Talent to Burn (Hidden Talent #1) (2 page)

He raised an eyebrow. “Your aura says otherwise.”

I shrugged. “You’re wrong. And I haven’t seen or spoken to my brother in fourteen years, since I was eleven.”

“You haven’t heard from him at all?”

“Nothing. Not a word.” I waited for Jamie’s face to drop, disappointed in me like people always were.

Instead, he cocked an eyebrow and sipped his coffee. “You will.”

“How can you be so confident?”

“That’s what I do. That’s what brought me to you. You will find Eric, and I’ll be with you when you do.” His dark eyes glinted at me. “That’s what my finding sense tells me, and it’s very rarely wrong.”

“Lucky you.” His cockiness was back in full effect. “Who are these people you work for? I’ve never heard of any such group.” I deliberately relaxed my taut muscles. This could be useful intelligence. I’d learn what I could.

“I work with the Order of Enlightenment. It’s been around since the twenties.” He sipped his coffee. “It’s quite a story.”

“Mmm,” I said. I wasn’t really in the mood for a long story, but I needed to understand whether I’d been wrong, and Jamie was, in fact, a threat to me.

 
“It was started by mediums, but we’ve evolved since then. Now we’re basically a union of odd Talents of all sorts—everything from clairvoyants to mechanical empaths. We have the advantage of being written off as a bunch of crackpots, which allows us to do more than you might expect. The Grey Institute ignores us. We end up with a lot of their rejects. People who don’t have Talents that fit into their program, or people who don’t like it there for one reason or another.” He sat back in his chair, waiting.

My head spun, trying to put it all together. I’d never heard of this group. “How did you get interested in Eric?”

“We watch the Greys. Many of our people have dreams and visions about the place.” He paused, and a dark expression flickered over his features, replaced quickly with a deliberately casual smile. He couldn’t hide the darkness in his aura, though, which hinted at negative emotions—fear, sadness, even hate. I didn’t know which. “Eric left there a couple of months back. We kept an eye on him because one of our people had a vision of him coming to us. We knew he was powerful, but we didn’t know in what way. Then we lost track of where he was for a few weeks—and the next we heard, he was wanted for arson and murder.”

Those words raised my tension level even further. The world had shifted out from under me, and I had about a million questions. The most important one: “Why did the Greys break into my apartment?”

“They’re looking for the same thing as we are. You, and through you, Eric.” Jamie pushed himself back from the table. “I know it’s a lot to take in.”

“I don’t understand why anyone would think I knew his whereabouts.”

Jamie shrugged.

His evasiveness pushed me over the edge. I slapped the table. “I don’t have time for this. I need to know how you found me.”

“Seriously.” The trickster faded and he made solid eye contact with me for the first time. I was surprised at the intelligence in his face. “Our leader asked all of us who can find things to look for you. I got the itch, and followed it to your bar. Experience tells me you’re going to lead me to him.”

“And the men at my apartment?”

“Maybe the same…or maybe they followed a paper trail. Who knows?” Jamie leaned over the table. “I—we—really need your help. Eric is in trouble.”

“I told you, I don’t know where he is.” My patience had run out. I was done.

“You said you dreamed of fire.”

I laughed, and it sounded hollow even to me. “I dream. It doesn’t mean anything.”

“What did you dream, Catrina?”

“It was nothing.” I folded my hands on the table. “The Greys experimented on me for years, and the dreams never meant anything or went anywhere. I don’t have any real Talent, only echoes of one. I’m useless to you and to your Order.”

“How can you have an aura like that with no Talent?”

I shrugged. The question had long ceased irritating me.

Jamie toyed with his coffee cup. “I see. Did they turn you out then, when your brother was Talented and you weren’t?”

The words stung, underlining the way I’d felt for years. “No, I left. Absent without leave.” There was no point in telling him the rest of it. I’d told him too much, and already regretted it. He wouldn’t understand, and I didn’t need to open myself up any further. Enough was enough.

I stood up. “Can you give me a ride someplace?”

“Where are you going to go?”

“Bus station, train station, freeway on-ramp…whatever’s closest.”

“But where then?”

“As you pointed out, I’m being chased. After I left, I spent most of my life trying to keep away from the Greys. It’s been a long time, and lately I’d fallen into thinking they weren’t interested in me anymore, thought I had some chance of a normal life, but I guess I was wrong. If there’s one thing I do know, it’s how to run and hide. So if you’ll excuse me, I need to get as far away from here as possible.”

Jamie sighed. “You won’t help us at all?”

Hell no.
“I wouldn’t even know how to start. I don’t have anything to tell you that could possibly help you.”

“Don’t you care about your brother?”

“Last time I saw my brother he didn’t want anything to do with me, and that was a long, long time ago. For all I knew—or cared—he was dead.” I bit down on my lip as I lied, breaking the skin, filling my mouth with the metallic taste of deceit.

Eric, the only person who’d cared for me in that God-forsaken place, my big brother, my idol. Eric, who’d looked after me in place of the mother I couldn’t even remember. Eric, who hadn’t wanted to come with us when Dad broke in one night to set us free. I had never forgiven him.

Jamie got up and threw some money on the table. “Okay then,” he said, zipping up his motorcycle jacket and heading toward the door. “Come on, I’ll take you to the bus station.”

“As easy as that?” I guess I’d been right. He wasn’t one of the bad guys. Small consolation for my life being upended, but I could start over. I’d done it before.

“As easy as that.” He pulled out a scrap of paper, scrawled something on it, and handed it to me. “My number. In case you change your mind.”

“I won’t.”

“Take it anyway. You never know.”

To save money, I thought I’d hitch instead of catching the bus, but after several hours, I gave up. Not my day. Or perhaps not my life. Admitting defeat, I bought a ticket at the Greyhound depot and boarded a southbound bus.

