Mender (The Ashport Mender Series Book 2) Read online

  “How many of you are there?”

  “Only me at the moment,” I answered, suddenly missing Freddy very much. He’d been the mender in town before I showed up to share the job, up until the damn cops arrested him. I didn’t say anything about that, though. The less Hansen knew when it came to Freddy, the better. We had, after all, sprung him from the prison transport. But I did miss having another mender around. Sometimes being more than one person was a good thing. Though the affiliates were an effective support system, sometimes you simply needed help from someone with the right skillset. Normally, we could have dealt with each thing at this point.

  “How many are there, usually?” Hansen continued.

  “You know…you ask a lot of questions,” I said as I drove away from the hospice.

  “Well…you’re finally answering some of them.”

  There were limits, though. But I had tried keeping everything under wraps and that didn’t work with this guy. Maybe he couldn’t help himself because of what he did for a living. The fact that he’d picked up on something about me meant he was good at noticing things, too. It wasn’t like I had a sign on my forehead announcing my affiliation. The fact he’d been investigating me, though…that had caught me off guard. Mostly because I knew that would have involved McAllen, and I couldn’t believe he’d be bothered enough to do that. Still, that reminded me of the shooting.

  “How is Detective McAllen?” I asked carefully, knowing it was a sore point as I had been at the scene when it happened.

  “Not good,” Hansen said. “He woke up yesterday, but something went wrong and they had to operate again. Blood clot.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. I meant it. I liked McAllen. He’d always treated me fairly despite whatever misgivings the asshat next to me had. Said asshat kept silent a little while as we drove through town, heading back the way we’d come only an hour earlier. In the end, though, curiosity got the better of him.

  “Why didn’t you come to us when you found out a cop had been shot in the same place Andrea had been kidnapped?”

  I stopped at a stop sign, checking for traffic before driving again. “The same reason none of us ever do,” I said. I had left the alley in a haze of confusion after being hit by the van. I hadn’t heard about the shooting of McAllen until later. Since no one had come for me by then, I figured I hadn’t been seen. “You would have thought I had something to do with it. Hell, you did believe that,” I explained. “That’s why we stay out of your way. You lot always misunderstand and throw out accusations first.” At least now he knew I was the intended victim, not someone who was to blame for McAllen’s injuries.

  “Yeah…everyone you know looks at me like I come spreading the bubonic plague or something.”

  I shrugged. “You kind of do.”

  It didn’t take long before we were back at Mona’s house, the street as peaceful as earlier. No Agent Larkin in sight, only people out walking or raking what leaves had started falling in their yards. Picture perfect. Nothing to suggest the poor man inside the house, who couldn’t move his fingers even if his life depended on it.

  “And why are we back here?” Hansen asked as we walked up to the front door.

  “Because I have a bad feeling about this,” I said. “And put that away,” I added, pointing at his badge.

  “Can’t do that,” he said. “I’m supposed to—”

  “I don’t give a crap. Put it away. It upsets people.”

  He sighed, point made, but at least did as I said, putting the thing in his pocket, as Mona opened the door.

  “Did you find out anything?” she asked before I could open my mouth. Didn’t even care that I had brought a complete stranger to her doorstep.

  “Maybe,” I said. “I won’t take up your time, Mona, but I asked the wrong question when I was here earlier.

  “Okay,” she said, no idea where I was going with this, but trusting me nonetheless. “Fire away.”

  “I shouldn’t only have asked you about Jake’s affiliation. I should have asked if there’s anyone else in your family with the same or a similar one.”

  Her eyes widened at this. “Dr. Morris told me on the phone there was another boy with the same affliction. Do you think someone targeted them?”

  Seemed Hansen wasn’t the only one sharp on the uptake today.

  “Might be, yeah,” I said. It was too much of a coincidence. According to Dr. Morris, Michael had been attacked yesterday. Jake the day before. I wouldn’t be surprised if it happened again. “So…are there more in your family?”

