Night Shadow (33 page)

across the holographic keyboard.

“Ah—what do the numbers represent?” Blackthorne asked apologetical y.

Odd, because to Lexi it was perfectly obvious. “These are all the dates of

applicable terror incidents that took place over the last five years. Some of

these places and dates are confirmed Knight hits. There are a handful that

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Night Shadow

I can’t confirm or substantiate, but I believe due to witness reports that

these are his as wel . Hang on—let me put them in order as if they
were

actually confirmed . . . There.”

She scowled at the screen. For a second there she’d been sure this was

going to answer at least some of their questions. “Hang on, let me make a

graph so—”

“We don’t need a graph,” Edge said politely. “Just tel us.”

“The graph is easier to read—No? Okay. This is completely illogical.

There’s no rhyme or reason to what’s going on—Let me take this one out.

And these three . . . Now let’s see.” She shook her head and manipulated

more dates. “It doesn’t make any kind of logical sense—I don’ t see a

damn pattern of—Wait—” She turned to meet Alex’s eyes.

“If I’m interpreting this mess correctly—and I believe I am—According to

these numbers, the big bang is in seven hours.”

Before he left for Libya, Alex had a private meeting with Black-thorne and

Fox in Gabriel Edge’s impressive library. Yeah, this had become

everybody’s business, but theirs were the lives, souls, whatever the hel

they were on the line.

It wasn’t Lexi’s “big bang” he and the guys were worried about. There

were so many T-FLAC and T-FLAC/psi operatives on it that it would be a

miracle if Knight managed to start so much as a campfire, let alone blow

up a country. They hoped.

It was that, the prelude to the big bang event would be the
assimilation
of

the three of them. Since they had no idea how that worked, or when or

how it would happen, they al agreed that they had to get their affairs in

order.

They had to take into account that the world would be saved. They would

not.

Suddenly wil s had to be changed, provisions made, financials set. Being

wizards helped, but the arrangements still took thirty-two minutes of

precious time.

“One more thing,” Lucas said after the legal guys shimmered out of the

room, and just before they returned to the ever-growing col ection of

assorted specialists in the other room.

“What?” Blackthorne indicated that Fox, closest to the door, open the

damn thing, they’d wasted enough time. “Our dicks fall off to give us a

warning?”

“Sydney amps my power when we’re together. More so when we

physical y touch. Either of you experience something like it with your

ladies?”

“No,” Blackthorne answered flatly. “Open the door. Let’s get this show on

the road.”

“How does it manifest itself ?” Alex asked. The way he felt when he was

around Lexi amped . . . something. He didn’t think it was his powers,

however.

Fox described what happened when he and Sydney touched. Alex felt a

ridiculous surge of envy. It sounded cool. He wanted that—hel , he wanted

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Night Shadow

everything—with Lexi. “Nope. Not that way for us.” He shot a glance at

Blackthorne. “You?”

“Unfortunately not.”

“Then we’re not all the same, are we?” Fox said quietly.

“Or having the women amp our powers hasn’t started for us yet,” Alex

offered.

Fox put his fingers on the ornate door handle. “Or maybe you two don’t

have the
right
women?”

“No,” Alex told him cool y. “Not the case.”

“Same here,” Blackthorne said firmly as he tossed something into the air.

Before he could catch it, Alex beat him to it with a lightning-fast reflex.

Opening his hand Alex saw the glint of the golden circle and the sparkle of

the diamond. “What the hel are you doing with this?”

Blackthorne snatched the ring out of Alex’s open palm. “I’m making things

right with Kess before I go. You might want to think about doing the same

with Lexi.”

“It’s not like that.”

Blackthorne and Fox both laughed. “Deny it all you want, bro. You’ve

fallen for her,” Fox said, slapping Alex on the back.

“If she’s the right one, then what does a ring matter,” he retorted.

“Wel , replied Fox, if they are the right ones, then we have to presume

that like Sydney and me, the pair of you could potentially have your

powers amped by Lexi and Kess. It might make the difference between l—

”“Immaterial,” Alex cut him off, reaching over to pul the handle since Fox

seemed to be on a mental field trip. “Fucking power surge or not, I don’t

give a damn that she’s a trained operative. She’s trained for everything

but dying a slow and painful death. I’m not taking Lexi anywhere
near

Mason.”

Blackthorne nodded, his expression grim. “Now
there’s
something we all

agree on.”

Lexi and the other women were sitting on the lower steps of the enormous

sweeping staircase outside the library when the three men came out.

“Here’s something that not only all of
us
agree on,” Sydney said mildly,

getting to her feet. “But
Duncan
agrees with us. We go where you go.”

“No!” Alex, Lucas, and Simon said simultaneously.

“You’re taking a ful team,” Lexi said reasonably, also standing. Adrenaline

pumped through her system, making everything appear bigger and

brighter. She wanted to leap from the third step and fling herself into

Alex’s arms. He looked grim and unyielding. In the thirty-some minutes

the guys had been doing whatever it was they’d been doing in their host’s

library, she’d retrieved her weapons and listened to Edge’s logic about

why the three women should join the teams. “
I’m
a member of your

team.”

Alex gave Lexi a cold look that could slice steel. “No.”

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Night Shadow

Kess opened her mouth. Simon swept her with a glacial green glance.

“
You’re
not an
operative.
You work in the damned information

dissemination department.”

“And you don’t work for T-FLAC at al ,” Fox concluded, glaring at Sydney.

She walked down the stairs to stand toe-to-toe with him on the stone

floor. Like Lexi and Kess she was dressed in black cargo pants, a black

long-sleeved shirt, boots, and underneath—LockOut. The only difference

between Sydney’s outfit and the other two women was that she’d pinned a

small yel ow flower she’d found—somewhere—to her lapel. “I’m a temp.

