Raven (Kindred #1) (21 page)

“Sure he would,” Art said, leaning over the back of the couch beside where she sat. “What else did he say, girlie?”

Trying to remember the conversation, she turned her lips into her mouth to buy herself some time. “He said… payback’s a bitch and he has his eyes on your prize,” she said and when Brodie backed off this time, she saw the deliberate look he dropped to his uncle.

“There’s nothing we can do,” Brodie said.

“There’s one thing,” Art said.

Zara was lost because again they were carrying on their conversation as though they were alone. “Have you got time to track him?” Brodie asked.

Art exhaled in defeat. “No. He’s a fucker.”

“What else is new,” Brodie muttered.

“I don’t understand,” Zara said, seeking an answer on their faces. “Who is he? He said he didn’t care about the device or who it killed.”

“He’s a guy set on revenge,” Art said. Brodie was walking away from her again, so she turned and slid a leg over the couch so that she was sitting astride the backrest.

“How do you know who he is?” she frowned and tilted closer.

“Slick looking motherfucker with a scar right here,” Art said, lifting his chin to indicate the line of the scar on his neck and she nodded. “His name is Griffin Caine. He’s something of a groupie. He followed Brodie’s work for years. But he was just too erratic to be brought inside.”

“He threatened Brodie’s life,” she said. “But he… called him Raven.”

“Brodie’s been Raven for years,” Art said. “Sometimes even he forgets who he really is.”

“Being back here, so close to home and dealing with CI… it must be bringing back memories,” she said, glancing at Brodie, but he was retrieving the bottle of scotch and not listening to them. Bringing her legs up, she crossed them and balanced in her seated position atop the couch.

“It hasn’t been easy for him,” Art said, watching his nephew pour out a large measure. “When we first heard what Grant was doing… We were in Egypt and… it’s funny how your demons can find you no matter where you are, isn’t it?”

“I can talk to Grant,” she said, lowering her volume and hunching a little closer to Art. “I’m not convinced he’s a lost cause. If we can figure out why he’s doing this—”

“He’s doing it to punish our father,” Brodie said. She had thought he wasn’t paying attention but it turned out she was wrong. He tossed the liquor down his throat and poured out another measure. “He’s doing it for spite. Our father died for this damned piece of metal and plastic and Grant wants to show him that it was for nothing. That our father’s sacrifice meant nothing.”

Absorbing this declaration, she considered how well the brothers knew each other. “How do you know that?” she asked. “You said last night that—”

“Because he’s right,” Brodie said, rotating the glass full of scotch back and forth in his hand. “Grant is right.”

Art jumped up from the couch to head in his nephew’s direction. “Did you hit your head tonight? Breathe some crazy-making fumes? You don’t support this. People will die! Innocent people!”

Snapping around, his fury burned from his eyes. “Yeah,” Brodie retorted. “But if Caine knows about it…” he glanced past Art to focus on her. “He thinks she’s fair game.”

“You invited this,” Art said with impatience, yanking the bottle of scotch away and sending the bullet Brodie had discarded on the counter, clattering onto the floor.

“You’re saying this is my fault?” Brodie said, slamming his glass on the counter.

“You knew it was a possibility. You knew that as soon as you found a woman to care about—”

Depressurizing his anger, Brodie exhaled his resolve. “This is what he’s been waiting for,” Brodie said, retrieving his glass and turning his mouth down into it. He didn’t deny Art’s declaration that he cared for her. “This is why he’s been dogging me for years. Killing me wasn’t enough.”

“No, it wasn’t,” Art said, speaking in solidarity. “But you’re not going to fall apart now. Caine is the least of our problems. We’ve avoided him this long. We’ll just keep avoiding him. You know that half his fun comes from the chase. He’s not going to put a bullet in Zara until you’re there to watch it.”

Her observational role suddenly became interactive. “In me?” she asked, scrambling off the back of the couch to dart toward the men. “Why does he want to kill me?”

