When Sparks Fly (30 page)

Xera slid back her chair. “We’ll worry about
him later. Are you coming to find Brandy, Blue?”

He shook his head. “I want to check on the
experimental plants I started in the garden. I’m trying the new
‘black gold’ technique. You know, the one where they use granulated
charcoal to boost plant growth? It’s supposed to be far superior to
compost or organic fertilizer. It could be a huge help on the farm.
It wouldn’t hurt to boost your yields here, either.”

Xera’s eyes were already glazing over.
“Great,” she interrupted. “Good luck with that. Gem?”

Gem grinned and kissed Blue’s scratchy
cheek. He hadn’t shaved that day. “You know
I
like to hear
about it, hon. Why don’t you find us when you’re done? You can fill
me in.”

He whispered something in her ear that
caused her to blush. She pushed at his shoulder playfully and
joined her sister.

“Who knew you’d end up marrying a farmer?”
Xera teased. “I swear I’ll barf if I have to hear anything more
about crop yields and soil fertility.”

Gem smirked. “Just as well; he’s
my
farm boy, and boy, can he sling hay.”

Xera made an amused yet exasperated face.
“Roll in the hay, more like. We’ve barely seen you two in
days.”

Gem lifted a shoulder, a satisfied
expression on her face. “Marriage agrees with me.”

“Huh.” Xera admitted, “You do seem
happy.”

Gem’s face glowed. “I’m so glad I married
him, sis! I’m sure we’ll have our share of arguments, but we’re
both willing to do what it takes to keep this marriage strong. He’s
a good man.”

“Good to know. Now, where’s our sister?”

Gem and Xera looked in their apartment
first; then they headed to the obvious next place, the brewery.

“Think we’ll find Match there, too?” Xera
asked. “I swear, I’d suspect them of having an affair if she
weren’t still so banged up. You’ll have to have a word with her
about a chaperone, especially now.” Her tone was matter of fact,
but her face betrayed her solemnity. This was no small matter. That
she was asking Gem to do the talking showed that she’d feel
hypocritical bringing it up. Her indiscretion had hurt both her
sisters, and it still stung.

“Sure. Maybe.” Gem wasn’t about to fuel any
of her sister’s self-recrimination. Fortunately, they’d reached the
door to the brewery, which made a good distraction. She held it
open. “After you.”

Xera strode through, calling Brandy’s name.
“We need your input for what we’re going to do tonight!” She spoke
loudly to the air, assuming her sister was inside. After all, there
were only so many places a girl on house arrest could go. Besides,
there was a light on at Brandy’s desk, at the end of vats.

As they got closer, they could see the back
of Brandy’s chair. Their sister was sitting at her desk, facing
away from them. She didn’t respond to their calls.

“Are you sleeping?” Xera muttered when she
got close enough. She spun Brandy’s chair around, then gasped.
Brandy’s head lolled to the side. Her eyes were blank and staring.
Gem felt her gorge rise.

Xera cursed and felt for a pulse. “She’s
alive!”

“Yes, but not for long,” a new voice
said.

The lights went out.

Blue’s plants were doing even better than
he’d hoped. Pleased, he entered the kitchen, eager to tell Gem all
about it. He had high hopes for the girl. She might have grown up a
tavern owner, and disavowed all knowledge of gardening, but she was
smart and extremely interested in everything he did.

She enjoyed hearing about his experiments
and plans (probably because they were business-related, and she had
a particularly apt mind for business) and encouraged him to try out
many new ideas, as long as he didn’t discard what worked in the
process. Cautious, she was. She’d never have made the risky
investments that had led to his success, but her slow and steady
approach had reaped its own rewards and he didn’t fault her. He was
more cautious these days as well. A man was less inclined to make
omelets with his nest egg.

She wasn’t in the taproom, but Azor and Zsak
had come in. He greeted both men with surprise. “Hey! You didn’t
tell me you were getting out of the hospital.” Since a hug was out
of the question, even if he hadn’t been afraid Zsak’s arm would
fall off, he settled for a hearty (opposite arm) forearm clasp.

Zsak grinned. He looked a bit pale but
otherwise sturdy. “I couldn’t take it anymore. I threatened mayhem
if they didn’t let me out. Luckily, Azor stopped in and gave me a
ride back here.”

