Murder Game
Page 48
His thumb slid along her wrists and he reluctantly let go of her arms. “Are you okay now? Let me look at your leg and see that we didn’t open that gash.”
She remembered the hurried exit from the other house the night before, although she’d been drowsy and suspected he’d put painkillers and something to make her sleep in the IV. Shockingly, her leg hurt less than her bruised hand. Whatever Nico had done had really helped.
“It’s fine.” She felt shaky, wanting him to hold her. “I think he was there.”
Kadan’s gaze jumped back to her face. “He? Who?”
She moistened her dry lips. “The puppet master. I think he found me.”
“It was a dream. Last night was very traumatic, Tansy. There was blood everywhere. It stands to reason you’d have a nightmare.”
She shook her head. “I think it was more than that. Please make certain my father’s all right. He was in my dream, drowning in blood, and I couldn’t save him.”
Kadan rubbed his chin along the top of her head. Rye. Check in with Tucker and Ian. I need to know her parents are safe. It stood to reason she’d have nightmares about her father; after all the revelations, how could she not?
“Rye’s calling now, honey.” He kissed her forehead and moved back to examine her hip. Her screams still echoed in his mind. He’d known more fear in the last twelve hours than he had since his childhood. “Tell me why you think the puppet master found you. Tell me about your dream.”
She did, in a hesitant voice. It occurred to him, as he watched her face, that she didn’t expect him to believe her. She must have had nightmares before her breakdown, very similar to what she was suffering now, and no one believed that the voices wouldn’t leave her head. She could still hear the victims and their killers long after the police had closed the case. He had to be very cautious in his reaction. Her fingers plucked nervously at the sheet, and that small telltale action tugged at his heartstrings.
“The last dream I had, for one moment I thought I heard his voice, but then it was gone and it was all part of the nightmare. This time I’m sure it was him.”
Kadan let out his breath, his mind turning the possibility over. “Can you do that? Talk to one of the killers in a dream?”
She shook her head. “No way. I get impressions, sometimes very strong ones, but it’s always of things they’ve done in the past, not present. The puppet master is a tracker and he can follow my impressions, but he shouldn’t be able to enter my dreams.”
Kadan frowned, trapping her injured hand beneath his. Her nervous plucking at the sheet was making him want to drag her into his arms and rock her. He needed to stay cool and think. “Have you heard of dreamwalking?”
Tansy sat up. When she did so, Kadan caught her waist and moved her up into a more comfortable position. She didn’t protest his help, although her leg didn’t hurt that much. She knew, on some level, that he needed to help her, to feel as if he was doing something for her. “I’ve heard rumors of the talent, but I don’t understand it and I certainly can’t do it.”
“One of the members of our team, Jeff Hollister, is a major talent when it comes to dreamwalking. It’s dangerous. If you’re killed in the dream, or caught there, you can’t get back to your body and it eventually dies. I think it’s a very rare talent, but then so is being an elite tracker. We have to face the fact that there’s every possibility that the puppet master is a dreamwalker. Nico can also dreamwalk, but he claims Jeff is far stronger.”
“How does it work?” Now she was even more frightened. Her fingers tangled with his and clung. “Can he get to me?”
“Maybe, but we’ve got Nico and I’ll get Jeff to come on board. He had a stroke some time back, but he’s recovered and has wanted to go on a mission. This might suit him.”
“I don’t understand.”
“They can protect you while you’re sleeping, maybe even kill him if we set it up right.”
“In the meantime, going to sleep isn’t a good idea?”
“Let me talk to Jeff and find out what he thinks. Do you need help getting up?”
She tugged at his hand as he stood. “Thank you for believing me. I could be wrong, but I don’t think I am.”
“I hope you are, baby, but I’d rather be prepared if you’re not.” He lifted her off the bed in one easy movement.
“What are you doing?”
“Carrying you to the bathroom so you don’t have to walk on that leg.”
“No you’re not. I’m fine. Really. I’ll get dressed and make breakfast, and then we’ll try to see what we can find out about the West Coast team. If we’re lucky, we can pick up impressions on how the game works and what the stakes are, along with identifying the killers.”
