Predatory Game

  Saber avoided Jess's outstretched arm and pushed past Logan to gain entrance to her room. Horrified, she stared around her. Bile rose, but she pushed it down. To have someone invade her room was such a violation, but to do this...the room stank as if the occupants had had an orgy. Her clothes were slashed to ribbons and every scrap of underwear was thrown around the room, most containing sickening white blobs. The bed had been neatly made, but one of the cleaners had pulled back the covers to find more underwear coated in semen.

  Saber pressed her hand to her mouth, shocked to realize she was trembling. She could feel the sympathy in the room, and was grateful the men didn't look at her. She turned abruptly and stalked out.

  "Logan," Jess began.

  "We're on it. He left enough DNA here to identify an army. This is a sick bastard, Jess, and she's not safe. If this one is connected in any way to Whitney, he's gone rogue at this point. Whitney would never condone this. He's too...scientific. This would be abhorrent to him."

  "Funny where people draw their lines. Sometimes I wonder what the world is coming to." He paused and looked around at the cleaning crew. "I want this room stripped of anything he may have touched. Separate her fingerprints so nothing goes out but his. I don't want a flag raised on some remote computer Whitney might be monitoring."

  Logan nodded toward the crew and walked down the hall beside Jess. "Whitney knows she's here, Jess. I can smell him. She's in trouble."

  "Yeah. I got that."

  "And she's gearing up to run. He's too close to her this time, he'll nab her."

  "I'm hearing a note in your voice I don't like, so don't beat around the bush, spit it out."

  "Unless he planted her."

  Jess thrust on the wheels and took himself into the lift. Logan crammed his body in as well. The doors slid shut and Jess rubbed his temples. "He didn't plant her."

  "Then how did she manage to find you? You're the one GhostWalker conducting an investigation into our chain of command. Tell me how she ended up on your doorstep. When you couldn't find a background on her I told you she was another Chaleen. They're coming after you because you're a good guy, and that makes you vulnerable. You think the best of people, especially women."

  "I didn't think at all around Chaleen, at least not with my brain. They studied me and sent someone programmed to be whatever I wanted. You saw it because you weren't sleeping with her." The doors opened and Jess waited for Logan to step out before he shot out of the small space in a fit of temper. "It was stupid, I'll admit that, but I caught on soon enough."

  "She broke your heart."

  "She didn't have my heart. She smashed my ego, but my heart was never touched. Saber, on the other hand, definitely could rip the thing right out of my body, so she damned well better not be Whitney's spy."

  "Could you kill her?" Logan's voice was low, mild even, but his gaze was cool and steady. "If you had to, to defend yourself, could you kill her?"

  Jess remained silent.

  "For a moment there, in the club, when she realized she was surrounded by your team, I saw her look at you, Jess. She thought about taking you out right then and there."

  Jess swallowed his first response--denial. Hell yeah, she'd thought about it. He wasn't certain how she thought she might get away with it, but she'd thought about it. "I know she did," he admitted. "And she had every right to. Because, if she betrayed me, I'd want to strangle her with my own two hands."

  A heartbeat went by. A second one. Logan sighed. "You didn't answer me, Jess. Wanting isn't the same thing. I'm not going to let her kill you. If she makes a wrong move..."

  Jess shook his head. "I'm not suicidal, Logan. I never have been. I lost my legs, not my mind. I'm better off than most, everything else is in working order. And I'm making some progress with the other thing, enough to think there's hope. But if she turns out to be Whitney's, I don't know if I'd know how to face that, or if I could let you take her out. I just don't know. And it's fucked up to be talking about this like she's not going through enough as it is."

  Logan shrugged and walked away, leaving Jess wanting to hit something. In the end, Jess went to find Saber. She wasn't in the kitchen or his bedroom. He knew she wouldn't be out in the open. She didn't feel safe. In his home--in her own home--she didn't feel safe. He wanted to yell at someone, hit something. Preferably Logan. Because Logan was right and he was wrong. And damn it all, that sucked.

