She held her breath.
“What the—”
Everybody saw Ella, an elegant-looking woman, she knew. But docile. Easily manipulated. Easily controlled.
And this man was no different.
As he knelt by her, she watched from under her lashes, her gaze shielded. The needle ready. And as he went to reach for her, she moved.
He snarled, but the needle was already in his arm, and at that concentrated dose, all he needed was a little.
Within moments, she had two guns, a knife, another cell phone, and more. She took his body, and not sure what else to do with his limp, unconscious self, she shoved it under the bed.
There. Rawlings was down for the count. She looked around the room, searching for signs of what had happened. There weren’t many. Broken glass. The needle. She carefully picked it up, dropped it in the water decanter, and slipped into the hall, glancing around, left then right, her senses on red alert.
Couldn’t go out the front.
Nor the back door.
Careful . . .
Careful . . .
* * *
SOMETHING rode just under his skin as they closed in on the compound.
He didn’t know what it was, but it had him edgy as hell.
Careful . . .
Careful . . .
Nalini went to touch his arm and he edged away. “Stop it already,” he bit off, even as that whisper danced through his mind.
Careful . . . careful . . .
A soft brush against his shields. A sigh.
Without understanding why, he eased them down.
Jillian’s voice was a soft, hesitant whisper. You have to stop the ice . . . and tell that woman to leave you alone. It’s not helping.
And then, like a wisp of smoke on the wind, she was gone.
“Stop the ice.” He should know what that meant.
Shooting Nalini a look, he saw something dancing through her eyes. Wariness. Secrets.
What. The. Fuck.
She reached out a hand.
He slammed on the brakes. “You touch me again, I’m going to knock your ass out,” he warned, feeling the burn of power rising in his brain.
“How?” A ghost of a smile danced on her lips. “It’s okay, Joss. Just . . .”
She reached out again.
He pressed, sending a warning slice to her mind, watched as she flinched.
“Ahhh . . .” She went pale, even paler than normal. “Nasty, nasty trick, Joss.”
“Don’t touch me again,” he warned.
The burn got hotter. Heavier. But it hadn’t quite managed to penetrate whatever was muzzing his brain.
She sighed. “I’d say I’m sorry, but you have to understand how fractured you are. If you don’t get it under control, you’re going to screw every last one of us. Including her.”
Something flickered through his brain.
Her . . .
Her.
His heart pounded against his ribs.
Heavy. Slow.
Her . . .
* * *
AS she was running across the grounds, she heard them coming behind her.
One of them was coming at an angle, and he was close . . . fast, too.
Damn—
She heard an odd, muffled pop.
There was a shout.
She didn’t slow. Didn’t stop. The dude closest to her was fast . . . streaking her way with a speed that rivaled her own. Patrick had put a decent runner on his guard dog goon squad.
She put more into it, the ground slapping against her feet.
Another odd little pop . . . and the runner was down, screaming in agony.
Gunshots, she realized.
Somebody was shooting. Focusing in the darkness ahead, she thought she saw him. The vivid red of his hair, the spiral of tattoos on his arms. Tucker. Thank God.
The next few moments were a buzzed blur. Adrenaline thrummed through her veins. Her heart was in her throat. Almost out of here . . . almost. Almost.
As she breached the lovely stone gates that surrounded the property, she snarled. Had to climb. Damn. The main gate was closed . . .
Pop, pop, pop . . .
And then a gloved pair of hands closed on her wrists. “I gotcha,” Tucker drawled. The muscles in his arms bulged as he hauled her up, making the tattoos dance and shift.
She looked up into his familiar eyes, his hair tumbling into them. “I gotcha, girl,” he drawled, smiling a little.
Breathe, gotta breathe.
Seconds later, they were on the ground and Tucker was next to her. As they tore off into the night, they were too aware of those who were pursuing them.
“They’re coming after us,” she said grimly. “They’ll be on the road the second we are.”
“No.” Tucker’s voice was tight, controlled.
Shooting him a look, she saw the strained look on his face. “Not just yet, they won’t.” He pointed to the roadside and they slowed just before they would have slammed into the car. “I can hold them for a few.”
The look on his face was one of strain unlike anything she could ever recall seeing. “Tucker?”
He just shook his head. “Get in. We have to go,” he said thinly. “The farther we are when I lose the hold, the better.”
Well, then.
She’d known he had a knack for odd things . . . a strong knack, but that strong?
* * *
THE mantra of careful, careful had given way to breathe, breathe.
Gripping the steering wheel, Joss shot Nalini a dark look. “What in the fuck did you do to me?”
“Nothing much, big boy. Just kept your head intact a little while longer,” she said, eyeing the gate ahead of them.
She’d slid into the backseat. By all looks and appearances, she was lying there, bound. Of course, one look at her eyes and one would know she wasn’t helpless. “This isn’t going to work if you can’t look a little more scared,” he snapped. “Vaughnne managed a better job than you are.”
She smiled at him. “Vaughnne can’t do what I do. You just open the back for them.”
He swore.
This was going to go bad.
Very bad.