Azor looked unhappy. “I wouldn’t have
visited if I’d known he would go AWOL at the first sight of someone
he knew. He jumped out of bed and demanded his clothes.”

“I would have walked out in that stupid gown
if they hadn’t fetched them,” Blue’s partner said without remorse.
“Azor was a handy ride. Wasn’t going to pass that up.” He plopped a
bag on the bar and spoke to Jaq. “Hey, stick these somewhere safe,
could you? They loaded me up with enough meds to choke a
donkey.”

He glanced around and said to Blue, “Where’s
your lady? I want to tease her about marrying you when she could
have had me.”

Blue snorted but wondered the same thing. “I
was just looking for her. She and her sister went hunting for
Brandy. Have you seen any of them, Jaq?”

Jaq shook his head as he wiped the bar.
“Haven’t seen Brandy since first thing this morning. Said she was
going to be in the brewery. They probably found her there.”

Blue got a sudden uneasy feeling in his gut.
It was probably nothing, just déjà vu. After all, he’d been to the
brewery a couple of times since they’d found Brandy and Jean Luc,
and nothing bad had happened.

Azor and Zsak stilled at his expression.
Cops themselves, they were attuned more to his unease than to any
other stimulus. Paranoia ran in the profession.

“You want me to come with you?” Zsak
offered.

“You’re in no condition to handle trouble,”
Azor said with a dismissive glance. “I’ll go.”

Blue tried to wave them off. “It’s fine,
guys. There’s probably nothing wrong. Why would there be?”

“Well, why don’t we use the security system
to check for them? Rather than running around looking, we can
screen the whole premises. I’ve got time, and Gimpy here isn’t
doing anything special,” Azor suggested reasonably. Though he
didn’t say it, he may have thought, as Blue did, that manning the
security system would keep the still-recovering Zsak out of harm’s
way. He had no business getting physical if there was something
wrong.

“Hey!” Zsak protested the nickname, but was
ignored.

“If you’re determined,” was all Blue said,
but privately he was glad for the backup. His paranoia had paid
dividends more than once, and these guys had likely benefited from
similar gut instincts.

Minutes later they were searching each of
the security screens Blue had set up, while the office manager
looked on in mild annoyance. They’d have to move this stuff one of
these days. Although the need was no longer acute, Blue was a firm
believer in good security. However, that didn’t mean it necessarily
belonged in the manager’s office.

“There,” Zsak said quietly. “They
are
in the brewery. Or at least Brandy and Xera are.” And it was worse
than Blue’s instinct had imagined.

He took a steadying breath. He could just
see Brandy lolling in her chair near her desk, either seriously
hurt or dead. She stared at the ceiling with a vacant expression.
Xera was on the floor next to her, her arms bound behind her back.
She’d been secured to one of the heavy legs of a nearby bench. She
had a killing expression on her face, and she stared intently at
something or someone.

Zsak panned the camera around. He stood
straighter as it passed over Gem. She was upright against a pipe,
her arms behind her. Her eyes tracked someone just out of sight,
surely the same person at whom Xera had been leveling such
loathing.

Zsak adjusted the view. “No way!”

“Kiyl?” Blue clenched his fist in shock. He
wanted to wrap it around the man’s throat.

“But…he’s dead,” Azor said. “We saw him
die.”

“We saw a flash. Your men and his body
disappeared. But that’s him, Azor,” Blue murmured.

Azor nodded. “He duped us, somehow. That
flash must have been a distraction, and maybe he changed form and
flew away. Amazing; even jacked up on drugs, he shouldn’t have been
conscious after being shot with a stunner like that. I wonder what
he used to counter the effect?” He got out his communicator to call
for backup.

Zsak shook his head. “Some kind of military
hardware, maybe? What I want to know is, is there anyone else in
there now?”

There
was
someone else present. In
the shadows behind Kiyl they spotted another Kiuyian, but it was
Match, and he was secured like Gem. His head lolled forward. He
twitched from time to time, as if fighting for consciousness.

“Out!” Azor ordered The Spark’s office
manager; Tam Rasheed would just be another body in the way when his
men arrived. He looked at Zsak. “Put your earset on. You’re
coordinator. I want you feeding my team data as they converge. Keep
Blue and me updated. We’re going in.”

Blue was already opening a locker and
extracting equipment he’d stashed there a month earlier. Guns and
dragonskin riot gear armor were soon piled on the couch. Azor
looked impressed.

