Edge of fear, p.31
Edge Of Fear, page 31
Heather was worried, and scared enough for the entire T-FLAC organization,and all their friends and families. Why were she and Caleb stillhere ?
Instinct and emotion urged her to go to Caleb. But she wasn’t going to do anything to piss either of these guys off.
Having the social skills to converse adequately, but charmingly, in four languages at a cocktail party hadn’t exactly given her the experience for what she needed in this situation. Charm and BS could only go so far.
“I’m here, alone.” She infused confidence and authority into her voice by sheer necessity. This wasn’t a dress rehearsal. “Alone.” It sure was starting to feel like it, which ratcheted up her nerves another few notches. “I just told you I can give you what you want. Bring Caleb to me. Let us walk out of here, and everyone leaves happy.”
One of the brothers motioned to the two men flanking her. “Search her.”
“Right here with you, honey,” Keir Farris said softly.So softly that Heather thought it was in her head. Was that even possible? “Start backing up slowly. Straight back, that’s a girl. Keep going.” How was it that nobody else could hear him? The trouble was, there was still that “Oh, shit!” tone in his voice.
One brother was apparently fascinated by the sea life swimming through the thick strands of kelp. The other scowled at her as he observed her taking a step back. “Where do you think you’re going?”
She stopped in her tracks and lifted her chin with false bravado. “I don’t want your goons to put their hands all over me. You asked me to come. I’m here. You told me you’d let my husband walk out of here with me. So”—she held out her arms—“back off.” She slid her feet backward, inch by slow inch.
“Look. No purse.” She pulled her pockets inside out, the bracelet ridiculously heavy on her wrist. “No weapons, no microphones, nothing.”
“And no account information,” one of the brothers snarled. “Do you think we’re fools?”
Heather figured that they didn’t want her honest answer. She gave them her cocktail smile. “I think you’re businessmen. The numbers are in my head; isn’t that why you demanded that I be the one to deliver them? You knew that already,” she said, flattering their intelligence. “I’m prepared to do the deal as agreed.”
The situation was surreal, and her stomach was knotted with tension and nerves. At her apartment earlier, Lark had told her to just hand over the bracelet to the brothers. Just give them what they wanted and her invisible bodyguards would take care of the rest. Every instinct in Heather urged her to do just that. She wanted to get out of here so badly she could barely think of anything else. But a cautious little voice in her head reminded her that Caleb had thought he’d placed a protection spell on her, and it hadn’t worked. Boy howdy hadn’t it worked.
What was there to say that Keir’s spellwould ? For God’s sake—he was having problems teleporting her! “Oh, shit” was right.
The second she gave these guys the bracelet there was no reason for them to keep either herself or Caleb alive. If the protection spell didn’t work, she and Caleb might both end up very, very dead.
In a very, very permanent way.
Her tension eased slightly as the El-Hoorie brothers’ men started disappearing. One by one, they were being picked off and teleported out of the room. So Caleb’s men could teleport the bad guys, but she was stuck here? That didn’t make any sense at all. Still it was pretty funny watching people disappear into thin air. Thank God she’d seen this before or she’d think she was going stark, raving nuts.
“Keep going,” Keir told Heather softly. “Don’t stop until you get to the wall.”
One of the brothers motioned his two men to stay where they were. “Our money is where?”
Heather’s back hit the wall. “Sw—”
Caleb’s people had been teleporting the brothers’ men at a dizzying speed. Suddenly the brothers noticed that their number was dramatically decreased. They might not know why or how, but they could obviously count. Surprise, surprise.
One brother raced across to the bench where Caleb had been. Had been? She blinked. Where was he? Had Lark teleported him out already? She almost shouted out his name when the other brother leveled a big black gun at her. Oh, shit. Again.
There wasn’t even time to brace, if such a thing were possible. It happened so fast she just stood there paralyzed. A split second later she heard a chink as something metallic—thebullet ?—dropped to the floor a few feet in front if her as if it had hit a force field. Not waiting to confirm her suspicions, she ran like hell for the exit. Okay. Good to know.
The protective spelldid work.
The plan had been for her to hand over the bracelet, and then quickly have Keir Farris teleport her back to her apartment. If for any reason that wasn’t possible, she was to head for the exit, where either Tony Rook or Dekker would teleport her. Supposedly, in wizard theory, she shouldn’t be in any physical danger.
Running all out, she prayed she wouldn’t be slammed in the back by a bullet, or flattened by a ricocheting piece of cement. Behind her all hell was breaking loose as Caleb’s men engaged the terrorists in a no-holds-barred fight to the death.
Gunfire strafed the Aquarium. The sound bounced and echoed off the cement walls and the thick glass of the tanks in a deafening cacophony. The noise set off the alarm systems, which not only added to the rising decibels, but turned on bright lights across the exhibits. Chunks of cement become projectiles, and as dangerous as the bullets.
