Blood Moons (10 page)

Dr. Chase nodded, but Dara could sense dishonesty in her.

"You were born with dysfunctional ovaries. They are basically just a mass of cells that failed to develop properly. You won't be able to have children."

Liar!
her mind shouted with absolute conviction. But even as she knew that the doctor was lying, she also felt her anxious determination. There was a reason for what she'd just told Dara. Without looking deeper into her mind, Dara couldn't tell what that reason was, and she didn't dare take the risk. Instead, she slowly raised her shields again and made herself relax her grip on the armrests.

It took her a while. She was still learning how to do things like this and she was so freaked out she couldn't concentrate on the process. Part of her wanted to demand answers, pry them from Dr. Chase's mind. Dara had to fight with herself not to do anything stupid. Tristan would kill her if she exposed them.

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"I'm truly very sorry," Dr. Chase said.

"Can I go now?" Dara had to get out of here this instant.

The walls were beginning to close in on her and the doctor's voice was echoing in her head. It was a bad sign. She was losing control.
Focus,
she told herself, but it was impossible.

Her shields were slipping again and without them, she didn't know how deep she'd get into the doctor's mind if the woman touched her. Couldn't tell if she'd want to stop it, let alone whether she'd even be able to. Her mind was like an open sore. A single touch would be agonizing to the both of them.

When Dr. Chase tried to touch her to offer comfort, Dara flinched and snatched her hand away.

All at once, she felt the faint presence of Tristan. He wasn't quite there, but remained a weak projection of his telepathic self. It was enough to give her something else to focus on.

Dara grasped onto that fragile link and slowly built her defenses around it, shutting herself off from the outside world. Another headache built up behind her eyes, but if she looked queasy, the doctor would take it as the reaction to the bad news she'd just received.

Dr. Chase nodded. "Yes, of course. We're done here. I'll be sure to update your file and get you assigned to me as your primary physician. I don't usually see women, since there are so few of them in Wolf Block, so this should be a nice change for me. Is that acceptable?"

Dara all but jumped out of the seat, about to run out and in any direction she happened to turn, as long as it was far from here. But she stopped at the question. "You're asking my opinion?"

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"Of course," Dr. Chase said kindly and smiled. "When you are in here, you are first and foremost my patient."

Have to get out of here!
"Then it's acceptable," Dara said and nodded. "Which way out?"

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Tristan turned the page in his book and cursed. He had no idea what he'd just read. He looked at the bathroom shield again, for at least the thousandth time in the last two hours.

And it didn't help that he'd turned his back to it; he seemed to have a compulsive need to look.

Dara was still in there. Had been since she'd come back from med lab. Not a word or thought. She'd just closed herself away and refused to come out. Tristan had even tried to look into her mind but apparently she'd learned how to lock him out.

So he'd stopped trying, telling himself he was giving her space.

The cells were open for the daily five hours of "out time."

Most of the men were in the gym or in front of the TV—where Tristan should be. But instead of availing himself of the pool for an hour or two, he had opted to stay here and pretend to read, just in case some stray decided to cause trouble.

It used to be there wasn't a single prisoner who would voluntarily enter his cell without express invitation, but today he'd sensed at least six guys pass by with more than a little curiosity. Tristan had no doubt that if he wasn't there, they'd make themselves right at home. So he'd placed himself between the doorway and the bathroom screen and brooded.

That protective streak was really beginning to piss him off.

Seemed he couldn't go anywhere these days without someone thinking his cellmate was fair game. He'd found 90

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himself in the surprising position of needing to reclaim his place among the other inmates. As if taking in a female cellmate—like he'd had any choice about it—had made him an outcast and fair game. What was it about this woman that made all order in his life evaporate?

He'd even taken some time out of his routine over the last few days to do the stupidest thing he could—make it clear to a few men that Dara Frost was not to be touched if they valued their extremities. He couldn't have signaled a weakness more clearly. Instead of using his influence to get something for himself, he was undermining it to help a female. If he didn't get cornered by a gang this week, he'd call it good.

Today when Dara had gone to the med lab, he'd made his way to the gym. He hadn't even gotten halfway there before he'd passed a group of men talking about her. Tristan had known what he was doing even as he'd caught a couple of them by their throats and slammed them up against the wall.

He'd
known
it, damn it! And still he would not have been able to stop himself if he'd tried. Disgusted with himself and this protect-the-little-woman shit, he'd skulked back to his cell, not in the mood for exercise anymore.

He'd made it here just in time to feel Dara lose it.

Whatever had happened to her today, it had shaken her badly. She'd come back even paler than usual, moving like a marionette on strings, eyes wide as saucers. Bad news notwithstanding, they were supposed to be a team, damn it!

Maybe he hadn't made that clear enough. Maybe she still hadn't grasped the concept that whatever happened to one of 91

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them happened to the other. For Christ's sake, they as good as shared a mind!

Tristan tossed the book away and pushed off the floor. He faced the screen and silently counted to five to give her one more chance. Nothing happened. He reached out with his mind and encountered her shields. His hands balled into fists at his sides. "Dara," he called to her.

No answer.

"Damn it, get out here."

Nothing stirred.

"
Dara!
" He banged his fist against the shield. Of course, it made no sound, but the force was enough to create a faint outward ripple. "Don't make me force you."

The shield retracted like a solid curtain and Dara came out, brushing past him without meeting his gaze. She was still firmly in flight mode, headed for the doorway, completely heedless of what was on the other side.
Oh, no you don't.
He caught her arm and turned her around. "You're not going anywhere. Not until you explain."

"Let go of me," she said, remaining as tense as a caught mouse.

