She frowned. Alarms were ringing in the back of her mind, and she didn’t understand why. But it was a warning she’d long ago learned to heed. Flicking the sound off, she leaned back and snagged her bag off the coffee table, then dug around until she found Jack’s wristcom. The computer hummed as she attached the two. “Computer, download all files to link 1045.” She hesitated, and then added, “Send search results to outlink 1097b.”
“Proceeding, Earthling.”
Turning the sound up again, she glanced back at the gorilla. “What sort of message?”
“From your partner.”
She grimaced and rubbed her eyes. This wasn’t trouble, just a nutter. Either that or someone was playing a very cruel hoax. Someone like Suzy, maybe.
The computer hummed its readiness. She detached the wristcom and put it back in her handbag, which she tossed onto the nearby chair, out of the way. “My partner is dead. Leave before I call security.”
The white teeth flashed again. “The man you killed was not Jack. It was a replica—a means for the real Jack to officially disappear.”
The real Jack? The man was definitely a nutter. “You have three seconds before security arrives.”
Her finger hovered over the call button, but she didn’t press it. Because there was something about this man that almost made her believe him.
Either that or she was suffering from sleep deprivation.
His shrug was almost graceful. “Call them,” he said, “but not because of any threat you see in me. Call them because of the others.”
Others? What the hell was he? An alarm cut through the silence, strident enough to wake the dead. Someone had broken into her apartment. Her heart racing, she reached for her gun, only to remember that they’d confiscated it. And her spare was locked in the safe. She thrust up from the chair and ran like hell across the room.
“Safe open,” she hissed.
“Retina identification required.”
No time, her mind screamed, even as the bedroom door crashed open. She spun around, catching a brief glimpse of two men wearing black face masks, before a flash of white arrowed across the shadows. Her fear surged, and she threw herself sideways. Heat sizzled across her hip, and pain flared, short and sharp. She hit the floor with a grunt that turned into a yelp as another flash of light cut through the gloom, slicing through her shirt but missing skin. The wall inches from her shoulder peeled away and began to burn.
Lasers. The sons of bitches have lasers. She pushed to her knees and scrambled behind the sofa, though it wouldn’t offer much protection. Light flared again, and a two-inch hole appeared on her right. The carpet near her feet began to burn.
She had to get out of here before the bastards destroyed the apartment—and her. She shuffled backward, then twisted to look at the door. One of the men was standing there. It left her with only one option—the window.
She lunged to the left and grabbed her boots from the end of the sofa. Then, making sure the sofa still hid her, she half rose and flung the boots toward the kitchen. They clattered against the wall and dropped. Light flared again, spearing one boot as it fell to the floor. The smell of burnt leather stung the air. It was a smell that would be joined by burnt flesh if she didn’t get the hell out of here, pronto.
She scrambled upright and dove headfirst for the window. Heat seared the soles of her feet as she flew through the air, but in her desperation to escape, there wasn’t even pain, just a great surge of determination. Then the glass was shattering around her, glittering like diamonds even as it cut through her skin, and she was free-falling out into the rain-soaked night.
THE ACRID SMELL OF SMOKE stung the night air. Water sheeted across the pavement, flanked by the silvery-white fire hoses that snaked their way up the stairs and in through the main doors. The flashing red and blue lights of the emergency vehicles gave the small crowd of people huddled at the far end of the street an almost haunted look. Samantha Ryan was not among them.
But Gabriel would have been surprised if she had been. What did surprise him was the fact that she was here at all. Not many cops lived inside their patrol zone, and fewer still could afford an apartment in a place like Brighton. The old bayside suburb had once again become the playground for the trendy rich, and apartments like this, so close to the beach, cost more than Samantha Ryan would ever earn.
As Gabriel tried to enter the building, a young man dressed in the black uniform of the State Police stepped forward. “Sorry, sir. No one’s allowed inside.”
He stopped and impatiently dug his ID out of his pocket. “What happened, son?”
The officer’s eyes widened as he took in the badge.
“Bomb on the second floor, sir.”
His gut clenched. Ryan lived on the second floor. Sethanon had obviously made it here before him. He glanced around but didn’t see any ambulances. That could either be a good or a bad sign. “Anyone hurt?”
The officer shook his head. “Two apartments were seriously damaged, though.”
“Who’s in charge upstairs?”
“Captain Marsdan.”
Marsdan was the head of Samantha’s squad. Why would he be called down instead of the Internal Investigations Unit? Even suspended, she was still a cop whose apartment had just been bombed. That was IIU’s territory, not the beat police’s.
He nodded his thanks to the officer and made his way upstairs. Black uniforms were everywhere on the second floor. After flashing his badge at the officer manning the door, Gabriel stepped into the shattered remains of Samantha Ryan’s apartment. By the look of it, the front room had taken the brunt of the blast. The wreckage of what once must have been a coffee table and sofa lay partially embedded in the wall to his left. A few twisted metal shelves arched up the wall to his right, framing the hole that now led out into the corridor. The tangled remains of a desk and com-terminal sat in the far corner. What remained of the kitchen wasn’t worth salvaging.
