Dark Hunger (28 page)

“So he suffered emotional trauma and depression,” Dr. Andradre said.

“Yes. But I don’t know where he’s been these past few months or what he’s been doing.”

“Before he left, did he exhibit signs of memory loss, confusion, dementia?”

She shook her head. “No. You don’t understand. My father was a scientist, a smart man in his field, not violent at all.”

“Hopefully we can help him.” He patted her shoulder. “But it may take time, Miss Armstrong.”

She nodded. “My father was—is—a good man,” Annabelle said. “He would never hurt anyone. I don’t understand what drove him to do what he did tonight, but I think he may have been brainwashed.”

His eyes narrowed as if he thought
she
might be demented. “Let’s run some tests and see what we find. I’ll keep you posted. And it’ll be a while before we complete them, so if you want to go home and get some rest, just leave a number where you can be reached and we’ll call you.”

“Can I see him first?”

Compassion glimmered in his eyes. “I’m afraid he may not know you.”

“I don’t care,” Annabelle said. “I need to see him before I leave.”

He nodded solemnly, then led her through a set of double doors and into a triage room. The policeman at the door gave her a condemning look, but she ignored him and went inside.

The scent of antiseptic and alcohol filled her nostrils, the sounds of hospital machinery and voices whirring in the background. Quinton followed her, but he stood in the doorway as if to offer her some semblance of privacy.

Her father lay in bed in a hospital gown, his face still gaunt and chalky. His hair had thinned and grayed since her mother’s death, she noticed now; he’d lost weight, and his skin was dry and cracked.

She placed her hand over his, shivering at the feel of his ice-cold skin. “What happened to you, Dad? Where have you been? Why did you leave me?” Her voice choked. “You have to wake up, to get better so you can tell me who did this to you.”

Grief and sadness welled inside her, but then she felt a tiny movement. His fingers inched around hers, and he squeezed her hand. It was only a small squeeze, barely discernible. But the movement gave her hope that her father was alive inside that shell.

And that one day he would come back to her.

Quinton popped two painkillers as he studied Annabelle and her father. He looked weak and frail, close to death. Even if Armstrong physically survived, would he be able to overcome the effects of the demon’s possession?

While Dr. Gryphon had spoken with her, he’d probed the doctor’s mind. Gryphon had delved into mind control for a government experiment. He had served in the military in the Gulf War and understood the trauma of combat firsthand. He’d consulted on research regarding dementia and replacing cognitive thoughts and memories through a combination of drugs and hypnosis, and was also experimenting with repairing memory through stem cell replacement.

In the military, the enemy had used brainwashing techniques on him. His own experience had prompted his obsession with that area of study.

Were the bombers a product of his experimentation? Were they his subjects?

Detective DeLang and Agent Horton met them in the waiting room.

“How is he?” Detective DeLang asked Annabelle.

“Still unconscious. But he did squeeze my hand slightly, so that’s a good sign.”

Quinton hoped to hell the man recovered. So far, he was the only witness who could prove that the suicide bombers hadn’t been working of their own accord. If he could tell them who’d contacted him, how the mental suggestions had been planted in his head, Quinton could track down the perpetrator in human form and destroy him.

Agent Horton turned to Quinton. “So you haven’t been able to question him?”

“Not yet. But as soon as he regains consciousness, I will. The doctors and nurses have strict orders to contact me immediately.”

“Tell us about your father,” Agent Horton said to Annabelle. “Did you know he was going to be at the charity event tonight?”

“No, I had no idea.” She explained about her mother’s death and her father’s desertion. “I haven’t seen him since.”

“Did he ever exhibit violent tendencies?” Detective DeLang asked.

“Never.” Annabelle massaged her temple. “He was a scientist, studying genetics. He was kindhearted, a hard worker. For goodness’ sake, he didn’t even like to hunt; he’d never hurt a fly.”

“Yet he nearly killed himself and hundreds of others tonight,” Agent Horton said.

She frowned, unable to argue.

“We found a connection between the first two bombers,” Quinton interjected. “Both suffered from post-traumatic stress syndrome and had signed on to the same online support group.”

“And Mr. Armstrong?” Horton asked.

“He didn’t suffer from PTS,” Annabelle said. “In fact, he was never in the military.”

“So what were these guys saying online?” Agent Horton asked. “Were they forming some kind of cultlike vigilante group to get revenge on the world because they thought people had abandoned them?”

“Makes sense,” Detective DeLang agreed. “Veterans often feel like they aren’t appreciated, that they’re forgotten once they return home. Especially if they’ve lost loved ones due to divorce, physical impairment, death, or if they’re financially struggling.”

“But for a group of them to plan a terrorist attack,” Annabelle said. “That seems improbable.”

“Sometimes when troubled people get together, they feed off each other’s anger and bitterness,” Agent Horton said.

“The mob mentality,” Detective DeLang added with a worried frown.

“How about other motives?” Agent Horton asked. “You said these men were homeless. Could someone have paid them off or offered to send money to their families if they carried out the bombing?”

“So far, none of the men we’ve investigated had a history of violence. No big insurance policies or vendettas. Ames had no family,” Quinton said. “And as far as masterminding the three attacks, none of them had the resources or presence of mind to orchestrate an intricate plan such as this.”

But they had been easy marks for a demon to possess because they already suffered from some sort of dementia, substance abuse, or disease.

Quinton placed a hand at Annabelle’s back. “I’m going to take Annabelle back to the hotel to rest.”

“Just don’t leave town, Miss Armstrong,” Agent McLaughlin said.

