New Regime (9 page)

She wasn’t cured during that too short night.

The berserker’s love didn’t make her forget her rape. His
touch wouldn’t make the vivid images suddenly stop attacking her brain.

But it was a start.

She called Ellis on her way into work. “Everything okay,
Ellie?”

He hesitated. “Why do you ask?”

She frowned and sped around a lumbering truck. “Ellie?”

“Everything is fine, Rune. I’m good.”

He didn’t sound good. “Are you at work?”

“Yes.”

“I’m on my way in. Talk to you in a few minutes.”

“Rune?”

“Yeah?”

Again, he hesitated. “Nothing.”

Dammit.
“I’m on my way, baby.”

“Okay.”

She was familiar with his voice when he was close to tears.
She didn’t know what was going on, but something sure as hell was.

“What’s wrong?” Lex asked. She’d decided to ride into work
with Rune instead of waiting for the twins, who were still eating breakfast
when Rune left the house.

“I’m not sure.”

Lex was quiet for a moment. “I don’t think Levi is going to
come back to us.”

“Yeah he will. I did. He will.”

“It’s different with Levi. He’s not as resilient as you are.
Humans are different than us, Rune. Something inside them is…” Lex paused, then
continued, her voice almost angry. “Fragile. We have to accept that.”

“Lex, Levi is one of the strongest humans I’ve ever met.
Both the twins are. They may be human but something inside them is very
special.”

“Magical. I know.”

“But?”

“They could have gone either way. They ended up…good. Kind.
Caring. But there was a time when the twins were not the men you know today.”

Rune found it suddenly hard to swallow. “Explain.”

Lex nodded. “I’ll try. The twins are two parts of a whole.
One of them contained something we’ll call
good,
and the other contained
something we’ll call evil. But they balanced each other out.”

“Until Karin Love began to nurture the evil,” Rune said.

“She made that evil grow like toxic weeds. My mother and her
slayers tortured those boys. Exposed them to every depravity, every disgusting,
hurtful thing they could think of. Forced them to hurt other people. And for a
while,” Lex whispered, “it seemed to be working.”

Rune shook her head. “What happened?”

“
I
happened,” Lex said. “I did.”

She didn’t speak again for five minutes, lost in her
thoughts. Rune didn’t prompt her. She wasn’t eager to hear any more of the
torments Lex and the twins had endured.

“The twins saved me,” Lex said, finally, “and I saved them.
And that darkness within them, it faded. But it never really went away in one
of them, and I’m terrified it’s coming back.” She put her fingers to her lips
and cut off a sob before it could fully form.

“When I said one of them was good and one was evil, guess
which one of them was evil, Rune. Guess.”

“Fuck me.”

“Yeah.” Lex turned to Rune as they pulled into the Annex
parking lot. “Ellie can bring him out of this. I know he can. He has to try. If
he doesn’t hurry, Levi is going to be lost. And if Levi goes, so will Denim.
Rune,” Lex went on, when Rune remained silent. “So will
I.
”

Rune had known Levi was struggling, that he was faltering.
She’d hoped he’d pull himself out of it. But he wasn’t getting better. He was,
as Ellie had said, getting worse.

Getting darker.

“I’ll talk to Ellis,” she said. But what if even Ellis
couldn’t help him?

“Thank you,” Lex whispered.

“They’ll be okay, Lexi.” But she wasn’t so sure.

Lex clutched at Rune’s hand. “If love can’t save him, give
him another outlet. The way you did when you gave him Bach Horner on the
mountain.”

“Let’s go inside. It’s time to work.”

“You promised them you’d help them hunt and destroy
slayers,” Lex said. “You promised them. Denim told me.”

Rune gripped the steering wheel. “I did.”

“Then you fucking do it, Rune Alexander. If that’s what Levi
needs, you fucking keep your
promise.
”

Rune turned her head slowly to face Lex. “If Ellie can’t
help him, then I will. I will help him find and kill slayers if that’ll save
him, Lex. I swear.”

But even as she said it, she understood that helping Levi murder
COS members was not going to help bring him out of his darkness.

She’d be nurturing that evil, exactly as Karin Love had
done.

Lex went to join Raze and Jack, both standing at the end of
the hall, and Rune headed straight to Ellis’s office.

She needed a taste of sweetness, of innocence, of the pure
goodness that was her Ellie. She needed his love.

Not, perhaps, as much as Levi needed it, but she was going
to get a dose just the same.

He was sitting at his desk, his chin propped on his hand,
staring vacantly at his computer screen.

“Hey,” she said.

He jerked and then jumped to his feet. “Rune.”

She opened her arms as he ran to her, then caught him in a
hug that made her instantly relax. It grounded her, that hug.

Neither one of them said anything.

Rune saw a shadow from her peripheral as someone came to the
door. When she turned her head slightly and saw Gustav, he held his palms up
and slipped noiselessly away.

