Tangle of Need

Chapter 70

SIENNA SURVIVED ANOTHER meeting of the maternals to crawl into bed under the fluffy sky blue comforter she’d bought online. Patterned with white snowflakes, it felt so soft around her body that she felt as if she were floating on a cloud. Until it was tugged away sometime later, to be replaced by a far heavier, hotter blanket. “You’re late,” she murmured sleepily.

Nuzzling kisses along her neck, strong hands caressing the curve of her waist. “According to my many spies, you went to bed at eight thirty.” A kiss pressed to her breastbone. “Maternals make your head hurt?”

“A fraction less this time.” Pushing her fingers through the thick glory of his hair, she tugged him up for one of those long, lazy, sexy kisses she adored from her wolf. “What did Lucas say?” With anchor detail having wound down as Nikita and Anthony began to shift the anchors into permanent safe houses in earnest, Hawke had gone down to DarkRiver territory with Riley for a meeting to finalize the inter-pack dating rules.

“That we should just shoot ourselves in the head now.” Parting her thighs, he settled in between. “I like finding you naked in bed, all sleep-warm and silky.”

Lips tugging upward at the satisfied statement, she wrapped one leg around his waist. “My friends gave me some very pretty lingerie as a mating gift.” The intimate present had caused her to blush—making Evie, Maria, and the rest of her lunatic friends howl with laughter. “I’m scared to wear any of it,” she told the wolf in bed with her, “in case you tear the satin and lace to pieces.”

Nipping at her lower lip, he ran one hand up to pet and fondle her breast. “You can do a fashion parade later—after I’m suitably sated.”

“Arrogant man.” She nibbled on his jaw. “You woke me up from a very nice dream.”

A gleam in the wolf blue. “I’ll make it up to you.”

He did. Twice.

Lying happily exhausted across his chest, she stroked the muscled heat of him and spoke of something that had been on her mind since the confrontation in the forest. “Ming’s not going to let it go.”

“I know.” Hawke didn’t sound worried—his voice was that of a predator in hunting mode. Cold. Focused. Without mercy. “Which is why I’m going to kill him.”

Pushing up on his chest, she looked down into his face, her hair creating a ruby red curtain around them. “Excuse me. I think you must’ve accidentally used the wrong pronoun.”

The growl that rumbled up out of his chest was loud enough to rattle the water glass on the bedside table. “Fine, you can stand in the corner and cheer while I kill him.”

She burst out laughing, and it was the last thing she’d have ever thought she’d do while talking about Councilor Ming LeBon, telepath and a monster who had turned her childhood into a torture chamber. Unlike the man in bed with her, the one who’d taught her to play, and who treated her like she was a gift he’d been waiting a lifetime to open.

“If you’re imagining me with pom-poms,” she said, glimpsing the renewed gleam in his eye, “stop right now.” The effect of her order was somewhat diluted by the laughter that continued to dance in her blood.

“Or what?” Unrepentant, he tumbled her over onto her back, but in spite of the wickedness in his expression, his next words were deadly serious. “He’s going to die, Sienna. No one threatens my mate and gets away with it.”

Ming had been her private nightmare for a long time. That was before she’d been claimed by an alpha wolf who had a ruthless will when it came to protecting those who were his own. Sienna understood that part of him—because it lived in her, too. Anyone who dared hurt Hawke would beg for mercy by the time Sienna was done with them.

“We have to have a plan,” she said, speaking to the wintry-eyed predator that watched her out of the man’s face. “One so good, Ming’s abilities won’t save him.” The Psy male was a telepath specializing in mental combat, could slice through minds as if he had blades in his hands. “You and I will have to work as a team and trust certain others to assist—the most critical problem we have to solve is how to dispose of him without impacting the innocent in the Net.”

Hawke’s hand closed around her throat, the possessiveness of his hold echoed by the raw demand of his kiss. “You are so perfect for me”—hot words against her lips—“I’d steal you if you weren’t already mine.”

Surrounded by the strength and heat and wildness of him, she had never felt so ready to take on a nightmare. “I think we should call it ‘Operation Ming Is a Dead Man Walking.’”

A feral grin on his face, Hawke leaned down until the night-glow of his eyes was only a centimeter away. “He won’t be walking for long. We’ll make sure of it.”

RIAZ knew he had Adria’s heart and her commitment as he accompanied her down to the den the next afternoon. She would never again try to leave him. Not that he’d allow it, he thought with an inward growl. But he also knew she hid within her a deep vein of wariness, and he hated that she was unsure of his love on any level. Hated it.

Patience, he counseled his wolf, but when it came to Adria, he wasn’t patient. Like any lone wolf who had made up his mind about his woman, he was pitiless in his determination. “I never canceled our request for couples quarters and it came through two days ago,” he told her, feet set apart and hands on his hips, ready for the fight she was no doubt about to give him. “We’re moving.”

