Kadan frowned, trapping her injured hand beneath his. Her nervous plucking at the sheet was making him want to drag her into his arms and rock her. He needed to stay cool and think. “Have you heard of dreamwalking?”
Tansy sat up. When she did so, Kadan caught her waist and moved her up into a more comfortable position. She didn’t protest his help, although her leg didn’t hurt that much. She knew, on some level, that he needed to help her, to feel as if he was doing something for her. “I’ve heard rumors of the talent, but I don’t understand it and I certainly can’t do it.”
“One of the members of our team, Jeff Hollister, is a major talent when it comes to dreamwalking. It’s dangerous. If you’re killed in the dream, or caught there, you can’t get back to your body and it eventually dies. I think it’s a very rare talent, but then so is being an elite tracker. We have to face the fact that there’s every possibility that the puppet master is a dreamwalker. Nico can also dreamwalk, but he claims Jeff is far stronger.”
“How does it work?” Now she was even more frightened. Her fingers tangled with his and clung. “Can he get to me?”
“Maybe, but we’ve got Nico and I’ll get Jeff to come on board. He had a stroke some time back, but he’s recovered and has wanted to go on a mission. This might suit him.”
“I don’t understand.”
“They can protect you while you’re sleeping, maybe even kill him if we set it up right.”
“In the meantime, going to sleep isn’t a good idea?”
“Let me talk to Jeff and find out what he thinks. Do you need help getting up?”
She tugged at his hand as he stood. “Thank you for believing me. I could be wrong, but I don’t think I am.”
“I hope you are, baby, but I’d rather be prepared if you’re not.” He lifted her off the bed in one easy movement.
“What are you doing?”
“Carrying you to the bathroom so you don’t have to walk on that leg.”
“No you’re not. I’m fine. Really. I’ll get dressed and make breakfast, and then we’ll try to see what we can find out about the West Coast team. If we’re lucky, we can pick up impressions on how the game works and what the stakes are, along with identifying the killers.”
“Lily, Rye’s wife, and Flame, Gator’s wife, are researching the East Coast suspects. It shouldn’t be difficult to identify members of teams who took the psych test and served together. If they have a history, and they used those nicknames in the service, then even if they are out now, we’ll find them.”
“Put me down.” She wasn’t going in the bathroom with him.
Kadan set her down reluctantly, allowing her body to slide against his, hands skimming down her sides to hold her hips against him. He rested his forehead against hers. “Be sure, Tansy. I don’t want to find you on the floor.”
“I’m sure.” She was even more certain she needed a shower and actual clothes to face the other GhostWalkers after screaming her guts out. “Go make sure my father’s okay.”
“Don’t lock the door.”
“I have no doubt if I did and I fell, you’d have no problems breaking it down,” she said, teasing him.
Kadan wasn’t certain he was in the right frame of mind to be teased, but he managed a faint smile as she closed the door in his face.
“She all right?” Ryland greeted, snapping closed his cell phone as Kadan entered the room.
“Yes. I want to get in touch with Jeff. We may need him. How’s he doing?”
“He’s strengthened his right side, that was the damaged side, and he’s walking now. The right leg was unresponsive for a long time. He’s working out daily, sometimes too much. The tremors stopped in his hand and he’s no longer numb in his face. Lily thinks his right leg will always be a little weak, but his talents are stronger than ever. He’s had more time than any of us to practice, and Lily was particularly hard on him, working him as much as possible on exercises to keep him from seizing when he uses psychic ability.”
“If I needed him for dreamwalking, do you think he’s up to it?”
“I’ll double-check with Lily, but we’re not going to keep him on the sidelines much longer. You know Jeff, he’s a kamikaze, high IQ, needs a lot of stimulation. He’s thrown himself into his recovery, but he wants action.”
“Talk to Lily then. What did Tucker say?”
“Says all quiet, but if you’re worried, they can bring in Sam.”
Kadan frowned. “Not yet. Let’s see how things play out today. She’s going to try to lift impressions from a couple more pieces.”
“You’re not happy about it.”
“No, it’s dangerous. I might not be able to pull her back if the impressions are too strong. And we’ve got an enemy we can’t identify trying to track her. He knows who she is thanks to the news story. He’s smart, this guy. And he’s patient. He flies under the radar.”
