Primal Mirror, page 2
“Chocolate cupcakes.” His mother’s favorite; she’d baked them at least once a week.
Later, after she was too sick, he’d baked them for her.
“Pieces of color. Tiny pieces of color on the small brown cakes.” A blink that appeared to have been forced by her watering eyes. “It hurts.” She pressed a hand to her stomach. “Oh, it hurts.” Then she made soft sounds…that were an exact mimicry of his mother’s small heart monitor signaling an emergency alert.
Remi jerked away his hand.
She stumbled, swayed.
Feeling like shit, though his face was hot, his grief tangled with anger at the intrusion into the most painful part of his past, he gripped her upper arm to stabilize her. A jolt under him before her head shifted, her eerie, beautiful eyes meeting him head-on.
At that instant, there was no lack of clarity to her, no fuzziness to the edges of her.
And no muddiness in her scent.
It was complex, and bright, and intoxicating.
“She was happy the last time she wore that watch.” Clear words, the intent in them potent. “No pain, just comfort at being with you, at lying by the window in the sun, with the forest just outside.
“She was so proud of what she’d accomplished in life. You were her greatest pride…” Gaze turning dull and unfocused, her eyes drifting away, her muscles going slack under his grip…and her scent twisting once more in that funhouse mirror.
Shaken, he released her.
She turned and walked back the way she’d come, until she stood in the same spot as when he’d first seen her. But she’d left carnage in her wake.
Bending down, his hands on his thighs, he gulped in lungfuls of air as his mind filled with memories of the mother who’d brought him up with love and heart and courage. She’d also held his feet to the fire when needed, especially during his teenage years, when he’d wanted to rage at the entire world.
“You sit your ass down, Remington, and we’ll have this out until I know what’s hurting you.” Fierce eyes of palest brown locked with his, her leopard a golden glow on the edges of her irises. “No son of mine is going to go off the rails because he’s got a fear inside him that he’s allowing to fester.”
Her strong, capable hands cupping his face, holding him in place. “You are not only your father’s son, Rem-Rem, you are also your mother’s son. Don’t you ever forget that.”
You were her greatest pride…
His throat closed up. How could a Psy know to say that? How could a Psy understand what a blow it struck to his weathered but never-forgotten grief to know that his mother had died proud of the man he’d become?
In the sun, in her favorite chair, in the little cottage he’d built for her when she got too tired and sick to get up to her aerie. She’d wanted to die at home, not in the antiseptic environs of a hospital. “I’m dying anyway, baby boy.” A husky whisper of memory. “I’d rather spend my last days surrounded by the green that’s always fed my wild heart.”
So he’d brought her home, and when she’d asked, he’d carried her outside, into the trees. But she’d been content to spend most days in her favorite armchair, next to an open window from where she could watch the world while the sun caressed her face.
She’d shifted in that sunlight one last time right before the end: a leopard who was too thin, whose bones stuck out against her pelt. But who’d sighed in contentment as her eyes closed, her head placed on her forelegs as if she was just taking a lazy afternoon nap. His last memory of his mother, sunbeams dancing over the black and gold of her.
…lying by the window in the sun…
How could this strange Psy with the broken scent know any of that?
It took effort for him to rise to his full height, even more effort for him to retract his claws into his body. His leopard was right at the forefront of his mind, and he knew his eyes hadn’t yet returned to their human shade.
He had to get that under control if he was going to talk to the group. Because he was certain the woman with the unnerving presence that disturbed both man and leopard on a fundamental level hadn’t said a thing to them about him, telepathically or otherwise. They remained in the exact same positions, while she stood there rocking back and forth, her arms hugging her curvy body.
It was several minutes later that he emerged out of the forest, his stride easy and his expression friendly. He’d moved so that he arrived from a different direction to where the woman had entered the trees. It had also been long enough since then that the others shouldn’t connect the two incidents.
The entire group froze—and two of the men did so in a way that told him they had tactical training. He lifted a hand, keeping it casual and lazy through sheer effort of will. “Remi, your neighbor.”
When the young woman locked her gaze with his again, his gut tensed.
The brunette crossed over to him even as the blue-eyed one blinked, then looked away.
“Good morning.” The greeting was flat, but the brunette came close enough that they could talk without strain—while her guards followed, two besuited shadows. The third man shifted closer to the woman who’d told Remi things she had no way of knowing.
“I am Charisma Wai, executive personal assistant to Auden Scott”—a nod toward the silent younger woman—“the new owner of this land.”
Chapter 2
“Remi Denier quietly bought up a piece of land in the Smokies and set up a territory with a bunch of loners he met while roaming. Just heard he’s sent out the call for others to join the pack.”
“So he finally accepted it? I knew he was meant to be an alpha the first time I ran across him—and he was determined to break his neck on a racetrack at the time.”
“I’ve had my eye on him for around the same amount of time. Figured I might one day have a problem on my hands—Remi’s too dominant to be prowling around without a pack.”
“You think he’s willing to listen to advice that might make the entire thing easier?”
