Heavy Metal (A Goddesses Rising Novel) (Entangled Select) (22 page)

Like sex on a scratchy, hard balcony.

With that thought, reality restored itself. Sam had been so lost in Riley he’d stopped hearing the waves and feeling the floor. Sound and sensation rushed back now, along with the chill breeze. She had to be freezing. And they’d been gone a while. Nick might come looking for them.

“Thank you,” he murmured.

“Mmm.”

Purely male pride made him smirk at the satisfaction in her hum. “Are you okay? I hope I didn’t crush you.”

“No, but…” She leaned upward, and their bodies separated. “Sorry, I—” She froze, like a bunny on a lawn or a deer at the edge of the road.

“Wha—”

“Wait.”

Sam waited. Riley stared into the dark, down toward the beach.

“Someone’s here.” She barely whispered it, but a sharp edge came through anyway.

Sam jerked as a buzz split the air. He didn’t clue in that it was his phone in his pocket, halfway down his thigh, until it buzzed again. He cursed and sat up, helping Riley to her feet. Her movements were frantic as she dragged her clothes back on.

“Where?” Sam asked as he automatically checked the text.

Where the hell are you guys?
Nick.

“Close,” she whispered back.

Sam shoved the phone in his pocket and fastened his jeans. He grabbed her hand and they dashed around the corner to the back of the house. Sam headed for the bedroom he’d come out through, but something about the rail at the far end of the balcony caught his eye. He halted and stiffened his arm, keeping Riley behind him.

“What is it?”

Sam pointed at the odd shape in the darkness and eased them closer. He strained to hear any movement or other sounds, but the ocean surge was too loud.

When they were several feet away, he saw that the shape was a grappling hook caught around the top of the rail. A rope dangled down the side. He stiffened and let go of Riley, urging her back. But she stuck close, her fist with the screw-ring upraised.

All the doors were closed and the rest of the balcony empty, so Sam knew if someone had climbed up here, they must be around the far side of the house. He braced himself as he reached the corner, but even prepared, he couldn’t stop the blow. The heel of a hand whacked him under his chin—the move of a smaller attacker on a bigger target. Sam’s teeth snapped together. He tasted blood, saw stars, and then pain radiated through his jaw and up over the top of his skull.

But the attacker was an amateur. He’d only landed the blow because it was a sucker punch in the dark. Sam sent two quick punches where he estimated the other guy’s head to be. The first missed, but the second cut off the guy’s laugh. Something crunched under Sam’s knuckles, and a howl filled the air.

Sam’s vision cleared, and despite the faintness of the moonlight, he recognized Anson on his knees, clutching his nose.

“You son of a bitch!” Sam hauled him up by his collar. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

But Anson was in no shape to answer. Dark blood stained half his face and trickled over his fingers. He’d stopped howling but hung in Sam’s grip, clearly dazed.

“Crap. Let’s go.” Sam motioned Riley to walk in front of him while he dragged Anson’s stumbling form. He couldn’t believe this guy used to be so fearsome.

“Do you sense anyone else?” he asked Riley.

“No, just him. But I don’t know my range.” She hurried ahead to pull the hall door open all the way.

“Wait.” He shoved Anson into the hall and peered out past him, double checking. Light filtering up the stairs pushed back most of the shadows. The hallway was clear. He shoved Anson down, and the loser crumpled into a heap on the floor.

Riley moved to his side. “What do we do?” she whispered.

He turned to put his mouth against her ear for maximum silence and hesitated. Her shampoo was different, he noticed. But buried beneath the surface floweriness was Riley and, more importantly, Riley and him. His hand tightened possessively around her upper arm, and he had to close his eyes against the emotions rushing through him. He swallowed and remembered what was happening. They couldn’t assume Anson was alone.

“Find some metal,” he whispered. She disappeared back into the bedroom and came back clutching a pair of silver candlesticks. Sam used hand motions to convey that she should stay up here with Anson. He didn’t want to leave them alone, but the guy hadn’t moved, and Riley loomed over him, gripping her fancy weapons. She nodded.

Sam crept to the top of the stairs and paused, listening to intense silence. He had no sense of anyone downstairs. But he also had no weapons except for his fists, and a position that fully exposed him if he tried to get a line of sight into the living room.

