Blindsided
Authors: Tes Hilaire
Blindsided
ISBN: 978-0-9896040-3-1
Copyright © 2015 by Tes Hilaire
Cover design by Patricia Schmidt (Pickyme)
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from the author, Tes Hilaire.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
Excerpt of Deliver Me from Chaos copyright 2015 by Tes Hilaire
Young Adult Novels by Tes Hilaire
The Hunger Chronicles:
Adult Novels by Tes Hilaire
The Paladin Warrior Novels:
Deliver Me a Paladin for Christmas
(A Paladin Warrior Short)
For Sharon S. at Devil in the Details Editing and all her support and encouragement when this author needed it most. And yes, I promise I’ll get to Garret’s story soon.
Prologue
August 11
th
2104: 1752 EST
Aria struggled across the floor. Push with her good leg, pull with her good arm. She slithered, dragged, and whimpered her way toward the book shelves. That was where Garret had fallen, and if she was right, where he still lay. She didn’t know what was happening outside, didn’t know who had shown up, whether they would be able to help or not, but that wasn’t her immediate concern. She had to find out how badly Garret was wounded.
At least one of them had to make it out of this alive. Teigan would fall apart if they both died.
Don’t die. Don’t die. Don’t die.
Chanting the mantra like a prayer, she made her way through a minefield of tossed pillows, overturned end tables, scattered porcelain, and chipped safety glass. More cuts, more bruises; didn’t matter. Agony already burned her alive from the inside out.
Don’t have much time left.
The broken bones wouldn’t kill her, but internal bleeding would. After shooting Garret, Bryon had turned back to her. His iron fists smashing into her until she was sure the next hit would kill her. Then he’d stopped; just walked away. Why?
Please let it be help, please…
She bumped against a chair that had been shoved out of position and stopped to get her bearings. “Garret?” she asked tentatively.
No answer.
“Damn it!” She rolled to get around the obstacle. Fire lanced from her side across her chest and a searing wall of pain blocked all sensation below her knee. She bit down on the moan. Too much. Too much. Too much…
“No!” She locked onto the denial, drawing up the image she’d formed of Teigan in her mind. God, Teigan. She would never be with Teigan again. Would never hear his voice. Would never feel his touch…
But I can give him this. I can save Garret.
She pressed on. Her world narrowed to the tips of her fingers, each milestone measured in the texture of the oriental flowers on the area rug, the individual grooves spacing the hardwood planks of the floor. It seemed an eternity later that her fumbling fingers found the bottom of Garret’s booted foot.
“Garret?” She grasped on, shaking his ankle. Dead weight.
With a choked sob, she pulled her way up his limp body lying slumped against the shelves. Mud crusted fatigues, empty utility belt—her palms squished into his sopping wet shirt—blood. No, no, no. Frantically, her hand raced over his chest, tracking the thick liquid, following the increase in heat until she found the source of sticky blood oozing from a hole in his upper chest, right side. “No, no, no…”
He still breathed, though it sounded like he was blowing bubbles with his own blood, and there was a heartbeat, but it was weak and thready.
What to use, what to use?
Screaming in agony, she yanked her T-shirt off past her cracked ribs, over her head, down her smashed elbow. Taking a handful of shallow breaths to recover, she climbed back over him and pressed the fabric against the wound with her good hand. “Hold on, Garret. Help’s on the way.”
Inside she still screamed,
Don’t die. Don’t die. Don’t die.
She didn’t know how long she lay on him, using her bodyweight to put pressure on the wound. From outside, sounds began to drift in and out of her consciousness. The heavy crack of the antiquated revolver, a helicopter, circling, a sharp bark. Frodo?
So cold…
The commotion drew closer. A man shouted something. Through the shattered door, scents drifted in.
Blood, sweat, adrenaline, fear…Teigan. He’d come.
Aria closed her eyes and let go.
Chapter One
July 28
th
, 2104: 0736 BST – Two weeks earlier
Teigan edged around the corner of the filing unit, scanning the long alley of openings in front of him. He couldn’t see the end. Like a larger-than-life row of dominos, the floor to ceiling storage units seemed to go on for miles.
Didn’t matter, he’d gotten what he came for. He fingered the lump in his suit jacket once more, the data chip burning like a hot coal of guilt in his pocket. He hated assignments like this. There was no global threat, no national security danger. But a favor had been called in, so here he was putting his ass on the line for the greater good of worldly politics.
He snapped his head back, just as a beam of light flashed over and past, moving further into the Global Police storage basement’s bowels.
Shit. A curious guard.
Yeah, George, what was that noise anyway?
George, who Teigan met briefly when he’d keyed in, hadn’t been suspicious then, Teigan’s disguise as a Global Police operative was tight, but he bet the pudgy guard sure as hell was suspicious now.
When Teigan got back stateside, someone was going to pay for this snafu. The new decrypter he’d been given for the mission worked all right—it could decrypt anything. He’d done just what he’d been told to do: turn the sucker on, flip on the universal adaptor, and the bin he was trying to access should “pop.” The bin had popped alright—as had every other stinkin’ six-by-six inch receptacle in the vast underground warehouse. Pop pop pop pop pop…all those pops had made for one mother-fucker wham. And now? Georgie Porgie was going to have to be removed from the equation.