“Lily, Rye’s wife, and Flame, Gator’s wife, are researching the East Coast suspects. It shouldn’t be difficult to identify members of teams who took the psych test and served together. If they have a history, and they used those nicknames in the service, then even if they are out now, we’ll find them.”
“Put me down.” She wasn’t going in the bathroom with him.
Kadan set her down reluctantly, allowing her body to slide against his, hands skimming down her sides to hold her h*ps against him. He rested his forehead against hers. “Be sure, Tansy. I don’t want to find you on the floor.”
“I’m sure.” She was even more certain she needed a shower and actual clothes to face the other GhostWalkers after screaming her guts out. “Go make sure my father’s okay.”
“Don’t lock the door.”
“I have no doubt if I did and I fell, you’d have no problems breaking it down,” she said, teasing him.
Kadan wasn’t certain he was in the right frame of mind to be teased, but he managed a faint smile as she closed the door in his face.
“She all right?” Ryland greeted, snapping closed his cell phone as Kadan entered the room.
“Yes. I want to get in touch with Jeff. We may need him. How’s he doing?”
“He’s strengthened his right side, that was the damaged side, and he’s walking now. The right leg was unresponsive for a long time. He’s working out daily, sometimes too much. The tremors stopped in his hand and he’s no longer numb in his face. Lily thinks his right leg will always be a little weak, but his talents are stronger than ever. He’s had more time than any of us to practice, and Lily was particularly hard on him, working him as much as possible on exercises to keep him from seizing when he uses psychic ability.”
“If I needed him for dreamwalking, do you think he’s up to it?”
“I’ll double-check with Lily, but we’re not going to keep him on the sidelines much longer. You know Jeff, he’s a kamikaze, high IQ, needs a lot of stimulation. He’s thrown himself into his recovery, but he wants action.”
“Talk to Lily then. What did Tucker say?”
“Says all quiet, but if you’re worried, they can bring in Sam.”
Kadan frowned. “Not yet. Let’s see how things play out today. She’s going to try to lift impressions from a couple more pieces.”
“You’re not happy about it.”
“No, it’s dangerous. I might not be able to pull her back if the impressions are too strong. And we’ve got an enemy we can’t identify trying to track her. He knows who she is thanks to the news story. He’s smart, this guy. And he’s patient. He flies under the radar.”
“Is he working for Whitney?”
Kadan shook his head. “It doesn’t feel right to me, and Tansy picked up that he had worked for Whitney sometime in the past. She thinks there’s the possibility that he ran the psych testing for the candidates for the GhostWalker program. Can Lily access those files and get us names?”
“She’ll try. It’s much more difficult. We’re using a back door into Whitney’s computer as well as searching the computers he left behind, but most of those records were destroyed when the GhostWalker program was supposedly disbanded. No one wanted the news to get out that the government’s top scientist, still working for them, experimented on children that he bought and sold. We now know there were more girls than the ones he held at his home. This experiment has been ongoing for too many years, and you and I both know others had to have known about it.”
Kadan led the way to the kitchen. Nico had brought in groceries earlier, so there was coffee made. He set about making breakfast. Tansy wasn’t going to be standing on her leg, and she sure as hell wasn’t serving breakfast to everyone before she handled the game pieces. Ryland pitched in and helped him, and by the time the others came in, breakfast was ready.
Tansy came in, limping a little, very pale, her eyes taking up most of her face, but the fragrance of cinnamon and sin drifted through the air. She was barefoot, wore no makeup, and her mouth was devoid of lipstick. She wore a soft pair of sweats and a thin tank that hugged her br**sts, and Kadan thought she was the most beautiful, sexy woman he’d ever seen. He went to her immediately, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her against him, inhaling her scent while he dropped a kiss on her upturned mouth.
You smell great. He couldn’t say it out loud, not in front of everyone, and he couldn’t stop himself from running his finger down the length of her arm, taking in her soft skin. Aloud he said, “Your father is fine.”
