Unforgettable (Talented Saga #6) (34 page)

I was positive the message I’d
received, the one from the Unknown Sender, was from Ernest. He’d
tried to outbid us for every Created that came up for auction,
which meant his goal was the same as ours. But why? Why did he want
the Created? And more importantly, who was he working
with?

Brain-dead people don’t just start
walking, talking, and functioning all by themselves. Someone,
someone extremely proficient, had restarted his brain. And restored
at least some of his memories. At least, enough that he recognized
me.

I knew it was a risk, a big one. But I
had to know.

“
Henri?”
It had been a long time since he and I
communicated telepathically, but he’d always had weak defenses. I
prayed that was still true. I didn’t want Catherine or her team
hearing my orders.

“
I’m here, Tal,”
Henri sent back.

“
Follow him.”

“
You don’t have to ask me
twice. I’m on it.”

I’d now succeeded in getting every
single member of my taskforce to break the rules. Yeah, I was an
awesome team leader.

WAITING FOR TALIA
and the others to make their way out of the
auction house was even worse than enduring the earlier elevator
ride. I was antsy, my fingers twitching with the need to do
something. Anything. Sitting in that damned hovercraft while Talia
was fighting and being attacked made me feel damned useless. I
hated feeling useless.

Talia’s orders to retrieve the girl
from the SUV had momentarily brightened my spirits, since having a
task kept my mind busy. But other agents were closer to the vehicle
and in a better position to grab the girl undetected. Reluctantly,
I agreed to let them handle it.

Truthfully, I was a little surprised
that nobody balked about grabbing an unconscious girl and taking
her with us. It would inevitably cause a host of problems. I wasn’t
sure who exactly this Libby chick was, or how important she was to
the Poachers, but she’d been in my vision. Her daddy, the big bad
Duke, was going to want his precious little manipulator back. On
the up side, if we could get Libby to talk, UNITED might learn a
whole lot more about the Poachers. I prayed this was true, so
Victoria wouldn’t march us off to a beheading station.

In my lap, my communicator
buzzed for what seemed like the thousandth time since the mission
began. Agent Canary, tattletale that she was, had reported Talia
for ordering the purchase of Anya. Then, she’d reported Talia’s
plan to rescue Kenly. Then she’d reported a commotion of sorts.
Victoria wanted to know what the hell was going through my
girlfriend’s head. Literally, she’d sent me the same message six
times in a row:
Erik. Look inside your
girlfriend’s head. Immediately. Tell me what the hell she is
thinking.

Swear words were rare for the
councilwoman. She didn’t like to sully her mouth with such
vulgarity. So I knew Talia had finally succeeded in pushing her to
her limits. I also knew that there was nothing I could say to make
the situation better. Much of it was entirely my fault. And I would
tell Victoria that. Take the blame for Anya, at the very least. But
explanations had to wait. Just then, all I cared about was Talia’s
immediate safety. If her cover wasn’t blown yet, it was about to
be. No way were all those unconscious guards going to go unnoticed
for long.

“
How long until they’re
out, you think?” Miles asked, working his jaw back and
forth.

The fight in the hallway where the
Poachers had been keeping Kenly was broadcast via the comm units to
every agent taking part in the mission. So it wasn’t a surprise
that he, too, had realized shit was about to escalate.

“
Five minutes, ten tops,” I
replied. “Knowing Talia, closer to five.”

Miles smiled wryly. “That girl’s a
firecracker, kid. How do you control her?”

My laugh was derisive.

“
No one controls Talia.
That’s why the council is so damn scared of her.”

“
You aren’t wrong about
that,” Miles replied.

“
It’s also why the council
needs her,” Janelle added.

Silently, I wondered whether her
usefulness would trump their fear. It had to. If not, they weren’t
going to have themselves a Created poster boy. At a minimum, I’d be
bargaining for conjugal visits in exchange for my time.

Several minutes of tense silence
passed, in which my communicator buzzed four more times. Victoria
was like a dog with a bone. As a distraction, I glanced at the
screen, just to see if her message had changed any. Maybe she’d
even drop the f-bomb—that would give Talia great satisfaction while
she twiddled her thumbs in containment.

My smile faded quickly, though, when I
realized the most recent messages were not from Victoria. All six
were lacking source identification. Which was downright odd. This
was a UNITED-issued communicator, meaning no one had the frequency
besides those within our organization. And all of those people were
programmed into the device, so any comm came with a corresponding
source name. Puzzled, I opened the most recent missive.

*
We are coming for you, Erik. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.
We see all.*

What the….

Crazy thoughts flashed through my mind
as I typed back.

*Who is this?*

When I hit send, a dispatch error
popped up on the screen. I tried again. Another error: Message
undeliverable.

“
What’s wrong?” Janelle
asked.

I looked up and found both Miles and
Janelle watching me intently.

“
Not sure. I just received
a really weird message.”

I held up the communicator so that
both agents could see the screen.

“
How does this even
happen?” I asked. “No one outside of UNITED has this frequency. And
any time an agent sends me a comm, his or her name comes up. So,
what’s going on?”

“
It’s a hacker,” Miles
said. “A good one, too. He’d have to be, to break through UNITED’s
digital protections.”

