Dark and Deadly: Eight Bad Boys of Paranormal Romance (69 page)

Jordan was a soft burn on his skin, an indigo shift of light.

That way.

He crossed a Rêve boundary to discover the white Corinthian columns braced against darkness above and below, creating a space for dreamers to play.

The Agora.

It meant that when Joshua had submerged Jordan, he’d taken her here, a place that was supposed to be safe and monitored, Chimera marshals at the ready.

Coll had warned against rogues getting in.

But a rogue nightmare? It made no sense.

Jordan’s wake guided him through the Agora, but wide of any of the columns where she could’ve called for aid. She hadn’t entered any of the ongoing Rêves either, wherein she might have been able to find refuge, other Revelers acting as witnesses. Safety in numbers.

No, the waves of her passage led right up to the howling boundary of the Scrape.

Rook had had occasion in the past to set out into the shifting sands of that desert, so he knew intimately how easy it was to get lost. Now he crossed without hesitation. The essence of Jordan was so much better than others he’d tracked out here. Of course, all of them he’d left in pools of their own blood, never to rouse again.

He trudged against the wind, the grains of sand nicking and eroding his skin as he pushed forward. The Scrape was a trial of endurance, him against whatever psychotic he was tracking, and Rook, Chimera tracker, always won.

But how could he match his strength against a nightmare of his own creation? There was no way to overtake…himself.

And yet, the shape of a bent human figure, arms across the face, was just ahead.

Rook’s heart double-beat, then stalled as he realized that the figure was a male, not a female, not his girl. Even closer, Rook could identify the man.

Vincent Blackman.

Seemed Jordan had pushed him very, very deep. If he wasn’t led back to dreamwaters, he’d never wake up again, either.

Blackman fell back on the ever-shifting desert floor. “Don’t hurt me! Don’t hurt me!”

“I’m not here for you, man,” Rook called to him. “Have you seen Jordan?”

“What?” Blackman yelled against the wail of the wind.

“Jordan Lane. Have you seen her? Which way did she go?”

Blackman shook his head. “I don’t know where she is. I don’t know where
I
am. Where is this? What is this place?”

“You’re in the Scrape, beyond all the Rêves,” Rook yelled back. “You’re lost Darkside.”

“Help me get back, get out of here! I’ll give you anything. I have money.”

Rook waved his arms to cut him off.
No.
“I have to find Jordan.”

If he brought Vince Blackman back, Jordan would be lost, he knew it. If she was this far into the Scrape, she might be lost already.

“Please,” Blackman begged. “There are…
things
…out here.
Monsters.”

Nightmares, Rook thought. Or more than nightmares, like Joshua?

This was very bad. Further confirmation of bad things lurking in the dreamwaters.

“I’ll come back for you,” Rook said.

“You won’t.”

“It’s my job.” He was Chimera. “I will. Hold out as long as you can.”

Vince looked as if he knew the hopelessness of his situation—that he was going to die. “Can you get a message to my father? Jordan’s sister works for the men who are holding him for ransom. She’ll know who to contact.”

And so Rook’s suspicions were confirmed about the
Envoi
Rêve. The way Jordan had originally been targeted made perfect sense now. Maisie was indeed the connection, though he still thought it wasn’t intentional. She was just living too fast for caution. This was her wake-up call.

“If Jordan Lane is lost in this, then my father is as good as dead.” Millions peered out into the unending void. “Tell my father I’m sorry.”

“You were supposed to bring Jordan to the people who have your father?”

Vince nodded “Not going to happen now.”

Rook would never have let that happen. Blackman had been destined to fail. Nice try, though.

“Hold out as long as you can,” Rook repeated.

“There are things out here,” Blackman said, looking around at the empty space.

He was going insane, and yet Rook didn’t doubt him. Not after Joshua, a nightmare with a mind of its own. There were indeed monsters Darkside. Joshua had infiltrated the Agora twice now. And infinitely worse, the nightmare had infiltrated the waking world.

And right now it had Jordan in its grasp.

***

Jordan was naked in a dream, exactly the reason she hadn’t wanted to try Rêve in the first place. She’d known this would happen, and if she ever got back to the waking world, she’d have the satisfaction of telling Maze,
I told you so.