“I haven’t even called in to let them know I’m bringing you.” Frustration rumbled through him.
And still that faint whisper. Getting louder now. Familiar even. A woman’s voice. He knew her . . . who the hell was she?
There. It’s there. It was so close . . . all this time . . .
What was she talking about?
“Don’t worry. They won’t care once you open that door. If they don’t touch me, you pull me out and make them,” Nalini said.
“Touch you . . .”
Pieces fell into place.
That odd calm that had washed over him.
With a composure he didn’t feel, he said, “You control people, don’t you? They have to touch you, but when they do, you can control them.”
“Yes.”
In the rearview mirror, he met her gaze.
“That’s not all, is it?”
She shrugged. “I do it through impressions . . . I leave an impression, and I take some of the bad shit away. I don’t take memories, but I can haze things up for a while. When you push, anything I do goes away.” With a sigh, she said, “You were hurtling two hundred miles per hour down the wrong road, with the wrong thoughts. And you still had too much chaff in your head from the mind-fuck Taylor did on you. We had to fix it.”
“We didn’t do anything. That’s not much better than mind-rape.” He stared at the road. If he looked at her again, he just might pull the car over and do something he’d regret.
“I know.”
As he slowed to a stop just outside the gate, Nalini said softly, “There wasn’t much choice. You were disintegrating and you know it. You’re thinking better now. Keep it that way . . . and start looking deeper, you brainless moron.”
Looking deeper . . .
He curled his lip a
t her, but there was no time to ask what she was talking about.
There were two men striding toward them.
And they didn’t look happy.
TWENTY-THREE
WELL, they’d needed a distraction of sorts, Dru thought.
The appearance of the maroon SUV counted.
As the men opened the gate to admit the SUV, both Dru and Tucker heard the raised voices. “How steady are you now?” she asked quietly, studying the gates.
The whole bleeding fence was wired. They had to figure a way around that.
“Steady enough,” he said, and his voice was easier now, that slow, lazy drawl more like what she was used to. “I’m good. Granted, I’ll crash and burn when this is done, but I’m good.”
“Can you hold the gate?”
He shot her a look. “Hold it?” Red brows ratcheted up as he studied her face. “Why, so we can just walk in . . . yeah, that will go over well.”
“No. If you hold it so they can’t shut it . . . distraction.” Her eyes narrowed as she thought it through. “But we need more than that. They’ll have cameras. Lights . . .”
He reached over, caught her hand, squeezed hers. Even through the leather gloves, she could feel the heat of his hand. “Relax. I can get the gates. And then some.”
She slanted a look at him. “And then some?”
“Yep.”
On an unspoken cue, they rose from their crouched position, staring at each other. “Just what is then some?”
He stared down at the ground, a thoughtful look on his lean features. “I never much told you how I work, I guess.” As he lifted his head, his gray eyes met hers, dark and turbulent as a summer thunderstorm. “I fuck with electrical shit. Any sort of electrical . . . including what’s inside your head. I can do it just enough to slow some people down.” Then he flashed a wicked, vivid grin at her, one that made him look just a little bit devilish, just a little bit wild. “Or I can do it enough to fuck up that gate, every last lightbulb, every last camera in there. Whatever I want.”
Dru stared. Then she shifted her attention to the gate. “What about his SUV? Any weapons they have?”
“The SUV, oh, yeah. Weapons, depends. Stun guns?” He gave her a wicked grin. “Other stuff . . . if it’s anything advanced, yes. Basic firearms, no, but I still can fuck with the owner. That’s all that matters.”
Turning her head to the SUV, she smiled. “Do it.”
* * *
IT was a release sometimes, Tucker knew. The best kind. And if he wasn’t careful, the worst kind, especially when he used it on people. That was why he had to be careful. People could die if he slipped.
But cars, electrical gates, cameras, that was so safe . . . and so much fun.
As he pictured all of it in his mind, his breath started to come in harsh, edgy pants. It was a rush, raw and erotic, and that just proved to him how fucked up he was. Although he didn’t need proof. He knew he was fucked up, had been all his life.
The gates . . . several different series of them. Cameras . . . those first, and he felt the little pop, pop, pop in his brain as they went down. Damn, that felt good. He took a few seconds, probing at the series of gates, wondering why they were running on a couple of different generators, then it clicked for him as he felt the prickly burn of life coming from somewhere deeper in the compound.
Alien life. Not human.
All energy felt different to him, and this wasn’t a human. He couldn’t quite understand it, but he pieced the picture together well enough. After all, Dru had been sharing intel with him in case something happened to her. Somebody had to go to the cops, and although he didn’t know if he’d be believed . . . well, if something had happened to his girl, he wouldn’t worry about the cops. He’d kill Whitmore himself.
The gators. He was pretty sure that alien life energy he sensed was the gators. So a second set of gates, running off a different generator, was to keep the gators confined.
Okay. Leaving that one alone . . . on to the lights, and whoa. That was a rush.
They exploded with a glorious burst that had people swearing so loud, he heard some of them from out there. Even the lights placed on the grounds went up in a blaze as he flooded them with a power surge. So damned good. Felt so good.
