Ky (In the Company of Snipers Book 13)

by Irish Winters

  Not until she was yards away from him did she glance over her shoulder.

  Tucker growled something unintelligible. He hadn’t moved, just sat on his butt in the snow with his knees spread wide and a bewildered, vacant look in his eyes. He’d developed a slow but definite list to his right. He tilted. His eyes scrolled to hers. “Eden? How’d you get all the way over there?” he asked hoarsely, right before he face-planted.

  Oh snap! Did I kill him? Eden scurried back to his side, shaking from the terrible thing she’d done. This was so bad, smacking another agent. It went against all she knew to be right, but she’d needed to, and now he was hurt, and—

  Get a grip, Stark. He’s out cold. Not dead.

  Tucker groaned, which was a good thing, but he probably couldn’t breathe with his face in the snow like it was, so she rolled him to his side and then onto his back. He grunted at the not-so-gentle treatment. Too bad.

  Sucking in a deep breath, she smoothed her gloved fingers over his poor, dented head. Three corner-shaped cuts bled profusely. She lifted the chunk of ice for another look. It wasn’t even cracked.

  “You gave me no choice,” she told him in no uncertain terms. “Darn it, Tucker, you asked for it, and buddy, you’re lucky I didn’t have my Glock, because I would’ve... because I... oh, snap. I couldn’t have shot you, but I would’ve pistol-whipped you. Why didn’t you just shut up and listen? What happened to you?”

  Tucker didn’t answer because he was out cold, but he breathed evenly, a positive sign.

  Now what? She made sure his collar was up so his cheek wasn’t resting on ice or snow, then glanced up at the tree branches where he’d hidden her. Nope. Not going to happen. There was no way she could drag him to higher heights. The man was twice her size and a deadweight. So where could she put this big oaf where they’d both be hidden from view while he, umm, healed?

  The line of snow-frosted pines at her six beckoned in the night breeze. What choice did she have? Eden dug her fingers into the shoulder pads of Tucker’s jacket. She planted her heels, braced her weight backwards, and dug in. Little by little, she slid him into the shelter of the noble trees. Finally situated beneath the low boughs of an enormous pine, she rolled him onto his side in case he started to choke.

  The wind kicked up, erasing the ruts of her journey with a dusting of snow. Inside her fragrant hideaway, stillness reigned, broken only by the sound of her hammering heart. What now?

  Eden knelt at Tucker’s side, scooped up a handful of snow and pressed it against his bleeding head. God, he was a mess. Head wounds bled so much. The snow was already soaked dark red beneath his head. Spattered blood stained what was once his winter-camouflaged jacket. Could things get any worse?

  Eden slid her hand out of its glove. With the pad of her thumb, she peeled back his eyelid. It was hard to tell for sure, but the pupil didn’t seem to be as black or as dilated as before, just the same dark eyes of one of her favorite agents. Her method of snapping him out of it might have been extreme, but it seemed to have worked. Daylight would reveal his true condition, but for now, she needed to keep him breathing and warm.

  “Don’t you dare die on my watch, Tuck.” She gulped at her audacity and her fear.

  Snap, he was a big man, broad-chested, handsome as heck, and now vulnerable with those three dents in his skull. Puffs of frozen vapor huffed out between his parted lips. His thick eyelashes twitched as if he was dreaming. She placed one palm to his sternum and drummed her fingertips, just because.

  She was alone again, her one source of protection down for the count. What was a girl to do? Bawl like a baby like she’d done with Ky after he’d cut her open, not once, but twice? Her eyes replied with a blur of tears thinking about him. Not cool. Eden summoned Tuck’s salty vernacular instead. Whoever that asshole with the coal-black eyes was, it was darned time for a little tit-for-tat. She was no ordinary FBI analyst. Black Eyes needed the comeuppance and the shiner he deserved for messing with Tucker’s mind. And hers!

  She lifted Mother Nature’s icepack off Tucker’s poor bludgeoned noggin and checked the bleeding. It had slowed, thankfully, but he would have scars. Three of them. Right in a row. “I got you good, huh? Frozen water. Who knew, right?” she asked, wishing he would snap out of it, sit up, and just be his usual, rowdy self again.

