"I see." Her gaze ran over her husband, pausing on his bare head. From her thoughts, I could see his words weren"t completely unusual, as he often entertained Hunters, but the only place she ever saw him without his hat was in bed. "You don"t need any more coffee? Croissants?"
"No, dear." Emerson a.s.sured her. "What you already brought is perfect."
"Okay. Well, if you"re busy here, Josi and I are going to take Sierra shopping. She"s actually up, if you can believe that. She"s excited about finding something to wear for her date tonight."
"I"m sure she"ll find something beautiful with your help." Emerson swiped a hand over the moisture beading on his forehead.
After Charlaine left, we all returned to the library, with Emerson stopping where the rooms adjoined to pull out pocket doors on either side of the wide doorway. I hadn"t noticed them before, and they were flimsy enough to still give me worry, but the lock should at least give us warning if anyone approached.
Mari had moved Brody, and blood stained the white carpet where he"d lain. Two spots several inches wide where the blood had leaked down on either side of his neck. Not a lot, but enough that it would cause immediate notice. Emerson stepped over the marks and knelt by his son, taking his hand. "He has a pulse." Amazement filled his voice.
"You accuse me of working with Unbounded," Keene said, "and here you have one in your own household."
"Apparently, I was right about you." Emerson looked up at Mari with a pointed stare. "Want to tell me how she can move so fast?"
Things were growing more complicated by the moment. Before we left, I would probably have to knock him unconscious and remove his memory of Mari.
"Let"s focus on your son." I put acid in my voice. "You have some explaining to do."
Emerson"s gaze dropped to Brody. The wound was noticeably healing now, and relief vied with horror on Emerson"s face. "He"s not my son."
"Yes, he is." I wanted to shake him.
"I mean, he is, but he"s adopted. Both our kids are. We couldn"t have children, and I admit, I was worried about pa.s.sing on the gene. I know with each generation it becomes less likely, but it"s happened, and I"ve seen good men have to . . ."
The scenes of carnage in his mind made me sick. "The Emporium must have had a hand in your adoption process."
Emerson frowned. "Why would they? I"m well-known in Hunter society, and they listen to me, but I"m a busy man. I haven"t been on an actual hunt since before Brody was born."
"But you do pa.s.s on orders to others." Amazingly, I kept the bitterness to myself.
He shook his head. "I"m in the Hunter Circle, and I do give orders, but there are many others who are far more active. We made sure that no one man would have total control. We couldn"t risk that the Emporium would be able to put an end to us, to our work."
Emporium. He"d singled them out again.
"So," I said viciously. "He"s unconscious now. You can call your friends. They can dispatch him for you."
Emerson"s eyes grew wide and his expression contorted. "No, no. Not my son. I can"t." His voice grew stronger, his eyes hard. "I won"t."
"Even if he"s not working for the Emporium already, they"ll be watching, waiting for him to Change." Keene leaned against the back of the couch, looking considerably worse for wear. Not at all like his usual self.
Emerson"s head swung back and forth. "No, they won"t know."
"Of course they will." Keene"s lip curled in a sneer. "The Emporium has been foisting their offspring on mortals for years, tampering with genetics to get a higher rate of Unbounded and checking back to see if they Change. Likely they picked you because of your position with the Hunters. Probably trying to get a man inside. Your son"s about thirty, isn"t he? The Change usually takes place between thirty-one and thirty-three. Oh, yeah, they"ll be watching and waiting to pounce, to convert him to their cause."
"Brody would never-" Emerson began.
"You"d be surprised what people will do to survive, especially once that gene kicks in. Like you, I"ve been hunting Unbounded all my adult life," Keene said. "I know."
Renegade Unbounded, he meant, but a chill ran over me that had nothing to do with his former allegiance. That sensation I sometimes had in my gut was screaming warning. With a sinking feeling I realized we shouldn"t have come here at all. Because while the Emporium might not have noticed Brody"s Change before, it was likely that the sensing Emporium agent from last night had noticed him as I"d been noticed, and while the Emporium might delay contacting him because of more pressing matters, they"d keep a closer eye on him. Especially knowing Ava had sent us to the hotel last night. They would worry that she"d have identified Brody"s nature, and Keene and I were well enough known by the Emporium that our coming here would set off all kinds of alarms.
I pushed out my thoughts, pa.s.sing the walls of the townhouse and into the street. Life forces gleamed as people careened by in cars or moved more sedately on the sidewalk. The blocked life forces were easy to locate: two seated in front of the building, probably in a car. Two more across the street. They hadn"t been there when we"d entered, but at least one of them had been nearby to alert the others. Or they had the place on electronic surveillance.