“It’s a long story,” Art said. “Needless to say, their feud is rooted in a situation involving a woman.”

“Feud?” Zara asked, resting a hand on the countertop to support herself in case this story got any worse, although she couldn’t imagine how it could.

“Caine was in love with her and she didn’t want him,” Art said. “The story is irrelevant to the fact that he hounds Brodie at times like these because he enjoys watching people suffer. It would be the highlight of his life if Brodie made a mistake.”

Narrowing her eyes, she sought an explanation. “Why would—”

“Because he has anger management issues and narcissistic tendencies,” Brodie said while examining the contents of his glass.

That sounded like someone else she knew. “It’s a wonder you two were friends,” she muttered.

He didn’t entertain her sarcasm. “We were not friends,” Brodie grumbled and drank more of his alcohol.

“We focus on this mission and deal with Caine later.”

“This mission is fucked from the start,” Brodie said. “We still can’t figure out where the fuck Grant is stashing the device in the city. The fucker is smart. He knows better than to digitize anything. Frank taught him the virtue of doing things old-school.”

Brodie elevated the glass toward his lips. Zara put a hand on Art’s chest to urge him aside. Then she slipped into the narrow space between Brodie and the counter to seize his glass before it could reach his mouth.

“Well, it’s not in the bottom of that bottle,” she said, handing the glass off to Art who hurried it away before Brodie could snatch it back. “That’s one place down.”

“What are you doing?” Brodie asked her and his body swayed forward, pinning her to the solid granite at the small of her back. “Worried if I drink too much that the equipment won’t work when we get upstairs?”

“I’m looking forward to finding out,” she said, scratching her nails up the fabric of his tee shirt and around his neck where she linked her fingers and used his strength as leverage to pull herself higher. Pouting, she fixated on his mouth and exhaled a murmur of want.

Seeing him stressed made her want to calm him. She wanted him to relax, to erase his worries and remind him of her warm body because she wanted to be a sanctuary for him. Brodie was an outlaw, the kind of man who wouldn’t shy from any fight and she was in awe of his abilities.

To be a part of his life, to be a place of safety and comfort for him, would be a privilege. From what she’d gleaned from him and from Art, Brodie hadn’t exactly had an easy life, but she wanted a chance to offer him security and relief.

His hum of pleasure encouraged her. “Come on,” she whispered. Hoping he’d trust her enough to let her in, she tried her best to be unthreatening in her seduction. The last thing she wanted to do was set him more on edge. “Relax for me, beau.”

The force of his arm clamping around her stole the air from her lungs and he hauled her up to join their mouths just as she wanted him to. The bitter liquor still flavored his tongue but she reveled in that taste and the broad masculinity of the man who lifted her from her feet and onto the kitchen counter. Quickly putting himself in charge, he parted her knees and dragged his teeth on the inside of her lower lip as he broke their kiss.

Art appeared in her peripheral vision, but even as Brodie turned to look at him with business written all over his face, she couldn’t stop staring up at this man who was beginning to take her over.

“We still have time,” Art said. “Tuck and I will take care of business. We’ll find out where it is.”

“Who is Tuck?” she asked, exhaling her hormonal mist to pay attention to the conversation again. “Where is he?”

“Tuck uses the alias Swift,” Art said. “He is our computer whizz, the guy who got into your computer at CI.”

“Oh,” she nodded, stroking Brodie. “Is he here?”

“No, he went back to his own lady tonight,” Art said. “He hasn’t been with her for a while and he promised her a visit.”

Perking up, she glanced at each of the men. “He has a lady?” she asked, reassured that if he had a girlfriend he had to have some redeeming qualities.

“Kadie,” Art said.

“What’s she like?”

“We’ve never met her,” Brodie said, sliding a hand up her back to grasp her neck again. “Tuck likes to keep a nice thick, clear line between Kadie and anything that could get her hurt… which is basically everything in his life that isn’t her.”

Squinting, she moistened her lips. “And she’s happy with that?” Zara asked. It took a strong woman to watch her man go off into battle regularly without any idea of where he was, what he was doing, or who he was with.

