Veil of Justice, Shadows of Justice Book 3 (11 page)

She didn't get it. They were in the middle of
nowhere. Alone. Kristoff couldn't have this kind of reach. Bracing
for whatever nightmare plagued Nathan, she reached for their mental
connection once more.

Her vision went black and it took the nasty
stench to clue her in. He was back in his cell and he'd brought her
with him. A feral growl built and morphed into a scream. She wasn't
sure if it came from his memory or her present.

Oddly, she thought the car was still moving,
but all she could see was a distorted man at the end of an
impossibly long arm. Either she was going insane, or she was
playing the rat role in Nathan's post traumatic stress
nightmare.

"Nathan," she begged as the man pressed her
chin to an impossible angle.

FIVE

Courage is what it takes to stand up and
speak;

courage is also what it takes to sit down and
listen. Winston Churchill

Jaden watched the first edge of the sun
warming up the horizon while frustration rode her hard. In the
helicopter they'd borrowed from the Marine Corps, they continued
their hunt along all the main roads leading away from the prison.
Three days of searching still hadn't shown them even a glimmer of
Nathan's Mustang. She wanted to follow Petra's example of
unrelenting hope, but her cynical side was telling her this was a
lost cause at best, a trap at worst.

Beside her Cleveland smacked the receiver
against his leg. "I don't get it. I put that tracking tag on
myself. This should've been a cakewalk."

Jaden thought he sounded rather like her
husband with the retro clichés. Maybe she shouldn't let them spend
so much time together.

"There!" Jaden pointed to a car slumped into
a ditch. "Is it running? Are they alive?"

In the pilot's seat, Petra's husband Gideon
dipped his chin. "Affirmative. Two warm bodies and a hot
engine."

Jaden looked at Cleveland's display. No
reading that this was the right Mustang, but what were the
odds?

She slid back the helicopter door, ready to
repel down, but Cleveland grabbed her collar. "Give him a minute.
They aren't going anywhere."

Gideon fed them more details as they popped
into his head's up display. "Driver's heart rate is racing.
Passenger is nearly comatose."

"Set us down!" she barked. Gideon was
adjusting for wind and safety, but her patience, always in short
supply, evaporated with each additional ray of sunshine. "We've
gotta get out of here before daybreak."

"Working on it," Gideon barked back.

Jaden jumped out before the runners touched
down, and raced to the car. Cleveland waited, but with his longer
gait eating up the difference they reached the car
simultaneously.

Jaden held a hand up, signaling him to hold,
then she moved closer, gun drawn. It was loaded with stunner shot,
but Gideon had real ammo loaded on the helicopter's guns.

Creeping closer to the car, which was still
running, she saw Petra's former assistant, Kelly in the driver's
seat. The girl was clawing at her neck, but even in the seconds
Jaden observed, she was losing the fight.

Confirming it was Nathan, albeit a pretty
worn out version, in the passenger seat, Jaden put the gun
away.

Cleveland rushed forward and Gideon kept
watch from the helicopter.

"Something's blocked her airway," Jaden
explained. "Wake him up while I work with her."

Cleveland muttered about Nathan breaking
apart, but he shook the shoulder once, then again. Finally the man
in the seat blinked up at him. "Rough night?" Cleveland asked with
a smile.

Nathan only blinked.

"This guy is nearly comatose," Cleveland said
to Jaden.

Jaden jumped back as Kelly suddenly reared up
off the seat gulping air. Then she had to pull the smaller woman
out of the car when Kelly started beating on Nathan.

Jaden dodged fists and feet as Kelly flailed
around, yelling about rats, telepathy and ungrateful bastards.
"Give me a hand," she pleaded to Cleveland, but he only laughed at
her predicament.

Cleveland rounded the car, but before he
reached the women, he tripped. His face pressed to the pavement,
asphalt digging into his cheek, he couldn't move.

Gideon's voice boomed from the helicopter's
loudspeaker. "This is a rescue, soldier. Remain calm. The rose red
city glows at sunset."

Jaden assumed that last bit was a code phrase
Nathan had left in his in-case-of-capture file. Gideon repeated the
message twice more before Cleveland could finally peel his face off
the road.

