Defender Hellhound (Protection, Inc: Defenders Book 3) Read online

  There was nothing Ransom wanted more than coffee… except to get away. “No. I have to go. We can talk later.”

  “Sure you don’t want any coffee?”

  Exasperated, Ransom snapped, “No! What is this?”

  “I’m worried about you.”

  And there it was. “I’m fine.”

  “You’re really not.” Roland’s tone was kind, but did not invite argument. “Do you even know how many times I’ve literally picked you up off the ground because you pushed yourself so hard with your power that you passed out?”

  “Well, if I was unconscious, I wouldn’t know, so…”

  “Not funny.”

  Ransom, who hadn’t been joking, decided that anything else he said would only aggravate Roland more. He kept his mouth shut.

  Roland changed the subject. Sort of. “Want to tell me what was going on just now?”

  “No.”

  “Or this morning?”

  Short of breaking his promise to Natalie, the last thing Ransom wanted was to inform his boss that he’d seen the worst moment of Tirzah’s life in a vision. “No.”

  “Or backstage at the circus, when you wrote down a motel address on your arm right before you collapsed?”

  That had been Natalie’s motel. Luckily, she hadn’t been staying there at the time; it had been the motel she’d booked in advance. Ransom wondered how much time Roland had wasted looking into everyone who was already at the motel before giving up. He was annoyed enough by the prying to hope it was a lot.

  “No,” said Ransom.

  Roland gave an exasperated sigh, then ran his hand over his short, silvering hair. “All right. I’m going to give you some options. One: you don’t use your power unless I give you permission. I know some information comes to you whether you want it or not, and that’s fine. But no using it to search for anything without my go-ahead. It’s too hard on you.”

  “I don’t enjoy it either,” Ransom pointed out. “I don’t use it unless I absolutely have to.”

  “You absolutely have to a lot, though. I’d like you to let someone else be the judge of when it’s truly necessary.”

  Ransom instinctively balked at that, but made himself think it through rather than knee-jerk refusing. He’d only found Natalie because he’d decided to chase after that elusive vision of her face, long before he’d had any idea who she was. When he’d pushed hard enough to make himself pass out, he’d gotten the information that maybe he could save her. And just now, he’d learned how to protect her. Would Roland have authorized any of that?

  “It’s my power,” Ransom said. “I can’t hand it over like a set of car keys.”

  Roland folded his arms across his broad chest. “Option two: I want you to talk to someone about whatever it is that’s going on with you.”

  Tempted as he was to pretend he didn’t know what Roland meant, Ransom asked, “Who?”

  “Anyone! Me, one of your teammates, someone from the west coast team, a therapist…”

  “If I tell a therapist I turn into a hellhound and I have visions, they’ll get a completely wrong idea about what my problems really are.”

  “No. They won’t.” Roland slid a piece of paper across the desk. “Here’s the names and phone numbers of three therapists. One of them is in Refuge City, and the other two will work over video. They’ll keep everything confidential, including from me, and they won’t think you’re delusional.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  Triumphantly, Roland replied, “Because one’s a coyote, one’s a raccoon, and one’s a pegasus.”

  Ransom had to appreciate the masterly way his boss had maneuvered him into asking that question, so he could provide that response. But he knew enough about therapy to know that it only worked if you were honest and forthcoming. And he couldn’t trust in confidentiality. Even the best-meaning people were human, and could slip up. Not to mention that rooms could be bugged and session notes could be stolen or hacked.

  He slid the paper back across the desk. “Sorry. It’s just not for me.”

  The entire atmosphere of the room shifted, as if a bright sky had gone overcast. Roland’s tone was distinctly ominous as he said, “I’ve only got one option left, and you’re not going to like it.”

  Ransom couldn’t imagine that he’d like it less than the other two. “Go on.”

  “Take a leave of absence. Get your head together however you want to do it: walk the Appalachian trail, live in a Zen monastery, stay home and watch Netflix, anything. We’ll welcome you back… when you’re ready to try one of the other options.”

