His left fist. The one with the gunshot wound.
"Owwww, G.o.dd.a.m.n it!" Rene howled, clutching his hand against his belly and staggering backward as pain lanced through the entire left side of his body. When it had subsided down to a dull, throbbing ache and he could breathe again, he stumbled back toward the car and leaned heavily against it.
"Son of a b.i.t.c.h," he whispered. For at least the millionth time, he opened his mind and strained to sense any hint of Tessa"s presence whatsoever. He didn"t expect to feel her and was no longer dismayed or disappointed when he couldn"t. Where are you, pischouette? Give me a sign, a thought, a big "f.u.c.k-you-Rene"-anything. Come on, Tessa. Help me here.
He"d fought traffic as the interstate had cut through the heart of El Paso, and was now somewhere south of the city, just past exit 42. Did they stop in El Paso for some reason? he wondered because he"d seen no sign of the maroon Jaguar. They can"t still be ahead of me somehow. I"ve been driving d.a.m.n near ninety miles an hour all this time!
"Where are you, Tessa?" he asked as traffic rushing by on the interstate sent a smart, hot breeze flapping into his face. Jesus Christ, am I going the wrong way? Could they be going west instead? But why? Martin Davenant wouldn"t know where Brandon is, where he"s going, and Tessa sure as h.e.l.l wouldn"t tell him.
"It"s east," he told himself, shoving his hair back from his brow. "It"s east, G.o.dd.a.m.n it, they have to be going east. I just haven"t caught up to them yet, that"s all."
Since he was still for the moment and didn"t have to worry about plowing headlong into oncoming traffic, Rene closed his eyes and opened his mind again, this time reaching out to the birds. He"d never tested himself, never pushed the limits of his abilities, and figured now would be as good a time as any. What the h.e.l.l, he thought, widening the scope of his telepathic range for miles in all directions like a big, broad, mental umbrella.
The effect was immediate and staggering; he didn"t know how many birds he"d inadvertently stumbled upon, but from the looks and feel of things inside his skull it was thousands of them, if not ten thousand, all crashing into his brain at once.
"G.o.d...!" he gasped, buckling at the waist, nearly crumpling against the side of his car. He shoved the heel of his hand against his forehead, his brows furrowed, his teeth gritted as he struggled to make sense of the maelstrom of thoughts he was picking up from the birds. He saw what they saw, felt what they felt, heard what they heard, and it overwhelmed him in a dizzying internal cacophony. It was so disorienting, nearly painful, he moved to break the connection, to close his mind.
And then he saw it-a low-slung maroon sedan. His mind had come across a hawk floating on a thermal draft over the interstate; through its small but sharp eyes, he could see the telltale, shield-shaped red and blue sign with the unmistakable numerals, 10, emblazoned across the center. As the hawk swooped over the maroon car, Rene caught it with his mind, simultaneously breaking his mental bond with all of the other birds and focusing solely on this one. The hawk circled the highway in a broad circ.u.mference, following the sedan until it drove past a landmark by which Rene could orient himself-a ramp for exit 49. Son of a b.i.t.c.h, they"re less than ten miles ahead of me!
Rene jerked himself out of the hawk"s brain and hurried around to the driver"s side of the Audi. He didn"t bother with a seat belt, and only barely bothered to swing his prosthetic leg around and out of the way of his left foot-this only out of necessity, because he needed the s.p.a.ce to reach the accelerator. When he"d bought the car, he"d been told it was electronically limited to topping out at 130 miles-per-hour. Guess it"s time to find out for myself, he thought grimly, as he put it in gear and roared back onto the highway.
He didn"t hit 130, but came awfully d.a.m.n close. He might have reached it, had he not seen the maroon sedan parked in the emergency lane just before the ramp for exit 55, its emergency flashers marking a pulsating, staccato beat. As he approached, he watched a man get out of the driver"s seat and jog around toward the pa.s.senger"s side, where upon he opened the back door and leaned inside, all but disappearing from Rene"s view.
Rene stepped on the brakes, slowing the Audi and pulled it to a sliding, skidding halt in the gravel-strewn lane behind the sedan.
Along the way, as he"d been driving, he"d wrestled with the steering wheel using his injured left hand-gritting his teeth against pain the whole time, as he"d forced himself to curl his fingers about the wheel-and fished his Sig Sauer P228 out of the glove box with the other. He held the pistol-loaded, c.o.c.ked and potentially lethal-in his lap and didn"t even bother turning off the Audi"s still- growling engine after throwing it in park.
He got out of the car and walked toward the sedan, his stride wide, his pace brisk, his brows narrowed with murderous intensity.