"Not a chance. Tell me what happened."

"Can't you just ... guess?" she taunted, raising a challenging eyebrow. The brave front would have been more convincing if he couldn't feel her shivering.

"Not without making us both ... extremely uncomfortable."

She was resisting the telepathic link. He'd destroy her mind if he tried to force it. "
Talk
to me," he said instead.

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"No," she said, yanking her arm out of his hold. Her head had to be hurting again, trying to keep him out of her mind, and out here, there was no escape from him. At least the impulse to flee seemed to have passed. Dara wasn't an idiot.

She knew what was outside this cell was far worse than what was inside it. So instead of bolting out the door, she sat on her bunk and gave him her back, seemingly determined to ignore him.

"You still don't get it," he said, baffled by the realization.

"No, you act like you do, but you really don't. Try to wrap your irrational female mind around this concept: I am the only one on this planet whom you can trust."

Dara laughed, a scornful, bitter sound. "Then my situation is sad indeed, if the only one I can trust is an inmate of the highest security prison known to man. Housed, I might add, in the block reserved for the worst of the most dangerous criminals. Sure, pal, let me just whip out the cookies and hot chocolate and tell you all my deepest, darkest secrets. I just know you'll keep them safe forever and ever."

Tristan silently watched her sitting there for a moment.

Her hair was more out than in the clip she'd restrained it with.

Sitting the way she was, hugging her knees to her chest on the bunk, she looked even more vulnerable now than she had the day she'd arrived, a scared little mouse trying to hide in a cave crawling with hungry vipers. Now that mouse had come far too close to a viper's fangs.

The urge to put his arms around her and tell her he'd keep her safe almost overwhelmed him. He stamped it down. It 93

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would do her no good if she didn't learn to keep herself safe.

And he had a feeling Dara wouldn't believe him anyway.

"There are snakes," he said quietly, "and there are bears in this prison. The snakes are the ones who have ice in their veins. They kill and torture for the thrill of causing pain. They slither from place to place, live in shadows and stare out of them to choose their prey. And they have no remorse. A snake only gets caught when he gets too greedy. Picks a prey too prominent to be overlooked. The bears..." He trailed off.

The bears kept the snakes here in line. But she wouldn't believe that. She still thought the guards were the law. Hell, the guards were the worst of them.

Tristan picked up the book he'd tossed away and tore out a random page, crumpling it into a tight ball. He sent it flying out the doorway, over the catwalk and down into the abyss.

"My parents were killed when I was ten. A soldier on his way to some battlefield or another invoked his right to be housed in our living quarters. We had no choice but to let him in. He stuffed his face at dinner and wouldn't shut his mouth. Asking my parents whether they were supporters of the empire.

Whether they were ready to contribute to the effort and give their son into the service. When my parents didn't jump at the offer, he tied my father to his chair and made him watch as he raped my mother. Over and over again." Ten pages came loose in his grip and he balled them up so tightly that his nails bit into his palms.

"And when she was dead and he was so weak he could barely stand on his feet, he took out his gun, put it to my father's head, and pulled the trigger. I was closed away in my 94

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room. They thought it would be safer for me. Thought if something happened, I would be safe locked away. But I wasn't."
I was in my father's mind. Saw it all through his
eyes. And when his brains exploded all over the floor I
screamed.

Dara made a small sound but would not look at him, her hands fisted in her lap. He knew she'd heard him in her mind.

He'd felt her shields give way. Now they were up again. "He found me there," he continued. "Took me with him to the front.
Congratulations,
he'd said.
You've been given the
privilege of serving the empire to better mankind.
" Those words would never leave him, so long as he lived.

The book in his hands ripped in two. How he wished the bastard was alive so he could get his hands on him again. "It took me twelve years, but I did it. I trained in the army and anywhere else I could, built up my strength, learned how to work every weapon ever invented. Mastered techniques outlawed on seventeen planets.

"I discovered that my mind was the greatest weapon of all." And what a weapon it had turned out to be. Once he'd learned to channel and control it, there'd been nothing to stand in his way. Men tried to hide the soldier, protecting their own. Snakes writhing in their nests. The harder they fought, the more determined he'd become. And the more they'd suffered.

"I found him eventually. Had to go through a few people to get to him and bodies started to pile up when those I questioned refused to cooperate. The lot of them were 95

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sadistic sons of bitches just like
him.
As for the man himself

... There wasn't much left of him by the time I was done."

"T-that's why you're here," she said.

If only it were that simple. "No," he replied. "I am here because I gave myself up. They wouldn't have caught me otherwise. After the soldier was dead..." He shuddered at the memory. Blood everywhere, covering him from head to toe and still he'd known they would never be able to link him to any of the deaths.
That
had made him sick to his stomach—

the thought that after everything, he'd become one of them.

A monster walking around with blood on his hands and no one to point a finger at him.

Tristan looked at his hands and they were bloody. He dropped what was left of the book and shook his head to chase the memory away. He wouldn't go back there again.

Not ever. His hands were shaking when he forced himself to look at them again, but this time, there was no more blood.

"I was finished. No more need to hunt. Snakes get greedy.

Bears only kill to survive." That night had nearly killed him.

Grief aside, he'd
felt
the bullet tear through his father's head.

Only the thought of revenge had kept him going. And so he'd thought he would trade one nightmare for another. But neither nightmare had ever gone away.

"Why are you telling me this?" Dara hugged her knees to her chest and tried very hard not to focus on the gruesome picture his words had drawn in her mind. Try as she might, though, she could not rid herself of the image of him as a little boy, huddled in a dark room all alone.