Black Gate: Timewalker Chronicles, Book 4 (27 page)

She needed to check in with Seb or Frank and find out how she could get some of her things. She needed to contact her mother and order a new identity and documentation. If Katherine Green was M.I.A., she needed a new name and a new place to live. New clothes. New bank accounts. New car.

Bloody hell, dying was a pain. She felt a bit of sympathy for Sarah and Tim, who’d had to fake their deaths after Chicago and start over. But they were happy now. And if they could do it, so would she.

“You’ll live with me. And I own more than one vehicle. You are welcome to drive whichever you prefer.”

Katherine slid from the bed and he followed, stood before her and lifted her face in his hands before she could make it to the shower. His gaze was guarded, but she felt the doubt in him, the fear that she’d run again. He studied her for a moment. “I’m going to take care of you, Kate. I promise.”

“I know.” She kissed his palm and then pulled away. “I’m going to take a shower.”

“I’ll make some calls and shower after you.”

“Okay.”

When she was clean, she wrapped up in a thick green towel and opened the door to find him without a shirt on, bare-chested and glorious as he leaned against the door frame. She was ready to lick him up and down, until she noticed the cell phone stuck to his ear and the concern on his face. She wanted to reach out and rub the frown from his brows, cradle his face in her hands and promise him everything was going to be okay. But she couldn’t do that. Neither of them knew what was coming.

So what if she’d had her ass kicked the last couple days? She’d run from him and from the Gate. She’d been bitten by one Immortal and nearly killed by another. She’d made mistakes. So had he.

But they’d survived. And now, Teagh was all hers.

He was totally worth it.

Teagh handed her the phone and she placed it to her ear as she looked up at him.

“Hello?”

“Kat? It’s Drew.” Teagh leaned over to listen and she tilted the phone’s speaker out so he could place his cheek next to hers.

“What’s wrong?” She’d heard that tone of voice one too many times. Clipped. Harsh. It was Drew’s version of holy hell, and when he used it, they were usually getting shot at.

“And how did you get my cell number?” Teagh asked the second question, but Andrew ignored him. She could have answered. If there was a piece of data anywhere in the world that Andrew wanted to find, from cell phone numbers to secret, offshore bank accounts, he did. Finding people who didn’t want to be found was his specialty.

“Robbie’s gone.”

Katherine stiffened and bit back panic so she could think. “What do you mean, gone? Dead? Missing? What?” She needed clarification. Gone could mean a hundred different things.

“Spooks took him a couple hours ago. Marched right into the mess hall and tranqued him in front of everyone. We couldn’t stop them, not without making a big scene.”

Katherine understood. The bloodshed would have been epic and completely ruined everything the boys were trying to accomplish by staying on the inside. “Where did they take him?”

“We don’t know, but the Rear Admiral recognized one of them. Said he was one of the gentlemen in the room when Doc Hansen got his special delivery last year. Said you’d know what that meant.”

“I do.” Katherine knew exactly what the doc was referring to. The “special delivery” was the genetic material that had killed five other people and changed her and Robbie’s lives. The Immortal who brought it to Doc Hansen must be behind Robbie’s abduction. The thought made her heart pound in fear.

“Good.” He sounded relieved. “Look, I have to bolt. You and your boyfriend are going to have to take care of this. We’re pretty much on fucking lock down here. And you know how much I fucking hate holes.”

Drew was seriously keyed up. Of all the boys, he rarely cursed. Two F-bombs in one breath was pretty much Defcon One when it came to Andrew.

“Where are you?” The Casper Project had four home bases in the States, and Andrew could be calling from any of them.

“Denver.”

“Are you guys all okay?” Denver. They were still in Colorado. Close to the mountain home the Casper Project had taken. Close to the Gate.

“Yeah. We’re golden. Except Ryan. Haven’t seen him since yesterday morning. I swear that bastard goes ghost every goddamned day.”

