Blaze (31 page)

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Authors: Joan Swan

BOOK: Blaze
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“This is a bold move,” Keira said from behind her. “Even for you.”
Jocelyn turned to face the other woman. The perfect shot had tucked her weapon into the waistband of her baggy sweatpants. A rather comical sight, although Jocelyn passed up the opportunity to comment. Keira kept her arms at her sides, within easy reach of the gun. No sense in pushing. Even the best could be pushed too far.
Scott had placed his own weapon into the holster at his hip, but stood alert and ready, a respectable fifteen feet away.
“Have you two reconciled?” Jocelyn tossed a look past Keira's shoulder toward the bedroom. “Or is this just a little. . . for-old-time's-sake sex?”
“None of your business,” Keira said.
“Maybe not personally, but professionally, it is. If you two are . . . connected . . .” Jocelyn wondered just how their powers strengthened. She knew what their powers were individually, but no one seemed to know exactly what happened once they were together.
Luke entered the room, looking young and handsome and virile in the gray flannel shirt he'd pulled on with his jeans.
Keira snapped her fingers twice near Jocelyn's face. “Here,
Jocelyn
. Focus.”
She laughed. “I think I like you.”
“I
don't
like you.”
“I know.” Jocelyn took no offense. “But we don't have to like each other to work together.”
Keira's expression went combat-stiff. “We are not working together. We will
never
work together.”
“Oh, never say never. You may change your mind when you hear what I have to say.”
“What the hell is this about?” Luke stepped up beside Keira like a protective wolf.
“Doesn't involve you, handsome,” Jocelyn said. “This is between us girls.”
She pulled one of the photos from her pocket. Keira went very still. The anger in her face transitioned into apprehension.
“What the hell?” Luke reached for it. Davis grabbed Luke's arm and yanked him backward. Luke swore and shook off Davis's hold, but didn't advance again.
“I came to offer you a deal,” Jocelyn said.
Keira crossed her arms. “You have nothing I want.”
Oh, the naïveté. Jocelyn had once been that foolish. A lifetime ago.
“Not even your brother?”
It took two full seconds for the words to register. When they did, Keira's fresh face went slack.
“She doesn't have a brother,” Luke said.
Jocelyn kept her eyes on Keira. “Cash O'Shay, thirty-nine years old. Birth date, April tenth. Mother, Lacey O'Shay. Father . . . the big
unknown
.”
“My brother,” Keira started slowly, “is dead. You should get your information straight before you try to use it as leverage.”
“Is he?” Jocelyn's eyes narrowed. “Did you ever see his body? Did they ever recover bones from the fire? Was a death certificate ever issued?”
“No amount of information you spit out regarding me, my brother, my mother, or my childhood would surprise me.”
“I didn't figure you for a believer. That's why I brought this.”
Jocelyn turned the photo to face Keira, displaying a picture of a man holding a
New York Times
newspaper dated the day before.
“That could be anyone.” Keira pried her eyes away from the photo. “I've seen what a good computer artist can do. You could put the face of the pope on a penguin and make people believe it's real.”
“Then hold it.” She pushed the photo toward Keira. “That's your thing, isn't it? Your ability? Touch it.”
Keira leaned back.
“What's wrong? Afraid it's real? Or are you afraid it's not? Or are you even sure? I know all about your many fears, Keira. I
understand
all your fears. The ones that have held you back all these years. It's a shame, really. A strong woman like you holding yourself hostage from the things that would make you happiest in life.”
Keira narrowed her eyes on the image as if tuning in to it. “You're lying.”
“Am I? Are you sure? Or are you just afraid? And are you going to let your fear keep you from the possibility of finding your only living family? Are you going to let it dictate your future? Your career? Your happiness? It's your life, Keira.
Live it,
for God's sake.” She waved the photo. “And give your brother a chance to live his.”
“Goddamn you.” Keira snatched the photo from Jocelyn's fingers. She turned her back on everyone, took the photo with both hands, and bent her head.
