VAUGHN LEFT THE room to make the call using the comm in Faith’s workspace. As a DarkRiver sentinel, he had a contact number for BlackSea that was routed to whichever senior pack member was currently on shift as liaison. Today, that happened to be Malachai Rhys. The big male listened to Vaughn’s proposal, then connected him to Miane Levèque after a minute-long delay.
Vaughn knew what Malachai had been doing in that minute when Miane appeared on the comm and began to speak without Vaughn having to explain anything. “The bottle’s in a lab on one of our floating cities,” the alpha said. “I can pledge a BlackSea favor to get it to you via a teleport, but you tell me if I can trust this Ps-Psy.”
Vaughn was unsurprised by her wariness; Psy had long been the enemy of changelings and even now, Vaughn himself only trusted a rare few. “I can’t give you an absolute guarantee,” he responded. “Tanique is Faith’s brother, loyal to NightStar. And NightStar is headed by Anthony Kyriakus, who has no love for the Consortium.”
Wholesale chaos and violence was bad for the F-Psy who were a vital part of NightStar’s power base, especially with so many of them now opening up to visions outside the antiseptic limits of business contracts. If there was one thing Vaughn knew about Anthony, it was that the other man protected his foreseers, including Faith, with a merciless will. “On the flip side,” he added, “Tanique didn’t grow up in NightStar but with the maternal side of his family, so he may have loyalties we don’t know about.”
“Faith NightStar was the one who suggested we ask her brother?”
Vaughn saw where Miane was going. “Not a vision,” he clarified, “but she had a tone in her voice I’ve come to know. I’d never bet against her.”
“I’d be a fool not to heed the advice of the best foreseer in the world.” Miane put her hands on her hips, her cream-colored long-sleeved shirt moving with a fluidity that made Vaughn wonder if it was one of the experimental luxe fabrics BlackSea was famous for creating.
“We’ll need the bottle within the next two to three hours,” Vaughn reiterated.
Miane’s curt nod was a silent promise they’d have it. “This is a massive risk on our part, cat.”
“Sometimes even sharks have to take a leap of faith.”
Miane’s lips curved at the implied question about her changeling nature, but there was no humor in her eyes. “I’ll kill Tanique Gray if he betrays us.”
Vaughn knew that should Miane attempt to take such an action, he’d have to get in her way. His jaguar, too, would never forgive betrayal, but like him, Faith had already lost one sibling. Vaughn didn’t think she could bear the loss of another. But he also had total conviction in his mate’s abilities—even when she didn’t have a vision, Faith “saw” things.
Like this morning, she’d insisted he wear his leather-synth jacket when he absolutely hadn’t intended to go out on the jetcycle today. If he’d refused to listen, he’d have had to return home to get it barely an hour later, after one of his packmates asked him for a favor that necessitated a trip to the city. And three days earlier, she’d called Tamsyn to tell the healer about a deal she’d seen for good quality chocolate chips.
“I bought them,” Tamsyn had said to Vaughn when they ran into each other yesterday. “Then today, Roman comes home and reminds me I promised to make chocolate chip cookies for his and Jules’s entire class after they finished a big project. I totally forgot, would’ve had to scramble if Faith hadn’t given me that tip.”
Small things, miniscule even, but they added up. “I don’t think you’ll have to kill Tanique,” he told Miane, but held her gaze so she’d know he was as big a predator as her, his dominance such that even Lucas couldn’t make him do anything. Vaughn’s jaguar chose to follow Lucas’s panther because that panther had earned its respect and loyalty. “Understand, he’s family.”
Miane didn’t blink. “I suspect you and Malachai would get on well,” she said before ending the call.
Vaughn received a message five minutes later asking him to share teleport coordinates. “I’ll be back soon,” he told Faith and grabbed his dirty T-shirt, which he’d thrown into the laundry basket.
Running out of his lair, he went full tilt for twenty minutes, until he was surrounded by trees that all looked identical. He hung his tee, with its distinctive Celtic design on the front, from a branch. Then he took a photograph to send to Miane. It didn’t surprise him in the least when the teleporter who appeared with a small storage box was a tall male dressed in Arrow black.
After his recent lifesaving actions in bombings and disasters, Vasic had become famous worldwide. But Vaughn knew him from well before that. He hadn’t been there the day this man with his winter gray eyes brought in the medic who saved Dorian’s life, but he’d heard the details from those who’d witnessed the incident. Without the help provided by the teleporter and that medic who the entire world now knew as a power, Vaughn’s fellow sentinel and friend would be dead.
