“In” being exactly where he wanted to be. With a big meow, he plopped back down and she opened the door, totally focused on maneuvering through with her bags and cane. So focused that he was able to sneak through the entrance just a second before the door closed.
But Bobbie realized he had followed when she was in the hallway, scooped him up, and said, “Let’s get you home.”
She tucked him tight to her side, his head pressed close to her breast, and he imagined staying there forever. So did the cat within him, which hinted at the fact that this wasn’t the first time Bobbie had come to the feline’s rescue.
The close proximity to her had him battling for control. She was soft and warm, but also strong beneath the feminine veneer. The warrior, he thought again, intrigued by the dichotomies Bobbie presented.
But there was also another thing drawing him near—the aura he had sensed earlier. It was both comforting and intoxicating and was creating a synergy he was finding difficult to ignore. Inside him, his core did a slow whirl and he fought it back, needing to maintain control to keep his altered shape.
Bobbie stopped at a door on the lower floor of the condo and knocked.
No answer.
She waited for a minute or so and then knocked again.
When there was no response, she mumbled, “Some people shouldn’t have pets.”
With him tucked against her, she continued to the end of the hall and a small elevator where they rode up to the third floor. Her condo was in the middle of the building and she placed him on the ground to enter. When the door opened, the cat’s instincts acted before he could, and he darted into the room.
“Make yourself at home,” she teased, the laughter evident in her voice.
He quickly snuck to a spot beside the sofa, where he sat and watched as she efficiently emptied the bags and put away the few groceries she had purchased. When she was done, she headed down a hall, and soon the sound of running water drifted out.
Strangling the thought of her beneath the water, he allowed himself to explore her home.
It was like visiting the tropics after leaving Antarctica.
Unlike the gleaming steel and cold stone environment in the SolTerra offices and his home, Bobbie’s condo was animated by color and life. A bouquet of lively pink tulips in a bright sea-blue vase sat in the middle of a bistro table near the kitchen.
On a low wall unit that delineated the area between dining room and living room were framed photos. He jumped up onto the wall for a better look, acrobatically landing on the far edge before delicately winding around the frames on its surface and examining each one.
Bobbie and her family. A group photo of soldiers in uniform along a broken cement fortification. The platoon with which she had served, he assumed. Wedding photos of two different couples. With the physical resemblance of the groom in one and the bride in the other, he had no doubt they were her older siblings.
He plopped down and surveyed the rest of the area from his perch on the wall unit, from where he caught sight of the various prescription bottles on the surface of the breakfast bar. He jumped down, determined to find out more, and then leaped up to a stool by the bar before taking another, shorter jump onto the counter. As he peered at the bottles, it was evident that they were full and he wondered why.
Had she just refilled them, or was she the kind to tough out the pain? Even though his one encounter with her had been brief, he could answer his own question.
Bobbie was the kind to rough it no matter the discomfort she was in. She wouldn’t like to be medicated to the point of numbness. She would want to live even if it meant enduring hurt. That was plainly obvious from the life and color present in the apartment.
Which begged the question of what kind of life he was living in his cold sterile environs. Maybe that was why she intrigued him so. The emptiness inside him had recognized she could fill the void with her vitality.
He dropped back to the floor and scurried down the hall, bypassing the bathroom and doing a quick run through a bedroom, which seemed relatively unused although it contained some free weights and an exercise bike.
As he entered the second, larger bedroom, it was clear this was where Bobbie slept. He could smell her in the air, and as in the other room, there were family photos on the neatly organized surface of a dresser. On a nightstand beside the bed sat a paperback novel, a romance, he realized from the binding, and it made him smile to think that beneath the skin of the warrior lurked a closet romantic.
He raced back out of the room, but hesitated by the bathroom this time. The door was ajar. He could easily slip inside to catch a glimpse of her, to replace the fantasies he’d had that afternoon with reality, but honor kept him on the other side of the door.
He was already violating her privacy with his little foray into her personal space. He would not push it any farther.
As he hurried back toward the main living area of the condo, another photograph on the wall unit suddenly grabbed his attention, along with two framed medals. The photo and medals were on a second shelf instead of in the more visible position along the top.
He peered at the medals and discovered that Bobbie had been awarded not only a Purple Heart, but also a Silver Star for valor during battle. A memory popped up from the data he had skimmed earlier, making him recall the article that had mentioned how Bobbie had saved the lives of several of her fellow soldiers. It totally fit what he knew of her so far.
He wondered if one of the men she had saved was the one wearing the uniform in the photo beside the medals. A smiling and obviously happy Bobbie sat in the lap of a handsome Latino man. He had his hand around her waist possessively and a gleam in his eye that spoke volumes. A surprising jolt of jealousy surged through Adam, creating a sudden quiver in his center. He tried to tamp it down, but fighting back the sentiment brought only more problems as something gave in his body. It was followed by a pop of bone shifting in a joint.