Deal with it.”

Lexi bit back a smile. A
temp
?

“Jesus.” Lucas looked at Sydney with horror. “You’re
armed.
”

“My brothers—”

“Taught you to frickin’ shoot
tin cans
in the backyard!”

Sydney turned to Lexi and Kess. “Years and years at the shooting range.

Own a gun.
Extremely
proficient.”

Lexi bit her lip so she didn’t laugh, giving Sydney a thumbs-up. It was no

laughing matter. Not even close. But Duncan Edge wanted them to go,

and go they would. Lexi kept to herself that she thought the beautiful

Sydney and perky Kess weren’t in any way qualified to go on an op. She’d

been trained for this
.
And she was going. Come hel or high water. Or

Alex.

“What are you thinking?” Simon Blackthorne glared at Kess. “Are you a

souped-up marksman with years of experience I don’t know anything

about?”

Her chin tilted pugnaciously. “I know which end of a gun bul ets come out

of,” she answered grimly. “I know how to pul the trigger, and Lexi

showed me how to install a clip.”

“Hel .”

“Shit.”

“Damn.”

“Is that a yes?” Lexi asked.

“No!”
The three men shouted in unison.

El Azizia, Libya

32° 31’ 48" N, 13° 0’ 36" E

“—than ninety percent of the country is desert or semidesert,” Lexi told

the men, running a bottle of tepid water across her cheek, as they drove

through shifting sands. “Water here is a
big
problem. Twenty-eight

percent of the population doesn’t even have access to safe drinking water.

Can you imagine that in this day and age?”

The rhetorical question was met with a few grunts and a “huh?”

Lexi was part of the twelve-man team. Eleven men, one small, gray-eyed,

bul -headed female. Alex was glass-chewing-head-exploding-
furious
with

both Duncan Edge and the Council for even
suggesting
that Lexi and the

other two women be allowed anywhere near Mason Knight.

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Night Shadow

Fox, just as pissed, had reluctantly taken Sydney and his team to Death

Valley. Blackthorne, Kess, and his team headed for Israel. Alex took El

Azizia, Libya. Even in the winter it was hot. But tolerably so. The fact that

he was hot under the col ar was not due to the thermometer nor mitigated

by ful -body LockOut.

He’d stuck Lexi in the middle seat of the twenty-something-year-old

passenger van. The middle of the fucking middle seats. Surrounded by

hundreds of pounds of wizards in full-body LockOut, and as much wizard

power as they’d been able to muster. The only way he and the others had

relented, and that had taken precious time arguing at full voice, was if the

Council put protective spel s on the three women, gave them some powers

of their own, and ensured—fucking-wel
guaranteed
—that
no matter

what
—they would be protected at all costs.

It still wasn’t enough. Not for Alex, not for Lucas or Simon.

“The Phoenicians were the first to establish trading posts in Libya,” Lexi

informed the hot, sweaty, spoiling-for-a-fight wizards trapped in the fast-

moving vehicle with her. “When the merchants of Tyre—that’s present-day

Lebanon—developed commercial relations with the Berber tribes and

made treaties with them to ensure t—”

Her voice was like nails tapping through his skul . Each word a reminder

she was here instead of someplace safe. And it was fucking killing him.

“Stone? Give it a rest. We’d like to hear ourselves think,” Alex said from

the seat behind her.

“The radio doesn’t work,” she pointed out reasonably. They’d been driving

for forty minutes. She’d been talking for at least thirty-nine of them.

“Got a damn iPod?”

She shrugged. “Not on me.”

“Then
sing.
”

Several guys cleared their throats. One was stupid enough to laugh.

“I don’t know how to sing.”

“Perfect. Then just be quiet. Problem solved.”

Lucas had shared his Trace Teleport ability with both himself and Simon.

Edge had amped their powers. Alex cast the Trace out as far as he could.

Half-wizards here and there. Going about their businesses as they’d done

in this area for hundreds of years. Merchants, not tangos. Not Vitros. Not

goddamned Mason Knight.

“I don’t suppose anyone wants to hear how the Greeks conquered Eastern

Libya when, according to tradition, emigrants from the island of Thera

were commanded by the oracle at Delphi to find a less crowded place to

live in North Africa. They founded the city of Cyrene in 630 B—”

Cranston, sitting next to Alex, burst out laughing, a couple of the other

guys muffled their amusement. Alex grabbed the back of Lexi’s neck and

gave it a warning sqeeze.

“Just saying—”
Sorry. I can’t help myself. I’m so freaking scared I can’t

shut up.

He knew she was, which was why, against every instinct, he hadn’t

teleported her back to Eldridge Castle for safekeeping where she’d be

even more afraid. Becaue Lexi, being the woman she was, wasn’t in the

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Night Shadow

least bit afraid for her own safety. She thought she was there to protect

him.
Her bravery, her single-mindedness, her sheer
guts,
humbled him.

Wanna come back here with me?

From this close he could feel the relief rol off of her.
Please.

At this point why the hel did he care if his men knew he and Lexi were—

Whatever they thought was immaterial. He didn’t fucking care. All he

wanted was Lexi. Lexi close. Lexi happy. Lexi safe. “Cranston? Switch

seats with Stone. I think I have some duct tape in my pack.”

They stopped for gas. Everyone got out to stretch their legs or hit the

head. “He’s not here, is he?” Lexi asked Alex quietly. In a small square of

shade, they leaned against the wall of a market while Wil iams fil ed the

tank. “Thanks.” She took the soda bottle he opened and handed her. She