  He knocked on the bathroom door. "Come out of there. I want to take another look at that bruise on your face."

  There was a small silence. "I'm fine, Jesse," she finally answered. "I just need a minute alone."

  "You've had your minute."

  She pushed the door open and glared at him. "I'm the victim here, dragon king, so get over being angry."

  "I'm angry because a GhostWalker found me in my own home, lived here, and I didn't even suspect for months. I usually spot a GhostWalker within seconds of meeting one. Sometimes even before."

  "Because of the energy."

  "Exactly. There's a feel to it."

  "Well. Then I get to be angry too, because I didn't know about you. How'd you figure it out?"

  "You slipped up and spoke telepathically."

  She put her hands on her hips. "I did not. I don't make mistakes like that." She'd been making mistakes ever since she'd met Jess. She'd never felt such a physical attraction to a man, and then, as time went by, such an emotional attachment. Jess was easy to love. And God help her, she was in love with him.

  "You did."

  She bit at her lower lip, tapping her foot with her restless energy. "Why didn't you say anything?"

  "For the same reason you didn't say anything."

  "All right. I can accept that," Saber conceded.

  Jess sighed. "You know this can't be coincidence that you're here, Saber."

  She closed her eyes briefly. She'd known the conversation was going to circle back to Whitney. "How many lives do you suppose Whitney has ruined in his quest for the perfect soldier?"

  "Too many. So you know this wasn't some mystic coincidence," Jess said. "He must have known you take announcing jobs at small, local radio stations." His throat squeezed tight and his chest hurt as he realized the full implications of where he was going with it. And he had to be right. "He orchestrated that accident. He killed three of my workers to create an opening for you."

  "Patsy's fiance." Saber sank down onto the floor and stared up at him in dismay. "He killed Patsy's fiance in order to put us in the same place at the same time. How could he know you would take me in?"

  "How much do you know about his experiments?"

  "In our labs, quite a bit, but other places, not much. I know he trained soldiers, that that was his ultimate goal. He did a tremendous amount of psychic research, and he seemed to be very accurate with his placement."

  "We're fairly certain he has some psychic ability. How else would he know which infants to choose, which children? Not by looking. He has to do it by touch. He has a breeding program, Saber. When he does his experiments, he strengthens the pheromones in his couples to match them."

  "You're saying I'm attracted to you because of something Whitney did?" The thought of that sickened her. For once in her life she had found something that was free and clear of Whitney and the endless tests and observations. Someone good and decent.

  "There's evidence that he does that, yes. In our case, we can't know for certain, but it would make sense. He would plan to throw us together and let his work do the rest."

  She pressed her fingertips to her eyes, calling on every bit of discipline that had been drilled into her to keep from screaming and throwing things. Even this. Even her love for Jess Calhoun hadn't been free will.

  She caught movement and lifted her head as Logan came up behind Jess. "I can't take all of this in. I think Logan wants to talk to you." For once she was grateful for the interruption, because she was not going to have an emotional breakdown in front of anyone. "I need to just go somewhere quiet and t
hink about this."

  "Saber..." Jess waited until she looked at him. "Whatever he did doesn't matter. I love you for who you are, not for how my body reacts to yours. And he can't make love happen. Remember that, will you, when you're thinking? I'll be in my office."

  She couldn't talk with tears flooding her eyes and choking her throat so she turned and went back to the only sanctuary left to her--Jess's bathroom.

  Damn. Damn. Damn. He had to follow. Had to run them off the road, keep the two idiots from being interrogated before they gave his description. He wanted to scream and spray all of them with an Uzi. Take them out. Screw them. Screw Whitney. They had no right to interfere in his plans.

  CHAPTER 10

  Saber stood very still in the middle of the bathroom, her body trembling. The room was large, with cooling tiles and wide, open doorways. Jess could roll his chair into the shower. The Jacuzzi tub was huge and she thought about sitting in it and letting herself cry. Maybe she'd brought this on herself with her voice. She'd deliberately used her voice, tried to summon her watcher from the shadows, and maybe she'd succeeded.

