The First Prophet (33 page)

“Even if I was thinking about you?”

There was a glitter of amusement in his eyes, but he frowned and held on to the playful
role of sulky male. “Well, even so, if you’re able to think about anything at all,
I’ve obviously lost my touch.”

His touch roamed up her inner thigh just then, and Sarah had to struggle for a silent
moment to find the breath to murmur, “Perish the thought.”

“Literally? You can’t think anymore?” He had pushed the sheet down, and his lips teased
her breast with single-minded intensity.

“Tucker…”

“Don’t think about anything, not even me. Just feel.”

She didn’t have a choice. He had quickly learned just how to please her, and he used
all that knowledge now to keep her mindless. It was a gift, a glorious escape from
fears and worries and dread of a future that loomed all too near and much too dark,
and Sarah accepted it gratefully.

And just as before, it surprised her that he could make her feel so much, surprised
her that she was even capable of feeling so much.

But when he came inside her, when her body surrounded him and they moved together,
everything that had gone before seemed merely a prelude, a pale imitation of what
they were truly capable of. The pleasure built and built and built toward some impossible
peak Sarah couldn’t even imagine, and when they reached it at last it was together.

One body. One soul.

Murphy wasn’t happy and it showed; she had never been known to hide her feelings.
About anything. “This is not a good idea,” she said.

“You’re ideal for the job I need you for, we both know that. You have a natural shield,
and it’s the strongest I’ve ever encountered. They’ll never know you’re sharing information
with me.”

“You’re trusting I won’t tell them.”

“I know you won’t.” His voice was calm. “You’ve given over your entire life, all that
you are, to this war.”

After a moment, she said, “Interesting that you call it a war.”

“Don’t you?”

“Yeah. And it’s one we have to win.”

“I agree. Which is why I need someone on the inside
to keep me, as much as possible, in the loop. Some information I’ll find myself, the
way I found you, but there are way too many puzzle pieces still missing.”

“Just how did you find me?” That was bugging her, and it showed.

“I don’t believe in coincidence as a rule, but you happened to cross paths with one
of my team whose ability is detecting other psychics. She was probing because we were
on a case. She picked up on you. With a little luck and a lot of effort, I was able
to find you, obviously. You aren’t completely off the grid, just mostly.”

“Yeah? And what about you and your team? You’ve got a good shield yourself, Bishop,
but that doesn’t mean one of your people or one of the bad guys you go after might
not pick up on more than either one of us can live with. Literally.”

“I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen. Aside from myself, the only other team member
who knows anything about what’s going on is Miranda, my wife.”

“And I’m supposed to trust you on that?”

“Yes. You are.” He paused, then added, “It’s a two-way street. I can be a source for
you, especially when it comes to information you might need on various…factions…of
the government. I can get information for you more quickly than you could ever get
it on your own.”

“And all I have to do in return is keep you informed.”

“I need to know what you know, Murphy. If for no other reason than I need to be sure
that my team is safe, that Haven operatives are safe. I have to be certain none
of them are targets, and that means I need all the information you can give me.”

She drew a breath and blew it out impatiently. “That’s sort of the point of this setup,
you know; the fewer people who know everything, the less damage done if somebody goes
down. I’m not planning to go down, but let’s just say I do. Now I’ve got knowledge
about you and your teams.”

“No more knowledge than you could find tapping into any law enforcement database.
The other side has to know about the SCU and Haven. That’s why I need more information
from you and the people you’re working with. As far as I can tell, none of my psychic
agents or operatives have been targeted. Yet. There must be a reason for that.”

“Yeah, I imagine there is. But I can’t give it to you.”

“Not directly, no. But over time the information you can provide me will be pieces
of the puzzle. Until I can put it all together.”

She scowled. “Look, my source says you can be trusted, but
my
trust has to be earned.”

“I understand that. Ours is a relationship I hope to build on.”

“It may take a while,” she warned.

“That’s all right,” Bishop said. “I’m a very patient man.”

It was several hours later when Tucker woke. He propped his head on one raised hand,
the better to watch Sarah as she slept, but otherwise didn’t move. He still felt a
bit
shaky, and it wasn’t only because his muscles had been pushed to their limits tonight.
Something else had been pushed to its limits, maybe beyond them. He wasn’t sure what
it was, but he knew he’d never be the same again.

He gazed at Sarah’s sleeping face, and a wave of aching tenderness swept over him.
It was stronger than anything he’d ever felt before, so intense it was more than a
little terrifying. He had known her hardly more than a week, yet he couldn’t imagine
his life now without her in it. The wariness he had so often felt around her no longer
troubled him. He had never felt so close to another human being, so…wrapped up in
her.

And so afraid for her.

How could he protect her from the other side? How could he keep her safe?