“He’s not there?” So, Ryan was gone on another one of his mysterious vanishing acts. When they had down time, the boys had always been allowed to roam, and Ryan roamed far and often. He never told any of them where he was going. None of her team did. She was the only one the Rear Admiral had tried to keep on a leash. That was part of the reason she’d made sure to slip away. Ryan’s excursions usually only lasted a few hours, and the whole team was used to covering for him if he came back late. None of them knew where he went, and none of them asked. She’d pestered Seb to ask him once and his response had shut her down cold. ”
Hell, Kat. I don’t know. Maybe our boy’s off choking his chicken in the woods. Leave him alone
.” She’d never asked again.

“Nope. No idea where he is, as usual. Must have a girl in the city. But he’ll be…speak of the devil. His comm is coming in now. I gotta run. Be careful, Kitty-Kat. Be careful, but get our boy back.”

“I will.”

The line went dead. She turned to Teagh. “That Immortal bastard took him.”

“Who?”

“The same one who gave Doc Hansen the virus. The one who had Ajax’s D.N.A. made into a super-slushee that killed five people and gave me control of the Gate.” God, she wished the doc had a picture of the jerk. All she knew was that he’d been around a long time, had money, connections, and the President’s ear. If she started digging, it shouldn’t be too hard to find out who he was. Andrew would help her. The Rear Admiral, too, if he kept his word. He had to. If the Rear Admiral turned on her boys, she’d hunt him down and kill him herself. She’d let him go. She’d trusted him, and so had Frank and the rest of the team. It had been a calculated risk, one she’d encouraged her team to take. If the weasel made her regret it, she’d find him and make him wish he were dead.

Teagh frowned but didn’t take the phone from her frozen hand. “Droghan.”

“You know who it is? But I thought you didn’t? You asked Frank to find out his name.”

“That was before I knew he had access to Ajax. I knew of Droghan before, but didn’t realize he was the same Immortal your soldiers were talking about when they were here.” Teagh pressed the phone into her numb hand and steered her to sit on the bed. “Call the doctor. See if he knows anything. Call Raiden. Tell him to get his ass over here. I’ll contact Bran.”

“What are we going to do?” Katherine hated to act like the damsel in distress, but she’d made the decision to trust Teagh with her life. That meant he had to be good for Robbie and her team, too. And Teagh knew how to hunt for an Immortal. She had no idea where to start looking, and no time to learn.

“We have to go back to the Gate. If Droghan has him, that’s where he’ll take him. With you gone, and Ajax out of his reach, he’ll need Robbie to open the Gate for the Triscani, if that’s his goal.”

“He’ll open the Gate in Colorado?”

“Yes. If he can convince Robbie to do it for him.”

“He’d have to clear the house first, and the Casper Project has it now.” Katherine shuddered to think of the loss of life the teams would deal with if they tried to take on the Immortals without warning. God help them, even with advance warning, they’d be sitting ducks. “I thought you said Droghan found Ajax.”

“He did.”

“Then how is Ajax out of his reach?”

“When I found you in the dark, and realized where you’d been, Bran checked in on Ajax. The dagger was not ours, Kate. We had to move Ajax. We couldn’t continue to allow Droghan to have access to him.”

“When did you move him? You were with me the entire time.”

“Not while Mari healed you.”

Katherine closed her eyes and wanted to pound her forehead with the heel of her hand. Mari had stripped her top to try and heal the wounds and helped her in the shower. “You were out of my sight for all of twenty minutes, Teagh. What the hell could you guys have done in twenty minutes?”

“Relocated the King to a prison on the Earth plane, where Droghan would no longer be able to find him and would never think to look.”

“Where? Where did you put him?” What he was saying seemed impossible, but she was beginning to adopt a whole new definition of that word.

“We place him in Raiden’s stasis capsule. Bran supplied a new power crystal from his ship and we put him under. He’ll rest peacefully until we can safely bring him out stasis.”

“Raiden went with you? And no one bothered to tell me or Mari what you were doing? Did you take off the chains?”

