The Sandman (12 page)

Harlen smiled, just as toothy, back at him. “I thought you said breaking back into Chimera was walking into certain death.”

“Well, there’s certain death and then there’s the Sandman.”

***

“Drink,” Rook said, handing Jordan a bottle of water. He’d been watching her eyes slowly clear up over the past couple of hours, but now she managed to pick up the flatscreen remote and change the channel from his
Dukes of Hazzard
rerun.

The private plane that the senator had arranged to get them to Steve Coll as quickly as possible was the kind of luxury he’d never experienced before—oversized, white leather seats—and yet he was disappointed that Jordan was an arm’s-length away to his left. His lap would’ve been better, but he wanted her to be comfortable as the drug wore off.

“Feeling better?” So far, she hadn’t wanted to talk about the memory retrieval scare.

“Still can’t believe that’s legal,” she said. “The waking world is just as scary as the one Darkside.”

“In my experience, scarier.”

She was quiet for a second. “I’m okay. Angry.”

Yeah, he’d picked up on that.

She paused on a news program that had Dreaming Debacle! blaring in red across the top of the screen, unscrewed the water bottle’s cap, and took a deep drink. Three talking heads were debating while the host intermittently took over with his single head to look acutely concerned while a spinning graphic punched Crisis! next to his temple.

“We’ll be landing soon,” Rook told her. “I don’t want to spend our last couple of hours alive arguing, so I’m thinking about begging you to stay with the plane.”

Attention still on the screen, she put the cap back on. “I don’t want to spend our last hours alive arguing, either.”

Exactly what he’d thought she’d say.

Still, he had to try. “We don’t even know what we’ll find. Might be smarter to split up.”

She looked over at him, and he found unflinching decision in her gaze. Brick wall kind of decision.

“
You
could stay with the plane,” she said lightly, turning back to the television.

“Very funny,” he answered. He should’ve brought it up while she was still loopy.

After the aborted memory retrieval—just the thought made him sweat—he couldn’t accept her being in danger anymore. But if it
was
the Sandman tearing up the eastern shore, then at least he wouldn’t be worrying for long—they’d all be dead.

The host took over the entirety of the screen, his voice lowering with gravitas. “My first trip Darkside, as those in the know call it, led me into the very heart of the Agora. I found a troubling darkness there, wherein I witnessed and, yes, singlehandedly apprehended, a criminal element. As it is an ongoing investigation, I can’t discuss the details, not even the
great risk
to my life and the lengths I went to in order to save—again singlehandedly—the lives of several Chimera. But I can say, with a heavy heart, that not all lucid dreams are safe.”

The ticker on the bottom of the screen noted that I-95 was now closed for seventeen miles north and south of the city due to weather. Details next.

Rook groaned, disgusted. That guy was just making shit up. “You switched from the General Lee to this crap?”

“They don’t know anything,” she said, bewildered.

“They don’t want to,” Rook responded. “They’re just there to hear themselves talk.”

She turned off the television, tossing the remote onto a small side table. “I feel like we’re not doing enough.”

Rook cocked his head, baffled. “We’re going to into a freak storm to find Steve, and then most likely, face the Sandman. That’s not enough?”

She leaned over the side of her chair, and catching her intent, he leaned over his. They kissed. She was soft and sweet, and now maybe he could get her on his lap. And after, he’d really argue with her.

“Point taken,” she said. “Let’s make the most of our time.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Jordan squeaked when he whipped her out of her seat and into his arms, impressive for a guy who’d survived the fall of the black market and had been beaten so badly in the Scrape.

Malcolm looked left and right, as if deciding what to do with her. “What kind of a crap airplane is this?”

Jordan craned her neck to look around—several large leather seats and a bathroom at the back. Yeah, it was more corporate than personal luxury. No swanky bedroom like in racy novels featuring a billionaire bad boy and the woman with whom he’s negotiating a ruthless takeover.

“Seats probably recline,” she suggested. “I’ll be on top.”

“You can be on top when I’m done.” He still sounded grumpy, but she wasn’t going to budge. She was going with him to find Steve.

He put her on her feet while she ran a finger over his stubbly jaw and frowned at the darkness under his eyes. So much sleep, yet so little rest.

