"The man I feel sorry for is Martin Howard," Dahlia said. "He loved his brother. I saw it on his face. I think he might have let his brother kill him."
Nicolas pressed a kiss to her temple. Dahlia had been so close to Roman Howard that his heart had been in his throat. He hadn't dared to take his eye from the target, and there'd been no way to protect her from the raging violent energy that had surrounded her. He never wanted to feel that helpless again. "I wasn't going to let that happen," he said matter-of-factly, pushing away the memory of her convulsions and his fear of what kind of damage her physical response to violence might occur.
They walked through the enormous, intricately carved oak door into the entryway of the house. Dahlia found her mouth was dry. An older woman stood uncertainly, wringing her hands together and smiling, although she looked suspiciously close to tears. "Dahlia, this is Rosa. She's been a mother to me all these years and keeps the house running," Lily said.
Dahlia didn't recognize the woman at all, but the name stirred memories. Of a nurse named Rosa who always took care of Lily. Milly had stayed with Dahlia just as Rosa had opted to stay with Lily. "I'm so pleased to meet you," she murmured around the lump in her throat. She couldn't quite decide how she felt. Her emotions were welling up out of nowhere, struggling to be recognized, but it was the last thing Dahlia wanted. She was not going to set fire to Lily's house.
"It's good you've come back to us, Miss Dahlia," Rosa greeted.
The voice was in her head. She remembered it calling to Lily, pulling her away from Dahlia in the middle of the night. She remembered the pain in her head, nearly splitting it open, the shards of glass being driven into her skull. At once her temperature began to rise and the pressure in her chest increased. Dahlia halted. "Maybe this isn't such a good idea. It could be dangerous."
"This house belongs to all of us, Dahlia," Lily said firmly. "It's stood up to all of our various problems and it can stand up to yours. Won't it, Rosa?"
"Of course. Can I offer you anything to eat or drink?" Rosa asked.
Dahlia shook her head. If she tried to eat, she might get sick.
Lily seemed to know how she was feeling. They just wanted it over. She led Dahlia and Nicolas to the room that had been her father's office. The door was securely locked. "I don't let anyone come in here," Lily explained. "There are too many sensitive documents." She approached a tall, beautiful clock and opened the glass door.
"If this is too difficult, Lily," Dahlia began.
"No, I want you to see. It helps that there were several of us. We started together. I found you, and together, we'll find the others." The clock revealed a hidden door. It slid open and revealed another door in the floor itself.
Dahlia's heart was pounding out of control. For a moment she couldn't move. Lily started down the stairs, calling back to her. "I can help you shield yourself from the amounts of energy you draw, not all, but it should allow you to be in public, maybe go to a show once in a while or shop for clothes when people are in the store with you."
Nicolas reached for Dahlia's hand, pulled her tightly against him, ready to take her out of the house the instant she indicated it was too much for her.
With Nicolas touching her, Dahlia's emotions could be kept in check. "How? I've worked all my life to control it, Lily," she asked, wanting to believe, but not daring to. "All of you do seem to have such control." She didn't set a foot on the stairs, but watched Ryland follow his wife down.
"Everyone suffers headaches, and other physical repercussions when they use their talents, but you're the first energy magnet," Lily replied. "I didn't realize I'd been experimented on, and I thought my father had provided this house with its massive walls and soundproofing to protect me. Of course, he was protecting his experiments for the most part." She stopped on the bottom stair and looked back up at Dahlia.
"It must have been terrible for you to discover the truth," Dahlia sympathized. She felt physically ill at the thought of Lily finding the tapes of their terrible childhood. Nicolas had told her how Lily had gone looking for a way to help save the GhostWalkers and found the evidence of her father's betrayal. She felt physically ill at the thought of joining Lily in viewing those tapes.
"You don't have to do this," Nicolas reminded.
