Marie Harte - [PowerUp! 08] Page 9

  He smiled at the remembrance, then focused once more on the present. “I’d like you to screen our new friend, Fielder. See to it.”

  “Will do, sir.”

  Carl disconnected the call and got down to business. Trading guns for women would serve its purpose today, especially as some of the females seemed more than unwilling and just young enough to be considered illegal in most states. Just what Carl’s new clients had been looking for.

  He wrapped up the deal and hurried back to his limo, careful to keep himself free to take calls. He couldn’t wait to see what happened in Caracas. Owen and Dalton had no idea what was coming their way. It would be fun to watch them squirm, fearful for their lives. What great stories they’d have to tell their pathetic friends when they returned. And they’d know just how far Carl’s reach extended.

  He laughed and poured himself a scotch. And waited.

  * * * *

  Owen spent that day and night unable to stop thinking about Ian. Had his little thief found the new Whistler etching he’d intentionally left in his personal, less secure safe off the bedroom? He’d bought it for three hundred thousand, only because he had a feeling Ian might like it. Was Ian making good use of his time painting? Though Ian had refused to admit it, Owen thought he liked the artistic challenge in copying the works, more for art’s sake than for the money he’d get when he sold the forgeries.

  Ian had a creative streak that meshed well with Owen’s own ability to generate income. He had no idea why, but he’d always been able to know when to invest and when to pull out. Granted, he’d gotten burned a few times when he’d let sentiment rule logic. Yet even then, he’d known he should withdraw and intentionally ignored his instincts.

  After a restless night’s sleep and a breakfast not worth mentioning, he paced the small room, feeling hemmed in and uncomfortable in the sweltering heat. He slapped at another mosquito, wishing for the moderate climate of Bend once more. Did Ian realize Owen never brought anyone into his home? Acquaintances and casual dates he entertained away from Bend—his true home. Ian wouldn’t understand what his presence meant to Owen, but the others in his employ would.

  They’d take care of him. He hoped. He had a feeling he’d need to give Tim a raise when he returned. That’s if Ian hadn’t stolen the man blind and convinced him he’d be better off working elsewhere.

  Owen grinned, glad to concentrate on his little thief and the pleasures still awaiting him.

  “Owen. I’ve got him.”

  Caleb’s mental call preceded the familiar thickness of psychic energy, a foreign sense of someone else rushing at him. Like a narrowed tunnel, Owen saw the target at the very end and readied himself to rush through and connect.

  While Caleb held the tie, he lay down on the bed, gripped his pistol by his side, and closed his eyes, knowing he’d barricaded the door as best as he was able. The flimsy lock would do little, but the chair against it would scrape the floor if moved, alerting Owen to company.

  He let himself go and focused, using a surge of disgust and anger to push him fast. He raced through the tunnel and landed in DeSanta’s essence. A clingy quagmire of powerful energy enveloped him, making it hard to breathe.

  DeSanta had a potent psyche, domineering and sticky all at once.

  “I’ve got him. Get out, now,” Owen sent Caleb before he forgot himself in the task at hand.

  “I’m gone. Be there in twenty. Maybe less if I can.”

  Caleb winked out, leaving Owen alone with the mark.

  Owen didn’t want to linger, but he had to satisfy himself that he was doing the right thing. Despite all that he’d seen and studied about the man, the truth came from the knowing. On a sigh, he leeched into DeSanta’s bones and blood and thoughts. While Morvelo DeSanta enjoyed an early lunch, laughing with his henchmen about something, Owen seeped deeper. And then the memories hit him. Hard.

  Feelings and visions of torture, madness, and moments of loving clarity intersected. He whipped a young boy to death while stripping the flesh off a little girl. Then he molested them in ways that made Owen want to gag. And then, a vision of DeSanta bouncing his niece on his lap, no thought of hurting her at all, just a pure, innocent love—which completely contrasted with his disgusting, baser needs.

  More violence, this time meted out with a gun and a knife. A slashing pattern DeSanta particularly liked to use when making a statement to his enemies.