  She paced for a while and then tried sitting. Eventually the cleaners left along with most of the GhostWalkers. Only Logan remained, and he went into the office to talk to Jess. They left the door slightly open. She was fairly certain Jess wanted to catch her before she went upstairs, but she had no intention of going up. She couldn't stay in that room. Instead, she crept past the office and into the kitchen.

  The room smelled comforting and spicy. The scent made her feel a little better. She made a cup of tea, but couldn't sit still, shaken and uneasy that someone had managed to get into the house, so close to her--to Jess. The clothes weren't the only thing slashed to ribbons. She'd spotted the picture of Jess she had on her bedside table, glass shattered, frame smashed, and the photograph ripped up.

  A prickle of awareness slid beneath her skin, into her mind. She took a breath and let it out. Someone was watching the house. Was it the GhostWalker team? Were they keeping tabs on her? Protecting Jess? She stayed quiet, stilling her mind, trying to feel friend or foe.

  The unease that would not quiet gave her the answer: that was no friendly out there that she was picking up. She hurried up the stairs, keeping her steps quiet. If she was lucky Jess would think she'd fallen asleep and he'd work with Logan for a while. The GhostWalkers had more than likely interrogated the prisoners and they'd be feeding information to Jess in the office. That should buy her the time she needed.

  In her bathroom, Saber scrubbed her face clean, removing the faint lines along her eyes and around her mouth. Adding color to her skin tone aged her by a couple of years, nothing dramatic, and the eye makeup took away the lost waif look she always had without it. She looked at herself in the mirror and her heart squeezed down hard, her lips trembling as the picture blurred into memories she didn't want to ever think about.

  Such a beautiful child, he had said, his hand stroking her cheek while she'd looked up at him. Such a beautiful child and so lethal, so deadly, one of my greatest achievements. Just sit there and play the game with little Thorn. Wrap your hand around her ankle and feel her pulse. There's a girl. You feel it don't you? Her heart, tapping away, that steady rhythm. Just like the puppy. Keep your touch light. In order to win, they can't know you are there.

  But the puppy died. I didn't mean it. It was an accident. Tears welled up before she could stop them.

  At once he frowned, looking severe. What did I tell you about crying? Do you want to go back into the dark? In the ground where bad girls belong?

  She struggled to hold back the tears, shaking her head, suddenly very afraid. She reached for Thorn's ankle. The little girl was sound asleep, her hair sweeping across the pillow, so white it looked like silk from a corncob. She was only about three, and at eight, Saber felt very motherly toward her. Her own heart beat too fast in anticipation. She had to be careful, keep Thorn from any danger. Stay in control. The doctor wanted her to show control. She moistened her lips and absorbed the rhythm of Thorn's body into her own.

  Saber forced her body to relax, to simply take in the sound and feel of that small little heart. She kept her touch light, so light Thorn wouldn't wake up. The thump was so tiny but strong. She knew the exact pathways in Thorn's body, the veins and arteries and neural pathways, every line that fed or was fed by that single organ.

  She breathed for both of them, air rushing in and out of their lungs. For a moment she experienced a strange euphoria, as if they were both the same person, one in the same skin, heart and minds totally in tune. And then she introduced the small irregular beat. A thud. Wait. Another thud.

  Thorn stirred, pain rippling across her face. Her eyes fluttered open and she looked directly into Saber's eyes. Knowledge was there. Understanding. Thorn had always been so intelligent, far beyond what Whitney ever guessed--or maybe he did--and maybe he was afraid of her.

  Saber tore her hand from Thorn's ankle. "I did it. And I didn't mess up this time." She kept her voice triumphant, with no hint of defiance. But she wasn't touching Thorn again. There would be no second experiment because she was beginning to suspect the doctor would have been happy if she'd killed Thorn. He'd been happy when the puppy had died. She'd seen that in his eyes even when he looked at her sternly.

  There was a long silence. She kept her head bowed. Finally he dropped his hand on top of her head. "Good job, Winter. You're a very good girl."

