Chapter 11

"Dios mio." Anita was the first to speak after my voice faded. "So you had a daughter? She lived?"

"No." I fought to keep my voice free of emotional inflections after speaking about what was no doubt the worst memory of my life, and that was saying something.

"We knew Killian had taken up with you," Carlos said. "We did our best to keep tabs on the other important players. He does not seem like the man to turn away from his woman."

"I would have said the same," I said. "And maybe there was a Hider working their magic on me." Something I hadn't had a chance to mull over. I changed directions. "I tell you that because in the facility, they were keeping us quiet with a form of mind control. Not one abnormal, with the exception of the Magelore, retained any special abilities. Myself included. I'm blocked off from anything I could do before." I mean, there was Cowboy, but he hadn't been able to use his EMP pulse, so maybe he'd lost that too.

Their eyes widened.

"You mean . . ." Carlos shook his head, "they took away your powers?"

"I think they buried them deep under some sort of false memory. They gave us new names and told us that all we'd lived before was a lie, a memory of lives that didn't exist. If you fought them, they hurt you. If you kept fighting them, they killed you."

"How did you survive?" Anita asked. "If they were so inside your mind?"

There was fear in her voice and it was not unwarranted.

"I gave them exactly what they wanted. I gave them compliance and agreement. I never took a step out of line after they stuck me in the facility. But they were still watching me, as you can see. And I'm sure they kept sedatives in the food. Which I ate. Because I had to."

"The last day?"

"I didn't eat as much. I claimed I wasn't feeling well." I pushed my plate away from me, feeling that same nausea. "They made it addictive, I'm sure."

"Oh," Anita said, "you are looking rather green."

I nodded and my stomach gurgled. I refused to throw up the first real meal I'd had in far too long. "I need to sleep."

"He fled to Europe," Carlos said as I stood. "With at least your son. There was no record of a girl."

Hope, dangerous and so desperately needed, flared in my chest. "Did they make it?"

"He made it there, but the purge spread. What started here, most of the world adopted." Carlos shook his head. "There is no safe place for us any longer."

His words hit me harder than I would have thought possible—or maybe it was the withdrawal from the drugs in my system—and I stumbled after Anita. She led me away from the dining room, and my dog followed.

"What is her name?"

"Hasn't got one yet," I said.

Anita held open a bedroom door. "It is my daughter's room, but she wouldn't mind. There is a bathroom attached and you can use any of her clothes you find."

She shut the door behind me, and I damn well knew she was trying to play on my sympathies. It wouldn't work. I wasn't looking for their daughter. I couldn't. Not if I was going to find my boy.

I forced myself into the bathroom and ran a hot shower. The heat was a welcome distraction and I hissed as the water hit the sore points on my body where the tracers still resided. "Like I've been hit with buckshot," I muttered, soaping up and scrubbing away the smell of the facility.

The dog gave a soft woof as I stepped out of the shower and toweled off. I ached all over, but the fatigue of a full belly, hot shower, freedom, and fear were crashing down on me and I fell onto the bed.

The dog jumped up and lay beside me and I slung an arm over her, an anchor in this storm I didn't quite know how I was going to get through.

Sleep caught me quickly and I didn't fight it, didn't try to navigate my mind, or the things I needed to keep away from those who would read my thoughts.

The current that had been swirling through me, hidden away, swept over my dreams and I found myself wandering in the darkness as if I were meditating.

"Bear!" I called my son's name, hoping but not expecting an answer.

"MOM!"

I spun to see him running toward me. His face was filthy as if he'd been rolling around in ashes, and his clothes were torn, but he was alive. I caught him in a hug, shocked at how much he'd grown. He was up to my shoulder now, too big to scoop up. Nearly twelve, he'd lived more than most people did in fifty years.

He clung to me, sobs ripping out of him. "I knew you weren't dead. I knew you weren't dead."

The irony was not lost on me. This would not be the first time he'd been told I was dead only to find out that I wasn't.

"Don't tell me where you are," I said. "There may be people watching. Tell me if you are okay, if you are safe."

He tipped his face up to me and I marveled that he was there. Not once in all the times I'd checked in on him had I dared reach out to him. Even in my safe place, I'd worried about drawing attention to him.

"I . . ." He shook his head. "I have Captain with me." Captain was his dog, a Malinois like Abe had been. "The three of us are hiding."

Three.

"Killian?"

Bear bit his lower lip. "No. He disappeared a few weeks ago. Mom, he was just gone one day. I woke up and he was gone."

He would never voluntarily leave Bear during this madness. "Who is with you?"

"Just me and—" He turned his head. "I have to go. Mom, we're okay. We're safe right now."

"I'll check on you every night. I'm coming," I whispered into his hair, kissing the top of his head as he faded away.