Anticipation bubbled in Jocelyn's chest. Just how good was Keira? Jocelyn had heard stories, but she wanted to test her ability firsthand. She cut a look at Ransom to see if she could discern a connection between them, curious how their powers worked together, or if they actually did. But the blond hunk seemed distraught as he watched Keira wander a few feet away.
A low growl ebbed from Keira just before she whipped back and advanced on Jocelyn. Keira fisted both hands in Jocelyn's suit jacket, pushed her backward, and slammed her against the nearest wall. All so fast, Jocelyn didn't have time to react.
She cried out in surprise. Her instincts rolled beneath her skin, urging her to fight back, take Keira down. But her intelligence, her cunning, told her to hold back.
“Yes, I'm sure you're lying.” Keira rasped the accusation an inch from Jocelyn's face. “This man is dead. And he has absolutely no connection to me whatsoever.”
Scott and Davis raised their guns simultaneously. The metallic slide of a weapon sounded nearby. “Release her and step back,” Scott ordered.
“Keira—” Luke's worried warning followed. “Keira, stop.”
“I'm just getting started.”
Keira jerked Jocelyn forward, then slammed her back again. A spike of pain traveled down Jocelyn's spine, but she let it flow, then ebb, determined to ride out this storm and see where it led. She'd learned the key to a person's character showed under the greatest pressures, and Jocelyn wanted to see if Keira lived up to her file.
“Who do you think you are, God? How dare you screw with our lives? I'm damn sick of it. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have someone screw with
your
life? Follow
you
? Know every little detail of
your
existence?”
Keira's voice dropped to a tone that raised the hair on the back of Jocelyn's neck.
“I know where you work, what you drive, when you eat, sleep, and go to the gym. I know who does your hair, what medications you're taking, and which family members you're still on speaking terms with.” Keira pushed a finger into Jocelyn's chest to punctuate her words. “But most importantly—I. Know. Where. You. Live.”
“Let me go.” Jocelyn forced her voice to remain cool.
The guard's meaty hand gripped Keira's bicep, and he pressed his weapon to her head. “Release her or I'll shoot.”
“Keira,” Luke pleaded. “Please.”
She shoved Jocelyn away and jerked out of Scott's grip.
Jocelyn straightened. The combination of excitement, pain, and fear made her breathless. She searched Keira's dark blue eyes, wishing she could get inside the woman's head. She was even gutsier, more cunning than Jocelyn had expected. Never, in all her years in the military, in private industry, in intelligence, had Jocelyn met anyone quite like Keira O'Shay.
“You're right,” she said. “He's not your brother. He's just an employee we used for the photograph. And yes, he died yesterday in a car accident on the way home from work. You're as good as they've all told me.”
Hands on hips, Keira narrowed her eyes. “You were
testing
me? You fucking, coldhearted
bitch
. If you don't kill me right now you'd better sleep with these jerk-offs, because I'm gonna—”
“
This
is your brother.” Jocelyn pulled another image from her pocket, ignoring Keira's rant. If she had a dime for every threat she'd ever received, Jocelyn could have retired five times over by now.
Here came the risk. The huge risk Owen had urged her toward and one she still wasn't completely invested in. There was no telling what a woman like O'Shay would do with this information, but Jocelyn had to agree that having the kid with a team with paranormal powers of unknown limits was incredibly dangerous to their mission. It was also hazardous to many powerful political figures and ultimately for Jocelyn's career. She had to force Keira's hand, and Cash was her only current leverage.
And all thanks to Rostov and his whacked-out theory of how those chemicals would affect similar DNA patterns and children. The bastard's crazed attack on Cash's wife and son had almost exposed the entire system. If Jocelyn hadn't orchestrated the cover-up and ultimately imprisoned Cash when his personal investigation had touched too close to the truth, the whole mission would have collapsed in the biggest scandal since Watergate.
Now, she had to get the boy back and eliminate that possibility once again. This was really getting old.
She shrugged her shoulders and tugged at the hem of her jacket to get the garment back into place, smoothing her free hand over the wrinkles Keira had creased into the front. She'd just had it dry-cleaned, too.
“He
is
alive,” she said, forcing her composure back into place. Refocusing on her goal now that her curiosity had been sated. “He's been working for us, but his usefulness is coming to an end. We can release him to you, or we can eliminate him. Your choice.”