He had been so involved with his little expedition that he had not been conscious of the power he had been consuming to maintain the animal form. Only now did he realize that he had taxed his powers beyond his limits. Jealousy had put the final nail in the coffin, making him lose command of the situation.
Strangling a moan as the pain of the transformation raced throughout his body, he moved closer to the front door so he could make his escape. He sought out his own life force and urged it along his nerve endings so that he would have some kind of influence over the change. The fur receded swiftly and his body elongated. Pain ripped along muscles that loosened back to their normal length. Bones rotated and popped into place as they assumed their regular positions. As he shook off the animal vitality he had consumed, his body filled out.
Seconds later, with a final shudder and shove of energy to his extremities, he restored his true form and that of every item that had been on him before he had morphed.
Light-headed, his body bathed in sweat, he leaned against the wall and sucked in a few deep breaths to steady himself, drawing on what little energy remained at his core to provide support against the weakness in his body.
The sound of the water shutting off in the shower propelled him to find the strength he needed to retreat. Careful not to make a noise, he opened the door and rushed out into the hallway. Resting against the wall, he took another few deep breaths until he had stabilized. Then he hurried out, needing to deal with so many things.
He had never morphed for as long a time as he had tonight, and it had left him feeling weak. He was normally quite robust, since he was careful about maintaining his energy levels. He would have to recharge the energy he had spent on the shapeshifting, energy that had already been taxed by the blasts from his attackers. Plus, he had to process all that he had learned from his short online peek into Bobbie’s life and even shorter visit to her home.
Despite the brevity of those contacts, Bobbie continued to intrigue him, but tonight’s episode had proven one thing to him: Allowing emotion to interfere was
a dangerous thing. The jealousy that he had experienced due to the photo had nearly undone him at a very sensitive moment.
He suspected it wouldn’t be the last time that emotions related to Bobbie would challenge him. She called to him emotionally and her aura drew him on another level. If he couldn’t handle the feelings both of those roused, he might put her at risk.
That was the last thing on Earth he wanted to do.
Bobbie had clearly been through enough on her own without him adding to her misery.
CHAPTER
8
Adam stood on the second-floor balcony off his bedroom, staring at the waves churning up against the shore. The moon was full, bathing everything beneath it with shades of almost white to silvery gray. A storm was brewing tonight. Besides the smell of the rain that was on its way, he sensed the growing energy gathering in the clouds above him.
Closing his eyes, he lifted his face to the skies and inhaled deeply, as if by doing so he might suck in all that turbulent power. Maybe some long-ago ancestor, the one from whom he had inherited his abilities, had been able to gather such storm forces. So far Adam had not been able to harness powers in that fashion, but maybe tonight with the experiment he planned to run he would find a way to tap the intense energy of the tempest, much as he was able to do with the creatures around him and the smaller bits of free-floating energies in the cosmos.
As a child Adam had shied away from gathering such forces, aware that he lacked the ability to control what he did with them. But he had learned some restraint as a teenager, and he had begun to experiment. He discovered that each living thing he touched possessed its own unique energy signature. Trial and error had helped him to improve the process by which he could round up that energy and use it for a number of purposes.
Anything electrical was within his control with just a thought. With a simple touch he could take on a new shape, which oftentimes gave him a fresh perspective, he thought, recalling that night’s adventures in his animal form. Every bit of energy he absorbed brought a new awareness to him.
Like the sensation of Bobbie’s skin beneath his fingers, pulsing with life.
Adam sucked in a breath as he imagined how the rest of her might feel pressed against him. So warm and feminine.
What would it feel like to be one with her physically? Or to share that energy and spirit and create a unique synergy of their respective powers?
Tamping down the desire that was becoming almost painful, he opened his eyes and stared up at the skies.
If there was a God up there, why hadn’t He allowed Adam to understand what his purpose on this Earth was supposed to be? It still frustrated Adam that he hadn’t been able to put some of his powers to any real useful purpose. And now he had a new one to consider—his ability to skip across distances in the blink of an eye.
He shoved off from the balcony railing and headed indoors, away from the impending storm that matched the mounting disturbance inside him. He stalked from his bedroom along the lengthy hall lined with empty rooms and then jogged down the stairs. On the first floor he barely spared a glance at the large open floor plan some designer had thought appropriate for a man of his wealth and importance. To Adam the house and all its luxurious contents had been just things to impress prospective investors in SolTerra.
It would never be a home without more, he thought. Without the joy and love he had seen radiating from Bobbie’s face in the photos resting on her wall unit.
He hurried down the stairs to the basement, where he had his home office and laboratory. Placing his face close to a retinal scanner securing the glass door, he waited for the system to validate his identity. When the magnetic lock disengaged, he walked into the state-of-the-art facility that rivaled those at his SolTerra location. To the uninitiated, it might seem as if they had discovered Dr. Frankenstein’s lab, but to Adam it represented the possibilities of what his company could do.
For all that he could do with enough power. Power that he was lacking right now.
He had to recharge himself.