  The visions and feelings grew in intensity, and he felt DeSanta relive them as he pushed the man to open himself. DeSanta shook his head and rose from the table. He excused himself and wandered down the marbled hallway into a large bedroom, where two small girls quivered with fear, chained to the foot of his bed like dogs.

  DeSanta stared at the darker of the two. He wanted… No. Owen surged into the man’s mind. Instead of crushing DeSanta’s heart, as he’d done previously, Owen managed to turn him away, toward the bathroom, where his death would be in private and not in front of the children.

  Can spare them that, at least.

  DeSanta stumbled, muttering to himself and cursing his inability to focus.

  Owen felt nauseous, the power of DeSanta’s sick, twisted desire making it difficult to hold control. He exerted himself once more, aware of an excruciating pain in his temple. Fuck. Not good. He didn’t have any more time to play. With the notion that he was judge, jury, and executioner and that this man had been found wanting, he brought out a mind trick that used to scare the bejesus out of him and leveled it at DeSanta—a darkness, an oppressive, putrid hatred for everything the man was.

  Owen let it pour out of him, shooting DeSanta full of his own evil. A reflection of his own truth in the form of Owen’s version of hell.

  DeSanta clutched his heart and stared blindly at the pristine white walls of his bathroom. He tried to cry out for help, but Owen tightened down on the man’s muscles, freezing his vocal chords.

  Yes, extreme pain. Anguishing punishment, you fucking bastard. He gripped harder and jerked his mind, so that arteries tore and DeSanta’s lifeblood flooded his chest cavity, missing the heart. Internal damage no one would be able to explain, a definite turn from the invisible footprint he normally left. Yet Owen wanted to make a statement.

  Still focused, he began to trace into the man’s flesh. The skin, the largest organ of the body, and Owen’s personal playground at the moment. Into DeSanta, he carved the ugly truth. Rapist. Murderer. The devil claimed his due, scored into the man’s chest and across his forehead as a warning to all.

  DeSanta lay dead and bleeding while Owen stared through his dead eyes at the feet that entered the bathroom.

  He heard men swear and cross themselves as DeSanta’s flesh continued to peel, talking to the evil in them as well.

  And then he heard the roar of sirens and the local police Caleb must have sent to save the girls and anyone else trapped in DeSanta’s mansion. Gunfire erupted.

  He continued to swim in the morass of the man’s mind, a dangerous thing, considering DeSanta now lay dead. With some effort, Owen pulled himself together and swam back through the tunnel toward himself.

  He opened and blinked his dry eyes at the ceiling, slow to understand the loud noise drawing closer to the room. He gripped the pistol in his hand, not sure how much time had passed since he’d been gone.

  Pounding on the door, accompanied by more gunfire, jerked him out of his stupor. Still exhausted and unable to do little more than crawl, he rolled off the bed and landed hard on the floor, away from the door.

  Just in time too, because the chair against the door slid across the floor as the door was flung open. Someone emptied a machine gun into the mattress. More footsteps entered.

  “Stay the fuck down,” Caleb shouted.

  Grunting. The sound of fists striking flesh. Owen raised himself over the bed to see another man try to knife Caleb in the back. He raised and shot his own gun before the guy had the chance.

  Caleb dropped the man he’d been holding and swung around to see h
is attacker crumple to the ground, his hand over the bullet in his belly. Then he turned back to Owen. “You look like shit. Son of a bitch. You’re bleeding.”

  Owen wiped a shaky hand under his nose, not pleased to find it covered in dark blood. His head hurt too, from banging it on the floor when he’d fallen. He tried to get up but couldn’t. “H-how did they find us?”

  Caleb scowled and hurried to help him stand. With one arm, he held Owen upright, and with the other he grabbed the duffel containing their change of clothing, some supplies, and more weapons. “I don’t know. But this shouldn’t be happening. We need to move, now.”

  They’d just skirted the dresser and neared the bathroom when shots fired. A blazing pain struck Owen’s thigh.

  “Shit.”