“Working for you?” Keira gave an absurd snort of laughter. “This is unbelievable.”
Keira snapped the photo from her hand, a skeptical frown etching her forehead. But it didn't take long for her expression to shift. Anger to shock. Shock to torment. Keira pressed a hand to the center of her chest as if her heart ached.
Jocelyn had clearly won this battle. Maybe not the war— yet. But this battle was over. “Getting a little more from this one, are you?”
Keira's hand closed around the photograph before dropping to her side. “I don't know what you think you'll gain—”
“The boy.” Jocelyn went in for the kill. “We'll give you your brother if you give us the . . .”
Scamp, brat, pain in the ass
“. . . child. He has abilities that will be an invaluable asset to our military and ultimately our country. We want to help him grow and explore those abilities.”
The only thing that enabled her to keep the grimace out of her voice was the knowledge the kid would be killed as soon as they gained custody. And his father would be eliminated as soon as he completed the experiment. Then all Jocelyn had left to get rid of was this damn team. That would be far trickier.
“I assure you, Cash is alive. Take some time with that photograph, and you'll know I'm telling you the truth. You'll have to be the one to make the final decision as to whether or not you're willing to sacrifice your only living relative for a little Greek orphan who means nothing to you.”
Jocelyn strode to the door. Her loyal dogs followed. At the threshold, she paused with one hand on the doorframe and turned back toward Keira.
“You have forty-eight hours to decide. Then your brother's usefulness will have expired . . . and so will this deal.”
“Dargan.” Keira's voice brought her attention around one last time. The other woman's eyes drilled into Jocelyn with as much ice and determination as any enemy she'd ever faced. “I suggest you stay away from those picture windows in your living room.”
SIXTEEN
K
eira's gaze blurred on the bright, crisp early afternoon sunlight spilling through the windshield as she waited for Luke. She sat in the passenger's seat of Alyssa's crossover looking down the quiet street where the SUVs carrying Dargan and her two thugs had disappeared ten minutes before.
Damn spooks thought they could just walk into their lives, drop a bomb, issue ultimatums, and flounce out again. Screw them. Upside down and sideways. She'd get her brother back and she'd keep Mateo. She'd find a way.
Just holding the photo of her brother sent a smooth, molten heat flowing through her, filling all the gaps, easing all the loneliness. God, she'd idolized him.
But who was he now? Doubt edged in. Why would he go through life without contacting her? And was he truly working for her greatest enemy?
She lifted the picture and studied the man. He was sitting on a stool in some type of lab, looking over his shoulder at the camera as if someone had called to gain his attention. Unlike the other man Dargan had tried to pass off as her brother, this one looked back at her. Touched her. Spoke to her.
But it was her mother's voice that invaded Keira's mind.
You good-for-nothing piece of shit. Look what you've done! You'll pay for this, boy.
A loud
gong
made Keira flinch. In her memory, she could still see her mother, face creased with wrinkles from a lifetime of smoking, dyed-blond hair hanging in stringy patches to her shoulders, grab the frying pan from the stove and whip it against Cash's temple.
The splash of liquid. The roar of flames. The crackle of wood.
And Cash's final scream.
Run, Keira! Get out!
She forced her eyes open, her mind back to the present.
Luke trotted down the front steps, duffel bag in one hand, phone pressed to his ear in the other. The sight of him helped her refocus, and her heart squeezed.
She ran a hand over her thigh, the jeans rubbing coarse against her fingers. Jeans of hers he still had in the depths of his closet. Along with a few other odds and ends she had forgotten when she'd packed for the academy.
What are you doing with these?
she'd asked after Dargan had left, and Luke had offered the pants for her to change into.
After all this time?
He'd shrugged.
I guess I was hoping you'd come back for them.
She hadn't told him she still harbored a few of his shirts. That she still slept in them every night. She would have, it would have been the perfect moment, only she felt something shifting inside her. The news of her brother sent doors in her psyche slamming shut. She didn't know why. Didn't know how to stop it. Only felt herself splitting away from the bond she'd forged with Luke.