“Thanks,” he said, taking the box Vasic held out. “What did Miane promise you?” Vasic wasn’t a commercial teleporter, so it wasn’t as if BlackSea could’ve hired him.
The other man’s gaze was pure frost. “What has she promised you?”
Vaughn bared his teeth. “Not a thing.”
He didn’t think the Arrow would respond, but Vasic said, “Life isn’t always a cost-reward ratio. It’s something the Psy long forgot. Some things we do in the name of friendship—or because it’s the right thing to do.”
Vaughn had already liked this Arrow who didn’t back down in the face of a predator’s challenge, but right then, he had the sense he might one day come to call Vasic a friend.
• • •
NINETY minutes later, Faith and Vaughn dropped a sleeping Naya off at Tamsyn’s place, where Sascha was having a meeting with the healer and a number of the pack’s submissives. They then drove toward Tahoe in a high-speed vehicle. And now here Faith sat in a small conference room, her mate at her side, waiting for her father and her brother.
She’d become accustomed to keeping her face impassive when walking into meetings with her father. Anthony had made it clear the charade that theirs was, was nothing but a business relationship that had to continue post-Silence. PsyClan NightStar might be powerful, but it had powerful enemies, too. Anthony was a highly visible target. He refused to make Faith one when she’d successfully settled into a non-public life.
“I’ve lost one child. No more.”
Faith remained at some risk because killing or even badly injuring her would significantly affect NightStar’s bottom line. However, that risk was nowhere near what it would be should NightStar’s enemies realize Anthony would strike terrible bargains to keep her safe. No outsider could ever know that Anthony Kyriakus, head of PsyClan NightStar, former Psy Councilor, and current member of the Ruling Coalition, loved his children.
Her father entered at that instant, a tall man with patrician features and black hair silvered at the temples, his expression the epitome of cool Silence. “Vaughn. Faith.”
Safe inside the windowless meeting room devoid of monitoring equipment, Faith hugged a man who had been too long in Silence to easily show emotion. But his arms came around her, his scent familiar, and his voice deep as he said, “You’re well?” The simple, toneless question held such a weight of love that it made a knot form in her chest.
Swallowing, she drew back to look up into his face. “Yes, Father. I’m well.”
Scanning her face, Anthony said, “I see signs of strain.”
“I had a marathon session yesterday,” she admitted. “Nothing dangerous. Vaughn was working nearby the whole time and he made me take regular breaks.”
“I had to physically disrupt her trance,” Vaughn muttered, his scowl in his voice.
“Everything was flowing so beautifully, I wanted to keep going. But”—she held up her hands when her father would’ve spoken—“I’m having a break today and tomorrow to recharge.”
Psychic power burned energy, but in the case of the darker visions of violence and murder and natural disasters, it was also viscerally draining. Such visions haunted her for weeks afterward. Thankfully, she hadn’t seen anything too distressing of late, only small warnings she’d been able to pass on so people could avoid bone-breaking accidents or personal catastrophes.
“Faith.” Anthony held her eyes with the brown of his, the charisma in his gaze potent. “I know you disliked the Tec 3 uplinked chair you had in your cabin—”
“‘Dislike’ is too weak a word.” The tiny hairs on her arms rising in cold warning, Faith shifted back to stand with Vaughn.
Her mate immediately wrapped one arm across the top of her chest to tug her against the muscled strength of his body. It was a silent promise. A deadly one, too, should it be necessary.
Air rushed back into her body, the painful tightness in her chest melting away. “I hate that chair.” A full-length recliner shaped to her personal body contours, it had monitored and transmitted every breath she took while using it during the cold years she’d spent isolated in a one-person cabin.
“You hated the intrusion, the fact that the data was fed to the medics,” her father countered. “The chair itself would be invaluable to anyone who needs to monitor your well-being.” His eyes went to Vaughn.
The jaguar who belonged to Faith brushed his fingers over her collarbone, a DarkRiver cat calming his mate. “I don’t need technology to make sure Faith is safe during her visions.”
“He really doesn’t,” Faith reassured her father.
Despite her strong negative reaction to the idea of a Tec 3 uplinked recliner, she knew Anthony only wanted the best for her, that every action he’d ever taken in relation to his children had been to protect. Losing her half sister Marine to a psychopath had honed that protectiveness to a deadly edge.
“I’m safe,” she said. “I promise.” She couldn’t control the dark or wild visions, but she never went into a controlled one unless Vaughn was nearby.