Dahlia took a deep breath. She did have to do this. Dr. Peter Whitney was the monster in her nightmares. She'd believed she might be crazy because she had such vivid impressions of this laboratory, yet she'd been told repeatedly it didn't exist. But most of all, she had to go see her past because Lily was grounded there. She wanted Lily in her life. She wanted to claim her as family. And she wanted to help Lily find the other women Whitney had experimented on. She couldn't bear to think they were out there somewhere in the world, alone, feeling as if they might be insane. It had started in the underground laboratory and she needed to confront it. She put her foot on the narrow, steep stair, and made her way down.
She stared at the one-way expanse of glass. At the door leading to the small dormitory rooms. Her hand went to her throat protectively. "It is real. I'm not crazy."
Lily wrapped her arms around Dahlia. "No, of course you're not crazy. I've got all the tapes of our childhood. I've got investigators looking for the other girls as well. I think I may have found one. We're not certain yet, but it's a possibility. I'll show you everything, Dahlia."
"Do you remember the other girls? I've been trying to remember them. Flame, with her red, red hair. She's very vivid in my memory."
"Iris," Lily confirmed. "And there was Tansy. She was very quiet and introverted."
"That's right." Relief was flooding through her. She did remember the other children. Girls, all of them with their own nurse. "There was the baby, Jonquille. She was so tiny. And Laurel. Who else?"
"Wasn't there a Rose? I remember her laughing."
Dahlia nodded. There wasn't much laughter in the laboratory. She should have remembered Rose. "I know there are others."
"We'll think of them together," Lily consoled. "We'll find all their tapes, and we'll find them."
They looked at one another and smiled in understanding. Lily held out her hand. Dahlia took it. "I'm so glad you've come. Ryland is wonderful. I love him so much, but I felt alone sometimes. You make that go away."
"That's exactly how I feel," Dahlia admitted. "Is this where Dr. Whitney brought Jesse and the others when he experimented on them?"
Lily nodded. "He didn't want Colonel Higgens to know about them. He suspected Higgens was trying to kill the GhostWalkers, and he wanted to make certain his experiment was carried on."
"Basically," Ryland said, "Dr. Whitney used my group as a decoy to keep Higgens from knowing about his other group. He worked here at this laboratory and the men used the tunnels to get in and out."
"So if you all died," Dahlia reached for Nicolas, "he'd still have someone to continue his research on." She bit back the rest of her thoughts when she saw Lily's face. "I'm sorry, I know you must have loved him."
Lily leaned against Ryland for comfort. "I think of him as two men. The monster who did all this to us, and to the men, and the man who was my father."
"Have you found his research on Calhoun and the others?" Nicolas asked.
Lily nodded. "A couple of days ago. I haven't gone over it, but once I do, I should be able to find all the problems and start working up a program for them." She turned to Dahlia. "Just as I will for you."
Dahlia looked up at Nicolas--her rock, her anchor. The man that had provided a life and now a family for her. She wrapped her arms around his neck, her first real spontaneous demonstration of affection in front of others. "Thank you. Thank you for giving me back my life."
He kissed her, uncaring that Ryland had a silly grin on his face and that Lily was looking too pleased with herself. "I love you, Dahlia Le Blanc. I always will."
Her black, haunting gaze drifted over his face. "It's a good thing, because I love you very much, Nicolas Trevane, and if you trifle with my feelings, you'r
e playing with fire. Literally."
Turn the page for a sneak look at
Christine Feehan's new Carpathian novel DARK SECRET
coming in February 2005 from Jove
PROLOGUE
"Come on, Colby," Ben Lassiter yelled, feeling like a fool running alongside the tractor. "You have to be reasonable. Get off that damn thing and listen to me for once in your life. You're being stubborn!"
The ancient tractor bounced along in the gathering dusk, shooting up clouds of powdery dirt to spray over Ben's immaculate sheriff's uniform. Colby waited until he was totally out of breath and at a complete disadvantage before she stopped the tractor and sat staring moodily out over the field. Very slowly she pulled off her leather work gloves. "I'm getting tired of these visits, Ben. Just whose side are you on, anyway? You know me. You knew my father. These people don't belong here and they certainly don't have the right to try to force me to turn over my brother and sister to them."
