Shards of Hope

Chapter 41

THE DAY AFTER she’d met Tavish, Zaira put in time working on the construction in the valley. Venice was quiet at present and the Net in general had stabilized after recent disruptions. Much as it pained Zaira to admit it, Nikita had been right to insist on the public statement by the Ruling Coalition.

As for the hunt for the people behind Aden’s and Zaira’s abductions, that continued unabated. Both of them were in direct touch with the team tasked with following all possible leads, including those via property records. It turned out the bunker land was owned by a shell company that was owned by a shell company ad nauseam.

The final ownership led back to a five-year-old child who’d died fifty years earlier; but no Arrow had ever let a dead end stop him or her, and the hunt continued. Zaira didn’t interfere with the investigation, aware she wasn’t the best person to handle this kind of a back-end track—she did better with a physical target.

Instead, as she worked in the valley, she plotted how to get Aden to take a break from his duties as leader. He needed time to just be Aden, she thought . . . and remembered how he’d been in the bed in the aerie. He’d definitely not been thinking about his responsibilities then. The primal part of her stretched out at the memory of his arousal, at the remembered sensation of his hand clenching in her hair, and of how he’d felt so hard and hot under her.

Breasts swelling tight against her bra and pulse racing, Zaira could feel the rage that wasn’t rage around Aden rising to the surface. Even two days earlier, she’d have fought to stifle it, but that was before she’d met Tavish, before she’d begun to question whether she had in fact inherited the madness, rather than simply being driven by a justified anger. If it was the latter, then there was the possibility she could leash her violent possessiveness and have the man who currently worked in her line of sight.

At some point during the past hour, several of the males had stripped off their T-shirts, sweat dripping down their backs. All were in Arrow shape, their bodies strong, but Zaira noticed only Aden. Sleek and muscled and beautiful as he maneuvered a heavy piece into place, she wanted to pet him.

His eyes caught hers as the thought passed through her head, and for an instant he looked incredibly young, the words he telepathed to her unexpectedly playful. I’m never wearing a shirt again.

She replied instinctively. Good. I like the view.

Forced to look away by his task, Aden nonetheless didn’t break their telepathic connection. Would you do what you did at the aerie? Touch me, kiss me, own me?

You forgot the biting.

Anything you want, Zaira. I’m yours.

A shudder rippled through her at the passionate commitment in his tone, but a squadmate five feet to her left yelled for help with a falling wall right then, interrupting her sensual conversation with Aden. By the time she finished the assist and found Aden again, it was to see him in intense discussion with Cristabel and Walker.

No more time for play, she thought, disappointed. The latter should’ve worried her for what it betrayed about her discipline, but once again, she thought of Tavish and of how her parents had hurt her. She’d never do that to a child. Never. That cruelty was simply beyond her. So maybe, just maybe, she wasn’t a monster and could be permitted to love Aden.

Returning to Venice after night had fallen over the canals, that thought in mind, she’d just finished changing after her shower when Mica telepathed her. We have intruders.

Zaira had put the entire facility on alert as soon as she and Aden returned from the Smokies, the watch doubled and extra sensors laid down along the entire perimeter, including in the waters of the relevant canals. How far?

Three minutes till they cross the southwestern boundary line. Confirmation that it’s two operatives, moving with stealth. A pause. They have small packs. No visible weapons.

Outside on the roof by this point and in a position to watch the boundary, she got down on her belly. Did our scanners detect explosives?

Negative.

Using the high-powered night-vision goggles she’d picked up, Zaira considered the pair. Breathing masks, she ordered, after weighing up all possibilities. No one is to stop them.

This couldn’t be coincidence. Either Aden’s and Zaira’s rumored abductions had given someone else the courage to attack the Arrows or these saboteurs were connected to those who’d taken them. Zaira wasn’t about to waste the opportunity to discover more.

Understood.

Zaira grabbed a mask for herself from a nearby storage locker as Mica initiated the telepathic tree that meant the order would hit every Arrow mind within the compound in fifteen seconds flat, then settled down to wait. It didn’t take long. The saboteurs lobbed gas grenades into the compound before turning to make their escape.

Quickly ordering most of her team to remain behind to handle the gas, using countermeasures that’d ensure it wouldn’t spread beyond the compound, Zaira and three others set off in shadow pursuit of the saboteurs. When the two—a male and a female, both in sleek black wetsuits—slipped into different canals, Zaira and Alejandro took the male, while the other team took the female.

Their target didn’t come up out of the water.

Having long before prepared for such a threat to the compound, Zaira used the heat sensor built into her phone to track him, guessing either he’d had breathing equipment stored in an easily accessible part of the canal or he’d taken a short-acting tablet that boosted the oxygen in his blood, allowing a longer period of immersion.