“I know the bond you two share is powerful,” her father replied, “but Vaughn, you can’t monitor every aspect of her health.”
Faith realized her father had no framework for understanding the beauty and intensity of the mating bond. Deciding not to push the point, she said, “Do you need to get rid of my old chair?”
“No.” Anthony’s tone was so cool she felt chastened for her flip response. “We have three prototype next-generation recliners with top-of-the-line health-monitoring functions, including a direct emergency link to a medic if your vitals drop below a certain point. I want you to have one.”
Faith’s skin crawled at the idea of once again using a chair that spied on her. She opened her mouth to speak but Vaughn beat her to it. “Give us a minute, Anthony.”
Her father left the room without further words, pulling the door shut behind himself.
“I don’t want that chair.” Arms folded, Faith glared at her mate.
“Red, you can turn off the monitoring functions, right?”
She stayed stubbornly silent until Vaughn brushed his fingers over her jaw in a caress that she knew came from the heart of his jaguar. “Yes,” she admitted. “We can take out the chip, lobotomize it.”
“So”—Vaughn cupped her cheek, ran his thumb over her cheekbone—“you accept your dad’s gift. He’s not the most warm and cuddly guy, but you’re his little girl. He’s just trying to look after you, same as Lucas does with Naya.”
Her lower lip trembled. She’d been so locked up inside the memories of how much she’d hated that chair that she’d forgotten why it had been created in the first place. So she’d be safe. “I love you.”
Vaughn’s smile was pure feline smugness. “I know.”
She mock-punched him before opening the door to let her father back in.
“I’ll try the chair on a probationary basis.” Too easy a capitulation would make Anthony suspicious. “We’ll also be disabling all broadcast functions. Any data it collects”—which would be zero—“will be kept strictly local to our home.”
“I don’t want to monitor you, Faith. I just want you to have all possible safeguards.”
Faith gave in and hugged her remote, dangerous, loving father again. “Thank you.”
He touched the back of her head before looking toward the door. A light knock came seconds later. Though the two of them drew apart, Anthony didn’t speak or go to the door. When it opened, Faith realized he must’ve answered telepathically. No one in NightStar would ever barge in on her father.
“Sir.” The six-foot-tall young male who spoke was striking, with Anthony’s patrician bones under mocha-colored skin, his hair black and tightly curled. He was a Ps-Psy, gifted in psychometry . . . and he was her younger brother.
“Tanique,” Anthony said. “You know your half sibling Faith and her mate Vaughn D’Angelo.”
Tanique greeted Vaughn with a polite nod, but his attention was on Faith. “I’ve wanted to speak properly with you for a long time.”
“I feel the same.” Faith reached out her hands before she remembered Tanique had been raised in Silence and, unlike her, hadn’t left the Net to join a changeling pack where touch was an essential and everyday part of life.
Any post-Silence changes in her brother would be slow and hesitant.
Dropping her hands, she said, “You’re permanently at NightStar now?” All adult Psy could choose the side of their family line with which they preferred to align themselves. Tanique had done it, not at eighteen but later. Regardless, Anthony would’ve paid a penalty to the family who had raised and educated him but would no longer have the benefit of his abilities.
Thirty was the point at which such considerations no longer applied.
Tanique was barely twenty-four and a half.
“Yes,” he said. “NightStar is my home base, though I do travel.” Her brother continued to look at her with beautiful eyes of a pale tawny brown that made his face even more striking. They were almost feline, her brother’s eyes, with fine striations of darker brown and yellow in the irises.
Faith got the impression that he was as curious about her as she was about him.
“My skill set meshes far better with F-Psy than with the telepathic abilities prevalent in my maternal line,” he added in a voice that reminded her of Anthony’s, only younger. “They didn’t know quite how to make use of me, but Father does. I do a little work for private collectors, but the bulk of what I do involves museums that wish to verify the provenance of exhibits or items the institutions wish to purchase.”
Faith shook her head, her pride in her brother a tidal wave of pressure against her heart. “That’s not all you do,” she corrected. “I know you’ve helped find more than one lost or kidnapped child.”
Tanique didn’t blink or shift position, but she caught a subtle change in his expression. “Father’s taught me that we aren’t only machines bound to our gifts.” A glance at their shared father that held unhidden respect. “Yes, we need to support ourselves, but we can also choose to use our abilities in ways that are good for society . . . and for our spirits,” he finished hesitantly.
