Riding the Storm (38 page)

Annika
cut in front of him, Wyatt by her side. "I'll take the men, you take the
helo!" Annika shouted to Wyatt, and Remy waited in a holding position
behind their human shield, clutching Haley, prepared to use his own body to
protect her if necessary.

But
one by one, the men stopped running, actually dropped to the ground, their faces
twisted in pain and bearing the shock and awe that could only have been put
there courtesy of the man Haley had said possessed extraordinary sniping
skills.

"Dammit,
Ender," Annika grumbled loudly over the roar of the impending helo.

"The
fucking helo's still mine!" Wyatt yelled.

"Go,
Remy. Straight into the woods," Annika said. "Don't leave Haley
alone—that's your assignment now."

Remy
didn't argue, sprinting against the force of the wind brought on by the blades
of the chopper, trying as hard as he could not to jostle Haley, and ran until
he could barely breathe, until he saw the black concrete trail that cut a swath
into the mountainside.

The
explosion that happened seconds later rocked the ground so hard, Remy nearly
lost his balance. But he kept running, across the road and into the wooded area
on the other side.

He
ran for at least ten minutes, until his head began to spin. Camouflaged by the
fall foliage, he stopped and turned back to see if anyone was behind him. When
he saw he was alone, he knelt down on the ground, still not letting go of
Haley, talking to her softly in Cajun French, asking her to
please wake up,
chere
.

She
didn't. For a second he closed his eyes and put his forehead to hers, until
Wyatt's voice came quietly over his shoulder.

"Remy,
the helo's waiting." Wyatt knelt down beside him and felt for Haley's
pulse, the way Remy had done seconds before.

"She's
not waking up. And my father—"

"She'll
get medical attention once we're off the ground. Let's go—we need to get you
out of here. Your father's safe; Ender already put him on the helo."

Remy
nodded, his training kicking in. The danger wasn't over. Never would be really,
he realized about ten minutes after boarding the helo and laying Haley down on
a stretcher next to his father, who was also unconscious.

The
helo, which was supposed to be gaining altitude, suddenly shuddered and
shifted.

"What
the fuck?" Ender called out.

"We're
losing altitude!" the pilot responded.

"Shit."
Wyatt pressed his face to the window. "Itor. They had a second helo and
they're following. They have a Mech on board."

"What
the hell is a Mech?" Remy asked.

"The
guy can manipulate engines. I can't do shit about it, because we're not on the
ground—I can't throw anything at it, except this helo."

Ender
cursed under his breath, muttering about preparing to bail, and Remy stared out
the window and then back at Haley.

"I
can take down their helo," he said with a quiet calm he actually felt.

"Can
you do it without taking us down too?" Ender demanded, and Annika and Wyatt
turned their stares to Remy. He glanced over at Haley, who was being made as
comfortable as possible, then looked out the window.

"I
don't plan on dying today," Remy said. He moved away from the group a bit,
closer to one of the windows, as the helo jerked again. He steadied himself
with a palm pressed against the glass, the anger at Itor and what they tried to
do to Haley, to his father, to him, rising in his chest.

Eyes
closed, he concentrated on exactly what he needed—something that wouldn't make
him too out of control, since all his normal options regarding release were
severely limited.

He
opened his eyes, stared at the other helo—his skin tightened and tingled, their
helo slammed to one side and a bolt of lightning came down in a perfect angle
to slice through Itor's helo and take it down.

"We're
back on track!" the pilot yelled.

"Get
us out of here now!" Remy roared.

Behind
them, the helo had virtually disappeared from the sky in a fiery burst that
rocked their own helo. Thunder boomed and a heavy rain tailed behind for a few
seconds, but Remy closed his eyes and took some deep breaths, and dammit, he
did it.

"Excellent,"
Wyatt said, clapping Remy on the shoulder. "We'll make the connection with
the jet within fifteen, and then we'll blast back to ACRO."

Remy
nodded, moved to sit next to Haley for the entire flight and just prayed.

When
the jet set down at the ACRO compound, Remy was more wrung out than he'd ever
been in his life. He still had no idea what the hell he was going to do next,
and the woman who'd guided him through the last difficult days was out cold.

He
was scared to death that she'd never wake up.

Touching
her hand as they wheeled Haley off first, he watched them spirit her away to
receive further medical care. And then he buried his head in his hands, tried
to block out all the white noise hammering his skull. His body ached for so
many different reasons, and his mind felt twisted and unsteady.

When
he finally stepped out into the predawn light, he saw that Ender and Annika
were long gone, but Wyatt was waiting for him out on the landing strip. The man
was lying on his back on the frosty tarmac, staring at the sun as it peeked
over the distant line of pines. He was wearing sunglasses, but still…

"Hey."
Wyatt stood when he saw Remy approach. "I was trying to move the clouds
around, but Mother Nature isn't that cooperative."

"Tell
me about it," Remy muttered. Thunder rumbled in the distance in response,
and he just shook his head. "Can you take me to see Haley?"

"Not
right now. But she'll be all right—we've got the best medical care here."

"So
where do I go now?"

"You've
got places to be," Wyatt said, turning Remy in the direction of another
tall, well-built guy, who looked to be in his mid-thirties. He wore black BDUS
as well, and he reached out a hand for Remy to shake.

"Remy,
it's good to finally meet you in person. I'm Devlin O'Malley."

Head
of ACRO. Wyatt nodded to both men and took off toward one of the large houses.

"Good
to meet you too, sir," Remy said automatically to Dev.