Heather didn’t look back. Raising one arm to protect her head, just in case, she used the other to protect her stomach and ran. Her heart was in her throat, and sweat poured down her temples as she raced toward the closestEXIT sign. Maybe she should have just handed over the bracelet. Where was Caleb? More importantly, was he safe? Or, heaven help them, bleeding and powerless? She wanted to scream. Scream for the gunfire to stop. Scream her husband’s name. Hell, just scream until the panic stopped surging through her system.
She saw Dekker, a gun in each hand, running to intercept her at the designated exit. She paused, bracing herself to be teleported. Nothing happened.
He scowled, got off a shot at a man charging behind her, and kept coming. He stopped a few feet away and reached out to take her arm. “What the hell?”
“Oh, God, now what?” But she saw “what.” He couldn’t touch her. His hand was stopped—blocked—a foot from her body. That, apparently, was as close as he could get.
“Rook,” the op shouted into his lip mic. “To Heather.Now. ”
Rook materialized beside her with a cocky grin. “Hi, beautiful. Ready to go home?” He shot the man beside her a sneaking glance.
“He can’t teleport me, either.” She didn’t even try to keep the panic and nerves out of her voice. “Where’s Caleb? What’s going on?”
“We’re on it,” Rook insisted. “Let’s get you out of here. Ready?”
“Ye—” She didn’t teleport when Tony tried again either. She was suddenly very afraid.
Farris glanced at Rook. “Take her outside. I’ll get Caleb.” He was gone in a poof and a blink.
She and Rook ran side by side. The firstEXIT door was locked and Heather tasted the burn of panic. “This way.” Rook pointed to the left with the barrel of his gun.
Okay. This wasn’t supposed to happen. She was here to save Caleb. And she’d seen nothing but the back of his head. Heather’s heartbeat faltered, and she slipped on something on the floor. She threw her hands out as her feet shot out from under her. Tony tried to grab her.
Three things happened simultaneously. One, Tony couldn’t touch her, two, somehow she was upended and placed gently back on her feet, and three, Caleb arrived wearing a scowl. “What the hell are you thinking, Rook? Why is she still here?”
“Can’t teleport her. Neither can Dek or Farris.”
“Bullshit.” Caleb’s eyes narrowed when she didn’t go anywhere. “Who the fuck protected her?”
“Farris. But I’m telling you, he can’t teleport her either.”
“Impossible. Probably,” Caleb amended.
“Whatprobably ?” Heather shot back. She grabbed fistfuls of his shirt. “Do something. Conjure up some eye of newt or whatever it is you have to do but—”
“Bean,”Caleb said with dawning wonder.
“What?” everyone seemed to ask in unison.
Heather curved her hand around her tummy. “Oh, God. Is something wrong with the baby?”
“Try,” Caleb began, pausing to turn and fire a few cover rounds down the hallway before saying over his shoulder, “talking to him.”
She took a deep breath, wondering if she was so far gone crazy that there was never any chance of coming back, then as reasonably as possible, said, “Bean, we need to get out of here, so Daddy and I would really appreciate it if you could—Holy crap!”
She was back in her apartment.
Lark was sprawled on her bed, reading an Italian fashion magazine and popping chilled grapes into her mouth. She glanced up as Heather noisily collapsed into the straight-backed chair at the table.
“You look sweaty. Everything okay?”
Stunned, Heather managed a nod. “Uh. Oh, crap. Damn. I think so.” She rubbed her stomach in awe. “I am okay. Apparently my son is already taking care of his mother. He teleported me home.” She swallowed, then grinned as she felt the gentle answering flutter in her womb.
Lark crossed her feet, and grinned. “Told you he was going to be powerful.”
Heather held onto the chair until the dizziness of reentry faded. “You knew this could happen?”
“I’m an empath, remember?”
Heather frowned as she glanced around, expecting to see Caleb. Wanting to see Caleb, damn it. “Bean only teleported me?”
Lark smiled. “Caleb’s a powerful man and a wizard, Heather. Caleb can handle himself.”
From your lips,she thought, standing. “Hard to forget,” she muttered, going to the kitchen for a glass of water. Wine would have been better, but not when she had a baby onboard. “How come Bean didn’t protect me in Matera?” she shouted, filling a glass.
She walked back into the other room, and sat down at the table. Placing her half-empty glass beside her, she started sorting through the small mountain of jewelry still piled there in a jumbled mess. All that was left of her old life. “Well?”
“Timing is everything,” Lark said, her expression a mixture of amused and triumphant. “A carrier has to hit the fifteen-week mark before the baby’s powers start to develop.”
“Carrier?” Heather groaned. “That makes me sound like Typhoid Mary.”
“Yeah, sorry, didn’t mean for it to come out like that. At any rate, you conceived fifteen weeks ago as of three this afternoon.”
