jordan said from outside the room.
“I’m fine.”
He walked in.
“This is the women’s restroom.”
He made a face. “So? You worried I’m going to see something I’ve already seen? I just saw you come back in. You had that look on your face like something was wrong.”
“When I was learning Murt’s signature, and you tried to lock on, what did you feel exactly?”
Jordan searched the floor with his gaze. “It was weird. I’d locked in on your frequency before, but this time something was different.”
Kayci nodded. “I know. It was like it booted you out.”
“Yeah, it was crazy. It was a jolt of electricity that lingered on—similar to when you jumped into my head, just before I confronted Avery.”
“When I gave you the conduit to view?”
“Yup, when you broke off contact it was kinda like a kick to the skull. Well that’s similar to what I felt today, only it was different, it was my whole body, like a shock or something.”
Kayci took a deep breath. “That’s what I was afraid of.”
“What does it mean?”
“If I didn’t know any better, I would think there was someone else, some other psychic getting in there and messing us up. There was just way too much energy going on there, way too much.”
Jordan bit his lip. “But who could it be?”
She shrugged. “I’m sure you noticed we’re the only ones of substance showing up on the frequency plane.”
“And everyone on your team is dead. Right?”
“Yeah.”
He gave her one of his patented tilted-head looks. “There’s not someone you’re forgetting, some old agent or something? I mean we can’t afford to miss someone again.”
“Well, there are ex-agents of SORC out there, but they’re long retired. And none of them I know were crooked enough to be involved. Plus, there’s no motive for anyone get involved here.”
“Okay, but you know it better than me. It was strange enough to wonder.”
“True, but it’s not like we’re ever going to be alone. Do you remember the list I told you about? That NSA watch list of potential psychic terrorists we were watching?”
“Yeah, I remember,” He gave her a facetious grin. “After all I was on it.”
“We need to get a hold of that list—because something’s not adding up. I need to scour that list and see if anyone on there might be linked to this case somehow. It’s quiet, almost too quiet for it to be so difficult. I should have been able to lock into Murt’s frequency. We’re not that far away from him. And I should be able to wreck him.”
“If I’m not mistaken, someone can
mask their frequency. Correct?”
Kayci nodded slowly. “Of course, you saw that first hand with Nathan and Cayden. They masked each other so we couldn’t see them. And I remember Nathan told me about a psychic from Seattle. A young kid, he was able to completely hide his signature from everyone. He could stealth really well. But beyond that he could spoof.”
“What’s a spoof?”
“It’s the ability to pick up someone else’s signature and make it appear to be yours. You’re basically wearing it as a hat, and you can manipulate things. But it’s not easy and only a few have had the ability.”
Jordan crossed his arms and gripped his biceps. “So in theory, I could pick up, say, Agent Rahandumar’s signature and just chill out, totally undetected from people like us?”
Kayci scratched her head. “Yeah, and we’d be screwed. Even worse, if the psychic is strong enough, and the other person is weak enough, you could bend them.”
“Bend? As in bend to their will?”
“You got it.”
“You mean like mind control.”
“Yeah, it takes a very strong psychic and a very weak subject, but it can happen.”
He pointed to his chest. “Like Avery tried to do to me in the bathroom.”
“Similar.”
“And like Cayden did to me to get me out on that boat, he fooled me.”
“Well, those instances were different, because in both cases all they did was nudge you, using me as bait. They were manipulating you via frequency but that’s something quite different because they were using your emotions for me against you. They didn’t control you physically, they made suggestions and your feelings for me clouded your judgment. You could have said no, you still had free will. It’s what I’m going to do to Murt if I can find an angle, just give him a suggestion and hope he makes a mistake for the FBI to capitalize on. What I’m taking about is controlling the subject completely to the point where you can make them act physically and believe mentally.”
“So you think someone is controlling Murt somehow?”
She shrugged. “Maybe, I don’t know for sure. It seems like a stretch because a strong psychic like that would never be able to hide their signature completely unless they had someone masking them. But I’d still see what we call remnant markers and I don’t see any at all, that’s where I’m having a disconnect with that whole concept.”
Jordan blew an audible breath and clapped his hands together. “Why does everything have to be so complex? So what’s the play?”
Kayci thought about it. “First thing we need to do is save the girl. I have something we can try, working together. You’ll have to link up with me before I try and get into Murt’s head. But it should work.”
They exited the bathroom and went down the long hallway to the conference room. On their way down the hallway, Kayci turned to Jordan and looked him up and down.
“What?” He asked.
“Nothing, but, when’s the last time you washed those jeans?”
“Huh?”
“You heard me. You stink like garbage.”
“I do?” Jordan bent over and took a whiff, made a face and took another. “I don’t smell anything. I don’t think.” He sniffed again, harder. “Well, maybe I do smell something.”
She smiled. “Are you sure?”
He rolled his eyes. “Okay you’re screwing with me again. Damn, how come I can’t tell you’re doing that until it’s too late?”
Kayci nodded. “I do that on occasion because you need to learn. That’s your biggest weakness.” She stopped him outside the door of the bustling room. “Jordan, you’re as gifted a practitioner of energy as anyone’s ever seen. What you did against Nathan was truly spectacular. But I need to warn you it’s going to get worse before it gets better.”
He looked worried. “Worse, how?”