“Is he working for Whitney?”
Kadan shook his head. “It doesn’t feel right to me, and Tansy picked up that he had worked for Whitney sometime in the past. She thinks there’s the possibility that he ran the psych testing for the candidates for the GhostWalker program. Can Lily access those files and get us names?”
“She’ll try. It’s much more difficult. We’re using a back door into Whitney’s computer as well as searching the computers he left behind, but most of those records were destroyed when the GhostWalker program was supposedly disbanded. No one wanted the news to get out that the government’s top scientist, still working for them, experimented on children that he bought and sold. We now know there were more girls than the ones he held at his home. This experiment has been ongoing for too many years, and you and I both know others had to have known about it.”
Kadan led the way to the kitchen. Nico had brought in groceries earlier, so there was coffee made. He set about making breakfast. Tansy wasn’t going to be standing on her leg, and she sure as hell wasn’t serving breakfast to everyone before she handled the game pieces. Ryland pitched in and helped him, and by the time the others came in, breakfast was ready.
Tansy came in, limping a little, very pale, her eyes taking up most of her face, but the fragrance of cinnamon and sin drifted through the air. She was barefoot, wore no makeup, and her mouth was devoid of lipstick. She wore a soft pair of sweats and a thin tank that hugged her breasts, and Kadan thought she was the most beautiful, sexy woman he’d ever seen. He went to her immediately, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her against him, inhaling her scent while he dropped a kiss on her upturned mouth.
You smell great.
He couldn’t say it out loud, not in front of everyone, and he couldn’t stop himself from running his finger down the length of her arm, taking in her soft skin. Aloud he said, “Your father is fine.”
She looked up at him and smiled. “Thanks.”
He craved that look in her eyes. Soft. Loving. Reserved only for him. His hands found her hips and slid upward, shaping her body. She didn’t even flinch as his palms caressed her tucked-in waist through the tank, found her narrow rib cage, and went up the sides of her breasts. She wasn’t wearing a bra, and he resisted cupping the soft weight, but he couldn’t resist teasing her.
No stripping you naked on the kitchen table and having my way with you?
She nibbled on her lower lip, her gaze holding his boldly.
You’ll probably have to wait on that one until we’re alone.
The way her eyes ran over him, touching on the bulge growing in the front of his jeans, had him grinning like a fool—and he rarely grinned.
“Sit the hell down,” Ryland growled. “The two of you are killing us.”
Kadan pulled out her chair for her, waiting for her to adjust her leg for comfort before sliding into the seat next to her.
“I appreciate all of you for what you did for me last night,” Tansy said. “I had no idea those men could find me, and I’m very ashamed of my father for the part he’s played putting your lives in jeopardy. Believe me, if I could find a way to repay you . . .”
“You have,” Ryland said gruffly.
“I have?”
Gator winked at her. “Yes, ma’am. That goofy look on Kadan’s face is worth all the bullets in the world.” He leaned across the table toward Kadan and sniffed. “And he sure does smell pretty now.”
Kadan hooked his foot around the leg of Gator’s chair and jerked, dumping him unceremoniously on the floor.
“Kadan’s family. That makes you family,” Nico said solemnly, as if nothing had happened. He didn’t even glance down at Gator, who sat on the floor, laughing.
“I see,” Tansy said.
Kadan dropped his hand beneath the table to her thigh.
Does it hurt?
She shook her head.
My hand hurts more.
He immediately took her hand and turned it over to examine the palm. “Take a look at this, Nico. When she took the gloves off, the ivory piece branded into her skin, although it’s not a burn. I tried opening her hand to get her to drop the thing, but not even using pressure points helped. I hit her hand on the table edge. Do you think it’s broken?”
Tansy attempted to pull her hand away, but Kadan tightened his grip. The men crowded around, looking at the impression of the knife embedded in her palm. Nico turned her hand around and murmured to her to open and close her fingers.
“Her hand’s not broken, Kadan, and the impression is fading. How does your talent work, Tansy?”
Again she tugged at her hand, but Kadan kept possession of it, although he did lower her arm, taking her hand beneath the table, out of sight. His fingers brushed back and forth over her palm in long, slow caresses where no one could see.
