Silver Storm: Timewalker Chronicles, Book 2 (14 page)

Luke kissed her and closed the door. Tim quickly averted his gaze and walked to his truck. It wouldn’t do to be caught watching that little interaction, especially when he wasn’t sure what Luke might see in his eyes.

Luke popped his car’s trunk, loaded his arms with Sarah’s bags and followed Tim to his truck. The man scowled as Sarah began shivering again the moment Tim settled her in the seat, his skin no longer in contact with hers.

“She’s a mess.” Luke settled the purchases in the backseat and stepped back.

“I can see that.” Tim wanted to kick something. His field medic skills didn’t apply to shocked-out super-human women who could shoot lightning. Give him a laceration or good old-fashioned bullet wound any day. At least he wouldn’t have this helpless panic turning his stomach into a volcano.

“It’s too dangerous for Alexa here, and I won’t risk it.” Luke held out his hand and Tim shook it.

“I agree. Get out of town.” Tim nodded toward Alexa’s car. “Where you headed?”

“South. We’ve got a friend a few hours from here. You’ve got my number. I’ll do whatever I can from there, but I won’t risk Alexa again. Especially after seeing the power Sarah threw around tonight. She can do this, if you help her figure it out. This one’s all yours.”
I’ve got my own problems
.

The words popped fully formed into Tim’s head, but Luke’s tone and worry for his wife were clear as a bell.

Holy shit. The guy was a telepath on top of everything else?

Tim met Luke’s questioning gaze and nodded. Hell, yeah. He got the message. He’d
heard
. He answered aloud. “Get Alexa out of here. I’ll call you as soon as it’s over.”

Good luck. You know how to reach me
. Luke’s telepathic farewell drove home, once more time, that Tim was in deep, way over his head on this one. Add in the insistent arguments his brain engaged in with his second head about getting Sarah naked, and he was looking at bottom of the fucking Marianas Trench deep.

They both walked to the driver-side doors of their vehicles. Luke paused and closed his eyes, like he was listening to something no one else could hear. Tim watched him with interest. Who was Luke talking to? More secrets…

Luke opened his eyes and met Tim’s knowing gaze without apology or explanation. “They’re gone now. We got a little help diverting their attention. Get out of here, get her warmed up and take care of her.”

“I will. Thanks.”

“Good luck.” Luke drove off and Alexa blew him a kiss through the glass, both hope and resignation in her gaze, as the car sped out of sight, out of town, and out of danger. He really wished they had the luxury of following them.

Tim started his truck’s engine and turned the heat on full blast. Sarah was unconscious again, shivering. Her lips were purple and he could see the thin blue vessels in her too-pale eyelids like veins running through cold marble. As gently as he could, he repositioned her on her side and rested her left cheek against his thigh. His fingers trembled as he pulled the hair away from her neck to expose the Mark on the back of her neck. A tangle of twisted emotion clogged his throat as he lowered his hand to the Mark. Everything he’d seen and felt in the last few hours coalesced into a jumbled mess in his head.

Nothing made sense anymore, except Sarah.

Warmth spread through him again and he rested his head back, closing his eyes for a couple minutes to embrace the feeling. He wanted this. He wanted her. In less than twenty-four hours he’d gone from ignorant bliss to this all-consuming need for a woman.

Love at first sight? Lust? Alien interference? Fate? Some thousand-year-old man playing cupid from a spaceship? The answer didn’t matter to him anymore. She needed him. She was brave, powerful, and sexy as hell. She also didn’t have a clue how to protect herself.

He did. Now Luke’s lecture made sense. He got it. Alexa and Sarah were both powerful. They were both frightening in what they could do, and what their powers could be used for. They needed serious protection.

And someone to trust.

Glancing at the innocent dusting of freckles on her cheeks, Tim knew she wasn’t cut out to fight alone. She was soft and scared. She was a nuclear bomb inside an eggshell. So he’d be hard for her. He’d kill anything that looked at her funny, and make sure she didn’t crack.

