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WARRIOR: THE TIME HUNTERS

A Berkley Sensation Book / published by arrangement with the author

PRINTING HISTORY
Berkley Sensation mass-market edition / July 2008

Excerpt from
Enforcer
by Angela Knight copyright Â© 2008 by Julie Woodcock.

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ISBN: 1-4406-3926-4

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July 10, 2008
The outskirts of Atlanta, Georgia

Galar Arvid hated time travel.

First came the electric tingle that built almost instantly to white-hot pain. Then the sickening wrench of the Jumpâthe nauseating feeling of being ripped apart and reassembled in the blink of an eye. His ears rang from the sonic boom of displacing air, but worse was the blinding blue-white light that left him unable to see for several crucial seconds.

Galar was moving well before his sight cleared, putting space between himself and the spot where he'd materialized. If the killer opened fire, he'd just as soon not be standing around waiting to get hit.

Any sign of temporal aliens?
he demanded.

Sensor implants throughout his body did their work, the results processed by the computer that wound throughout his brain in fine strands no thicker than a molecule. The comp gave him access to bursts of great strength, as well as sensor data, any information he cared to know, and an uncanny accuracy with weapons.
No indication of non-natives in the area,
it told him.

Good. Maybe they'd beaten the Jump thief to the scene.

His sight finally clearing of purple afterimages, Galar turned to look for his fellow Temporal Enforcers. He quickly spotted the two as they moved to safety through the dark, tree-ringed clearing. His comp relayed his snapped mental command over the TE communication channel as he strode toward them.
“Report!”

“I hate time travel,”
the timber wolf said. A hundred kilos of fur, fangs, and computerized intelligence, the big beast plunked his furry butt down on the leaves to scratch vigorously at his T-collar. Vocalizer lights flashed around his neck in time with the words.

“You hate everything, Frieka,”
Enforcer Riane Arvid put in.
“Except bitching.”

“That was
not
the report I had in mind,”
Galar said drily.

“Well, I seem to have all my paws,”
Frieka replied, contemplating them thoughtfully.
“And I don't want to yark up my dinner, which is a real improvement over some Jumps I've made.”
To Riane, he added,
“Did I ever tell you about the time your father and I . . . ?”

“Yes,”
Riane interrupted.
“At least six dozen times.”
She was a tall woman dressed in temporal armor that clung to her lean, muscled body. The T-suit's tiny matte navy scales rendered her all but invisible, as well as virtually invulnerable. Only her pretty face showed clearly to Galar's acute night vision: wide, dark eyes, a lushly sensual mouth, red hair falling around her shoulders, a single jeweled braid swinging beside her cheek. An intricate tattoo swirled down one side of her face in shades of red and blue. Like Galar, she was a genetically engineered Vardonese Warrior, complete with computer, sensors, and fantastic strength.

And, like Galar, she was well armed. A belt studded with weapons and pouches rode her narrow waist, including a shard pistol, several knives, restraints, a fist-sized courier 'bot, and other assorted gear. Temporal Enforcers had to be ready for anything.

The cyborg wolf peeled his lips back from his teeth, an intimidating display in a creature the approximate size of a pony.
“You, brat, are a smart-ass.”

“Better than being a dumbass,”
she shot back. Despite the acid words, genuine affection warmed the look the two exchanged.

“I hate to interrupt your customary banter,”
Galar growled.
“But we do have a potential murder victim to save. Frieka, patrol the perimeter and give the area a good sniff. I want to know if the Jump thief has been here.”
He looked through the stand of trees. Just beyond it, across a neatly trimmed square of yard, lay a long, narrow brick box of a house, looking deceptively peaceful in the moonlight.
“Riane, you take the rear of the victim's home, I'll take the front. Full camouflage. The natives don't need to know we're here.”

The smile faded from Riane's face, and she straightened, almost throwing Galar a salute before his cold gaze stopped her.

“You're not in the military now,”
he reminded her.
“Enforcers don't salute.”
Riane had been in Temporal Enforcement less than a year, after three years with the Vardonese Space Fleet. Old habits died hard.

She nodded jerkily, pivoted with a soldierly snap, and strode away. Galar's gaze lingered involuntarily on her swaying ass. To his relief, Riane chose that moment to activate her suit's camouflage field and disappear from view.

He glowered. The instinctive glance at her butt told him it was time to find a woman once this mission was over. It wouldn't, however, be Riane. He didn't get involved with those he worked with. Not emotionally, not sexually, not in any way at all. Ever. That lesson had been seared indelibly into his brain a decade before.

Galar turned away, gaze colliding with the wolf's reproachful ice-blue stare.
“She may be a little green, but she's a good kid, Master Enforcer,”
Frieka told him stiffly.
“You didn't have to bite a hunk out of her.”

“Yeah, she is a good kid. So good that if somebody gets killed because you two are busy dicking around, she'll never get over it. If I have to rip a strip off her to keep that from happening, I'll do it.”
He lifted a brow.
“By the way
â
didn't I just give you an order?”

The wolf flicked an ear and stalked off, hackles bristling with canine affront.

Galar watched him go.
Well, my reputation as a son of a bitch is secure
. He activated his own suit's camo field and headed for the house. Time to do a scan of its layout and find out what the hell was going on.

His computer pronounced the building an example of the twenty-first-century style called a “two-bedroom ranch.” It was constructed of the red brick favored by builders of the period, though its front door and shutters were white-painted wood. Filmy lace curtains hung over the windows.

Come morning, the police would find the house splattered with Jessica Kelly's blood. Yet there was no sign of that violence now. It seemed Galar's team had beaten the killer to the scene.

His neuronet computer confirmed that, its voice murmuring in his mind.
The house's residents are in good health.

Something moved inside the house, just beyond one curtain. Wary, alert, Galar moved closer. Through the window, he saw a woman standing at an easel, a paintbrush in her hand. Must be Jessica Kelly, the victim they'd come to save.

Affirmative,
his computer whispered in his mind.

Anybody else in the house?
Invisible, he stepped up to the window to watch as she worked.

Charlotte Holt, her roommate. Currently reading in her bedroom.

Is she a human of this era?

Affirmative. Sensors indicate no alien chemical traces present in her body
. Molecules of the foods and materials of the future couldn't be disguised.

A native, then. Galar grunted. Charlotte would disappear at the same time as Jessica, though none of her blood would be found. Police would never be sure whether she'd been the killer or another victim. Historians would argue the topic endlessly over the coming centuries.

He'd do his best to save Charlotte if she was a victim. If she was Jessica's killerâwell, he'd be able to do nothing at all, not even save the artist herself. His team was forbidden to interfere in crimes between temporal natives.

Brooding, Galar watched Jessica work. She was tall for a woman of the twenty-first century, leggy in her paint-stained jeans and T-shirt. Dark hair lay around her narrow shoulders, straight and thick and shining. Her eyes were a smoky, intense blue under angular dark brows, her features delicately rounded, her lips full, wide, red as rose petals. The sensuality of her face was matched by a lush body with curvy hips and breasts that looked like delectable handfuls.

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