A stiffening of her jaw. “Nice to be asked.”

Hackles paradoxically flattening at the acerbic edge in her voice, he snagged her around the waist and kissed her until she bit at his lip to get some air. Grinning at the sting that told him his empress was back, he said, “I’ll let you pick the sheets.”

She snarled at him, letting him feel her claws, but, to his surprise, cooperated in the move. Since the anchor detail was now at a low pitch, they had time to do it that day.

It was around nine at night that Adria gave a very welcome laugh and said, “You’re a menace.”

A slow grin spread across his face as he saw she’d found the bear he’d carved sleeping belly-up, a big smile on its face and a bottle of beer in one paw. “He had a party with the skunk.”

Adria put the bear next to the drunken skunk on the shelf he’d put up for her to keep her mechanical puzzles. “You have more, don’t you?”

He made a noncommittal sound … and found himself pounced on, as she tried to threaten the answer out of him. Turning the tables, he had her in giggles, and then he had her sighing and arching underneath him, her body molten with welcome. Afterward, she lay with her hand on his heart, his thigh pushed between her own.

Nipping at her ear, he said, “Are you ever going to admit to the fact you’re a maternal dominant?” It happened once or twice in every generation, a maternal female with such aggressive protective tendencies that she chose to train as a soldier. But nothing, Riaz thought, could change the steely core of compassion that made the maternals who they were, that inherent kindness intertwined with strength reflected in Adria’s every action.

Her laugh was husky. “What kind of lieutenant would you be if you couldn’t figure it out, hmm?” She wrote her initials over his heart, as if marking him. “Nell was faster than anyone else to peg me—she wants me in the maternal cabal.”

Grinning at her description of the power at the heart of the pack, he tucked her hair behind her ear so he could see her face. “Interested?”

“I dunno—it’s like the mafia. Once you’re in, you can never get out.” A smile that danced with mischief, but her next words were thoughtful. “I chose to train as a soldier because it suits my wolf—I’m too aggressive to be a full-time maternal.”

“You’re great with the submissives.” Ensuring the health of their young was only one aspect of the complex duties undertaken by the maternal females, but it was an important one.

“Yes.” Another design on his chest, this one more aimless. “Working with pups and juveniles fulfills the other side of my nature. So the setup I currently have is about perfect … though, I might open a channel with the cabal.” Another wicked grin. “It’d be nice to get their input on some things, plus since I’ll have a foot in both camps, it’ll be a way to make sure nothing slips between the cracks when it comes to the children.”

“Do you think Riley had that in mind all along?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me—even dopey over Mercy, he thinks ten steps ahead.” Stealing a smiling kiss, she settled herself more closely against him and closed her eyes. “Go to sleep. We have to get up early.”

“Good night, Empress.”

“Good night, Golden Eyes.”

He smiled, nibbled at her ear again. “Say that in public and you’ll be sorry.”

“Now you’ve gone and dared me. Don’t you know never to do that with a maternal female?”

Riaz growled playfully at her. He was happy deep in his heart … but not content, because this laughing woman who had his wolf’s devotion, a woman he adored beyond life itself, expected him to leave her, maybe not today or tomorrow, but one day. It was a hidden shadow in the violet-blue, a darkness he only glimpsed when she thought he wasn’t watching. … and it eviscerated him.

He refused to allow her to hurt that way. Fucking refused.

JUDD was unsurprised to see Aden on the back steps of Xavier’s church a week after the attack on Sonja. “The anchors in this region are safe,” he told the Arrow. Each and every one had been moved, their locations known only to Nikita and Anthony, no backup files kept either on the Net or outside. But to everyone’s surprise, the telepathic file containing images that could be used for a teleport lock in an emergency, had also been sent to Sascha.

“My daughter’s flaw,” Nikita had said during the meeting, staring right across at that daughter, “makes her the lone individual we can trust absolutely not to use the information to cause harm.”

Sascha’s reply had been as frank. “I’ll share it with Judd—he’s the only person who’d be able to get to the anchors in an emergency.”

“The decision is yours,” Nikita had said. “As an E, you have the capability to judge whether or not a former Arrow will use the information to kill.”

It was, Judd knew, the first time Nikita had ever acknowledged that Sascha wasn’t a failed cardinal, but a powerful one. And because he, Sascha, Lucas, and Hawke all knew that even if the civil war in the Net turned brutal and threatened to engulf the packs, none of them would seek to collapse the Net, to murder indiscriminately, he held the file inside his mind, tucked away in a section that would immediately and automatically degrade if his shields were ever breached.