Davenant hadn"t even noticed him yet, still too f.u.c.king busy with whatever he was doing in the backseat. When Rene drew closer and heard the hoa.r.s.e but distinctive sounds of someone screaming, shrill and nearly sobbing, he moved even faster, raising the gun to level it at head-height.
"Get your f.u.c.king hands off her," he seethed, ignoring the pain that ripped through his arm as he clapped his left hand against Davenant"s shoulder. He jerked the other man backward and spun him around, slamming him against the car door frame. He shoved the business end of the nine-millimeter into Davenant"s face, flattening his nose beneath the steel muzzle.
And then realized.
He"d never seen Martin Davenant in his life, but was willing to bet the man wasn"t traveling with a wailing infant in the backseat. A second glance now revealed what he"d been too seized with emotion to realize before-the car he"d been following wasn"t a Jaguar at all, but a Hyundai, the sleek silhouette of the sedan similar, but not identical, to Davenant"s.
Viens m"enculer, he thought, watching in dismayed horror as a pale pink pacifier dropped from the man"s hand and bounced to the gravel and dirt below.
"Oh, Christ...!" the man whimpered, his eyes enormous and nearly crossed as he gawked at the pistol against his nose.
There was a woman in the front pa.s.senger seat, a woman who shrieked loudly now, her voice momentarily drowning out the peals of the unhappy baby. She all but scrambled over the center console inside the car, fighting against the restraint of her seat belt"s shoulder harness, trying desperately to throw herself protectively over the child.
Viens m"enculer.
Which turned out to be children-in addition to the baby, a little boy no more than three years old sat belted into a booster seat on the driver"s side, round-eyed and frightened as he blinked at Rene.
"Please don"t!" the woman screamed, trying to wrap her arms simultaneously around both the little boy and the bucket of the baby"s car seat. "Oh, G.o.d, please don"t hurt my babies!"
Viens m"enculer, Rene thought. f.u.c.k me. "Please," the man said, his voice shaking, his hands raised. "Please...take whatever you want. Anything you want, mister. Just please...please don"t hurt my family. Please."
"I"m sorry," Rene whispered, lowering the gun. In that instant, he opened his mind, reaching out to both the man and his wife, calming them as abruptly and effectively as an intravenous sedative. The woman stopped screaming; she moved, sliding away from the children and back into her seat, her expression softened and nearly dull, her gaze distracted and dazed.
The man"s hands dropped limply to his sides and he stood there, blinking over Rene"s left shoulder like a marionette at the ready, waiting for someone to come along and pick it up by the strings. In that moment, Rene obliterated from their minds any memory of him whatsoever.
I"m sorry, he thought.
"Mommy?" the little boy inside the car whimpered. "Daddy?"
Rene leaned over to look into the car, and the boy shrank in his car seat, all wide and frightened eyes. The baby-a girl to judge by the fuzzy pink, ruffle-trimmed jammies-continued to howl, drumming her small hands and feet in indignant outrage.
The man"s name was Vincent Thomas. The woman was his wife, Yvonne. These were their children-Nathan James, who was two and a half, and Olivia Marie, who was three months old.
Rene knew these things because he could see them plainly in Vincent"s and Yvonne"s minds, just as he could see they"d been on their way to Vincent"s mother"s home in Alamo Alto.
Christ have mercy, I"m sorry.
"Hush now, pet.i.t," he said softly, reaching into the car and brushing his fingertips lightly against the baby"s face. At this caress, the baby instantly hushed, blinking up at him with wide, glistening, curious eyes. Her skin was impossibly soft, nearly velveteen, flushed and warm to his touch. He could smell her; a sweet infusion of baby lotion, lavender soap and underlying these, the hot rush of her blood. He could feel her in his mind, the same sensation of sunshine and warmth that he"d felt when he"d touched Tessa"s belly, only stronger this time, more developed and cognizant.
"Her name is Olivia," said the boy, Nathan. Rene was aware of his thoughts, as he was the baby"s, but made no move yet to control or manipulate either of them. Surprisingly, there seemed no need; Nathan"s momentary fright had likewise waned as Rene had touched the baby and now, seeming somehow satisfied that Rene posed no threat, the boy smiled at him shyly. "She dropped her binky."
"Here." Rene reached down, picking the fallen pacifier from the ground. "Why don"t you hold onto it for her then, pet.i.t?"
The painful realization that he"d missed out on this, that he might have built a life with Irene and raised their baby together, that they might have taken midmorning drives to Grandma"s house, left him nearly breathless with remorse and heartache.
"Is my daddy sleeping?" Nathan asked.