Jaden gave up on the single-minded fury in
her arms and resorted to pressing a nerve that rendered her
unconscious. "Should've started with that. Damn, would you look at
her neck?"

Cleveland scooped Kelly into his arms and
carried her to the helicopter. "I'll be back for him."

Jaden crouched down to look at Nathan from
the relative safety of the open driver's side door. "How bad is
it?"

"Beats the hole."

Poor man.
Jaden's stomach twisted.
She'd spent too many lives in and around the flawed justice systems
of the world. At least he seemed conscious now. "Can you walk?"

"Not yet. Did I hurt your friend?"

"Not as bad you hurt yours." She regretted
the quip when Nathan struggled to make his muscles move. "Easy,
soldier. She'll be fine when she wakes up. She seems to think you
were choking her."

Nathan groaned. "Where are we?"

"About two hundred miles west of
Leavenworth."

"No pursuit?"

Jaden nodded. "We're trying to keep it that
way." When Cleveland joined her, they looped Nathan's arms over
their shoulders, intending to drag him to the helicopter.

"Hold up," Cleveland said.

He looked pointedly at the ground. Nathan's
feet were merely open wounds linked together by narrow strips of
skin. Jaden's stomach rolled again and she silently cursed whoever
had done this to him.

They shifted, using a chair carry to hustle
him to the helicopter where Gideon waited with a medical kit. Jaden
and Cleveland stripped the remaining gear from the Mustang and
stowed it while Gideon finished the first aid and got Nathan
secured for the flight.

With a little effort they got the car out of
the ditch and back on the road, then Cleveland drove away and Jaden
buckled herself back into the copilot's seat.

She and Gideon made the trip back to Chicago
in silence.

* * *

Gideon landed the helicopter at the pad
reserved for military use at Chicago's Midway airport and shut down
the systems. Jaden had yet to say a word. He didn't think it was a
good sign, but then, the only woman he vaguely understood was his
wife.

"I gave the girl a sedative," he said.

"I wondered. Good plan. ETA on her getting
conscious?"

He checked his watch. "Maybe an hour."

She nodded.

"Are the cars ready?" she asked.

"Three. Inside, just as requested." Gideon
flicked his thumb in the general direction of the hangar. He'd done
all he could to assist the rescue and help her transport both
patients to the safest place in town. "Did I forget anything?"

"Doesn't look like it." She smiled, and
though it was a tired expression right now, it eased his mind some.
"But I probably forgot to say thank you."

He tapped his ball cap and gave her the wink
that always worked on his wife. "You're most welcome. Now let's
move some cargo. Slick Micky's waiting."

* * *

Nathan woke up feeling sluggish, but without
the small-space panic he'd been dealing with. He prodded around his
mind, took a swift inventory of his body and swore viciously to
find himself trapped by the effects of Paracuron again. What the
hell? Hadn't Kelly – Cali – whoever she was fixed all this?

The encounter in the ditch had been real. He
knew it! Either healing wasn't her gift, or something else was in
play. Terror of the smart virus crept into his mind, but he
banished it.
Can't feed the negativity
.

He tested his responses, unreasonably
grateful for cooperative eyelids. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
He did a quick tactile inventory and decided someone had padded the
fall pretty well. The sheets were clean and soft under his
fingertips and the clinical scent in the room was underwritten by
the rich aroma of coffee.

"Hello?" he called, pleased to feel his
fingers and toes respond, though the rest of him felt lead
lined.

Footsteps responded, heels clicking on hard
floors, in a purely feminine manner. Kelly? He was probably just
wishing. She didn't seem the type for heels. Nathan shifted and
failed, cursing Kristoff's chemistry that he still couldn't move
any major muscle groups. Then the clean scent of vanilla teased his
nose. "I've died," he whispered, "and gone to heaven."

"You'll offend your host if you keep that
up," the woman said, leaning into his field of vision.

"Petra!" She looked amazing, healthy and a
bit rounded around the edges. "Where am I? Where's Kelly? Your
assistant," he clarified. "She saved me, but I might've hurt her.
Is she here?"

