 
MIRIYA

A Double Helix Novella

Jade Kerrion

Copyright Jade Kerrion 2014

Smashwords Edition

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MIRIYA

Thirty years into the First Genetic Revolution, society's tolerance for human derivatives is wearing thin. Clones and in vitros are regarded with suspicion, and mutants with resentment. Yet in spite of the hostile environment, some alpha telepaths—like Miriya Templeton—have thrived.

Her luck is running out.

Destiny has set her life on a collision course with Danyael Sabre, the alpha empath who can kill with a touch. Whether he becomes friend or foe, whether he and she live or die, will depend on the choices she makes. On her decisions hang the outcomes of the Second Genetic Revolution.

Miriya, however, does not believe in destiny, nor want any part of the revolution.

It is up to the enforcer, Jake Hansen, to convince her otherwise, and he is running out of time.

~*~

Get a free copy of the award-winning Perfection Unleashed (Double Helix #1).

_Click here to get started:_ http://www.doublehelixbooks.com
CHAPTER ONE

"She will win the battle."

In his fifth-floor office in the Mutant Affairs Council headquarters, Alex Saunders dragged his attention away from the view of the Potomac winding lazily through Alexandria, and looked at the young woman standing in front of his desk. He searched her pale face, hoping to catch a glimpse of humor or irony following her startling proclamation. Unfortunately, he saw neither.

Stifling a sigh, he waved his hand at the leather chair across from his desk. "Have a seat."

Erin Bryne arched an eyebrow. "You're stalling, Alex." The Irish lilt in her voice lent the derisive statement a musical quality.

_Right_. His lips twitched. Erin was an alpha precognitive, and her track record was flawless. She would know, of course. "Please, sit anyway. Can we talk about this?"

With an impatient gesture, she shook her auburn hair back from her face before leaning over his desk and intruding into his personal space. "What's to discuss? You'll need her before the year is out."

"You know we don't accept alpha mutants as enforcers without clearing all the administrative hurdles—psychological evaluations, security clearances, the whole shebang." He waved a hand at the computer terminal. "It's March. It'll take twelve months to get the paperwork done."

"You'll need her before the end of the year."

"And that's assuming she qualifies—"

_"Before_ the end of the year, Alex."

"And assuming she'd even want to join the enforcers."

Erin tilted her head. Her green eyes gleamed. "I hope you're persuasive, then."

Alex shook his head. "You're going to have to give me something to stand on. I need to know more about this battle you're talking about. When, where, against whom—"

"I have no other information for you. You know my visions are rarely detailed, but I have never been wrong."

"And you saw her at this battle?"

Erin hesitated for a moment before taking her seat. She smoothed her hunter green dress and crossed her legs. "No, I didn't."

"Erin—"

"It's...hard to explain. She's not visible, but her presence is palpable. You cannot win this fight without her."

"And what are the consequences of losing it?"

Erin smiled faintly. "It is not a fight you can afford to lose."

Alex sighed again. He leaned forward and swiped his finger across the dark screen of his network terminal. It flashed and brought up her records. He studied them once more, and arrived at the same conclusion. "She's not enforcer material."

"It doesn't matter."

He glared at Erin. "It _does_ matter. Enforcers are entrusted with the burden of policing rogue mutants. We need people who aren't lawbreakers themselves."

"What law has she broken?"

"Oh, where do I start? Mental coercion, resulting in unlawful possession of highly valuable articles, including jewelry, sports cars, apartments—"

Erin shrugged. "Unlawful? Isn't that rather excessive, Alex? I'm sure she did not receive anything the giver wasn't delighted to give her."

Alex went on as if he had not heard. "Unlawful entry—"

"Come now. Sneaking onto college campuses and sitting in classes is hardly a criminal offense. It's not as if she used her telepathic powers to pick the exam answers out of the professors' heads."

"Which brings us to the issue of insider trading."

"Technically, it's not insider trading."

"She _stole_ the information out of someone else's head and used it to make it big on the stock market."

Erin smiled. "And far more reliably than most precognitives who dabble in the stock market. If she's in as much trouble as you say, why haven't you brought her in?"

"We have other things on our plate."

The young woman's smile widened. "That's because, in the grand scheme of things, she's not even a public nuisance, let alone a civil or criminal threat. Come on, Alex. Her talents or her track record isn't an issue. We both know your biggest problem will be convincing her to leave her high-flying, carefree life to join the stodgy ranks of enforcers."

Alex might have bristled at the insult if it were not true. He waved a hand, dismissing Erin. "I'll think about it."

"As you wish. Just keep in mind that you're running out of time." She rose gracefully and walked to the door. Pausing at the threshold, she threw a glance over her shoulder. "Oh, Alex, I did forget to mention something about the pivotal battle in my visions. I did see one face, just one face that I recognized."

Alex's eyebrows drew together. "Who?"

"Danyael Sabre."

Alex paled.

Erin turned her back on him and walked away, closing the door behind her.

_Damn it._ Alex's hands clenched into fists. His gaze drifted to the window, but he saw nothing of the view beyond the glass. Danyael Sabre—an alpha empath who could heal or kill with a touch—was a walking train wreck, the shattered pieces of his emotional psyche held together by little more than willpower and contained within exquisitely built psychic shields.

If Danyael's façade of control cracked, if his psychic shields collapsed, the fallout would be mass suicide, the emotional equivalent of a nuclear bomb.

Alex could not afford to let that happen. The tenuous, hard-won respect that mutants received in a world transformed by the Genetic Revolution would not survive Danyael's emotional breakdown.

What could he do?

Imprison Danyael in a windowless cell for the rest of his life, his deadly empathic powers contained within four walls?

Alex refused to believe it was his only option. He both liked and trusted Danyael. Preemptive imprisonment was an injustice to the alpha empath who had spent years of his life carving out a semblance of normality for himself. Danyael was a model citizen. A doctor by training, his skill was desperately needed by the residents of Brooklyn, New York, where he worked in a government-sponsored free clinic. Furthermore, Danyael always played by the restrictive rules imposed on alpha mutants; he had never balked at the "big brother" oversight of the Mutant Affairs Council.

So far.

It left Alex Saunders, director general of the Mutant Affairs Council, only one choice whether he intended to save Danyael, or save the world from Danyael.

He returned his attention to the profile of the woman on his screen. A bitter half-smile twisted his lips. "Welcome to the ranks of the enforcers, Miriya Templeton."

Whether you want to or not.
CHAPTER TWO

When the first scalding mouthful of coffee slid down her throat, Miriya Templeton was still not entirely sure she was fully awake. She wrapped her fingers around the mug to warm them as she stared blearily at the crowd bustling past the coffee shop in Harvard Square.

She allowed her mind to drift, to listen to the quiet flutter of passing thoughts preoccupied with daily toil—uncompleted homework, an upcoming exam, approaching work deadlines, conflicting job schedules, unpaid rent, a dirty kitchen, a traitorous girlfriend, an unreliable babysitter, a failing marriage, gossipy roommates, an overdue oil change, and inevitably, the general crappiness of the weather.

Miriya sighed. It just went to show that telepathic eavesdropping rarely paid off. The thoughts of others were, as a rule, boring, and worse, depressing. Occasionally, she picked up a gem, but she had to hunt for it, usually by sitting in graduate-level classes—undergraduates were almost always more preoccupied with finding the next party than delving into the secrets of the universe—or, when she had the time to make her way down to D.C., wandering the halls of Congress and listening to the thoughts of members of the House Committee of Ways and Means.

The last tip she picked up had made her several hundred thousand dollars richer. It paid, in cash, for her Cambridge condominium as well as her sporty red coupe, and freed her from the burden of keeping men company—men whose only two claims for her attention were wealth and a weak mind. Her telepathic capabilities had kept those dates short and devoid of sex while rich, literally, in outcomes.

Ever since she found a way to keep her income flowing, she no longer had to trouble herself with dull dates and the occasional irate wife or girlfriend, leaving her an abundance of time to do precisely nothing.

Miriya stared at her untouched croissant. Now that she had everything she needed, she was no longer certain what she wanted.

Well, until she figured it out, she had her routine to keep her busy. She reached for the backpack nestled at her feet and pulled out her electronic tablet to check the class schedules for the day. Miriya glanced at her watch. Classics 407: Violence and Sacrifice in Ancient Greece sounded decidedly irrelevant, which made for perfect cocktail-party-chatter material. The class started at 11 a.m. She would have just enough time to make it across the Harvard campus.

She poured her remaining coffee into the thermos flask, slid her backpack over her shoulders, and started on her trek to the next class.

Something brushed against her mind—an almost tangible touch. She jerked to a stop and looked sharply over her shoulder. The crowd flowed around her, the endless babble of their inane thoughts fading into white noise as she tried to zero in on the sensation of another mind, as honed as her own.