  Ransom had imagined plenty of versions of this conversation, but he hadn’t expected to just be cut loose.

  It was inevitable, growled his hellhound. Actually, they put up with you for a lot longer than I’d expected.

  Roland gave a deep sigh. “I’m not firing you. I want you here. We all do. But I’ve been watching you self-destructing before my eyes ever since we started, and I don’t know what to do about it because you won’t even tell me what’s going on. So I’m done with watching. Get help and stop hurting yourself, or go away until you’re ready to.”

  Go away, repeated his hellhound. Go away.

  A chill struck through to Ransom’s bones. He heard its flat coldness in his voice as he said, “If I walk out the door under those conditions, I’m not coming back.”

  Roland stood up. He was as tall as Ransom, but broader. Bigger. But his presence wasn’t only a matter of size. When he chose, and sometimes when he seemed to not even be trying, he commanded attention. Ransom had carefully observed him do it, to see if he could learn how to do the opposite and vanish, but had eventually concluded that it was an indefinable personality trait and not something that could be taught.

  Roland started to speak, but his voice was drowned out by the hellhound’s snarl as it surged forward, ripping and clawing its way to the front.

  Images flashed before Ransom’s inner eye:

  Roland bleeding on the ground while a woman stood over him, swinging a tree branch at a pair of black-clad men. Ransom could feel his terror that she’d get herself killed, and his fury and shame at his own inability to protect her.

  Roland in an underground laboratory, his chest bandaged, learning that the woman had died. Pressure in his wrist as he nearly broke the handcuff chaining him to the bed, a hot wetness across his chest as his wound opened up and another in his eyes as tears flowed, shouting, “What was her name? She died for me—at least I should know her name!”

  Ransom came back to himself with an unpleasant jolt. Roland was gripping him by the shoulders, looking worried and angry. “What was that?”

  There was stinging liquid in his eyes. Ransom thought for a moment that it was tears, then realized that it was sweat. He was shaking so badly that he wasn’t sure he could stand if Roland let go of him. “Nothing.”

  “Don’t give me that!”

  “Nothing I want to talk about,” Ransom corrected himself. Roland was angry at being stonewalled; fine. That was better than being shocked and horrified and betrayed if he knew what Ransom had seen.

  Just go, growled his hellhound.

  Ransom stepped away, bracing one hand on the doorframe to keep himself upright, then walked out.

  He had to concentrate hard to stop himself from staggering like a drunk. He made it to his office, grabbed his laptop, and took a quick look around to see if there was anything else he wanted. Pete had family photos on his desk, Merlin had plastic dinosaurs, Tirzah had cookie jars, Carter had tools, Dali had boxes of homemade candy, Roland had potted plants that he traded out for new ones when they inevitably wilted and died. Ransom had nothing. They could give his office to someone else, and they wouldn’t even need to clean it out.

  He wanted to make a quick, unnoticed getaway, but whether by accident or design, everyone was in his way. They were all talking, but he couldn’t distinguish what they were saying. He was too drained by his vision to fight his hellhound,
and the black beast responded by shoving quick flashes of everyone’s worst moments at him:

  Pete as a cave bear, raging and out of control.

  Tirzah at the side of the road, her hair matted with blood and mud.

  Dali opening her eyes in a hospital bed, bewildered and afraid.

  Merlin as a little boy at the dinner table, watching his parents talk to each other and ignore him.

  He didn’t only see their pain, he felt it. Their fear and confusion and sadness and despair and loneliness and rage was a weight on his back. He had to get away before it crushed him.

  Someone grabbed his arm, but he shook them off. He made it down the stairs and to the parking lot, then into his car. His hellhound sank back down into the darkness of his mind. The visions faded away, leaving him with a headache so intense that it made him feel shaky and sick.

  His knuckles turned white as he gripped the steering wheel, willing himself to drive safely. Much as he couldn’t bring himself to care for his own sake if he crashed, there were other drivers on the road. He had to protect Natalie. He had Heidi in his apartment.

