Blindsided (44 page)
Authors: Tes Hilaire
Unable to resist, she twisted, looking over her shoulder to see how close her pursuer was only…he wasn’t there.
“What the heck?” she slowed, easing into the shadows beneath the tattered awning of a boarded up pawn shop. She waited what seemed like an eternity, but was probably only a couple minutes, and still he didn’t round the corner. Had she really lost him? Maybe he was too spent after calling forward the beast to follow? Or, more likely, he really had decided she wasn’t worth the effort.
“Gift horses, Kat, let’s not look too closely.”
Edgy and still unable to shake the feeling of being hunted she stared down the empty street. Her apartment was only three blocks over but she didn’t dare go there yet. Not until she was sure he wasn’t tracking her. Nor could she stay here. With nothing left to do she stepped out of the shadows, briskly walking down the sidewalk.
For over a half-hour she walked, zigzagging through the streets, switching back and forth before slowly making her way back. Eventually she decided that even her paranoia was satisfied and worked her way towards her apartment.
The grungy building was tucked tightly between two others, their hollow-eyed windows and crumbling brick facades testament to the harsh life they led. They’d passed from barely livable to hazards decades before and even had the faded condemned signs to prove it. Not that they were easily distinguishable against all the graffiti spray-painted onto the bottom couple stories.
The apartment building she lived in hadn’t escaped the questionable artistic abilities of the locals either, though it had dodged the more official exterior decoration of the condemned signs. Kat wasn’t sure this was because the building boasted a better health & safety rating, or whether the building manager just happened to know the right hands to grease, but whatever the case, the small studio apartment she rented held all the qualities she required. Namely that it was cheap, out of the elements, and had a distinct lack of nosey neighbors. No one here cared who you were or what you did as long as the favor was returned.
With a last glance over her shoulder she strode across the street to the apartment door. No codes or fancy security here, the door creaked open, blasting her with the stale scent of hopelessness, mold, piss, and despair. Breathing shallowly through her teeth she made her way up the creaking stairs to the third floor.
It wasn’t until she was in her apartment, the door firmly closed, chained, and bolted behind her that she dared take a deep breath. The action was like to opening the floodgates, the stress of the last forty-eight hours slamming into her all at once and compromising her limbs. Paint chips flaked, catching in her hair as she used the door behind her to control her fall to something akin to a slow slide to the floor.
She lifted her shaking hands, burying her face in them as she counted backwards from twenty down.
Get it together, Kat. You can’t afford the time to breakdown.
Not that she’d made any progress thus far. Five years ago she’d fled Ganelon’s little corner in the upper reaches of hell and spent every waking, and often non-waking, moment since trying to stay out…until now. Now she had to find a way back in. The one entrance she knew of was well warded and the only way in undetected would be to shadow another tainted soul past the wards when they checked in to report. Only there was no way any of those scum she’d been tracking tonight were going to be able to report anything. Not to Ganelon, not to one of his merker, not to anyone.
There had to be another way. Another back door that wasn’t warded or something.
Why don’t you just go back there and let that Paladin take care of you? That will get you back in Hell.
Laughter bubbled up in her throat, echoing eerily in her nearly empty studio apartment. Yeah, that would solve all her problems. Lucifer was so merciful on those who were returned to him that way. Not to mention his lordship would no doubt turn her right over into Ganelon’s capable hands.
She shuddered, the hysterical laughter snuffed with the thought of what Ganelon would do with her when he got his hands on her. He did not take kindly to those who reneged on their bargains, which made her goal of sneaking back into the hellhole Ganelon called home highly inadvisable. She would though. She had no choice.
“Oh Mia, Mia, Mia.” She closed her eyes, swallowing. “Hold on, baby. I’m coming for you.”
“Coming for who?”
She lifted her head, the scream in her throat cut short by the hand that clamped down over her mouth.
While growing up Tes Hilaire always wanted to see a ghost. Or meet an angel. Or dine with a vampire. Despite her vivid imagination, none of these things ever happened…yet. In the meantime, she writes about them from her home in North Carolina where she lives with her hero, her cat & dogs, a son and two daughters–one of whom claims to actually have
seen
a ghost (Tes is very jealous). She hates lima beans, loves spaghetti, and still believes in the impossible. For more about Tes and her books, visit
TesHilaire.com
or visit her on Facebook at
www.facebook.com/TesHilaireAuthor
.
Blindsided
Agent Teigan Evans is used to secrets, but this time it’s personal. As an overworked, underappreciated field agent working for a highly classified government agency, he thought he’d seen everything—until he’s given his newest assignment. Someone is murdering the government’s top secret, genetically engineered V-10 soldiers, and they want Teigan to impersonate the assassin’s next target. The catch? The target is Teigan’s half-brother, a brother he never knew existed.
Aria Octavia Idyllis is used to being underestimated—people see only her blindness, which makes a perfect cover for the secrets she must hide. Like the fact that her aunt was involved in the program that created the V-10, and that she knows the identity of the assassin, as well as who his next victim will be. Not able to sit by while lives are at stake, she tracks down the V-10 soldier to warn him, and with this selfless act, ends up revealing her deepest secret… she’s a Viadal child as well.
With his brother’s life on the line, Teigan can’t afford the softening of his heart toward an unregistered Viadal. Aria is the only one who can draw the killer out, but using Aria on the mission will expose her identity to those who see her only as a weapon, not as the warm-hearted woman he has come to know. Teigan is faced with a choice, irrevocably alienate the woman of his dreams, or risk losing the brother he’s just found.
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