Night Whispers: ShadowLands, Book 1 (17 page)

“Yes.” He pulled out a few materials from the kit and moved closer to Carrie.

Circuitous wasn’t bad, if it kept the crazy people off their trail. At the same time, Carrie didn’t look like she was in such great shape. “You know what’s wrong with her?”

“Between the bite she took and the multitude of drugs pumped in her system over the past year, there are many things that could be wrong with her.”

Erik was working on the knot to the girl’s scrub pants. Jules struggled to move. “Here, let me see to her.”

He glanced up at her from beneath his lashes. “I hardly have a prurient interest in this child.”

She subsided. First, because she was too exhausted to move, and second, because he’d seen her in a lot less while she had been kicking her habit, and he’d never strayed into inappropriate territory.

Things could have changed, but she trusted him enough to watch him take care of Carrie from a few feet away.

He placed a towel over the girl’s lap for modesty and worked the dirty material of the pants down so her hip was exposed. He ripped open an alcohol pad and wiped the area clean.

She was curious, but not alarmed. Until the light glinted on the scalpel she saw in his right hand. “What the fuck are you doing?”

He didn’t glance up. “I had a small object on my right hip. I felt it there after one of my many experiences in the laboratory. I feared it might be a tracking chip. So I removed it.” He probed the girl’s hip and made a satisfied sound. “And I see they inserted one in her as well.”

She was already reaching for the fastening to her own pants when Erik spoke. “I already checked you. You are clean.”

That was a relief. Still. “Please don’t undress me when I’m sleeping.”

“I had no choice. And you were more than sleeping.”

No, she didn’t want to think of that. Didn’t want to think that though the doctors hadn’t had time to insert a tracker into her, they clearly had done something. “Someone could be right on our tail.”

“I know. That’s why I stopped. And why we’ll shortly be going in another direction.”

She gave a terse nod, finally understanding the willy-nilly driving. “Ah. Smart.”

He glanced over at her, and she was pinned by his pigmentless eyes. “Your body probably needs to relieve itself. Do you need help or can you manage?”

Her bladder was killing her. “I can do it on my own, thanks.”

Somehow she did, maneuvering out of the van. The garage was dim, but Erik had left the door open. She made her way outside to find a few small houses parked far and away from each other.

It would have been nice to go inside one of those houses to use the facilities, but they were in a hurry. She went around the side of the garage, dropped her trousers and did her business, wishing, not for the first time, that she was a man.

When she was done, she took a moment to lean against the garage and take a deep breath. Her lungs hurt. Her muscles hurt. Her head and stomach? Yeah, they hurt too.

In the light of day, she dared to look at what she knew was the source of her pain. Erik had taped gauze over her biceps. Why, she wasn’t sure, since she hadn’t been bleeding. So she wouldn’t see the ugly red striations popping up on her?

He hadn’t covered up enough skin. Lines of red streaked out from beneath the white cotton, the raised bumps ominous.

Pigmentless flesh marked with raised red veins…

She touched one. It was hot.

Jules took a deep breath. No time right now to worry about this. Once they were away from the bad guys for good, then she would consider what this meant for her.

She made her way back into the garage. Erik stood by the van, washing his hands with some of her bottled water. She assumed the puddle on the ground was tinged pink with blood, though it was too dark to see. His blood, Carrie’s blood. Who knew. “Did you get it out of her?”

“Yes. Hopefully there are no more trackers in any of us.” He touched his collar. “Or on us.”

“I can try to cut the collar off,” she offered.

“Unless you have a buzz saw stashed in here, that will be impossible. These were made to withstand sawing with a knife.” He shrugged. “It is unlikely there is a GPS in here. This is pre-Illness technology. They had barely managed to manufacture these as prototypes for electroshock purposes. None had been invented with dual capabilities.”

Even if a tracker was in that sucker, nothing could be done about it right this minute, she supposed. Surely Compound would be able to figure out how to get the thing off him when they arrived. “Fine. Want me to drive?”

He arched a brow. “No.”

Good, because the thought of losing consciousness at the wheel and plowing into a tree wasn’t really an idea she was keen on either. “’Kay.”

They both climbed into the van. She was proud of herself for not flinching when he reached over and fastened her seat belt for her. Look at her, tough chick that she was.

She saw that he had appropriated her spare sunglasses from the back. Luckily, she had always liked too-large frames. The pair fit his face without looking too absurd.

He noticed her watching him. “You understand,” he said softly, “why you are sick, don’t you?”

No, she wasn’t a tough chick at all. She had to swallow the bile in her throat. “Instead of going to California, do you think we can maybe go to Raven Rock?” She leaned forward and pressed the button for her dashboard GPS. Raven Rock’s location was programmed in. With a few pushes, she was able to set it. It was a difficult task because her hands were shaking.

Erik appeared to study the console. Behind those glasses, she couldn’t tell what was going on. “We won’t go to California.”

She leaned against her seat back, reassured. “Good.”

The van rumbled as it started, and she let her old friend take control.

James didn’t know what was going on with Jules’s tracker. For a while, she’d gone northwest, giving him the slight hope she was taking a circuitous route home. But then she’d turned, and backtracked east, only to head north now, as if she were preparing to cross over the border to Canada.

Each time, he had readjusted his route to match hers.

He glanced at his handheld, now docked in the console of his vehicle, as if to reassure himself that they were both headed toward some sort of merger.