Of its own accord, his thumb traced the soft contours of her neck and jaw as warmth continued to pulse between them. Yes, he would take care of her now, whether she liked it or not. And if that meant he couldn’t stop touching her, he wouldn’t stop.

Good thing the truck was an automatic.

<><><>

Wednesday, 8:34 a.m.

Sarah woke in a rose-scented bubble bath. The hot water soaked into her aching body and relieved some of the pain in her limbs, but none of the agony inside her head. The hard plastic knots of the strap adjusters on her cami bit into the back of her shoulders. They were pressed into her skin by the hard wall of muscles she leaned against.

Tim. She was in a bathtub with Tim. “Where are we?”

“My house. Just relax. We almost lost you out there.”

The Triscani had attacked her, sucked the warmth from her soul. Memory flooded her, and with it came a dose of ice-cold panic. Cold, inhuman creatures. The Archiver told her they were nasty. That man had a serious talent for understatement. Her head jerked forward and physical agony sliced through her skull at the sudden movement.

“Shhh. Don’t move. I’ve got you. You’re safe now.” The heavy weight of his forearm rested just beneath her breasts and her temple was pressed against his neck. His other hand wrapped around her neck, over her Mark, tempting her with the pulsing heat of his heartbeat. He held her in place, wrapped around her like rope around an anchor.

He thought she was safe, protected by his strength and his arms. He had no idea just how wrong he was about that. She’d have to leave him behind. There would be no other way to protect him from the Hunters she knew were coming after her from the Triscani horde. She’d seen them in the storm, too. But far better that they hunt her now than find their true prey. She’d bait them, then lead them on a wild goose chase across as many continents as she could manage. She needed time. The baby girl needed time.

She relaxed into his embrace and let the soft scents and Tim’s touch soothe her battered mind. The bathroom was lovely, with white roses and ivy entwined in the designer tile lining the walls. Soft pink and lilac tones bathed the room in a woman’s soft touch. The intricate lattice of roses and color kept her eyes occupied and her mind calm as she floated in the warm in-between, not quite fully alert. She felt like she was waking from a dream that just wouldn’t let go. A nightmare, really, that she recently escaped and was in no hurry to return to.

But she didn’t have much choice. She’d made sure of it. She’d dealt those bastards a blow they wouldn’t soon forget. They’d hover over Chicago like a dense lake mist now, afraid to leave her here. They had to hunt her down; they needed to kill her even more than they needed to burn down Chicago. Because she knew the truth. She had discovered the answer to the Archiver’s thousand-year-old question.

She knew what they were after, and she’d burn in hell for eternity, stay on the run for years if that was what it took to make sure they didn’t get it. Sarah would do whatever it took to protect the girl. Sarah had made sure her own energy flared white hot and brilliant when the Triscani attacked, as distraction and protection meant to hide the baby girl’s life force from hungry Triscani eyes.

The girl’s physical body was very, very young, tiny and vulnerable. But her soul was old and powerful, and the child knew too much. Not yet born, but the baby girl already knew she was hunted by monsters.

The thought made Sarah angry and doubled her determination to help the child any way she could.

She’d been distracted by the child’s bright presence riding the energy field, just as the Triscani had been. The first telepathic attack had happened within moments of her initial contact with the child. The touch of the Triscani Hunter’s mind had been excruciating, the pain, incredible. The bastards had nearly killed her and she hadn’t even seen one yet. She hadn’t expected that. But burning brightly enough to hide the baby girl’s energy signature while under Triscani attack had nearly drained her dry.

Now Sarah needed rest, and she needed to try to lure them away from Chicago. Not that they would go. The baby was here, somewhere.

Too bad she couldn’t just lead the bastards on a merry chase all around the globe, go somewhere storms raged constantly so she could hide from their technology and their power, and somehow keep their attention focused solely on her and away from the child. The beautiful, perfect child.