"Shh," Petra soothed, laying a gloved hand on
his shoulder. "She's asleep in the next room."

A dream or maybe a memory flitted at the
edges of his mind. The cell, the rat, the screaming. "Did I – did I
hurt her?"

Petra shrugged a narrow shoulder. "She's
sporting a few bruises, but I can hardly tell who did that."

"So you didn't look?" Nathan knew his sister
usually respected the privacy of others, but they were both curious
people. It wasn't outside the realm of possibility that Petra had
snooped through Kelly's memories.

"Not past the aura," she confirmed. "Though
that's hard to ignore. Do you have any idea how much emotional
baggage she's hauling around?"

Ashamed he didn't know much at all about
Kelly, Nathan gazed beyond Petra, studying the ceiling.

"Relax. It will all be okay. Can I prop you
up a bit?" She reached behind him, adjusting pillows, and he got a
good view of her belly.

"You're pregnant!"

She stood up, patting herself all over and
looking around. "What? Are you sure?"

"You're not funny. I'll kill Gideon."

"Neanderthal!" Petra punched him. "He's my
husband, you idiot."

"Fine. I'll reserve judgment until
after."

"After what?"

"If the kid's ugly then I'll kill your
husband."

Petra pinned him with Medusa's look before
she changed the subject. "About the poison. You're sure it's
Paracuron?"

"I'm sure." He didn't like the resulting
frown on his sister's face. "Aren't you sure?"

The frown eased a bit. "There's no reason to
doubt you. Do you know which strain?"

"No idea." Kristoff had been working on his
chemistry cocktails for years. "It has to be new," Nathan pointed
out, "because Kelly had me up and feeling normal just before –"
whatever had happened in the car still wasn't clear.

"Is there a Paracuron with an amnesia
effect?" Petra asked.

"I imagine that would be an ideal part of any
Paracuron equation, though we've never found a soldier or inmate
alive to discuss it." Those missing inmates, those who'd been
soldiers, were the catalyst that forced Nathan's department to send
him undercover. "Based on the lingering and alternating affects,
it's obviously a smart viral.

"Kelly told me I had a fever for a couple
days. Then I felt completely normal for a bit." He left out the
details in between. "Now I'm back to this."

Petra shook her head, her brow furrowed as
she thought. "We received a list of organics that might help, but
I'm not sure if it's a cumulative list, or if I should try each
item individually. Are you willing to help evaluate?"

"I am ever your happy guinea pig." He cleared
his throat. "Did Kristoff tag Kelly too?"

His sister blanched and Nathan used his
telekinesis to whisk a chair to her side. "Are you okay, Pet?"

"Thanks," she said, sinking into the chair.
"I'm just not ready to believe Kristoff is operating at full
strength already."

Nathan wasn't sure that was the real issue,
but he wasn't feeling strong enough to breach Petra's mind. "He was
causing all kinds of hell when I went undercover." He studied his
sister's face, picking up on the clues. "Kelly said he came after
you." It was his worst nightmare to have his work putting his
family at risk.

"The reverse actually. Well, not really." Was
she blushing? "A little of both is the most accurate answer.

"I thought I was losing my mind and my gift,"
she began. She shared bits and pieces, filled in the blanks, and he
cringed frequently during her recitation.

"Remind me to thank Gideon when I'm up and
able."

"What, you don't want to kill him
anymore?"

"Didn't say that."

"Moving on," she said with an aggrieved sigh.
"I've continued researching Kristoff and his connections. And I've
stumbled on a few things we can talk about later. For now, let's
get you feeling better."

"Good plan." He winced again, as another icy
lance of pain pierced his temple. "Where's that list of
plants?"

She pulled a small notebook out of her
pocket. He laughed. "Still afraid of the modern conveniences?"

"Of course not," she snapped. "If you'd put
half as much energy into your health as you put to irritating me,
you'd be walking by now."

Nathan laughed, but he was terribly afraid
she was wrong.

* * *

Kelly heard Nathan's laughter, and the steady
voice Petra used with tough clients. She hoped Petra never
discovered the truth about Nathan's mental connection to her,
though unless she left right now, she'd be hard pressed to explain
her presence at the breakout.