  “Damn it.” Caleb yanked Owen into the water closet with him, slammed the door shut, and shoved Owen down. Then he opened the window they’d planned as an escape route and checked outside. “Clear. Come on.”

  Sirens sounded from outside. Caleb climbed through the window with the duffel strapped to his back and turned to help Owen through while keeping his gun trained on the door.

  Owen’s leg ached something fierce, but by concentrating, he was able to ignore the pain. A numbness crept up his leg as he worked himself over the ledge and onto the steel railing. Except the lack of feeling didn’t stop at his thigh. He shook, his reserves fading, and went to one knee. The fire escape shook.

  He whispered, “Good thing you came when you did. I’m flaming out, man.”

  Caleb swore, fired into the street below them from the flimsy landing on which they stood, and said something Owen couldn’t make out.

  The world spun, and he saw nothing more.

  * * * *

  When he woke, everything was dark, and he felt a strange vibration around him. His throat ached, and he swallowed hard, coughing at the itch there.

  “Easy. Christ, Owen. Next time, give me a little more warning.”

  Caleb.

  Out loud, his friend said, “We’re right now in the plane heading home.” A pause. “It was Kerr. He sent a note with one of the bastards who bombed our car. Oh right, you missed that, Miss Daisy, because I had to find us alternate wheels and carry your heavy ass out of Dodge. Anyway, apparently Kerr can’t wait to see you again.” Caleb sounded gruff when he added, “I’m staying until he’s done. That was way too close for comfort, and he’s got to have impressive contacts if he tracked us that soon. The flight manifest was scrubbed, and no one but me and a few higher-ups knew about this.”

  “Great.” Hell. It even hurt to mentally communicate.

  “No. I want you to talk to me, with your mouth. Open your eyes, slacker. Come on. I know you’re tired, but I need to see…”

  Owen felt as if he’d been in a coma for weeks. It took Herculean effort to open his eyes.

  “Christ, Owen. Your pupils are still huge. Not good, man.”

  “I know that,” he rasped. “I feel…bad.”

  Caleb swore, creatively, in several languages. Two of which Owen recognized.

  “Okay. Close your eyes and rest. We’re flying back to a private airport away from Bend, then driving back to the house. You need rest, man. Oh, and when I called to check with Tim, he said your boy is safe and sound and funny as hell. So the fact Tim hasn’t killed him yet is a plus.”

  Owen wanted to laugh at Caleb’s dry tone, but he couldn’t find the energy. A slight pain in his leg alerted him that the gunshot he’d suffered had been real. But the relief that Ian was waiting for him, alive and well, gave him the respite from consciousness he needed.

  “…okay? Owen, hey, Owen.” “Buddy, you still with me?”

  Caleb’s voice faded, and Owen sank into oblivion once more.

  Chapter Eight

  “So what’s it like?” Ian asked as he stirred sugar into his iced tea. “I mean, being that large must be terrific when it comes to getting people to do what you want.”

  Tim raised a brow. “Really? Because you don’t seem that impressed.”

  “I’m the exception. Most people with a normal brain respond to brute tactics.”

  Tim chuckled. They sat outside on the deck, overlooking the beautiful Cascade Mountains. Reuben had cleared the area out back, and unless someone planned on firebombing the house, they were clear of sniper attack. A good thing, because Ian had lost his patience for sitting still an hour after Owen had departed two days ago.

  He sighed again. “I’m bored.”

  “How can that be? I caught you breaking into Owen’s vault twice and found you rummaging through his locked office just this morning.”

  They stared at the lunch on the table in front of them. Bless Bev and her killer nachos.

  Before Ian could speak, Dolly joined them. “Boy, I need a break.” She glared over her shoulder, and Ian bit back a grin. Reuben stared at the three of them at the table, nodded to Tim, then went back inside the house.

  Through the glass walls, Ian watched the large man disappear, probably back to doing his rounds around the place. So mundane, but the Knox brothers seemed to revel in dull activities.

  “He bugging you, Dolly? Want me to talk to him?” Ian offered, curious about Owen’s security.