  A whine sounded from the passenger seat. Ransom glanced over, and saw Heidi sitting beside him. He was so disoriented that he wasn’t sure if she was real or a vision until she laid her head down on his thigh and nuzzled his side.

  Her touch grounded him. He blinked hard, forcing himself to concentrate. Probably he should have taken a cab, but he couldn’t stop now when Heidi was with him. Ransom drove on pure instinct, unable to focus beyond not driving into anything or running any red lights, until he found himself in a parking lot. He hoped it was the motel’s, but darkness was closing in on his vision.

  He brought the car to a jerky stop, then sat in the driver’s seat for some time before remembering to put it in park and turn off the engine.

  You have to get out, he told himself. You need to warn Natalie. And the car will get too hot for Heidi.

  But he couldn’t make himself move.

  Until someone opened the door.

  Chapter 7

  It wasn’t unusual for Natalie to feel restless. Normally she’d have dealt with it by practicing the trapeze or acrobatics, or looking around until she found someone who wanted help practicing their own act, or finding Merlin and asking him if he wanted to do something. But she didn’t have a trapeze, the motel room was too small for acrobatics, and she’d never see the circus or Merlin again.

  She’d gone out after Ransom had left to buy dog food and a leash, so in theory she could take Wally for a walk. But in reality, he was fast asleep. She could go for a walk by herself, but she wasn’t sure it was safe to leave Wally alone given that he could teleport.

  Natalie got down on the floor and did some stretches, then got up and tried to read a book, then lay down and petted Wally, then stood up and paced. Having that ticking clock at the back of her mind should have made her more focused, but it also introduced the element of “If I only have a year to live, is this a good use of my time?”

  It made so many ordinary moments incredibly fraught. When she only had so many books left to read, it was hard to concentrate on any given one because that little voice in her head kept asking, “Are you enjoying this one enough that you’d be okay with it being the last book you ever read?” If she was hungry, she’d get caught up in wondering if she should skip the fast food joint and find somewhere really good, only to spend hours searching for a worthy restaurant and then being disappointed in it, when she could have eaten a burger in fifteen minutes and then gotten on with her life.

  “I need to raise the proportion of bucket list moments to ordinary moments,” she told Wally. He twitched in his sleep, scrabbled briefly with his paws, then lay still again. Natalie decided to take that as agreement.

  “I only have to get through today and tonight,” she went on. It was great to have someone to talk to, even if it was a puppy who didn’t understand a word and also was asleep. “Then it’ll be all bucket list. Even the downtime, because one of my items is ‘road trip’ and that includes every bit of the road trip. Even the—”

  A black-and-white shape materialized beside her. Natalie jumped, startled, then relaxed as she recognized Heidi.

  “Came to visit your brother?” Natalie asked with a grin. She hoped Ransom wasn’t going to worry that she was lost. Though presumably if he did, he could use his psychic powers to figure out where—

  Heidi barked, jumped off the bed and ran to the door, then looked back and barked again.

  Natalie had no idea why Heidi wanted her to follow, but it was clear that she did. And Natalie was more than willing. She hurried to the door and flung it open. She only realized that she’d expected to see Ransom when she felt her own disappointment at the sight of nothing but a half-empty parking lot.

  Heidi ran out, making a beeline for a car parked across two spaces. It was a dusty, dull red Honda like many others, but Natalie recognized it as Ransom’s. She’d run enough cons involving recognizing cars that she’d automatically memorized his license plate. She should have been glad to see it, but instead she felt uneasy. Taking up two spaces was inconsiderate and rude, and also attracted attention. It didn’t seem like him.

  Natalie ran after Heidi. Her heart lurched when she saw Ransom slumped over the steering wheel.

  She yanked open the door.

  He gasped, jerking awake, and grabbed her hand. “You’re all right. I was on time.”

  Her relief that he was alive and conscious was immediately replaced by concern. He looked terrible, pale and sweating, with bruise-dark smudges under his eyes. Her first thought was that he’d been in an accident, but she didn’t see any blood and the car wasn’t visibly damaged. But a seemingly minor impact could have big effects. He could have whiplash or internal injuries or had a blow to his head…

  Heidi materialized in the passenger seat. She nuzzled him, whining, and he laid his other hand on her head.