  She nodded and swallowed hard. “My nephew, Will. He’s related to my husband’s side of the family.”

  “And his affiliation is?”

  “Exactly the same as Jake’s.”

  Chapter 7

  “I’m just saying there’s useful stuff in the other car,” Hansen pointed out. He sat against the hood of the Beetle, arms folded.

  “Well, it’s too late now,” I said, sitting inside the car, door open, dialing Will’s number again.

  “It wasn’t when—”

  “Now we’re here, and I am driving this car.” I sighed. “Straight to voicemail again.”

  We’d been trying to reach him since leaving Mona’s house, and so had she, no doubt. Will had come to Ashport with Jake, visiting his aunt and uncle, as well as going on a camping trip with friends and his girlfriend, who was local.

  “What kind of kid keeps his phone off this long?” Hansen asked, shaking his head.

  “The kind who’s sharing a tent with his girlfriend. Not like you were busy checking your phone the other night, either,” I said without thinking and saw his shoulders stiffen as he looked down a moment. I had forgotten about his embarrassment regarding the safe house. So much else had happened. I tried very hard not to laugh as I got out of the car. There was nothing else to do but head up Highfield Ridge and look for the kid.

  We had about an hour of sunlight by this time, and we had no water and no flashlights. At least there was a wide trail heading up the ridge, as the area was used by people often. That was probably why Will and company had gone there as well. The trail was easy enough to be no hassle, and far enough away for them to be alone. A nice few days, no classes, enjoying the outdoors and drinking, I guessed. And so, Will hadn’t heard about his cousin. No wonder Mona hadn’t been alarmed when he didn’t answer his phone. She’d had enough to worry about.

  “You really think he’s in danger?” Hansen asked as I locked the car and we started walking along the trail. It would be quite flat at first before a steep incline dominated the trek a while.

  “I can’t afford not to check it out,” I said. “Whoever’s doing this must be stopped.”

  “I agree, but—”

  “No cops,” I interrupted. “In all honesty…what would you say if I came to you claiming someone was using their special abilities to render people in a waking coma?”

  “I’d think you were off your rocker.”

  “Exactly. So what do you think your colleagues would say to this?”

  He didn’t say anything, but his jaw tightened. It was a sore point; I knew that.

  I’d seen how hard it was for him when we’d had to hide in the forest near the Kreutz Farm from the same people he worked with every day. Then he hadn’t even known what was really going on. It was only common sense that had gotten him to go along with what it.

  “Okay, so what’s your plan then?” he said finally.

  “Plan for what?”

  “Dealing with someone who can put us in the same state as Jake and Michael?”

  “Oh, well…to deal with whoever it is very, very quickly.”

  I saw his lips twitch a little at that, almost like a restrained smile trying to escape. I did have a point, though. If we wanted to avoid the same fate, and I didn’t want that to happen to us, we had to render the person doing it incapable of using their ability.

  “So, we’re basically walking blind into this?”

&nbs
p; “Yup. I don’t have luxuries like back-up.”

  He seemed to consider this a while. We kept walking, the susurration of nature a continuing meld of sounds around us. The wind blowing through the trees, birds chirping away, a river far to our right, a creek crossing the trail at several points. It was like we were on a bizarre hike. All the visual beauty dampened by the crap-feast waiting for us.

  “Why do you do this?” he asked, startling me a little as he’d been quiet for so long. We had started on the steep hills by now, our pace not slowing down, though.

  “Someone has to,” I said and shrugged. Had I ever had other plans? Sure. But life didn’t always give a crap.

  “That’s not really an answer,” he pointed out.

  I bit my lower lip a moment, trying to figure this out. My first instinct was to keep quiet. But Gerard had been worried about Hansen knowing about us. If he didn’t understand, he could turn on us, and that would make things difficult.

  “Someone helped me out years ago when I needed it,” I said slowly, measuring my every word. “My whole life turned around then and…I knew how much I had needed someone to care. To actually give a damn and give me a hand. Afterwards…I kind of gradually fell into this.”

