All Things Wicked (25 page)

He fought it back, struggled to see past the images assailing his mind. The room blurred, overlaying pictures crashing together. Sweat stung his eyes.

—
pull on the chains that bind her flesh to hands in the dark. He watches from the fringes—

“Caleb!” Jessie’s scream.

Juliet’s scream.

So much screaming.

—
and a cross burns bright as day behind him, shadowing his face, but his eyes. Gold then red. Eyes as radiant as the fires of hell—

Long fingers curled around his neck. Caleb choked, managed to grab Tobias’s wrists. The man grimaced, his features a snarling rictus of pain, and Caleb’s skin crawled. His nerves peeled back, scathing inch by inch, as magic sizzled between them.

Around them.

And still Juliet screamed. It wasn’t like anything he’d ever heard before; as if her power hijacked her voice and filled the room with it. His head pounded, a skull-caving rhythm that he saw reflected in Tobias’s wild eyes.

He wrenched at the man’s hands. Magic flared, a spark to gasoline, and suddenly, there was nothing but hot air and clinging static. Tobias’s hands locked into his shirt, eyes wild, mouth distorted.

—and the mountain moves beneath her—

“Get down!” roared a masculine voice that fell flat inside the cacophony of Caleb’s head.

—
as each leg and finger and rotting limb twitches, an earthquake of human flesh—

Magic slammed into him like a tank, a bullet; the impact swept him off his feet, sent him careening through the air like so much trash and broken meat. Every muscle in his body twanged, screamed in unison as he collided with a far wall and slid bonelessly to the floor.

—
and she starts to sink into it, swallowed by glistening, grasping hands of the putrid dead—

“No,” he groaned, clawing at his eyes. Struggling to rip the cobwebs of magic from his mind. “Juliet . . . Juliet!”

—
until another hand—this one pink and living and warm—seizes the queen’s in a living grip. The woman stands atop the shaking mound of death and decay, her blond hair streaming down her back, and strains with all her might to keep the queen from sinking—

Gunshots fractured through the chamber, echoed and reechoed until it became a single, thunderous sound.

—
and she glares over her shoulder, green eyes brilliant with unshed tears. “Damn you, Caleb Leigh,” Delia says tightly—

Red lights pulsed on, shattering the fitful flicker of half-shattered fluorescent lights.

Save my sister!
The whisper was barely a breath of sound, a ghostly murmur in the fringes of his awareness.

And suddenly, the magic was gone. The voices ceased. As if a steel door swung shut behind him, utter silence settled into place.

Caleb found himself splayed against the wall, his shoulders propped awkwardly with his legs twisted out in front of him.

He blinked hard.

Red lights flicked on, flicked off. Again, over and over. An alarm. Something was buzzing; not his head, he realized. A comm.

Silas stared down the barrel of a gun, shoulders hunched around a bloodstain still spreading over his chest. Ashen, but upright.

The barrel smoked faintly.

On the floor beneath it, Mrs. Parrish lay in a pool of blood. Her thin throat worked, eyes wide and surprised, owlish without her spectacles. Her chest shuddered as she reached out a bloody, trembling hand. “The . . .” She sucked in a breath. It rattled. “The doctor . . . is . . .
a hero
,” she wheezed.

Mouth set into a grim line, Silas pulled the trigger.

It clicked.

Mrs. Parrish laughed. And fell silent, head sinking back to the ground with a final, heavy thud.

The comm in Silas’s other hand buzzed again.

Caleb pushed himself upright, clambering to his knees. Juliet. Where was Juliet?

“What?” Silas rasped into the comm.

The voice filling the red-lit silence was tight and worried. “Get the hell out of there,” Naomi ordered. “Alarms are exploding from hell to topside.”

Silas spun. “Jessie!”

Caleb dragged himself to his feet, locking his knees. His chest hurt; his throat felt too dry, aching. He couldn’t take the time to catalog his bruises. “Juliet?”

Silas jerked around, hesitated.

Swayed. “Over there,” he managed, and yelled again. “Sunshine, God damn it!”

“Here!”

His sister was alive. And sounded strong; it was all he needed. Caleb sprinted across the floor, gaze pinned on the sprawled silhouette in the far shadows. As he got closer, he saw Juliet’s hands twisted in her hair. Her cheek pressed against the floor.

So still.

Was she breathing?

Caleb sank to his knees beside her. Hands shaking, he slid his fingers over her sides. Gently rolled her over.

Her head lolled, black lashes shadowing her cheeks.

“Oh, shit,” he whispered. “Come on, Jules. Come on, honey, don’t do this.”

Pressing two fingers to her neck, Caleb prayed harder than he’d ever prayed in his life. For her to be alive. For her to be all right.

He’d promised.

Please, God.