“Are you telling meI now have wizard powers?” Heather demanded, half horrified, and half intrigued. And absolutelynot wondering how Lark knew the exact hour of Bean’s conception.
“Not you. Your child. And through Bean, your own natural abilities can come forward.”
Say what? “Believe me, I don’t have any natural, orun natural abilities,” Heather assured her.
“Time will tell,” Lark said enigmatically.
As much as she wanted to ask Lark what she was talking about, Heather bit her tongue. Lark wouldn’t tell her, and frankly she had enough on her plate to think about right now without going down that road.
While Lark reclined on the bed, flipping through her magazine, Heather got up again and paced. “Wherever your father is, I wish he and the others would hurry up and come home,” she whispered.
In a matter of seconds, four men crumpled into a heap at her feet. Blood oozed from a cut above Keir’s right eye. Dekker had a split lip and what appeared to be the beginnings of a nasty bruise on his cheek. Tony Rook’s hand was swelling and black-and-blue already.
Caleb rolled onto his side, wincing as he got to his feet.
“Why do you guys always like to do it thehard way?” Lark demanded, shaking her head as she took in their disheveled appearances. “What’s the point in being wizards if you don’t utilize your powers in these situations?”
Tony Rook grinned. “Perk of the job.”
“What the f—What wasthat ?” Keir asked, rubbing his lower jaw and looking at the others.
“Warp speed courtesy of Mini Edge,” Lark said, barely containing her excitement.
Caleb’s blue eyes fixed on Heather. She could tell he was favoring his left side. His ribs? “How’d you make that happen? What did you do?”
Worry about you. Love you.“I just wished you’d hurry up. I guess Bean did the rest.”
“Awesome,” Rook announced. “We flew through those guys at warp speed. Heather, honey, you can wish me through any op you want. Hey, thanks,” he told Caleb as he noticed that his hand was healed. He flexed his fingers and grinned. “That isso cool.”
Still watchingher, Caleb fixed his friends’ battered bodies. His eyes promised her retribution for showing up at the Aquarium.
Tough.
As usual, his closed expression betrayed nothing more than what she imagined she read in his eyes. And even there she could be way off. Where had he learned to be so damn,annoyingly inscrutable?
“Send a detail back to the Aquarium. They’ve got the place prepped to blow,” Caleb told Lark.
“Presidential and environmental group scheduled, tenA.M. tomorrow. I’m on it.” She disappeared, taking her grapes and magazine with her.
“Heather, give me whatever it is that has the account numbers, so we can get this tied up.”
“Do you have any damn idea how freaking…annoyingthat is? ‘Get this tied up?’” she repeated through her teeth. “Like you haven’t just walked in and disrupted my entire flippinglife !”
Caleb glanced at the jewelry strewn on the table. “Which piece is it?”
“Bean, Mommy needs to talk to Daddy alone. Could you please send everyone wherever they’d like to go, as long as it isn’t here?”
“Hey, w—” The three men disappeared instantly.
Holy crap. Tony was right. Thiswas awesome. “Now, please put Daddy’s butt in that chair. Gently.”
Caleb flew through the air, but landed lightly in the seat.
“Careful,” he warned, looking a little shell-shocked. “Power corrupts.”
“It’s also convenient,” she countered, moving closer to him. “I can’t have you teleporting off into the sunset when you have so much explaining to do.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me,” she said, folding her arms over her chest and pinning him in place with a look. “I want to know why you used me. Why you thought it was okay to make me a pawn in the game you were playing with my father.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“Really. What was it like?”
Caleb rubbed his palms over his face. “It didn’t even start out as my assignment, Heather. I agreed to come and talk to you just to get out of the damn hospital. This wasn’t even my op. I was supposed to pass you off to another operative.”
“To do what?”
“Find your father. Finding him meant finding the money. Finding the money meant chopping the financial legs out from under a dozen terrorist groups.”
“Why didn’t you just go to Matera and teleport him where you wanted him?”
“Teleportation requires visual contact.”
“Oh, for—You could have become invisible, walked into that place any damned time you liked, andseen him.”
“Tried that. Problem was, the place was a labyrinth. We couldn’tfind him. We knew he was inside.Then. But we couldn’t be sure he’d stay there while we kept searching. I tried everything before I came to you.”
For a moment her eyes were clear and bottomless. “There’s one thing you didn’t try.”
“And that was?”
“You didn’t tell me the truth andask for my help.”
“Hindsight is twenty-twenty,” he said grimly. “But in all honesty, the thought never crossed my mind.”
“Too bad. It could have saved a lot of time.”
“And a lot of pain.”
“Yes. Marrying me was a bit drastic, considering that all you needed from me was a couple of hours at most.” She pinned him with her gaze. “I understand that fighting terrorism is more important than, say, trying to find a way to make that Curse null and void.” Seeing him wince, she added, “You certainly take that duty thing seriously, don’t you?”