She looked up at him and smiled. “Thanks.”
He craved that look in her eyes. Soft. Loving. Reserved only for him. His hands found her h*ps and slid upward, shaping her body. She didn’t even flinch as his palms caressed her tucked-in waist through the tank, found her narrow rib cage, and went up the sides of her br**sts. She wasn’t wearing a bra, and he resisted cupping the soft weight, but he couldn’t resist teasing her. No stripping you na**d on the kitchen table and having my way with you?
She nibbled on her lower lip, her gaze holding his boldly. You’ll probably have to wait on that one until we’re alone.
The way her eyes ran over him, touching on the bulge growing in the front of his jeans, had him grinning like a fool—and he rarely grinned.
“Sit the hell down,” Ryland growled. “The two of you are killing us.”
Kadan pulled out her chair for her, waiting for her to adjust her leg for comfort before sliding into the seat next to her.
“I appreciate all of you for what you did for me last night,” Tansy said. “I had no idea those men could find me, and I’m very ashamed of my father for the part he’s played putting your lives in jeopardy. Believe me, if I could find a way to repay you . . .”
“You have,” Ryland said gruffly.
“I have?”
Gator winked at her. “Yes, ma’am. That goofy look on Kadan’s face is worth all the bullets in the world.” He leaned across the table toward Kadan and sniffed. “And he sure does smell pretty now.”
Kadan hooked his foot around the leg of Gator’s chair and jerked, dumping him unceremoniously on the floor.
“Kadan’s family. That makes you family,” Nico said solemnly, as if nothing had happened. He didn’t even glance down at Gator, who sat on the floor, laughing.
“I see,” Tansy said.
Kadan dropped his hand beneath the table to her thigh. Does it hurt?
She shook her head. My hand hurts more.
He immediately took her hand and turned it over to examine the palm. “Take a look at this, Nico. When she took the gloves off, the ivory piece branded into her skin, although it’s not a burn. I tried opening her hand to get her to drop the thing, but not even using pressure points helped. I hit her hand on the table edge. Do you think it’s broken?”
She remembered the hurried exit from the other house the night before, although she’d been drowsy and suspected he’d put painkillers and something to make her sleep in the IV. Shockingly, her leg hurt less than her bruised hand. Whatever Nico had done had really helped.
“It’s fine.” She felt shaky, wanting him to hold her. “I think he was there.”
Kadan’s gaze jumped back to her face. “He? Who?”
She moistened her dry lips. “The puppet master. I think he found me.”
“It was a dream. Last night was very traumatic, Tansy. There was blood everywhere. It stands to reason you’d have a nightmare.”
She shook her head. “I think it was more than that. Please make certain my father’s all right. He was in my dream, drowning in blood, and I couldn’t save him.”
Kadan rubbed his chin along the top of her head. Rye. Check in with Tucker and Ian. I need to know her parents are safe. It stood to reason she’d have nightmares about her father; after all the revelations, how could she not?
“Rye’s calling now, honey.” He kissed her forehead and moved back to examine her hip. Her screams still echoed in his mind. He’d known more fear in the last twelve hours than he had since his childhood. “Tell me why you think the puppet master found you. Tell me about your dream.”
She did, in a hesitant voice. It occurred to him, as he watched her face, that she didn’t expect him to believe her. She must have had nightmares before her breakdown, very similar to what she was suffering now, and no one believed that the voices wouldn’t leave her head. She could still hear the victims and their killers long after the police had closed the case. He had to be very cautious in his reaction. Her fingers plucked nervously at the sheet, and that small telltale action tugged at his heartstrings.
“The last dream I had, for one moment I thought I heard his voice, but then it was gone and it was all part of the nightmare. This time I’m sure it was him.”
Kadan let out his breath, his mind turning the possibility over. “Can you do that? Talk to one of the killers in a dream?”
She shook her head. “No way. I get impressions, sometimes very strong ones, but it’s always of things they’ve done in the past, not present. The puppet master is a tracker and he can follow my impressions, but he shouldn’t be able to enter my dreams.”