Ben swiped at the dirt covering him, gritting his teeth against his frustration. He took several deep breaths before he answered her. "I didn't say it was right, Colby, but they have money and power. You can't just ignore them. They aren't going to go away. You have to talk to them or they're going to take you to court. People like the De La Cruz brothers don't lose in court." He raised his hands to grasp her small waist before she could jump off the tractor by herself. Resisting the urge to shake some sense into her, he lifted her down easily, retaining possession for a moment. "You have to do this, Colby. I mean it, honey, I can't protect you from these people. Don't put it off any longer."
Colby pushed away from him, a small gesture of impatience, swinging her head so her disheveled hair spilled out from under her hat, hiding the sudden sheen of tears swimming in her eyes. Ben quickly looked away, pretending not to notice. Colby in tears was lethal either way. A man would kill for her if she cried, and anyone else witnessing her tears would very likely take the brunt of her anger.
"Fine," Colby began moving across the field at a fast pace. "I presume you have the entire lot of them camped on my porch?"
"I knew Ginny and Paul were gone tonight." Ben had ensured that his sister-in-law invited the two kids over for homemade ice cream.
"Like that was hard to see through," Colby tossed the words sarcastically over her shoulder at him. She had known Ben since kindergarten. She was certain he persisted in thinking of her as a wild, untamed little girl, not quite bright, when she was perfectly capable of running a ranch all by her little lonesome and had been doing so for some time. She wanted to box his thick skull for him.
"Colby, don't go in there like a powder keg. These people aren't the type to be pushed around." Ben easily kept pace with her.
"Pushed around?" She echoed his words, suddenly furious, stopping abruptly so that he had to rock back on his heels to keep from running her over. "They're trying to push me around. How dare they come here acting so arrogant I want to sic the dog on them! Men!" She glared at him. "And another thing, Ben. All my equipment keeps disappearing and some little gremlin is messing with the machinery. Instead of kissing up to Mr. Moneybags and his entourage, you might consider what is going on out here. That's your job, isn't it, not escorting the rich and infamous around." She began moving again, setting her usual fast pace, her small feminine body radiating fury.
"Colby, you and I both know it's a bunch of kids playing pranks. Probably friends of Paul," Ben tried to soothe her.
"Pranks? I don't think stealing is a prank. And what about my missing persons report? Have you even tried to find Pete for me?"
Ben raked a hand through his hair in sheer desperation. "Pete Jessup is probably off on a binge. For all you know that old man stole your things to pay for his alcohol."
Colby stopped again very abruptly, so that this time Ben did run into her and had to catch her shoulders to keep from knocking her flat. She slapped his hands away, a fine outrage smoldering in her. "Pete Jessup quit drinking when my father died, you turncoat! He's been invaluable around here."
"Colby," Ben tried to calm her down, his voice persuasive and gentle. "The truth is you took in that homeless old coot out of the goodness of your heart. I doubt he did more than eat your food every day. He's a broken-down cowboy, a drifter. He's just taken off somewhere. He'll turn up eventually."
"You would say that," she sniffed, truly aggravated with him. "It's just like you to let sneaky thieves and the disappearance of an old man go by the wayside so you can mix with some rich idiots who are here to try to steal my brother and sister."
"Colby, come on, they proved they're relatives and they claim they have the children's best interests at heart. The least you can do is listen to them."
"You probably agree with them, don't you? Paul and Ginny are not better off with that group. You don't know anything about it, or them. Paul would end up just like them, so arrogant no one could stand him, and poor little Ginny would grow up thinking she was a second-class citizen because she's female. They can all go straight to hell for all I care!"
Although it was early evening and still relatively light, the sky suddenly darkened as if a giant shadow were passing overhead. Black ominous clouds boiled up out of nowhere. A cold wind arrived on the wings of the dark mass, tugging sharply at Colby's body. A shiver of apprehension blew straight down her spine. For a moment something touched her mind. She felt it, felt the struggle for entrance. It was so real she stopped moving and Ben nearly tripped over her again.
"What is it?"
Colby could see Ben was clearly uneasy as he turned in a slow circle to scan the surrounding area. He had his hand on his gun, unsure what was stalking them or where the threat was coming from, but he obviously felt it as well.
