Shards of Hope (Psy-Changeling 14)

Aden’s response told Zaira he was following her train of thought. We’ll make sure the medics assess her for further signs of torture.

Giving the order for Olivia to be taken to an Arrow medical facility, Zaira spoke to Mica, who’d led the team that had brought the woman in, and asked if they’d discovered anything in her apartment. The answer was expected: “Nothing but a four-day cache of disposable drug injectors preloaded with what must be Halcyon—though I’m having it tested to confirm—and some clothing.”

Zaira released her lieutenant to his duties and walked back outside with Aden. “I didn’t get a chance to tell you earlier”—because she’d decided to pounce on him instead—“but it looks like both Jim and Olivia simply took a water taxi into Venice a week ago. We’re working on backtracking further, but my instincts say we’ll find no paper trail that leads back to anything substantial.” This entire conspiracy was too well organized.

“Update me if there are any developments.” Ordinary enough words, but his eyes took her back to their stolen kisses, her body humming at the proximity to his. “I have to return to the compound, but I’ll be back soon . . . and we can finish our earlier conversation.”

Her heart slammed against her rib cage.

Chapter 48

BEATRICE STARED AT the target she’d taken as part of her first live mission, nausea churning in her gut and threatening to erupt from her throat. The girl was crying again, begging to be released. Beatrice had given her water and some food, so she wasn’t emaciated, but her face was thinner, her eyes red.

“I don’t think she knows anything,” she dared whisper to Blake. “I’ve used every viable interrogation technique.”

Blake backhanded her. Hard.

She fell to the floor, stayed there when he came to straddle her body and wrench back her head with a grip in her hair. Blood trickled from her nose, her entire face a throbbing pulse. “You used only the nonviolent methods,” he said, his voice toneless and cold. “You’ve failed the test.”

Her eyes burned. “No, please.” If she lost him, she’d have nothing and no one.

“Stop sniveling and get up. I’m going to show you how a real interrogation is done.”

Rising to her feet, she wiped away the blood and tears and followed him to stand beside the girl, who looked at her with scared eyes. “Please help me,” she begged. “Please.”

Blake grabbed the girl’s jaw in a punishing hold. “There is no help here.” Taking a hunting knife, he cut a deep line over her left breast while muffling her screams with his palm.

Blood blackened her thin red top, but he’d cut with care to cause pain without doing a debilitating injury. Beatrice’s stomach lurched nonetheless and she would’ve stumbled back if Blake hadn’t raised his head and said, “This is how you get answers.” Removing his hand from over the woman’s mouth when her scream died to snuffles, he held the knife, point down, over her abdomen. “Your father is a scientist, is he not?”

The woman nodded frantically. “Yes, yes! He is!”

“And he’s creating a serum to neutralize Psy abilities.”

“Yes!”

“Good, we’re finally getting somewhere.” Turning, he held the blade handle out toward Beatrice. “Get the rest of the information.”

Chapter 49

IT WAS AFTERNOON in Venice by the time Zaira was able to go off shift, and though she’d been up for well over twenty-four hours, she went to bed with a deep sense of frustration at how little she’d unearthed about the conspiracy targeting the Arrows.

The pathologist had just confirmed that Jim’s brain, while showing signs of Halcyon damage, wasn’t the Swiss cheese that scans showed his female partner’s to be. Even after a full detox, Olivia might never salvage large blocks of memory. Jim, on the other hand, might well have made a total recovery.

According to the pathologist, the male may have been “one of the lucky few who have a kind of natural protection against long-term Halcyon damage.”

“Which is why he had to die,” she said to Aden when he joined her in her room ten minutes after her own return. “If it was Blake, he was very careful about it.”

“No luck with surveillance feeds from security and street cameras?” Sitting on the bed, he took off his boots and socks.

She shook her head and, having already changed, stood in front of the closed door and indulged her need by watching him. Boots set aside, socks beside them, he rose and removed his belt to drop it by the boots. “Beggars belief to think this situation is unconnected to our abductions.”

“Agreed. Two different entities suddenly after the squad? I don’t buy it.” Zaira blew out a breath and watched him strip off his T-shirt. “How are things in the valley?”

“On track.” He stretched, rubbing the back of his neck, his body flexing.

Breath catching in her throat, she clenched her stomach. “How do we do this? What are the rules?”

“We make the rules.” He closed the distance between them, crowding her up against the door in a way she’d permit no one else. With Aden it felt as if she was basking in sunshine, her body turning molten.

Running her hands up his sides, she shivered when he dipped his head to kiss her throat. On the PsyNet, her shields began to fall, but she’d built fail-safe after fail-safe since RainFire. No one would know her emotions, know that he was her greatest weakness.

She held his head against her, craving the contact, the sensations he aroused in a body that, before him, had never understood it had the capacity for such pleasure. But as her mind began to haze, she felt the hard thrust of his erection against her abdomen. “Do you want full sexual contact?” Zaira wasn’t sure if she could trust even Aden to invade her body in that way.