As his chest tightened, a vise of something raw and wordless and so black it hurt to breathe in, Caleb lowered his head. Touched her lips with his. “Please, Jules,” he breathed against her mouth. “Don’t leave.”

Jesus Christ, don’t leave him alone. Alive.

Oh, Caleb. Thank you.

A sigh, a murmur, and Caleb closed his eyes as something . . . changed. As if a curtain parted, something heavy lightened.

Juliet’s pulse knocked faintly under his fingertips.

Suddenly, he could breathe again.

“Get
out
of there!” Naomi shouted through the comm, her voice tense.

The red light drilled holes through his head as he gathered Juliet’s listless body into his arms. “I’ve got her.” The lab flung his voice back at him, overwhelmed only as Silas roared, “Jessie, we need to go!”

“Give me just a second.” Jessie’s voice, exhausted to the bone, meshed with a clatter of keys. Caleb looked up, found her standing behind the computer. Her fingers flew over the keyboard, lightning quick. “I’m downloading—”

“Now, woman!”

“Almost got it.”

“They aren’t going to come with sirens,” Silas said as he awkwardly refilled the clip in his gun. “They’ll come quietly and ready to kill. This shit’s way bigger than anything—”

“Debrief later.” The comm clipped to his belt crackled as frequencies collided. “Fuck, shit, shitfuck, son of a bitch. They’re closing in hard and fast, go!”

“Got it!” Jessie pulled a small black cartridge from somewhere on the computer bank and sprinted toward Silas. She was still so pale, almost yellow with the effort it was taking her to remain standing. Lucid. She slipped an arm around Silas’s waist. “We’re coming, Nai, and we got injured.”

“I’ll meet you at the pickup.” The comm clicked off.

Caleb made it to the door on legs that were too damned unsteady. He didn’t want Juliet to wake up and see the spray of blood and pulpy flesh that was all that remained of Tobias. To see Mrs. Parrish’s frail, old corpse.

She’d have enough to worry about without knowing everything he’d only just figured out.

“We’ll meet Naomi at the boat,” Silas was saying between his teeth, features ashen, and leaning more heavily on Jessie than Caleb knew he’d ever want to.

Caleb nodded tersely.

“She’ll get us through— Jesus Christ, where’s the back way out?”

“This way,” Jessie said, pushing past a half-fallen slab of concrete wall. “Is Juliet—”

“She’ll be fine,” Caleb replied as he held her close to his chest. He ducked through the hole, sheltering her with his body.

“She’ll be awake, anyway,” Jessie suggested, her gaze intent on the room they stepped into. “Oh, shit.”

Silas grunted. “Fuck me.”

The room was only faintly lit, remnants of electricity making it through shredded wiring. More of the storage tanks took up one wall, while a bank of small, six-by-six-by-six containment chambers ran wall to wall. Doors hung open, glass long since shattered.

As Jessie pushed through the darkened room, Silas’s pained breath overloud in the tomblike silence, they left smudged footprints in the soot blackening the metal floor.

The carnage, remains of a fire now smudged with dust and time, was impossible to miss.

Caleb cradled Juliet, her head tucked under his chin, and stared at the tanks at the far wall. Incubators, he realized. Tiny little prisons for infants born from a test-tube mash-up of genetics.

Juliet’s prison.

“I . . . remember something like this. When I dream.” Jessie hesitated, shaking her head. Her eyes so damned haunted, Caleb could hardly stand it. Silas’s grip tightened across her shoulders, and they firmed. “We need to get out of here.”

Caleb shot her a hard glance. “Jess?”

“Now,” she told him. “Hurry.”

They strode past the cells, the wide observation windows long since shattered. Left black footprints as they found a hall beyond and followed it hurriedly to a set of double doors. The chain sealing them closed was unbreakable, but the hinges at each side no longer held up.

Caleb slammed a kick to the metal panes, twice, three times, until they gave way with a loud screech and pop.

Blessed air swept over the group, and Caleb inhaled gratefully. City and rain; acid and refuse and thousands of bodies crammed behind protective walls.

Even as much as he hated it, it was better than the stale miasma of death filling the building behind them.

Gripping Silas’s side tightly, Jessie scanned the darkness beyond the empty lot. “They’re coming in from three quarters.” Her mouth quirked. “The fourth team got waylaid by squatters. Go.”

Caleb followed her lead. She could
see
, after all.

And as he held Juliet close, he realized wearily that his sister—the second woman he’d do anything to protect—had always been able to see so much more clearly than he ever could.

Too little, too late.

Picture a teacup.

His grip tightened on Juliet’s warm body.

They were still going to die.

Chapter Twenty-Two

F
ailure. Mission Director Parker Adams didn’t like the word. Failure meant someone, somewhere, didn’t do their job right. Which came down, simply, to the fact that
she
was the one who failed.