“You have a few lessons yet to get you into the next level. They’ll come. We’re here, involved with this. And I know you don’t want to be, and you know I don’t want to be. But at the same time, with my team gone you know there’re people out there who want to do harm with their skills.”
He nodded. “I know—I know and someone has to stop them.”
Rumi stepped out of the room, pushed past them and then stopped, looking upset. “We need to talk, come with me.” He urgently led Kayci and Jordan down a long hallway, into an empty tan room and shut the door behind them.
Kayci asked, “What’s going on?”
“We have a problem.” Rumi ran his palm over his forehead. “Evan Hill is having some sort of meltdown about you guys being here. He went right over our unit chief to the top end of the FBI and they want you out of here.”
Kayci squeezed her eyes shut. “Let me get this straight. You guys pulled us off the street, begged us for help and now you’re telling me you’ve wasted our time for the past twenty hours?”
Rumi shrugged. “That’s my fault, I thought…I mean…Kayci, it’s his daughter, and he carries a lot of weight in the FBI.”
“So, he’d rather let his daughter die, than accept help from every possible channel?”
“He’s got some sort of problem with the whole psychic thing, I don’t really blame him and a lot of people in the FBI feel that way. He’s afraid you’re going to either cause some sort of issue with the men on the case or God forbid actually get into Murt’s head and cause an unintended consequence. They prefer real police work to some sort of…whatever this is.”
Kayci laughed. “This is stupid. You know for a fact we get results. Just because it’s never on the official record doesn’t mean it’s not happening and you know it.”
Rumi walked in a tight circle and raised his hands. “Look, my hands are tied. If it were up to me this wouldn’t even be an issue. But Evan…” He huffed.
Jordan chimed in, “What’s his problem with us?”
Rumi tilted his head to his shoulder. “He’s got a problem with the NSA in general. He’s a criminal profiler with a pile of degrees, he believes in science and patterns of human behavior. It is what it is. He carries a ton of weight.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Kayci protested. “Don’t we get any say here? I don’t want that girl to die any more than you do.”
“Look,” Rumi threw his hands up. “This is out of my hands, you know how this works. It’s coming from the top and they want you out of here, now. I’ve been told to debrief you on the way out the door.”
Kayci looked at Jordan. “I guess that’s it then.”
Jordan rolled his eyes. “Wonderful. So I guess we say good luck.”
Rumi shook his head. “There’s nothing I can do, guys, I’m sorry. They’re going to allow Evan to work the case.”
Kayci nodded. “I’m going to talk to the director. I can save that little girl.”
“No, Kayci, stay out of it,” Rumi insisted. “You’re on thin ice as it is with the intelligence community.”
“What? Why?”
“It is what it is, Kayci. You’re the only part remaining of a rogue unit, you’re going to find it tough to get work and you know it. You’re going to find it tough to come by any acceptance especially with the FBI because we investigated SORC. There’s always going to be suspicions about how guilty you were in all that. That’s how it always goes and you know it.”
Rumi pointed down the hallway, Kayci nodded and started down the path.
Chapter 5
Jordan switched the radio on, then back off, then back on and started switching stations from the control on the steering wheel.
Kayci glared at him from the passenger seat. “Are you trying to see how long it will take me to punch you?”
He sighed and shut if off again. “There’s nothing on the radio. All this new pop music is crap.”
Kayci thumbed through pages on her phone. “I think that’s a given for every new era after the one that was your personal favorite.”
“I guess so. But at least there was a time when people played actual instru
ments and sang without auto-tune.”
“Not since the nineties.”
Jordan switched lanes. He wasn’t really liking this Ford Explorer as much as his old Suzuki. In comparison, the Ford felt big and bulky. And since he was something of a driver, he noticed subtleties in how vehicles handled. Driving was one of his joys in life. He’d driven from one end of America to the other and back several times. Maybe with all that money he’d buy some sort of sports car, like a Porsche or that new Audi he saw driving by the other day.
“No, we’re not buying a car.” Kayci said.
Jordan huffed. “Was I broadcasting again?”
“Terribly loud.”
“You have to teach me how to be stealth or at least not broadcast to the psychic world everything I’m thinking.”
She nodded. “I have to teach you a lot. There wasn’t really much time for anything like that. But now that we have a little downtime, maybe we can work on some things.”
“I can’t believe that the FBI just kicked us out like that. It’s messed up.”
Kayci waved her hand. “Screw them. I tried. If that little girl dies it’s not on our hands.”
Jordan felt a bit of guilt. But he could tell in spite of her declaration that Kayci was feeling more. “It still sucks. I feel sick over it. I feel like we should do something. We could’ve saved her. Right?”
She nodded. “I think so.”
“Maybe we could, you know, help a little bit without anyone knowing.”
Kayci looked over at him, her devilish one-eyebrow raised look was both sexy and intense. “I’ve thought of that. I know where the rendezvous point is. I could get close enough to nudge him. And no one would be the wiser.”
Jordan nodded. “I saw we do it. I can’t leave it alone.”
“And I have a good plan, a little misdirection of the mind and I think we could pull it off.”
Jordan’s budding excitement stifled when he suddenly started to get that feeling. He swallowed hard and pulled over on the shoulder of the two-lane stretch of blacktop.
“What’s wrong?”
He glanced over at her. “I’m not sure, but…” He looked behind them, then to both sides.
Soul Frequency (Frequency Series Book 2) Page 2