“I’m not certain. I’ve had the ability as long as I can remember. I touch something, and I can sense the impressions left behind by anyone who has touched it before me. If it’s strong energy, such as violence, the impressions are equally as strong. It’s rather like always being in on private conversations.”
“So you wear gloves most of the time?”
She nodded. “Always. I don’t wear them when I’m camping up in the mountains, but as a rule, unless I want to stumble onto someone’s secrets, I’m careful.”
“I’m shielding for her,” Kadan said. “Which is why she’s able to be okay here with all of you and in this house.” His fingers continued to stroke her injured hand beneath the table.
“We really should get started,” she said.
Kadan sighed. She was right. If he was going to eliminate both teams quickly, he needed this information. “Let’s do it then.”
“I’ll clean up,” Gator said.
“I’m going to button down the house and set up a couple of escape routes just to be safe.” Nico shoved back his chair.
“That leaves me to talk to the ladies about what they can give us on your suspects,” Ryland added.
Kadan appreciated his friends’ discretion. It was difficult enough to watch Tansy suffer while she worked, but he also knew her inevitable reaction embarrassed her. She didn’t want to try tracking in front of an audience. He held her hand as they went into the bedroom where he’d set up the pieces. He’d placed the four pieces side by side on the dresser.
“Sit. I don’t want you screwing up your hip.”
She nodded, almost without hearing him. Her gaze was already fixed on the small, perfectly detailed bull. He kept his mind in hers, wanting to understand what she was doing so he’d have a better chance of helping her when she needed him. She was already half-gone from him, tuning everything out around her but the object that she was going to handle. She pulled on the gloves almost absently, not even glancing at him.
There was only Tansy and the ivory game piece and the information it would yield. Her breathing changed first. Kadan watched Tansy’s face rather than her hands. He knew the moment she picked up the ivory bull with her gloved hands. The jolt of violent energy was strong. He felt it blast through her mind to encompass his. Along with the violence was a sexual energy that didn’t surprise him. Tansy’s record of tracking was 100 percent, and if she thought a piece represented the highly sexual nature of the owner, he believed her.
“He’s very involved in the rodeo. He likes the power of the bull and craves it for himself. He enjoys his prowess with women. His buddies want the details, and he tries to top his record of several women in one day, all begging for his attentions. He often has a couple of women at the same time. He enjoys that he can get them to do anything he wants more than he actually enjoys the sexual act. He’s a total adrenaline junkie, needing the high all the time. The murder doesn’t give him his fix, but the idea of getting away with it, the planning, carrying out, and walking away clean—that’s the rush for him. The more public, the greater the risk, the better the high.”
Her eyes deepened in color, going from blue to violet. He could see the silvery lines begin to form in them, and his belly hardened into tight fist-size knots. She moved farther and farther away from him along the thread of the cowboy, where he couldn’t really follow. He could see blurring images, coming and going fast, but his mind’s eye couldn’t grasp them. He could only pick up the impressions from her.
“This was a chance to pull ahead of Team One. The idiot Stallion couldn’t keep it in his pants and lost points for the other team. If he could pull this off, they’d surge ahead. The target was everything they could possibly want. High-profile. In public. The method was up to him, just get the job done. His kind of scenario. The thrill of walking into the courthouse with cameras everywhere and chatting with his target had been amazing. Hell, he nearly came in his jeans. Bodyguards everywhere. Stupid rent-a-cop mentality. Maybe for fun he’d take a couple of them out as well, but he had to make certain it all went down exactly as instructed, making sure the correct targets were taken.”
Tansy swallowed hard and forced herself to slow down, to try to make sense of what she was seeing and feeling. “He wants to do the murder publicly; it’s almost a euphoric feeling, very sexual, although sex has nothing to do with the crime, even if his target happens to be a woman. He isn’t at all like Stallion, where the murder is all about raping and dominating a woman. It’s the thrill all the way with this one.”
She took another breath, let it out, and slipped deeper into her hypnotic state. Kadan could see the silver spreading through the violet, so that her eyes began to shimmer. “You loved being in the military and didn’t want to leave. Why did you then? You hide your true nature so well. Why? You were forced to leave or you would have stayed on forever. You could do whatever you wanted and not get caught. Oh God.”