On to the next . . .
He felt the probe at his mind.
Somebody new. Unwelcome. Deftly, he averted it, sidestepping for just long enough to disable any of the weapons he could. Didn’t work on all of them; most of the weapons used here were firearms, but there were a few stun guns and that was good. He took them out, and by the time he was done, he was cruising so high, he might as well have been in the stratosphere.
One more thing . . . the car. He killed the battery, killed it so dead they’d never be able to start it, and then, just for kicks, he screwed up the rest of the electrical system.
“Whoa.” Pressing the heel of his hand to his right eye socket, he blew out a breath. “That’s a rush.”
“You okay?” Dru asked.
She reached out to touch him—he didn’t see it, but he sensed it coming, and he stepped away. “Don’t touch me just yet, darlin’. Dangerous until I blow some of this off.”
That mental probe came back, and Tucker shut himself down just before it could connect.
Sweat was dripping off him as he swung around to Dru. In the gilded moonlight, she stood there silently, but not very patient, her eyes glittering, hands clenched.
“Is it done?”
He smiled.
“Taking that as a yes, then,” she muttered. “Bloody dark now. Didn’t think of that.”
“Don’t worry. I always think of that.”
Swinging his pack off his back, he pulled out two sets of night-vision goggles.
As he slid his pair on, he was treated to the pleased smile curving Dru’s lips.
“You, Tucker, are fast becoming my very favorite person in the entire world.”
* * *
“YOU gotta leave.”
Joss glared at the man in front of him, tried to restrain the edginess burning under his skin.
“I have the next delivery for him and you want me to leave?”
“We’re having problems. Deliveries have to be postponed.”
“Hmm.” He started toward the back and gestured to the back of the SUV. “Come look at this.”
Jerking open the door, he said a mental prayer that Nalini would at least try to look scared. Or something other than, I’m going to eat your eyes the second I get my hands on you.
One of the men peered inside.
Nalini lay there, a sex-kitten smile curving her lips.
“Ah . . .”
Closing a hand around Nalini’s arm, he jerked her out and shoved her at the guard. Reflexively, the guard’s hands closed around her.
His face went slack.
In the next second, he started to smile.
And the second after that, Joss felt the weirdest damn thing happening . . . it wasn’t inside his head, but it was happening on a level that wasn’t exactly physical. Almost the way his ears popped when he was on an airplane. Pop, pop, pop.
Seconds passed as he shook his head and tried to process it. The hair on his arms rose, stood on end.
The guard stumbled back against the SUV. “Hey, Bruce . . . gotta come help a minute,” he called, his voice thick, rough. And he stared at Nalini like he’d never seen anything so amazing.
“Sanchez, we’re not supposed to be doing anything but watching the gate,” Bruce snarled. He came around the back of the SUV, glowering. Took one look at Nalini and went to shove her back into the SUV.
Joss could barely process it. He was too aware . . . something. A mind. He realized. There was somebody out there. Pop, pop, pop. And then screaming . . . darkness.
All the lights around them exploded into darkness.
“What the . . .” Bruce began. But the rest of his words died as he laid hands on Nalini.
And she stole away his will.
“There we go, boys,” she said, pleased. “Into the back, if you would.”
Joss ignored them, turning his back, trusting her to deal with his. He focused on the woods around them, reaching out. He felt it, damn it. He’d find whoever it was—
But then that mind, cagey and adroit, deflected him, swatting him away with relative ease. “Oh, no, you don’t.”
When he went to try again, though, it was gone.
Whoever it was, Joss couldn’t sense him again.
Him . . .
Swinging around, he stared at Nalini, who was in the process of cuffing the two guards. “What in the fuck is going on?”
She lifted a pale brow at him. “Are you asking me or just snarling to snarl?”
“I . . . shit.”
Behind him, he heard the faintest sound. Heard the rustling of trees. He had his weapon in hand before he even turned, edging so that he had Nalini behind him.
“You know, it’s nice in theory to have a man doing that, but I’m as capable as you are,” she said coolly, moving out from behind him.
He never even noticed.
The moon shone down, casting its full light on a face that hit the very heart of him.
Her . . .
Her . . .
It all came rushing back.
The elation, the dizzying need, want, and love. The misery.
All of it, gone. Not for long. But it had been gone.
However Nalini had taken it away from him, he didn’t know. She’d stripped it away, though. Thoughts of everything and everybody but finishing this job. Including his knowledge of Dru, replacing all of that edgy, troubled misery with false lassitude.
The last vestiges of that calm shattered into a million tiny little pieces, withering to dust, drifting away on the cool night wind.
Just like his heart.
Slanting a look at Nalini, he said quietly, “If you ever do that again, I’m going to hurt you. I don’t care if you’re a woman or not.”
She reached out and cuffed him on the side of the head. “I told you . . . look deeper.”
Then she turned her head and the two of them stared at the other two, standing on the side of the road.
She held a gun, Joss thought numbly.
She held a fucking gun.
He’d been prepared to help her out of this, as long as she wasn’t really working with Whitmore.
The Reunited Page 24