It hurt. It frightened. And it was completely out of her control.
Luke tossed his bag into the backseat, shut the door, and slid behind the steering wheel. “Yes, Cash Evan O'Shay.”
Keira flinched at the sound of her brother's full name. As Luke continued to impart information to Mitch, a familiar shell coated Keira's insides, a protective reaction she'd developed as a child, one that prepared her for the inevitable shit storm about to hit.
“I know he's supposed to be dead.” Luke backed out of the driveway. “Check on that. We'll explain when we get there.”
When he disconnected, Keira said, “Drive slow, Luke. I need to think.”
“You should have been thinking
in there
.” He tossed his phone on the dash and glared at her. “You just threatened a high-ranking federal employee. With witnesses who just happened to be federal law enforcement.” He jerked the car into drive and pounded the steering wheel. “Christ. You're giving her exactly what she wants, Keira. Do you remember what happened the last time they had one of us on trial?”
That
hadn't been the shit storm she'd been expecting.
“Well what
do
you expect,” he said, “when you go and say things like ‘stay away from those picture windows in your living room'? God. Sometimes, Keira, you just fucking floor me.”
So much for blocking him from her thoughts.
She blew out a long breath and closed her eyes as Luke stopped at a light. Tears immediately stung the backs of her lids. The warmth and pressure of his hand on her knee gave her a fleeting taste of reassurance.
“Hey,” he said, voice softer. She peeked at him from beneath her lashes. “Off the record, I'm damned impressed at the way you stood up to that bitch. Just don't do it again. I swear I feel older by the minute.”
She pressed her lips together and nodded, then blurted the questions she couldn't hold back anymore. “Do you think Mateo really
is
my nephew?”
“Facts are leading in that direction, babe.”
She huffed a humorless laugh and shook her head. A hell of a lot more made sense now—her immediate feeling of connection to him, even before they met, that sense of familiarity when she looked into his face, the belief that Tony had been lying about Mateo's origin, the sense of deceit rolling off Dargan trying to spin the same story.
The responsibilities that went along with the very real possibility that Mateo was her own flesh and blood made her dizzy. She leaned her head against the seat. If they didn't find Cash, if they couldn't reunite Cash and Mateo, she was going to have to choke down her fears and take the boy in, because he was her family.
Yes, she'd considered the possibility, but now that possibility was almost a certainty. She had a freaking five-year-old
nephew
who didn't speak a word of English.
“
And
he's the cutest thing since Elmo.
And
he thinks you walk on water.”
Her head lolled toward Luke as the light turned and he continued through the golden aspens and towering pines lining the roads. Either her barriers were shrinking or his clairaudient abilities were growing. “Elmo is not cute.”
Luke grinned, his white teeth glimmering, his cheek creasing into a deep crescent beneath the morning's stubble. He hadn't shaved in the shower, leaving him scruffy and so sexy. That profile was to die for.
She had never loved anyone more. Never loved
him
more. And the split growing inside her was excruciating.
“Can I see the photo?” he asked.
She passed it across.
“Well, the resemblance is definitely there,” Luke murmured, and set the photo in the middle console. He clenched his teeth until his jaw muscles rolled. “I think the best way to do this is to just spill it. Just start talking and don't stop until it's all out.”
“There's a limit on confessions in a twenty-four-hour period. I'm over mine.”
“Save the drama.”
Jeez, she didn't know where to start.
“Start with the fire,” Luke said.
“Stop reading my thoughts.”
“You're
projecting
.”
“Smartass.”
Keira's mind was a jumble of events and emotions, of people and places and circumstance.
“The fire was my fault,” she said. “My mom left me home while she went out to the bar. I was hungry, tried to cook something for myself. I don't even remember what, bacon and eggs I think, because whatever it was involved grease.
“The grease caught fire, and I was trying to put it out when Cash came home from his job. Some type of fast food place, I think. Right after that our mother showed up. She was drunk—as usual—and when she saw the fire, she lost it. Just freaked out. Cash took the blame and said that he'd started it. Our mom, God, I can still see it. She picked up the frying pan and hit Cash in the head. The grease must have spread, because a second later flames were everywhere, all across the kitchen, dotting Cash's jeans. All I remember after that was Cash screaming for me to run, get out of the house. So I ran. Didn't wait for him. Didn't look for my mother. I just ran.”
