Knock, knock... (38 page)

If he meant all that his pictures said he did. If he
was
true to his passion.

Then he'd be true to her.

But she knew, first he had to be true to himself.

"Tell me."

Shay kept her eyes closed. She felt his energy surge toward her, wrapping around her, caressing her shoulders, her hips, her head. Light gentle strokes caressed and soothed even as they whispered through on a promise.

She needed to hear the words.

He needed to voice them.

"Tell me," she whispered, keeping her voice soft and delicate, yet offering him hope and a future together like none other.

He lowered his head to rest his forehead on hers. She opened her eyes to see him close his. An almost imperceptible shudder worked down his body and his shoulders lowered and relaxed. She sensed his energy sink deep into her own, blending and melding to join with hers, as one.

As calm and sure as she'd ever heard his voice, his words came as a benediction. Releasing her from her prison and giving her the strength to fly free.

She let her heart energy cross the small divide to crawl into his heart chakra and curl up inside.

So quiet, more impression than sound, he whispered, "I love you."

***

Wednesday, at dawn…

Ronin loved working the night shift. Although it was closer to breakfast time, there was something magical about the city at dawn. That more crimes were committed, and there were more predators to hunt at night made his working life that much more interesting. He understood the predator mindset and he did some of his best police work at night.

His twin brother Roman often did his best work at night too. Even growing up, Roman could be found, well after bedtime, with a pencil scribbling over every square inch of his textbooks. He'd gotten hell for that many times.

Instead of art, Ronin had music in his soul. He played the trumpet and favored jazz. That both brothers had gone into law enforcement said much about who they were as men, but having a creative outlet meant they survived the rigors of the brutal world they worked in better than many others.

He had worried about his brother for years. After that bullet, Roman could have taken a desk job. Instead he'd walked away and set up his own company. And he had proved to be damn good at it. Ronin had used his services many times.

He knew that while Roman checked over Shay's site and said that there'd been nothing obviously amiss, he'd also worried that the door to the office was essentially one any two-bit burglar could break if they wanted to get inside. That just meant they couldn't narrow the field at all that way.

And Roman had gone a step further with the new security system he'd ordered for Shay's apartment
and
her office. Last Ronin heard, they were both still arguing over who would get to pay.

There were many people involved in the Foundation. Any one of them could access the information needed to identify people associated with it. But none of that explained how these people had been killed recently. He understood about the energy – well as much as any non-psychic could – but, like Stefan said, the person doing this could be anyone, anywhere and have skills they hadn’t run across before.

And how scary was that?

He didn't understand Stefan's explanation about Tabitha hiding on the ethers. Like who could?

Ronin had spoken to several of Stefan's friends about other cases involving psychic criminals, trying to get a handle on how they dealt with these sorts of things, but the information wasn't helpful. Some had been enlightening in the scope of the crimes and the people who committed them, but it didn't shed light on Shay's issue right now.

His brother was playing watchdog, and Ronin knew it would take a tank to pry him away from Shay's side. Good thing; as it seemed her attacker could appear and disappear at will. He needed to brush up on his skills if criminals were taking to the ethers.

Just then his email signaled a new message. He clicked on the link and bent his head to read.

Finally.
They’d found Darren's twin. He read, then reread the message.
Shit
.

He reached for the phone.

"Stefan," he began, "I found Darren's twin. He's in Seattle. In the morgue. He was a John Doe and has only been recently identified. Cause of death...as far as they can tell, heart attack. He's been there for a year."

Silence.

"Stefan?"

"I'm here." Fatigue whispered through the phone line. "I didn't see that coming."

"No one did. And if he isn't the one causing all this havoc, who the hell is?"

"I don't know, but we have to find out, and fast. There's an edge of instability here. I don't like it. In fact, I'm working at the children's hospital right now. Trying to strengthen the walls. Just in case."

"Is it working?" Ronin asked. He'd love to think something like that was doable, but he highly doubted it. He knew Shay's foundation had contributed heavily to the new wing at the hospital and that definitely made it and those who worked there, potential targets. He winced as he thought of the damage that could be done.

"I hope so. I'd planned to go home and rest, then do more tomorrow. Now I'm not so sure. It's one thing to have a villain you think you know, but it's quite another to have a nasty piece of work that is also aggressive and faceless. While we thought it was Darren's twin, I understood the potential capabilities of this person, now... Now, it's a whole new game."

Crap.
Ronin hung up the phone slowly. "A whole new ballgame? Why is nothing ever easy?"

He bent over his keyboard and got to work.

***

Enough was enough…

Too bad Darren was no longer here. They could play his favorite pastime. Murder. The hospital wasn't the best place for games. At least right now. It
was
however
,
the right place for real get-away-with-it murder. Everyone there was dying anyway. So who would notice one more?

And that was the pissy part of tonight. It had been too easy. The old woman hadn't even been scared. It's as if she’d waited for her maker to come. And if that didn't beat all.