“I’m going to make the offer. But I like what I’m seeing so far—I don’t think it’s chance that he bought land right up against the border of a fallow territory under trust control.”
“Smart. He holds that ragtag pack together for a full year, and he’s in position to apply for a land grant. I don’t like cats as a rule, but yeah, I hope he makes it.”
“I mean, if we can put up with a bunch of mangy wolves, anything’s possible.”
—Conversation between Lucas Hunter: alpha, DarkRiver leopards and Hawke Snow: alpha, SnowDancer wolves (27 January 2080)
REMI HAD NEVER heard of Auden, but he did know the last name Scott. Few years back, a couple with that name had been on the comm channels all the time as representatives of the now-defunct Psy Council.
The husband had been big, with skin the hue of mahogany and a military bearing, his face carved of aristocratic lines that shouted breeding. His wife, slender and fine-boned with cool white skin and ice-blue eyes, had carried the same air of contempt. Oh, they’d been clever about acting the perfect, refined Councilors, but Remi had always had a good bullshit detector.
Henry and Shoshanna Scott, that was it.
The skin and eye coloring had altered in Auden, become more intense on both fronts, but no doubt about it, those two had to be her parents. Her height was close to her mother’s, but her face held her father’s aristocratic bones on a feminine frame.
“Well now.” Remi folded his arms, and added a kick of charm to his smile, even though he knew it was wasted on most Psy. But no harm in trying. “I’ve been attempting to get in touch with the owner of this land for quite a while. All trails led to dead ends. You mind telling me how Ms. Scott managed to track them down?”
Auden Scott remained silent, her unseeing gaze on the trees.
Her assistant could’ve told him it was none of his business, and she’d have been right. Instead, she said, “Auden inherited it from her father. The records were lost after his passing—and it appears from the unauthorized structure on the land that someone made use of that oversight. Do you have any knowledge of the people who trespassed here?”
Remi’s leopard growled within, not particularly interested in talking to this woman whose scent was off, too, but not like Auden’s. Charisma’s had that metallic undertone present in the scents of a percentage of Psy.
It wasn’t as bad as before the empaths had returned to the PsyNet, but it was still bad enough. Changelings who’d had more contact with Psy than Remi had told him that the metallic edge came from those who had no real emotion in them, their growth permanently stunted by the program called Silence that had ruled Psy lives until the very recent past.
The three men carried a faint glimmer of the same scent.
Auden Scott, this woman who’d just torn him to pieces, shifted on her heel.
His cat drew in another breath, snarled. What the fuck was that in her scent? Some kind of sedative? He’d smelled nothing medicinal when close to her, and he could’ve sworn that Psy didn’t deal much with those types of drugs—multiple Arrows had told him it messed with their psychic abilities.
Forcing his attention off her, he answered Charisma Wai’s question. “Paramilitary-type unit,” he said, wondering if she was as clueless as she was making herself out to be.
Everyone knew what had happened to Councilor Henry Scott—he’d picked a fight with the biggest wolf pack in the country and lost. Man had mingled with exactly the type of people who’d abducted, then brutally operated on Aden and Zaira. The two would’ve died if Remi hadn’t been prowling around with the intent to spy on the activity up here; next thing he knew, he had two bleeding Arrows in his vehicle. “Whole unit cleared out one day roughly a year and a half ago and haven’t been back since.”
Aden had told him the squad was certain the unit was linked to a group called the Consortium. “They’ve gone quiet of late,” he’d said more recently, while the two of them were scaling a sheer rock face. “Kaleb mentioned to me that while he’s never been able to prove it, he’s always suspected Shoshanna of being part of the Consortium, maybe even the central figure.”
So whichever way you sliced it, the Scotts had been involved in all kinds of deadly games. They were likely to have been in this up to their necks.
“I see.” Charisma Wai made a note in the thin computronic organizer in her hand. “Do you have any further details?”
“Nope.” Remi glanced once again at Auden Scott. “Funny.”
Auden focused on him, staring in an unblinking way that his leopard would’ve read as a challenge at any other time. Today, he was disturbed by that stare—because he was near certain she wasn’t seeing him at all, her gaze directed at some sight beyond his senses.
“What is funny?” Charisma Wai asked after a glance at her boss.
Who blinked several times before her gaze turned fuzzy once more, the abnormal tones back in her scent.
A growl threatened to rumble inside Remi’s chest; he fought it back because Psy would take it as a threat. “Losing track of a whole piece of land.”
“Councilor Scott’s passing was unexpected.” A smile so false that it looked like a skeletal rictus to his eyes. “And, to be quite frank, he was wealthy on a level you can’t hope to understand. This little tract of land was but an afterthought.”
“Oh, ouch.” Remi’s grin was real. “That put me in my place.”
“No offense was intended.”
“Rich people things, huh?” Remi lifted one shoulder in an easy shrug to take any sting out of his words. “So, you interested in selling?”