"Come
with me," Dev said, and even though the tone was pleasant, Remy knew it
was nothing less than a command, and he followed him away from the landing
strip and toward the road.

Two
large ACRO guards appeared from around the other side of the jet, to flank
either side of them, and they walked in silence until Dev stopped him outside a
large black van.

One
of the guards knocked on the back door and then swung it open. Remy Senior sat
inside, his head bandaged, looking guilty. And old.

"T,
you're all right. Itor told me—"

"They
said a lot of things to get what they wanted," Remy interrupted. "I'm
fine."

"I'm
all right too," Remy Senior said. "These people, they said they're
gonna send me someplace. Give me a new identity."

Remy
wondered how the hell ACRO was going to accom-plish Remy Senior not revealing
anything, especially when the guy'd been drinking, and decided that he didn't
want to know.

"I
forgive you," Remy said, his voice raw, his body suddenly weak with
emotion. He didn't mean it—yet—but he knew he would at some point.

"You'll
be able to see him, once we get him settled," Dev said from behind Remy.
"Right now, it's safer for him this way. And I know you don't want
anything to happen to him."

"No,
I don't," Remy said. "I don't want anything bad to happen to anyone
because of me."

"You
can't control everything, Remy. You can only do the best you can," Dev
said, and moved back.

"I'll
see you soon, Dad," Remy said, leaning down to give his old man a hug.
Remy Senior hugged him back.

"I
love you, boy," Remy Senior said. Remy nodded, and the guards shut the
door on the man who'd been Remy's father all his life. His only father.

In
seconds, Remy and Dev were ushered into the back of a large black Humvee,
complete with tinted windows and bulletproof glass.

"We'll
go to my office—a mile up the road. Can you grab a bottle of water for me? I've
turned off my second sight for a while," Dev said, and Remy hadn't
realized that Devlin was blind until just then. Devlin's eyes were clear,
bright, and Remy had assumed that his nonblinking stance had more to do with
military training than anything else.

"I
do blink, but it's habit." Dev smiled.

"You
can read my mind too?" he asked.

"Everyone
always asks me the same question about the blinking. Sometimes the best part of
being psychic is screwing with people's minds."

The
car stopped and both men got out, walked into a beautiful old Victorian house
that was made with reinforced steel and bulletproof glass, although the average
person walking through wouldn't have noticed those safeguards. Remy followed
Dev up the winding staircase and into a large office, where a woman sat behind
a desk.

"We'll
go into my office," Dev said. "No calls, unless it's an emergency,
Marlena."

Devlin's
office was large, lined with bookshelves and computers and, Remy noticed, no
windows.

"I'm
safer without anyone being able to see in," Dev said. "But you don't
care about that. You want to ask me something."

"I
want to know about the tattoo."

Dev
stared at him with that unblinking look. "For this, I'll turn the sight
back on. Show me," he said finally, and Remy unbuttoned his pants and
pulled them down to expose the tattoo on his hip. Dev reached out to touch it
and he said, "It's Haley's."

"Yes."

"And
you've been able to gain more control since it appeared."

"Yes.
And I want to know how and why it connects me to her. Why she put it
there."

"She
didn't put it there, Remy. You two obviously have some kind of connection—one
that we had no idea of when we sent her to find you."

Remy
refastened his pants and then sat heavily on the leather couch, and Dev took
the chair across from him.

"I
don't know if I want that connection anymore," he said roughly, ran his
hands through his hair and blew out a frustrated sigh. "I don't want to be
responsible for putting her in danger. Not again."

"She
seems to be the only one who can ease your needs during the storms. You're
calmer when you're close to her. And when you're not with her, the tattoo can
connect you."

What
Devlin said seemed so freakin' logical. But Remy already knew that love and
desire were anything but. "There's got to be a better way than having us
connected for life with the tattoos."

"If
there is, we don't know what it is yet. And we don't know if it will hurt
either one of you if we try to remove the tattoos. Right now, doing nothing is
the safest bet for all concerned."

"Who's
the 'all concerned'?"

"Just
the entire free world," Dev said, and calmly told Remy the many ways in
which his weather power could be used, and abused, ways Remy had never even
given thought to.

His
hands shook, his mouth dried and he sank back in his seat. "It's just like
the Itor guy said. I'm a fucking menace," he mumbled.

"In
the wrong hands, yes."

"In
any hands."

"That's
not true. If you decide to sign on, we can help you over the hard part, the
part where you feel you won't ever be allowed to live a normal life."
Devlin leaned forward, elbows on his thighs, and looked right into Remy's eyes.
"You don't have to do this alone anymore."

"I've
never lived a normal life," Remy admitted. "Except with the SEALs,
but even then, they never saw me as normal." Dev fished a piece of paper
out of his pocket and handed it to Remy. "That's over. And I see you as
very normal, if that helps. So sign this, and you'll be part of our team."

Remy
took the paper out of Dev's hands, scanned it quickly. "What, for the next
six months, I'll be living, eating, breathing ACRO? One day off every six
weeks? Getting my outside time doled to me by the warden in charge? And this is
supposed to make me happy?"

"It's
supposed to make you the best operative you can be. You're responsible for
finding your own happiness," Dev said. "But I can do something to
help with that. I'll send you happiness every night, if you want. Blond,
brunette, redhead—all three if you think you can handle it."

"I
don't get how this happened," Remy mumbled.

"There
are so many things we can't explain, Remy. I can't explain your powers, or why
they were given to you, or why I have the powers I do. The best we can hope for
is to learn to control them and use them for good, as hokey as that
sounds."