Eye of the Falcon (Psychic Visions #12)(9)

Inside, his mind was in turmoil. Had Jordan been shot because he had failed to guard the girl? Or because he’d been injured, and that made him a liability? It didn’t matter what the answer was because Dylan got that much closer to being the next one forfeited. In fact, as he drove back, he worried he would get a bullet right away. The boss had kept him around to take care of Jordan’s body, but now what? Just because they’d been together for years didn’t give Dylan a free pass.

He walked back into the cabin and headed for the kitchen. There he washed up and started dinner. He did all kinds of jobs here. None of them mattered. He didn’t have any other life. He had given his life to the big man eons ago. Dylan was too old to do anything different. He was a wiry monkey man, strong, but there wasn’t a whole lot to him now. He’d aged and not well. He used to be as bombastic and fiery over issues as his boss was. The boss was much younger, but the years were becoming more noticeable as he aged too. The question now was, how long did Dylan have?

For a long time he thought loyalty was the answer to longevity. Now he had to wonder if a bullet was in his near future. He prepped the potatoes and tossed them into the pan to start frying. He could hear the boss on the phone.

Bits and pieces of the conversation came his way. None of it made a lot of sense. Dylan and the boss were both Irish, but it was as if his boss spoke a different language. That was okay. The less Dylan knew, the better.

It might stave off that bullet for a while.





Chapter 4





Issa listened to the footsteps retreating from the bedroom. She had no idea who this man was. She’d only awoken to the pain—fingers poking and prodding.

It was hard to lie motionless as they continued to explore her wounds. Her feet felt funny—warm, yet cold; stinging, and yet healing. She couldn’t figure out what they’d done to her feet. Everything hurt so damn much. Now if only she knew where she was, why she was here, and who these men were. The one thing she did know was that Roash stood guard beside her.

As if sensing she was awake, her falcon leaned forward and gently stroked his beak along her temple. Hot tears came to her eyes. She didn’t know if anybody could possibly understand how bereft her life had been, how empty since she had lost her own falcon two decades ago. Roash had filled those footprints more than most, but their relationship still didn’t have the same depth as what she’d had.

It seemed like she had spent all that time searching for another feathered friend, an animal that would give her the same connection. Something about this one made her hope and, at the same time, made her fear. This was the second time in her life everything had blown up.

The first time had cost lives. And everything she’d known—her father, her brothers, her homeland, and the house she’d spent every day in. The fields and the hills, the cliffs and crannies, she had climbed and crawled and laughed and played on them all. But the loss of her own falcon had hurt the most. It turned her into a mute for many months. Nobody understood. Specialists said it was the shock and trauma of losing so many family members. But, in fact, it was the trauma of having the voice in her head go silent. It had been … special. The two of them together had been … incredible. But she’d been a child, and nobody had believed her. They understood the falcon came when she called, that he had been trained, and, even though she was young, she had worked hard to develop the bond between them. Of course she had. Her father had always threatened to take the falcon away if the two didn’t do their best for him.

Her dad had been an opportunistic man, gleefully dealing in activities that the government would’ve done a lot to stop. But it was the only way he knew. It was how he fed his family, how he’d been raised. And it was a life he took to naturally. He led a large group of trusted men just like him.

She’d had an odd relationship with her father. As long as she was of value, she was treated fairly. But, even though a mere child, dare she cross him … As such, her memories were conflicting. Most of the time she was happy with foggy memories that allowed her to see him in a warmer light. But she was an adult now. She knew he had been a smuggler. But the other charges she’d seen on that criminal record sheet had shocked her. Made her question her childhood.

The covers were pulled off her body yet again. She knew she should be worried that whoever checked her over was someone she didn’t know. And that her body was entirely exposed and just as injured. But she had heard nothing but compassion in either of the men’s voices. Soon blankets were pulled up to her neck, and a welcomed warmth invaded her body.

She was so very cold. In her homeland, she was used to the cold, as they all were. You got up in the morning, and you could see your breath in the air, and she found a certain joy in the experience. Evidence of the freshness of the world around them. And she missed it.

She missed so much. Everything that had happened in her twenty-six years of life, she could label into parts: part one being before the nightmare, before she lost all but one family member.

Part two being the aftermath. That horrible stage of immigrating to America, forced to see doctors and specialists, looked upon as an oddity, attending school, which she had no interest in. A life without her father or her brothers. Or her beloved falcon. A life inside the concrete city with concrete boxes stacked on top of other concrete boxes and stuck beside more concrete boxes.

Life where there were no green hills, no waves crashing on the shores below. And worse yet, no breath hanging frozen on the air when she got up in the mornings. And no falcon ever at her side. The loss had been overpowering.