"Oui, pet.i.t. Daddy"s sleeping." Rene smiled and nodded once. "But he"ll be awake again when I"m gone. Don"t you worry."
He would have given anything-traded all of his money, every last f.u.c.king dime from his considerable fortune-to have someone say that to him, that magic, precious, powerful word: Daddy. He might have had a second chance for that; he"d thrown it all away with Irene, but he might have had it again with Tessa and her unborn child. If I hadn"t f.u.c.ked things up. And oh, Christ, now she"s gone and I"m never going to get her back. I"ve lost it all again and it"s my fault.
He drew back from the car, seized with a sudden, powerful loneliness. "You forget about me now, pet.i.t," he said, opening his mind again. "You and your wee souer, no?"
He saw the little boy nod, his gaze growing dreamy, just as his mother"s had. Only the baby, Olivia, continued blinking at Rene as he turned to walk away, her eyes bright and fascinated, her little mouth forming an endless series of oooos and aahhhs.Chapter Fifteen Brandon had always been more perceptive than Tessa, more aware of what he called the chi of things in many ways. Like the afternoon when they"d discovered the crumbled remnants of what she now believed to have been the Morin clan"s original great house; the electricity in the air Tessa had sensed about the rubble-and been eerily fascinated by-had affected Brandon on some deeper, more visceral level. The place had disturbed him.
The chi of things. That"s what he had always called it, some kind of foreign term a.s.sociated with the martial art of aikido, which Brandon had studied through Lina"s older brother, Jackson.
"Aikido" means "the way of harmony with ki," he"d told her once, when they had been sixteen, only a couple of months after they"d found the old ruins out in a field. He"d accompanied her to the third floor of the great house, to the ballet studio, and while she"d practiced at the barre, he"d stood nearby, practicing aikido moves in a ch.o.r.eographed fashion he called kata. He had taught her some aikido maneuvers over the years, wrist locks and other techniques that seemed simple enough in the demonstration, but proved to be devastatingly effective in the implementation.
When they had finished, they"d sat together on the floor, their backs pressed against one floor-to-ceiling mirror panel while facing another of identical proportions on the opposite side of the room.
Ki-as in the middle part of aikido-is a derivative of the Chinese word, chi, he"d signed, finger-spelling the unfamiliar terms, his hands moving swiftly, deftly in the air.
What does it mean? she"d signed in reply, to which he"d offered a shrug.
Some people say it"s in everything and everyone, he signed. Everywhere-all around. It"s a sort of energy that flows through you and surrounds you.
She"d given him a dubious look, the corner of her mouth hooked in wry amus.e.m.e.nt. "Use the Force, Luke," she"d deadpanned, and he"d laughed silently.
Exactly, he signed, giving her a playful shove.
She had shoved him back, then leaned her temple against his shoulder, resting. Grandmother Eleanor and the Grandfather come home today, she thought, opening her mind so he could hear her. It had been November; Augustus and Eleanor had traveled to Lexington for a nearly three-week long annual breeding stock Thoroughbred auction. As she spoke, Tessa toyed, in fond habit, with the green sapphire pendant around her neck, her sixteenth birthday gift from Eleanor. I hope she brings us back Snickers bars.
It had been a while since Eleanor had indulged in what had once been a standard wrap-up to her adventures. As her grandchildren had grown older, animosity between Brandon and their older brother, Caine, had magnified, and the two young men seldom made or found the opportunity to be in the same room together anymore. It was an arrangement Eleanor seemed to respect, and her habit of bringing candy for them and telling them about the world beyond the farm had fallen by the wayside as a result.
I miss that. Tessa sighed wistfully, gazing across the room in a distracted fashion at her reflection to find Brandon watching her through the mirror as she tugged the sapphire lightly to and fro along its chain. She had thought he would echo her sentiment; had expected it, actually, and was surprised when he said nothing in reply. She tilted her head, glancing up at him, quizzical. Don"t you, Brandon?
He shrugged. I guess.
She poked him lightly in the ribs with her elbow. Oh, come on. Sure you do. Caine wasn"t always such an a.s.shole to you- especially not when we"d all sit around with Grandmother and listen to her stories. We all looked forward to it.
Again, she expected agreement from him, some manner of concession, but again, none came. He didn"t say anything and Tessa sat back from his shoulder, puzzled. She touched his arm to draw his gaze. "Didn"t we?"
He shrugged again. I guess. He flipped his hand dismissively, as if to say, Whatever.
Tessa pulled against the crook of his elbow again so he could watch her lips move as she spoke. "Maybe we could just go together," she suggested. "You and me."