Elusive, it remained out of reach—a hint of a shadow rather than actual darkness. Had she only imagined it?

Frowning, she pushed to a brisk walk. Her eyes stayed focus on the path ahead, but her mind swept out. Once or twice, she brushed against that _something,_ but each time, it retreated.

She threw out a thought. _Quit playing with me._

She could have sworn she heard a chuckle—a warm male voice, rich with good humor rather than malice.

It did not say anything else.

Her ratty sweatshirt and faded denim jeans helped her blend into the ranks of shabbily dressed graduate students as she walked into the classics class and took a seat at the back of the room. With an affected air of boredom, she pulled her computer notebook from her backpack and opened it, ostensibly to take notes.

In fact, her notebook provided a barrier, more psychological than physical, but it helped discourage the curiosity and interest of others and saved her from the trouble of exerting her telepathic powers to change minds.

On her part, Miriya tried not to stand out. She had pulled her blond hair into a messy ponytail and kept her makeup to a minimum. At twenty-three, she looked like a perfectly ordinary graduate student.

Except that someone apparently knew she was not.

The professor, an elderly gentleman with a thick French accent, scanned the room. His eyes lingered briefly on Miriya. Confusion furrowed his brow.

_I've always been here,_ Miriya prompted. _You've seen me before._

A faint shrug lifted the professor's shoulders. His attention moved on.

Miriya did not release her contact with the professor's mind. If that _presence_ had followed her into the class, surely the professor would notice it too. Only once did the professor falter in his appraisal of the students in his class. His hesitation lasted only for a moment. Something flickered in his mind, perhaps a telepathic prompt, though not from her.

Miriya traced the professor's gaze to a young man, skinny and bespectacled, wearing a crimson Harvard sweater that, now that Miriya was paying attention, seemed brand new. His prominent Adam's apple bobbed in his scrawny throat, but he appeared at ease and otherwise preoccupied with his electronic tablet.

He did not look dangerous, but then again, neither did she.

Carefully, she reached out with her mind.

Instead of the sensation of wading through Jell-O—there was, unfortunately, no elegant way of describing the sensation of connecting with an unshielded mind—her mind touched a rock-solid surface, rough-hewn like cavern walls, impenetrable.

Miriya sucked in a deep breath.

He was a telepath, and a strong one too.

She closed her computer and was about to shove it into her backpack when she heard his voice. _Aww, don't run away. You picked this class. The least you could do is have the spine to sit through his boring lecture._

Boring?

Why couldn't you choose something else, like Art in Pornography or something along those lines?

You must have mistaken Harvard University for the indie art studio around the corner.

He chortled. _Possibly, yes._

He fell silent when the professor began his lecture. Miriya tried to focus, but it was difficult to drag her attention away from the precise and honed mind just several feet away from her.

She was surrounded by intelligent, even brilliant people, but psychic ability allowed the mind to play in an entirely different dimension, inaccessible by most.

Despite the Genetic Revolution that transformed the world nearly thirty years prior, change and acceptance had been slow in coming. Psychic-level mutations were rare; _powerful_ psychic-level mutations even more so. As a result, alpha mutants were regarded with a great deal of wariness, even fear, and subject to a significant amount of regulation and monitoring from the Mutant Affairs Council.

Miriya had absolutely no intention of getting sucked into that hellhole.

The young man's voice cut into her thoughts. _Unreal. He actually believes the crap he's spouting, about the similarities between Dionysus and Jesus._

To her shame, Miriya realized that _he_ had been paying attention to the lecture and she had not. She fumbled for a response. _It's...uh...the symbolism of it._

_No one should have to stretch the truth_ that _far to make the symbolism work._

Symbolism is art, after all. I would have thought you'd be into it.

He laughed. _Art is supposed to stimulate the senses. I still think that the Art in Pornography class would have been more—_

You said stimulating, not titillating.

Hey, if it can be both, why not?

Miriya did not reply, even though he did make her laugh. She did, however, spare him a quick glance. He continued to stare studiously at his tablet, but the corners of his mouth tugged into a faint smile.

Miriya drew in an unsteady breath of air, but her racing heartbeat refused to settle down. The psychic connection was intoxicating. It was more than the conversation; she had other stimulating—at that word, her lips twitched in an effort to suppress a smile—verbal conversations with her Harvard and MIT classmates too. The mental touch made all the difference, a deeper and far more intimate level of connection than most people ever understood or enjoyed. It offered her glimpses into the workings of a person's mind, and insight behind the facades and mirrors that frequently obscured true personality.

When the mind touched back, the connection was electric.

Rarely had she enjoyed two-way psychic intimacy. She was much too skittish for it. Besides, most of the people capable of it were alpha mutants, usually telepaths, and a great majority of them worked for the government.

A shiver twitched down her spine. Her fondness for the government could be rated somewhere between a colonoscopy and a rectal exam.

Miriya had few doubts as to whom he worked for. She would have to put some space, physical and mental, between her and that man. She did not know if her psychic shields were any more formidable than his were. They were likely far more crude, but they protected her from direct telepathic manipulation.

As soon as the class ended, she slipped her computer into her backpack and walked out of the classroom. He made no apparent move to follow her, but Miriya was not taking any chances. The corridors were packed with students, but the crowds cleared as she stepped outside. A brisk breeze tugged at her ponytail as the narrow confines of the buildings opened into wide grassy quadrangles. From late spring through early fall, the lush lawns served as a central gathering place, where students playing Frisbee tried not to trip over others lounging on the grass. The quads were also channels of transportation, their crisscrossing paths connecting the buildings around the perimeter.

Miriya's pace was quick, though no faster than that of the other students around her, scurrying to make it to their next class on time or to grab lunch at the student union before all the tables were taken. She returned to her condominium complex, two blocks away from Harvard, but instead of taking the elevator to the twenty-fifth floor, she went to the garage in the basement.

She dug her car keys out of her pocket and pressed on the remote control. Her firecracker red Audi coupe beeped. Her heartbeat was still racing faster than normal and her pulse was erratic, but her hand was steady on the wheel as she accelerated out of the garage and headed toward Boston.

Physical distance would help steady her nerves, as would comfort food.

Bistro Du Midi was crowded on a Friday afternoon, but a telepathic prompt secured her a prime spot near the unlit fireplace. She studied the menu delivered by Fred, a waiter whose steady smile and charming patter belied his emotional heartbreak over a lost custody battle. Miriya stifled a sigh. _We hide so much pain behind our smiles._ She looked up at him. "I'll have the shellfish bouillabaisse."

"Very good. And wine with your meal?"

"Isn't it a little too early for wine?"

His smile flashed. "It's five o'clock somewhere in the world."

"A Riesling, not too sweet."

"I have just the perfect one for you. I'll be right back with your bread basket."

Miriya stared at his retreating back. He seemed like a sweet man, and from the fractured slideshow of his memories, his wife was a first-class bitch. Miriya did not know which was worse—not knowing others' thoughts and their inevitable heartaches, or not being able to do anything about it.

_Beep beep!_ The now-familiar male voice broke into her thoughts.

Miriya jolted upright. _You!_

Why did you skedaddle? I'm sitting in a philosophy class now. You are missing a stimulating discussion on the differences between happiness and joy.

She could not help responding in a similarly humorous vein. _Stimulating or titillating?_

He chuckled. _I swear I am falling in love with you._

Your standards are quite dismal. You don't even know my name.

Of course, I do, Maria Durand, or do you prefer Miriya Templeton these days?

She froze. _I..._ Even her mental voice quavered. _I don't go by that name anymore._

Of course not. Maria Durand was something of a scoundrel, even by the low standards of the Louisiana bayou where she came from. Miriya Templeton, on the other hand—

You didn't pull that information out of my head. You're working for the government, aren't you? What kind of files do they have on me?

Wouldn't you like to know?

Why did they send you?

To offer you a job.

Miriya snorted. _I don't need a job, and even if I did need one, I wouldn't work for a horde of lying and abusive monsters, who cower behind their taxpayer-sponsored jobs—_

Aww, come on now. Horde is a little strong. I grant there are a few bad eggs in the carton, but we're not all awful. How about a tiny few?

Tiny would be more appropriate for the size of their—

_Now that's just cruel._ His mental voice caught on a chuckle. _And to be fair, you haven't seen all of our—_

What do you want, whatever-your-name-is?

Jake Hansen, at your service, ma'am. Alpha telepath and telekinetic. I'm an enforcer with the Mutant Affairs Council. Like I said, I'm just here to offer you a job.

The aw-shucks country boy routine isn't going to work on me.

Technically, I'm from Colorado, which means I'm not a country boy.

