Illicit Intuitions: Sensory Ops, Book 3 (22 page)

H gritted his teeth. Unblinking, enraged, he coalesced a chunk of the absorbed energy into a gelatinous ball. He locked his gaze with Janus’s evil black one and called on the memory of every vile emotion the man had ever pumped into him.
 

“My name is Dr. H.”
 

“Tell me where the lenses are hidden, Hermes.” Once he’d realized how much being called Hermes hurt, Janus had always delighted in using it. Eventually H had learned to block it. “Or I’ll get your sister next.”

“They. Aren’t. Hidden.” Speaking in curt, one-word sentences for emphasis he knew would irritate Janus, he gathered and built the rolling and rumbling darkness. “You. Will. Never. Defeat. Me.”
 

With a forceful shove from his mind, he turned the greedy shadows back on their creator.

He wasn’t sure how well it had worked the first time, but at best he hoped to knock Janus back a few steps. To make him rethink his intentions.

Janus grasped at his throat. Gasping. Desperate for air, he fell to his knees and half-crawled to the door where he knocked weakly. His gaze swung back as he knocked a second time.

H tilted his head and watched the fear swirl in Janus’s blank gaze. The power had shifted. The sting of his lie and regret for causing another human pain vanished beneath triumph. Years of overwhelming oppression were vindicated.
 

The door opened. Elise stepped inside. Her gaze flew from Janus to H before she swooped down and dragged Janus from the room.

Whitestone had infiltrated his study. His lab. Though their tactics didn’t surprise him, his failure to read Elise did.
 

He’d been too distracted by Ava from the first moment to catch the subtleties he should have seen. When he’d started questioning the possibilities, he’d jumped to believing the first answers offered. And he hadn’t gone back to considering the source once Ava denied the claims.
 

The door lock clicked.
 

He’d screwed up and endangered Dana. It wouldn’t happen again.

H stood—as best he could while tied to a chair—and worked his way to the counter. A distance which normally would’ve taken five seconds to cross took closer to five minutes.
 

With the chair on the floor, facing the cabinets, he pulled his right knee up and lifted his leg onto the counter. His toes didn’t quite reach the knife block. He scooted down into the seat trying again. He moved his foot closer to the knife handles.
 

It took several tries of wiggling his toes and readjusting to start again to get a good grip on a handle. His leg muscles trembled with fatigue. His right ass cheek stung. He fumbled the grip a few times before getting the narrow handle firmly between his big and second toes.
 

Slowly, so as not to drop the knife, he lowered his leg to the floor and scooted up in the chair. The sharp edge of the blade dug into the bottom of his foot, reminding him to watch the pressure. After giving the quivering muscles in his hip and outer thigh a brief rest, he spread his legs so he mostly straddled the chair. He slid his right leg along the side of the chair, ignored the cramp gripping the bottom of his foot insisting he release the knife and eased his foot backward.
 

Pressing his shoulder blades against the slatted wood of the chair, he arched his hips out and leaned to the left. The lower right side of his back pinched. The thigh muscles extending into his glutes spasmed in protest at the unfamiliar angle.
 

He wouldn’t stop.

When Janus recovered, he would be pissed he’d been bested—however temporarily. He would come for revenge and he wouldn’t come unarmed. The only surprise would be his weapon of choice and whether his torture would be emotional or physical.

Biting down, H angled himself forward until his arms dug into the chair while he simultaneously raised his foot. His toes shook from the effort of holding the knife handle. His arch burned.
 

He sank as deep as possible into the chair, lowering his hands until the cool tip of the blade brushed his fingers. Cautious not to cut himself, he stretched his leg farther back. Sweat popped out on his forehead and dripped into his eyes. The front of his thigh joined the screeching chorus of agony.
 

Bending as far backward as he could with a chair stopping him, he managed to guide the blade up between his wrists and grab the handle with his hands. Finally. His leg flopped back to the floor. A bruise on the top of his foot slammed into the front chair rail.
 

Fire coursed through the fibers and sinew protesting his contortions, making him wonder if he’d be able to walk when he finally got free. He would. Sticking around for more of Janus’s games wasn’t an option. Checking the clock, he noticed nearly thirty minutes had passed.
 

Verifying his remaining time, he dropped his shields and scanned the boat’s inhabitants.
 

Awe.

Anger.
 

Aggression.

Acceptance.

Janus and his crew had varying depths of dedication and feeling about their jobs—some stronger than others, but none closed in.
 

Releasing a pent-up breath he hadn’t noticed himself holding, H worked the blade up and down against the bindings. It was a dull blade, as he wasn’t making quick progress.

Continuing to work on the rope, he sent his mind in search of Ava. He couldn’t make a connection, but she felt… Close. Oddly muffled, like she was submerged.
 

The ropes gave a little. He continued the sawing action and tried again to connect to Ava. Nothing. No fear. No pain.
 

She was blocking him. Or the earlier connection had been due to her attempting a connection. Or her connection to Dana had boosted her power. Or she was no longer able to make connections.
 

The last option curdled in his gut.
 

Unable to locate her, he sent his mind in search of Dana. Out of respect for privacy and the need to build themselves up, they hadn’t formed a mind connection since gaining their freedom. He wasn’t convinced this would work. Dipping his head, he concentrated on the feel of Dana and their twin bond.
 

Insecurity and worry and love greeted him like an open-armed welcome when he found her. Smiling, he sought to reassure her. To offer her at least a glimmer of hope that he would be back with her soon.
 

Her relief swept over him, followed by a flurry of alarm and distress and vengeance. More people had boarded the boat broadcasting bold impressions of determination.
 