His first day out hadn’t been so bad. His car was nice and secure, and it made a comfortable cocoon for him. He’d had to stop a few times to relieve himself, but he’d made the stops as fast as possible. The feel of the air on his too-sensitive skin had been almost painful.

No, barring the oppressive silence of his own thoughts spinning round and round in his mind, the day hadn’t been so bad.

James watched the sun sinking far off into the horizon. The true test would be the night.

Bad things happened at night. He knew that all too well.

He could call Gabriel on the sat phone for company, but he’d checked in a couple of hours ago. No need to worry the man or confirm fears that he couldn’t handle this alone.

Since it made him feel better, he pressed the button on his handheld that would normally have tapped into Jules. There was dead air there now, but he would keep the line open. A more depressing variation on road-trip music.

“Jules,” he said to the silence. “I hope you’re okay.”

“Jules. I hope you’re okay.”

“I’m fine,” she murmured automatically, caught in the light doze she’d slipped into.

“What?”

“Huh?” She lifted her head and looked at Erik.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Oh.” She could have sworn… She laid her hot forehead against the window. The scenery rushed past her, the sun-faded sky highlighting the flat, empty road on either side of the highway. Now she was hearing things. Great.

Chapter Ten

When James was young, he and his mother would head out to the grocery store in the evenings, after she came home from work. He would sit in the front seat, even though he knew now he had been far too small to do so, and would peer over the too-high dashboard. The night seemed endless during those short rides.

It seemed even more endless now that it was full dark and he was out in it.

The road was abandoned, as expected. If the moon had been out, perhaps it would have minimized the barrenness of the setting, but a strong cloud cover had rolled in, hiding the light.

His eyes were tired, but he barely blinked. So much adrenaline was pumping through him, he doubted he would accidentally sleep, but he refused to take any chances. It was well past midnight and his bedtime.

It freaks me the fuck out when they walk on the side of the road like that. The way they stumble around, I can’t tell if I’m tired and hallucinating, or they’re real. And if they’re real, it’s like they’re just waiting for me to wreck so they can munch on me.

Jules’d told him that once. Since then, he’d done his best to make sure she had some sort of shelter during the night, though that was more in her control than his.

He forced himself to relax his hands. The knuckles were starting to hurt with all the clenching he was doing.

Jules had called them phantom hitchhikers. He’d tapped into her during that ride, worried over her as usual.

The visual she’d painted had creeped him out too. Since night had fallen, he’d been alert for any sign of Shadows lurching along, but his high-powered beams hadn’t picked anyone up. Occasionally, he jerked his head this way and that, but he figured the movement he saw was simply figments of his tired imagination.

What if they weren’t, though? What if danger was just out there, in the woods surrounding either side of this small country road?

You’re safe in the car. It’s like your office. Or the bunker. You’re so safe. Can’t get hurt. Keep driving.

He checked his handheld for the millionth time, making sure that his and Jules’s route were calibrated properly. She’d continued to make progress toward Canada.

That fact worried the hell out of him. His mind had automatically spun out the three scenarios most likely to result from this set of facts: 1) she wasn’t in the van or 2) she was in the van but somehow not in control of it or 3) she was in the van and had a very good reason for heading out of the country.

“I’m trying to keep positive here, Jules,” he murmured. “But it’s hard.”

“I’m trying to keep positive here, Jules.”

Jules jerked. She’d woken from her nap long ago but had simply been resting with her eyes closed.

She hadn’t imagined that.

“But it’s hard.”

James? But how was this…

God damn, but she’d forgotten about her earpiece. She couldn’t speak with him, but she was able to hear him. The thin piece of plastic worked independently of her collar, as long as the battery remained charged.

“I know in my gut you’re still alive. I’m praying you’re in that van of yours on your own.”

Excitement rose in her belly. He was tracking her GPS! He knew she was on her way to him! She turned to Erik, already smiling, ready to tell him the good news, when James spoke again.

“You better have a damn good reason for heading for the border, though.”

The border? Wait. The border of what?

Slowly, she raised her head and looked, really looked, at the console for the first time since she’d punched in Raven Rock’s coordinates and fallen asleep, trusting Erik to get her to safety.

The screen was blank. The route had been canceled out.

Erik’s rough profile was stubborn and unyielding. A granite man who could move mountains. Who could crush insignificant girls who got in his way. “Where are we?”

He glanced at her. He’d tossed her sunglasses off somewhere, leaving his silver eyes free to assess her. “You’re awake. Do you feel better?”

“Yes,” she half-lied. That awful lassitude had diminished somewhat, but her head and stomach were still churning, more so now that she had to consider where her old friend was taking her. “Where are we?” Without waiting for a reply, she leaned forward despite the resulting pain in her arm and shoulder and reached out to press the button for the GPS.

His hand was there before hers, covering the dial. “Don’t do that,” he said.

A warning. Perhaps even a threat.

She licked her lips, suddenly cold. Their eyes met for a brief moment before he turned back to the road. His hand remained over the control of the GPS.

She leaned back in her seat. “Trying to hide the fact that we’re headed toward the border?”

A long beat passed. He removed his hand. “How did you know?”

She didn’t. For all she knew, they could be headed to the border of Canada, Mexico or North Dakota.

However, now she could find out. Quick, she pressed the button for the GPS. The map popped up, showing her what border James had been talking about. “Funny,” she said, not bothering to disguise the acid in her tone. “Pretty sure you’re going the wrong way.”

His sigh was soundless. “This seemed like the best choice.”