Chapter 14
Nick nodded in a short, jerky movement.
He’d been so sure. So fucking cocksure. He’d actually thought he could stroll into the agency that he’d dedicated his entire postmilitary life to, put out a call for help, and they’d all come running to help him just as he’d always run to help them.
He was a naive idiot.
Maybe if Kin had been there it would have been different.
Kin would have backed him no matter what he’d become, and would have forced their companions to see it the same way, at least for the short term.
Just long enough to free about five hundred kids and who knew how many hundreds of adults.
But Kin was missing in the action of searching for him.
The idea of what could have happened to his brother had kept his stomach churning endlessly since Jamie had first dropped the bomb on him.
If Paulson had gotten ahold of Kin Gregory, wouldn’t he have been eager to gloat and taunt Nick with the knowledge?
No. He would save it and savor it. He had been waiting for a chance to play Kin in a hand that would trump him. But, if that were the case, why hadn’t he used that card instead of putting a bullet into him?
After all, he’d become more trouble than he was worth much more quickly than Paulson had anticipated. And how could he continue to apply logic to a man who clearly had gone way off the logic tracks?
Besides, there were much more dreadful things to worry about. Realizing abruptly that he knew the government he worked for just a little too well, he knew they had just bet everything on a losing hand and they were in incredibly deep shit.
They had a debt to pay and the proverbial leg-breakers were breathing down their necks.
“Come on,” Nick demanded of Amara, holding a hand down to her. She had understood long before he had, so he knew there was no need to explain much. “They’re calling higher-ups for direction. When this agency has to look higher for permission to do something, it’s never a good thing.”
She took his hand and they hurried across to the car they’d taken.
“What are we going to do, Nick?”
“The only advantage we have, babe, is that it always takes a bureaucracy fucking forever to get their shit together. Jamie will stall for me as long as he can, but we need to get back there first and solve this before the government can swoop in and step in exactly where Paulson is. They’ll probably even keep the sick prick on as a consulting source of information.
None of those people will ever see a moment of freedom again in their lives.
They’ll become permanent lab rats or military weapons …
trained killer K9s.” Nick slammed the car door shut, taking a moment to breathe in so he could see past the fury he hadn’t felt so overrun with since he had been a kid.
“You were right. We should have stayed. The government will get hold of us and the first thing they will want to know is how to kill us. If they can’t kill us, then they’ll vaporize the whole thing. ”
“Maybe they should. I mean, we’re all animals and monsters, right?” she said softly.
Nick jerked around to look at her, for the first time seeing that meek, defeated girl he’d been shoved into only a few days earlier.
He wanted to explode in rage at her, but he realized that it would be hypocritical if he did.
He had just had to try defending human deaths and explain the uncontrolled nature of things civilized humans could not or would not be able to accept.
Some, he knew, they shouldn’t accept. And when Jamie had asked him if there was a way to control the Morphates, he’d rushed to say yes …
he could control them. But it wasn’t true.
He could control only that one building.
That single pack. He didn’t know for sure if there were others, but he suspected there were.
Each pack would have its own leader and, he knew, would feel threatened by any other it came across.
There was no such thing as two Alpha males.
Even a grunt like him knew that. They would figure out how to kill or dominate each other, or they would choose territory just like the gangs, and humans would get caught in the crossfire.
“Amara,” he said quietly, “my brother came looking for me. He’s twice the cop I ever was. He found me. I know it. He’s either dead or …”
“Paulson has him.”
“Yeah.”
“You think he’s been turned?”
“If Paulson had him, he turned him. You know he did. Just for shits and giggles. Or just because Kin wouldn’t have ever given in.
” Not like he had. He should have known Kin would come after him.
No matter how scarce his reports, Kincaid wouldn’t have stopped until he was looking at Nick’s body, dead or alive.
“Nick, there’s only one thing we can do.”
Nick turned to look at her again, staring into coppery eyes and trying to figure out how in hell he could keep her safe and help his brother and uncounted others at the same time. “Babe, I am completely open to suggestions,” he said roughly. “And it better be a fast one. We’re out of time.”
“Drive. I will explain on the way.”
“Back to the labs?”
“No. Not yet. We need to pick up some things first.”