She lifted her arms so he could take off her top. “Promise me something.”

He worked the clasp on her bra. “No.”

She smiled. He knew her so well. “Rook.”

He slipped his hands in the waistband of her pants, anchoring himself against her, his warmth on her bare skin, but he wouldn’t meet her gaze. “It’s too much. You ask too much.”

“Just to stay together.”

“I wish I’d never seen you that night of the beach Rêve.”

Seriously?
“Then Vince would’ve turned me over to Lambert’s people.”

Malcolm’s eyes narrowed, as if what she’d said had hurt him. He shook his head. “Sera got shot. Could’ve been you.”

“I bet she’s okay with all her choices, too. Even if the shot had killed her.”

“And the memory retrieval?”

“Didn’t happen, anyway. The senator found her soul.”

Malcolm lowered his head, his breath in her hair. “Please, Jordan. It’s the only thing I’ll ever ask you for.”

He was playing all his cards, but she couldn’t afford to fold. “And the only thing I’ll refuse. Our chances are better together.”

“I love you.” He was begging.

She brushed her mouth against his. “That’s a ‘together’ kind of statement.
I
and
you
. How about we let it ride and see what happens?”

She knew she was asking a lot of her loner guy. The runaway. The tracker.

“I don’t know how to work this way,” he said heavily.

“We’ll figure it out.” She tugged at the hem of his T-shirt. “You know I love you, too, right?”

“Yeah, I got that.” He pulled his shirt off in one motion, and she breathed deeply to get a lungful of Malcolm, sweet, dark, sexy.

She laughed. She was so in love with him. It really didn’t hurt that his chest was
by far
the finest she’d ever laid eyes on. She kissed his right pec and wrapped her arms around his waist. Squeezed an ass cheek. There were lots of reasons to love him, and his body was definitely one of them.

“All right, just settle down now.” He still sounded strained. Unhappy.

“Nope.” She went for his the button on his pants.

“You’re so bossy.”

“You’ll learn to like it.”

But he was stronger than she was, and he used his impressive muscles to remove her hands before she could get inside. He stripped her, instead. Pushed her back into her seat, naked.

“Or you can be the boss,” she offered as he went down on his knees.

In one deft movement, he pulled her to the edge of her seat and spread her legs. Her mind fragmented into a million pieces, pleasure warming through her core to her belly, chest, and fingertips from one long, exquisite kiss.

***

Rook discovered that the seats did recline enough to suit their needs. Jordan was silky and loose above him, and he controlled her movement with his hands on her hips, torturing them both by setting slow strokes that darkened her eyes and made him grit his teeth.

He didn’t want it to end. Finishing scared him because then this moment would be over.

Loving Jordan was a free fall, and he wanted to fly. But more likely, they’d be crushed against the rocks that he couldn’t see but knew speared upward from below.

He used to fear the past, but now he feared the future.

She rocked her hips back, and his hands relished in the flare of her ass. She tightened around him, smiling slyly, and the universe narrowed to just her and the blood surging through his veins.

He was falling, helpless, his control slipping.

“Let go,” she murmured.

He just gripped her tighter, ecstasy ripping raggedly through him. “Never.”

***

Jordan’s hair whipped in the wind as she deplaned, Rook behind her. A black SUV was slowing to a stop on the tarmac, and when she reached the bottom of the steps, the driver—a man in military uniform—got out of the vehicle and strode forward to meet them.

“Colonel London,” he called out over the wind. He was middle-aged and clean cut. Jordan shook his hand. “Senator Fleight sent me,” he added while he shook Malcolm’s.

They hurried to get inside the vehicle, and to Jordan’s surprise, Malcolm opened one of the back doors for her, then got in with her. He was taking staying by her side very literally.

Colonel London turned around in his seat after slamming his own door shut. “Why exactly are we headed into the storm zone? Nothing going in has been getting out of there. Communication is cut off, too—some kind of electromagnetic interference. Thousands are feared dead.”

Jordan and Malcolm had discussed how to answer these kinds of questions—as truthfully as possible, without endangering cooperation. If the waking world was going to hell, that’s what everyone they encountered deserved.