She stalked down the hallway, heels clicking on the scarred floor, shoulders ramrod straight. She knew every eye in the office would be at attention and on her until she was out of sight; expected it, after the reprimand she’d lashed them to the bone with.

If any of them still had skin, they weren’t going to give her another reason to strip it.

Two teams.
Two
freaking teams had answered the Church’s alarm, and both had come back empty. No clues. No suspects. Nothing but reports of Church operatives they’d never heard of before and a burning building.

The fire brigade had contained the worst of the blaze, but Parker wasn’t as concerned about the fire brigade.

Where had she gone wrong?

The report Jonas had sent her had pointed to the very same address the alarms had originated. Evidence of
anything
was scarce enough that Parker suspected either something highly illegal or—as it was the Holy Order of St. Dominic they were talking about—highly political. Which meant top secret.

Which meant something better than Sector Five clearance.

Every motion rigidly leashed to icy control, Parker pushed open the office door.

And froze.

Simon Wells perched on the desk, the defined muscles of his back gleaming in shades of gold and crimson. His dark hair fell over his eyes as he struggled to reach the lurid hole leaking sluggishly down his lower back.

Her eyes narrowed, even as bile rose in the back of her throat.

Don’t be sick.
Blood was part of the business.

“Why the hell,” she asked with deliberate, frozen calm, “aren’t you at the infirmary?”

He barely afforded her a glance over his shoulder. His eyes were dark. Empty aside from the pain filling them. Still, he smiled lazily. “Don’t like needles.”

It came out much too awkwardly for Parker to assume he was all right.

She turned, opening her mouth to call for medical aid.

“Please, Mission Director.”

She hesitated.

“Just need . . . to get patched up, that’s all.”

Parker turned slowly, her palms damp as she braced them at her hips. Her suit was black today, austere and authoritative. And a color that wouldn’t show sweat as she surreptitiously wiped her hands on the fabric.

Simon Wells watched her, his rangy body half turned. He held out a clean white square, marred only by a bloody thumbprint on one side. “I could use your help,” he said quietly.

Oh, no. Oh, please, not this.
Her stomach fluttered with sudden butterflies.

The man looked like hell. A bullet hole decorated the front and back of one side, blood dried to flaky stains where his own sweat hadn’t kept it moist and brilliant red. His cheek was split, and the waistband of his jeans was almost black with the amount of blood he’d lost.

He wavered, and Parker shut the door, crossing the small office to grab his shoulder before he fell off the desk.

“Fine,” she said, summoning up as much asperity as she could. “But I want a report while I clean this up.”

Again, that easy smile shaped his mouth.

It didn’t, Parker noticed as she took the bandage from his hand, reach his eyes.

“You’re a good woman, boss,” he said, turning again so she could reach the torn, gleaming flesh in his lower back.

She stared at it for a long moment before gently, cautiously, she began wiping at the blood surrounding it. More trickled out, slow and thin. “Now,” she added, just in case he’d missed the command inherent in the statement.

“Don’t have much to say,” Wells said. Pain thickened his voice. “Went down on a Holy Order mission with Tobias and got shot. Don’t remember much after.”

“What mission?”

His broad shoulders rippled with muscle as he shrugged, only, to hunch again. “Shit,” he muttered.

“Don’t move,” she ordered. Gently, she applied the square of woven fabric to the hole and pushed. Hard.

His breath slammed out from between his suddenly clenched teeth.

Hers lodged in her throat as she forced herself to brace her free hand on the warm, solid muscles of his back. “What does the entry wound look like?”

Lucky for her, she sounded normal. And he couldn’t see her face.

“Could reach that fine,” he replied, gritting it out. “You’re a saint.”

“Not hardly. Give me another piece.” She took the square he handed her and very carefully peeled the blood-soaked one off his back. Quickly, she covered it again, forcing another swiftly indrawn breath from the agent. “Where is Mr. Nelson now?”

“Dead,” he told her, so matter-of-factly that she blinked at the back of his head.

He was filthy. Clammy and bloody, stained by dirt and whatever else he’d been up to without her knowledge. Or consent. The ends of his hair dripped rivulets down the skin of his back, and she watched one slide past her hand. Past the wound.

“And your mission?” she asked again.

“Can’t say,” he replied. “But it’s over.”

“Over?”

“I’m a free agent, now.” His head drooped, and Parker was forced to brace her legs, splaying her free hand at his shoulder before he slid away from her. “Parrish’s department is gonna . . . gonna take some time to reboot. Got no one t’answer to.”

Silently, Parker reached for the medical tape by his hip. Using her fingernails and teeth, she tore strips long enough to secure the bandage in place. Her clean, soft hands looked almost obscene against the bloody mess of his warrior’s body.

But that’s why she was the director.

And he the missionary.

“That should hold until you get it stitched,” she said, her voice suddenly too loud in the strained silence of the office. She stepped away, but didn’t remove her supporting hand until she was sure he wouldn’t fall.