She would not, however, waste energy attempting to cover herself. Malcolm Rook had taught her that. She had darksight, a rare talent. And could drown people, scary. And she was tough as nails—she’d had to be to finish raising Maze. So she was not going to whimper and scream. And she was not going down without a fight.

Joshua was not what he seemed.

Where was he taking her? Damned if she knew.

The farther he dragged her, the less he appeared to be a little boy. She’d glimpsed it before, the first time she’d seen him. Her darksight had shown her true. This was not Malcolm’s brother. It was a thing in the shape of a boy. It had climbed into Malcolm’s nightmare, taken it over, and used the kid’s appearance to skulk around, wearing Joshua’s memory as a disguise.

In retribution for the torture
this
Joshua had put Malcolm through, Jordan struck at it again. But the boy, unfazed, jerked her forward.

She didn’t care when she fell. Didn’t care that he kicked her in the guts or that her knees were bloody and scabby with grains of sand. She was so pissed off, she didn’t feel pain.

The little fucker was going to die.

Just as soon as she figured out how to kill him.

***

A dark skid in the sand, wet with blood.

Rook could guess whose.

He sniffed, and smelled her. In spite of the wind, he felt a hint of her warmth again, brushing against his skin. The wan light was tinted blue-violet, bright with anger.

How did a man catch up with his own nightmare?

He had the answer now: when his woman was fighting it every step of the way.

***

Joshua attempted to drag her forward by her hair.

The sand had become less deep, the ground harder, like bedrock. The wind howled louder and louder, overriding all other senses. She resisted forward movement with all her strength. She grabbed at her hair, tried to yank it out of the child’s hands.

Much farther, and she’d be dead. He wasn’t taking her home for a tea party. He’d been lying in wait.

Well. He’d picked the wrong Chimera. She was going to drown his ass. Drown him for real, as in, until he stopped twitching. Malcolm had shown her how to reach out with a part of herself—the darksight—and push.

Joshua’s stance twisted, and she knew he was about to strike her again. Her scalp burned at the roots where he yanked her along.

With all the willpower in her body, she walloped him with her mind.

Joshua flew back, taking a fistful of dark strands with him. His body thumped, skidding on his back over the wavering grains of sand.

Jordan crab-crawled away, then scrambled to her feet to run, though she had no idea which way to go. She put muscle into her speed, dived into the howling monsoon, praying it would cover her tracks. The wind pushed against her, but she fought it. And crashed headlong into a wall.

The wall was Malcolm Rook’s chest. He’d found her; she’d never doubted he would. Now they had to go the fuck the other way.

“It’s not your brother,” she warned breathlessly.

“No, not Joshua.” Malcolm’s arm came around her bare waist.

With a shriek, Joshua dropped out of the sky on top of them. He gouged long, bloody lines across Malcolm’s face.

In panic and fury, Jordan
pushed
again. Harder. With a distorted moan, not-Joshua jackknifed into darkness and wind.

“This way,” Malcolm stretched his arm forward.

She didn’t understand how he knew where to go, but she trusted it and they jogged, arms around each other, into the storm.

Another inhuman shriek, and Jordan was jerked by her ankle. Fell right out of Malcolm’s grasp and was dragged, belly down, away into the dark, her fingers making tracks in the sand.

Malcolm was suddenly there, standing over her, while Joshua the creature ripped at and tore him.

She
pushed
, tears blinding her.

Joshua was flung back again.

Malcolm helped her back up, but staggered as they tried to move forward. She put herself under his shoulder to take some of his weight. “Where do I go?”

Blood flowed down his chest, sticky-slick on skin, darkening his jeans. He was clumsy and weak, but he lifted his head, gaze seeking left-right, then finding and fixed:
That way.

Again they drove forward together until she felt the shimmer of a boundary.
Thank God.

And they stumbled into some fantasy Rêve, a surreal medieval dungeon. Revelers were decked in costume—sexy warrior girl with a huge hammer, cloaked man with hood and staff, some Orc-faced dude with a fat sword.

The players all stopped and stared at her, too stunned to help.

Malcolm said the columns of the Agora were always there. She lost no momentum as she reached forward, seeking. Malcolm dropped onto the stone floor. And sure enough, the great column appeared before her. Her palm made contact just as Joshua shrieked again behind her.