At that instant, Faith saw only a younger brother still struggling to find his footing, not the gifted Ps-Psy who’d once carried a child a mile out of a dense jungle after picking up a lost backpack and catching a glimpse of where the child’s abductor had taken him.
“Choosing to do the right thing can be hard at times,” she said softly, “but it’s worth it.” The dark visions used to leave her crumpled in a fetal ball until she accepted them as part of her gift and took ownership. Now, sometimes, she saved a life. Against that, the intense psychic control, the pain of living a murderer’s dreams, none of it mattered.
Tanique gave a nod so like Anthony’s that Faith bit back a smile. For all his poise and training, her brother suddenly put her in mind of the youths in DarkRiver. Adorable. He’d probably hate that description had he embraced emotion, but she thought an older sister should have leave to think such things. “I was actually hoping to ask your help with something.”
“I’d be happy to provide it.” His reply came so quickly on the heels of her words that she realized he wanted to build a relationship with her as badly as she wanted to build one with him. “You have an object for me to look at?”
Faith gestured to the box on the table. “It’s in there. Can you take a look, see what you sense?” It was a deliberately vague statement on her part; she didn’t want to influence him in any way.
“Can you open the box?” Tanique’s tone was more sure now that they were in his area of expertise. “It’s so I don’t get sidetracked by any impressions left on the box by those who’ve carried it.”
“I should’ve thought of that.”
Once she’d opened the box, Tanique simply looked at the barnacle-encrusted bottle for a long minute before he reached in and lifted it out, while being careful not to brush so much as his knuckles against the inside of the box. The letter had been deemed too fragile for handling, but Miane had sent a small piece from it that had broken off during the original transit. A blank corner, the paper was protected inside a small plastic sleeve.
Tanique left it in the box for now.
His first words came bare seconds after he touched the bottle. “Youth, curiosity, a feline energy, cold anger. A surface layer only, likely from the people who handled it over the past few days.”
Faith didn’t interrupt, though she was impressed by how quickly and accurately he’d picked up all that.
“The sea,” he murmured, running his fingers over the barnacles. “I can hear its crashing whisper in my mind . . . but you don’t need me to tell you this bottle was in the ocean.”
He angled his head to the right, as if struggling to hear a faraway voice.
“Age,” he murmured. “There are long-ago echoes here, from decades ago. Of an elderly man cleaning the bottle . . . but there’s a new deep imprint, too. A girl . . . no, a woman. A young woman held this not recently but recently enough and for long enough that the imprint hasn’t faded.”
When he looked at Faith, she had to bite back a gasp.
She’d seen Psy eyes turn black. Her own did that during a surge of emotion or when she was using large amounts of psychic power. She’d also seen the colors in Sascha’s eyes when she was using her empathic abilities . . . but this, she’d never seen. Tanique’s irises had taken on a shimmer of pale green. As if reflecting the bottle.
“She was afraid, but fierce. Hurt.” Squeezing shut his eyes, he lowered his head, only to shake it after thirty seconds. “That’s all I get.”
It wasn’t as much as Faith had hoped, but it was fascinating to see her brother at work. “Thanks for trying.”
“I don’t think anyone but the old man spent great amounts of time with the bottle.” Eyes ordinary now, he looked at the plastic sleeve that held the piece of paper. “May I . . . ?”
Faith nodded. She knew the water changelings wouldn’t have offered the piece to a Ps-Psy if they didn’t expect it to be touched. While her brother’s specialty was esoteric and not well known outside of museums—and some crime departments who’d been able to secure the services of a Ps-Psy—most people could connect the dots.
This time, he didn’t have to tell her to open the bag for him. Unsealing it, she shook the piece of paper straight out onto his palm.
Tanique’s spine snapped straight, his jaw going rigid. “Pain,” he said. “Anger again. More pain. Anguish.”
Faith saw her brother’s other hand fist at his side and had the startling realization that to be a Ps-Psy was to be bombarded by emotion. How had her brother survived Silence? It was a question she’d ask him one day, when they were alone and he didn’t feel so overwhelmed.
“The young woman who touched the bottle, she handled this paper on a boat.” His breathing grew ragged as his body swayed from side to side, as if he were on a boat himself. “The boat rocked . . . but not for long. She was frantic to get the paper away before it was too late and they reached land again. Home, she was thinking of home the last time she touched this.” Releasing the paper so it floated down to lie inside the box, he opened his eyes.
Faith went to say thank-you, but Tanique wasn’t done.