Alejandro kept stealthy pace with her. While he wasn’t cleared for solo missions any longer, his reflexes were flawless and she trusted him to watch her back. And, no matter what anyone else said, she thought part of the real Alejandro still remained, still had pride.

She would not crush that pride by consigning him to inconsequential tasks.

“Zaira.” A whisper less than sound as their target disappeared from the sensors. “He must have an entrance below the waterline.”

Zaira nodded, making note of the only possible building into which the target could’ve gone. Lapped by water and serviced by an overbridge, it was in neat but not elegant condition. A light came on in a room on the third floor above the waterline less than two minutes later, just as Zaira received a telepathic report from the other team.

Our target appears to have arrived at her personal living quarters. Entry was not observed, as it occurred below the waterline, but the silhouette seen in a room soon afterward matches the subject’s shape and size.

Zaira told the second team to stay in position and go with the target if she made a move. I’ll organize for another team to relieve you at 0700 hours.

Yes, sir.

Zaira and Alejandro stayed on watch until the same time, but their target seemed to have bedded down for the night. In the meantime, she’d already sent details of both locations to Aden, along with a request for more support. With the majority of the Venice contingent having relocated to the valley, she was running on a skeleton crew.

He was waiting for her when she handed over the watch to the relief team, and returned to her quarters.

“What did you find?” she asked, sitting on her bed to take off her boots after waving him into her room and going across to open the doors to her small and well-alarmed balcony.

“Both rented their apartments under false names, but we were able to use the photos on their IDs to trace their true identities.” He leaned against her closed door. “They’re not human or Psy but water changelings.”

Zaira looked up. “Water breathers? That, I didn’t predict.” The water-based changelings tended to keep to themselves. Even other changelings claimed not to know much about the reclusive group. They certainly didn’t pick fights—or hadn’t.

Boots and socks off, she rose to get rid of her jacket while Aden remained against the other wall. He was once again wearing his ankle-length leather coat over a suit. The suit was black, the shirt the same color. She wanted him to take it all off so she could warm herself up against his skin.

“A number of the sea changelings do call Venice home,” she said, forcing her mind back onto the right path. “I’ll factor that into my new threat assessments.”

“I’ve alerted our people in other water-edged or otherwise water-accessible areas to do the same.”

Throwing aside her uniform jacket, she removed her weapons and set them carefully under her bed, right below where she slept. Access would take her less than two heartbeats. Roll off the bed, grab a weapon in the same move, shoot. Should the attack come via the door, she could roll under the bed to the other side and use the bed as a shield. Should it come via the balcony, she’d already be shielded by the bed’s bulk.

“Any obvious red flags?”

Aden shook his head. “Both are living a vanilla life on the surface, working from home on building websites.”

“Easy cover.”

“We’re tracing their clients, but as yet, they appear to be legitimate small businesses, so someone is doing the work. No military or other suspicious contacts who could’ve supplied them with poison gas bombs, but the woman is a chemist, could have the expertise to have made them.”

“Even with that,” Zaira said, “I’m guessing they’re grunts. Low level and expendable. I’ll keep them under surveillance—they may lead us to people with more authority if we allow their overseers to believe they remained undetected.”

Aden nodded. “I’m working my contacts to arrange a meet with the alpha of water-based changelings and I’ve got people working on digging up more data about them. Either the entire group is in on it or they have two rogue members.” He slid his hands into his coat pockets as she undid her tight braid and threw the hair tie on the small table where she kept wildflowers in a painted porcelain vase.

The delicately but brightly patterned vase was a direct violation of pre-Honeycomb rules. It had also been a gift from Aden. He’d given it to her a year ago, and it was one of her most precious treasures; he understood her desire for pretty and shiny things, had never judged her for it.

A sudden quiet between them.

“Did Ashaya Aleine get back to you?” she said quickly when he straightened in preparation for leaving.

A nod. “Soon after you left—she confirmed that it’s a combination of the Alliance implant and the one she created; she also said that it’s highly unstable. If we hadn’t dug it out, it would’ve overloaded soon afterward, fail-safe switch or not.”

The idea of Aden dead because someone wanted to play at being a scientific mastermind had Zaira’s jaw going tight. “Is there any way we can protect ourselves against it?”

“No. I’ve asked Aleine to work on a possible defensive countermeasure, but the fact is, it’s probable the only solution will turn out to be a different type of implant and even the Alliance implant is in its early days.”

“I could live a lifetime without ever having something shoved into my brain again.” And if it happened, she’d dig it right back out, no matter the consequences. “At least now we know whoever was behind this had the power and the contacts to get their hands on two experimental implants.”