Only four agents? I doubted it. Not for three of us. They"d want to be sure-and that meant at least one more, a sensing Unbounded who could hide from me and could possibly hide other agents as well.
If Keene hadn"t come, I"d shift out with Mari. As it was, he"d created a liability we might not survive. I stepped over to Keene, motioning for Mari to join us.
"He"s not with them, I tell you," Emerson insisted, fear showing as red blotches on his face. "He"d never join them."
"Shields," I said in an undertone to the others as we ignored Emerson. Mostly I spoke for Mari"s benefit and I was relieved when the worried excitement she"d been broadcasting vanished. "They"re here. At least five. Possibly more."
Keene"s face looked pained. Any other day, I"d tease him, but this was too serious.
"I can shift to the compound and tell Ritter," Mari said.
"He won"t be able to get here in time. I"m betting they"ll wait to attack until we leave, to see if we have Brody with us." At least the four seemed to be staying in place. I wished I knew where the sensing Unbounded was. Or was I only imagining the additional trouble?
"What is it?" Emerson asked, looking up at us from his place on the floor next to Brody.
I stared at him, an idea coming to me. "I think they might have noticed your son"s Change. Maybe that"s why the Unbounded were there last night. For him." I didn"t believe that last part was true. The Emporium"s primary purpose for being at the fundraiser had to be to protect Patrick Mann and also his father, though we didn"t yet know why the vice president would be in danger. Still, it didn"t hurt to plant the idea in Emerson"s head.
Emerson"s breath came faster. "Please, help him. Help us."
"Of course we will." I reached for my coat over the arm of the couch, removing a syringe with a smaller needle and handing it to Keene. By the size, he"d know what it was for. "They probably want Brody to give them your genealogy records, but as long as those records aren"t here, they have no reason to break in right away. The records aren"t here, are they?" Of course, I already knew they were upstairs in his safe, and my whole premise was absurd, because the Emporium"s main goal would be to get Brody and convince him to work for them, knowing he could get the records later. Only our presence-Renegade presence-would make them act earlier, but in Emerson"s highly emotional state, I doubted he"d notice details.
Emerson choked. "They"re-they"re . . . oh, they"re in my safe." He thought about the safe behind the picture above the fireplace in his upstairs bedroom, and I could see the combination in his mind. Interesting what a little suggestion could do.
"Don"t worry," I said. "We"ll help you. We"re all in this together."
A sudden gasp cut through the silence in the room. All heads turned toward Brody, who was breathing now, his eyes rolling in fear. A ghastly hoa.r.s.e sound came from his throat.
"It"s okay," his father soothed, patting his hand. "It"s okay. Rest. You"ll be fine."
"Don"t try to talk yet." Keene was already in place behind Emerson. "You"ll heal soon enough." He lowered the needle into Emerson"s neck, pressing the plunger.
"What? Wh-" Emerson keeled over, sprawling across his son.
Keene dropped to his knees next to Brody. "Sleep," he said, injecting a larger portion of liquid from the syringe into Brody. "This will help with the pain."
Brody lapsed back into unconsciousness, though with his accelerated metabolism and the curequick, it wouldn"t last long. I knelt between him and his father, placing a hand on Emerson"s forehead and pushing my thoughts down. Instantly I was in his mind. Instead of the sand stream of thoughts that existed during consciousness, a lake glistened below me. I dove inside the liquid, swimming deeper. Most unconscious minds were symbolized by lakes, but a few weren"t and I was happy not to have to learn a new system. Bubbles containing thoughts circled around me and I carefully extracted a few: Mari shifting, his later thoughts about her, the needle going into his neck. The memory segments were short and his attention so riveted on his son, that I doubted he"d even notice their absence. I was tempted to remove the entire meeting, but that would leave a black hole he"d certainly question. Besides, he needed to know about his son.
Seconds later, I was diving into the lake of Brody"s mind, extracting only the very last memory of seeing his father drugged. It wasn"t more than a glimpse and he wouldn"t miss it. I could see from the memories that he"d been conscious for a few minutes before he"d started breathing and the sensation had terrified him. I left that. He needed to learn that part of being Unbounded as well as the rest.
As I searched for the memory of Mari"s first shift, something interesting caught my attention. In his mind, I was glowing in the hallway and as I sat on the couch. Odd that I hadn"t noticed this before when I"d been in his mind. Energy seemed to pour off me. I resumed my search and found more energy, this time leaking from Mari as she shifted over to Emerson.