He gripped the edge of the desk, his arms bulging as he carefully leveraged himself to the floor. When he turned again, nothing but simple gratitude shaped the angles of his face. Not even pain.

The man was good.

“Thank you,” he told her simply. “Sorry ’bout the mess.”

He wasn’t out of danger yet. The faintly too-thick way he was talking told Parker he was still suffering from blood loss. She reached for the comm clipped at her waist even as she ordered, “Go to the infirmary. I’ll have Rosario meet you—”

“Already said,” Wells cut in as he turned for the door. He grabbed the bloodied T-shirt he’d slung over one chair and crossed the office on mostly steady legs. At least he wouldn’t keel over.

Yet.

“Then,” Parker said, annoyed, “go to the mess hall and drink something.” The look he shot her over his shoulder as he thrust his arms into the T-shirt sleeves forced her to add, “Something nonalcoholic. That’s an order.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He pulled the T-shirt over his head and Parker forced herself not to flinch as the pattern of blood decorating the stretched fabric became jarringly obvious. The white bandage peeked through the hole left behind.

What the hell had happened?

“Agent Wells.”

He stopped in the doorframe, hand on the doorknob, half turning to raise a dark eyebrow at her.

“You are under no means,” she said, every syllable etched in glacial emphasis, “a free agent. I expect you fit and ready for duty as soon as possible.”

His lips twitched. “Yes, ma’am,” he said again, and closed the door behind him.

Parker glanced at the wads of bloody cloth left behind, at the faded imprint of a crimson handprint smudged on the corner of the desk.

And the docket folder left on the chair. Operation Wayward Rose.

Thoughtfully, she picked up the folder and studied the surface. Everything Jonas had been able to find, which wasn’t as much as she’d hoped, was in this folder. Everything on Juliet Carpenter.

Everything she’d been able to compile even without Mrs. Parrish’s order to do so.

Slowly, she ran her thumb along the flap’s neat crease. And the faint trace of blood left behind.

The comm at her waist buzzed. Without looking away from the bloody evidence, she fit the earpiece to her ear. “Mission Director Adams.”

“It’s Jonas, ma’am.”

“What is it?”

The man sighed. “News for you regarding Operation Wayward Rose.”

“I’m listening.” She didn’t sit. She didn’t move the discarded bandages from their surreal spot across her desk. She simply studied the folder, and listened as Jonas filled her in.

“I sent in the routine report through the usual channels—”

“Which I have in my hands.”

“Yes, ma’am. Well, I got notice back from, uh . . .” He hesitated. “Not you.”

Jumped. Again. Parker’s grip tightened on the folder. “Who?”

“Classified. The electronic signature’s from the mainframe, though.”

Damn it. “And?”

“All activity regarding Operation Wayward Rose is to cease immediately,” Jonas told her. “All of the Mission’s data is to be sealed and passed to Sector Three.”

She clenched her teeth before she said something rude in front of her agent.

“I’m under orders to destroy all backups, ma’am,” he added apologetically.

Parker scowled, mind working rapidly. “Fine. Do so.”

“Yes, ma’am.” A beat. “Ah, the folder I sent—”

“I shall have it to you within the hour,” Parker said. “You may be assured that you will have
all
currently existing copies, do you understand?”

Another pause. Then, “Yes, ma’am. I’ll begin the data demolition immediately.”

Parker clicked off the comm, raising her eyes to the window separating her office from the busy cubicles now less manned than before.

Most of the agents had gone out to find something useful to do, she knew. Only those who rarely left their terminals remained, and they studiously avoided looking in her direction.

She sighed.

They heard her coming down the hallway, she was sure of it. All remaining eyes lifted to her as she cleared her throat. “Operation Wayward Rose is now ended,” she said. “All data is to be compiled into one drive, sent to Agent Stone, and existing data destroyed. As of this moment, this operation is classified. Am I clear?”

A chorus of “Yes, ma’am!” in various stages of irritation and relief almost made her smile.

Almost.

“Agent Eckhart, I want an updated status on Ghostwatch,” she continued. The balding man nodded once and bent over his terminal. “Send Mr. Neely to me as soon as he arrives.”

“Ma’am,” Eckhart acknowledged.

“I’ll be back in the topside offices within the hour,” Parker continued, daring anyone to bat even a flicker of a relieved eyelash. “I expect future operations to end with no less than complete success, am I once more clear?”

“Yes, ma’am!” replied the small crowd.

She nodded. And without another word, leaving Wells’s mess behind and tucking the docket firmly under her arm, she strode for the elevator. Once inside, she touched the communication button and said, “Bring the car around. We’re returning topside.”

“Yes, Mission Director,” said a tinny, masculine voice.

Parker glanced down at the folder under her arm.

Politics. Not on her watch.