Invasion of Justice (Shadows of Justice) (4 page)

She walked away without a backward glance, just keeping her eyes on the path least populated.

"You're at the Ritz, right?" he called across the patio, much too loudly for her comfort.

She sensed the swivel of heads and heard the hush before the murmurs resumed, but she kept walking. Not for the first time, she wished for just an ounce of the telepathic powers her brother had. It would make moments like this so much easier.
A quick zap of thought from one mind to another, even a less developed one like Gideon's, and she could rid herself of the annoyance.

But, no.
She had to be the hyper-perceptive, aura reading empath in the family. Too bad her family didn't seem to need one of those.

She paused at the corner, debating whether to follow her instincts in a search for her sister or return to the suite and try once more to find Nathan.

Before she could decide, she felt a dark presence behind her. On reflex, she sidestepped, bumping into a pleasantly nervous couple on their first date.

"You okay?" the young man asked.

She nodded and moved away quickly, turning to catch a glimpse of her attacker.

Gideon stood a mere arms-length away and his aura simmered with temper and hostility. She followed his gaze, then scanned the area around him, but no one nearby exuded anything worthy of distrust.
In fact, no one nearby seemed interested in them at all.

The signal changed and she crossed the street along with everyone else, including Gideon.

She stepped up her pace, knowing she couldn't outdistance his long legs or athletic stature, but she intended to try. Passing a string of boutiques near the hotel, Petra darted inside one and tried to shield herself from Gideon.

If he was working against her and the CRIA, as she suspected, she needed time to put Kincaid on his trail.

"We're closing," a tired clerk said from the counter at the middle of the store.

Petra looked around at the available products as she searched for a reasonable excuse to stay.
Lingerie. She stifled a sigh. Inventory spanned the basics on up to some truly kinky-looking stuff near the back. She headed to those displays.

"I just met the hottest guy and well–"

"You're not under-dressed to impress?"

Petra didn't care for the condescending tone or the telltale expression on the clerk's face, as if she knew exactly how boring Petra under-dressed. Petra ducked behind a rack of strappy leather configurations when Gideon prowled past the window. "There he is. What do you think?"

The clerk glanced, then let herself be distracted by the tantalizing, masculine view. She made a suggestive growl in her throat. "He's looking for you?"

Petra bit back a defensive reply. "Yes he is. Help me out?"

The clerk gave her another critical once over. "They always think the goody-girls have a secret streak of hussy," she muttered. Flipping a switch on the counter changed the sign on the door to closed and dimmed the front lights. "Come on. Let's see what we can do."

"Thanks," Petra looked at the nametag, "Monique."

"Nah, that's just the boss's marketing plan. Call me Maggie."

Petra smiled and looked closer at Maggie. Beneath the thick, sultry eyeliner was a sincere, intelligent gaze. "Let me guess, you're a goody-girl down deep?"

Maggie laughed and patted her full and well-boosted cleavage. "Right here where it counts. My grandma raised me with classic values, but the pay here is phenomenal." She gathered a leather teddy, a see-through bustier, and a red lacy design and then ushered Petra to the dressing rooms.

At a panel Maggie scanned the bar codes on each garment. "Your measurements?" she asked.

Petra shrugged, unwilling to admit she only tracked her bra size for necessity.

Maggie reached for a wand, waving it over Petra from head to toe, then gave her that look again.
"D-cup? Wow."

A computer voice announced, "Bust thirty-six, waist thirty, hips thirty-nine."

Petra tried to hide her humiliation.

Maggie clucked her tongue. "Hey, you're built. Enjoy it."

"I'm just a few inches too short to appreciate those numbers."

"Okay." Maggie touched another button on her panel. "I've programmed heels. We've got those, too, if you like the look." She pulled back a drape and Petra walked into the small cubicle. "Give it a sec to upload and enjoy the show."