Gone, just like that.

Did I dare try to reach Killian?

"Fuck," I muttered and did a slow turn. "Killian, you sexy Irish asshole, where are you?"

I strode through the darkness and the fog, but there was no response from him. But if he was in a facility, and his mind was blanked out . . . my guts clenched, and I woke in a cold sweat.

What if Killian was trapped like I had been? No, that wasn't quite right. Eligor had never tried to control me to the extent the others had been controlled. Killian could be like Easter—his mind blank, his body working on autopilot. Or worse . . . if he'd fought them too hard, they might have killed him outright. I'd seen it happen to over a dozen abnormals at the facility, so it was more than plausible.

As much as I was angry that he'd let me be taken, that was not the reality. He wouldn't have just let me be taken.

He'd thought I was dead.

And now he could be the one on the cold side of the grave.

I fell out of the bed and barely made it to the toilet where I lost all that good food. I heaved until there was nothing left. Heaved until the sweat slid down my face.

I pressed my pounding head into my hands as I propped myself up on my elbows. My dog came and sat next to me, her one good eye watching me closely. There was no judgment there, she was just waiting.

Waiting for me to make a decision.

"Hey, girl." I dug my hands into the skin around her neck and scrubbed her fur, expecting her to close her one good eye in enjoyment as any other dog would.

She locked her gaze on mine and didn't look away. Her scarred ear twitched, then both flicked back and she let out a soft growl.

Not at me.

At whatever she was hearing inside the house.

I pushed to my feet and scrounged around Rosita's clothes, pulling on jeans that were on the loose side, a T-shirt, socks, and a pair of beat-up Adidas that were a shade big too. I scooped Dinah up from the bed.

"What's happening?" she asked.

"Dog is upset about something," I said.

I went to the bedroom door and slowly turned the handle, cracking it open. The clock beside the bed read three in the morning, so I'd only been out a few hours.

Voices, soft, hushed, urgent.

I slid out of the door and crept down the hall, dog at my heels. Her big paws were silent on the carpet.

"Are you sure, Carlos?" Anita whispered. "This is the Phoenix we're talking about."

I edged myself to the doorway so I could see them, but they couldn't see me.

"They took her once, she's not invulnerable." He rubbed a hand over his face. "And she wouldn't agree to look for Rosita. They could bring our girl back to us. It is a trade worth making."

A chill swept down my spine, and I had a very bad feeling I knew what was happening.

"You dosed the food good? I know we weren't sure if we would need it," he said.

"Yes." Anita shook her head. "I didn't think she was going to eat anything at first."

"I didn't either. The Magelore has agreed to help us pin her down." He took his wife's hands and I slid back down the hall.

Everyone had an angle, everyone had a reason for cutting your legs out from under you. So Peter wanted to do his own thing, did he? Fucking Magelores.

I crept back down the hall, not to my room, but to Cowboy's. I turned the knob and slid through, motioning for the dog to follow. When she did, I shut the door without a sound.

Tucking Dinah into my waistband, I went to Cowboy and grabbed his shoulders. He didn't so much as move. Fuck, I couldn't carry him.

"We have to leave him," Dinah said. "We don't have a choice."

The door creaked open and I spun, grabbing Dinah and holding her steady on Peter as he stepped through. He held up both hands. "Don't shoot," he whispered.

The only reason I didn't was because I didn't want the two Hiders to know I was awake.

"They've phoned the facility," Peter said. "They want my help to pin you down. We have to go."

I narrowed my eyes and my finger rested heavily on the trigger. Dinah growled. "Fucking traitor."

Peter shook his head. "You can't get that kid out of here by yourself. I can pack him. You go get what you can from those two."

I didn't lower Dinah. "No double-crossing?"

"Well, I'm double-crossing them. But I know who the top dog is here, and I am sticking with her on this front." He tipped his head at the dog at my side.

"Funny," I muttered, and lowered Dinah, half expecting him to rush me. But he didn't. He moved slowly, as if he knew I was on edge, and stopped next to the bed, looking down at the kid.

"He's really got to get his legs under him. All this packing him around is getting old fast."

"Search the room, find a couple bags," I said as I slipped out the door and headed to the other side of the home. I didn't bother to hide my steps.

Hiders were talented, but they didn't tend to be fighters. And I had no desire to kill abnormals—weird since that was exactly what my father had trained me to do.

Anita looked up as I stepped into the kitchen, but her eyes didn't go wide. They closed and her mouth whispered what I suspected was a prayer.

"Double-crossing me rarely goes well for anyone," I said softly, my voice even. The dog at my side let out a low growl, picking up on my anger even though I sounded as if I were about to thank them for their hospitality.