  I didn’t like thinking back on my early teens and my time in Yorov’s hands. They’d fooled my terrified parents into thinking they could help cure me. That’s what they had been promised, and so they’d sent me away. I didn’t really blame them anymore. I understood now how scared they must have been having a kid who knew what they were thinking all the time. But Yorov…I would be forever grateful they had spies in their midst. People who helped kids like me get away. My life now wasn’t only a way for me to pay them back. I actually knew what it was like to be on the other end of the stick. How could I stand back and not care?

  He must have noticed my mind trailing off. “Care to elaborate?”

  I shook my head and noticed the look of disdain on his face. “It’s not the first time Yorov’s been after me,” I heard myself explaining. “They tried various ways of manipulation when I was a kid. A kind person got me out.”

  I blinked in confusion. How did he do that? Sometimes, he got this look in his eyes that made me feel like I was caught out, like my bad attitude was reined in somehow. It left me confused and angry each time.

  “Hmm…kind of makes sense now, I guess,” he mused.

  “How?”

  “Now that I know what you…can do.” He didn’t seem able to actually say the words read minds out loud. “I get why a company that size is after you.”

  I raised an eyebrow at this, not planning on helping him in the least.

  “Corporate espionage, deal manipulations” he continued, and gave a slight shrug. “I can see them using Andrea the same way. Why else would they have kept her alive these past few days when she was not their intended target?”

  “Huh…so you’re not just a pretty face, are you? And here I thought McAllen was the brains of you two.”

  Comments like that usually disturbed his countenance, but not this time. Damn it. I clenched my jaw in silent consternation. For a brief moment, I had forgotten about the shooting. He was right, though. Andrea's ability to project herself into places where her physical body was not, could be very useful indeed when obtaining information.

  “So where were you five years ago?” he asked, ducking under a branch that had grown over the trail, no threat to me, but low enough to hit him in the forehead.

  I smiled. He was persistent. I would do as Gerard said, of course. Try to get this cop to let the Community be, but I couldn’t be sure he wasn’t still out to arrest me for anything. False identities weren’t exactly what you wanted to discuss with the police.

  “Probably at a coffee house, enjoying a macchiato and—”

  “Hey, I am trying to make some sense of this.”

  “You ask too many questions, Detective.”

  “Yeah? Well, we can’t all get information the way you do,” he snapped.

  No, I tried very hard not to obtain information that way, so I was not having this scorn thrown at me. “I know all kinds of things about you without listening in,” I said, seeing the confusion in his eyes as he looked at me. “I’ve seen you naked, remember?”

  “Damn it, Evans,” he exclaimed, averting his eyes, making me smile wider. Yep. There it was. Disconcerting him always worked.

  As we came up the steepest part of the ridge, the sun was almost down, in its own way a stroke of luck, as it helped us pinpoint Will and his friends at once. They had lit campfires. Two to be exact. The camps were placed a little way off the trail, higher up than we were at the moment, but not in the most wooded area. I noticed the fire furthest from us was smaller than the other one. A private little camp? Will and his girlfriend, I guessed. We could hear singing and shouting from the other camp, though it was hard to see the people in the weak light. Still, it was not difficult to guess.

  “They’re hammered,” Hansen commented as we sped up. I’d noticed he’d walked all the way with ease, not out of breath despite our high tempo. I knew very well how he looked–lean with defined muscles hidden under those clothes. A runner’s body, I had figured. It made sense now. The ground was flat for another hundred yards before several trails met ahead of us. Almost like a tiny mountain intersection. From there, we would have to walk up a steep area again, to reach the camps. It was the first time since we started the ascent we’d had any view far ahead, and what we saw, stopped us both short a moment.

  It didn’t matter that details were difficult to discern. A figure was heading up toward the camps, moving fast, almost at a run.