Normally he did so by meditation to absorb free-floating energy particles in the atmosphere, or with occasional experiments testing the life forces of other living things. In the last few months, however, the growing call of the power had led him to try bigger and better ways of hunting the energy. In doing so, Adam had learned that he seemed to have a natural affinity for all things electrical—funny, in a way, given the work he had chosen to do with SolTerra. It had made him wonder if that hadn’t been some kind of subconscious choice all those years ago when he had decided to devote his studies and work to alternative energies.
Regardless, his company had been developing new methods of harvesting forces in nature, and tonight he would not only test one of those methods, but also attempt to use it to restore the vitality he had lost.
Adam rushed over to the computers and engaged them by placing his thumb against another reader. His father had taught him the value of defending against intrusion and to never second-guess an opponent. If someone got through the first door, he still wouldn’t be able to access his network without clearing another hurdle.
A panel of monitors jumped to life after the system confirmed his identity. Each screen contained different bits of information, from the sensors tracking the incoming storm to the readings from his last energy-harvesting session. The end result of that experiment, the withered remains of the small purple foxglove plant, sat on the worktable.
He had chosen the foxglove for its known medicinal values, and to his surprise, the readings he had gotten from the plant had been higher than those from the plain old potted fern he had used as a baseline. That had served to put him on notice that he might want to somehow gather those different healing energies.
But he wasn’t the one needing healing, he thought, recalling Bobbie’s pained expression and the guarded way she had moved after the run-in with the men.
Too bad his only power seemed to be to take and not to give, he thought, with a last look at the emaciated plant. He had only sipped a bit of its life force, but it had been too much for the plant to handle. The power he had gathered had not even been enough to allow for any physical change from the energy.
Not that he had any intention of shifting into your average garden-variety petunia. Too many remnants of the borrowed life force often came over during such an exchange, like the flight instincts of the cat that evening. He had no idea what would happen if he shapeshifted into a nonsentient form.
Tossing the pot into a wastebasket, he sat down at the computer and viewed the radar reports on the incoming weather. The brighter orange and red markings delineating the strongest cells in the thunderstorm were moving quickly and would soon be directly above his Spring Lake residence. With a wave of his hand over a button, he released the lightning rods built into the uppermost story of his home.
Almost as soon as he had done so, the low rumble of distant thunder warned that the tempest was growing nearer. For months Adam had been monitoring such storms using high-speed video. Shooting over fifty thousand frames per second, he had been able to detect the smaller ribbons of electricity that actually composed what the eye saw as only one huge bolt of lightning.
He had also discovered another interesting phenomenon. With him maneuvering the lightning rods by remote, he was actually able to reliably draw the bolts to those devices. It was as if his natural affinity was beckoning the energy to join with him.
Acting quickly, Adam engaged the junctions that would funnel any electrical strike he attracted to a series of sophisticated energy cells and capacitors. The purpose of the collection was twofold. If the array could collect and keep the charge, SolTerra might be able to develop a new source of energy to be marketed.
If he could then personally absorb the power from the energy cells, he hoped to be able to take that force and calm the growing need within him. Afterward, he might be able to direct it to something or someone else without causing harm. Unfortunately, his control was
sporadic, even after so many years of trying. Plus there was the recent phenomenon he had been experiencing, which created intense static in his brain and pain if his energy levels fluctuated too greatly.
He suspected that part of the problem was the source of his power. Man-made power did not produce the same results in his body as natural supplies from the cosmos or other living things. As for his shapeshifting experiments, he chose his subjects carefully and made sure he didn’t take too much of their vitality, hence his need for alternate ways to recharge his power.
An insistent beep-beep-beep intruded from a nearby computer. The weather service was issuing a severe thunderstorm warning.
Perfect, he thought, and flipped one of the monitors to the security camera watching the rooftop. He shifted the camera’s orientation with a joystick, training its view onto the two lightning rods. Then he grasped the remotes for the rods, directing them toward the storm, focusing his attention on the rods while occasionally shooting a half-glance at the video from the high-speed cameras recording the experiment.
Anxiously he waited, his heart drumming in his chest and his core growing warmer as he absorbed some of the free-floating electrical energy increasing with the approach of the storm.
A flash of light brightened the night sky in the distance, followed several seconds later by the crash of thunder.
Another minute passed.
Another flare of light. More distinct. Closer this time. The thunder followed within a few heartbeats, its vibrations thumping against his senses.
The storm was nearly overhead.
Less than a minute later, the first zigzag spike of lightning blasted into one of the metal rods. A second followed ferociously.
Adam turned from the sight of the strikes, their images alive on his retinas as he glanced at the screen tracking the energy levels in the battery array. Only a slight rise. Not nearly enough for the cells to be used as a power source.
Anxious minutes passed before he pulled another bolt of lightning to the rod, and this time it ramped up the readings, as did a fourth hit. Each strike increased the power levels in the cells, but the storm was shifting by too quickly. As fast as the squall had moved in from the land to the west, its fury sped eastward out to sea.
The Lost (Sin Hunters) Page 6