Colby stayed very quiet, not moving a muscle, like a small fawn caught in a poacher's light. She immediately sensed she was in mortal danger. It wasn't hostile toward Ben, but she could feel the malevolence directed at her. Whatever it was struck directly at her mind, seeking entrance. She took a deep slow breath and let it out, forcing her mind to think only of a wall--high, impregnable, a fortress nothing could enter. She focused completely on the wall, keeping it strong, impenetrable.
The thing seemed to withdraw for a moment, puzzled perhaps by her strength, but then it struck again, a hard thrust, spear-like, that seemed to pierce her skull and drive right for her brain. Colby uttered a soft cry of pain and dropped to one knee, holding her head even while she forced herself to breathe calmly. Her mind was strong, invincible, a wall so thick and high no one would ever break it down. Whatever malevolent thing was after her would not be allowed to breach her defenses.
She became aware, after a few minutes, of Ben's large hand on her shoulder. He was bending over her solicitously. "Colby, what is it?"
Cautiously she lifted her head. The presence was gone, winging away from her, back toward the ranch house. "My head, Ben, I have the headache from hell." She did too; it wasn't a lie. She'd never experienced anything quite like the attack. She actually felt sick to her stomach, and she wasn't certain she could walk without her head falling off. Whatever it had been was strong and terrifying.
Ben took her elbow and helped her to her feet. She was trembling; he could feel the continuous shivering beneath his hand so he held on to her. Colby didn't pull away from him like she normally would have, and that worried him. "You want me to call an ambulance?"
Her emerald green eyes laughed at him even as they mirrored her pain. "Are you crazy? I have a headache, Ben. The mere thought of contact with the Chevez family gives me major headaches."
"Your brother and sister are both members of the Chevez family, Colby. You would have been, too, if the adoption had gone through."
Colby ducked her head, his words hitting her dead center in her heart. Armando Chevez had never adopted her. He had confessed his reasons on his deathbed, hanging his head in shame, tears swimming in his eyes while she held his hand. He had wanted his grandfather to relent, to accept him back into his famil
y. Armando had known that due to the circumstances of her birth, if he adopted her, his grandfather in Brazil would never allow him to come back to the family. It had been too late then to push the paperwork through. Armando Chevez was ashamed that he had betrayed her unconditional love for him in favor of a family who had never answered a dying man's letter. Colby had remained loyal and loving, nursing him, reading to him, comforting him right up until the day he died. And she still remained loyal to him. It didn't matter that he had died before the adoption; Armando Chevez wasn't her biological father, but he was her father all the same. In her heart, where it counted.
The way the Chevez family hated her had never mattered to her; she loved Armando with every fiber of her being. She loved him with the same fierceness with which she loved her brother and sister. As far as she was concerned, the Chevez family didn't deserve Armando and his children. And the two De La Cruz brothers, guardians and bullies for the Chevez family, could go straight back to whatever hell had spawned them. They were directly responsible for Armando's grandfather's bitter hatred of her. She wasn't good enough to be a member of the family. Neither was her beloved mother. Armando's grandfather pronounced she would never be accepted into their illustrious family and his reasons had been abundantly clear. Her mother had never married her father, there was no name on the birth certificate, and Armando's grandfather would never accept an Anglo bastard into his pure-blood family.
As they moved around the vegetable garden toward the ranch house, Colby slowed her pace, turning her mind inward for a moment to focus her strength of will on control. It was important to stay calm and relaxed and breathe naturally. She tilted her chin and walked with her head up to meet the all-powerful De La Cruz brothers and the Chevez family members who had come to steal her brother and sister and their ranch.
They were gathered together on her small porch. Juan and Julio Chevez resembled Armando so much Colby had to blink back unexpected burning tears. She had to remember this was the family who had so cruelly rejected her mother because she had given birth to Colby out of wedlock. This was the same family who had callously ignored her beloved stepfather's pleas and allowed him to die without so much as a word from them. Worst of all, they were here to take Paul and Ginny away and to confiscate the ranch, their father's last legacy.