Chapter Eighteen
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
...and then the Dead Man bent over Reece the empath, pinning him tighter to the hood of the Smart car. “I have to protect Seattle from dangerous empaths like you,” he said, in his deep, broody, and accented voice. “But I never thought defending the world from empaths would mean getting this close to one.”
Reece squirmed on the car hood, but the empath was never going to escape the Dead Man’s hold: the bigger man was just too strong. And that shouldn’t have been so sexy, but it was, because Reece wasn’t going to escape his feelings either.
(continued in the next comment)
—EXCERPT FROM HUNTING FOR LOVE , AN EMPATH/EMPATH HUNTER FANFICTION
One moment, Grayson was offering Reece a hand down from the truck.
The next, he was scrambling to catch him before he tumbled off the tailgate.
He got an arm around him just as Reece listed into him, boneless and unmoving as a rag doll. Grayson tilted him enough to glimpse his face, already knowing what he’d see.
Closed eyes. Slack expression. Because Grayson’s arms were suddenly full of unconscious empath.
He shifted Reece back to center, the full weight of his head resting against Grayson’s chest.
“Bad Decisions Bear,” he muttered.
He held Reece up for a moment, weighing his options. Reece himself didn’t weigh much, light and easy in his arms, soft in the hoodie and warm with that empath extra body heat. He was right up under Grayson’s sensitive nose, but for all of Grayson’s ribbing about his unwashed hair, he smelled good.
But Grayson would ignore all of that. Reece was unconscious; Grayson would behave with impeccable professionalism and keep the touching to an absolute minimum.
Starting with dropping the hand he hadn’t realized was still loosely intertwined in his own.
Grayson immediately let go, slipping his arms under Reece’s to steady him as he considered their options.
Reece had been game for driving up to Vancouver. But they’d also been planning to stop by Reece’s place first and that probably wasn’t an option anymore; Grayson wasn’t going to leave him alone and passed out in the truck, not when Waller knew where Reece lived, but folks would notice if Grayson carried Reece up and down from the studio with bags for two, and it’d be better if they didn’t leave a trail.
But waiting wasn’t ideal either, not when they only had a limited amount of time to search at Stone Solutions Canada before Vivian Marist returned to Vancouver. Reece would probably be unconscious still for some hours. Grayson couldn’t even be sure how many hours; he’d never knocked the same empath out twice before.
He could find somewhere safe for Reece to stay and leave him behind; maybe take him back to Detective St. James’ house. But Reece was dangerous in ways no empath ever had been before. And he knew it and wanted to stay with Grayson, even when it meant a trip to an airsoft course or Vancouver. Because he trusted Grayson to keep everyone safe, even when he didn’t trust himself.
Grayson bent forward, enough to get his left shoulder aligned with Reece’s stomach and lever him up and over as he straightened. Looked like they were heading to Canada, and it was Reece’s own fault that he couldn’t ask for the truck keys or complain about Grayson’s driving.
He worked his right hand into his pocket to pull out his phone. Pictures of the Dead Man were classified. They weren’t supposed to exist. But Reece had pulled this stunt and ought to see for himself where it got him.
He held the phone up and out to the side to get the back of the truck and both of their faces in frame, so there was no question who it was tipped over Grayson’s shoulder.
“Guess who gets to wake up to this in their texts?” he said, as he snapped a picture.
The missing glove was in the truck bed, lying innocently where Reece had been sitting. Why it wasn’t on Reece’s hand was a good question, but Grayson wasn’t gonna find out until Reece was conscious again.
Balancing Reece on his shoulder, Grayson grabbed the glove and stuck it in his pocket before closing up the tailgate. He carried Reece over to the passenger door and got it open.
He leaned forward again, awkwardly hunching and twisting to keep Reece’s head from bonking the door frame, then set the still out-cold Reece on the passenger seat.
“Very Bad Decisions Bear,” he told him, as he reclined the seat enough that Reece wouldn’t fall forward or slump off, then buckled him in—there’d be weeks of lectures if he forgot that part.
He straightened up and considered Reece, the lopsided look of one glove. After a moment, he reached for Reece’s left hand and pulled that glove off too. He stuck them both in the glove box, then slipped his coat off and put it over Reece. With Reece now secured and supine, Grayson shut the passenger door and went around to the driver’s side.
It was a short trip onto I-5, but even at midafternoon, the rush hour traffic was already starting. Without Reece’s chatter to fill the truck, Grayson put on music as he inched north, but even that wasn’t enough to tune out his thoughts.
Reece had taken off a glove in public. EI and Stone Solutions both would have some pretty big opinions about that.
They’d have even bigger opinions about Grayson taking an empath up to Stone Solutions Canada behind their backs.