What was it about his breezy conversation that made her want to keep talking to him when she knew she should be cutting it off? _I told you, I don't need a job._

His tone altered, became serious. _The Mutant Affairs Council knows what you've been up to, Miriya. It wouldn't be too hard to bring forward charges of illegal psychic manipulation—_

Miriya's chin tilted up, a physical reaction to a mental conversation. _How would that be any different from what the telepaths in the council do?_

_That's precisely the point, Miriya. They're_ with _the council. They're acting on behalf of the council._

Doing what?

Jake hesitated for an instant. When he spoke again, there was laughter in his voice. _Wouldn't you like to know?_
CHAPTER THREE

Curiosity killed the cat.

Fortunately, Miriya reminded herself, she was _not_ a cat.

She was an alpha telepath, an adult of sound mind, financially secure, content with life.

None of which served to explain what she was doing on a flight to New Orleans. She glanced at the skinny man seated beside her and shook her head. "You realize that Mardi Gras is the worst possible time to visit New Orleans."

Jake grinned and pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. "It just sounds like one big party."

"A party like you've never seen." Miriya allowed her thoughts to drift, the memories to return. Her mind reached out and brushed against Jake's, against the now-familiar rough surface of his psychic shields.

She sensed it when his defenses eased. She too relaxed her psychic shields, allowing her memories to seep seamlessly from her mind to his. Streets so tightly packed with half-naked, sweaty people that breathing became a chore. The distinctive scent of alcohol mixed with human waste; the cloying smell of vomit no amount of water could wash down the clogged drains. Screaming people, reeling drunks, flashing breasts—

_Wait,_ Jake protested. _Not so fast. I liked that part._

_You would._ Her psychic shields snapped back down around her mind. _Pervert._

Not fair. I'm just a man with normal needs.

That statement, she reflected ironically, was true. Her telepathic powers had manifested in her early teens, unfortunately right around puberty when the minds of the boys around her seemed obsessed with female body parts.

It was one thing to respond to a verbal insult or an unwelcome touch. It was another to react to thoughts, especially when they were idle wishes and juvenile speculation. Still, for a girl—for she had been a girl then—accustomed to standing up for herself, with fists, if necessary, her teenage years had been especially difficult.

Her grades plunged. When they hit rock bottom with an F in art—the first and only F ever given out for an art class in the history of St. Augustine High School—she called it quits and ran away from home.

Miriya fared better than most sixteen-year-old runaways. Her telepathic powers of persuasion guaranteed free food and lodging. As she honed her craft, her tastes in men improved to those with an abundance of resources to spare on a pretty, young girl. She legally changed her name and dropped the Cajun accent. The expensive meals, designer clothing, jewelry, cars, and apartments soon followed, and all for the pleasure of her company, sexual favors not necessary.

Her final patron, Charles Brandon, was one of those rare Renaissance men—an intellectual, a prominent businessman, and a philanthropist. Together, Charles and Miriya had enjoyed fine meals in Michelin-starred restaurants, which were often preceded by visits to art galleries, museums, or lectures and discussions with prominent experts in economics, social sciences, or physical sciences. Charles awoke her hunger for knowledge and returned her to the path she had abandoned when she dropped out of school.

Cambridge and Boston, with their abundance of excellent universities, offered sufficient intellectual diversions to keep her occupied year round. One day, when wandering through Harvard's hallowed halls, Miriya had chanced upon a stray thought. A Fortune 500 corporation was negotiating in secret an acquisition of a promising technology start-up.

Miriya promptly invested in the start-up. Three months later, with only minimal reluctance, she reported to the IRS a return of 532 percent. Her telepathic abilities soon yielded additional investment ideas, though some of the best tips she found while wandering the halls of Congress, the fertile mixing ground of wealthy corporations and crooked politicians.

Her financial concerns vanished soon thereafter. Independently wealthy and with only a twinge of regret, she had released Charles. He went on to find happiness in the arms of a pretty socialite. For a year since, Miriya had enjoyed a life free from the burden of friendships and relationships, too busy to be lonely.

Besides, a telepath was never really alone. She had too many voices in her head. Not even the privacy of her condominium offered the silence she craved. She had learned how to tune the endless barrage of other people's thoughts down to white noise, but after a while, even white noise could become intolerable.

She had resigned herself to an eternal headache.

Jake's hand slipped over hers, tightening quickly enough to keep her from instinctively jerking her hand out of his grasp. His touch was light enough that she could have succeeded if she tried, but she did not. "It's not all bad," he assured her.

"What isn't?"

"Being different."

She affected a casual shrug. "I don't think I could have gotten this far by being normal."

Jake chuckled. "I think you underestimate yourself, and just how far some otherwise-normal people get in life. Still, being different offers different opportunities, demands different responsibilities. You'd never have gotten invited along on this trip if you were normal."

"So, what are you expecting from this trip, beyond your standard Mardi Gras revelry, drunkenness, and licentiousness?"

"Licentiousness? Wow, I haven't heard that word since I last read the Old Testament years ago."

"I took a class in biblical archeology three months ago. The professor was exceedingly fond of quoting scripture." _So, what will we be doing in New Orleans?_

Investigating the Mistick Krewe of Comus.

What in heaven's name for?

Oh, good. I was worried that your first question was going to be, "Who-da-what-da?"

You're a country boy to the core of your being, Jake.

He offered her a good-natured shrug. "We are who we are. Tiger. Stripes. All that sort of thing." _So, the krewe. What do you know about them?_

Not much more than any native New Orleanian knows. The Mistick Krewe of Comus is not your run-of-the-mill parade organizer. They're more like a secret society. I don't think they organize parades anymore, not since the city council demanded to know the membership rolls of any krewe that wanted parade permits. Antidiscrimination. All that crap.

You don't believe in it?

In what?

Antidiscrimination.

Miriya snorted. _I'll believe in it when it starts working. Anyway, the krewe still runs a Mardi Gras ball, supposedly. It's believed to be an incredibly elaborate affair, invitation-only. Everyone wears a mask, of course._

Which provides no defense against a telepath.

She frowned. Jake's matter-of-fact statement confirmed that his aw-shucks demeanor did nothing to dull his powerful edge as an alpha telepath. _What did you want with the Mistick Krewe?_

For several years, the Mutant Affairs Council has tracked high levels of psychic activity in New Orleans, especially around Mardi Gras. The abundance of charlatans—magicians and fortunetellers—makes it easy for second-rate telepaths and telekinetics to disappear into the crowd, so to speak, and defraud the public.

_Defraud?_ Miriya's eyebrows drew together. _Fortune-telling is a game, Jake. Everyone knows it. No harm, no foul._

Not if people get hurt or when they disappear.

What?

Much of the psychic activity appears centered around the Mistick Krewe headquarters. Last week, in anticipation of Mardi Gras, the council sent in one of its undercover agents to investigate, but we haven't heard from him in almost five days. He's the reliable sort, so we're certain something's seriously wrong.

So the council is sending you in to find him?

Jake shook his head. _The council is sending me in to identify the source and reason for the psychic hyperactivity. If I find our agent along the way, that's a nice plus, but that's not why I'm here._

That's a bit hard-hearted, isn't it? It appears that working for the council is an occupational hazard. It sucks when you can't even count on your boss to save your ass.

Jake disagreed. _The council takes care of its own. It's why you're here, after all._

I beg your pardon.

We need you to find our agent.

Miriya's scowl furrowed her brow. _Why me?_

Because you can find him. You know his mind intimately.

What?

Jake looked at her. His Adam's apple bobbed in his throat as he swallowed hard. _I'm sorry, Miriya. It's Charles Brandon. He was working on behalf of the council when he vanished in New Orleans five days ago._
CHAPTER FOUR

Miriya's jaw dropped. "But Charles isn't a mutant!"

Jake cast a pained glance around the airplane. "Say that louder, will you? I don't think they heard you all the way in the cockpit."

She grabbed his wrist, her fingernails digging into his flesh until he winced. She lowered her voice to a whisper, but it was no less angry. "Charles is not a mutant."

"Never said he was," Jake conceded.

"So why the hell was he working for the Mutant Affairs Council?"

"Come on, Miriya. Not every person who works for the U.S. Military wears a uniform or goes to war. Likewise, not every person who works for the Mutant Affairs Council is a mutant."

"And Charles? How did he get sucked into this madness?"

The lines around Jake's mouth tightened to a frown. "We recruited him. Sometimes, we need people who are well-connected. Charles was one of them."

"You mean he had the social prestige and reputation to get invited to a Mistick Krewe ball."

"Among other things, yes."

Miriya shook her head and slumped into her seat. "Oh, God."

Jake remained silent for a moment. "I'm sure Charles is all right. The krewe would not want a criminal investigation. I'm almost certain of it."