The old woman had started praying as soon as the process had started. And how could she have known that her time had come? And not just praying, but almost chanting. Bizarre. There'd been nothing to it. The old woman had given up on life almost immediately. Almost grateful to end her existence.

Peaceful. As if she'd been happy to go. And damn, that wasn't the intention at all. The children's ward would have been better.

And it's not like the plan had been to take out the old woman. She'd just been the closest target to vent my anger after not being able to enter Shay's grandfather's room. The old woman had been the closest target.

But had Shay gotten the message? Not likely. It wasn't personal enough. She didn't know the old woman. She wouldn't care. She wouldn't suffer from the woman's death.

That was the whole purpose here. To make Shay suffer. To make her afraid, looking over her shoulder to see if anyone else she loved might die or when she would become the target.

There was no fun to this game if there wasn't pain caused to someone else. And fear.

Shay needed to be afraid…because she was going to get hers. And soon.

Or maybe not soon...

Maybe now...

S
tefan closed his phone and closed his eyes. Damn and double damn. At what point did life get simpler? When did the number of bad guys decline? He'd thought for sure they were dealing with Darren's brother, Danny. Had to be. It made perfect sense. But he'd been dead a year. A whole year. Had died around the same time as Darren. And of a heart attack. Like Darren, like the recent victims.

A coincidence?
Not.

Stefan knew he was missing something.

What?

There was a definite familiarity to the energy, and if it wasn't Darren's twin’s, then whose was it? A parent? A child? But then it would have to be a young child. And few children hated with the degree of intensity required to kill, and kill again.

Darren hadn't been old. Twenty-eight, maybe twenty-nine and he'd died a year ago. It's possible he'd fathered a child when he was as young as sixteen, but not likely. Still it
could
mean there might be an eleven- or twelve-year-old out there with his abilities. But it was unlikely a child that age would be a killer.

It wasn't impossible for the psychic skills to develop that young, but they usually showed up at puberty. Who knows with this family? But even if they did show earlier, the pattern was they didn't develop the required strength and endurance for several more years.

More likely the killer was a sibling or a parent.

Lissa, his ghost friend, appeared in front of him. Gone was the joyous soul he'd come to appreciate. Instead a sense of gravity, of sorrow, emanated from her. She never said a word. Just sat there.

Waiting. Hoping to help, but like him, not knowing what to do.

So like her sister Alex…

Sister?
Could Darren have a sister? Or another brother? Damn. He leaned forward and stared out into the dark night beyond his bedroom window. Was that it? Was there any chance there was
another
sibling? A sibling who might have had lost both their siblings at the same time. Was that possible? And if so, would that be enough to cause such a reaction? To compel him to extract revenge for the deaths of his brothers? Maybe all the family he had in the world.

Thanks, Lissa.

She smiled hopefully.
I didn't help, but if you have an idea of what to do – good.

Sometimes you don't have to do anything. Just being you, is great.
He smiled at his visitor even as his mind worried on the problem.

But why focus on connections to Shay?

Unless this person believed Shay was responsible. And the only way this person could know that is if they knew what happened that night?

And understood what had gone wrong.

In that case, were they after revenge? To kill Shay. Destroy her life. Or to make her lose what was important to her?

Anyone who knew Shay, knew people were more important to her than even her projects, but Darren had always had a major problem with Shay's projects. Shay had shared how much Darren complained when he thought she cared more about them than about him. He'd been right, but that's because he must have realized Shay's heart hadn't been engaged the way Darren wanted it to be.

Stefan had been able to see that. But Shay hadn't been willing to see it.

But what about the last victim, the elderly lady in the hospital? She hadn't been associated with one of Shay's projects. Who knew why that target had been chosen? So close to Pappy but not an attack against him.

Or was the old woman a target for any number of other reasons?

If the attacker had gone after the old woman out of rage, that meant their anger was unstable. The person unbalanced. When one focused on using negative energy long term it had the effect of destabilizing the energy at the core. That could be what happened. And it would make the attacker
very
dangerous.

But now what? What or who would this person target next? Stefan had already considered the children's ward. Was there another vulnerable spot? One that held more meaning for Shay? She’d funded thousands of projects over the last decade through the Foundation. She had many friends with only a few family members to target.

More of Shay's projects? More of Shay's family? Friends?

The field was pretty open.

Stefan?

He frowned, not recognizing the voice. Lissa had left, so it wasn't her. And this voice was so faint as to be hardly distinguishable.

Stefan? Help me. Something bizarre is going on here.

He shook his head, trying to clear it and focused on the voice.
Tabitha?

Yes! I had an ethereal visitor. When it couldn't get in my room it got pissed. Went down the hall. I followed, but it disappeared into the children's ward.

"Shit." Not there.
Please not there.
He hadn't finished reinforcing the shell. It took longer than a few hours. Could take days.

Help. I need help, Stefan!
Tabitha screamed.

He couldn't do this alone. He sent out a massive panicked call to anyone who could help and then he jumped free of his body.