Fallen Embers (27 page)

“I hear you,” Marc said as he reached for his sister. He pulled her in for a quick hug and added, “It'll be okay. Just take care of yourself.”

“Uh, boss? Can I talk to you?” Nighthawk asked. His manner radiated anxiousness. Not the best state of mind for a bodyguard.

Marc glanced at his sister and then shrugged. “If you can make it quick.”

Julie rolled her eyes. “We'll be outside,” she said as she cast one more surprisingly critical glance around. Her reaction was something of a disappointment. It was important to Marc that she like his place, but somehow he didn't think she did.

“What's on your mind?” Marc asked after the door had closed on his sister.

“Did you mean what you said? That I'm the best you've got?”

“Yeah, I meant it. Why?” That wasn't the only reason he wanted Nighthawk guarding Julie, however. Hawk was also the
only
person Marc could trust to not act too surprised if it turned out Julie's abilities to sense things were as good as Marc's, which was to say, about a thousand times better than anyone else's.

If Marc could have figured out a way to stop Julie from going out and searching for Parker—and maybe telegraphing her talents to the world—he would have done it. In a heartbeat. If he believed he could do even half as good a job of finding the boy, he'd have made up some stupid excuse to keep her here and taken to the streets himself. But he hadn't been lying when he told Julie she was Parker's best chance.

His need to keep his sister safe had been at war with the fact that a little boy's life was at stake. That had been one helluva tough call to make. Marc didn't honestly know if he could live with himself if protecting his sister cost some innocent child his life. But what he did know was that Julie would never forgive him if that was the case.

“If I'm so good, why you always got me babysitting women who hate me?” Nighthawk complained.

Marc bit back a smile. “Why are you always doing stuff that makes them hate you in the first place? If they liked you even a little, it would make both our jobs a whole lot simpler. Besides,” Marc said, turning serious, “this isn't just any woman. It's my
sister
, man. I need to know she'll be safe, and I'm trusting you to make sure she is. So don't leave her and don't let her get hurt, okay?”

“I got it. I won't let you down. I promise.” Nighthawk's gaze cut to Marc's desk. He nodded at the duffle bag Marc had been packing when Julie came in. “You still planning on going out of town again tonight?”

Marc nodded. “Yeah. I have to.” He hated it though. Part of him wanted to stay here and watch out for Julie himself. Part of him even wondered if he shouldn't be joining the search for Parker. He could hit the streets and ask questions too, couldn't he?

But there were others who could do that, just as competently. And there was no one else who could go after Elise in his stead. If he let her slip away again, if he let this chance go, who knew when he'd get another?

After months of nothing at all, suddenly everything was happening at once. And didn't that just figure?

Julie's new bodyguard barely fit in the car. She glanced at him in the rearview mirror. His head brushed the roof, his knees pressed into the back of her seat. Maybe she should have borrowed a bigger car this time around. “All right, so.” He rubbed his hands together and looked at her expectantly. “Where d'you wanna start?”

“Good question.” Julie shook her head. She had no idea. There was clearly no point in going back to the mansion, other than to switch out the cars and…sorry, no. Hawk, or Nighthawk, or whatever his name was, would just have to deal. If she went to Brennan's place they ran the risk of getting embroiled with the police, and that was something else she wanted to avoid.

Maybe she should call Kevin? She'd lifted one of his cards while he'd been sleeping, not because she really planned on using it, more because it seemed that having a contact on the police force was not a completely bad thing. She could use some tips but, on the other hand, did she really want him involved? Did she want to run the risk of having to hurt him if he learned too much? “I'm open to suggestions.”

“Okay.” Hawk's eyes met hers in the mirror again. He studied her thoughtfully, then said, “So lemme ask you something. Are you a freak like your brother?”

“Excuse me?” Julie turned to glare at him.

“Don't go getting attitude. You know what I'm talking about. All that weird, freaky shit he does?”

“Can't say I've noticed.”