“I know you’re in here. Come ou’ with your ‘ands raised!”
Not likely. Teigan reached into his pocket, grabbing the pressure syringe. One shot would put Georgie into a nice deep sleep, and when he woke? He’d be lucky if he could remember who he fucked yesterday.
“This aisle’s clear!” Another voice rose, much closer.
Mega-shit. George had brought a friend.
This sucked. Whitesman could kiss his ass. He was
going
to take some of that vacation time he had coming when he got back. First though, he had to get out of here, which meant he had two choices: wait for George and friend to converge on his position and go for the all-out, drag-down fight—which would be satisfying given his current level of aggravation—or sneak around to take one guard out from behind, and then use the syringe on the other.
He fingered the syringe in his pocket. He only had enough of the high power tranq for one dose, but he’d really prefer not to kill anyone.
Easing back, toe-to-heel, toe-to-heel, Teigan quietly slipped down the narrow row. Silently waiting at the far end, Teigan pressed himself against the bins, listening to guard number two’s approach. Shuffle, scuff, step-step. Shuffle, scuff, step-step. The guard was coming around the edge of each row and scanning from side-to-side, most likely with stunner poised and ready.
Shuffle, scuff—Teigan made his move, spinning around the end of the storage unit. Before the guard could register what was happening, he’d grabbed the guard’s stunner arm and smashed him into the open bins, effectively slamming a two-by-six-foot section closed on the end of the row. The guard remained conscious—damn, the bastard had a hard head. Pinning him with his body, Teigan dug his knuckles into both sides of the guard’s neck. The man’s eye bulged, his face reddened.
Just…a…few…more…seconds. Hurried footfalls rang down the center aisle.
Shit. Just pass out already, will you?
The guard went lax under Teigan’s full body hold. He stepped back. The guard crumpled. A crack rent the air and fire burned across Teigan’s upper arm. He threw himself further into the row, slamming another set of bins shut and squeezing into the cover.
Fuck. George had a phaser. Who the hell gave a guard a lethal phaser? Damn. All this because a US ambassador couldn’t keep his fly zipped around the French Prime Minister’s daughter?
Global police my ass, try global paparazzi.
He was so getting tired of this shit.
“Now George, that wasn’t nice.” Teigan pulled the syringe out again and cupped it in his hand.
“Come ou’ where I can see you!” George’s East London accent wavered as he screamed the command.
“Okay,” Teigan tried for reason, “as long as you promise not to shoot again.”
“Come ou’ with your ‘ands raised! NOW!”
“I’m coming out.” Teigan placed his hands on the back of his head, careful to hide the syringe, and stepped slowly out into the aisle.
George moved forward cautiously, sparing a quick glance for his fallen comrade. Guard Two’s chest rose and fell evenly under the serviceable beige shirt—why was it always beige?
“Turn around,” George commanded when he got near, his uniform pitted with sweat over his heaving barrel chest.
“You got it.” Teigan turned, hands still on his head.
A click and whir; handcuffs being removed from George’s belt. A hand clasped one of Teigan’s arms, yanked it down and snapped the cool polymer on. George reached for the other… Teigan spun, hooked a leg behind George’s and sent him crashing to the ground. The phaser went skidding. A split second later Teigan was on George, the pressure syringe against his carotid artery.
George’s brown eyes widened in fright, then drifted closed.
Silence.
About fucking time. Teigan rocked back on his heels, scanning the cement around him. A splattering of small red circles led into the shadow of the open bins.
“Get in, get the chip, get out, and don’t leave behind any traceable evidence…”
Right.
Removing his jacket, he ripped a swath of his shirt off, wrapped the seared flesh of his bicep, and tied the strip. Pulling his personal kit from the inside of his jacket, he opened the sealed pouch, grabbed a sterilizing wipe—aka blood-be-gone—and wiped up the mess: Maybe he could get some sick leave added to the vacation time.
As an added precaution, he ripped the guards’ com-buds from their ears, then unlocked the handcuff from his wrist and linked the two guards together. Even if guard number two roused, it would take him a while to drag Georgie to the far end where the only exit was. By then Teigan would’ve cleared the security feeds of this event and made it back to surface level.
Five minutes later, he’d done just that, keying out the same way he’d come in. He sauntered out of the alley and stepped onto the people mover. Mission complete. Yet, as he stood tucked safely between a suit and a harried waitress, he couldn’t ease the itch riding his shoulders that he’d come, over time, to associate with impending disaster.
His fingers closed convulsively over the chip—still red hot. Between the unfocused, straightforward stares of the early morning London foot traffic, Teigan managed to shift his body enough to create a space of privacy and pulled the chip, pressing it against the side of his wrist unit to activate the sync. He blinked, staring at the file name glaring at him from his view-screen. The itch exploded into a full blown burn as new adrenaline coursed through the already tense muscles.