She remembered the firefighters outside the house. How one had swept her up in his arms and jogged with her across the lawn, setting her on the step of his fire truck to check her over. She wouldn't recognize him now, but she'd never forget the depth of concern in his eyes, an emotion no one had ever shown for her but Cash, and one that had touched her deeply.
That one look had been the impetus for her quest into the fire service.
“The days after that are a blur. The police took me away. I remember sitting in the corner of a dark room at some type of child services facility, and all I could think about was how they were going to take me to jail and I'd never see Cash again. And when they came the next morning, they did tell me I'd never see Cash again, only they told me it was because he'd died in the fire.”
Keira numbed out. If she didn't, she'd short-circuit.
“Honestly, after they told me Cash was dead, my memory blacks out. I don't have anything more than spotty recollections about my life until a couple years later. And all that is just foster home after foster home until I landed with one couple who mined my value until I turned eighteen. None of which I want to talk about now.”
Keira focused on the quaint shops lining Truckee's touristy downtown.
“You were five years old?” Luke said.
“Yes.”
“And your mother left you alone? With nothing to eat?”
She rubbed her eyes. “Yes.”
From the corner of her eye, she saw Luke's hand squeeze the steering wheel. “So, what Dargan said, about the death certificate, the proof... About Cash not actually dying in the fire . . . ?”
“It's true. I never had any proof. By the time I was old enough to understand that things hadn't been followed up, I didn't see a point in asking for proof. I believed he was dead. I couldn't imagine why anyone would lie. Why he would fake it. The possibility never entered my mind. All it would have done was force me to relive the terror. I just wanted to move on. To find purpose. To do something with my life that up until that point had seemed so pointless.
“Where has he been for twenty-five years? Why didn't he come find me? Why didn't he tell me he was alive?” She turned a burning gaze on Luke. “I've spent my whole damned life believing I was responsible for his death. Do you have any idea how much . . . how much . . . ?”
“Trauma . . . ?” Luke supplied.
The memory of his sister's suicide and the guilt he'd self-inflicted over not seeing her troubles took the heat out of Keira's anger. They'd both suffered in such similar ways over the course of their lives. How could she turn out so screwed up and he turn out so . . . damn perfect?
“Hardly perfect.” He shot her a quirky grin. “I'm pretty sure you were screaming about that yesterday at the airport. And I had a complete
Leave It to Beaver
childhood. Don't keep beating yourself up over things you can't control.”
“I was not screaming. I don't scream.”
Luke laughed, low and throaty, rubbed a hand over his mouth, and slid a hot look her way. “Uh, yeah, baby. You do.”
“Shut up.” Heat infused her face. She smacked his arm. “And she said he worked for them. Does that mean he's involved in all this? That he knows what I—what we've—gone through, yet
allowed
it?”
“She also said his ‘usefulness is coming to an end' and talked about ‘releasing him' or ‘terminating him.' Mateo told us his father was ‘trying to get free.' That doesn't sound like employment to me. It sounds like incarceration. Consider the source.” He pushed the photo toward her. “Wouldn't you rather trust your own information?”
She looked at the picture of her brother, alive and well. Pain swelled in her chest until she was sure she would crack. She needed a break before she tried to read that photo again.
“I need to call Angus.” She reached for his phone on the dash. “Can I use your phone?”
He nodded and she dialed her boss's cell.
“Special Agent West,” he answered.
His familiar voice lit off fireworks of emotion. She really liked Angus. Enjoyed working with and for him. And the thought that he was one of
them
turned her inside out.
“Hey, Angus—” She cleared her throat, trying to sound . . . normal, although she didn't know what normal was anymore. “It's Keira.”
An extended silence followed. Sickness rolled in her belly as she tried to hold on to denial.
“Well.” His voice was tight. Curt. “You sure made a mess of things, didn't you?”
Ah, damn.
Disillusionment stung deep.
“Sir?” She'd play dumb as far as it would take her.

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