Too many emotions penetrated his mind too quickly, but he needed to stay aware. He needed to know who was approaching. Or at least have an idea of their intentions. He severed the link to Dana and raised a few of his barriers.
 

The knife slipped through the last fibers of the rope. He held tight to the handle and, rotating stiff shoulders, moved to the door.
 

Damn. A double-sided lock. He stepped back and lifted his left leg, ready to attempt kicking the door in. His right leg trembled, weakened from recovering the knife. It wouldn’t support him, and he didn’t have the strength in it to use it for kicking.
 

Grinning, he rotated the wrist of the hand holding the knife. Lowering to his right knee, he positioned the knife tip just behind the strike plate. Gripping the handle with his left hand, he used the palm of his right hand to plunge the blade into the wall.

Shouts and sounds of fighting above deck grew louder. He jiggled the blade back and forth until the lock bolt gave way and the door popped open. He stepped into a narrow hallway. A shaft of light shone down a short stairway several feet away.

“Agent Malia, your reputation precedes you.” Elise’s spiteful sneer reached him from outside the door at the top of the stairs. “But you should have stayed away.”
 

“And miss kicking your ass?” Skin slapping skin with dull thuds and grunts of exertion punctuated the Agent Malia’s response. “Never.”

Agent Malia? Ava?

She’d played him from the beginning. Lied to him.
 

H moved toward the opening, passing a narrow door on his right. An almost imperceptible flourish of hope wafted beneath a layer of intense suffering. The same suffering he’d felt earlier.
 

He paused and split his attention between the fighting above deck and the pain beyond the door. He tested the knob. Locked.
 

Bending at the waist, ignoring the tightness along his right side, he jammed the knife into the door frame and released the lock bolt more easily than he had from the inside of his room.
 

Glancing toward the opening at the end of the hall, he watched a slender ankle step down onto the first step. He shook his head and stepped through the doorway he’d just busted open and closed the door behind him. It wouldn’t buy him much time, but he preferred at least a little protection between whoever headed his way and himself.
 

A greasy-haired brunette, faded to little more than skin and bone, huddled on a bed and whimpered when he approached. Her eyes bulged and locked on the knife in his grip.
 

“It’s okay.” He rolled the handle so the blade rested along his forearm, hidden from her view. He forced himself to shove aside the urge to rush. He was pressed for time, but she needed a gentle approach. “My name is H. I’m not going to hurt you. We’re going to get out of here.”

“He’ll kill me.”

“Janus?” She was nearly beaten down. Her mind wouldn’t handle much, but he locked his gaze with hers and projected a burst of peace into the air around her. She settled some. A fraction of her fear slipped from her dark gaze.
 

She shook her head.

“General Scott?”

She pulled back. Nodding frantically and waving her hands in front of her.
 

“On my word, they won’t touch you again.” He extended a hand and smiled encouragingly. When she finally looked up to him, he gasped. “Madelynn?”

She nodded.
 

“It’s me. Hermes.” It was odd using the name he’d rejected, but it was the only way the woman would know him. They’d been kidnapped about the same time and put through tests together. She had empathic abilities, but on a much lower scale than General Scott and Janus like so she’d been released. “They said they let you go. That you weren’t…”
A valuable asset any longer.
 

“They changed their minds.” Her voice rasped as if her vocal chords had been permanently damaged.
 

“Well, Madelynn. We’re getting out of here, and they won’t be coming for you again.” He would make sure she was the last victim of Eston White, just as he would work with Madelynn to make sure she recovered fully and knew how to effectively shield herself. He scooped her off the bed. She weighed no more than ninety pounds, and desperate for the likely first show of kindness in who knew how long she curled into him.
 

He turned to leave. Ava stepped into the doorway dressed in a wetsuit with her hair pulled into a ponytail. A serrated diver’s knife was strapped to her calf and a warrior’s glint sparked in her eyes.
 

“H.”

Betrayal jolted through him. “Agent Malia.”

He’d been honest with her when it hurt, when it stomped all over memories he wanted buried, but she’d lied to him. The worst part was, he didn’t hate her for it. He hated himself for getting sucked in to what he’d known couldn’t be real. He’d given her too much power.
 

Madelynn shifted in his arms, drawing his attention back to the immediacy of their situations. He glanced beyond Ava in to what sounded like an empty hallway. The noises above deck had calmed, but the raucous emotions still clamored. “Is it safe to leave?”

Ava’s brow creased for a split second, but she held back anything she might have said about his responses to her. “Yes.” Her focus on her apparent job worked for him. “We’ll need to get statements from you both, but Elise and the men aboveboard have been restrained.”

“I’ll speak to Agent Lawson or Agent Burgess.” He erected his remaining shields and moved toward the door, stopping just short of where he would have to brush her to pass. Weakened emotionally, mentally and physically, the slightest touch could diminish his protections. “Madelynn will speak to no one until she’s received medical attention.”

“Madelynn?” Ava reached out toward the woman in his arms. “Madelynn Davids?”

“You know her?” Madelynn tried to sink deeper into him. Her eyes begged him to keep his word as her head moved in an almost imperceptible nod.
 

“She’s been on our Missing Persons board for over a month.” Regret splintered Ava’s gaze as she stepped forward.

Madelynn flinched and whimpered. Her terror and pain battered his defenses. Janus’s torments had likely given her issues with issues. H angled her away from Ava.

Ava jerked to a halt and angled her head. “Are you all right?” When Madelynn refused to look at Ava, she turned to him. “Is she all right? A lot of people have been looking for her.”