“We have to retrieve Chimera Marshal Steve Coll,” Malcolm said. “He has information on the current Darkside crisis.”

Colonel London’s eyes widened. “What really happened?”

“The black market fell, which is why so many revelers aren’t waking,” Rook answered. “Marshal Coll was investigating why, and if the Agora might soon meet the same fate.”

“Dear Lord,” the colonel said. “Do you think it could?”

Malcolm nodded. “There’s a good chance. Certainly worth driving into the storm zone to find him.”

He’d left out the Sandman, of course, the part of the story that would make just about anyone doubt them.

But doubt flickered in the colonel’s eyes, regardless. “You should have a convoy to head into the storm zone, not a single vehicle. What if some of the roads are blocked?”

“Chimera isn’t moving fast enough with Director Bright dead. We appealed directly to Senator Fleight and she made arrangements to avoid any additional loss of time.”

Colonel London frowned deeply. “I don’t like this. Doesn’t feel right.”

“I don’t like it, either,” Jordan said. “It’s damn terrifying if you think about it.”

“I’m thinking.”

“Please think and drive,” Jordan said. “The sooner we get Marshal Coll, the sooner we can secure the Agora.”

He shook his head, as if he really didn’t want to go along with them, but took the SUV out of park and started the vehicle moving. They wound around the small airport hangar to an access road, and from there, onto a two-lane byway, the long grasses on either side waving like water in the wind.

They turned onto a highway after awhile, which was jam-packed with oncoming traffic but starkly apocalyptic on their side. It wasn’t long before they were stopped at a roadblock, and the colonel lowered his window to show identification and papers. The police officer lost his hat as he waved them through.

Twenty minutes later, when stopped again, the officer actually placed a call before letting them through. “I strongly urge you to turn around.”

“I’ve got the urge to turn around myself,” the colonel said.

Jordan took Malcolm’s hand, and he squeezed hers in return.

They finally exited onto a smaller, somewhat-elevated highway, and the wind bullied the car repeatedly into the next lane. The colonel fought it, dirt and small rocks dinging off the metal and creating spidery cracks on the windshield. Scattered debris scooted along the pavement in front of them, and visibility decreased so that the colonel had to hit the brakes hard when a figure of a man gusted into visibility.

Not a man. Not even shielding himself from the wind. The figure was thinner, meaner looking than any human.

The colonel squinted at the form. “What the hell is that thing?”

A nightmare, and it was holding out its hand, palm up for them to stop.

“Ever seen one of them attempt to communicate?” Jordan asked Malcolm.

“No, I have not.”

The nightmare pulled his arm back a little, his hand fisting, first two fingers making a peace sign.

“What the fu—”

Jordan felt the same way. “I think it comes in peace.”

“What is it?” the colonel demanded.

Jordan sighed and met his gaze in the rearview mirror. “You’ve heard about the hallucinations and paranoia that revelers have been experiencing?”

He didn’t answer.

“Well, that’s one of the hallucinations. Except you’re not hallucinating.”

And it was standing upright more than the others she’d seen, a certain familiar angle to its shoulders and head that she couldn’t place. Weird.

Malcolm suddenly released a long, slow breath. “Oh God… Coll…”

“Where? Are you tracking him?” Jordan had hoped that the closer they got to Steve, the sharper Malcolm’s tracker talent would get.

“No.” Malcolm’s voice had gone thick. “
That’s
Steve Coll.”

Jordan shook her head but looked at the nightmare closer. He lowered his arm and stood there waiting. Yeah, kind of giving off the quiet patience that Steve had. Still had to have because how could he be a nightmare? Or
all
nightmare?

“That’s impossible.” She was going to throw up if it was Steve. That poor man.

“I’m going to see what he wants.” Malcolm opened his door. The wind resisted his push and whipped inside the car, dirt stinging Jordan’s eyes, but it cut off as she blinked back tears.

Malcolm stumbled forward against the gale, his T-shirt plastered to his side from the west, hair crawling along his scalp. Jordan got out, too, ignoring the colonel’s protest. Her hair went truly crazy, but she grabbed at it as she ran.