  He’d checked into the Knoxes’ records the night before, the open and classified government documents. Decorated Special Forces types who’d separated from the service years before retirement, they’d been hired as mercenaries and “conflict consultants” prior to joining up with Owen a few years ago. Since then, they had a spotless record of keeping him safe when he’d traveled abroad.

  Tim too passed the bar. Not that Ian didn’t think Owen could handle his own with investigating his employees, but, well, there was Harry Barker, after all.

  “So what really happened with Harry?” Ian asked, wondering if Dolly or Tim would say anything. Owen had that uncanny ability to instill the utmost loyalty in his people. Hell, even Ian wanted to take care of the guy, and Owen could more than afford to hire the best. It just seemed like Owen tried to take care of everyone else and put himself last. So weird for a guy of the rich-and-privileged set.

  Dolly’s mouth thinned. “That con artist wormed his way into Owen’s good graces. He was polite, funny, even a snappy dresser. We all liked him, at least until he had the nerve to sell Owen out. Tim saved his life.” She nodded. “Reuben and Joe almost had him, but the men he let into the house to kill Owen took him with them when they left.”

  Kill Owen? His mouth grew dry. “When did this happen?” Ian asked, intrigued. Jack hadn’t said anything about an altercation here. Nor had anyone else. Then again, Jack didn’t often confer with Ian, which was why Ian had to spy on his boss. For Jack’s own good, of course.

  “I don’t know that Owen would want us to share,” Tim hedged.

  “He wouldn’t mind a bit,” Dolly refuted before Ian could. “Do you know, Ian, that you’re the only date Owen’s ever brought here?”

  Tim colored. “I don’t think Ian’s his date, Dolly.”

  “No. He told me I’m his new boyfriend.” Ian beamed. He’d been practicing tossing the word around, wondering at the seeming meaning Owen attached to it. He’d been pretty emphatic about them not being casual. All that mine crap. Ian got a secret thrill out of the thought of belonging. Owen was hot, rich, but more importantly, he genuinely seemed to like Ian. Unlike Ian’s other friends, who grew annoyed with him at the drop of a hat, Owen laughed off his teasing and encouraged Ian’s dry wit. To Tim, who still looked uncomfortable, Ian said, “You did know he’s gay, right?”

  Dolly laughed with Ian when Tim’s blush intensified.

  “We shouldn’t be talking about him like this,” Tim said weakly.

  “Why not?” Ian shrugged and took a sip of tea. “You’re family, right? I mean, this is his personal oasis, his safe spot away from the press and everyone trying to get a piece of him.” Ian had wondered about Owen’s life, and from what Bev and Dolly had confided the past two days, Owen only seemed
to relax here.

  His insights into his new boyfriend made him realize Owen had a much harder life than he’d once thought. Hundreds of thousands of people relied on him for their livelihood. His millions made jobs possible, while his connection to Jack ensured even Ian had legitimate work.

  “Family?” Tim asked. “Uh, I work for him.”

  “Family,” Dolly said firmly and nodded. “Owen is a wonderful man. He helped my mother when she got sick. I never asked, either. He volunteered to get her treated and paid the tab. He keeps trying to get Bev to write a cookbook, because she’s always wanted to but is afraid to fail. But with Owen’s backing, it’ll go far. He’s a true gentleman. Unlike some people,” she muttered and looked over her shoulder in the general direction where Reuben had disappeared.

  Ian smothered a grin and asked again, “Want me to talk to him?”

  Tim balked. “You leave Reuben alone. He’ll eat you alive. I don’t think he has a sense of humor.”

  “You got that right,” Dolly agreed. “He’s been on my case about sticking close, staying clear of the main windows, and any other thing he can pick on me about. Do I look like I have a death wish?”

  Ian studied her. For a forty-three-year-old woman, she looked pretty damn good. Not that forty-three was old, but the woman smiled a lot and had an earthy prettiness he could appreciate, even as a gay man. He’d love to draw her like that, smiling and laughing. She and Bev seemed close. Joe and Reuben were brothers, but here, in this place, everyone seemed to come together. Even Tim’s bashfulness fit in with the women who tried to take care of him.