“Yes. But he was sedated.”

“That’s not enough. He could have killed you. All of you.”

She was ratcheting herself up to screaming at him until Teagh pulled her close and held her cheek pressed to his chest. “Raiden is a forbidden son, just like Ajax. A dark prince. He can walk in the dark. He went with us. Mari and Raiden are the only two people who know the exact location of the hidden stasis pod, and Raiden held a portal for the four of us. He is incredibly strong for a half-blood.”

When the world had stopped shifting under her feet she spoke again. “Okay. So, in the twenty little bitty minutes I spent with Mari when she healed me, you, Bran and Raiden went to Ajax, hauled him out of there, opened a portal to a deep sea cave in Bermuda, where Raiden was held prisoner for two years, and put Ajax into Raiden’s old stasis pod?”

“Yes.”

“I thought that cave was blown up.” Mari and Sarah had both told her that the Triscani destroyed the caves after Mari found them. In fact, they’d blown up the boat Mari had been using, and she and Raiden had to catch a ride with sharks just to get back to the main island. That cave was hundreds of feet below the surface and sealed by explosives.

“Just the entrance tunnels. The inner chambers were intact.”

Katherine squeezed him. Hard. “You’ve been busy.”

“Raiden and Bran had hours to come up with scenarios while I searched for you. We needed to keep him out of Droghan’s reach. And I am glad they discovered the solution. As long as Bran can supply us with power crystals from the ship, we can keep him there until we can figure out a way to bring him back to us. And while he’s in stasis, he won’t be a danger to you or anyone else.”

Katherine shuddered. True, Ajax should be safe, and unaware. Maybe that would be better than the black rage and despair she’d seen in his eyes. There was something to be said for oblivion. Especially for an Immortal who had no end, no relief in sight.

Teagh raised her hand to his lips. “I was grateful to Raiden for the solution. Especially once I realized you had made a blood oath to the King. He could have done terrible things to you. I couldn’t allow that. Nor could I allow Ajax to hurt himself that way.”

“Hurt himself?”

“Yes. When he once again returns to his right mind, he would not be able to forgive himself for hurting my Marked Mate. It would destroy him. Bran and I have protected him not just from the world, but from himself. We took him the moment he started to turn. He is a very honorable male. Hurting females is not something he could live with. If he’d hurt you, he wouldn’t be able to forgive himself.”

The entire situation made her heart hurt. Teagh loved his King like a true brother, yet was helpless against the dark stain that had claimed Ajax’s soul. What kind of man held on to hope for seven hundred years when faced with such evil? What kind of man visited a ranting madman and read to him? Fed him? Brought him pictures of sunsets and gardens, laughing children and beautiful women?

The kind that kept promises. Suddenly, Teagh’s promises to her took on staggering new depth. “
Forever is forever, Kate
.” Teagh had made no blood oath to her, but he’d taken her Mark. He’d saved her life more than once. He’d made love to her like she was his whole world, and he’d followed her into the dark. He was extraordinary, and he’d given his word to Ajax long ago, loved the man and not just sworn loyalty to a title, to a King.

Speaking of blood oaths. “Teagh. You said that it was dangerous for me because of my blood oath to Ajax. I never gave him a blood oath.”

“You placed your hand on his chest? Did you not? And your blood touched his skin. You felt a horrible wrenching pain and thought he was trying to kill you, turn you to ash. That is what you told me after we made love.”

“Yes.” And her description of the event had earned her a growl from her man and another round of mind-blowing orgasms. “But I didn’t make him any promises.”

“Ever? The blood and the oath do not have to be given at the same time. With most Immortals, yes. But not to him.”

“I did not promise him anything.”

“Are you sure about that? Think hard. He is very good at getting what he wants.”

Katherine bit her bottom lip and thought back to her initial encounter with the Lost King…

Hunters. Go, human, and say nothing of this. Promise me you’ll return?

I will. I promise
.