Nalini Singh: Tangle of Need

No Tk ever used the layout of furniture as a lock—it was too transient. And all teleport-capable Tks had an inbuilt space-sensing ability that meant they would never materialize in solid matter. Unless there was a psychic failure, the teleport would abort at the obstruction. However, if a Tk did ’port in, the unfamiliar layout could grant the anchor an extra few seconds in which to run or use a weapon. “It’s a smart move.”

“Henry is dead.”

“You?”

“Vasic.” A pause. “We can’t trust him, not after this is done.”

Judd didn’t misunderstand the warning. “The children in the Arrow schools,” he said, instead of responding directly to the statement, “who’s watching out for them?” Even with the darkness swallowing the Net and the Arrows’ attention, Aden would not have forgotten their youngest brethren.

“The most stable of us each have a group we monitor.” Aden passed Judd a small black data crystal. “The names and addresses of the children. If anything happens to us, they are the ones you must protect.” A pause. “Trust it to Walker—he’ll understand and be able to help them better than you or I.”

Judd put the crystal into the inside pocket of his leather-synth jacket, the act an unspoken promise. “Does Vasic monitor a group?” Vasic might not feel, but he had a conscience, would never damage a child by abandoning him. That conscience was why the Tk-V hated himself, though he would not put it in those terms.

“No.” Aden looked out into the night. “He doesn’t trust himself not to kill if he sees a teacher hurting a child—we can’t yet intervene. It risks giving everything away before we’re in a position to take total control of the training system.”

“How close are you?”

“On the verge. Unlike Ming, Kaleb appears to have no inclination to take a direct hand in the schools.” A long pause. “Even when we seize the reins, total liberation will be impossible.”

“I know.” Without the mental discipline forged by his rigid Arrow training, Judd’s abilities might have self-destructed long ago. “But the process doesn’t have to be cruel.” A young boy’s arm didn’t have to be broken over and over again until he stopped screaming.

“Some would say such a stance will destroy the foundation of the program.”

That pain was a state of mind, to be overcome. “And perhaps we’ll discover it makes us stronger.”

Aden didn’t say anything for a long time. “I have to go. There has been an explosion at a Psy research facility in Belgrade.”

Judd watched the other Arrow disappear into the darkness before rising and entering the church to take the second pew from the back. He felt the slightest brush of air as the Ghost slid into the pew behind him a minute later. “Do you know about Belgrade?” Judd asked while they waited for Father Xavier Perez, the third part of their unexpected triumvirate, to finish speaking with a parishioner in his office.

“Of course.” No arrogance, simple fact. “It was small and is being contained, no fatalities.”

“Luck or a lack of planning on the part of the attackers?”

“The latter. The facility is privately funded, and about to begin a critical assessment of the Silence Protocol—somehow, their mission statement leaked into the Net twenty-four hours ago.”

The fact that any group had gained permission to conduct such a study was momentous, though Judd had a very good idea of how it had been done. As he had about the leak. “Pure Psy acted in the heat of the moment.” Judd knew what the Ghost knew about Vasquez, and so he knew this act was out of character. “Henry’s death may have severed the leash that kept Vasquez rational.” He had no doubt his fellow rebel was aware of the ex-Councilor’s demise.

“Perhaps.” No concern. “It’s time, Judd.”

Yes, the dominoes had begun to fall, unstoppable and inexorable. “Is the violence necessary?”

“Some things need to be broken to become stronger.”

The Ghost left thirty seconds later, called away by something urgent.

Sitting alone in the peace of the church, Judd thought of the murders perpetrated by Pure Psy, the violence done tonight, the blood that would be spilled in the future. Instead of reminding the populace of the value of Silence, the aggression was nudging awake long-buried emotions, fear so dark and from so deep in the psyche that not even the most painful conditioning could keep it imprisoned.

Silence was one crack away from total failure.

Some things need to be broken to become stronger.

“He does not understand friendship,” Judd said to Xavier later, “but I do.”

The priest’s dark skin glowed in the light from the candles that were the sole illumination now that he’d turned off the lights. “Is it mercy to end the life of a friend savaged by torment, or is it a sin?”

“Those are your questions, Xavier. Mine is only this: if he proves too unstable”—willing to extinguish the Net in a rippling wave of endless death—“will I have the strength to execute a man who is a mirror of who I might’ve been in another life?”

TWO WEEKS AFTERthe attempted assassination of the San Francisco anchor, and a week after the flurry of bombings on a number of Psy research centers and institutions of learning, it felt to Adria as if the entire world was holding its breath. Seven days had passed with no more signs of a civil war that could devastate the planet, but with Judd Lauren having shared what he knew with the senior members of the pack, Adria knew the lull was nothing but the calm in the eye of the storm.

It was all going to come crashing down, sooner rather than later.

As a soldier, she worked with her packmates and their allies to prepare the pack and the region—and to some extent, other parts of the world. Through their allies’ connections, and their links with the Human Alliance, the BlackEdge Wolves, the water-based changelings, and less formal relationships with other groups, SnowDancer had a worldwide network that disseminated and shared information in an effort to provide people with the means to protect themselves when the storm blew in.

However, within herself, where no one could see, she fought a far more heartbreaking war. Her love for Riaz had come to define her. She knew that no matter what the future brought, she would never again feel this glory, never again burn with such vibrant passion and wild tenderness. It brought her incredible joy to live with him, to laugh with him, to fall asleep in his arms … and every day, she woke up and for a single painful second, wondered if this was the day he’d look at her and realize what he’d given up.

She’d learned to hide that instinctive dart of pain, and today, as they sat on a bench in Golden Gate Park, watching the people out for a stroll among the flower beds on this piercingly bright fall day, she could almost believe that everything was as it should be, that she was with a man who was meant to be her own and no one else’s.

“Are you ever going to talk to me again?” Riaz demanded, his tone that of a man at the end of his patience.

It puzzled her. “Didn’t we just have a conversation about the toy dog we saw in that woman’s purse?” The little yapping thing had gone silent when the woman walked past them, its big eyes watching Riaz and Adria as if it expected to be eaten.

It had made them both laugh.

But no laughter colored Riaz’s voice when he spoke again. “We talk about everyday things, inconsequential things.” Eyes of palest brown met hers, shimmering with a film of heated anger … but his words, they held raw pain. “You’ve shut me out of your heart, amada , and it’s shredding me to pieces.”