The hologram shivered to life. Petra gaped at the life-size image of herself in skimpy black leather, thigh high boots, and silver studded accessories. As the image turned and posed with attitude Petra never dreamed of, she had to admit she didn't look half as bad as she'd thought.

"Wow! Is that real leather?"

"Yup," came Maggie's answer from the other side of the curtain. "You won't find softer anywhere. It's surprisingly comfortable–sans studs–under street clothes."

Further comment was stalled by the next image of the much-too-sheer bustier and matching boy shorts. "Yeah but will I really look this good in person?"

"It is you 'in person'. Or it will be when you buy it."

A low wolf whistle preceded, "Use my card."

Petra saw herself blanch at the sound of Gideon's slumberous voice and decided it was a look that had to go. She threw back the curtain, grateful the move closed the hologram, and glared at him.

"What are you doing here?" Petra snapped.

"How'd you get in?" Maggie demanded at the same time.

Gideon opened his arms. "I'm here for you, baby. Good to know we're on the same page."

Petra sniffed and folded her arms while Maggie dashed off to her counter, concerned about security messages.

"I didn't do any real damage," Gideon assured Petra quietly. "Now are you playing this game out or should I call your bluff?"

She didn't like the way he crowded her, or the glint in his eyes that suggested either answer would suit him. "What did you see?"

"What didn't I see?" He whistled again.

She scowled and he laughed, letting the sound carry out to Maggie and barely giving Petra time to prepare before his arm cinched her waist.

"We'll take it all."

"We'll take the red," Petra contradicted. She smiled sweetly up into his face. "Some things should be a surprise."

"Ah, baby, think of her commission.
She stayed open late just for you."

"True enough." Petra noticed Gideon's offer to pay seemed to have slipped his mind. Handing over her bankcard, she miraculously kept her face in neutral when she confirmed the total.

Gideon chuckled over her shoulder. "Real leather. Mmm-mmm." He drew Petra closer. "Can't wait to feel that."

She'd give him something to feel all right.

"You okay?" Maggie asked.

The concern behind the question told Petra her expression betrayed her. "Yes, of course." She formed a smile with no little effort and, when Gideon took the bag, wished Maggie well.

Outside, Gideon maintained the physical contact, steering them clear of others as he aimed for the hotel. His touch annoyed her on many levels, especially safety. Blocking herself from him meant limiting her awareness of other threats. Based on what she'd felt in this city so far, that worried her.

"Please, let me go now."

"As soon as you're safely tucked back in your room."

"A safe arrival could be in jeopardy if you don't let go."

"Do you always talk like that?"

"Like what?"

"Like you've got a stick up your ass."

"I refuse to dignify that," she said, pulling away, but he held fast.

"Guess that's a yes."

He barreled them through the lobby and into the first elevator, assuring them a private ride by sending a wicked look at the few people who'd been waiting.

"That was quite rude."

"Uh-huh." He pressed the button for the sixth floor. "So report me."

"Actually, I plan to do just that. When Kincaid downloads your file–"

"He'll find what I want him to find."

The doors opened and Gideon stepped out, but Petra jerked away from him at the last second, intending to slip away and find a safe house until Kincaid could bring her in.

The exercise she'd mastered in training failed her in the field. Gideon's lightning-quick reactions resulted in her arm clamped in his invincible grip, the elevator door opening wide, and her being dragged into the hallway.

She opened her mouth to protest when a resounding endorsement echoed in her head.

"Trust Gideon.
Trust only Gideon."

"No," she cried, when the precious connection to her brother ended so abruptly.

"Quiet." Gideon clapped a hand over her mouth and tucked her into an alcove near the stairs.

In her distress, she'd left herself completely open. Gideon's memories blurred her vision and tumbled through her mind, unwelcome and disorganized.

She struggled to block the influx, to deflect it somehow, for his privacy and her sanity. She didn't want to know he'd been juiced with the human growth hormone cocktail used by the military. She didn't want to see any part of the covert operation that ended in his painful shoulder injury. She didn't want to understand his deep-seated frustration and she certainly didn't want to believe she was his assignment.

