The Psy-Changeling Series, Books 6-10 (109 page)

She felt her heart lighten with sensual humor. Oh, how she needed him. His ability to play, to laugh, to love, made every darkness bearable. “So you’re stripping me naked for my benefit?”

A look so innocent, it would’ve done one of Tammy’s rambunctious twins proud. “Of course.”

Faith let him love her, let him comfort her . . . and hoped it would break open the deadlock on her mind. Because whatever was coming, it was a crushing, terrifying blackness that only ever meant one thing.

Death.

Sophia allowed herself to lean against the garage wall once they’d exited onto the quiet street outside. She wasn’t concerned about setting off alarm bells if caught on surveillance—even Psy sometimes lost the perfect posture that had been drilled into them as a symptom and indication of control.

Max braced himself with one arm on the wall beside her, his eyes ablaze though he kept his distance. His earlier touch everyone would discount as a human action inspired by the emotions of the moment. But if he touched her now, Sophia knew she wouldn’t be able to resist crumbling into his embrace.

“You okay?” Rough tone, violence contained.

She wanted so much to crawl into his arms, to hold the solid reality of him to her until she believed he was alive, was safe. “Yes.”

Lines bracketed Max’s mouth. “This has to be connected to the work we’re doing for Nikita.”

“Not necessarily.” Realizing that he was focusing his anger into work, she kicked her sluggish brain into gear. “Bonner is very wealthy, and Bartholomew said that he has many groupies.”

“I’ll have his visitor logs and mail records checked out. But fact is, he likes playing with you—I don’t think he’d have you killed.”

“He has no way of knowing I’m working with you on another case,” she said, her hands clammy inside her gloves, her heartbeat erratic, “especially if this particular plan was put in motion before we met. He considers you his adversary, doesn’t he?” She’d seen the notes, notes Bonner had sent to Max while he’d still been an unknown serial killer. Each had been a taunt, a declaration of his superiority.

But then Max had caught him.

“Fuck.” Blowing out a breath, Max clenched his fist against the wall, the rough texture of the plascrete rubbing against his skin. He wanted nothing more than to grab Sophia and drag her to his chest, to crush her close until the thudding fear of his heartbeat decreased to something less agonizing.

“Max,” a soft word, a warning from a J with eyes full of remembered terror.

Shoving his other hand into a pocket to stop himself from reaching for her, he said, “Bonner likes to get up close and personal.”

Sophia nodded, her hair lifting in the breeze that sent a discarded soft-drink bottle rolling down the otherwise empty street. “Yes, a bomb is something more apt to be used by those of my race—especially if the aim was expediency.”

“Let’s see what the bomb squad has to say.”

They had to wait fifteen more minutes before the squad called an all-clear, having removed the device and placed it into a blast-proof container. “High tech,” the female member of the team said. “Nothing your average malcontent could make on his own.”

Max hunkered down beside her, aware of the two males giving Sophia the once-over. If they so much as smiled wrong in her direction, those faces would be hitting the old-fashioned concrete of the garage floor—he was not in a rational mood right now. “Someone wealthy?”

“Sure. The rich can source anything, but they’d have to have some fairly strong contacts—this stuff is Defense grade.”

“Is it from a Psy company?” Sophia came to stand so close beside him, he could’ve reached out and curved his hand around the smooth temptation of her calf. Though he forced himself not to touch, her proximity soothed the clawing edge of his protectiveness.

“Can’t tell from a surface look, but they’re the leaders in explosive technology, so I’m guessing yeah.” She locked the box. “You want me to call forensics?”

“Thanks.” Rising, he said good-bye to the bomb experts just as two uniformed officers arrived to hold the scene secure. “Detective Chen is on her way,” one of them said.

Grabbing Chen’s number from them, Max made a call to her, then one to Bart, telling him of the incident and asking him to have his people go over Bonner’s mail and visitor records.

“I’ll organize it,” Bart said. “Glad you’re safe.”

“Thanks.” Ending the call, Max made another one asking for a ride to the airport.

“Shouldn’t we stay for the investigation?” Sophia asked.

“No point.” Max wanted Sophia out of here, wanted her safe. “I know Chen, and she’s a hell of a detective. She’ll keep us in the loop if they discover something—and she’s okay with taking our statements over a comm link.”

“And if this
is
connected to Nikita rather than Bonner,” Sophia said, “then we need to be in San Francisco.”

“Yeah, because even Psy sure as hell wouldn’t attempt to blow up a cop five minutes from an Enforcement station unless they were planning something damn spectacular. Either we’ve gotten too close to something—”

“—or we were meant to be a distraction,” Sophia completed.

The question was—Who or what target was important enough to chance taking out a cop? The fact that he was human didn’t negate the danger—all politics aside, Enforcement command would take the murder of one of its officers as a personal attack.

 

Sascha grinned as Lucas stopped at a small corner shop to buy her an ice cream. “Thank you, Mr. Hunter.”

“You’re welcome, Sascha darling.” He shook his head as they pulled away from the store. “I don’t know where it all goes.”

She took a contented bite of her chocolate-coated chocolate ice cream. “Don’t make me mad.”

He shuddered. “I think you’ve fulfilled your quota of crazy today.”

She made a face at him, able to hear the cat’s humor in his voice. “There is no quota, not once you start carrying around a bowling ball in your belly.” A little pat to reassure the baby, who appeared to be fast asleep. “Not that I don’t adore our little bowling ball.”

A fond glance from the cat beside her. “Why are we going into work?”

“Because they need you to sign documents.” Savoring the delicious treat, she sighed. “It’s such a beautiful day.”

“Let’s take a drive through the Presidio before we head in,” he said, referring to the forested region just outside the city. “You can find a nice sunny spot to eat your ice cream while I take a nap.”