But if someone had wanted this place truly destroyed, he hadn’t done a very thorough job. The damage was hefty, but the apartment itself was still in reasonable shape, and the furniture was replaceable. So why bother? It almost looked as if whoever had done this was trying to cover something up rather than actually destroy anything.
A balding man in his mid-forties stepped forward, suspicion evident in his small brown eyes. “Can I help you?”
Gabriel flashed his badge yet again. The suspicion in the captain’s eyes increased.
“Have you located Samantha Ryan?” Gabriel asked.
“Since when has the SIU gotten involved in a case as mundane as a bombing?”
“Since when have the beat police?” Gabriel deliberately put a derogatory edge on the term, wanting to evoke some sort of honest response from the man.
Anger darkened the captain’s face. “Since it was one of my damn officers who was hit. Got a problem with that?”
The man’s sudden fierceness surprised him. Such loyalty to the ranks was a rarity these days. “Actually, no.” He watched a young officer bend to examine a small hole in the floor, then switched his gaze back to the captain and repeated his question. “You found Ryan yet?”
“No. Security reports show she was home, but we’ve found no evidence of it yet.”
If she’d been here, they would have found bits of her by now. “Mind if I look around?”
As an SIU officer, he outranked the captain and had the right to go where he wanted. But he’d discovered very early on that politeness cost nothing and gained much.
“I want to know if you find anything.”
Gabriel nodded. Whether he would actually say something or not was another matter entirely. Stepping past the captain, he moved across to the small hole the young officer had been examining. Squatting, he ran a finger round the edges. The white marker next to it told him forensics had already checked the hole, so he didn’t have to worry about fouling evidence. The rim was glass-edge smooth. The hole wasn’t a result of the bomb blast, but more likely a la
ser. He frowned. Lasers were a rarity on the streets. Even the black marketeers had trouble getting hold of them.
The SIU had them. The defense forces had them. So, too, did a few more covert government departments. As far as he knew, Sethanon didn’t have them.
He rose and moved into the next room. This room, a bedroom, had been shielded from the main blast by the kitchen cooking units. It had more smoke and water damage than anything else. Sodden masses of boxes and clothes lay everywhere. Even the bed was laden down with junk. Samantha Ryan might live in the apartment, but she sure as hell didn’t sleep in this room. There wasn’t space enough for a gnat to move.
He was about to turn around when the window caught his attention. Why was it broken when the bomb had destroyed nothing else in this room, not even the infinitely more fragile lightbulb? He weaved his way through the waterlogged boxes. Broken glass had scattered over the layers of junk near the window. If the explosive force of the bomb had caused the break, it would have blown out, not in.
He placed his hands on the sill, and, carefully avoiding the sharp shards still embedded in the window frame, leaned out the window. No stairs, and no obvious way of getting to this window from the ground. He glanced up. Another two stories, then the roof.
He headed back to the main room. “Captain, have you assigned anyone to the roof yet?”
Marsdan looked up, sudden interest evident in his hawklike features. “No. Why?”
“Might be worth a look. I think someone broke in through the bedroom window before the blast.”
Two officers were immediately assigned. He started to follow, but a long slash across the wall under the living room window caught his eye. He walked across to examine it. Another laser wound—and one that looked to have been caused by firing at a moving target.
He rose and looked out the window. If she’d jumped out this window, then surely she would still have been lying down on the rain-washed pavement when the police arrived. No human could survive a fall like that, and she certainly wouldn’t have been well enough to get up and run.
Then again, Finley’s test results had indicated Samantha Ryan was definitely something more than human.
He watched the rain gust across the pavement below. The fact that the bomb had destroyed only one section of the apartment suggested it was meant to either cover the attack on Ryan or destroy something specific. Maybe even both. No matter what that something was, no matter whether the bomb succeeded in destroying its intended target, she would have had a backup. It would be in this apartment somewhere, and she would be back for it.
All he had to do was sit here and wait.
SAM RUBBED HER ARMS IN the vague hope that the friction might stop her shivering. She was soaked to the skin and so cold she was beginning to lose sensation in her feet, which was probably a good thing, considering the depths of the laser burns. She hadn’t worked up the courage to look too closely at the wounds, but a cursory glance had revealed a shocking amount of scorched skin and something that might even have been exposed bone.
She blew out a breath and leaned out of the shadows again. Across the street, her apartment building had slipped back into dark silence. The flashing blue and red lights had finally left. Also gone were the teenagers masquerading as State Police officers, and the solitary gray Ford with its government plates.
She still didn’t understand why the SIU had been called down here. Granted, she was under investigation, but the bombing of her apartment was IIU territory—not State and definitely not SIU.
Maybe she should have arrested those two prostitutes last night. Maybe then her life would have remained sane.
But it was far too late for regrets. All she could do now was try and figure out what the hell was going on. She studied her apartment building again. All that remained was the solitary blue light hovering near the front steps. It designated a crime scene and warned anyone entering the building not to go near said crime scene. Upstairs, near her apartment, there would be another one, along with a monitor that would activate the moment anyone tried to enter her rooms. If the SIU were involved in the investigation, she had no doubt there would be a nonhuman guard somewhere in the vicinity.