Desperate, Petra launched herself away from the flood that was Gideon and into the peace that was her spiritual flight.

Petra's vain struggle against his hold suddenly ended. Gideon waited several seconds sure she was faking it. Then he swore softly at the increasing dead weight that indicated she'd passed out.

Consulting his multi-purpose card he took note of the infrared readout showing the positions of everyone on this floor. If he moved quickly he could get them into her suite before anyone turned the corner into this hallway. Tossing Petra over his good shoulder, he hustled to her door.

The multi-purpose card got them in, but it fried the 'do not disturb' code on the lock. Oh, well. He'd think of something later, if necessary. Aiming the bag toward a corner, he closed the door with his boot and then carried Petra into the bedroom, dropping her onto the bed. She was becoming a big pain for a simple babysitting assignment. He gave serious thought to just killing her himself when she woke up.

Working through a sudden, gripping headache, Gideon lit up her monitor and then checked the equipment he'd planted in her suite. Seeing it all still in place, he began to hack her files for more dirt on this glorified astrologer.

"You must be Agent Kincaid," a cultured male voice stated from the doorway.

Gideon stifled an ugly oath. He'd forgotten about the broken door. Turning, he gave the man his best attempt at a friendly smile and extended his hand.
"A pleasure to meet you, sir."

The woman with him blew Gideon's attempt to improvise. "
Randall, that is not Agent Kincaid."

Chapter Three

Petra's Rules of Conduct

Rule Number One: No touching!

Not only did the evidence officer shout at me, but so did the evidence. I merely hoped for a closer link to the missing girl, but picking up her comb sent me reeling with the residual from the victim and her kidnapper. Returning to the shrill voice of the irate officer wasn't the sort of homecoming I prefer.

–From the crime scene profile journals of Petra Neiman

Instantly, the mood in the suite shifted. Gideon hadn't felt so trapped since his recent career-stalling field op.

"Your name and purpose, sir," the woman demanded, with a meaningful glance at the lingerie spilling out of the bag near her feet.

"I have business here," Gideon said politely. "And you?"

Gideon held his ground as the woman approached. In a classy suit and pearls, she wasn't dressed for a fight, but she looked fit enough and Gideon knew the value of a good disguise.

"Well, now your business here is finished." The woman brushed past him. She shut down Petra's laptop and straightened the notepads and pencils beside it. "Make him leave, Randall."

"Easy, Pamela," the man soothed, coming to stand near her. "I'm sure the young man would like to explain."

"The young man is in your daughter's hotel room with enough trashy lingerie to outfit a brothel," she snapped.

"She's having classic mother issues," Randall said with a shrug.

The man stood a head taller than Pamela, and though the temples were gray, Gideon noticed a strong resemblance to Nate. If these were the
Burkhardts how the hell did they relate to Petra? And why hadn't that tidbit been in her file?

"Your daughter is fine. She's just resting in the bedroom." When Randall's brows rose and Pamela shot off to confirm his story, Gideon realized he'd offered the wrong assurance. He held up his hands in mock surrender. "I swear I haven't touched–"

"Randall!" Pamela's cry cut him off. "Oh, God. I think she's lost."

When Randall dashed away to join his wife, Gideon wasted no time escaping the potentially lethal situation. He didn't want to arrest or do something worse to Nate's folks. He took the stairs two at a time to his own suite. Once the door was secure, he lit up his monitor, selected the split screen option showing all the camera angles, and cranked the volume on the microphones in Petra's suite.

"I know what she's doing," Pamela was saying.

"You don't know, Pamela. Neither of us knows."

"Of course I know. I'm her mother. She wouldn't hesitate to go flying off to find Nathan. She's alone. That man couldn't ground an outlet. I won't lose both my babies, Randall, I simply will not."