She couldn"t blame Brandon for wanting to steer clear of Caine. What had always been pretty much prankish bullying in childhood had swelled to out-and-out abuse as they"d grown older. Sometimes Brandon stood up to Caine, but most times, he simply endured his brother"s contemptuous remarks and physical blows, despite the fact that he could have probably kicked Caine"s a.s.s.
Tessa had never really understood it until she"d moved to the Davenant house a year later, and fell victim to abuse of her own.
Sometimes it was simply better to weather a storm without complaint if there was no hope of ever escaping it.
"We won"t tell Caine," Tessa had offered. "It"ll just be the three of us-you, me and Grandmother Eleanor." With a smile, she leaned forward, poking him again in the ribs. "And all of the Snickers bars just for us."
He shrugged away from her, his smile more polite than anything. No, thanks, he signed. But you go ahead.
Again, he cut his eyes momentarily to her necklace, the green sapphire pendant, and Tessa had blinked in surprise. Their birthday had only been a month ago, the twelfth of October. Was Brandon angry that Eleanor had given such an obviously extravagant gift to her?
"Sweet sixteen is more special for girls," Eleanor had told her with a wink and a doting smile.
Just before Eleanor had surprised and delighted Tessa with the gift, she"d caught sight of her grandmother and twin brother together in the great house foyer. Neither had seen Tessa at the top of the stairwell at first; Eleanor had been cradling Brandon"s face between her hands in fond fashion, smiling and speaking quietly, words Tessa didn"t glean. She suspected she"d been forewarning Brandon about the necklace, offering some explanation as to why she was giving it to Tessa, because all at once, Brandon had frowned, his brows narrowing, and shook his head, jerking himself rather forcefully away from Eleanor.
Was he jealous?
"Grandmother Eleanor loves you, Brandon," she said. "She loves us both. Don"t you know that?"
I know plenty about Grandmother Eleanor, he replied with a quick glance at the necklace again, his brows narrowing, his expression clouding.
"What?" she"d asked. "What"s that supposed to mean?"
But he didn"t answer her at first, keeping his mind enigmatically closed. She didn"t know how he could do this; he could communicate with her through his mind, but somehow keep his thoughts otherwise utterly blocked from her. At the time, she"d simply dismissed it as an idiosyncrasy in his mental abilities, something that was the result of the grievous head injuries he"d suffered as a child.
"What"s that supposed to mean?" she asked again, frowning now.
His expression softened, his mouth unfolding in a slight, crooked smile. Olive oil, he mouthed, a turn-about of her favorite, long- standing joke; the words, when spoken aloud, looked identical to I love you to one who was deaf and read lips. He meant to diffuse the sudden, peculiar tension with this. Nothing, he said, his mind open enough to speak-but the rest like some broad and impenetrable wall, the thick and impregnable battlements of some medieval castle. It"s nothing, Tessa. Never mind.
Rene had told her he thought Brandon was stronger than even the Elders, that this was part of the reason why they were so determined to find him, but whether that was true or not, Brandon had always been more telepathically sensitive than Tessa-even though he refused to believe this. That morning over breakfast, he"d kept cutting his eyes toward the restaurant window, his gaze drawn to the interstate, his expression inexplicably puzzled. He hadn"t said anything about it, and Tessa had been too preoccupied with the brewing tension between her and Rene to ask him, but now she wondered.
Did you sense Martin following us? Did you know somehow, Brandon?
As she sat in the pa.s.senger seat of Martin"s car, watching the landscape whip past beyond the window, she wished with all of her heart for even one brief minute of Brandon"s ability, the way he could keep different parts of his mind opened or closed, like water- tight compartments in a ship. Help me, Rene, she wanted to cry out in her mind without Martin noticing. Please, Rene-I"m need you!
Not that she might have needed Brandon"s power. Martin had been on his cell phone nearly from the moment they"d hit the interstate, too distracted to do more than glance occasionally in her direction, much less notice whether or not she used her telepathy.
"...I don"t know," he said for at least the thousandth time, his brows furrowed, his expression exasperated. It hadn"t taken a genius to figure out to whom he was speaking. "G.o.dd.a.m.n it, Monica, we"re heading west on I-10, and beyond that, I don"t f.u.c.king know! I didn"t expect to grab her at a G.o.dd.a.m.n gas station bathroom, so I didn"t plot out a f.u.c.king itinerary."
Tessa dabbed at her nose with her fingertips, sniffling experimentally. The blood had dried, sticky and crusted against her skin, and she tried to rub it away.
"No, you stay there," Martin groused. "Just stay put, G.o.dd.a.m.n it. You have a credit card for the Broughman account if something comes up. Use it."