"Almost? You realize that the krewe has been associated with other secret societies in the U.S., including the Skull and Bones at Yale. From there, it's practically a Walmart of conspiracies."

"Surely you don't believe all those conspiracy theories."

"No, but..."

"But?" Jake prompted.

"What I believe isn't relevant. The question is, what did they do to Charles?"

"That's what we need you to find out."

"How?"

"You can track him."

Miriya blinked. "I can?"

"Of course you can." _You're an attack-class alpha telepath, right?_

"I...uh..."

Jake stared at her, his eyes wide. He then exhaled loudly. "Great, I got saddled with the clueless one."

Miriya's eyes narrowed. "I'm not clueless."

He nodded. "Oh yes, you are. Trust me, baby, I'm about to show you a whole new world."

~*~

Jake was not exactly Aladdin to her Jasmine. To begin with, she was obviously missing a pet tiger, and Jake and she did not cozy up together on a magic flying carpet.

The world he showed her though was new—dazzling, fantastic, and a hell of a lot of hard work.

In the comfort of her hotel room overlooking Jackson Square, Miriya raised a trembling hand and mopped a stray blond lock from her sweat-dampened forehead. _You're somewhere between north and northwest-ish. Sort of eleven o'clock._

Jake's voice chuckled. _Do I need to buy you a compass and teach you how to read it? I'm a country boy, after all. Ah can read mah compass like the best of 'em._

And you're moving.

Right again. How far do you think I am from you?

Miriya had to work harder to narrow down that information. She rose and walked around the room. The steady pulse of Jake's presence in her mind altered so subtly that she had to focus on the minute differences created by a distance of twenty-five feet.

And if she compared the sensation of that pulse to the original throbbing rhythm she felt when she first connected with Jake's mind when he had been standing in front of her in that very hotel room, he would be—

She rolled her eyes. No one had ever told her that math would be required to qualify as a psychic hound.

Only until you get better at this. Eventually, you'll be able to eyeball it. Honestly, once you get beyond a mile or so, it all sort of becomes a blur. At some point, the difference between twelve thousand miles and twelve thousand and five miles becomes irrelevant.

What?

Some of the most powerful alpha telepaths can track people across the world.

Damn.

Yeah. You should meet little Jessica. Her range is literally halfway around the world. Never seen anything like it. Anyway, what I meant to say was that, as you get close, you'll need the precision to know if someone is on the other side of the house or in the room next door.

And that's when the math comes in useful?

Like I said, in time, you'll learn how to judge distances without resorting to the back of a napkin.

Right, but until then—

With a sigh, she reached for a notepad and pen. Math had never been her strong suit. A frown furrowing her brow, she scribbled her notes on paper, struggled with the algebra, nibbled on the tip of her pen, and finally announced, "Half a mile."

Close. I'm roughly a sixth of a mile away, crossing Rampart into Louis Armstrong Park. Nice work, Miriya. You're a fast learner.

She had to be. What choice did she have? _How does this help me find Charles? I don't have a lock on his mind the way I do on yours._

But you know what his mind feels like. You've touched it before.

Yes.

When you get into the Mistick Krewe building, you'll have to scan for his mind. You're attack class; you can scan through physical obstacles. Once you find his mind, you should be able to get a lock on it. Charles Brandon has no psychic shields, so it shouldn't be a problem. Then it's just a matter of refining its location and finding him.

Miriya shrugged. The plan sounded straightforward enough. What could possibly go wrong?

Jake coughed. _Um, there is that small matter of getting_ into _the Mistick Krewe building._
CHAPTER FIVE

Miriya hated Mardi Gras, an unusual sentiment for a native New Orleanian, but not for an alpha telepath to whom all unshielded minds were as transparent as glass and as noisy as a flock of male Moluccan Cockatoos in mating season. Mental migraine aside, the stench of alcohol mixed with human waste was appalling. Fetid and pungent, it rose from the drains in spite of hard rains and power washes, and hung like a toxic miasma over New Orleans, as inseparable from the identity of the city as _cafe' au lait_ and beignets at Café Du Monde.

And it was only seven in the morning.

She had Decatur Street largely to herself, with the exception of the city sanitation crew working hard to purge the worst evidence of the prior day's excesses. Miriya stifled a sigh. Little surprise she had run away so many years prior. As a city, New Orleans had little to recommend it. Except that it had once been home.

She lifted her head and looked to the northwest. In a way, the city was still home. Were her father and mother still living together in their home by Lake Pontchartrain?

Her jaw tensed. As an alpha telepath familiar with the minds of Louise and Anton Durand, she would have no trouble locating them. As their daughter, she was not certain she wanted to find them.

Her grandmother had been the only person who had truly cared about her, and after she died, Miriya lost her only reason to linger in her dead-end life on a Louisiana bayou. She ran away then, and spent seven years away from home. She did not exchange a word with her parents in all that time—no e-mails, no phone calls.

No reason to break that trend now.

Besides, she had less than twelve hours to come up with a plan to crash the Mistick Krewe ball.

Miriya had no doubt she would be suitably attired for the ball that evening.

Her gown, a silver satin sheath elaborately embroidered with gold thread, had been purchased with Jake's government credit card, together with a matching gold mask, fringed with tear-shaped seed pearls and bedecked with seven feathers in varying shades of silver and gold. She had then spent another two hours selecting shoes and accessories to match.

The core of her disguise however was neither dress nor mask, but her psychic shields and a whole bunch of telepathic lies. Both, fortunately, were right down her alley.

With a Styrofoam cup of coffee in her hand, she wandered through the familiar streets of the city. New Orleans felt eternal—unchanging in its charming decay. She supposed it would go on decaying forever, never entirely falling apart, yet never relinquishing its stubborn right to the old ways.

The old ways, which included secret societies and invitation-only masked carnival balls held within ancient buildings with thick walls and clandestine corridors.

Walls and corridors, cold, dark, moldy, and just downright icky.

Personally, she preferred fiberglass and steel.

She glanced up at a building distinguished by its tall gray walls and narrow, stained-glass windows. It was far better maintained than most of the buildings in that section of the French Quarter, which, she supposed, should have been a dead giveaway if she had paid attention.

A tiny frown twisted her lips. She had become too reliant on her telepathic abilities to the detriment of her overall powers of observation. If she were to become an enforcer—

What the hell was she thinking?

She did not want to be an enforcer. She did not want anything to do with the council.

All she wanted was to find Charles.

It was not for love; no, nothing so trite. The obligations of friendship, as she well knew, could occasionally bind tighter than love. Besides, he did pay for a year's rent in an expensive Santa Barbara condominium, in addition to the lease on a flashy yellow Corvette—ah, she had loved that car—and provided her with a generous stipend.

Charles had been good to her. The least she could do was peek around for him.

She pushed out with her mind in the direction of the building, skimming as she always did over the thoughts of others. From what she could tell, most of the people were hard at work preparing the building for the party later that day, though few people actually had their thoughts on what they were doing. She brushed over the usual catalog of human miseries; the endless disgruntled whining about life and its lack. Come to think of it, considering the amount of negativity that assaulted her mind daily, it was a miracle she was upbeat at all.

Chalk it up to tuning it out. It was the key to sanity and survival.

Instead, she focused on the search for the familiar imprint of Charles's mind.

Jake had attempted to explain the science behind psychic energy, something about brain waves—alpha, beta, gamma, and theta waves, constructive versus destructive inference—before giving up with a shrug at her uncomprehending expression. "Just go with your gut feeling," he finally said.

She intended to. She saw little point in trying to ramrod a scientific explanation into a phenomenon that was at least as much art and still largely inexplicable. All that really mattered was her ability to tell one mind from another. Leaning against the outer wall, she sipped coffee from her cup as her mind roamed, sweeping through the space around her in ever wider concentric circles.

Jake had assured her that it was the most certain way of covering a great deal of ground while not missing anything. Miriya smirked faintly. She was certainly picking up a few tricks from Jake and reaping the benefits of his training with the Mutant Affairs Council. No question, there was a great deal more to being an alpha telepath than she had suspected. The talented amateur status, it seemed, did not count for much in a high-stakes situation where there was more in play than just dinner and a bed for the night.

Her mental sweep of the Mistick Krewe building continued. A tiny frown creased her brow. A surprising number of minds were protected behind psychic shields, far more than she usually encountered in the general population. The brief contact of minds was little more than a breath of motion as she passed by. She finally understood the true value of Jake's suggestion on the swift, sweeping circles; she left only the ghost of a psychic impression, too fleeting to be detected by any other than the most sensitive and well-trained telepaths.

If she kept learning from Jake at such a ferocious rate, she might actually have to seriously consider his offer of a permanent job with the council—at least until she learned everything she needed to know.