  “Shit,” Hansen uttered.

  “I told you,” I said, staring at the dark figure. “This wasn’t a coincidence.” I barely got the words out, before Hansen ran forward.

  “Wait,” I said before I managed to gather my thoughts and run after him. With his head start he was way ahead of me as he sprinted after the figure. I pulled at the strap of my purse so it rested against my back as I ran, seeing the figure was already halfway to the first camp. Whoever it was didn’t seem to be heading straight for it, though. I had no doubt the lone tent was the target. How the figure knew exactly how to find Will was beyond me, and I didn’t care as I ran hard to catch up, trying not to stumble over anything in the fading light.

  Being stumbled over was, however, what I should have worried about.

  Something crashed into my left side so hard I cried out in shock as I was slammed to the ground. I landed on my side, hearing a grunt from whoever had pummeled me as they rolled off me, hitting the rocky ground a few feet away.

  I scrambled to my feet immediately, knowing that remaining on the ground could be my last mistake. As I turned, I saw my attacker did the same thing, unsteady on his feet a moment, like me, as he got his bearings.

  Agent Larkin.

  “Fucking hell,” I snarled in my confused realization. That made him smile as he instantly attacked again, his speed surprising me at such a short distance. I blocked his first punch, and barely averted the second one, which snagged my left shoulder. It didn’t unsettle me more than my attempted knee toward his groin did him. He quickly made a short jump back as I extended my bent leg, kicking him in the thigh, catching him off balance as the pain made him go down on one knee. I instantly went on the offense, hitting his head once, before his arm came up between us, his other hand coming up and deflecting my blows. I lifted my knee as I was pushed sideways, hitting him square in the chest, but didn’t see his already moving leg kicking out, hitting me and toppling me over.

  I remember cursing my own inattentiveness as I landed on my ass, the suit over me instantly as he pushed me down, straddling me, trying to get a hold of my arms. I could hear myself snarling at him, though what I uttered I couldn’t say. I bucked hard, my hips jerking thrice, unbalancing him enough for me to push him, hitting whatever part of his face I could. I rolled over him, hitting twice toward his head while extracting a glori
ous cry of pain from him as I inadvertently placed my knee with all my weight between his legs while trying to get up.

  How he managed to stay focused I have no idea. Most men would have curled up at that point, but he managed to pull his gun on me, effectively stopping my movements by pushing it into my stomach.

  “Get the fuck off me,” he wheezed.

  I clambered off him and got to my feet while I kept my eyes on him. I was out of breath and my arm and back hurt, but other than adding this up in my head, I didn’t let it take my focus. No, that was reserved for the man in front of me. He was breathing hard, eyes squinting a bit. He stood up in a sort of crouch. I knew my punches to his head had been more distracting than pain inflicting. I’d hit him good in the thigh, probably not too bad in the chest, but his crotch had to be the worst. I had to give him some credit, though. The gun was still pointed at me with a steady hand.

  Then I noticed it was the damn tranquilizer gun again. He really was set on taking me with him alive. I guess that was something to be thankful for.

  “You’re coming with me, Evans,” he said, his wheezing forcing him to take a deep breath. “I would prefer you walking on your own, but I will carry you if I have to.”

  “Fuck you, you ass-turd,” I snapped at him. Not particularly eloquent, but it thoroughly painted a nice picture of my opinion of him.

  “Drop it,” Hansen said somewhere to my left. Both Larkin and I glanced in that direction as the Detective came walking toward us, his gun raised and aimed at Larkin.

  “Ah, Detective,” Larkin said, forcing a smile through his pain. “I thought you left. Fancy seeing you here with her.”

  “Put the weapon down,” Hansen said. I could see he was a little winded. He must have heard us and turned around.

  Oh God, Will.

  That meant the attacker was still coming for him.

  “You’re interfering with an arrest, Detective” Larkin argued.

  “The way I see it, you’re attacking a citizen for no reason. And trying to drug her.”