Body Master (23 page)

A cell phone ringtone broke her thoughts, and she sat up, wincing at the tenderness she’d earned last night. Dempsey’s phone was next to the bed. She glanced at the bathroom where the shower was still running and decided to take the phone into him.

She slid off the bed and picked it up. “Hello.”

“Uh, Seneca?”

“Apollo?”

“Yeah, it’s me. Sorry to wake you.”

“I was up. Dempsey’s in the shower. I can bring the phone to him.”

Apollo laughed. “I have a feeling that would make his day, but I’m in a hurry. Just tell him to call me back. I have news.”

“On Hager?” she asked.

“You know about Hager?” Apollo replied, sounding surprised. Really surprised. Like, totally shocked. Suspicion flickered in the back of her mind.

“I know everything Dempsey knows,” she said vaguely.

“I didn’t think he’d—” Apollo said. “Anyway, I’m almost certain that Hager is the guy we’ve been tracking. He’s operating the same way as the traitor on Govan—underground, building his empire. Which includes killing anyone who gets in his way. Ell must have overheard him on the ship, and he killed her when she figured out what he’d done.”

Seneca felt the bottom go out from under her.
Hager? Traitor? Ell?

Apollo continued. “Tell Max I set up a meeting with him and Carl at the diner at ten. Max will know where it is. Carl said he has something for him.”

Seneca managed, “Okay. Thanks.”

“Later.” He hung up.

She disconnected and set the phone back down on the nightstand. The thoughts tumbled over one another in a blur of disbelief.

Oh, God. How could she be so blind? It explained everything. Why he joined XCEL and put up with all the shit. Why he picked her. Lied to her. Used her. Her eyes burned.

“Who was on the phone?”

Seneca turned to find Dempsey standing outside the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his hips. She blinked the tears away, snagged her panties from the floor, and put them on. “Were you ever going to tell me? Or were you just going to kill Hager and walk away?”

He took a step toward her. “Who was on the phone?”

She pulled her shirt over her head. She’d slept with him because she thought he was a hero. Christ, she was a moron when it came to men. “Apollo. He told me about Hager and Ell and your traitor.”

Dempsey swore. “Sonofabitch.”

She grabbed her jeans and held them against her, feeling too naked in just the shirt and panties. “Don’t blame Apollo. All he did was tell me what you wouldn’t.”

He ran his hand through his wet hair. “I was going to—”

“When?” she snapped. “After you got me into bed?”

Dempsey looked over at her. “You got
me
into bed.”

Shit
. He was right. “My mistake. Won’t happen again. You didn’t answer my question about Hager.”

“I was going to kill him and leave,” he said.

It was the truth at last. She knew because it wasn’t what she wanted to hear. “Good. Because that’s exactly what we’re going to do. They replaced MacGregor yesterday. I guarantee Hager was responsible for that. I want him, and you’re going to help me get him.”

Then she walked past Dempsey, and he said, “I tried to tell you last night. And then—”

“My seduction was overwhelming, too much for you to resist. I know,” she finished. She skirted him, slammed the bathroom door behind her, and locked it before shedding her clothes. Then she turned on the shower, stepped under the hot water, and cried.

O
ver breakfast in the diner, Max told her everything about how Hager had betrayed and destroyed the Shifters on Govan. He’d give the government locations of Shifter populations—targeting women and children first—so the government could wipe them out. He managed an underground network of spies who did nothing but feed info to the government. Every Shifter knew someone was behind the genocide, but no one could ever identify him.

“A few thousand of us secretly boarded a ship to escape the planet. We thought we left him behind when we departed,” Max said. “But then Ell came up missing at the end of our journey. She left the sign of traitor in her own blood, warning us that he was on the ship. I just couldn’t locate him before we crashed on Earth.”

“You followed him here, to the city,” Seneca said, remaining emotionless as she drank her coffee.

“By scent. And lost him. After that, XCEL was the only way I could find him.”

“For revenge,” Seneca added, her tone cool and professional. Max hated it.

“Yes,” he said. “But Hager is working again, here. He’ll rip this world apart like he did on Govan.”

“How does he operate?” she asked. “What’s his plan?”

“He wants power. He wants to be in control. On Govan, that meant working with the highest government officials to carry out the Shifter genocide. Here, I don’t know.”

Seneca looked him in the eye. “But if he wasn’t your wife’s killer, you wouldn’t care what he did.”

“Probably not,” he admitted.

She leaned back in the booth, her eyes were wary and her expression tight. He should have told her last night, because he sure wasn’t winning her over this morning. Although, it was probably for the best. He had no intention of leaving Hager alive and no delusions of his own mortality. There was only one way to take Hager and his entire operation out, and that was with the powerful explosive device lying in the bottom of his duffle bag. All he needed was to get inside Hager’s headquarters with it.

“If he had that kind of power on Govan, then why did he come here with you?” she asked. “Why wouldn’t he just stay there?”

Max shook his head. “I haven’t figured that out yet. Something must have happened. The fact remains, he’s here and he’s rebuilding his network. This country is at serious risk.”

“Bart said he was building an army of Shifters. What would he need them for?”

“Maybe for protection. Maybe for an attack. I don’t know.”

She stared at him for a few long beats. Finally, she said, “So basically you’re telling me all this to keep me working with you.”

He could say the other reasons—because he cared about her. Because he finally realized that he could trust her. Because he wanted her to have the knowledge so she could keep herself safe. But none of it would change the present or the future for them. So instead, he said, “Yes.”