She would just have to grit her teeth against everything else the Mutant Affairs Council stood for. Ostensibly, it was a beacon for mutant rights, but everyone knew it was a flunky of the government, a heavy-handed tool for controlling and oppressing mutants, especially alpha mutants.

The thought of being controlled by others sent a shudder through her.

Miriya shook her head. The concept of employment by the Mutant Affairs Council was premature. She would get Charles out and then worry about how to handle the council's unwelcome advances. She refocused on what she was doing. Her posture was relaxed, the expression on her face one of absent-minded contentment as her mind churned through space, unlimited, unfettered—a joyous, even exultant sensation of effortless flight.

Was there anything more amazing than the gift of telepathy? Despite all its inconveniences, including the burden of other people's depressing thoughts, nothing was more precious, more liberating than realizing that _her_ mind had no limits. Miriya smiled, reveling in her freedom. Telepathy was a gift, one she had come to appreciate and even treasure.

Unconstrained by walls, her mind flicked through the building, until she found exactly what she was looking for.

Charles Brandon.

A smile teased her lips. _Gotcha._

Her telepathic power whipped out. Like psychic tentacles, it laced into Charles's mind, joining the both of them in a way she had never attempted before.

She jolted. The intimacy jarred her.

Her connection with Jake was different. He was an alpha telepath. He could shield large swathes of his mind even while maintaining a close psychic connection with her. Jake had a choice as to how much intimacy he would permit.

Charles, on the other hand, could not limit her access to his mind.

Miriya sucked in a deep breath and braced herself against the rawness of the contact. It was one thing to read another's thoughts and provide telepathic prompts, which was no more than she had previously attempted. It was another thing to fully access another's mind. She wasn't sure she liked it; in fact, she was certain she did not. It was more insight than she wanted into the dark corners of someone else's mind.

Miriya was not delusional enough to believe that her mind was devoid of dark corners, but at least those corners were _hers_. She shuddered and pulled back gingerly, maintaining enough contact to track Charles without delving too deeply into his shadows. She would never have guessed that Charles, the seemingly moral scion of the wealthy Brandon family, was sexually fascinated and aroused by prepubescent bodies, both male and female.

She pushed away from the wall and strolled down the street. Her jaw was tight.

Jake's voice whispered through her mind. _Miriya?_

What?

Are you okay?

I'm fine. Get out of my head.

I would, but your mind is practically rippling with tension. You sure you're okay?

I found Charles.

Really? That's great. Where? Is he okay?

Somewhere inside the Mistick Krewe building. I'll have to wait until I'm actually in the building to find him, but he's in there.

Awesome. So what's the problem?

I...found out something about Charles. I think I could have lived without knowing it.

_Ah._ Jake was silent for a moment. _It was bound to happen sooner or later. The problem with other people's secrets is that there's usually a reason people keep them secret._

Miriya sighed. _What do you do about it?_

Usually? Nothing.

Nothing?

Has he done anything wrong? Anything illegal?

No, not yet, but he really wants to.

Give some credit to morality and willpower, Miriya. If I listed all the illegal things I've ever considered doing, you'd never get to the end of the list.

But—

We're not here to judge them.

Her eyes widened. _Definitely not what I expected to hear from an enforcer with the Mutant Affairs Council._

Seriously, we've got way more important crap to deal with. You'll need to learn to put some emotional distance between you and the minds you touch. Don't get sucked into their lives, or they'll drag you down into their personal hells. Not worth it. Never, ever worth it, not even for the ones you love.

Miriya drew in another breath, filling her lungs. _Yeah, you're right. I...I'll get through it._

Did you figure out a way to get into the building yet?

_Still working on it._ She raised the cup to her lips and scowled. Her coffee was getting cold, and she had yet to complete a loop of the area. Her pace casual, she sauntered past bars and shops. Most of the doors were still closed, but occasionally, she caught a glimpse of an early rising shopkeeper hard at work behind the glass windows.

A man sweeping out the front steps of his store threw her an amused look. _Crazy tourist._

To maintain her façade, she peeked in at the storefronts even though she, as a rule, hated window-shopping. More importantly, she paused frequently to look up at the ornate balconies that characterized the French Quarter. The balconies did not quite connect between the stores, but the three-foot gap looked almost manageable, under most circumstances. Better yet, one of the third-floor windows on the Mistick Krewe building lined up fairly well with a balcony on the store next to it.

It was, however, a long way to the ground.

Miriya swallowed hard and moved on. Ten minutes later, she completed her stroll around the block and found herself back at the Mistick Krewe building. She tossed her empty cup into a trash can. _I might have found a way in._

_That didn't sound nearly as confident as I would have liked,_ Jake said.

_Well, it requires climbing, which would be hard to do in a ball gown._ She gulped, forcing saliva down her dry throat. _And, did I mention, I'm afraid of heights._
CHAPTER SIX

A half hour later, she walked into her hotel room to find Jake in a chair by the window. He tossed her a smirk. "How can you possibly be afraid of heights? You live in a twenty-fifth-floor penthouse."

"Well, technically, I'm not afraid of heights," she clarified. She set her handbag and card key on the desk, and slumped into the chair across from him. "I'm just afraid of falling from heights, and since I'd never intended to jump from my penthouse balcony, I figured I had nothing to be afraid of. Climbing _across_ balconies and playing James Bond is not exactly what I thought I had signed up for."

"I'll be with you."

She jerked her gaze up to meet his eyes.

A wide grin spread across his face. "I have to get in too. Even got me a new tux for the occasion."

"I think we should try getting in through a door instead of a window."

"The security guards are telepaths, and they will be on the lookout for gate-crashers. Telepathy can only get you so far against a psychically shielded mind, especially if you're not holding an invitation in your hand."

"We don't have to walk in with the guests. There are people in there right now, preparing for the party. Surely, they've got decorators, caterers lined up. Why not enter with them?"

Jake's eyes widened.

Miriya frowned. "Tell me you actually thought about it. Did it not even occur to you?"

He held his hands up. "I had other things on my mind, but yours is a really good idea. Did you by any chance pick up the name of the catering or cleaning company?"

Somewhere in the cacophony of thoughts swirling through the Mistick Krewe building, she had snatched up a name or two. "Tastebuds Catering. They have an office on Canal Street."

"Awesome." Jake shoved to his feet. "What are we waiting for?"

"Room service. I called ahead, and breakfast should be arriving in about ten minutes. I'm starving."

"Oh." Jake sank back into his seat and folded his hands across his chest. "How are you holding up?"

She shrugged.

"I remember my first mission as an enforcer," Jake said. "It was about five years ago."

Five years? Jake did not look a whole lot older than she. "What were you, a teenager then?"

"Just graduated from high school. The council offered me a scholarship to UCLA, in addition to psychic training and a guarantee of employment upon graduation."

"ROTC for mutants, huh?"

"Pretty much, though less physical, more mental. On my first winter break, the council got me started on simple investigations." Jake dragged his hands through his hair. "I've been on some pretty rough cases since, but I don't think any freaked me out as much as that first one."

"How so?"

"The realization that I was doing it _officially_ as opposed to on the sly. It's different when you don't have to constantly look over your shoulder, worried that some jackass enforcer from the council is going to slap electric handcuffs on your wrists and drag you off to a maximum-security prison."

A knock sounded on the door, and Miriya let the uniform-clad waiter into the room. The man politely murmured good morning before setting the tray of pastries and coffee down on the table between Jake and Miriya's chairs.

Miriya tipped the waiter and closed the door on him. She returned to her seat and cast Jake a narrow-eyed stare as she reached for a Danish pastry. "How often does that happen?" she asked.

"What?"

"The electric handcuffs, dragging-off-to-prison deal?"

"Four times that I've seen in the past five years, but those people deserved it."

"And who gets to make that decision?" Miriya scowled.

"Alex Saunders. He's the director general of the council. He has a team of advisors, all alphas, many of them precogs."

Miriya's scowl deepened. "I hate precogs."

"They have their uses."

"Charlatans. Mutter some new age mumbo-jumbo, and people treat it like it's the gospel truth."

"Some of them are actually quite good at predicting the future," Jake said mildly. "Would it get your hackles up if I told you that we reached out to you because of a vision?"

Her pastry paused on the way up to her mouth. Miriya stared, wide-eyed, at Jake. "A...vision?"

Jake settled back in his chair with a muffin. "That's what I heard."

"What...what kind of vision?"

He shrugged. "Not a clue. Alex doesn't tell me everything—only what I needed to know to pique your interest in coming along."

_What the freaking hell?_ Miriya set her pastry on a plate before folding her arms across her chest. "I'd like to know what I'm getting manipulated into."

"Look, you just find Charles—"

"Screw that. If you're laying some kind of trap for me to walk into and then blackmailing me into working for the council—"

"You're paranoid."