Hawk nodded. “Yeah, I figured you'd say that. So, I'm gonna go with ‘yes, I'm just like him' as your final answer.”

Julie sighed. “Is there a point to this?”

“Yes, there's a point. Because, as it happens, I know what your brother does when he wants to find someone.”

“You do?”

“Of course.” Hawk's eyebrows rose. “I know a thing or two. You didn't think your brother sent me on this ride-along just because I've got a pretty face, did you?”

“Well, now that you mention it…”

“Can we get started already?” Brennan snapped.

It was the first thing he'd said since leaving Marc's apartment. His tone was tense and anxious. A wave of guilt swept over Julie. They must sound so awful, joking around while he was in pain. She laid a hand on his arm. “Of course, sweetie. Right away.” She turned toward the back seat again. “Okay, so what do I have to do?”

Hawk looked thoughtful. “Well, for starters, you might want to get out of the car. Marc always does this standing up. And…actually, he generally likes to go up on the roof. Maybe you want to go back inside?”

Julie shook her head. “I'm sure right here in the parking lot will do just fine.” She pushed the car door open and got out. Cool night air tinged with moisture greeted her. In just the couple of minutes they'd been talking, the weather had changed. The fog was coming in. “Now what?” she pressed once Hawk had joined her on the pavement.

“Well, first he takes a few deep breaths and then he shakes out his hands. Like this,” he said, suiting his actions to his words. “Then he just kinda…” Hawk closed his eyes, threw back his head, opened his palms and just…breathed. In and out. Deep and slow.

“That's it?” Julie asked, heart sinking because, really, this was nothing she hadn't already spent her whole life doing—minus the theatrics that Hawk had clearly added on for effect.

Hawk opened his eyes and looked at her. “Yeah, that's it. And if you're like me, you would know that there's a pretty good chance you could bag something for lunch if you hang a left at the next street over that way.” He pointed toward the corner behind her. “But that's about it. Your brother, on the other hand, he could tell you the age, gender, approximate weight, hell, maybe even the eye color of every neck on every street for blocks around. But, uh…don't tell him I called them that. Okay?”

Julie sighed. “Okay great. His senses are stronger than yours—I get that. And maybe mine are too. But what's the big deal? Maybe we've had more years of practice or something.”

“Oh, whoa.” Hawk raised his hands in a defensive gesture. “No, no, ain't goin' there. I know better than to get into a discussion with a woman 'bout her age. Let me just say I don't think practice has anything to do with it, all right? And it
is
kind of a big deal, actually.”

“All right. Well…” Julie thought for a moment. Her sense of smell might be good—better than good, apparently—but if she tried to find Parker using only that, all by herself, one block at a time, it would take days. Which was why she'd really been hoping her brother would've put his whole posse to work. She'd had the stupid idea that if they all spread out and covered the city they'd be able to locate Parker within no more than a few hours. She should have known there was a problem with that theory, however, because if it were really that easy, surely Conrad and Damian would have suggested it first.

Now she was going to have to get creative, make use of all her senses, maybe even utilize some of the weird “talents” she'd been noticing lately. Maybe Hawk was right after all. Maybe she really was a freak. If that was the case, she might as well use it to her advantage, might as well pull out all the stops and see what she was good for.

“Come here, baby.” She gestured at Brennan who'd been eyeing her from the far side of the car. “Come here and give me your hand.”

Brennan walked over and put his hand in hers. The trust in his gesture was at odds with the anxious look in his eyes. She closed her own eyes so she wouldn't have to see it—the doubt, the fear, the hopelessness. She pulled him close and breathed in his essence. It might be easier if she could taste him, too, but that was so potentially distracting that she didn't dare risk it.

The scent of him sparked her memory. Every detail of the months they'd spent together flared up in her mind like bright, new flames from an all-but-extinguished ember. She remembered everything with heartbreaking clarity, as though only an instant had passed since she'd last tasted him. She followed those memories as she would a trail, her thoughts moving ever deeper into the dark recesses of her brain until she found the closely related scent she was looking for. Parker.