“Yes.”

Another taut silence.

Aden began to turn toward the door. “I’ll leave you to rest.”

“Wait.” She didn’t want him to go, wanted his scent close and his presence within touching distance . . . and if she hadn’t inherited her parents’ madness, then . . . “I’m not ready for sleep. Would you like to stay for breakfast?”

Aden straightened. “I’ll get the food while you shower.”

ADEN returned with the food to find that Zaira was still in the shower. Carefully taking her vase off the side table to place it on the floor, he moved the table to in front of the bed and put the food on it.

Shrugging off his coat, he slung it over the back of the single chair in the room and placed that chair on the other side of the table. He’d just taken off his suit jacket and tie when the bathroom door opened. There was no steam. “You don’t have to shower in ice-cold water,” he said when she walked out in the simple black T-shirt and supple black pants that functioned as off-duty gear for most Arrows who weren’t in civilian clothing for an operation. “That was only for training purposes.”

“It was cool, not cold.” Taking his jacket, the tie in one of the pockets, she hung it inside the closet built into the wall, then picked up his overcoat and did the same. “Why don’t you wear your formal Arrow uniform to these meetings with the Forgotten and other groups? Blending in again?”

“In a way.” He unbuttoned and folded up the sleeves of his black shirt. “A military uniform puts people on edge.”

“How do you do it—appear harmless?”

“I’ve practiced.”

Coming around the table, Zaira took a cross-legged position on her hard, narrow bed. She hadn’t bought a fluffy comforter yet; the idea of it reminded her too much of her secret time with Aden, made her too angry with missing him. “Where are the nutrient drinks?” He had to have bought the other items on the table from a nearby café.

He tapped the glasses on either side, but when she reached for one, he picked up a slice of apple and held it out. “You like this.”

Closing her fingers around the glass, she took a long drink. He didn’t lower his hand. “Trying to break my will?” she asked.

“Never.”

And because she knew he spoke the truth, she took the sweet, tart piece of fruit, bit into it. They didn’t speak again until after they’d finished the meal in a silence that wasn’t painful, wasn’t alone. His breath, his scent, the competent, confident strength of his presence, filled the space.

“Have you slept?” she asked as he finished off his nutrient drink. His dress would’ve told her he’d been in meetings in other time zones, even if she hadn’t been in touch with him about the saboteurs throughout the night.

He shook his head, his hair falling across his forehead. “I’ll need to get at least five hours soon or I’ll lose some alertness.”

The needy, lonely, twisted part of her merged with the controlled Arrow at that instant, and they both wanted only one thing. “Stay.”

He went motionless.

Uncrossing her legs, she got off the bed, braced for rejection. He’d seen her in the grip of the rage that was like madness, seen what she became. Maybe the time since that incident had made him realize just how bad of a bet she was in every possible way.

The half-insane girl inside her didn’t hit out at him in a preemptive strike, simply curled into a hard knot in her gut. She was flinching, she thought, just like Tavish. Trying to make herself smaller so it wouldn’t hurt so much. When she took hold of the table, he got up and helped her put it aside so that the bed was no longer blocked. Once that was done, she was aware of him waiting for her to speak again but she didn’t have any words. So she just got into bed and faced the balcony.

If he wanted to leave, he could leave.

There was silence for a long minute, and then she heard clothing rustle, a belt move against fabric. The bed dipped behind her soon afterward. She lifted her head for his arm and saw he’d removed his shirt. He was hot against her, the arm he put around her waist muscled steel.

He wrapped his other arm around the front of her shoulders as he’d done in the aerie, enclosing her in protective warmth. And for the first time since she’d returned from RainFire, she felt as if she could sleep again, no screaming aloneness in her skull, no crying deep in her soul from missing him.

A breath against her ear, his lips brushing her skin. “It’s raining.”

Her eyes went to the balcony doors and to the soft, misty rain that had begun to fall. At that moment, it was as if they were back in the aerie, back in that precious, secret time when she could forget her twisted history.

“Sleep,” she whispered. “I’ll keep you safe.”

He nudged his thigh between hers, their bodies utterly entwined. “How about we keep each other safe?”

She was the commander, her task to make sure no harm came to him, but she had the thought that right now they were just Aden and Zaira, and Aden was a man who would always want to protect his lover.

While they might not be lovers in the sexual sense, he was as entwined in her existence as their bodies were in this bed. Her heart, that twisted, scarred organ, felt things for him it felt for no one else.

Turning into his hold, her back to the threat of the open balcony doors, she closed her eyes and slept in the arms of the only person she had ever loved.