Marshal Harlen Fawkes stepped into view, though smaller than she remembered him.

He took in their ravaged, blood-soaked appearance: she, naked; Malcolm, a heap.

“What the—?” Fawkes said.

“Help!” Jordan pointed toward the boundary, a castle wall, where Joshua had followed them into the Rêve.

“It’s not a boy. It’s not a boy!” She knew she wasn’t making sense.

All the Revelers fixed their gazes upon him. Witnesses.

Then Joshua looked at them all, turned, and walked out once more into the Scrape.

“Chimera is behind you, and that’s what matters.” Coll sat in Rook’s desk chair, elbows to knees, gaze up and steady. Maisie munched a thumbnail behind him by the windows. “If Malcolm Rook says there’s something in the Scrape, then there is.”

Rook understood the subtext beneath the compliment. The Rêves weren’t going to close. They weren’t even going to slow attendance. It had too powerful a hold on people’s imaginations. It was a panacea for all the ills of the waking world. No pain, just release. Unless they were dragged out into the Scrape, that is.

Jordan scoffed, which meant she got Coll’s meaning, too.

“The testimony of the Rêvelers was inconsistent,” Coll continued. “Marshal Fawkes, however, not only corroborates everything you said, Jordan, but he shares your outrage as well.”

“It’s going to take time,” Rook said to her.

“I have a
bald
patch on my
head
.”

Her hair had fallen out where not-Joshua had grabbed it. Rook didn’t think it was noticeable, but Jordan was touchy about it. Though he was beyond exhaustion, his injuries hadn’t transferred to the waking world.

“Everyone has been warned to be more vigilant.” Coll cut a quick, sharp glance to Rook. “We will report anything unusual, like personal nightmares in pursuit.”

Rook took the jab. They’d already been through the Joshua thing at length: when the nightmare had begun; when the boy had first crossed what boundaries; what made Rook choose to keep it secret. It had been a mistake.

Coll groaned as he stood. “You both still planning to go back in after Vince Blackman?”

This was yet another fight between them. He was adamant that a new Chimera should not go out into the Scrape. And Jordan refused to let a man suffer because of her actions. Rook swore that this would be his fastest tracking ever. In and out.

Coll was working with Maisie on Vince Blackman’s father.

“I have something to do first this morning,” Rook said, “But yeah, we’ll track him down once it’s done.”

“Good enough. Maisie, with me.” Coll’s tone was hard.

She made a face at him. “Yeah, I got to talk to Jordan first.”

“I’ll be in the car.” He walked to the door, then paused and looked back. “Jordan, the stuff from your apartment will be moved to storage. We’ll work out the details of your life among us later.”

“Take your time,” Jordan said. “It’s up to Malcolm whether he wants to move or not.”

Rook felt himself smiling, the bolts of tension in his shoulders releasing, even when he was keyed up and angry. How did she do that?

He finally noticed Coll staring at his face, and sent him a questioning glance. But Coll just smiled back and said, “I’ll be in touch,” and left.

***

“You’ve
got
to get me away from him,” Maze murmured low. “He thinks he’s taking me to Vegas to find Blandman’s dad.”

They were huddled in a corner of what could only generously be called a kitchen.

“Blackman,” Jordan corrected. “And Vince is in serious danger at the moment.” She had put him there personally. The urgency to go back and find him bordered on panic. She would not be responsible for the death of another human being. No matter what Vince had planned for her, he didn’t deserve to be left out in the Scrape. No one did.

What if not-Joshua found him?

“I just need a little money,” Maze said with a sly smile, “and I’ll slip out the back.
Steve
can sit in his fucking car all day long waiting, for all I care.”

More games. “No, Maisie. You go to Vegas. You take care of this. Steve is your chance to get everything straight. To take your life back. Don’t screw this up for yourself. I can’t be there to clean up after you.”

“I never asked you to.”

Ha
. “You just did.” Jordan grabbed her sister and hugged her close. “Don’t blow this. Go to Vegas and see it through. Try something different.”

It was time to let her go. Fall or fly, it was up to her. This had been coming for a while, and they both knew it.