She decided to risk it, at least in part, and opened her mind. She didn"t say anything; she just tried to sense Rene, see if she could feel him somehow. Surely by now he"d figured out she was gone. Even if he thought she"d holed up in the bathroom to p.i.s.s him off, he"d have gone to look for her. Hopefully he"d found her purse spilled all over the ladies" room floor and realized something had happened. Hopefully he was looking for her somehow, some way-no matter how angry they"d been with each other.
Because last night meant something to him, she thought, closing her eyes against a stinging swell of tears. I know it did. I was stupid to think otherwise, to get mad at him over nothing.
She tried to sense him, but she couldn"t, not even when she braved opening her mind further, straining to feel even a trace of Rene"s presence anywhere close by.
Where is he? she thought, bewildered and frightened all over again. Why isn"t he coming for me?
She jerked, gasping in start as Martin reached out, shoving his hand roughly beneath her shirt. He balanced his cell phone between his left shoulder and ear while driving with his left hand and he pushed the flat of his right palm against her stomach. For one wild, panicked moment, she thought he meant to keep right on reaching up, to grope her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and she shoved him away.
"Yes, I can still sense the baby," Martin said into the phone, frowning. "Hold on."
He slapped her hard before she could raise her hand to try and ward him off, sending fresh blood trickling from her nose.
"I can sense it," he said again, returning his attention to the phone. "Yeah, she had the ledger, too. How the h.e.l.l do I know if all the records are there? I haven"t had a chance to check yet."
He prattled on, telling Monica about the deal to follow Brandon. Tessa could hear bits and pieces of the woman"s end of the conversation whenever her voice would raise, growing sharp or imperative, like now. She couldn"t make out the words exactly, but that tone told her plenty-Monica didn"t think it was a good idea.
"Look, do you want this or not?" Martin snapped finally, nearly shouting into the phone. "Jesus Christ, do you want to keep the status quo for G.o.dd.a.m.n chump change or do you want to be the first wife of the dominant house? Isn"t that what you"re always f.u.c.king harping on me about?"
The status quo. Tessa thought about the mysterious ledger she"d taken from him, the invoices, statements and three million dollars in payments to a company called Broughman and a.s.sociates. And hadn"t he just said something a few minutes ago to Monica about that? "You have a credit card for the Broughman account if something comes up. Use it," he"d told her.
Why would Martin have a credit card in that company"s name? she wondered. Is he working for them or something?
It didn"t make sense. Martin worked as a mid-level accounting manager for Bloodhorse Distillery, but like any other Brethren, his contact with the human world beyond this scope was strictly prohibited. And even though all of the Brethren had contributed to their considerable wealth over the centuries, control of it rested solely in the hands of the dominant clan and its Elder. While that changed as male heirs were born or died, at the moment, it meant that the Brethren"s fortune belonged, for all practical purposes, to Tessa"s grandfather.
Martin was paid a stipend for his work for the distillery, at least on paper, but he had no need for money outside of this. The Elders, with Augustus n.o.ble"s approval, provided him with everything he needed-clothes, food, shelter, cars, even the disgusting cigarettes he smoked so manically.
"I don"t trust the stupid b.i.t.c.h, either," Martin said. Aside from the blow he"d just delivered to her, he seemed to have forgotten Tessa was even in the car with him. He ranted and raved furiously on the phone, and she watched in undisguised alarm as the speedometer on the Jaguar edged over the ninety-miles-per-hour line. "Not for one minute. But what choice do we have? Do you want that son of a b.i.t.c.h Augustus n.o.ble to find Brandon first?"
Martin balanced the phone against his left shoulder again and fished around in his sport coat pocket, pulling out a rumpled pack of Marlboro Reds. He shook one loose, popping it b.u.t.t-first through the opened end, and slipped it between his teeth. She held tightly to the door handle as he then dug about for a lighter, and the car-now pushing the century mark speed-wise-meandered recklessly back and forth between lanes.
"Because if he does, Monica, you can kiss all of our G.o.dd.a.m.n dreams of dominance good-bye," he said into the phone, lisping around the cigarette b.u.t.t as he fumbled, lighting it with a gold-plated Zippo. A sudden, stinking cloud of smoke filled the car, and when Tessa coughed slightly, he frowned and cracked his window. "You do realize that, right? He"ll guard that G.o.dd.a.m.n kid himself now-lock him in his room and shove the key up his own a.s.s for safekeeping."
Tessa moved her hand hesitantly away from her nose. Her fingertips were smeared with blood; bright red droplets had fallen and stained the lap of her pants. The arch of her cheek was still stinging, and she had no doubt that there would be a bruise there. It would be gone as quickly as it came; her accelerated healing would see to that, but in the meantime, it ached just the same.