He had no choice. He inhaled slow and deep. He had to be a moving target. He barreled down the stairs and prepared to swing left, behind the wall. But nothing happened. The room was empty.

Sam hurried toward the laptop, whose screen still showed Chloe’s place, all images still. Anson or Numina or whoever was supposed to have gone to her house. How the hell had Anson known to come here? And where were Nick and Quinn?

The alarm was still armed and showing no breaches, so he hurried back upstairs to get Riley and the bastard. She stood over the weasel, a fierce-looking warrior with her tousled hair tumbling around her face and the candlesticks that, in the dim light, could almost have been short swords. Sam wanted to haul her up against him and kiss her, but even though Anson’s bloody face was still buried in his hands, Sam refused to give the man any ammunition, including revealing the extent of his relationship with Riley. Assuming the jerk hadn’t heard or seen them outside, but he thought that was a safe assumption, given Riley’s ability to detect his presence.

“What’s going on?” she asked.

“I don’t know.” He dragged the dirtbag to the stairs and forced him down into the great room. Quinn and Nick were just coming in through the door to the garage. Quinn held a couple bags of frozen vegetables, Nick a big package wrapped in white butcher paper. They stared, open-mouthed, as Sam dumped Anson in a dining room chair.

“Should I tie him up?” Riley glared down at Anson and hefted one of her candlesticks. He huddled, still holding his face.

“I don’t think that will be necessary.” Sam clenched his fists and tried not to break Anson’s face. Again.

“What the hell?” Nick’s package thunked when he dropped it on the marble counter and walked out of the kitchen section. He stopped, hands on his hips, in front of Anson. “Where did this shit come from?”

Sam explained how they’d discovered him. “Riley doesn’t detect anyone else around.”

“Neither do I.” Quinn came to stand next to Nick and gazed coolly at the leech. “How did you find us? What are you doing here?”

“Bleeding,” Anson said nasally. “I could use some ice.”

Sam would have given him another injury to take his mind off the first, but Riley went into the kitchen, put ice in a baggie, wrapped it in a hand towel, and gave it to Anson.

“Thank you.” He laid it gingerly against his face, wincing, and flashed Riley what he probably thought was his usual charming smile but looked rather gruesome. Riley’s expression didn’t change, but since Sam was watching closely, he saw revulsion in her eyes. That made him feel better about her giving comfort to the enemy. She was just playing the good cop side of things.

“What are you doing here?” Sam demanded, looming over Anson, willing to use every ounce of intimidation he could get from his size and position. Nick folded his arms and silently backed him up.

“Spring break,” Anson muttered from behind the towel-wrapped ice. He shook his head and studied the blood on the towel. “You broke my nose, you big ox.”

“You deserved it. What did you think I’d do when you sucker-punched me?”

Anson put the ice back and sat sullenly. Quinn leaned against the half wall behind her, and Nick grabbed a second chair, spun it around in front of Anson, and straddled it with his arms crossed over the top. He leaned forward slowly until it tilted, and Sam realized he’d set one leg on the toe of Anson’s shoe. Not directly on top of his foot, but the pressure still had to send an uncomfortable message.

“You’ll answer all our questions,” Sam warned, “and maybe we won’t call the cops.” Riley made a slight, jerky movement that Sam noticed because his body still hummed for her, and she still held half his attention. He also felt Nick’s disapproval, but he held his ground. The tactic wouldn’t work if Anson didn’t believe it was possible.

“What are you gonna tell the cops?” Anson challenged. “Look at me, and look at you!”

Sam assumed he didn’t show any evidence of Anson’s smack on his chin, while the leech’s nose had swollen into a misshapen hunk, still oozing blood. That might work against him, but… “I have the witness on my side. A witness,” he continued when Anson opened his mouth, “you’ve been chasing all over the eastern seaboard. But hey, if that’s not enough for you.” He leaned forward. “Tell us, and maybe I won’t
kill
you.”

Anson sighed and folded the towel to a clean spot, rewrapped the ice, and held it to his face again. “What do you want to know?”

“Everything,” Sam and Nick said at the same time.

