Right Through Me (The Obsidian Files #1)(54)

Zade grunted. “She saw me, huh? Sharp eyes, for an unmod.”

“And you dress to impress.”

“Now is not the time for cracks about my personal style,” Zade said. “You practically broke my ribs on that wall, dude.”

“Boo hoo, poor you. Go check yourself into the hospital.”

Zade snorted. “So, what’s the deal? Why bring her back to this dump at all? You could have sent one of us to get her things.”

“I’m not taking her anywhere right now,” Noah said. “She threw me out of her place.”

“Ah.” Zade looked puzzled. “That sucks. I’m, ah, almost afraid to ask—”

“So don’t.”

Zade didn’t, for about three seconds. Then he cleared his throat, and did. “For twelve years you’ve been kicking our asses, pushing us around. You can wrangle a bunch of crazy mutant freaks, but you can’t lay down the law with a *cat artist? Just be the man! Tell her how it is!”

Zade had a point, but still. Pushing Caro around might keep her alive, but it would kill something else, something he treasured. But he didn’t know how to say that in a way that Zade could understand.

“I put a locator tag in her coat,” he admitted.

Zade shook his head, bewildered. “Hope she doesn’t take it to the cleaners. Did you get her story?”

“No,” he said bleakly. “None. Best I could do was guess at some of it.”

“You rock, secret agent. So did you take out the lenses and do the scary glowing eyes thing?”

“Yeah,” he admitted. “All night long.”

“And she still didn’t talk? That gonzo yellow cat stare would make me confess to anything.”

He was too miserable to tell Zade to get stuffed. “Didn’t have much of an effect on her,” he said. “She wouldn’t spill a goddamn thing.”

Zade whistled. “She’s tougher than she looks. What signal did you plant?”

“The tile Sisko put on my Delaunay painting. I’ll tail her myself, today.”

“Did Mark hurt her? Can we kill him now?” Zade’s eyes gleamed.

“She wouldn’t tell me. But she has knife scars, and probably PTSD or something like it. Whatever happened, she barely got away with her life. I’m giving her some breathing room for now.”

A grin split Zade’s lean face. “You know, I’ve never seen you like this.”

Noah was irritated. “Like what?”

“All turned on. Fired up, but not AVP freak-out mode. Not deep-freeze robot-king either. This one’s new. Hey, I think maybe you annoy me a little less this way.”

Noah tapped data into his phone to monitor her locator tag. “You’re making me all soft and warm inside. Stop it, before I get confused about who I am.”

“Awww,” Zade crooned. “Am I emasculating you, Noah? I’m so sorry.”

“Get lost,” Noah said. “Go have some tacos and beer.”

“Too late, *. But thanks.” Zade strode away without looking back.



*



Mark peered through the chilly mist of the autumn morning. His phone burbled in his pocket. He checked the display. It was the leader of his Seattle team.

“Carrerra”, he said. “Give me good news.”

“You got it, boss. We’re following her. She’s on a bus. We’re behind it.”

“Good,” he said, circling the mud puddles. “Gareth Wickham gave you her address?”

“He knew her street address, but not the apartment number. Pain in the ass.”

“Did you push him hard, like I told you to?”

“We scared the living shit out of him. He would have handed over his own grandma and given us all blowjobs by the end. But he was still f*cked if he knew, and the building has sixty goddamn units. But we just got lucky. She came out the front door of the building, alone, just as we were getting out of the car. So we just got back into the car and followed her to the bus stop. She’s heading downtown now. How do you want us to wrap this up?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Being forced to micromanage was annoying, and he could see his target already, barely visible through the trees.

“I don’t wanna screw up. Tell me what your comfort level is when it comes to making noise,” Carrerra said. “It’s business hours downtown, so we’ll have to—”

“Be discreet,” he snapped. “Be creative. Don’t get caught, don’t be seen, and stay away from surveillance cameras. Most of all, do not make me wait one second longer than I have already. When I get to Seattle, I want her waiting for me. I don’t want problems. That’s why I pay so well. Do we understand each other?”

“OK, boss. Got it.”

Mark cut the connection, enjoying the hot buzz of pleased anticipation as his target approached. His first prototype slave soldier, and he could finally activate him now that he’d retrieved the freq wand from Kitteridge’s vault. R-Gen, serial number 57-878, who went by the name Brenner Jameson to the outside world. Once entirely human and now . . . not. Six foot four, two hundred forty pounds of enhanced muscle and super-dense bone, sprinting through the morning drizzle with the speed of a pro athlete.