Only when she used her ability. I"d been using mine almost the entire time.
Curious, I moved further into his past, dodging memories as they floated by. I quickly found what I was looking for: me at the fundraiser when our eyes met. I was glowing, though less noticeably. More brightness came from the electric cables, floodlights, and other equipment around the photographer"s backdrop, the greater the energy expended, the more the object glowed.
Odd.
Back further. This time Brody was looking at Patrick Mann by the fundraiser door. Patrick was also glowing, brighter than I had been. Using his ability?
At least that explained why Brody had singled us out. Something about energy translated to him as light. This could relate to his Unbounded gift-whatever it was. Maybe he really wasn"t involved with the Emporium. Not one of the memory bubbles hinted at such.
A crash reverberating in my physical ears broke my concentration, and I stroked upward, out of the water and opened my eyes, removing my hand from Brody. Checking mentally, I saw that the four Unbounded watching the townhouse from outside were still in their original places.
"That came from upstairs," Keene said.
"The safe!" I leapt to my feet and grabbed Mari"s hand. If I"d been able to see the combination to the safe in Emerson"s mind, could the other sensing Unbounded have done the same? "Drop your shield. We need to shift upstairs. I"ll show you where."
She nodded eagerly. "Okay."
"But-"
Before Keene finished we were gone, appearing in the room I"d seen in Emerson"s mind. I kept my link with Mari, throwing up a shield for both of us and hoping such a thing was even possible. It felt possible, if the ache at the base of my skull was any indication.
Another fireplace was alight here, this time a real wood one with a chimney. A large picture lay against the wall, and the safe was open. A slight figure with short, tight blond curls turned from the safe, completely dark to my mental senses. I was so accustomed to seeing life forces in every living being, even blocking ones, that for a moment my mind wouldn"t register the presence.
The figure turned, its movements exuding confidence like any other Unbounded. At first I couldn"t tell if it was a man or a woman, but by the lack of b.r.e.a.s.t.s, I decided on a man. Or an older boy. His crunched features told me he was a product of a forced early Change, so though he looked seventeen or eighteen, he could be over a hundred by now. Because his Change was forced, his life expectancy would be closer to four hundred rather than two thousand. At least that was how it worked with the other forced Unbounded I knew.
I pushed my thoughts toward him, finding a tremendous black wall shielding his mind. I"d never seen the like. The surface of it whorled as if it had a life of its own.
"h.e.l.lo," the man said. "I guess you heard the crash. You didn"t see me there in his mind, did you? I"m good at that. I saw you, but not what you were thinking, so that was kind of impressive. Not as impressive as me hiding from you, of course. But I bet not even Delia could break into your mind without a serious distraction." His voice wasn"t deep, but definitely male and slightly nasal.
"Too bad you"re so clumsy." I slid my finger onto the trigger of my gun.
He shrugged. "Who knew the painting was so heavy?"
"Give me that disk." We couldn"t let him take the information back to the Emporium. I didn"t want more deaths on my hands.
"No." His smile held no amus.e.m.e.nt. "I"ve heard so much about you from Delia, but besides the shielding, you aren"t much, are you? I think she"s made a mistake not telling the rest of the Triad the truth about your ability, but she won"t listen to me." He waved the disk. "Maybe after today she will."
Something was odd about his shield. A thick cord ran from it, leaving the Unbounded"s body and trailing to a broken window some ten feet away. The cord reminded me of the black snake I"d found in Patrick Mann"s thoughts.
But what"s it connected to? I guessed the answer even as the thought came. To his partner. Unbounded didn"t usually work alone.
I skimmed along the cord, finding the other Unbounded seconds before he climbed into the room. With all my force, I sliced at the cord, felt it sever. I shoved my thoughts at the Unbounded. Without the protection of the sensing Unbounded, his mind was all mine.
A knife hurtled past me, but I was already moving, antic.i.p.ating the movement. The new Unbounded was about Keene"s size and his ability was obviously combat. A fair match for me given that I could use both his ability and my own.
Wait. I whirled, jumping behind a chair as the sensing Unbounded near the safe fired in my direction. With a crack, his silenced bullet buried itself in the wall behind where I"d been standing. I raised my pistol, but Mari was already there next to him, slicing with her knife. His pistol fell to the ground. I turned back to my own opponent-only to have my gun kicked out of my hands.