Chapter Sixteen

Strength is vital to success, and partnerships are essential to strength. Merging the talents of one party with the complementary skills of another can create mutual benefit. Join us, and gain access to better partnerships and greater success than you have ever thought possible.

—Millinger.com

Anson leaned back in the chair, faded-denim eyes narrowing with resentment. “Can I at least have a drink of water or something?”

This time, Riley didn’t move. “Not until you start talking.” She kept her tone smooth and encouraging despite the tough words, and was gratified to see Sam’s mouth twitch. She retrieved one of the candlesticks she’d set down and waited.

Anson heaved a great sigh and tossed the towel-wrapped ice on the table. “Fine. Ask away.” He folded his arms and stretched out his free leg, trying to look like he didn’t care about his situation. But Riley noticed he leaned away from Sam, and his eyes kept darting between him and Nick. He was more afraid than he let on.

She wasn’t surprised when Sam started his questions all the way back at the beginning. He’d hinted at his guilt for the connection to the leech. “Back in college,” Sam said. “Were you working for Numina then?”

Anson’s eyebrows went up, making him wince and grimace. He tentatively touched the bridge of his nose. “Uh, no. Not then. You’ve probably figured out the whole leeching thing, right?” He glanced around at them. “Why it works?” When they nodded, he continued. “I was adopted, but my grandmother stuck around. She wanted me to know about my mother and my heritage, but she wasn’t that powerful and could only teach me so much. I figured I could ‘bond’ with another son of a goddess and pick his brain, get an in to the community. I hacked the Society’s database, found other male descendants my age, and picked you.” He shrugged and rubbed at some dried blood on his hand. “Bad choice, as it turned out. You were too noble to be of much use after that.”

It wasn’t hard to read between the lines. Jealous boy, resentful that he didn’t have the power he’d have had if he were a girl, seeking a way to take it instead of living a normal life and trying to be successful on his own merits. His methods made Riley’s skin crawl.

“So you were always planning to leech a goddess,” Sam said with disgust.

“Not from the beginning. But once I found out it could be done, I started planning.”

“Why Marley?” Quinn asked. Riley glanced at her, relieved to find she didn’t seem to need the wall to hold her up. At least, not yet.

Anson shrugged. “I liked her. That made it easier. You know she had to bestow power willingly, and that was going to be a challenge.” He gave Quinn a steady look that almost seemed sincere. “I didn’t intend to hurt her. She’d have been fine if you had left her alone.”

Quinn snorted. “You can’t lay any guilt on me. You get full the responsibility for the damage.”

Riley wondered if Quinn would tell her sister what he’d said, and if that would make her feel better, or worse.

Nick leaned on the chair again, pressing harder until Anson yelped. “When did you hook up with Numina?”

“I don’t know exactly. They must have tapped into my research somehow. They never told me how I came on their radar.”

“You didn’t ask?”

He raised his eyebrows. “Guys like that come to your door, offer you a job like this, for that kind of money—you don’t ask a lot of questions.”

“Guys like what?” Nick demanded.

Anson looked as delighted as someone with a broken nose and blood all over his face could look. “Seriously, you don’t know who Numina is?”

“We know,” Sam fibbed. “Who are you working with specifically?”

He shifted on his chair and pretended Sam hadn’t said anything, addressing his answers toward Quinn and Riley, as if he was gifting them with a history lesson. “Numina’s core leadership is made up of guys like William Yates, Benjamin Odrama, Darren Breffet.”

Somehow, Riley wasn’t surprised that he’d just named the world’s biggest computer magnate, a former U.S. president, and the most respected investment guru in history. How many more of the world’s leaders were part of that legacy?

“Gods,” Nick said, half scoffing.

Anson sneered back. “Yeah. Descended just like the goddesses. Only instead of having physical powers, they got power based off influence.”

“Influence,” Sam repeated.

Anson gestured. “You know how people say a guy has charisma? Seems charmed, no matter what he does. Everything he touches turns to gold. All those clichés? Influence.”

Riley wondered if he even saw the irony in his dismissal, calling the traits clichés. He obviously recognized his own charisma and used it whenever possible. Even when it didn’t work.