"Paranoia has kept me alive and out of the clutches of the council."

"The council isn't a witch cackling over a cauldron of boiling mutant bones."

Miriya rolled her eyes. "Great. Now I'm going to be stuck with that image in my head all day." She pushed to her feet. "I want to know what the vision is or I'm walking out of here."

"Miriya, I don't—"

"Maybe you should start finding out." Her eyebrows arched. "Time's a'wasting."

Jake's shoulders slumped; the expression in his eyes was distant. Was he communicating telepathically? Most likely, though Miriya did not feel like poking into the conversation. Privacy was tough to come by where telepaths were concerned.

A minute or two later, Jake blinked hard and straightened in his seat. His eyes focused on Miriya. "All I know—all Alex knows—is that there will be a battle, and we can't win without you."

"What battle? With whom? When?"

"Nobody knows, not even the alpha precog who had the vision."

"Seriously? You feed me this prophecy crap and expect me to be okay with it? I'm not a big fan of battles that hinge on me, especially when I don't have any details on who, what, when, where, how." She counted off on her fingers, punctuating the last five words. "Not to mention, I don't even know how to fight."

"Don't you?" Jake asked. "You were a scrappy little kid when you were still Maria Durand. Made more than a couple of noses bleed back in the day."

"Hah. I don't think mutant battles exist on the same level as a punch in the face."

"The principle is the same though. Stop someone before he hurts you." Jake sighed and adjusted his glasses. "Look, we don't have to talk about the precog's vision. In fact, we really shouldn't. It has nothing to do with finding Charles or figuring out the reason for the spikes of psychic activity in New Orleans at Mardi Gras."

"Really? What if this big battle is literally just around the corner?"

Jake shook his head. "The precog said you had to be in place, part of the council, by the end of the year. Whatever's supposed to happen isn't going to happen until after New Year."

Miriya glared at him and fought down her temper until she could mutter a sentence that was not loaded with curse words. "I hate this. You know I hate what the council does."

He averted his gaze. "I know. I'm sorry, Miriya."

He sounded like he meant it.

She was, however, not quite inclined to forgive him or the council yet. Jake was right, though, as much as she did not want to admit it. The only thing that mattered now was getting Charles out of whatever mess he had gotten himself into. He was a human, and as a rule, humans did not fare well in situations where mutants were involved. What were guns compared to the world-altering power of an alpha telekinetic, or intelligence and ingenuity compared to the mind-ripping power of a telepath?

The only superiority humans could afford was against empaths, the most common and weakest of the mutants. Feelings. Emotions. _Hah_. What good were they? What could they do against people in complete control of their faculties?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
CHAPTER SEVEN

Miriya fixed a polite expression on her face, and resisted the urge to smooth down her black and white waitress uniform as the security guard compared her government-issued identification card to the list of names supplied by Tastebuds Catering. Getting her name on the list was easy. Chantel Rhondeau, the owner of Tastebuds Catering, had no psychic shields to speak of.

Getting through the telepathic security scans at the entrance of the Mistick Krewe building was a different matter.

Jake's advice had sounded simple. _Create a clear image of the person you want them to see—a complete personality profile, everything from favorite brand of shampoo to bra size—and push it out there, far beyond your psychic shields. It's the first thing they'll connect with when they scan your mind, and if it's complete enough, they'll believe it's real. They won't even think to dig deeper._

A façade. She was good with facades. Heck, one could even make the case that Miriya Templeton was a façade seven years in the making.

It was easier, however, to go back to the person she would have been if her telepathic powers had not freed her from the cycle of poverty centered on the Louisiana bayou.

She was once again Maria Durand, a local girl, pretty and polite enough to secure a job as a wait staff with a high-end catering company, but not daring enough to aspire for more in life. The details came easily: raised in a rundown New Orleans suburb, lackluster grades, a host of minimum wage, part-time jobs, and then a lucky break—a boyfriend, Jake Hansen, who had found a job with Tastebuds Catering and vouched for her.

Encased in her old skin, she immersed herself in the play of light across Lake Ponchartrain each morning; the dull and crowded bus ride into the city; the usual mix of body odors mercifully subtle in chill of early spring; the mindless chatter of the kitchen staff mixing with the regular snap of knives against chopping boards; the fragrant sauces, rich with herbs, including mint and cumin—

Heavy pressure pushed against her mind.

—an appreciative sniff; a delicate sip off a tasting spoon; a dash of thyme to deepen its flavor. Careful hands loaded silverware and china plates into cartons. She inhaled, a nervous breath as a silver tray filled with hor d'oeuvres almost slipped.

The pressure against her mind moved on.

The security guard waved her in.

She loitered in the lobby, staring up at the banners that adorned the second-floor balconies and the curved staircases. Traditional Mardi Gras colors—purple, green, and gold—dominated the banners, but managed to come across as tasteful and elegant instead of gaudy. The Mistick Krewe certainly had excellent, and likely expensive, taste in interior decorators.

A minute or two later, Jake, who had been standing behind her in the line, joined her in the building, and together, they walked into the dining room.

They did not speak much, and when they did, the conversation was about the inconsequential—the placement of dishes, the missing salt- and peppershakers, and the arrangement of napkins over the cream-colored tablecloths.

The telepathic conversation was nonexistent. The abundance of psychic-sensitive security guards made it risky. Besides, Miriya and Jake did not need to talk. They had a plan, or at least the start of a plan.

Miriya made multiple trips between the kitchen and the dining room, and set the trays down on the buffet tables arrayed around the large room. With two of her "new" colleagues, she arranged the attractively decorated platters on the tables, interspersing them among the ice carvings and floral arrangements.

"Very charming."

Miriya looked around at the voice.

A white-haired woman, dressed in an elegant black gown, offered a cool but approving smile. Her wrinkled and liver-spotted hands, adorned with jeweled rings and holding a silver electronic cigarette, were steady in spite of her age. Miriya estimated the woman at ninety years old though she leaned only slightly on the arm of the pleasant-faced young man beside her.

"Everything's ready, ma'am." Miriya inclined her head. Her waitress uniform crinkled as she moved.

"Wonderful." The woman's voice was thin and raspy, as much from old age as from a lifetime of inhaling nicotine. She smiled, but Miriya's gaze fixed on the woman's eyes instead. They were brilliant blue, their gleam sharp, even arresting.

Psychic shields could protect minds; telepathic skills could create facades, but little could conceal the glitter of raw power in a person's eyes.

Miriya would have bet her entire bank account that the woman was a mutant, and not just _any_ mutant. At ninety, the woman was nearly sixty years older than the Genetic Revolution that had unleashed an explosive growth of human derivatives—clones and in vitros—and widespread acknowledgment of genetic mutants. She had obviously lived through and prospered in spite of conditions that had _not_ favored those who were genetically different, especially if they possessed power that others did not.

Amazing.

The corner of the woman's lips tugged into an amused, indulgent smile.

A telepath. An alpha.

The woman's mental voice—strong and steady in sharp contrast to her physical one—murmured through Miriya's mind. _Nothing so mundane, my child. You're shielded. I cannot read your thoughts unless you choose to share them with me, but I can sense your emotions._

Miriya's eyes widened. _You're an empath._

And skilled at attributing belief and intent to emotion. You're not really part of the wait staff, are you?

I am—

The woman turned away. _No matter. No need to answer the question. Your emotions can't lie, even if your thoughts can. I trust you will behave yourself tonight and not do anything to spoil the party._ She looked at the young man. "We'll go to the parlor, Scott. Our guests should be arriving soon."

"Certainly, grandmamma." He turned carefully on his heel, moving no faster than she was able, and escorted her from the dining room.

As soon as she could, Miriya excused herself and went in search of Jake. He was standing by the second-floor balcony overlooking the marble-columned foyer and raised a quizzical eyebrow as she approached. _Something the matter?_

Ran into an empath.

Ah, Madame Devereaux. I believe she's something of an iconic figure in the city. I'm surprised you did not come across her earlier when you lived in New Orleans.

We don't move in the same social circles.

Jake's shoulders moved in a shrug. _That might have something to do with it._

Is she dangerous?

His eyebrows shot up.

_She's not an alpha empath, is she?_ Miriya asked.

I don't think so, but of course, she's dangerous. She's shrewd and influential. I'd try to fly under the radar—

Too late. She picked up on me.

Did she say anything?

To behave and not spoil the party.

Jake stifled a chuckle. _She would say something like that. I don't think anything will faze her. She may not be an alpha, but she's a talented empath, after all._

Miriya smoothed the frown before it appeared on her face.