Annabelle glared at him. “Don’t worry. I intend to stay and help my father. And somehow I’ll prove that someone else was behind what happened tonight.”

Dr. Gryphon’s name jumped to the top of Quinton’s suspect list. In fact, some innocuous detail teased his brain, something from the monks’ teachings. Hadn’t old-world vultures descended from the griffin, the guardian of the mysteries of life and death?

He gritted his teeth.

Dammit. He couldn’t share his theories—the truth—with the police or the FBI. They would think he was insane.

No, he had to figure out a way to work with them without divulging the truth. A way to stop this demon and explain what had happened.

A way to save Annabelle so his premonition didn’t come true.

A way to leave her when it was over…

Exhaustion and a mixture of emotions left Annabelle drained as they exited the hospital and drove to the hotel.

Early morning shadows flickered across the city, the statuesque architecture looking almost garish in the darkness. The scent of death, evil, and fear permeated the air as they passed one of the aboveground cemeteries, the local legends of ghosts and the swamp devil echoing around her. The sight of the vultures circling above the mausoleums in search of human food sent a chill up her spine. Their angry screeching added to the desolate hopelessness she felt.

She wanted to shut down, tune out the world, the bombings, her feelings. Her contact with reality. Her own instincts when investigating a crime and unraveling a story.

All she wanted to do was crawl into bed and bury herself beneath the covers and cry.

And forget that she’d almost died tonight. That her mother was gone. Her father lost now.

Perhaps forever.

No, he would come back. She’d get him all the help he needed.

And she would expose whoever did this to him for all the world to see.

And Quinton…

God, he scared her. The power he’d wielded tonight without even touching her father or the police—he’d frozen them in place, literally held them back as if time had stopped. That was the only way she could explain what she’d seen.

He was a demon of some kind. Dangerous to her. He’d told her that himself.

But he’d saved hundreds of lives tonight, as well as hers and her father’s.

She had to stay strong. To prove that her father hadn’t acted of his own accord, that he’d been forced, brainwashed into committing a crime. The thought of him going to jail for the rest of his life for attempted murder or terrorism was more than she could bear.

But how would she prove his innocence? And how could she print the truth if Quinton was right and the mastermind was demonic?

Quinton’s gut tightened as he glanced at Annabelle’s dejected face. Dammit, he wasn’t supposed to let it get personal. Relationships interfered with the job and his objectivity.

But she’d somehow snuck past his defenses. And it was painful to see her this way, beaten down when she was such a fighter.

He parked at the hotel, then circled the car to her side and gave her a hand. The fact that she allowed him to help her spoke volumes about her emotional state. She was trembling as he guided her inside to their adjoining rooms. He rushed to the bathroom and turned on the shower.

“We need to warm you up,” he said quietly.

She moved on autopilot and began to strip. Bastard that he was, his body hardened, instantly coming alive.

But a sliver of guilt wormed into his consciousness, and he hesitated, refusing to take advantage of her in this vulnerable state.

She looked up at him with helpless vacant eyes, dropped her hand as if she was too tired to even undress, and he removed her clothes, forcing himself not to stare or touch her sexually when his balls ached and throbbed and his cock pressed against the fly of his suit pants.

When he’d spotted her in this delicious dress earlier tonight and made love to her, he’d imagined removing it at the end of the evening, but not like this.

Moisture glistened in her eyes, and her chin quivered as she climbed beneath the spray of water. But she didn’t move to bathe, she simply stood there shaking.

A snap decision made, he stripped off his clothes and climbed into the shower with her. She faced the wall, her head thrown back as warm water sluiced over her body.

He soaped the cloth and slowly ran it over her shoulders, her back, gently bathing her, then lower over her buttocks and legs. His cock twitched and pulsed, wanting between her legs, the urge to push her against the wall and drive himself inside her so strong that he sucked in a deep breath.

Then he turned her around slowly and bathed her shoulders, her arms, then trailed the bubbles over her breasts. His breath hissed between clenched teeth at the sight of her nipples budding and rosy under the warm water. But he didn’t linger. He traced a path with the bubbles over her stomach, thighs, and legs, avoiding touching her heat. Although his gaze fastened on the tattoo and he traced a finger over the design, wanting more, wanting to kiss her bare flesh.

If he did, he wouldn’t be able to resist prying her legs open and touching her intimately. He wanted to be inside her, to make her forget the pain for a moment as they’d done earlier. To take whatever little she could offer tonight before they faced another gruesome day tomorrow.

To give to her as he’d never given of himself to a woman before.

Suddenly her expression softened, and she seemed to realize they were naked and wet together, and she arched against him, hunger flaring in her eyes.

He kept his hands gentle as he tilted her chin up to search her face. Was she asking for his loving?

“Please touch me.” She closed her eyes, and he sucked in a sharp breath. He couldn’t deny her any more than he could deny himself.

His need raged, dark and raw, driving his movements as he trailed his hands over her shoulders, down her arms and to her breasts, where he cupped the heavy mounds in his hands.

“Quinton…”

“I’m here, Annabelle. It’s all right.”

He touched her tattoo again, then soothed her with soft whispers, her quiver telling him that his hands were awakening erotic sensations along her spine.

She slowly opened her eyes and looked up at him, and he heard her thoughts as if she’d spoken them aloud.

She wanted him. A man who could kill coolly without blinking an eye, without an ounce of remorse, but a man who’d saved her life more than once now.

A man who elicited erotic sensations in her belly, and made her feel more alive, more aroused, than she’d ever thought possible.

A threat to her—yes.

Would she have him?