Carlos put both hands on the round kitchen table and stared down the hall. I waited as Peter came up beside me, the kid slung over his shoulder. "Sorry, my friend, I'm with the mean one. She'll survive this, if anyone can."

He tossed a couple of empty bags out onto the dining room table.

"Money. Weapons. Easy food," I said. "Fill it, Anita. Peter, go with her. Make sure no more phone calls are made."

She opened her eyes and took in the bags. "We just want our daughter back."

I slammed my hand against the table, making them both jump. "You think I don't want my kid back? You think I don't want to stop whatever the fuck is going on here? Who else is going to do it? The strong ones are gone! Who else is left? WHO? You called them down on me, the one person left who might have a fucking chance to see this through!" I was yelling and I didn't care.

The words were out of my mouth, driven by my anger, before I could catch them. I hadn't even realized that part of me had thought about stopping this.

"Wait, you're going after them?" Peter sounded as shocked as Carlos and Anita looked.

Every muscle in me tightened. "No. That was not what I meant."

"Sure sounded like it was what you meant," Dinah muttered.

"It's not," I said. The mother bear in me wanted only to find my boy, to hold him in real life and not in a vision, and then spirit both of us away from the danger. I could do it. I knew I could hide us both.

Even without your abilities?

That was my own voice inside my head, not the one that had spent the past year in my skull, but I still shivered.

"They would find you, eventually. And that wouldn't protect your son." Carlos slumped into a chair. "Trust me, if I couldn't keep my daughter safe, you don't have a chance with your boy, no matter how much you love him." His eyes locked on mine, forcing me to hear him out. "If what you say about the facilities is true, your son would end up somewhere just like Clearview, his mind wiped blank, his body nothing more than a shell. Or dead. I suppose that might be better in a way."

I let rage pool in my eyes, washing away any emotion. "Then I suppose you are hoping that your daughter is dead?"

Anita gasped. "No."

Carlos, though, nodded. "Yes. Better for her to be gone than to be a blank, a nothing."

Bear . . . dead . . . or a blank, which was worse? Shivers ran through my body and my skin flushed hot. "How long before they're here? The facility?"

"We didn't call them yet," Anita whispered. "We . . . weren't sure."

Behind me Peter slumped. "Jesus. I'm going back to bed."

"Wait," Carlos said. "She is the only one left, Magelore. Despite what you are, you are no Vivian."

Vivian had been a legend in Magelore circles, old, strong, mean as a snake with a kink in its tail, and I'd killed her when she'd teamed up with my father.

Peter grunted. "Wouldn't want to be that. But you're right, I'm not as strong as Viv. You aren't going to convince her." He pointed a thumb at me. "She's not got emotions you can manipulate like a normal person."

Carlos and Anita shared a look. "What if . . . what if I offered to come with you?" he said. "I will be your personal Hider. You'll move in shadows."

I looked at him, seeing a genuine desire in his face. "If I'll go after the big bad uglies? That's the deal?"

"None of us are safe," Carlos said, not begging but close. "Not you, not me, not our children, until this force that has decided to wipe us out has been dealt with. Phoenix, you could be that person."

He was persistent, I'd give him that.

Anita was just as dogged. "Someone has to stand up against these monsters."

I turned my gaze on her. "I'm the biggest monster of all, Anita. And I couldn't do it. They caught me, kept me penned up, and it was a stroke of fucking luck that got us out of there. Even with a Hider it would be . . ."

No, I wasn't even going to consider this route. I'd left Bear behind so I could tackle the beast that was my father. And I'd nearly lost my son.

I wouldn't take that gamble again.

Peter cleared his throat. "Nobody else has had luck like that. And from what the kid said, there are other facilities that have as many or more abnormals trapped."

Carlos and I stood across from each other while Peter talked me up. "Why do you care, Magelore?"

He looked to the floor. "I have a penance to pay. Something I shouldn't have done, but did anyway, believing that I would be safe. I was a fool to help them."

I sucked in a slow breath, understanding dawning, but it was Dinah who called him out.

"You motherfucking goat's ass! You sold us out? You did, didn't you?" She squirmed in my hand, trying to tip her barrel at him, but I deliberately kept her pointed at the floor.

She didn't mean me in particular, or even her, but the collective us. The abnormals he'd helped them hunt down.

Peter didn't lift his head. "I thought they were going to be like the mob bosses. I figured I was throwing my lot in with the strongest kid on the block." Slowly he raised his head. "But I was wrong. As soon as they were done with me, they tossed me in the basement and left me to rot."

I could have shot him right there and been done with it but there was something he had that we needed. "You have information about them then?"

He swallowed hard. "Some. They didn't give me much, but I'll tell you everything I know."

Everything he knew turned out to be far more than he'd been letting on.