  Saber blinked to bring her face in the mirror back in focus. She was now white and ravaged from the memory. Thorn. She hadn't let herself think about Thorn or her sacrifices for years, but if there was one girl, one woman, who could outsmart Whitney, it was Thorn. "Be alive," she said aloud. "Stay alive."

  She stared at herself, looking for flaws. Her face was smooth and unlined, beautiful soft skin and very large eyes. She looked so young with her too-slim body and her little girl face. No one would ever suspect her of anything deadly. She straightened her shoulders and firmed her mouth. She had skills and she would use them to protect Jess. Whoever wanted him dead was going to have to contend with her. If it was Whitney, well, she'd always suspected he'd find her someday, and she wasn't about to allow him to hurt or kill Jess. If it was some nutcase fixated on her voice, she was going to remove the threat to Jess once and for all.

  Pushing aside the dresser, she crouched low to remove the small grill from the wall. The pipe curved back and she had to reach deep to pull her field kit out. Opening the leather case, she surveyed her options. As she studied the various choices, she sleeked back her hair using a stiff gel and then pulled a skull cap tight over it. She stripped with quick efficiency and dragged on a bodysuit so thin and tight it seemed a second skin. The suit acted as a sealant, keeping cells from being left behind when she took out a target. Her clothes were next, very nondescript, something a teen might wear. She pulled jeans and a T-shirt over the suit.

  She took no weapons, but she coated her hands with a solution to fill in all the lines of her palms and fingers, making them perfectly smooth, so she left behind no prints or cells, but could still make skin-to-skin contact. It was a miracle invention, one of Whitney's finest, and yet he hadn't turned it over to the government. The only covert use for it seemed to be his own. Originally she'd stolen several bottles with the idea that she might send it anonymously to a research center, hoping they'd duplicate it, but it was impossible to know which facilities he was associated with.

  Saber wasn't an anchor, so death, particularly a brutal one, had debilitating repercussions on her. She couldn't afford to pass out on the job, so she added a small vial of liquid to her armament. If she killed again tonight, she'd just have to take the drug and hope it held until she could be alone somewhere safe.

  She had to get through Jess's security to the outside without him becoming aware that she was gone. He was in his office with his friend Logan, looking at something he didn't want her to see. She'd have to spot his GhostWalkers, the ones she was certain were out there, g
uarding the house and Jess. They couldn't see her leaving or returning.

  She pushed open the attic door and leapt, catching the frame and swinging up. She carefully closed the door behind her, making certain it sat perfectly so it appeared undisturbed. She'd tested this route a hundred times, so she could make her way in the dark through the space to the dormer where the ventilation grill was. She followed the heating duct, avoiding a misstep as well as insulation, keeping herself as light as possible as she counted the steps to the small opening.

  The louvered air vent was a twelve-inch square. She had already prepared the grill, just in case, loosening all the screws with the exception of one. She had her emergency pack stashed there along with her tools. Quickly she took out the last tight screw and simply waited there in the dark, holding the louvers while she felt the night.

  There was someone on the roof. Not the enemy--at least not Jess's enemy. Ken Norton lay up there with a rifle in his hands. Mari had to be close. Again, Saber ignored the oppressive darkness and the way it made her feel until she found Mari's position. There was no sound or movement, neither GhostWalker gave themselves away; instead it was more of a leap in the energy, as if power was alive and lay on the rooftop.

  The dormer was difficult to see from the roof itself, and neither GhostWalker had any reason to be looking as long as she moved at a snail's pace and didn't draw their attention. Saber carefully pulled the grill inside, taking care not to scrape it against the frame. Now came the tricky part. She had to slip through the small space to the outside without getting caught.

  Movement always drew the eye and GhostWalkers had an unerring sixth sense. With excruciating patience, Saber slipped out of the attic into the open air. When she was dangling just a foot above the steeper roofline, she reached in with one hand and pulled the louvers back in position. Only a very sharp eye would spot that the air vent was slightly crooked. She let go and dropped into a crouch, her small feet making no noise as she landed.