I threw up a block and snap kicked at his stomach, following with a right hook. He slammed a kick to my thigh and a blow to my shoulder, but the movements left him wide open. I jabbed my fingers into his throat. Too bad I couldn"t get to my ballistic knife at the moment. He fell, and I kicked hard, readying myself to pounce, but a silent cry burst from Mari"s mind.
Spinning, I saw her, the disk from the safe in her hands, but she was unmoving, her face grimacing in pain. The shield! I"d dropped it with my concentration, and the sensing Unbounded was in her mind, holding her in place with an impressive show of mental force. Physically, he was several feet away, his chest bleeding from her knife. I saw Mari"s gun on the floor by the fireplace poker.
I thrust out my thoughts, crashing into the Unbounded in her mind. Shoving a pulse of light at him, I threw up a shield around Mari, mimicking the thick one I"d seen around his own mind. His fury lashed out as his thoughts careened backward, but slammed uselessly against the outside of the shield. Mari"s relief made me momentarily weak. She took a step.
Shift! I told her. Get out now.
Even as I thought the words, agony dug into my back. I sucked in a breath filled with pain-or tried to. My lungs no longer seemed to work. White hot agony filled my awareness.
Everything seemed to happen at once. Mari arching and falling toward the fireplace. Me sending a pulse of light to the combat Unbounded behind me. His wrenching pain. The sensing Unbounded running toward Mari, a recovered pistol in his hands. Mari tossing the disk into the fire. The Unbounded reaching for it. Burning his hand. Dropping the blackened, melted disk once more into the greedy flames. Keene appearing in the doorway and more silenced shots as the sensing man sprinted toward the window, dragging his companion with him. More pain filling my mind as Keene"s bullet found a target.
Blackness consumed my physical sight, but I was still mentally with Mari as she shifted next to me. "Are you okay?" she asked.
I couldn"t answer. Why wasn"t she bleeding? I"d seen her hit, hadn"t I?
"Erin," Keene spoke close to my face, "you have to shift out of here with Mari. She can"t take you all that way on her own. Concentrate. Can you do it?"
I nodded. Mari and I were still so strongly linked, that I doubted I could separate myself from her if I tried. Something to do with my mega shield that still covered her mind. Almost, it seemed to be keeping me inside her.
"Shift to the car," Keene said.
"What about you?" Mari"s breath came in gasps. "They"ll be back with reinforcements."
"I"ll meet you out front, but if they"re in view, don"t stop for me."
Mari gripped my hand. "Ready, Erin?"
Ready, I told her.
The next minute I saw numbers. Lots of numbers. I felt Mari"s joy in how they fell perfectly into place. So easily. Here and there . . . and then we were gone from the bedroom and in the car, with perhaps half of a heartbeat of time in between.
"I hope you have the keys," Mari said.
"My pocket." The pain had miraculously eased during that half heartbeat when we were neither here nor there, and I could see clearly again, but moving would probably restart the agony.
"Where are the Emporium agents?" Mari asked, digging for the keys. "Are they outside the building?"
With effort, I pulled my mind from hers to check, the shifting seeming to have righted my sense of self. "Yeah. Still in the same place. No. Two are moving now. They"re crossing and going around the corner. They can"t be leaving."
"Bet they"re going to help those other agents. That"s where the bedroom is located."
I took her word for it. She could also add pages of numbers without a machine and she pretty much always knew the time from a running count in her head.
Mari started the engine with too much gas, the roar sounding like a beacon that shouted out our location. "Keene shot at least one of them," she said, "and the one who had the disk is bleeding pretty badly. The jerk. He deserved it. Not sure how they got up to the second floor window."
"The other two are still in their car out front. Let"s get going before their friends come back."
Our car lurched forward. "I"m sorry about the disk," she said, a catch in her voice.
"They didn"t get it. That"s the important thing." I also felt sick about the disk, but it was only one of several copies, and if Mari hadn"t thrown it into the fire, it would be in Emporium hands now, which was far worse.
She picked up speed as she drove toward Emerson"s townhouse. Through my slowly returning vision, I could make out the car where the Emporium agents sat, not twenty feet from the stairway to the house. This was going to be close. The only thing on our side was surprise. Hopefully their companions who"d been inside had told them that both of us had been shot. It was possible they didn"t know I could piggyback on someone else"s ability, so even if Mari was sound enough to shift out, they would still expect me to be inside.
Not that I"d be much help to Mari in my condition. Every movement was torture, and I was having a problem breathing. Then again, maybe I could reach the Emporium agents" minds, maybe stop them if they tried to get out of the car.