She blinked a few times and looked down at the table. “I appreciate your honesty.”

He felt the heaviness in his chest at the subtle good-bye. It was the only way this could end. He could say he was sorry a thousand times and it wouldn’t erase the betrayal.

“Neither one of us can go home,” he warned. “It’s safer if we stick together.”

She lifted her gaze to his. “I realize that. We’re partners, and we have a duty.” Then her eyes focused on something behind him. “I think your friend is here.”

Max turned just as Carl stepped into the diner. He stopped abruptly when he saw Seneca, but Max waved him in. Carl sat next to Max, across from Seneca, and ordered a coffee from the waitress.

“Carl, this is Seneca Thomas. My partner,” Max said by way of introduction.

They shook hands but Max could sense the suspicion between them. He added, “She knows everything.”

Carl raised his eyebrows. “Is that right?”

Her brown eyes studied him. “Including that you’re a Shifter.”

Carl gave Max a quick look. “Was that necessary? You know the position I’m in.”

“He didn’t tell me,” she said. “I can see you.”

Max grinned as Carl’s mouth dropped open. “How is that possible?”

She spun her coffee cup and replied dryly, “Everyone acts so surprised when I tell them that. You must have had people like me on your last planet.”

“No,” Carl and Max said in unison.

“Great. How’d I get so lucky?” she murmured.

Carl asked, “Are there others like you?”

She shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

The waitress brought Carl his coffee, and he waited until she was gone before turning to Max. “Apollo said you found the traitor.”

“His name’s Hager. Running an underground operation and organizing the Shifters. We shut down his Skinman a few days ago, but it won’t be long before another one replaces him. Have you heard of any other Shifters working for the government?”

“No,” Carl answered. “I haven’t seen any either.”

Max exchanged a look with Seneca. Hager wasn’t following the same pattern of working with the government. What was he up to, then?

“Hager has to be stopped. I don’t need to tell you that,” Carl said. “He’s a threat, but we have other problems too. You asked me what happens to the Shifters you capture. They are picked up by a cryonics company called Smith Industries.”

“Nicely generic,” Max noted.

Carl nodded. “Officially classified as a private contractor hired to freeze and store Shifters. They set up facilities in all the cities XCEL operates in.”

“And unofficially?” Seneca asked.

He looked at her. “There are minimal cryogenics capabilities at the facility here, not nearly enough to handle the number of Shifters coming in. Which means not all your captures are being frozen.”

“Then what is happening to them?” she said with a frown.

Carl shrugged. “They’re gone. The last audit they had? The incoming Shifters didn’t equal the Shifters on hand. The contractor claimed some bodies were too damaged to bother freezing and were cremated. Of course, there are no remains to verify this, which means we’re missing thirty or so bodies locally.”

“So they could be using them for weapons development,” Max said.

Carl nodded. “It’s possible.”

“I didn’t know,” Seneca said quickly. “I would never have agreed to that.”

“I believe you,” Carl replied with a little smile. “Maybe they
were
cremated and the facility just kept lousy records.”

Max added another possibility. “Or their disappearance has something to do with Hager’s army.”

“Or all the above,” Carl said. “The fact is, we simply don’t know.” He looked at Max. “Someone is going to have to find out for sure what is happening to the captured Shifters.”

And that someone was Max. “Don’t suppose you have the location of the local cryogenics operation?”

Carl reached into his pocket and slipped a piece of paper to Max under the table. “This is strictly confidential. You understand that if you decide to pursue this, and something goes wrong, I can’t protect you.”

“I know.” Max checked with Seneca and found her staring at Carl.

She tapped her fingers on the table. “Carl Hannaford. I thought you looked familiar. Associate director for operations.”

He nodded. “Yes.”

“You’ve been in that office for over ten years,” she said.

They all knew what she was getting at. The Shifters had only been here two years.

Carl said, “Mr. Hannaford had a bad heart.”

Her expression was pensive, but Max had a good idea what she was thinking—Shifters were taking over. At this rate, he was definitely going to be working alone.

“You’re on the Committee that oversees the XCEL operations,” she said.

“That’s correct.”

“Our field office director was replaced by a Shifter,” she said slowly. “We killed the replacement and our deputy has assumed control of the agency. But we could use your help.”

Max nearly choked.

Carl smacked him on the back and asked Seneca, “What are you looking for?”

She leaned closer. “The Committee hasn’t been informed of the current situation—our missing director, Hager, Skinman—and we’d like to keep it that way for a while longer so we can find and neutralize Hager.”

Carl nodded. “I’ll do what I can.”

“Thank you,” she said and looked at Max. “I have a plan.”

“Am I included in this plan?” Max asked.

She lifted an eyebrow. “Oh, yes. You are definitely included.”

“I’m not sure I’m liking this plan,” Apollo said as he sat in the driver’s seat of the delivery van.

“You liked it enough to volunteer,” Seneca replied.

“Seemed like a good idea until it occurred to me that I might not be too happy with what we find,” he grumbled.

It was hard not to like Apollo. Six hours ago, they had intercepted a delivery out of the alleged cryogenics lab. The original drivers had been kind enough to share their destination after Dempsey “talked” to them. Four hours ago, they’d geared up and recruited Apollo to help complete the delivery. He’d used the driver’s saliva to get his DNA and finished replicating his face and hair fifteen minutes ago. Now they were heading into what could prove to be a very bad situation. And he didn’t
have
to do it.