Kadan frowned, trapping her injured hand beneath his. Her nervous plucking at the sheet was making him want to drag her into his arms and rock her. He needed to stay cool and think. “Have you heard of dreamwalking?”
Tansy sat up. When she did so, Kadan caught her waist and moved her up into a more comfortable position. She didn’t protest his help, although her leg didn’t hurt that much. She knew, on some level, that he needed to help her, to feel as if he was doing something for her. “I’ve heard rumors of the talent, but I don’t understand it and I certainly can’t do it.”
“One of the members of our team, Jeff Hollister, is a major talent when it comes to dreamwalking. It’s dangerous. If you’re killed in the dream, or caught there, you can’t get back to your body and it eventually dies. I think it’s a very rare talent, but then so is being an elite tracker. We have to face the fact that there’s every possibility that the puppet master is a dreamwalker. Nico can also dreamwalk, but he claims Jeff is far stronger.”
“How does it work?” Now she was even more frightened. Her fingers tangled with his and clung. “Can he get to me?”
“Maybe, but we’ve got Nico and I’ll get Jeff to come on board. He had a stroke some time back, but he’s recovered and has wanted to go on a mission. This might suit him.”
“I don’t understand.”
“They can protect you while you’re sleeping, maybe even kill him if we set it up right.”
“In the meantime, going to sleep isn’t a good idea?”
“Let me talk to Jeff and find out what he thinks. Do you need help getting up?”
She tugged at his hand as he stood. “Thank you for believing me. I could be wrong, but I don’t think I am.”
“I hope you are, baby, but I’d rather be prepared if you’re not.” He lifted her off the bed in one easy movement.
“What are you doing?”
“Carrying you to the bathroom so you don’t have to walk on that leg.”
“No you’re not. I’m fine. Really. I’ll get dressed and make breakfast, and then we’ll try to see what we can find out about the West Coast team. If we’re lucky, we can pick up impressions on how the game works and what the stakes are, along with identifying the killers.”
“Lily, Rye’s wife, and Flame, Gator’s wife, are researching the East Coast suspects. It shouldn’t be difficult to identify members of teams who took the psych test and served together. If they have a history, and they used those nicknames in the service, then even if they are out now, we’ll find them.”
“Put me down.” She wasn’t going in the bathroom with him.
Kadan set her down reluctantly, allowing her body to slide against his, hands skimming down her sides to hold her h*ps against him. He rested his forehead against hers. “Be sure, Tansy. I don’t want to find you on the floor.”
“I’m sure.” She was even more certain she needed a shower and actual clothes to face the other GhostWalkers after screaming her guts out. “Go make sure my father’s okay.”
“Don’t lock the door.”
“I have no doubt if I did and I fell, you’d have no problems breaking it down,” she said, teasing him.
Kadan wasn’t certain he was in the right frame of mind to be teased, but he managed a faint smile as she closed the door in his face.
“She all right?” Ryland greeted, snapping closed his cell phone as Kadan entered the room.
“Yes. I want to get in touch with Jeff. We may need him. How’s he doing?”
“He’s strengthened his right side, that was the damaged side, and he’s walking now. The right leg was unresponsive for a long time. He’s working out daily, sometimes too much. The tremors stopped in his hand and he’s no longer numb in his face. Lily thinks his right leg will always be a little weak, but his talents are stronger than ever. He’s had more time than any of us to practice, and Lily was particularly hard on him, working him as much as possible on exercises to keep him from seizing when he uses psychic ability.”
“If I needed him for dreamwalking, do you think he’s up to it?”
“I’ll double-check with Lily, but we’re not going to keep him on the sidelines much longer. You know Jeff, he’s a kamikaze, high IQ, needs a lot of stimulation. He’s thrown himself into his recovery, but he wants action.”
“Talk to Lily then. What did Tucker say?”
“Says all quiet, but if you’re worried, they can bring in Sam.”