“I have fragments of what she saw,” he said. “A glimpse of what might be part of a wall, an image of her toes, what looks like a chain attached to a wrist.” Another deep breath, his expression difficult to read but his body vibrating with tension. “An old sign, chipped white paint on graying wood: Edward’s Pier. Apostrophe before the s in Edward’s. Worn wooden boards under her feet, water below . . . and that’s it.”
“I’ve got it,” Vaughn murmured, his phone already in hand as he messaged BlackSea the details Tanique had given them.
Faith reached out a hand toward her brother. “Thank you.”
Only a small hesitation before Tanique put his hand in hers. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be of more assistance. She’s in trouble, isn’t she?”
“Yes, and you helped.” The sign he’d picked up was a highly specific detail. “I didn’t really understand until I watched you work, but our abilities are on the same continuum. I don’t know why they’re not listed together in the Designation charts.” She frowned in an effort to find the words to say what she meant. “We both see what isn’t there. In my case, I see what will be, while you see what has been.”
Tanique blinked . . . and his fingers, they seemed to curl further around hers. “Perhaps we should write a paper arguing the case.”
“I think we should.” Faith smiled at the excuse to spend more time getting to know her brother. “Do you have to go yet? We could head outside for a while, talk.”
But Tanique shook his head. “Since I’m officially part of NightStar, it’s not safe for you to be connected to me in a non-business context.”
Disappointment was lead in her gut. “Oh, of course.”
Vaughn prowled over. “How about you two meet in DarkRiver’s home territory? No prying eyes there.”
Faith didn’t bother to hide her delight when Tanique agreed at once.
“Tanique,” Anthony said after Faith and Vaughn finished giving Tanique their direct contact details so he could get in touch when he had a day off. “Your transport is here.” A piercing look. “Be very careful. Your ability is rare enough that no one has truly worked out your vulnerabilities, but you’re a NightStar. Don’t let down your guard.”
“Yes, sir.” Tawny brown eyes met Faith’s. “I hope to see you again soon.”
Faith just did it. She hugged him. He froze, didn’t respond. But neither did he push her away, and that was enough for today. “I can’t wait.”
Anthony waited until Tanique was gone to speak. “I’ll have the chair delivered to DarkRiver’s HQ.”
“Thank you, Father.” Then, prodded by the silent mischief in the eyes of the jaguar who was her mate, she said, “Is Councilor Duncan well?”
Anthony’s response was icy. “You should get going, or you won’t arrive home until the early hours of the morning.” The faintest touch of his hand to her hair before he was gone.
Vaughn held it together until they were in the car and on their way to a casual restaurant for a late-night snack. “Your father and Nikita. Man likes to live dangerously.”
Faith shot virtual daggers at the highly amused cat next to her. “He was so mad.”
“No, he was just telling his daughter to mind her own business.”
“I would have if you hadn’t been egging me on.” She fiddled with the edge of the simple white top she wore with jeans and ankle boots. “Do you think they really are? In a relationship?” Faith could imagine her father loving a woman, but Nikita? “Sascha’s mom is . . .”
“A cold, heartless bitch?” Vaughn supplied before adding, “They do have one thing in common.”
“What?”
“Both would kill for their kids.”
Faith nodded slowly, though she continued to find it difficult to imagine how a relationship between two such icily controlled people could work. And which one of them would bend in any particular situation when both were used to ruling their domains with iron hands? As for physical intimacy . . .
She shuddered, banishing those thoughts far, far from her mind. “Quiet,” she ordered when her mate chuckled with a knowing glint in his eye. “Shall we go see Mercy tomorrow afternoon since you’ll be off-shift?”
Vaughn’s thigh bunched under the hand she’d placed on it. “No. She’ll just complain about exploding any day soon.” It was a bad-tempered growl. “I’ve never seen a woman be so bad at pregnancy.”
“It’s only been the last few weeks, when she can’t be as active as usual.” Even Mercy’s sentinel-fit body had said “Enough” at that point. “You know she’d like the company, and I know you miss her now that you don’t run into her on patrol.”
Vaughn growled again but muttered that he’d stop by a bakery and pick up Mercy’s favorite upside-down pineapple cake.
Faith smiled, wondering if they could steal Naya again and take her along on the visit. But her smile faded as she considered what had happened tonight. “You think Tanique’s reading will help?”
“Edward’s Pier doesn’t sound like an official name,” Vaughn said. “If it was put up on private land, it won’t be easy to find.” He shrugged, the movement quintessentially feline. “But it’s a whole lot more than BlackSea had before.” Golden eyes locked with hers for a primal heartbeat. “Now we see how well they hunt.”