But someone had sent Keith Waller those real empath gloves, manufactured by Stone Solutions and mailed from Vancouver. Considering what had happened in November, and what had been done to Reece in March, Grayson wouldn’t’ve trusted Vivian Marist and Stone Solutions with anything right then.
But maybe he ought to tell Director Traynor at the Empath Initiative.
Traffic moved forward just a little, and Grayson moved with it.
What was EI gonna do differently, though? If Traynor knew what was going on, he’d send the agency’s biggest weapon—and that was the Dead Man. Nothing would change.
Except Traynor would want to hand Reece over to Polaris. Reece might have Polaris in his future, if the corruption ever set in all the way, but he didn’t belong there now. Not when he was still the sweet pacifist who’d nearly been kidnapped last night, yet ran and hid in Grayson’s truck just now so he wouldn’t risk anyone else getting hurt. Who’d said maybe it can be just the two of us to the Dead Man.
So no. Grayson couldn’t tell Traynor either.
He eyed the traffic. He could hit the shoulder and pass everyone, but there wasn’t gonna be anything they could do tonight, and Reece needed time to wake up anyway. They’d get in to Vancouver when they got in, find somewhere to get a toothbrush and a change of clothes.
Find a hotel room for the two of them to share, sleeping only feet apart as they had last night. That would be fine. Wasn’t like Grayson had spent the night hyperaware of Reece in that too-big Texas hoodie, soft and trusting and almost close enough to touch.
Grayson forced his fingers to loosen on the steering wheel.
It’d be just fine.
From Lake Sammamish, Jamey pulled into a rest stop to think, sitting in Liam’s car and taking in the snow-dusted evergreens. She’d sent Grayson and Aisha both the pictures of Stensby’s car, including the suitcase and the pen from the airsoft course. No one had heard from Stensby all day and all leads seemed to stop at the smashed cruiser.
Her phone beeped with a new text from Grayson.
Seems like the airsoft manager might have been the one chasing Reece in the Hellcat last night. We’re following a lead to Vancouver.
We. Jamey raised her eyebrows.
Jamey: Reece is going with you to BC? Where the Mysterious Facility for Corrupted Empaths is located?
Grayson: Yes. But I’m not taking your brother there.
A straight answer. Interesting.
A cardinal was hopping through the branches, bright red against the white snow. He chirped, and his mate chirped back.
Another text came in from Grayson.
He’s not my prisoner. He’s free to go anytime. He said he wanted to come with me today.
And now Grayson was explaining himself to her, like he wasn’t the Dead Man with an empath, but a good Southern boy promising to have his date back by curfew.
Also interesting.
But Grayson could go from gentleman to ruthless killer in a heartbeat. If he thought Reece was a threat, Grayson wouldn’t hesitate to lock him up with the other corrupted empaths where he couldn’t hurt anyone.
Which was, of course, exactly why Reece trusted him and wanted to be with Grayson.
She watched the birds hop from branch to branch. If she was being fair, she probably ought to acknowledge that whatever complicated person he was now, Grayson could have easily already taken Reece up to the BC facility, left him there, and never looked back. And he hadn’t done it.
What he had done was taken a bullet for Reece.
She looked back at her phone.
Jamey: Take care of him.
Grayson was following the trail from the airsoft course, and it seemed like Stensby’s path was twisted into that trail. It couldn’t be coincidence that the airsoft manager had gone after Reece the same night Stensby had lured Jamey out of town and Grayson was supposed to be across the country investigating the murder of Marie Pelletier—who hadn’t gone to Burlington at all, but was supposed to be in Prince Rupert, where Aisha was now headed.
Jamey ran a quick flight search from Seattle to Prince Rupert, scanning through the list with a frown. She should have realized her options would be slim; past Vancouver, the rugged network of mountainous islands that made up the British Columbia and southeast Alaskan coasts were vaster and wilder than most people realized, the towns smaller and more remote. Prince Rupert was a decent hub for the area, and you were still lucky to get one direct flight a day out of Vancouver.
After a moment, she texted Liam.
Jamey: If I told you we could charge everything to Grayson, can you figure out how to get me to Prince Rupert by morning?
Then she called up Aisha.
“Hey, you,” the other woman answered, and Jamey could hear voices in the background. “How are—”
“I’m in,” Jamey said. “Count me as part of your Vanguards.”
“Yes,” Aisha said, and Jamey could almost hear the fist pump. “We are officially the most badass super-secret spy team in the Pacific Northwest.”
“How much competition could we possibly have?” Jamey frowned. “How would we even know if we had competition if we’re all secret—you know what, never mind. Are you on your way to Prince Rupert?”
“On a layover in Toronto right now,” Aisha said.
Jamey’s phone beeped. She glanced at the text from Liam.
Consider it done.
She grinned. “Then I’ll meet you there tomorrow,” she said to Aisha, which earned another yes . “Flights are limited so it could be late afternoon, but Liam might be able to wrangle something earlier with his charter connections. Learn anything new?”