Kadan frowned. “Not yet. Let’s see how things play out today. She’s going to try to lift impressions from a couple more pieces.”
“You’re not happy about it.”
“No, it’s dangerous. I might not be able to pull her back if the impressions are too strong. And we’ve got an enemy we can’t identify trying to track her. He knows who she is thanks to the news story. He’s smart, this guy. And he’s patient. He flies under the radar.”
“Is he working for Whitney?”
Kadan shook his head. “It doesn’t feel right to me, and Tansy picked up that he had worked for Whitney sometime in the past. She thinks there’s the possibility that he ran the psych testing for the candidates for the GhostWalker program. Can Lily access those files and get us names?”
“She’ll try. It’s much more difficult. We’re using a back door into Whitney’s computer as well as searching the computers he left behind, but most of those records were destroyed when the GhostWalker program was supposedly disbanded. No one wanted the news to get out that the government’s top scientist, still working for them, experimented on children that he bought and sold. We now know there were more girls than the ones he held at his home. This experiment has been ongoing for too many years, and you and I both know others had to have known about it.”
Kadan led the way to the kitchen. Nico had brought in groceries earlier, so there was coffee made. He set about making breakfast. Tansy wasn’t going to be standing on her leg, and she sure as hell wasn’t serving breakfast to everyone before she handled the game pieces. Ryland pitched in and helped him, and by the time the others came in, breakfast was ready.
Tansy came in, limping a little, very pale, her eyes taking up most of her face, but the fragrance of cinnamon and sin drifted through the air. She was barefoot, wore no makeup, and her mouth was devoid of lipstick. She wore a soft pair of sweats and a thin tank that hugged her br**sts, and Kadan thought she was the most beautiful, sexy woman he’d ever seen. He went to her immediately, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her against him, inhaling her scent while he dropped a kiss on her upturned mouth.
You smell great. He couldn’t say it out loud, not in front of everyone, and he couldn’t stop himself from running his finger down the length of her arm, taking in her soft skin. Aloud he said, “Your father is fine.”
She looked up at him and smiled. “Thanks.”
He craved that look in her eyes. Soft. Loving. Reserved only for him. His hands found her h*ps and slid upward, shaping her body. She didn’t even flinch as his palms caressed her tucked-in waist through the tank, found her narrow rib cage, and went up the sides of her br**sts. She wasn’t wearing a bra, and he resisted cupping the soft weight, but he couldn’t resist teasing her. No stripping you na**d on the kitchen table and having my way with you?
She nibbled on her lower lip, her gaze holding his boldly. You’ll probably have to wait on that one until we’re alone.
The way her eyes ran over him, touching on the bulge growing in the front of his jeans, had him grinning like a fool—and he rarely grinned.
“Sit the hell down,” Ryland growled. “The two of you are killing us.”
Kadan pulled out her chair for her, waiting for her to adjust her leg for comfort before sliding into the seat next to her.
“I appreciate all of you for what you did for me last night,” Tansy said. “I had no idea those men could find me, and I’m very ashamed of my father for the part he’s played putting your lives in jeopardy. Believe me, if I could find a way to repay you . . .”
“You have,” Ryland said gruffly.
“I have?”
Gator winked at her. “Yes, ma’am. That goofy look on Kadan’s face is worth all the bullets in the world.” He leaned across the table toward Kadan and sniffed. “And he sure does smell pretty now.”
Kadan hooked his foot around the leg of Gator’s chair and jerked, dumping him unceremoniously on the floor.
“Kadan’s family. That makes you family,” Nico said solemnly, as if nothing had happened. He didn’t even glance down at Gator, who sat on the floor, laughing.
“I see,” Tansy said.
Kadan dropped his hand beneath the table to her thigh. Does it hurt?
She shook her head. My hand hurts more.
He immediately took her hand and turned it over to examine the palm. “Take a look at this, Nico. When she took the gloves off, the ivory piece branded into her skin, although it’s not a burn. I tried opening her hand to get her to drop the thing, but not even using pressure points helped. I hit her hand on the table edge. Do you think it’s broken?”