“I assume their use of it isn’t all the same,” Sam said. “Goddess abilities vary, as does the amount of power they have.”

Riley thought about John’s reference to splintering and said, “The men you named wouldn’t have a need to go after the power of goddesses. They have a high level of respect and success they wouldn’t want to risk.”

Anson winked at her and gave a little nod.

“How many Numina are there?” Nick asked.

Anson shrugged. “No idea. My best guess is about as many as there are goddesses.”

“Imagine that…men having the more subtle skills,” Riley snarked.

Anson ignored that, too. “Numina is a secret organization, even from within. You’re a member from birth, and all male descendants are included, no matter how much influence they have, but only certain ones are part of the inner circle. So there’s a wide range of success. And as you can imagine, some abuse it, get greedy, and fall off their peaks.”

“People like Broginvicci, Danner, Lilling.” Sam named some of the biggest recent falls from grace, CEOs and politicians who fit Anson’s description.

Riley gasped in recognition. Anson nodded at her. “Exactly. One of those guys was in my office a couple of days ago. They all want their power back, and influence isn’t doing it fast enough. So they came up with a bigger plan.”

The pieces were coming together now. Sam relaxed his threatening stance and paced at Anson’s side. “They found out you planned to leech goddesses—”

“A goddess,” Anson interrupted, one finger in the air. His self-righteousness was so ridiculous, Quinn laughed. “I only intended to leech one goddess. They came to me and offered me everything I’d ever wanted if I leeched more and used the power to help them get theirs back.”

Sam didn’t buy it. “They couldn’t offer you everything you’d ever wanted. You wanted to be a goddess.”

Anson made an annoyed face. “Yeah, well, their offer was still hard to turn down. I promised I’d work for them, and once Marley did the initial bestowment, it wasn’t hard to go after the others.”

“Because you were addicted.” Riley was sure she was the only one who heard the crack Sam barely kept out of his voice, the statement driven by his own fears.

Anson nodded but didn’t look chagrined or rueful.

“I would have been unstoppable.” He gazed into the distance, as if considering what could have been. “If I’d leeched Quinn—”

“Except she stopped you.” Nick’s hard tone stripped Anson’s wistfulness off his face. “So, then what? Numina didn’t cast you off?”

“I don’t work for Numina. These guys are members, but they’re working outside the organization.” He winced. “And no, they weren’t too happy. You notice they didn’t keep me out of jail. Too risky. They didn’t want a traceable connection to me.”

His tone gave Riley an inkling of why Anson had suddenly become so cooperative. Maybe he wasn’t thrilled with his treatment at his employers’ hands and was looking to change sides? She glanced at Sam, who didn’t seem to be thinking along the same lines. In fact, he looked suspicious, and that made Riley wonder if Anson was talking as a stall tactic. But for what? She tuned out for a second to check for prickles but still only sensed the people in the room.

“They came up with this other plan when they found out that I could track—” Anson broke off, his eyes widening and his face going red. He glanced at Riley out of the corner of his eye but kept his face forward.

Her mind raced. The Numina had found out that Anson could track…goddesses. It had to be goddesses. Quinn had said he could sense them with the residue from his leechings.

Suddenly she knew how Vern and Sharla and all the other shadow stalkers kept finding her, even when she traveled with no plan, no destination in mind. How they’d followed her on the way up here when the only people who knew where she was were people they should have been able to trust.

“How?” She stepped forward and raised a candlestick over his head. “How do you track goddesses? How did you track me?” Sam came around the back of the chair and nudged Riley out of Anson’s reach. But just let the bastard try to get a jump on her. So far tonight, all she’d felt for Anson was disgust and pity. But now fury lit, fueled by all those months of confusion and anxiety.

Anson’s smile was smug this time. “Once I tag a goddess, I always know where she is.”

“Why me?” It didn’t make any sense for Anson to have “tagged” her, even if their grandmothers were friends. “I didn’t even know I was a goddess. What did you think you could get from me when I shouldn’t have had any power?”

Sam tugged her back again. She hadn’t even realized she’d stepped nearer. She
really
wanted to brain Anson.