No. The Triscani would take out Chicago no matter what Sarah did now. She’d tried to warn the girl, get her to leave, but what could an unborn child do to affect her own fate? It wasn’t like the poor thing could grab the car keys off the counter and waltz out the door.

The baby was completely vulnerable. Which meant Sarah had to stay, and defeat the Triscani here. Nothing had changed.

Sarah didn’t know the girl’s identity, didn’t want to. The more conscious minds focused on the child, the harder it would be for her to hide her presence from the eyes of the Archivers, the Triscani, and time itself.

The child trusted no one but her mother, and Sarah couldn’t fault her for that.

But it meant no one could know. And that included the well-intentioned man holding her so tenderly in the water.

Today, in that storm, she’d met the future in the crystal-clear twinkling of a child’s mind, and no one could know who the girl was. She needed to protect the girl, give her a few years to grow up and harness the power and innate knowledge within her. Sarah had to have faith that once that was done, the Triscani would run scared.

Sarah closed her eyes and enjoyed the precious warmth of Tim at her back and the still warm water surrounding her. She reached down the long tendril of power that burned like a Roman candle, shooting random bursts of power across the energy plane to keep the Triscani Hunters occupied, and pulled energy from the wind and electrical grid of the house, pushing it toward the bright flame in a swirl of chaotic design, added more energy to it and watched a ball of light shoot through the dark places. She added enough juice to make sure it burned so brightly the girl couldn’t be found. Judging by the way her previous work had begun to weaken and stutter, she figured she could buy the girl a few months, a year at most, before burning herself out completely.

Sarah wanted to scream in frustration, but she didn’t have the luxury. So, she sucked at this game she was playing. She’d better learn fast. The girl needed a more experienced guardian, someone much more skilled. Someone who could make their power an impenetrable wall, not a barely held together patchwork of power that was already falling apart.

She sucked as a protector, but as far as Sarah could see, she was the only chance the girl had. She was it. She’d have to freaking figure it out.

The girl would need years to grow into some semblance of a woman, to be big enough to fight these bastards on her own. Years.

She reached for more power and Tim growled in her ear. “Stop it.” He gently shook her shoulders and broke her concentration. Sarah allowed the energy to dissipate with a tired sigh. She’d tackle that problem again later, when she didn’t feel like she was about to collapse.

“Sarah, stop messing around. Your temperature just dropped again and I felt you pulling energy. What are you doing? Trying to kill yourself?”

Sarah clenched her jaw to prevent it from chattering. She was cold again. Hell. It was going to be a long ten years. “Sorry.”

“Tell me what’s going on. Talk to me. What happened out there on that rooftop?”

Sarah shook her head and let the tears pool behind burning eyelids, then slide silently down her cheeks and into the water. She couldn’t tell him. His conscious knowledge that the child existed might increase the drain on her energy, make it more difficult for the child to hide from the world.

A man like Tim didn’t deal in half-truths and lies. He wouldn’t be able to accept it. She wished she had some way to tell him that wouldn’t endanger him, the child, or herself. However, she seriously doubted he’d be willing to globe-trot with her, always on the run from the aliens hunting her, and never know why.

The knowledge twisted in her gut like a dull serrated knife.

Sarah pulled out of Tim’s grasp and tried to stand. The now tepid bath water glued her cami and underwear to her flesh and she shivered as goose bumps rose to cover her from head to toe. She’d swear even the fine hair in her eyebrows rose in protest of the chill.

“Stop.” Tim grabbed her wrist and held her in place. Her flesh pulsed beneath his touch on her arm and through her foot as it bumped his bare leg beneath the water. He had boxers on, by the looks of them, and every square inch of exposed chest and strong legs made her want to weep in regret. He was magnificent, and now he could never be hers.

“I’m sorry, Tim. I can’t answer any questions. As soon as this is over, I’ll need to leave Chicago as soon as possible.” He frowned, but didn’t release her.

“Where are we going?”