  “Ransom?” Natalie asked. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “My power. It gives me migraines if I use it too much.”

  “Oh, thank God. I mean, sorry, I’ve heard migraines are awful. I thought you’d crashed your car, even though it’s obviously not damaged, but you looked so bad…”

  Ransom closed his eyes briefly. He took a deep breath, visibly gathering his strength, then opened them. “Never mind me. They know where you are.”

  “What?” She had no idea what he was talking about, but his tone made her skin prickle. Heidi gave an urgent whine. “Who knows where I am?”

  “Enemies,” he said tersely. “We have to get out of here. Get Wally. And your clothes. Hurry.”

  The prickle became a tattoo of icy needles, making her shiver. “Did you have a vision?”

  He nodded.

  “Do I need to warn everyone? Evacuate the motel?”

  “No. They’re only after you.”

  The needles became a freezing rain. “I’ll call a cab.”

  “We can’t risk a stranger getting caught up in this. I’ll drive.” He absolutely did not look like he could drive. Natalie’s doubt must have been visible in her face, because he said, “If you have any coffee… Caffeine helps.”

  “I’ll get some. I’ll be right back.” She hesitated, reluctant to pull her hand from his grip. It was so tight that it felt desperate, and she hated to leave him like this. And, though he didn’t seem in any shape to protect anyone, she irrationally felt safer with him than alone. “Ransom… You need to let go of me.”

  He glanced down, looking at his hand like it didn’t belong to him, then released his grip. Natalie bolted for her room, her heart pounding. She had no idea what was going on, but if Ransom thought she was in danger, she absolutely believed that she was. He looked like he’d driven through Hell itself to rescue her.

  Wally woke up with a snort when she came in. Her nerves apparently infected him. He rushed around, barking and tripping her up, as she flung everything into her suitcase, then grabbed the bag of pastrie
s that she’d stuffed into the mini-fridge. She was used to packing in a hurry, and had left most of her stuff in her suitcase anyway; it took two minutes, tops.

  She didn’t have any coffee ready, but there was a pot in the motel lobby. Grabbing her suitcase and the pastries and whistling to Wally, she bolted into the lobby. The coffee pot was empty, but there was a jar of instant coffee on the table beside it.

  Natalie snatched up the jar, dropped her key and a handful of crumpled dollar bills on the desk of the startled clerk, and fled back to the car with Wally at her heels. She tossed the suitcase into the back seat, deposited the pastries more gently, shooed Wally in, and climbed into the passenger seat. Heidi refused to move, making Natalie hold her in her lap.

  Ransom was sitting up, both hands clenched on the steering wheel, his face white as paper. This close, she could see tiny droplets of sweat sparkling on his coppery eyelashes.

  “No coffee, sorry. But I got this,” Natalie said, holding up the jar.

  “Thanks. I can brew some at home.”

  “If you just need the caffeine, you can chew on instant crystals. We used to do that at the circus, if we were traveling and didn’t have running water. They don’t taste good, but they get the job done. Here…”

  A measuring spoon came with the jar, buried in the coffee. She fished it out and filled it. Ransom let go of the steering wheel with one hand—he seemed to be using the other hand to brace himself so he wouldn’t collapse again—and reached for it. His hand was shaking so badly that she cupped hers around his, helping him tip the instant crystals into his mouth.

  He chewed, made a face, and swallowed. “Ugh. Let me have another.”

  “Yeah, I know that feeling.”

  After three spoonfuls, his hand stopped shaking. He started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. The car moved jerkily, but she didn’t worry that he would crash it. Natalie could almost feel the intensity of his concentration. Heidi squirmed around in her lap, then laid her head down on his thigh. Natalie glanced at Ransom, wondering if that would distract him, but he didn’t seem bothered. In fact, the car moved a little more smoothly.