But this time Sam spoke, his voice hard, his arm tight around Riley’s shoulders. “Think about it. He’s patient. Look how long his first plan took. He knew you weren’t part of the Society, that you didn’t know goddesses, because of his grandmother’s journals. He probably had you in reserve from day one. If you didn’t know anything about yourself, he could teach you. You’d be grateful.”

Anson’s expression had darkened while Sam spoke, losing any hint of charm, but he was smart. He must know that arguing would have made Sam’s assessment sound more true, so he just glared at them all, mouth pressed tight and hands clenched on his thighs.

“He was hedging his bets. If you didn’t come into your power when you turned twenty-one, there was no loss for him. But if you did, and if things didn’t work out the way he planned with Marley and the others—which it didn’t—you were his backup. You wouldn’t know anything about him. Unlike all the other goddesses, you weren’t warned about him.”

Pain stabbed through Riley, a shockingly intense stab of loss and nausea. “Did you…did you kill my family?”

Anson had the grace to look appalled. “No! I would never do something like that. It was a horrible accident.”

That he’d capitalized on. She pressed a hand to her burning stomach.

“What were you going to do with her?” Sam sounded as sick as she felt. “Leech her?”

“No. I don’t think I can do that anymore.” He sounded sad. “Quinn broke me.” He tipped an imaginary hat in her direction. She didn’t move.

“Good,” Nick barked. Anson ignored him.

“I wanted her to be mine. To care about me the way Marley did. I underestimated that kind of power,” he admitted, and Riley caught a glimpse behind all his pretense, to the lonely boy underneath.

In any other circumstances, she might have felt sorry for him.

“What’s their plan now?” Quinn asked in such a soft voice Riley spun toward her, alarmed. She was sagging against the wall now, but her gaze was steady on Anson. “It sounds like they’re moving on from you.”

Anson didn’t like that. He straightened in the chair and yanked his foot out from under the leg of Nick’s, which he’d eased up on just enough. “The Numina losers wanted me to identify goddesses so they could send recruiters to them. They’d feel them out for weaknesses or ambition. See who might be willing or susceptible to working for them.”

“Leeching them?” Riley asked, though they didn’t meet the criteria. Maybe their heritage made it possible for them, just like sons of goddesses.

But Anson shook his head. “Just employees with really unique skills. They want to set up a network and use the goddesses to help them get back on top.”

“I’ve heard enough.” Nick hauled Anson up by the collar and dragged him toward the garage door. “We thank you for your cooperation. Sam, call the security team in. They can decide what to—”

The prickles burst into Riley’s brain, and she gasped. “Nick, no!” Too late. Before she could tell him someone was out there, he twisted the handle on the garage door. It slammed inward, knocking both Nick and Anson back, and three men barreled in. Nick recovered immediately, tossing Anson at the first guy and kicking the door into the face of the third. The second guy made it inside and swung a fist at Nick’s head. He missed, and Nick didn’t hesitate to fight back.

Riley caught Quinn and pulled her away from the fight, into the living room. Sam put himself in front of them, but then the front door blasted open, too, splinters flying, the alarm blaring into life. Bodies seemed to pour in from every direction, though Riley flash-counted only half a dozen. Still, too many. Nick had his guy down, but the first one was on his back, struggling to pull Nick’s arms behind him and yank him upright and vulnerable. Sam moved forward to meet the second bunch, looking like an action movie hero as his fists connected with heads and guts, but there were too many.

Riley squeezed her candlestick and drew harder than she ever had, shoving two attackers off Sam in quick succession but not doing enough damage to keep them down. She watched Quinn for a second. The woman was weak and didn’t go for blunt force like Riley had. She pulled a rug and sent two guys tumbling to the ground, then dropped crystal vases and knick-knacks off a shelf onto their heads.

Sam landed a fist deep in someone’s abdomen, not just doubling him over but sending him staggering halfway across the room, where he tripped and crashed into an end table. There was no way Sam, as big and strong as he was, could have done that without putting power behind it. But the effort took its toll. He swayed on the spot and shook his head as if to toss off dizziness.

Another attacker ran in to tackle him around the waist. Riley wound up with her candlestick, threw power behind her swing, and swung for the cheap seats. The metal connected with his chin, flattening him before he reached his target.