She shot him a laughing glance, warmth filling her body at the remembrance of exactly why he was so sleep-deprived. “Are you complaining?”

“No”—a wicked smile—“I’m planning my revenge.”

 

Max and Sophia had gone over every piece of evidence related to Nikita’s case twice by the time they were twenty minutes into their flight. “What are we missing?” Max muttered, frustrated at the feeling that they were being blind to something critically important. Bonner and his twisted games just didn’t fit.

The vanilla of Sophia’s shampoo whispered across his senses as she bent her head over her organizer, an invisible caress. “Whatever it is, it must be taking place soon if they came after us in such a high-risk location.” They’d both realized the bomb could’ve been planted anytime in the past forty-eight hours. Which meant—“We have to work on the assumption that the timeline has to be very, very short by now.”

“A strike anytime soon will break the pattern of murders before a big deal.” Max had spoken to Nikita prior to boarding the airjet, reconfirmed that nothing was even close to final. “Why?”

“Something’s made them push their schedule forward.” Her thigh brushed his.

The fleeting touch was a balm, centering him. “Nikita’s people—anyone who’ll be out of easy reach for a long period?”

Sophia tapped the screen of her organizer with quick motions. “Prague, Berlin, Tokyo, hardly out-of-the-way locations. And any who are going are coming back within a week or two at most.”

“It has to be an issue of access,” Max muttered. “And for some reason, they were worried we’d figure it out—”

“
You
, Max.” Sophia’s eyes turned an intense, incredible night violet. “They were worried you would figure it out—you’re the wild card in this situation, a human whose thought processes they can’t predict.”

“Okay, so a target a Psy wouldn’t immediately think of, coupled with a deadly—” Ice crawled through his veins, right to his heart.
“No.”

“Max?”

“Where the hell did I see it?” Reaching into the seat pocket in front of them, he pulled out the entertainment module. “They were flashing the selections on the big screen when we boarded, remember?”

“Yes, but what did you—”

“There!” He stopped on the front page of a national tabloid. The headline was:
Scoop! Sascha Duncan Pregnant!
Below that was another headline in a slightly smaller font:
DarkRiver Alpha Keeps Pregnant Mate Captive!

Max put down the module. “Bastards are afraid the cats really are about to put Sascha into hiding.”

A sick feeling bloomed in the pit of Sophia’s stomach as she remembered the glowing warmth of Sascha’s presence. The E-Psy was something incredibly good, something their race needed to protect, not harm. “Our cell phones won’t work.” As a result of accidents in the twentieth century, all devices were now automatically blocked while an airjet was in the sky.

Max was already rising. “I’ll talk to the steward, get an emergency call out.”

“Wait,” Sophia said. “That’ll take too long. I’ll do it on the PsyNet.” Though she was a very strong telepath, her shields were viciously degraded. If she attempted to send that far without the aid of the Net, they could collapse, killing her before the message reached the intended recipient.

“You do it on the Net, I’ll make the call, cover our bases.”

Nodding, she closed her eyes to ensure total focus and opened her psychic eye. She hadn’t tried to cross her new shields before today, but if they were hers, they should obey her—and they did, wrapping her in distinctive mobile firewalls as she exited out into the PsyNet.

Forcing herself to ignore the battering influx of information that was the endless river of the Net, she arrowed straight to Nikita’s mind. As expected, the Councilor’s shields were beyond impenetrable, but Sophia began to try to break them. It was the easiest way to ensure she’d get Nikita’s attention as fast as possible.

It only took a split second. “Ms. Russo.” Nikita’s icy presence. “People who attempt to hack my shields don’t usually survive.”

Sophia knew full well she’d risked infection from a mental virus if the Councilor had laced her defenses with her own personal brand of poison. “You need to get a message to Sascha. We think she’s the next target.”

“Details?”

“Nothing concrete—but it’ll happen very soon.”

Nikita broke contact.

Dropping out of the Net, Sophia found that she was gripping the armrests so tight, her tendons showed white against her skin.

“Sophie, sweetheart, talk to me.” It was a soft-voiced command, meant to carry to her ears alone as Max returned to slide into his seat.

“I told Nikita.” She swallowed, realizing something too late. “I just hope she was the right person to tell.”

Sascha’s and Lucas’s phones both started beeping with the pack’s emergency code when they were two streets over from the HQ. Then the car phone started beeping.

“What the hell?” Lucas double-parked beside a bright magenta monstrosity that Sascha had been teasing him about buying.

“I’ll get mine,” Sascha was saying when she felt a telepathic knock on her mind. Firm, familiar.
Mother.
Her own telepathic reach was small, but Nikita’s was so wide, she’d hear Sascha’s weaker voice.

Thank you, Mother,
Sascha said, emotion a rock in her throat
, but the pack will take care of me. I promise.

Nikita’s mind dropped away, but Sascha didn’t take it for disapproval. Glancing at Lucas, she saw his green eyes had gone cat. “My mother just warned me I might be a target,” she said.

“I thought you were ’pathing to someone.” Starting up the car, he turned back the way they’d come, heading out of the city and toward their cabin. “Faith had a vision—that was your phone. Dorian cornered a sniper on his security rounds—that was my phone. And Clay got a call from Max before his own informants told him about another suspicious man in the apartment building facing the HQ—that was the car phone.”

Sascha blew out a breath. “Darling, you do realize that means the baby and I were never in any danger?”

Lucas squeezed the steering wheel as if he’d like to rip it off. “I’m not going to calm down for a while, so deal with it.”

Reaching out, she rubbed the back of her hand over his cheek. “Since we’re going home, I’ll have lots of privacy to pet you.” A nudge in her stomach, a thump in her heart. “And you can pet me back.”