“Simone Pelletier, Marie’s sister on Vancouver Island, is a paramedic, and she volunteers with Search and Rescue.”
“Go Simone,” Jamey muttered, then paused. “Wait.”
“I had the same thought,” Aisha said. “It’s an interesting career for an empath’s sibling.”
“You think the sister could be like me? Like Grayson? Maybe we can get in touch with her and meet her—”
“I tried,” Aisha said, more quietly. “I got Simone’s number from Marie’s roommate. Simone isn’t answering calls or texts, not from me, not from Chantelle either. Maybe she’s on her way to meet Marie in Prince Rupert, or maybe she’s off the grid on a rescue.”
“And maybe we might believe that,” Jamey said, “if there weren’t a million other coincidences piling up. Did you already tell Grayson that the missing empath has a sibling who could be like us?”
“I’m calling him after you,” Aisha said. “I got a text that he and your brother are following a lead from the airsoft course.”
“According to Grayson, the manager of the airsoft course was probably the one chasing Reece in a Hellcat last night,” Jamey said. “And Stensby had a pen in his cruiser from the same airsoft course.”
“Did they know each other?” Aisha mused out loud. “Could the airsoft manager have been the one who called you from Stensby’s phone?”
“He would’ve had to call at the same time he was literally trying to kidnap Reece, and Reece didn’t mention any Texas accent,” Jamey said. “I think the caller was someone else. But who? And how did he know what Stensby had done to Reece’s brake fluid? Stensby knows damn well he could be on the hook for attempted murder here. He’s not a fool; he’s not going to be out there telling people he sabotaged Reece’s brakes.”
“Your brother could have been hurt or worse, and we never would have known who was behind it,” Aisha agreed. “So who was your caller, and how did they get that confession out of a cop like Stensby?”
Jamey snorted. “I don’t suppose there’s a corrupted empath around that sounds just like Grayson.”
The line went very quiet.
“Not anymore,” Aisha finally said. “But obviously Grayson’s brother would have fit that bill, once upon a time.”
Jamey sat back against the car seat. “Grayson only mentioned him to me once. Said his brother was dead but never said how.”
“He’s never told me either,” Aisha said. “I know the Grayson brothers were prisoners somewhere out in Middle-of-Nowhere, West Texas. I know some twisted and unethical scientists were involved. And I know the whole facility was annihilated, and Evan was the only one who made it out of that West Texas bunker alive.”
Jamey swallowed.
“I’m pretty sure Cedrick Stone knew most of the story,” Aisha said, “and maybe there are others at Stone Solutions or the Empath Initiative who know more than me too. But I’m not sure there’s anyone alive who actually knows exactly how Alex Grayson turned Evan into the Dead Man. Evan says it’s better people don’t know it’s even possible.”
“He’s probably right,” Jamey admitted. “Imagine what people like Stone would do if they knew how to make more Dead Men.”
“Build an army to fight the empaths,” Aisha muttered. “And all of us would lose.”
Wasn’t that the truth.
Stensby was in the backseat of the white Challenger Hellcat, eyes closed contentedly. It’d felt so good to smash his cruiser up for Alex. Lake Sammamish had been his idea, to distract everyone. Then Stensby had called Keith, who was in a rage from losing Reece. It’d been easy to lure Keith to some sketchy strip mall in Kent so he could meet Alex, and now all three of them were a team .
They were idling outside an older gas station in Bellevue with Alex behind the Hellcat’s wheel. He’d given Keith instructions and the other man had gone inside. Stensby was happy to wait in the backseat. He was happy to do anything, as long as it was what Alex wanted. Keith understood and felt the same way now.
“Gretel sent a text. Says her dad keeps giving AMI membership lists to anyone who asks.” Alex was lazily scrolling through his phone. “For someone who keeps yelling about privacy, Beau Macy sure doesn’t seem to care about anyone else’s.”
How had Stensby ever disliked Alex’s accent? He loved his voice. Maybe Alex would keep talking forever. “I’m probably on that list.”
Alex glanced up, meeting Stensby’s eyes in the rearview mirror. “I’m sure you are. Keith too. Makes you wonder what they’re using these lists for, doesn’t it?”
“You should ask for them,” Stensby said dreamily. “You should introduce yourself to all of AMI.”
“You’ve had worse ideas.” Alex glanced at the gas station’s doors. “Here we go.”
An alarm split the air. The doors burst open and Keith came running out, thick wads of green bills in his hands. Behind the gas station’s glass windows, Stensby could see a lot of red.
“You’re a terrible kidnapper but luckily an excellent robber,” Alex said, over Stensby’s cheering, already throwing the Hellcat into Reverse as Keith leapt into the passenger seat and slammed the Hellcat door. “And I hope you’re both ready for our next stop.”