Getting around them all would be a problem. She could probably get past the first monitor using the State’s override code, but the monitors guarding the immediate crime scene usually had specific codes. The general override code wouldn’t work. While Jack might have managed to get past, she’d never had his aptitude for hot-wiring. But someone else did. Either that or someone from State had given the invaders her security codes. How else could they have gotten past the heat sensors near the windows? It was only thanks to the alarm she’d installed the day after Jack disappeared that she was alive right now.
A chill ran down her spine—a chill that had nothing to do with the cold and everything to do with fear. The stranger had said Jack was still alive. And Jack had all her old codes.
It didn’t make sense. Nothing that had happened in the last twenty-four hours made sense.
Including her surviving a two-story swan dive out the window and onto the pavement.
She was bruised and sore all over, and her feet burned something fierce from the laser wounds. But she had no serious injuries from the fall, and that was definitely a miracle.
However, it would take another damn miracle to get in and out of her apartment without being caught by the State and SIU watchdogs. And with her feet burned so badly, she couldn’t exactly run.
Sighing again, she wriggled her toes as the not-so-gentle rain briefly alleviated the pain of the burns. But sitting in the shadows of the building across from her own, getting wetter and colder by the minute, was achieving nothing.
She had to get into that apartment and retrieve her backup com-unit—if it had survived the blast. It should have, hidden and protected as it was by the mountains of junk in her bedroom.
But Jack knew about her backup system. If her partner was alive, and if he was behind the bomb, then that, too, would be gone. Though she had shifted its location since his disappearance, and the new alarm hadn’t allowed the invaders time to look around before they’d attacked.
At least she still had the comlink bracelet she’d stolen. And they’d been developed to survive just about anything—even a bomb blast. The files would be safe, as long as Marsdan and his juniors hadn’t found her bag—or, at least, bothered to look inside it. But to find out, she’d have to move. She grabbed the railing lining the steps for support and pulled herself upright. Fire leapt up her legs the minute she put any weight on her feet, and for a moment, she thought she was going to puke. Swallowing heavily, she tried to ignore the throbbing rush of pain and hobbled forward as quickly as she could.
Never before had the street seemed so wide. But after what felt like an eternity, she reached her building’s front steps and grasped the railing as fiercely as a drowning swimmer did a life buoy. Her breathing was little more than hungry pants of air, and her stomach heaved, leaving a bitter taste in the back of her mouth. Maybe her first port of call should have been a hospital, but the staff were required to report laser burns, and she’d have ended up in the hands of the State Police again.
Until she figured out just who was trying to kill her, she intended to trust no one but herself.
The churning in her stomach began to ease. After taking several more deep breaths, she resolutely hobbled up the front steps. The blue light hovering near the door became agitated, and a stern voice asked for her name and apartment number, adding the warning that she was about to enter a crime scene. As if she didn’t already know. She flipped open the monitor’s control box and punched in the State override code. The sharp voice stopped, and the globe ceased its whirling. Of course, when the State boys did a link with the unit to check who was coming in and out of the building, they’d know she—or at least someone with access to the codes—had entered. But hopefully, by then, she’d be long gone.
She edged inside the door and quickly scanned
the lobby. There was no one around. She limped across to the stairs and looked up. Everest had surely never seemed so high. She grabbed the handrail and began to haul herself up.
By the time she got to the first landing, the pain in her feet was so bad her legs were shaking and her head was spinning. She collapsed in a heap and stared at the remaining steps in despair. She was never going to make it the rest of the way. Not like this. Sweat dripped down her forehead, stinging her eyes. She wiped it away with the back of her hand, then groaned as her stomach rolled and rose. On hands and knees, she lurched toward the nearest planter. Luckily for the plant, she’d consumed little more than coffee over the last twenty-four hours.
Once she’d finished heaving, she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, closed her eyes and leaned back against the balustrade. God, she felt awful. And there was still another set of stairs to climb.
She was contemplating how she was going to manage it when the softest of sounds flowed across the silence—a resonance as soothing as the whisper of silk shimmying across a bed.
She opened her eyes and looked up. A man stood at the top of the stairs, staring down at her. The warm corridor light flared strangely across his back and shoulders, almost giving him the appearance of wings as it cast his features into shadows. A dark angel, she thought, and wondered briefly if death had come to collect her.
Nah. Hell was more likely to be her last resting place.
He moved, and the angel image fled. What remained was a tall man, with dark brown hair, dressed in a dark gray suit. The color of choice for those in the SIU.
She groaned again. She really wasn’t up to another tête-à-tête with the boys from the spook squad—if indeed he was one of them.
He walked down the steps, loose-limbed yet somehow graceful, then stopped near her feet and knelt down. He reached out but didn’t quite touch her right foot. She sucked in a gasp of air anyway. “Don’t—”
“I wasn’t,” he said, voice soft as he glanced up at her.
She knew those eyes. Would have recognized the odd, green-flecked hazel depths anywhere. This was the man who’d rescued her last night.