“
You mean like a Crypto?” I
asked.

Miles shrugged.

“
Could be. Not necessarily,
though. You don’t have to be Talented to be a whiz with computers.
Your stalker could be just an ordinary Joe.”

“
Yeah, I guess…,” I
replied, unconvinced.

Turning the communicator back around,
I clicked through the other messages from the unknown sender. They
were identical to the first one.

*We are coming for you,
Erik. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. We see all.*

Totally engrossed in the mystery, I
reread the words over and over again. Something about the last
part, the “We see all”, was troubling. Obviously, it was super
creepy. But it was more than just the creep factor. I felt like it
was a clue, an inside joke from the sender that I was supposed to
understand, and then be terrified by.

“
We are blown! Repeat, we
are blown. Big time. Everyone out. Now!” Talia’s screams shoved the
enigmatic messages off my radar.

“
Affirmative, Lyons. The
rest of the hostages are on their way to the safe house,” Catherine
responded. “We will double-back as reinforcements.”

“
Hurry!” Talia
grunted.

It must’ve been really bad in there.
She didn’t ask for help unless it was absolutely necessary. I
fastened my safety harness and checked my weapons, fully expecting
Miles to rev up the engine. When he didn’t, I turned to face
him.

“
Are you waiting for an
invitation?” I demanded. “Come on.”

“
She didn’t call for strike
teams,” Miles said, though his knuckles were white on the
hovercraft’s controls. He seemed as ready for this fight as I
was.

“
Are you friggin’ kidding
me? What, you need it spelled out phonetically?” I asked Miles.
Without waiting for a response, I hailed Talia on the comm unit.
“Do you need air support?”

“
What part of ‘our cover is
blown’ was unclear?” she snapped. “Yes! We need backup!”

“
Deploy strike teams now!”
Brand bellowed.

“
Is that enough, or do you
want to wait for an engraved summons?” I snapped at
Miles.

In response, Miles simply broke out in
an ear-to-ear grin.

“
I’m just playing by the
rulebook, kid.”

I was about to literally shove the
figurative book down Miles throat. Thankfully for all of us, I
didn’t have to figure out exactly how one might accomplish such a
feat. Miles had the hovercraft in the air and headed for the
auction house within seconds.

Ours was not the first craft to reach
Andrew’s Rock. Over the various comm units of people on the ground,
I heard another pilot calling out over the hover’s
loudspeaker.

“
Put down your weapons
immediately. This is an official raid.”

Through the windshield, I saw that his
words had no effect on the Poacher guards. Some of the UNITED
helicopters and hovercrafts were descending upon the expansive lawn
in the rear of the auction house, while others were circling the
manicured grass like vultures.

“
Erik? Erik! I lost her!
Please, find Kenly!”

The words were earsplitting screams
inside my head. Talia must have expended considerable effort to
bulldoze my mental barriers.

“
I will find her, Tals. But
you need to get on one of those hovers and
go.
Please, just get out of
there,”
I responded, already searching the
melee below for signs of Kenly.

“
There!” I shouted aloud.
My sudden exclamation startled Miles so much, the hovercraft dipped
sharply. “Sorry, man. Sorry. Touch down there.”

I pointed to a spot just ahead, where
Kenly and the guy, James, were dodging bullets.

“
I don’t know if I can
touch down here, kid. If this hover is blown up, we’re going to be
screwed,” Miles said, clearly unsure what to do.

“
Don’t worry about it, just
get me in as close as you can. I’ll get myself back to the safe
house,” I reassured him. Miles would be a lot more help to the
UNITED troops on the ground from up in the air, and I knew
it.

“
Comm me if you’re in a
bind, kid. I still don’t think I’ll be able to land, but I’ll…I
don’t know, do something.”

I smiled at the older agent, genuinely
appreciative for his concern.

“
Thanks, man. But really,
don’t worry about me. Just focus on your targets,” I
replied.

As Miles began our rapid descent, I
was already out of my seat and at the hover’s side exit. When the
plane was closing in on the ground, he hit the door release button.
As soon as there was just enough room for me to slide sideways
through the opening doors, I jumped down to the grass not far
below.

Kenly and James were only feet away,
but they’d stopped moving when I landed in front of them. Terror
blazed in Kenly’s brown eyes when she spotted me. I didn’t need to
be a mind reader to know the thoughts running through her head. The
last time we’d been this close to one another, I’d nearly killed
her. She had every right to be scared.

For a long moment that seemed to last
an hour, we just stood there, our gazes locked.

Just the sight of her started a slow
simmer in my blood. Talia’s description of Kenly’s actions that
night was accurate. She was more machine than human. As if her
brain had been rewired. Kenly barely recognized Talia, until she
had the knife pressed over my girlfriend’s heart. Still, whether
Kenly had been in her right mind or not would have been little
solace to me when I was standing over Talia’s grave.

But the girl standing before me now
was little more than a frightened child. This Kenly wasn’t the
monster I remembered from the Hamilton. This was the lost girl from
my visions.

And just like that, the guilt I’d felt
when viewing her swept through me once again. I was the sole reason
she was here. I told her to run. I told her to go somewhere no one
knew her. And she had. That was when the Poachers found Kenly. My
fault. It was all my fault.