“Who knows?” Art said with a shrug. “Swift is a private guy, so I wouldn’t ask him too many questions when you meet him.”

This was a night full of surprises; at least this one wasn’t unpleasant. “When am I going to meet him?” she asked Art, but looked at Brodie.

“He’ll get back into town tomorrow,” Brodie said.

Art’s concern was increasing. “Everything depends on us finding this piece of kit.”

Her role in this situation had been to get information, so she felt compelled to do what she could to get more. “I’ll find it,” Zara said and lay across the counter to snag her purse, which was still on the opposite edge of it. Brodie took her hand to help her right herself and she began to dig in her purse.

“How are you going to do that?” Art asked her.

Pulling out her cell phone, she held it up. “I’m going to call Grant and ask him where it is.”

She started to speed dial, but Brodie plucked the phone out of her hand before she could connect the line. “Two pieces of advice,” he said, giving the phone to Art, who took it away toward the couch. “First… and this is more of a house rule… don’t ever call anyone outside the Kindred Circle from this house, you hear me? No one.”

Not used to such orders, she saw one immediate problem. “How do I know who is in the Kindred Circle?” she asked, leaning back on her hands.

“Here’s a clue,” Brodie said, gesturing between himself and Art, who was returning to them. “You’re looking at the only two members you know.”

That didn’t help because she couldn’t contact these men even if she did want to. “I don’t have either of your phone numbers.”

He didn’t exactly light up, but he swept her hair over her shoulder with the back of his hand and scrutinized her neck. “Excellent, so there will be no confusion,” Brodie said.

Ready to push boundaries, she teased to see how far he would let her get. “What if I want a pizza?”

Brodie wasn’t for playing. In fact, he did deadpan better than anyone she’d ever met. “Then you go down to the basement, get in a car, and drive to the pizza place.”

If she did spend any more time here, she would have to get used to there being a no takeout rule, which wasn’t great because she was a terrible cook. “What’s the second thing?” she asked.

Planting his hands on the counter on either side of her hips, he loomed over her. “Don’t go running to Grant every time you need to fix a problem.”

That seemed to be more subjective than the previous rule. But it was an old habit. Grant and she had worked together for five years and when she was uncertain of something or needed help, Grant was the man she called because all of her issues were CI related—her life had been dedicated to that company for half a decade.

“Ok,” she nodded. “You’re right, I… I need to start thinking of him as the enemy, don’t I?”

“He’s sure not as great as you fucking think,” Brodie grumbled.

It wouldn’t be easy for her to switch her thinking because Grant had been her boss for so long. They had spent late nights together, sat in long meetings together, brainstormed, problem-solved. Now that part of her life was over and she had to realize that Grant wasn’t the unthreatening, easy-going CEO she believed him to be.

Except she was only here because she was connected to him, because she had access. If she couldn’t use that access then Brodie would have no further use for her.

“But Grant knows where the device is and we want to know,” she said. “I don’t want to get hurt, but I have to be able to help you.”

“Damn,” Brodie mumbled then righted himself to look at Art. “Maybe we should just lock her in one of the guest rooms. It’s a shame we don’t have Zave’s custom built suite.”

Horrified to hear that they knew a person who had a custom suite obviously designed to imprison people, she wasn’t going to let her aversion to the suggestion of being locked up go unregistered. “You’re not locking me in anywhere,” she said, sitting up straight. “Why does your friend Zave have a custom built suite?”

“To lock up women,” Brodie said as if this was the most normal thing in the world.

Drawing her eyes from him, Zara chose not to ask anymore questions when she wasn’t sure she could handle further revelations. “My suggestion makes sense,” she said. “I’m not going to tell Grant that we want to know. I can be… discreet. I know about this product and I know that Sutcliffe wants to meet him at midnight tomorrow, right? So I’ll just ask leading questions. I’m here, with you, in a safe place, no one can hurt me here.”