  But no. He wasn’t going anywhere, so Eden did what Eden did best. She settled into a comfortable cross-legged position, her butt against Tucker’s side so she could monitor his condition while she stretched that contrary psychic muscle of hers to do the one thing only she could do.

  Search out Black Eyes. Once and for all.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Ky slipped away from Zaroyin’s army with Tate and Sam at his side. Tate had re-secured the Omni 9000s in the moose carcass since they didn’t have the software to support them. Like shadows inside more shadows, they clung to the inky shroud beneath the trees and headed west. The wind and snow aided and abetted, but going was slow.

  If not for their goggles and the incredible infrared heat signatures put off by every living thing, walking in the dark would’ve been impossible. At best, it was still a hit or miss. Animals were easily detected, but vegetation and rocks required the absorbed energy from the sun to be visible with night vision, and there hadn’t been any of that since Ky had stepped foot in Kenora.

  “I’m coming for you,” he murmured to Eden on the chilly breeze. Ice and wind lashed them at every step. Logic told him to hunker down in the storm and wait it out. Never. Eden was out there somewhere.

  What he wouldn’t give to hear her sweet voice coming back to him over TEAMshield, but no. He’d neglected to bring along an extra pair. He had no way to know where she was.

  It didn’t make sense how Zaroyin had gotten his army of Feds into Kenora as fast as he had. They were equipped for the weather, yet none came with snowshoes or skis. There’d been no sign of snowmobiles, either. No winterized all-terrain vehicles. No Snow Cats or dog sleds. Fast-roping from any chopper, no matter how big, in the middle of a snow storm would’ve gotten most of the men killed, SWAT or not.

  Zaroyin and his men had to have already been in Kenora and waiting for Eden to drop out of the sky. That bizarre notion actually felt true. A level-ten psychic might just be able to sense where Eden’s plane would end up. Maybe that same psychic had guided Sweets’ last desperate actions as the Cessna plummeted to earth. Hell, Isaiah Zaroyin just might be behind all of this.

  An icy finger of dread tap-danced up Ky’s spine. That was a helluva lot of maybes and mights, but it made sense in a weird, science fiction sort of way. If Eden could reach all the way to Afghanistan, the doctor’s son could certainly get inside somebody’s head in Canada.

  The bastard was evil and sly. He’d muddied the playing field with one misdirect after another. The GPS locators. The spider-like mind-control devices. Charlie Sweets. Hell, even Becker’s worthless evidence against Tate had kept everyone unbalanced and running around like chickens with their heads cut off.

  Ky quickened his step. He wasn’t sure which bastard was running the show, Bick, Zaroyin, or Isaiah, but the bottom line was the same. This was nothing more than a friggin’ beta test of the drones’ capability to hunt Eden. They wanted her for a breeder in their bizarre, sick plot. No. Damned. More.

  “I say we stop to rest a few,” Sam suggested between heavy pants, most of which Ky suspected was an act.

  “No,” Ky returned without so much as a glance at the guy who still seemed to think he was in charge. The guy didn’t even have a pack to carry. Why was he tired?

  “Tucker will take good care of her,” Sam commented quietly, still trying to exert all that Navy SEAL dominance.

  “Piss off.” Ky underscored his answer with a burst of energy, slogging through the drifted snow and ready to go it alone if need be. Tate shut that wild notion down with a growly grunt, a good show of loyalty in what sure felt like a hopeless night with the odds stacked in Zaroyin’s favor.

  �
��Stay where you are, Eden,” Ky hissed into the dark. “I’m coming.”

  So. Psychics. Where to begin? Better question, how to reach out and touch a specific one when you wanted him, instead of when he wanted you?

  Eden cleared her mind, not sure her second sight would respond like she needed it to. With her index finger, she carved an arc in the snow around her, beginning and ending it at Tuck’s body behind her. She’d never done anything like this before, but that circle seemed like it would serve as her invisible barrier should things go wrong—her last line of defense should Black Eyes prove to be more wicked than she could handle.