So, Nate and Petra were siblings. A detail his superiors had effectively smothered. He made a note to find out why she didn't use the family name.
Burkhardt carried some serious weight in a variety of legal and security circles.

Gideon watched Randall walk over to cradle his wife's face. Using his thumbs to dry her tears, he kissed her forehead.

"They're grown ups, love. We did our best. Now their lives are up to each of them."

"We failed," she cried. "He's in prison and she's not strong enough to resist whatever turned him."

"You don't know that these two events are related," Randall said gently.

"They must be. She's always so open, so vulnerable. It's only a matter of time." Pamela slipped away from Randall to Petra's abandoned laptop. She ejected the card from the x-drive and toyed with it. "Remember our dreams? They were supposed to work together."

"On what?" Gideon asked his empty room.

He watched Pamela insert the x-card and open the file.

"Don't play it, love. She's not here."

Confused, Gideon tweaked the angle and refreshed the image from the bedroom camera. Petra lay on the bed, her breathing shallow but steady. She looked 'here' enough to him.

Pamela shook her platinum blonde head. "It's the principle. It's the only thing I can do for her."

Classical music filled Petra's suite. Did Nate's sister have to be so damned refined? He considered Nate a friend, a term with serious implications in their line of work, but they'd never swapped personal info. Thank God.

Mom and Pop Cynical clearly had no idea what their son was capable of. Or who he worked for.

Of course, at the moment, Gideon wouldn't swear to know those answers either.

Muting the crappy music, he kept an eye on them as they snooped through Petra's suite while he did his own snooping online.

Petra enjoyed the distinctive escape from the confines of body and environment. She focused on Nathan's face and her love for her brother. She found him in a prison cell, his back to the world.

I'm here Nate.

Her mental greeting met an unfamiliar hard shell. Petra pushed aside her lingering grief and seized on her irritation with his pity party.

Let me help you.

He rolled over and she gasped. His face was black and blue, his nose broken. The arm drooping from the metal bunk showed the first vicious tracks of behavior modification injections.

Irritation became indignation, which surged into temper.

Go away.

The broken words, though weak, were well timed. Nathan's mental shove took advantage of her negative emotions and sent her winging away.

She listened for her music to guide her back to her body, but only silence answered. Knowing anxiety wouldn't help, she relaxed and reached out in search of another anchor.

She bounced off full-blown anger radiating around her parents. She sent them a mental hug and moved on. Her links to Kincaid and Kelly were too weak and her intense connection to Gideon scared her. There had to be another touchstone somewhere.

Instinct led her back to Nathan, but to an earlier time. She saw him enter his building at Quantico, greet his assistant and General Hawthorne, then sort through the papers on his desk. She felt his normal pleasant mood shift as he read an urgent briefing from the Marine Commandant about juicing.

Then the fire alarm sounded and his heart quickened as he exited the building with his co-workers.

The harsh bells gave way to the opening notes of Mozart's Requiem and her spirit soared toward it. She loved returning to herself along this musical path.

She felt the mistake almost immediately. The surroundings were off. She could smell a damp, hot mildew. She thrashed helplessly against bindings and the scent of fear on her skin.

She felt physically weak and mentally exhausted. Her breathing came in spasms and tears rolled down her cheeks. There was no point in calling for
help, her mouth was stuffed with some cloth that tasted of menthol.

Her shirtsleeve was torn from when he dragged her into the car. Her pants were cold and wet.
Great. She'd peed herself. How gross.

The vocabulary tipped her off. A bad dream, Petra told herself. She'd just slipped into the nearby reality of a recent victim. Quieting her mind, she heard the music, the Requiem, but it wasn't the clear, digital version she'd programmed herself. This must be the captor's musical preference. Shivering at that thought, Petra searched for a way out, a way back into herself.

"Your sister wasn't nearly so cooperative." The man's familiar voice was old and kind, but she felt the underlying danger. "I thank you for behaving."

My sister will find me. She'll find me and tell Mom and Dad. The words formed with such clear conviction, Petra admired the trapped child.