She felt Ellie sigh.

“I’ve been neglecting you,” she told him.

He pulled away to smile at her, a flinching in his eyes she
hadn’t seen since before she’d given him his protective necklace.

“Have lunch with me today.”

“Sure, baby. I’ll meet you here around eleven. Sound good?”

“Yes.” He stepped away from her. “That’ll be great.”

“I need to talk to you anyway. About Levi.”

He put his hand over his mouth and tears sprang immediately
to his eyes.

“Ellie.” She grasped his wrist and pulled his hand away.
“What the fuck is wrong?”

“I’m not perfect,” he murmured. “I’m not good.”

She shivered. “Ellie. What do you mean?”

“I—”

“I’m sorry, but we have to get to work. Elizabeth has sent
some runs to our computers,” Gustav said, standing in the doorway.

Ellis wiped briskly at his cheeks. “We’ll talk at lunch,” he
told Rune. He walked to his desk and sat down behind it.

Gustav sat as well, and after a brief look at Ellis, began
tapping at the keys on his keyboard. “Elizabeth wanted you to know they have a
team excavating the well you fell into.”

“She didn’t
fall
into it,” Ellis snapped. “She was
pushed.”

“My mistake,” Gustav said.

“Good,” Rune said, staring at Ellis. “Anything yet?”

“No.” Gustav tried so hard to look casual he was anything
but. “But she said she’d send an update to you as soon as they have something.”

“Fine. Where do you need us?” She was anxious to get to
work, and hoping more than a little bit for a battle or two to get her workday
started on a positive note.

“There are three things in need of immediate attention,”
Gustav said. “You can split your team however you want to.”

“She’s aware of that,” Ellis said.

“What,” Gustav said, “is your fucking problem?”

“Guys,” Rune said, spreading her hands. “Come on. Give me a
job, then you two can chat.”

“My problem is that you manipulated me,” Ellis said. “You
took advantage—”

“
I
took advantage!” Gustav snorted and swiveled his
chair to face Ellis. They seemed to have forgotten Rune was in the room. “You
wanted it as much as I did. I didn’t force you to fuck me.”

“No,” someone murmured, and all three of them turned to look
toward the door.

The twins stood there.

Levi’s face had lost all its color, and even Denim had
paled. His scar stood out in stark relief against the pallor, and Rune knew he
was feeling Levi’s pain.

“Fuck,” she whispered.

“Levi,” Ellis cried, and leaped to his feet. But when he
started to run to the twins, Denim was the one to halt him.

“Best not,” he said. “Keep him away, Rune.”

Levi smiled, and it was that smile, not Denim’s words, that
caused Rune to shoot out a hand and yank Ellis to her.

“Stay put, Ellie,” she said, when he struggled to escape her
grip.

Levi didn’t say a word, but he stared at Ellis with such
bright hatred that Rune had to fight not to shield Ellis from the force of it.

But then that hatred faded and there was nothing left in his
eyes but…

Nothing. Just nothing.

And finally, he turned and walked away, Denim at his back.

“Raze,” Rune said, her finger tightening on her gun’s
trigger. “Can you make them out? I’m going to a different position. My view is
impeded by a rock the size of a fucking house.”

Rune had sent floaters to one of the hills right outside
Wormwood. Eugene had offered them telescopes, and, surprisingly, his blessing.

“The second you see pikes, you call me,” she’d told them.

It’d taken most of the day, but finally, she’d gotten the
call.

“You’re not going to believe this.” Raze’s voice slid into
her ear, somehow comforting as she lay in the dirt, alone.

“What?”

“They’re with a group of slayers.”

Strad was speaking almost before Raze had finished his
sentence. “Stay where you are, Rune. I’ll be with you in two minutes.”

“You and Jack keep your posts, Strad,” she ordered, sure
that the shiver running through her body was not detectable in her voice. “Raze
and I can handle it.”

“There are eight slayers that I can see,” Raze said, when
Strad was quiet. “But I’m counting six pikes.”

“The pikes are kissing slayer ass,” she murmured. “Fucking
pike alpha really is a son of a bitch.”

“COS and Others,” Jack said. “Working together.”

“These Others are idiots,” Rune said. It wasn’t the first
time COS used Others, and it wouldn’t be the last. When the slayers were
finished with them, they’d kill their asses. And the Others just kept letting
them do it.

“We’ll lose radio signal when we go inside, Rune.” Raze
hesitated. “Will you be okay?”

He wanted to tell her to stay outside the gates, that the
crew could handle it. She heard it in his voice. “I’ll be better than any of you
assholes,” she said. “Don’t do that, Raze.”

“Sorry,” he muttered.

She jumped to her feet. “I need to talk to the pikes. Get me
a live one—Sean Colley if possible. And kill the fucking slayers.”