  In her past experience, most kidnappers were easily influenced psychically. They weren’t exactly rocket scientists. Most hadn’t completed high school, much less gone onto college. Ignorance and greed ruled their method, motivation, and opportunity, making their actions easy to predict. But this guy? From that single second look she’d had of him, she’d sensed a higher intelligence. No. Black Eyes wouldn’t go easily into the night. He might attack once he knew she was onto him.

  She rested both gloved palms to her kneecaps, took a deep, slow breath in, and, exhaling it just as slowly, she let her second sight venture forth on a cloud of her frozen breath. It didn’t really work like that, but sometimes, the visual seemed to stimulate her unique abilities. The whole “if you see it, you can be it” philosophy. Whoever thought up that mantra was pure genius.

  Oddly, her second sight obeyed. She wiggled her backside at that simple achievement. With nothing but the shroud of this ice-cold Canadian winter wrapped around her, and Tucker’s heat behind her, she drew in another deep lungful of wintery air, closed her eyes, and projected her energy beyond the arc. This was her element. Her genius.

  Most people didn’t understand psychic channeling. They equated psychics with magic and witches. Worse, Hollywood made psychics out to be con artists or liars. The truth lay somewhere in between. Most people were born with some degree of sensitivity for the unseen. Intuition. A sixth sense. Dreams. Others called it a gut feeling. It was nothing more than the innate observation skills all living things developed in order to survive. Watch people, truly watch them, and you’d be surprised at what lay beneath the surface.

  So much of a psychic’s skill began with simple observations. Eden employed no cons or sleight of hand, just cared enough to look deeper into her victims and their oppressors. To really see the reason behind why they did what they did. To truly listen to the dreams of their heart and the sorrows of their past. Their hopes for their future.

  Sometimes handling an object they’d owned helped. Sometimes it didn’t.

  She drew in another breath and focused on the snowflakes drifting through the evergreen canopy. The delightful fragrance of crushed pine lifted into her nose and filled her half-circle with its natural energy. The world changed into hues of blues and whites, shadowy blacks, pewter grays with the softest violet borders, and greens that changed from darkest forest shades to limes to yellows.

  Black Eyes, she called silently. Are you sad? Talk to me. Come to me.

  Empathy. Her best and worst talent. It drew her into the most horrific situations, but combined with her gift of clairvoyance and the small dab of her mother’s specialty, the psychometrist’s ability to ‘read’ objects, it also allowed her to save people. Better yet, now that Black Eyes had revealed himself, she could mentally follow his psychic trail back to him.

  The audacious man. Or child. That first impression of him had left her unsure how old he was, only that he’d suffered becoming who he was today. That he might not have wanted to hurt her like he had.

  Uncertainty clouded the way between him and her. She swallowed hard and lifted her face to the branches overhead. Awareness of her current location faded as she kept her eyes closed and projected her second sight forward and beyond into the distance between.

  “Black Eyes,” she whispered again. “We really need to talk.”

  Three auras with shades of blue glowed nearby. Had to be Ky, Sam, and Tate on their way to rescue her. Of course. She smiled to see Ky so close and so intent on finding her. Warmth flooded her insides.

  She pushed forward. More like she aimed her second sight forward, thankful it cooperated and moved beyond the scene of her would-be rescuers. She needed to locate Black Eyes before Ky arrived. Her second sight would grow quiet upon his arrival, but only because he commanded every beat of her heart. When he was near, she really did have eyes only for him.

  It’s easier to see when your body is clean of foreign agendas, her mind whispered.

  “Yes,” she whispered back, willing to talk with herself if it helped.

  Anything was possible in a world so misunderstood and unexplained by science, a world full of telepaths who really could read minds. Intuitives who could grasp the intimate emotions and feelings of others without the burdensome need for spoken words. Psychic surgeons who healed the invisible damage to the psychic consciousness all people were born with, but never realized they had. Telekinesists who moved objects with their mind.

  Last, but not least, the gift Ky didn’t realize he possessed: clairsensitivity, the ability to sense other psychic energies afoot in the universe. It was all his doing the day he’d reached out from far-away Afghanistan and touched Eden with a desperate mental cry for relief. That was why he’d contacted her. He had the ability to feel out other sensitives. It also explained why he was able to intuitively detect the aromatic scent of her Vicks rub half a world away.

