Inescapable (Talented Saga #7) (46 page)

“
Brand and I will come with
you guys,” Penny announced.

The look of concern Brand shot his
girlfriend made me shake my head and refuse her offer. Even with
her mental shields in place, Penny was still bothered by the mass
of refugees. Too bothered to concentrate on the task at hand.

“
I think you two and Henri
should start canvassing local businesses,” I told her. “Agent Nadir
can help with that. A lot of the cafes and such should be opening
about now. Show their pictures around; see if anyone remembers
either Anya or Talia. Search people’s memories for images of both
just to be certain. Frederick, Miles, I will speak with the
harbormaster, and then do the same.”

Reluctantly, Penny agreed to the plan. She
pulled up a map of the town on her communicator and we divvied up
the shops between our two teams before parting ways.

“
Oh, and make sure you
modify the memories of anyone you speak to so that they can’t
tipoff the girls if they see them again,” Miles called after Penny
and the others.

“
No.” I shook my head. “It
would better if you
suggest
they tell Talia you or I are looking for her. If
she knows we’re here, and she is really here, she’ll come find
us.”

“
Got it. See you guys in a
couple of hours,” Penny called back.

The harbormaster was a young guy named
Martin with a scraggy beard, several facial piercings, and even
more tattoos. Unfortunately, he also enjoyed a party lifestyle and
was suffering an extreme hangover.

“
Yeah, I saw those chicks,”
Martin said from behind his incredibly cluttered desk. He leaned
back in his chair and yawned. Squinting against the harsh sunlight
streaming through the dusty blinds, he reached behind him and
touched a switch on the wall to close them.

“
Yesterday morning, right?
About what time?” I asked.

Miles, Frederick, and I were standing
opposite Martin, partially because there was nowhere to sit and
partially to impart that this was not a social visit. We wanted
answers, and we wanted them quickly. Had it not been physically
painful to be inside Martin’s head, I would have dispensed with the
question and answer route and just pulled the information from his
mind. But one quick peek inside his muddled thoughts was enough. It
had felt like icepicks were being jabbed in both of my temples.

Martin blew out an alcohol-laced breath that
made me queasy. “Early. Like wicked early. Maybe six a.m.? Nah,
probably a little later. The sun was up. Yeah. The sun was totally
up. So probably closer to like eight.”

I glanced at my companions. Talia had left
her cell around one in the morning. The pods had deployed at 1:37
a.m. Six hours to reach Nice seemed excessive. Those pods traveled
pretty damned fast. This furthered my assumption that the two girls
Martin had seen were not Talia and Anya.

“
Tell us again what the
girls looked like,” Miles said.

“
Like I told Hans, they
were both skinny chicks. One was hella scary. She was all fierce
and pissed off looking.”

“
Which one?” I interjected,
though I was pretty sure I knew.

“
The pretty one,” Martin
said decisively.

“
Which one was the pretty
one?” Frederick demanded, sounding as frustrated as I
felt.

If this kept up, I was going to have to suck
it up and dive back inside Martin’s head.

Martin scratched his chin thoughtfully. “I
don’t know. She was real pretty. Though it sorta looked like she’d
been on a three-day bender, you know? Big black circles under her
eyes. Oh, snap.” The harbormaster snapped his fingers. “Green eyes.
She had these big, green eyes, looked like they belonged in a ring
or something. That was the pissed off one.”

Anya. Interesting. She was definitely
pretty, but compared to Talia, well, there was no comparison in my
mind. My girlfriend was gorgeous. Maybe I was bias.

“
Really?” Frederick sounded
shocked. His response had more to do with the pissed off descriptor
than the attractiveness factor. “What about the other girl? What
was she like?”

Martin shrugged and drank from a large mug
of reheated coffee on his desk. “Kinda quiet? She didn’t say much.
She just followed the other girl around. The pretty one did all of
the talking. She wanted to know where they could rent a hover.”

“
Wait, you actually spoke
to the girls?” I asked.