Zsak shushed them and dialed up the volume
on the security camera before he fumbled with an earset, putting it
on one-handed. They could all hear talking.

“…was going to leave them like this and call
in a tip, but this is too good to pass up. Why settle for ruining
your sister when I can kill you all?” Kiyl’s eyes gleamed in
excitement as he paced. His skin was scaled with dragonskin, like
it had been when he’d fought Zsak. He’d transformed his hands into
having freakishly long fingers with razor-sharp claws, and he waved
one of those in Gem’s face. “Do you know how painful it was to
regrow this hand, you little bitch? Your boyfriend will pay for
that.”

“Leave her alone,” Match mumbled. It was
barely audible. He couldn’t lift his head.

Kyil laughed and turned toward his fellow
Kiuyian. “What’s that,
shatungu
? I don’t take orders from a
useless piece of meat like you. You can’t even change, can you?
Even your little brother is more of a man than you. No wonder your
father hates you.” It was apparent the two knew each other, or Kiyl
had taken the time to scout the neighbors. Something personal like
this, though…It seemed Kiyl knew someone in the household.

“What’d he call him?” Zsak asked.

Azor looked grim. “It means ‘Man who can’t
change.’”

“Plan?” Blue prompted as he finished
strapping on his armor. He had a gun but was smart enough not to
run out, guns blazing. He knew his wasn’t the coolest head just
then. Azor was many things, including calm under pressure, so he
was the right man from whom to seek advice. Besides, he was a
Kiuyian.

Unwisely, Match returned an insult. Maybe
the drugs had diminished his judgment. Either way, Kiyl grabbed his
hair and yanked his head back to expose Match’s throat.

“Haven’t you learned not to taunt a hunter?
Your kind isn’t fit to live. Pitiful throwbacks. I should kill you,
but…” Kiyl suddenly smiled, and it was a chilling sight. “Maybe
I’ll make sure you can’t breed instead.” He stepped back and raked
his claws down in a sudden flash.

Match screamed. The attack had created a
shallow trench of blood over his belly and down the front of his
pants. Kiyl stood back, watching him thrash.

“We can’t wait for backup. I’ll provide the
distraction,” Azor said in a sudden decision. “Blue, go to the
front of the brewery and wait for Zsak’s signal. I’ll slip in the
back.”

“That could be dangerous if he sees you. He
might kill someone,” Blue warned.

Azor’s smile seemed strangely amused. “I
believe he’ll be too busy. He’ll never be able to resist.”

Gem stared, desperately wishing she could
stop the blood. Even with Kiyl’s drugs in him, the pain must have
been bad. Match kept moaning like a wounded animal.

Kiyl moved near her, unholy satisfaction in
every line of his face. “You see what I do to your friends? Imagine
what I’ll do to your boyfriend,” he promised.

“What did I do to you?” she replied.

He grabbed her chin, his long fingers making
a cage around her head. “You stopped sending out Pax. I was getting
filthy rich off the stuff. Plus, it was my favorite drug. Nothing
like it. You snatched it away and then sicced the cops on us.
You’re a bad luck charm, lady, and you’re going to pay.”

Gem tried to keep her voice even. “Didn’t
you follow the trial? We were found innocent. My sisters and I
didn’t really have anything to do with the Pax; that was all Jean
Luc.”

He gave her a shove that banged her head
against the pipe. His disgust was apparent, as was a small seed of
admiration. “Yes, I saw that was reported. You paid them off. My
father did it all the time.” His eyes turned savage at the
reminder. “Your cop boyfriend sicced them on
him.”

Clearly, there was no reasoning with him.
One moment there was lucidity, the next, pure demon. The Kiuyian
had cooked his brain on one too many chemical cocktails, it seemed,
and now he was dangerously unpredictable. Not that he’d been safe
beforehand.

Someone entered through the back. The sound
of the opening door was so unexpected that everyone looked;
everyone but Kiyl. He immediately jumped for Gem and placed his
claws in a delicate position. “Step wrong and she’ll be smiling
through her throat,” he snarled at the shadows.

“Hey, man, it’s just me,” a youthful voice
said. Match’s brother Bijo appeared, stepping into the light. He
glanced nervously around. “Hey, I thought you were just after the
cop. What are all these guys doing here?”