She’d known the church wasn’t finished. She’d also known they
had some big fucking balls. Or maybe the slayers lingering in River County were
desperate.

She’d sent the twins, Lex, and Owen on other assignments,
and that was a good thing. Levi would have found it impossible to maintain
control with COS members so close. He’d have started killing and wouldn’t have
stopped.

And she needed one of the pikes alive.

As she sprinted down the hill and toward the slayers, she
glanced over to see the berserker at her side, running with her.

She’d known he’d run to her the moment Raze had mentioned
COS. The twins weren’t the only members of the crew who wanted to kill slayers
on sight.

And Strad thought, despite her massive skills, that she
needed his protection.

Hell. Maybe she did.

I love you so goddam fucking much…

She shot out her claws and waded into the midst of the
shocked slayers, whose attempts to scatter and flee came too late.

And even as she slashed open chests and throats and faces, the
guilt of not saving COS for the twins jabbed at her conscience.

She watched Strad collar Sean Colley. She’d never seen the
pike’s face but he had the same air of authority about him that all alphas
possessed.

The berserker thrust his spear into its sheath and with his
free hand grabbed a female pike, whose bleeding body had shriveled and wrinkled
in the moments since the attack.

They
all
were shriveling.

It must have been a reaction to stress, because they were too
near their pond to have dehydrated.

There was a lot to learn about fish shifters.

The berserker dragged the pikes away, leaving Rune, Jack,
and Raze to finish the slayers.

That had to have been difficult for him.

After the slayers lay in bloody bits and pieces on the
ground, she spared them only a quick, satisfied glance before leading her men
to Poison Pond.

Strad crouched at the water’s edge, holding the two pikes by
the chains of silver he’d locked around their throats.

They couldn’t shift, but the water would seep into their
thirsty, dry bodies and keep them alive.

She hoped.

Strad looked up at her. “You okay?”

She pointed her chin at the pike alpha. “He said anything?”

“No.”

She stood beside Strad’s crouching body, her stare on the
alpha. It was difficult to tell his age—the cracks and wrinkles of his stressed
skin made his appearance that of a very, very old man. She figured when he’d
had time to soak in some water and relax, he wouldn’t look quite so ancient.

She nudged his head with the toe of her boot. “Dude. Can you
talk?”

His head bobbed on the water, and he kept his thin, veined
eyelids closed. As the water of the lake slid into his ears, something black
and viscous was pushed out.

“Jack, go call Ellie. Have him send transport to take these
two back to the Annex. We can question them there. They have tanks.”

The alpha groaned and his eyelids fluttered. “No,” he said,
his voice weak. “I’ll tell you what you want to know. If you take me out of
Wormwood, they’ll kill me.”

He wasn’t wrong, but she really didn’t care if they killed
him.

She knelt beside Strad. “I want to know about Megan Smith. I
want to know about the lab where she’s being kept. I want names, and I want
locations. Give me some answers and I’ll leave you and what’s left of your
people alone.”

“Yes. Okay. Give me a second to—”

“I’ve heard there’s a broker,” she interrupted. “Is that
you?”

“No. And I’m hardly high enough on the food chain to be told
where any of the labs are. Sometimes I take the humans in when the broker
brings them here for safekeeping before they can be moved.”

“Safekeeping,” she said. “Safe-fucking-keeping.”

He flinched. “I do it for my people.”

“What does the broker do for you,” she asked, her anger
nearly choking her. “Bring you dried fucking fish food?”

“We have to survive. And in order to survive in a human’s
world—”

“Fuck you. I don’t care about your problems. I care about
the girl.” She shot out her claws. “Where the fuck is she?”

“I don’t know. I swear, I don’t know. The broker doesn’t
tell me where he takes them. He leaves them here for me to watch, then comes
back to get them when he’s ready to move them.”

“Them. How many have there been? All girls?”

“Six...seven. Maybe a dozen. I lost count. Yes. All girls.”

“What’s the broker’s name?”

“Johnson. He COS.”

The fine hairs stood up on the back of her neck, as though
Johnson were there, watching. “I know who he is.” She sat back on her heels and
pushed her palms against her eyes. “I need to know
where
he is.”

“You’re not asking the right questions,” the berserker said,
handing the chains over to Jack. And then, before she could blink, he pulled a
blade and thrust it through the underside of the pike’s jaw. “Where is
Johnson?” His voice was calm.

His stare was not.

Colley flopped in the water, his mouth opening and closing
as he fought for air. His eyes rolled back into his head. “Uh, uh,” he mumbled.
“Gah…”

“I know where he is,” someone said.

She and Strad whirled around, Strad jerking the blade from
the pike and readying it to fling at the new threat.

Epik stood there, his hands up, his bare body covered with
new wounds. “I know where he is. Let my master go and I’ll tell you
everything.”