He glanced at her. _Most empaths are of no consequence. Their susceptibility to other's emotions makes them rather fickle, if harmless, creatures. They can't focus enough to do any serious damage. The empath who is dangerous is the one who has mastered her emotions, as Amelie Devereaux has._

Whatever. Miriya snorted under her breath. _Should we change?_

Jake nodded. _I need to track down the psychic disturbances, and I'm sure they're not coming from just the old lady. You need to find Charles. If a fight breaks out for whatever reason, don't get involved. Just get Charles away from here._

Okay, fine.

_This way._ Jake led her to a window at the far end of the corridor. The bustle of activity and murmur of conversations faded. _Safe enough._ He pushed the window open. _Keep a lookout, will you?_

Miriya positioned herself several feet away, giving herself full view of the corridor as well as Jake. He looked toward the balcony of the adjacent store and frowned, his eyes narrowing.

Moments later, the two neat packages Jake had concealed earlier that day drifted across the open expanse between the balcony and the window. Jake snatched them out of the air, turned around, and handed one to Miriya. "Your change of clothes, milady." _Go get dressed. I'll keep watch._

Miriya nodded and slipped into a nearby bathroom. As she changed into her gown, she tried not to roll her eyes at the excessive faux gold decorations and the cherub-shaped hot- and cold-water knobs. She peered into the mirror and deepened her makeup to accentuate her eyes and lips. For a final touch, she raised her mask to her face and stared at the flare of feathers over her head. The overall effect was alluring and intriguing; she would easily blend into the crowd.

At the last moment, she remembered to grab her smartphone from the pocket of her discarded uniform. She stared at the tiny device. Where was she supposed to put it? Ah, what the hell. She slid it against the curve of her breast, tucked securely in her bra.

She walked out of the bathroom, and Jake flashed her an appreciative grin. While she lounged against the wall and affected boredom, he scooted past her, entered the bathroom, and locked the door behind him. Minutes later, he emerged, dressed in a tux. He shoved their wait staff uniforms into the packages and sent them out the window, back across the balcony of the neighboring building.

"Good timing," she said. "The ballroom is filling up."

"When did being late stop being fashionable?"

"When it takes a half hour or more to get through security." Miriya glanced out a nearby window. "The line's around the block, and about ninety percent of the people in the line don't even have invitations to the ball. It's only going to get worse as people get drunker and less rational about their odds of crashing the party."

"Coming in through the back door with the catering crew was one of your best ideas yet." Jake took Miriya's hand and squeezed it. "Let's go mingle. I want a bigger crowd for cover before you wander off on your own."

And it'll be good to figure out what we're up against.

Exactly.

It was, however, easier said than done. The abundance of psychic shields, used as often by non-mutants as by mutants, made anything more than a casual telepathic probe impossible. To top it off, everyone seemed to be on his or her best behavior; no one did anything in the least bit extraordinary.

Still, it would not hurt to be sure.

With her mask held up to her face, Miriya wandered through the crowd. The aroma of the hor d'oeuvres, appetizers, and desserts on display rose to mingle with that of exotic flowers. People gathered around the chocolate fountain surrounded by pyramids of strawberries, grapes, and mini cupcakes. The glitz and glitter of elaborate costumes and masks swirled around Miriya. The sparkle of light-hearted conversation filled the air, supplemented by the tinkle of champagne glasses as rims touched, and the light clink of silverware against china plates.

She caught several glimpses of Amelie Devereaux and her grandson, Scott, and made it a point to stay out of their way. If the old woman sensed her in the crowd, she gave no indication of it. Miriya took note of the people who clustered around Madame Devereaux and fought to claim her attention. They tended to be young—scarcely older than Miriya—which she found surprising. All of them possessed strong psychic shields that could not entirely conceal the sheen of power emanating from most of them. Without probing deeper, she could not know what type of psychic powers those young people possessed, but when it was _that_ much power, the _type_ of power scarcely mattered. It would be enough to do significant damage.

She caught Jake's eye across the room. _Mutants. Mostly alphas._

Jake's exhalation of breath shuddered through her mind. _I know. I don't think I've seen this many alphas in one place since the last Mutant Affairs Council annual party at the Ritz Carlton. It definitely explains the psychic energy, but not the why._

I'll leave you to figure out the why. I'm going after Charles.

Charles's presence altered subtly in Miriya's mind as she moved around the ballroom and dining room. She narrowed his location to the west wing of the mansion, specifically its southern tower. With a final glance over her shoulder to ensure that no one was paying her any particular attention, she strolled from the ballroom and into the foyer.

It bustled with activity; outsiders shoved at the cordon of security personnel. Some guests lingered in the foyer or loitered at the balconies with glasses of champagne in their hands and idle conversations on their lips. Occasionally, the guests spared mocking and indulgent glances at the uninvited horde clamoring to enter the most exclusive Mardi Gras event.

With a matching expression of bored superiority, Miriya walked up the curved staircase and strolled toward the west wing. The noise of the crowd faded, though she picked up on an occasional giggle and flurry of hushed conversations behind closed doors. Apparently, she was not the only guest to sneak away.

The pulse in her mind, her homing beacon to Charles, grew stronger with each step.

She paused at the foot of the staircase that wound up into the southern tower. Orange bulbs behind torch-shaped light fixtures lighting the narrow stairway did little to dispel the deep shadows. Miriya stifled an exasperated sigh. She could have managed _without_ the spooky eighteenth-century atmosphere.

The spiral staircase wound its way up the tower. She peeked through open doors of the rooms on each landing to find small sitting rooms, libraries, an occasional bedroom, and no sign of Charles. The rooms were not just tributes to an earlier age. A carelessly tossed, still damp bathrobe on the bed, a whiff of a cigar in the library confirmed that the rooms were recently used.

However, who lived in the Mistick Krewe building?

Charles's signal grew stronger; she was close. With her psychic shields locked in place, Miriya concealed herself in the shadows next to a door that was partly ajar.

A male voice, not one she recognized, spoke. "It seems you've overestimated your importance to the council."

"You did; I didn't," Charles retorted. His voice was steady, strong. "They're too cautious. I told you they wouldn't send an entire taskforce of alpha mutants to investigate the disappearance of a single human operative."

"They did send one though. Jake Hansen, an alpha telepath and telekinetic."

"I don't recognize the name. He's not one of the taskforce leaders."

"No, but the council claims all mutants are important to them, so we might as well put it to the test. Our inside man in the council confirms that there are three enforcer taskforces in Houston, and he's ready to scramble them the moment Hansen dies. Within two hours, thirty or more vengeful enforcers will descend upon the ball, and they'll be met by the largest gathering of alpha mutants anyone has ever managed to bring together in one place."

"Your plan is not going to work," Charles insisted. "Those untrained alphas will never stand a chance against council-trained enforcers. People are going to get hurt and—"

The other man snorted. "Exactly. All I need is enough confusion and panic to conceal what I need to do. One of the guests, or better yet, the council will take the blame for it."

"You're mad."

A low chuckle resonated through the small space. "No, I'm terrifyingly sane. You know it as well as I do, and that's the fact that disturbs you the most."

Miriya darted up the stairs as she heard the swirl of movement. She raced past meager pools of lights to hide in the darkness at the uppermost curve of the stairs. Her heart pounded as she inched forward to catch a glimpse of the man who had been in the room with Charles.

All she saw though was the back of his head as he stepped out of the room, pulled the door shut behind him, and walked away.

Jake!

Yeah?

Get out of the building. Now.

What?

Someone's trying to start a fight between the council and the alphas at the party by killing you. God damn it. Just get out now.

Alarm seeped into his voice. _But who? And why would they do that?_

I don't know.

What about you?

I'll get Charles, and then we're bailing.

Look, I'm responsible for you. I can't leave—

This isn't the eighteenth century. I'm not a princess who needs rescuing. Will you just get the hell out?

_I don't think—_ He screamed. His telepathic cry pierced her mind like a blade into her brain.

Jake!

He did not respond.

Miriya's hands snapped into fists, and she bit back a curse. _Freaking idiot._ Now she had to rescue him too. She raced down the stairs, past Charles's door. Her pace slowed only when she reentered the foyer and found herself back among a crowd—a much larger crowd than she had recalled twenty minutes prior.

She sucked in a shuddering breath and forced herself to alter her stride from purposeful to a languid stroll as she moved from the foyer to the ballroom and the adjacent dining room. Her gaze swept across the clusters of people gathered around the buffet tables and the bar. No one seemed disturbed; there were no signs of a tussle.

But there was no sign of Jake Hansen either.

"Excuse me, miss."

Miriya spun around.

The young man inclined his head. "I'm Scott Devereaux. My grandmamma sent me over to ask if you're all right."

Miriya looked past his shoulder. Several feet away, Amelie Devereaux, the matriarch of the family, sat in a high-backed chair, surrounded by her entourage of admirers. The old lady, however, ignored the fawning compliments offered to her and instead met Miriya's gaze with a subtly arched eyebrow.