I preferred hitching rides to the bus any day. At least when hitchhiking, you only had to deal with one crazy person at a time. Hunching my way down the aisle, I passed a tiny old lady dressed in black from head to toe, lamenting away to herself in a language I didn’t recognize, a couple of scary-thin guys with meth mouths and bad skin, and the usual gaggle of people like myself who didn’t have a lot of money or choices. At least the seats were usually comfortable enough to nap in.

I sat by a window at the back of the bus, a decision I regretted as soon as the enormously fat guy got on. Of course, he came and sat next to me, and I was trapped between his sweaty bulk and the window. He didn’t smell too fresh, either. At least he didn’t make eye contact, and the bus soon rumbled onto the highway south.

The driver pulled over in some nameless town—I didn’t even know if it was in Oregon or Northern California at this point—for a rest stop at a gas station. I wandered around, ate some fries at the chain restaurant next door, wished I had enough cash for a decent meal, and headed back to my seat.

As I came up the bus steps, the hair stood up on the back of my neck and I turned to look down the aisle. Near the back of the bus stood a tall man with almost white-blond hair and pale blue eyes. He stared straight at me, and he positively reeked of power.

Chapter Three

I had one moment of keeping my cool and then I turned and pushed my way back off the bus.

Trees lined the grass behind the gas station where the bus had parked. My adrenaline kicked in and I ran for the woods. I didn’t turn back to check if the blond was following me, but kept running. By the time I reached the woods, breathing hurt my chest and my heart pounded. I’d gotten mentally flabby doing bar work, gotten lazy about watching my back since I’d decided the Grey Institute wasn’t looking for me. I’d been running less often and less far. Stupid.

A few yards into the pine trees I cut right, not slowing my pace, and continued parallel to the tree line. After a minute, I came to a culvert and dropped down into a storm water pipe with only a trickle of water running through it. The scent of decomposing leaves filled the air. I waited, listening, trying to slow my heartbeat and breathing so I could hear anything over the sounds of my own body.

In the distance, the roar of traffic on the highway covered everything, a layer of white noise. Minutes trickled past. Finally, I let go of my breath. Paranoia crawled along my skin like bugs inside my clothes. I could have sworn I felt a presence nearby, someone waiting for me to step out into the open.

Rationally, I knew I couldn’t wait here forever, but my muscles trembled as I stepped forward and looked up out of the culvert. No one was there. I took a few tentative steps out. Still nothing. I had no idea what to do next.

I was sure the white-blond guy was the same one I had seen looking out the window of my apartment. Hair that pale was pretty distinctive on an adult. He’d looked directly at me, and then there was his aura to consider. Assuming I was correct, what was my next move? I was in the middle of nowhere, days’ walk from real civilization. The only thing other than woods I’d seen in miles was the rest stop, the only way out of here the bus, or hitching. I could try to wait him out, hope that he and whatever backup he had didn’t search for me in the woods. I could try and hike to the next town but I didn’t know how far away that was. Still, putting some distance between us seemed like a good idea.

I set out in the general direction of the highway, stepping cautiously so as not to make too much noise. Every crack of a twig or splash of my shoe telegraphed my position to anyone trying to follow me. Each time I made a noise I hesitated, waiting, my body cold with sweat.

I finally stopped for a breather, and sat down on a tree stump. My damp clothes had cooled and I shivered. I stank of sweat, mud, and through all of it the bitter scent of my own fear. I had no water or food, and the sky darkened even as I watched.

I sighed and used my hands to push myself up again. As I stood, the sound of a shot cracked through the woods.

Shit.

I launched myself forward, running through the bushes, no longer trying to be quiet, instead trying to be fast. Branches grabbed at my clothes, scratched my face, snagged my hair. I ran and ran until I could run no more. Sobbing for breath, I paused to listen. Nothing. Birds.

The shot hadn’t been that close. Maybe I had outrun the shooter. Maybe it had simply been someone hunting deer. Regardless, I needed to get out of here before the white haired man found me.

The traffic’s roar echoed farther away now. My tired legs took me once again in that direction until I reached the highway shoulder. I traveled parallel to the road for a while, until my feet stumbled one too many times and I stuttered to a halt.

 
If I hitchhiked I’d be a walking target, but it was that or hike through the woods with no supplies and someone taking potshots at me.

I couldn’t see a way out of here without help. I kicked at the ground, wanting someone to punch. Asking for help had never been my strong point, but my options were limited.

 
Stepping back into the woods, I pulled out my cell phone, and dug around in my pocket for Jamie’s number.

He picked up on the first ring. “Hello.”

I kept my voice as low as I could. Ridiculous, because if my hunters were close enough to hear me, they would have heard my tired feet crashing through the woods. “This is Cat. I need a ride. Can you help me?”

He scored points in my book for neither laughing at me nor making me feel stupid for asking for help only hours after walking out on him. Instead, he said, “Sure, where are you?”

An hour later—one of the longest hours of my life, hiding in the tree line—I was headed down the road on the back of Jamie’s bike, my arms wrapped around his leather-clad waist once again.

He hadn’t been far away when I called. This freaked me the hell out, but mostly I was glad to be out of there. I pushed down my instincts that said,
he was following you—don’t you think that’s a bad thing?
The guy with the white hair following me was creepy. Why should Jamie be any different?

Well, for one, he hadn’t broken into my apartment, as best I could determine. Second, he’d been upfront about the fact he was looking for me and why. Third, he’d given me a way out of a bad situation. Fourth, and this I felt a little bad about, he had information that I needed if I was going to get the Greys off my tail. Finally, as I sat nestled up against his dark gray aura, which resembled nothing so much as smoke from a summer campfire, my gut continued to think him trustworthy.