Only the people who had been at that meeting, as well as Walker and Sienna, knew that he and Sascha carried the files. The information was too explosive, too dangerous, could make them both targets if it got out. Unless an anchor in the relevant area sent out an emergency distress call, no one would ever know.

“The same is being attempted in every region across the world,” Aden now said, “but the task is massive, and the majority of cities don’t have the resources of two Councilors. For the time being, we’re recommending the anchors move their furniture around in unexpected ways and never go unarmed.”

No Tk ever used the layout of furniture as a lock—it was too transient. And all teleport-capable Tks had an inbuilt space-sensing ability that meant they would never materialize in solid matter. Unless there was a psychic failure, the teleport would abort at the obstruction. However, if a Tk did ’port in, the unfamiliar layout could grant the anchor an extra few seconds in which to run or use a weapon. “It’s a smart move.”

“Henry is dead.”

“You?”

“Vasic.” A pause. “We can’t trust him, not after this is done.”

Judd didn’t misunderstand the warning. “The children in the Arrow schools,” he said, instead of responding directly to the statement, “who’s watching out for them?” Even with the darkness swallowing the Net and the Arrows’ attention, Aden would not have forgotten their youngest brethren.

“The most stable of us each have a group we monitor.” Aden passed Judd a small black data crystal. “The names and addresses of the children. If anything happens to us, they are the ones you must protect.” A pause. “Trust it to Walker—he’ll understand and be able to help them better than you or I.”

Judd put the crystal into the inside pocket of his leather-synth jacket, the act an unspoken promise. “Does Vasic monitor a group?” Vasic might not feel, but he had a conscience, would never damage a child by abandoning him. That conscience was why the Tk-V hated himself, though he would not put it in those terms.

“No.” Aden looked out into the night. “He doesn’t trust himself not to kill if he sees a teacher hurting a child—we can’t yet intervene. It risks giving everything away before we’re in a position to take total control of the training system.”

“How close are you?”

“On the verge. Unlike Ming, Kaleb appears to have no inclination to take a direct hand in the schools.” A long pause. “Even when we seize the reins, total liberation will be impossible.”

“I know.” Without the mental discipline forged by his rigid Arrow training, Judd’s abilities might have self-destructed long ago. “But the process doesn’t have to be cruel.” A young boy’s arm didn’t have to be broken over and over again until he stopped screaming.

“Some would say such a stance will destroy the foundation of the program.”

That pain was a state of mind, to be overcome. “And perhaps we’ll discover it makes us stronger.”

Aden didn’t say anything for a long time. “I have to go. There has been an explosion at a Psy research facility in Belgrade.”

Judd watched the other Arrow disappear into the darkness before rising and entering the church to take the second pew from the back. He felt the slightest brush of air as the Ghost slid into the pew behind him a minute later. “Do you know about Belgrade?” Judd asked while they waited for Father Xavier Perez, the third part of their unexpected triumvirate, to finish speaking with a parishioner in his office.

“Of course.” No arrogance, simple fact. “It was small and is being contained, no fatalities.”

“Luck or a lack of planning on the part of the attackers?”

“The latter. The facility is privately funded, and about to begin a critical assessment of the Silence Protocol—somehow, their mission statement leaked into the Net twenty-four hours ago.”

The fact that any group had gained permission to conduct such a study was momentous, though Judd had a very good idea of how it had been done. As he had about the leak. “Pure Psy acted in the heat of the moment.” Judd knew what the Ghost knew about Vasquez, and so he knew this act was out of character. “Henry’s death may have severed the leash that kept Vasquez rational.” He had no doubt his fellow rebel was aware of the ex-Councilor’s demise.

“Perhaps.” No concern. “It’s time, Judd.”

Yes, the dominoes had begun to fall, unstoppable and inexorable. “Is the violence necessary?”

“Some things need to be broken to become stronger.”

The Ghost left thirty seconds later, called away by something urgent.

Sitting alone in the peace of the church, Judd thought of the murders perpetrated by Pure Psy, the violence done tonight, the blood that would be spilled in the future. Instead of reminding the populace of the value of Silence, the aggression was nudging awake long-buried emotions, fear so dark and from so deep in the psyche that not even the most painful conditioning could keep it imprisoned.

Silence was one crack away from total failure.

Some things need to be broken to become stronger.

“He does not understand friendship,” Judd said to Xavier later, “but I do.”

The priest’s dark skin glowed in the light from the candles that were the sole illumination now that he’d turned off the lights. “Is it mercy to end the life of a friend savaged by torment, or is it a sin?”

“Those are your questions, Xavier. Mine is only this: if he proves too unstable”—willing to extinguish the Net in a rippling wave of endless death—“will I have the strength to execute a man who is a mirror of who I might’ve been in another life?”