The pedophile was most likely on Kincaid's wanted list. That was Petra's only explanation for this connection. The crime scene must be close by to have caught her up like this. She felt a moment's worry. If something so evil had been happening nearby, she should've sensed it long before now.

The man approached and Petra worked to separate herself from the girl's overwhelming terror. If she could at least get a description of the pedophile for Kincaid she might save someone at last.

Struggling with the girl's torment and her own self-doubt, Petra tried to imprint the details on her memory.

The man himself was remarkable only that he was out-of-date in a cotton shirt with pearl snap-buttons and tan knit trousers. Looking past him, she sought any sign of the typical visual-recording equipment and found none. Instead she caught a glimpse of an antique console television playing a commercial in black and white.

She'd seen similar broadcasts during a documentary and for a moment the girl's trauma was forgotten in the midst of the experience. Recognizing the cheerful jingle, Petra snapped out of it.

Impossible.
Impossible! So says the woman who flies around the cosmos without her body. The sudden, violent invasion of the grown man against the child's small body caused pain to spear through her and put her analysis on hold.

Sadly, she felt the life ebbing from the girl, and the connection severed. Damn. She wouldn't save this one either. Grieving, Petra caught the faint sounds of Mozart once more and followed the music back, hoping to land where she was supposed to this time.

She was nearly to full consciousness when a wave of temper and worry sloshed over her. Not what she needed in her exhausted state.

"Hi, Mom."

"First of all you know better than to go off alone. Second, why must you use that awful piece for your return?"

Petra sighed. "It soothes me."
Though after this experience she might find a replacement. "Hand me that notepad, please?" She shifted to sit up, her battered senses forcing her to move slowly, but she wanted to sketch that dream or whatever it was before the images faded.

"It'll soothe you right into an early grave," Pamela sniped, handing her the notepad.

Petra's heart lurched and she ached for the girl and the unfortunate loss she'd just experienced. Drawing as fast as her hand could move, she made notations about the smells, clothing, colors, and lack thereof. When she finished she felt better equipped to address her mother's worry.

"Mom, really.
It's just music." Petra was in no mood for further dramatics. "I'm fine. I didn't plan this, but I was anchored." It wasn't really a lie. Nate had been there, if only momentarily. Nate! She stopped sketching to tell her mother what she'd seen. "I think Nate's been juiced or drugged or–"

Pamela shushed her. "I know just what you're doing. It's sweet that you always see the best in everyone, honey. But in this case, you're wrong. He's not worth your worry anymore." Pamela knelt next to the bed and caught Petra's hands in a vise-worthy grip. "Promise me you'll stop this nonsense."

Petra considered reciting the rest of the lecture herself, but her mother charged on, so she resumed her sketch. She barely kept herself from rolling her eyes and mouthing along in disrespect. Lord, she hadn't felt this way since she was nine.

Nine?

No! She couldn't deny the familiar jingle or the sense of a protective big sister out there somewhere. Petra choked on the sharp edge of realization. She'd just watched herself die. Well, not this self, but a previous self. It hadn't been a dream, not a random connection. It wasn't even symbolic. The Requiem had marked her descent into an early grave. She felt it, knew it in her soul she'd just seen the worst end of an earlier life.

"We're family," she whispered to herself, thinking about her sister, but her mother heard.

"Not anymore, love. Not after this. Nathan was a vibrant, strong telepath. Too strong to be manipulated by this bizarre drug theory of yours. Whatever happened, he's in prison accepting responsibility for his actions. It's time you accepted the reality of the situation."

"Mom."

Pamela sighed and released Petra's hands. "Fine. I'll humor your father and you and blame the work. But I'll remind you that was work he chose on his own."

"He's innocent."

"Innocence is a fairy tale. What will it take to convince you, Petra? Nathan would never want you poking around his brain like this. Your father and I demand you respect the spirit of the man he was."