“
Yeah. Like I told Hans—at
least, I think that’s what I told him. Memory’s a little foggy
sometimes, if you catch my drift?” Martin grinned
impishly.

I wanted to smack some sense into him. The
guy was a moron.

“
Yeah, we understand you
loud and clear,” Miles replied, revulsion rolling off of him in
waves. He got out his communicator and pulled up two pictures, one
of Talia and one of Anya. He angled the screen towards Martin. “Are
these the girls you saw?”

Martin nodded. “Totally. That’s totally
them.”

“
Okay, so you spoke to
Talia and Anya, right? They wanted to know where to rent a hover?
Did they say where they were going?” I demanded, putting a little
something extra behind my question to speed along this painfully
slow process.

“
Nah. Oh, but they wanted
one with long-range capabilities. Not like a rec hover. Something
sturdier. I sent them to the rental shop on Canal. It’s only like a
mile walk.” Martin gulped more of the burnt black
coffee.

Miles turned to me. “Anything else,
kid?”

I gritted my teeth and prepared my mind for
the onslaught of pain that was about to come. Just as I’d
predicted, being inside of Martin’s head felt as I imagined being
inside of a blender would feel. Blades seemed to be slicing and
dicing my brain as though wielded by a master chef. My thoughts
became jumbled and incoherent. Images that I couldn’t un-see
invaded my mind: Martin doing body shots off the stomach of a girl
in desperate need of a shower; Martin engaging in some incredibly
kinky acts with twins who, in his mind, looked just like Anya;
Martin waking up in the morning with the worst case of cotton mouth
known to man.

I swallowed the bile rising in my throat and
waded through the muck in search of images of the real Anya and my
girlfriend. Even though Martin had confirmed the two girls he spoke
with were Talia and Anya based on their photos, I didn’t trust his
judgment. I wanted to see the interaction firsthand.

Finally, I found the memory. Through
Martin’s eyes, I saw Anya asking him about the hover rental. She
did indeed look peeved. Though Martin had been more interested in
those of Anya’s features that were below her chin, so I couldn’t
get much of a read on her facial expressions throughout the short
conversation. Behind Anya, Talia stood off to the side, partially
obscured by the door to Martin’s office. Her chestnut curls hung
over her face. Her arms were crossed over her chest protectively,
and she was curled into herself as though uncertain.

With considerable effort, and tremendous
relief, I separated from Martin’s mind.

“
If you see either girl
again, you will not tell them you spoke with us. If they ask, you
have not been in contact with UNITED or Hans Walburton or any other
intelligence agency. Do you understand?” I ordered.

Martin’s already glassy eyes became even
glassier and unfocused under my command. He nodded slowly.

“
You never saw us,” I said,
just to reiterate the directive. Not having any experience
manipulating chemically altered brains, I wasn’t sure how much was
sinking in.

Miles, Frederick, and I left without so much
as a goodbye. The harbormaster was snoring before we made it
halfway down the dock towards the exit.

“
I thought you wanted Talia
to know you are looking for her?” Frederick asked once it was just
the three of us.

“
I do,” I said through
clenched teeth. “But the girl with Anya wasn’t Talia.”

Miles and Frederick both stopped dead in
their respective tracks. I kept going. We needed to meet up with
Penny and the others ASAP.

“
Kid, come on. Be serious,”
Miles called. “You heard what Hans said about altered visions and
energy field disruptions. I don’t completely understand how that
all works, but it makes sense. I know you think Talia must be
somewhere cold, but that might not be true. Besides, Martin
identified Talia in the photo.”

I turned and started walking backwards. “I’m
dead serious, Miles. I know Talia. That girl wasn’t my girlfriend.
She looked just like her, but it wasn’t her. Hurry up. We have to
find the others. And contact Crane and Victoria. I don’t know what
the hell is going on, but it can’t be good.”

“
Erik, I get that this is
very difficult for you. You are under a lot of stress right
now—”

I silenced Frederick with a glare. “I’m not
crazy.”