That agonizing question had barely risen in his mind when a sudden realization struck.
Jesus, not only was the pistol in the other room, but he wasn’t at all sure he’d used
the dead bolt and night latch on the door after he’d pushed the room service cart
back out into the hallway hours ago.

Careful not to wake Sarah, he slid from the bed and found his shorts and jeans. He
would much rather have remained in bed with her, absorbing her warmth and her scent,
watching her sleep and waiting patiently for her to wake so they could make love again.
But things left undone nagged at him.

It was after three
A.M.
but since he was wide awake now and Sarah seemed to be sleeping deeply, he figured
he might as well try to get something accomplished while
she got the rest she undoubtedly needed. He was hardly in the mood to wade through
more statistics of dead and vanished psychics, but he could try to refine the program
he’d written to look for some kind of pattern in the morass of facts and speculation.

Somewhere, there had to be a pattern, something he was missing. There had to be. Nothing
this extraordinary and far-reaching could have existed for so many years without leaving
evidence of its existence. Surely…

He opened and turned on his laptop first, then looked around for the gun.

And didn’t find it.

He couldn’t believe he’d left it in the Jeep, but the longer he thought about it the
more convinced he became that he had done just that. He remembered shoving the pistol
into the storage compartment between the Jeep’s front seats just after they’d left
Neil Mason’s house. He’d been so worried about Sarah, he didn’t think he’d given the
gun another thought.

“Shit. Some hero I am,” he muttered aloud. How the hell was he going to protect Sarah
without the damned gun? Throw rocks at them? Oh, yeah, that would be just great.

Before he even realized he was going to, he had pulled on a sweatshirt and sat down
to put on his socks and boots. He paused then, frowning, because there was something
else nagging at him. But it was a distant thing, out of reach and only vaguely troubling,
and he shrugged it away.

The important thing, the only thing that mattered,
was to protect Sarah. He had to go and get the gun, so he could protect her.

He remembered to take the door keycard, and the keys to the Jeep. He remembered to
test the door carefully after he closed it, to make sure they couldn’t get in and
hurt Sarah while he was gone. He remembered to be cautious as he walked down the hallway,
to be alert, and to check the elevator warily before getting in.

He even remembered to lock the elevator open on the right garage level, so it would
be there waiting for him and he wouldn’t waste time. Because he had to get the gun
and get back upstairs so he could protect Sarah.

The garage, like most of its kind in the wee small hours of the morning, was badly
lit and filled with shadows as well as eerily silent and cavernous, so that Tucker’s
normally quiet footsteps echoed hollowly off the concrete and metallic surfaces. The
Jeep was parked not too far from the elevator, so it didn’t take long to walk to it,
but he was nevertheless aware of a growing anxiety by the time he reached it.

He had to protect Sarah.

He was straining to listen but heard nothing. His head was throbbing oddly, and it
was getting difficult to think, as if a fog crept into his brain. For a moment, as
he stood beside the Jeep, he couldn’t even remember what he was doing there.

The gun. That was it. He had to get the gun and protect Sarah.

It took him several minutes to figure out how to use
the keyless entry gadget to unlock the Jeep doors, and he shook his head in bafflement
when he finally got the driver’s door open.

Christ, what’s wrong with me?

He leaned in and opened the compartment between the seats. The usual vehicle clutter
met his puzzled stare. A couple of folded maps, some paper napkins and two paper-wrapped
straws, the sunglasses he hadn’t needed today. Yesterday. A flashlight. And in the
bottom, when he pushed the rest aside and searched all the way down, a tangled and
gritty nest of coins, gum wrappers, and general Jeep lint.

But no gun.

Tucker stood there, leaning across the driver’s seat, and scowled. Where the hell
was the gun? He’d left it right here—

Then, abruptly, with the suddenness of a soap bubble, the fog vanished from his brain,
and he realized why the gun wasn’t here.

Because it was upstairs in their room.

He remembered. He remembered looking right at it when he’d gone back into the sitting
room. It was on the desk, beside his laptop. Where he had placed it, as soon as they
had settled into the room, so it would be within easy reach while he worked at the
computer and Sarah slept. Where he had left it hours ago.

Where it had always been.

He knew then. Knew in a terrible moment of absolute clarity what they had done to
him. He had underestimated
them, badly underestimated them. Because they had used the one tool he had never expected
them to use, the one tool he hadn’t even imagined they could use.

His own mind.

They’d crawled inside his head. They hadn’t been able to get inside Sarah’s, so they
had turned to him. Somehow, they had crawled inside his head and made him think the
gun was here, made him believe he had to come down here and get it, leaving Sarah
alone upstairs…

“Sarah. Oh, Jesus, Sarah—”

He never heard them behind him. He only had time to realize that, once again, he had
failed the woman he loved. He felt the agony of that even before the shock of the
blow, the blinding pain in his head. And then nothing.