Charisma Wai glanced down at the organizer. “We’re in the preliminary inspection process, so I can’t promise anything, but yes, there is a possibility the parcel will be up for sale.”
Well, that he hadn’t expected. And while he wanted to talk to Auden Scott, this was more important—it was pack business, was part of his duty as alpha of RainFire. That duty came first.
No one had ever had to tell him that. He’d known from day one.
“I’d appreciate a heads-up if you do decide to put it on the market.” RainFire wasn’t rich, far from it, but this particular parcel was so isolated and remote that it was unlikely there’d be other takers. The pack might be able to negotiate their way to it by dint of being the only interested party.
“Of course. Do you have a comm code I can contact you on?”
Remi recited it, then directed his next question to Auden. “You have any idea why your father bought this land in the first place, Ms. Scott?” he asked, to see if he could get a response out of her. “And why he hid it under so many shell corporations and false identities?”
Auden Scott ignored him.
Her mouthpiece graced him with that nauseatingly fake smile once again. “The Councilor’s records indicate he purchased it when he was young,” she told him. “He might’ve been building a property portfolio before realizing this region wasn’t the most valuable in terms of future capital value. As for the rest…he was a Councilor.”
Remi nodded. Even though she’d given him nothing solid, what she had said could be the actual truth. Psy generally didn’t make any attempt to own property in remote areas—unless of course, they were a Councilor up to nefarious business. Nice to have a secret getaway where you could torture prisoners without anyone hearing them scream. Also made sense that he’d structured the ownership so it couldn’t be traced back to him unless he allowed it.
Until, of course, an upstart pack set up shop here and ruined the whole operation.
“You have official proof of ownership?” he said. “I don’t want to be a stupid changeling taking you at your word.” Every changeling in the world knew that Psy like Charisma Wai thought themselves better than humans or changelings.
Humans were considered too weak, changelings too feral.
The executive assistant showed him the deed on her organizer screen. Looked official, with the transfer to Auden Scott noted as occurring three weeks earlier. If it was legit, then whoever was settling Henry’s estate had lost track of this land for some time.
“I’ll send you a copy at your comm code so you can verify it with the relevant authorities,” Ms. Wai said. “I understand your wariness given the rogue military unit you mentioned.”
Sometimes, the whole logic-is-best thing Silent Psy had going on actually worked to make them straightforward. Not often enough to balance out the other crap they pulled, but it was a small positive.
It could, however, also be used as a shield.
“Appreciate that,” he said aloud. “You know where the borders are? I don’t want any of your people startling my sentinels into aggressive behavior.” His senior people were far too smart to attack without thought, but Remi needed Wai to see them as a threat, so neither she—nor anyone else in the Scott camp—would start getting any ideas.
Another tap at her organizer before she flipped it so he could see the map on the screen. The boundaries glowed red. “Does this align with your understanding?”
“Looks good,” he said after a thorough scan. “My people have become used to running through here while it was uninhabited—I’ll tell them to back off, stay within our boundaries.”
“That would be appreciated.” Another smile that put him in mind of a cobra changeling he’d met—man’s blood really had run cold. Good thing cobra changelings were so rare that no one else he knew had ever come across one. “I wouldn’t wish our security to be startled into aggressive behavior.”
He gave her a small smile. “Got it.” After another glance at Auden Scott, who hadn’t spoken a single word to anyone the entire time, he melted back into the trees.
But he didn’t go far—just far enough that there was no way they could see him. It was possible the security team was doing telepathic scans, but his Arrow friends had told him that most security specialists didn’t bother with the draining task unless they were in a high-risk situation.
“Arrows do it as a matter of course,” a senior member of the squad had said, “but Arrows have more psychic power than ninety-nine percent of people.”
As it was, Remi could make things even harder for them.
Stripping in the shadow of the trees, he cached his clothes on a lower branch that wasn’t too wet from the rainstorm, then shifted. His body broke into a million pinpricks of light before coalescing into the leopard that was his other form. The change took a heartbeat, the agony and the ecstasy of it singing through his bones.
It was pain beyond the imaginable, and it was pleasure untold.
Shaking his body to settle his new skin in place, he jumped up onto the trunk with muscular feline grace before making his way to a thick upper branch from where he could watch his new neighbors even if they were once again out of hearing range. His tail twitched lazily, but there was nothing lazy about his eyes or his mind. A mind that Charisma Wai and her security goons could no longer spot—it was Zaira who’d told him that.
Lethal assassin, Aden’s lover, and the unexpected heart of the place the squad had made their home, she’d said, “You have a shield in either form, but I’ve noticed that once in animal form, your shield doesn’t feel like a shield. I can only sense changelings in animal form because I know so many of you. To most telepaths, you’d read as an animal.”
That suited Remi just fine.
So he wasn’t prepared for Auden Scott to do it again: jerk her head in his exact direction and stare at the trees as if she could see through the wall of dark green to the shadowed golden pelt of the creature that stalked her little group…as if she felt the same primal compulsion that had driven Remi to keep trying to get a response from her, find out the truth of her.