“
I didn’t say you are. It’s
just—”

“
I know what I saw,” I
snapped. “Trust me, Frederick. If you saw a guy that looked exactly
like Henri, but his mannerisms were wrong and his demeanor didn’t
fit with the guy who know, wouldn’t you know the
difference?”

“
I’d like to think so,”
Frederick replied. “But how is there a girl running around that
looks exactly like Talia? Does she have a secret twin?”

“
Like Hans said, I don’t
have all of the answers. I just know what I know. And I know the
girl Martin saw with Anya was not Talia.” I blew out a long breath.
“Now, please, let’s go find the others.”

Miles and Frederick thought I was finally
succumbing to the mental instability caused by the creation drug.
Nothing I said was going to change their minds, which was why I
needed an ally. Once Penny saw the images I’d pulled from Martin’s
addled brain, she would help argue my case.

“
Where are you
guys?”
I sent Penny.

“
Café Americano on Main.
Why?”

“
Stop making inquiries and
wait there for us,”
I replied.

“
Is everything okay? What
did the harbormaster tell you?”
Penny
asked.

“
I’ll explain when I get
there. I want everyone together so I don’t have to keep repeating
myself.”

Penny’s response was
hesitant.
“Okay, we’ll see you
soon.”

Penny, Brand, Henri, and Agent Nadir we
crammed into a back booth at Café Americano when we arrived. I
didn’t waste time with explanations just yet. Penny’s
interpretation of the memory needed to be unbiased, otherwise no
one was ever going to believe me.

“
Look into my head, at the
memories I read from the harbormaster’s mind. Tell me what you
see,” I demanded, pulling a chair over to the end of the
booth.

Miles and Frederick eased into the booth,
both wearing identical skeptical expressions.

“
Okay, what am I looking
for exactly?” Penny asked.

“
Just look and tell me what
you see,” I repeated.

Penny closed her eyes and concentrated. I
brought Martin’s memory to the forefront of my mind to make it
easier for her to access.

“
What a perv,” Penny
muttered as she watched Martin talking to Anya. Then, she gasped
and her eyes popped open. “What’s going on? Who is that girl? And
why does she look exactly like Talia?”

I leaned back in my chair and grinned,
satisfied. “That’s exactly what I’d like to know.”

“
You’re sure it’s not
Talia?” Frederick asked, still a little dubious but no longer
outright skeptical.

“
Positive,” Penny
confirmed. “I mean, she looks just like Talia, enough to fool most
people. Erik and I,” she gestured between us, “aren’t most people.
The girl the harbormaster saw was insecure, uncertain. Does that
sound like Talia to you guys? And letting Anya do all the talking?”
Penny shook her head emphatically. “No way. Talia is used to being
in control. She’d never have let Anya take the lead.” Expression
turning thoughtful, she added, “But what does this
mean?”

No one had an answer for that. Who was this
Talia lookalike? And where had she come from? Who was she working
for? How did Anya know her?

“
I’ve got to call Ian.
He’ll want to know about this,” Brand said, rising from the table
and stepping outside where it was quieter.

“
So will Victoria,” Miles
added. He didn’t move. “Do we want Victoria to know about
this?”

I trusted Victoria Walburton as much as I
trusted any politician, maybe a smidgen more if I were being
honest. And the councilwoman had been sincere when she spoke about
keeping Talia safe. She’d also agreed to hand Talia over to Crane
to hide, which further cemented my belief that she was on our
side.

“
Yeah, call her,” I
decided.

Miles nodded and rose. He joined Brand
outside to make his call.

“
What should we do now?”
Penny asked. “Go back to the islands? Go to London? Stay here and
find the doppelgänger?”

“
Let’s talk to the hover
rental people,” Henri said, automatically assuming the role of
leader.

He was used to being in charge, which was
fine by me. I needed time to think, time to process, and time to
come to terms with something I didn’t want to consider.

“
Sound good to you, Erik?”
Henri asked, pulling me out of my own head.