  She breathed evenly as the vision of him materialized. He’d never once cried for help, just the strength to persevere his tormentors or die trying. To not reveal what little he knew about troop movements and military intelligence. To not give in.

  Just as she began to truly savor the nature of the man she’d grown to love, the vision of a small dark-haired boy edged into the scene. Friendless and alone on a narrow metal bed, he stroked a fluffy Siamese kitten on his lap. Its back rose with every caress, its tail twitching. The sweet thing mewed, lifted its bony hips and purred a definite, ‘Do it again.’

  The kitten loved to play almost as much as he—

  Excuse me, she, loved tuna and catnip. Eden smiled at the psychic reprimand. Yes. She was that kind of sensitive. Eden could read the wishes of animals, too, even though the memory might be years old.

  Ah, the grace of furry pets exuded its own degree of sympathetic energy. The universe retained that psychic energy footprint, and only level tens could see it. She paused in her psychic journey and let the comfort of the years old memory work its magic. Hope lifted in her heart for the man she knew only as Black Eyes. Any man who had loved a kitten as much as he’d loved this one couldn’t be all bad. His eyes had to be black for a reason other than evil.

  The vision faded. She hovered between the warmth of Tucker’s body behind her and the chill of the blizzard before her, for a moment unsure where Black Eyes might be. Her second sight detected no black smudges as it had during Koenig’s and Shields’ approach. No blue aura, either. No faint glow of a good heart—

  Oomph! A hand close around her neck. She threw out a muffled scream even as the hand fought for a better hold. A gruff voice growled, “Got you.”

  Ky stopped dead in his tracks. A scream of terror had just rent the cold, dark night, close to his location. He shifted to north by northwest, his heart on fire. “Eden! Stay put. I’m coming!”

  Tate and Becker followed him somewhere close behind, but they’d better damned well keep up.

  Suddenly, Alex’s voice burst into Ky’s ear. “Do not engage.”

  “Bullshit,” Ky hissed, obeying that stupid order the last thing on his mind.

  “Ky!” Alex bellowed. “Hold up. It’s too late.”

  Ky shut his mind to his very stupid boss and ran faster, intent on closing the distance. What did Alex know? What kind of a man would stop now? It’s never too late! Isn’t that the rule? Never give up? Never stop trying?

  He blasted by dark tree trun
ks on his way to get to Eden. Branches whipped his goggles and jacket. He nearly fell in the drifted snow, not once, but twice, and still he forced his legs to pump faster.

  A light glowed ahead. Not fire. More like the green glow of a Chemstick. He stopped at the source, his lungs on fire and his heart in his throat. The sight on the frozen ground sent a shock wave through him.

  “Hold your position,” Alex ordered, as if Ky could’ve done anything else.

  Tucker Chase lay there. Dead. A bloody hole in his head. Dark blotches of blood on the snow. His eyes open. His arms stretched wide.

  “Son-of-a-bitch,” Alex hissed at what TEAMshield had just visually relayed to Virginia.

  “We’re too late,” Tate muttered. “She’s gone. Chase is down.”

  “Goddamnit.” Becker dropped to Chase’s side, “Not you, buddy. Not you.”

  Ky scanned the darkness, searching for one glint of a scope, one shadow of the bastard who’d done this. Eden had to be nearby. He’d just heard her. Tate scouted the immediate vicinity, his shoulders hunched, his rifle tucked into his chest and ready to engage. Ky stumbled onward. Where is she?

  “Mother picked up a satellite transmission,” Alex explained firmly. “I’m sending new coordinates via TEAMshield. Go north, Ky. There’s an underground complex. You’ll find Agent Stark there. Let Becker stabilize Chase. Call me—”

  “He’s dead, Boss.” Ky panned to the bleak scene behind him.

  “Think, damn it!” Alex roared. “If he’s so dead, why’s he spiking orange and red on your TID?”

  Ky switched his goggles over to thermal imaging display, the TID his goggles virtually shared with Alexandria. Sure enough. Chase’s heart glowed strong and red, but another item glittered on the display. Ky dropped to one knee to retrieve his only link to Eden.

  Something blue.

  Something round.

  Her jar of Vicks.