The next step was harder. She rolled the new scent around in her mind, isolating and examining it, until she'd memorized every quality—its shape, its texture, its color, its weight. Once she was confident she had it, firm, clear, unmistakable, she pushed her senses outward, looking for anything that matched.

A minute passed, then two. Finally—there. A faint tingle danced on the edge of her awareness, centered somewhere above her right eyebrow. As she turned her head from side to side, she could feel that tingle, like the faint buzz of static electricity, as it moved across her face.

It was very similar to the sensation she'd experienced as a child, tracking the sun through a set of heavy drapes—a game she'd invented to pass the early evening hours on those frequent occasions when she'd found herself the only member of her family awake.

She could feel the heat, she could sense the light, but she was shielded from the full impact. Back then, the filters had been damask and brocade. Now they were air and brick and distance.

She had a direction now but…was it really Parker she was sensing, or was that just wishful thinking? “We have to get closer. I need to be sure.” She opened her eyes and let go of Brennan's hand and felt the connection start to fade. “Oops.” She reached for Brennan's hand again. The tingle sparked to life once more as soon as they were skin to skin. Okay,
that
could be a problem.

“Can you drive?” she asked Hawk. When he nodded, she tossed him the keys. Then she pushed Brennan toward the car's back door. “C'mon. You're in the back with me.”

“A'ight, where to?” Hawk wanted to know once they were once again settled in the car.

“Just head that way,” Julie told him, using the hand that wasn't holding Brennan's to indicate the direction where she wanted to go. Then she sat back against the car's leather upholstery, closed her eyes and tried to concentrate while they zig-zagged across several city blocks.

For the first few minutes, Hawk kept up an almost constant litany of complaints—stoplights, other drivers, one-way streets, the price of gas—until Julie had to finally tell him to “shut the hell up already!” She said very little herself, other than the occasional, “More to the left,” and, “No, now you've gone too far.”

Brennan said nothing at all until they were stopped at yet another red light. Then he turned to face her. “What's going on? Do you know where he is? Are we…? Do you think you can find him?”

Julie nodded. She took another deep breath, emptying her lungs and then filling them again, trying to strengthen her hold on to the slender thread of awareness, the taste that buzzed at the back of her tongue, the flicker of…something indefinable, an afterimage, like a movie in extreme soft focus playing somewhere behind her eyes. “I do. I really think I can do this.” She gulped another breath, squeezed Brennan's hand a little bit tighter and felt the conviction grow. She was on the right track. She had to be.

“Is he…? I mean,
how
is he? He's not hurt, is he? Can you tell any of that? Do you know if…if he's all right?”

“Don't know yet.” She met his gaze. “I'm sorry. I'm doing the best I can. I'll know more when we get closer.”

Finally, after what seemed like hours but was probably only about forty minutes, and after more than a few mutinous mutters from Hawk, “You know we're still going 'round in circles, right?” the images in the back of Julie's brain sprang into focus in a way they never had before.

“Stop the car,” she ordered when the visions in her head combined with the motion of the car made her stomach flip over.

“What's wrong?” Brennan demanded.

Julie shook her head. “Nothing—just a little car sick. He's okay. I…I can feel it. He's someplace close by. C'mon, I need to walk.”

She had to let go of Brennan's hand to get out of the car, but this time the connection she felt to Parker—the images, the sense of knowing that he was nearby, of almost being able to pinpoint his exact position—remained. It wasn't that she could “see” the little boy, certainly not with her eyes, but it was more than just a feeling. It was like her brain, having finished processing all the bits and pieces of information she'd been feeding it, had finally figured out how to put them all together in a way that made sense.

She led the two men down the block, around a corner, and got halfway down the next block when she stopped. “There.” She pointed to a building across the street. “I think he's in there. Third floor, I think. Come on, let's go get him.”