Something in her yearned to speak, to pour out her heart to the old woman. Surely, she could trust someone whose eyes displayed so much empathy.

_Empath_. Madame Devereaux was an empath.

Miriya dug her nails into the palms of her hands. The sharp pain refocused her. She was in the enemy's den. She had no friends here, no one she could trust. She would not be lulled into believing otherwise.

She looked up at Scott's face. "I'm fine. Thank you for asking." She hoped her smile, pasted on her face, did not look as rigid as it felt.

He bowed slightly and walked away.

_Now what?_ Miriya turned her back on Madame Devereaux and walked away to put distance between herself and the uncomfortably direct gaze of the empath. She could contact the Mutant Affairs Council, perhaps even Alex Saunders, who was supposed to be director general of the council.

She could think of no other way to avert an all-out fight between the council and the alpha mutants gathered at the Mistick Krewe.

A cool breeze swept through the ballroom as several guests pushed open the patio doors and stepped outside. Miriya followed them into a walled garden. The guests dispersed in various directions, seeking privacy among the shadow of the trees. Miriya, too, found a quiet corner and reached for the tiny smartphone tucked in her bra.

It took several calls before she reached the Mutant Affairs Council headquarters in Washington, D.C., but it was Saturday and late in the evening. The operator took her message and promised to convey it to the right parties, but refused to connect her with Alex Saunders. Frustrated, she hung up and paced the short length of the flagstone path.

Miriya had never personally witnessed psychic battles, but she had read enough reports not to want to be involved in any skirmish that included people who could, with little more than a malicious thought, drive others to their knees, screaming in pain, or worse, against people who could lift and hurl a four-thousand-pound car.

Miriya was certain that no amount of telepathic powers could save a person from a vehicle-turned-missile.

What had Jake told her? _If a fight breaks out for whatever reason, don't get involved. Just get Charles away from here._

She inhaled deeply, though the motion did little to slow her racing heartbeat. She slipped the phone back into its hiding place and returned to the building. She weaved her way past the guests, sparing an occasional glance at tuxedoed men with dark hair and broad shoulders—which could have easily described thirty percent of the males present. Which one had spoken to Charles?

Several men she eliminated from the suspect list through a quick scan of their unshielded minds, but the list remained absurdly long. Unless she pushed hard enough to break through psychic shields—thereby giving herself away—she had no way of identifying the person who had spoken to Charles.

Of course, Charles _would_ be able to identify the person.

She kept her pace casual to match that of the mingling guests. With each step, she drew closer to the tower room where he was imprisoned.

The sound of conversation and movement faded into silence by the time she arrived outside Charles's room. She slid back the deadbolt and tried the handle. The door was locked.

From the other side, quick footsteps moved toward the door. Charles's voice called out. "Who's there?"

"Miriya."

"Miriya?" The lock jiggled and clicked. The door flung open. "What are you doing here?"

Her heartbeat skipped. He had _unlocked_ the door. She stared at Charles's face, the blood draining from her own. "Rescuing you, but you don't need to be rescued, do you? You're in cahoots with him."

Charles's mouth opened and closed, wordless as a goldfish. With visible effort, he regained his composure and held out his hand. "It's not what it looks like."

Miriya bared her teeth in a snarl. "So what does it look like?" She wanted to kick herself. She had a lock on his mind. Why hadn't she pushed harder and dug deeper? She could have yanked out all his secrets.

I've no excuses, other than my stupid, preconceived notions of personal privacy.

He lunged forward, grabbed her, and dragged her into the room.

She tried to push him away, but he was far stronger. Panicked, her mind lashed out. The attack was instinctive, though even to her, it felt clumsy—a crowbar instead of a scalpel.

The psychic blast sent Charles reeling. His grip on her faltered, and he stumbled backward. Miriya raced from the room, scrambled down the curved staircase, and ran headlong into a broad chest.

Strong hands seized her arms. A male voice drawled, "And what have we here?"

Pressure pushed against her mind. She gasped, and then gritted her teeth against the pain. Tears stung her eyes, blurring her vision as she stared up into the face of the man who had spoken to Charles, the mastermind behind the psychotic plan to drag the Mutant Affairs Council into open war. She saw glimpses of Scott Devereaux in his face, in the chiseled line of his jaw and cheekbones, but he appeared older, and his eyes were colder and harder.

Gathering her will about her, she shoved back with her mind, and hit the psychic equivalent of a granite wall. The man's psychic shields were even stronger than Jake's. The collision sent a burst of strobe lights flashing through her mind. The world around her vanished in a glare of nauseating white, before inching into normal hues.

He chuckled, apparently amused by her attempt to fight back. "An alpha telepath, huh? It looks like you're no more trained than those beggars crawling around my grandmamma, hoping for a handout. Let me show you a thing or two about psychic shields."

He pulled her up the stairs and pushed her through the open door of Charles's room.

Charles was leaning against the wall, breathing heavily. He shook his head. "Don't hurt her. Please."

The man looked at Charles. A slow smile crept across his face. "Ah, so you know her."

"Let her go. She's not part of your plan."

"I'll decide whether she's part of my plan. But first, those psychic shields." He returned his attention to Miriya. "Let's see how well they hold up."

She braced herself for his mental attack, but the blow across her face caught her off-guard. It hurled her into the stone wall. Before she could recover, he was on her. He ripped her dress from her body. His hand squeezed her breast and his other hand shoved between her thighs.

For a split second, she froze.

Charles lunged forward to defend her, but a psychic attack from the man sent him stumbling back. An instant later, agony bludgeoned Miriya to her knees, wrenching a scream from her. Shafts of pain pulsed through her shattered psychic shields.

She could feel his psychic touch, like claws, ripping through her mind, digging through her memories, shredding her. She curled into fetal ball even though she knew she could not protect herself. The mental assault was worse than the physical attack that had distracted her from maintaining her psychic defenses.

The man's low laughter throbbed through her aching skull, as intimate and violating as an unwanted caress. "So, you're here with the council. Came to save Charles Brandon, did you?" He snorted. "When did the council start sending out amateurs, feeble alpha telepath wannabes?" He turned his back on her. "Go back to school, girl. You're not worth my time. The council will scramble its enforcers, in spite of your warning, and in less than two hours, there will be a grand battle in the Mistick Krewe building." He spread his hands, the gesture welcoming. His teeth flashed white in his perfect smile. "Scott will die, and grandmamma too. The members of the Mistick Krewe will look to me, naturally, to take up the hereditary leadership role that has always belonged to the Devereauxes."

Miriya dragged herself to her feet and tried to hold the tattered remains of her dress together. She could not marshal a psychic attack. Hell, it took all her energy to form coherent sentences. "So, that's all this is? A stupid-ass bid for power that's going to get several dozen innocent people killed in the process?"

He spun around and stalked up to her. "My grandmamma is like a vampire. She just won't die, and she won't gracefully step aside either. My father _died_ , white-haired and feeble, still waiting for his chance for lead the Mistick Krewe. I won't let it happen to me." His gaze raked over her half-naked body. His lip curled with obvious disgust. "And you can't stop me."

He walked out of the room. The door locked behind him, and Miriya heard the sound of a bolt sliding into place. Bile mixed with the tears clogging her throat. _What have I done?_

Charles still wore a grimace of pain but he straightened slowly. He shrugged out of his sweater and walked over to her. "Here, you have to keep warm." He tugged it over her head and then drew her gently into his arms. His presence warmed her and steadied her through the shudders wracking her body.

"So, you're not with him?" Miriya asked finally, her voice still trembling.

Charles shook his head. "No, of course not. You can search my mind; you'll know I'm telling you the truth."

"I touched your mind." She shuddered. "I didn't want to go deeper."

To her surprise, he grinned. "Oh, _that_. It worked, then."

"What worked?"

"My prurient sexual fantasies."

Miriya rolled her eyes. Only an intellectual like Charles would know what to do with a word like prurient. "You mean—"

"Some non-mutants can form psychic shields; others, like me, can't. Keeping those thoughts front and center helps deter some puritan telepaths who dread digging deeper into an obviously sick mind."

"So, you don't actually like doing it with children?"

"God, no." His mouth quirked into a sardonic grin. "I'm sure they're not experienced enough to be particularly good in bed, and I'd have to do all the work. How is that a satisfying sexual encounter for me?"

Miriya's shoulders sagged with a sigh. She had not been wrong about Charles. The prepubescent fantasies were a façade, which was not part of the composite picture she had built up of him, of his general good nature, his keen intellectual moorings, and his obvious interest in women, usually blond and skinny.

His chest rumbled as he chuckled. "Threw you for a loop, didn't it?"

She pushed away from him and looked up at his face. "Did you know I was a telepath, before this, I mean?"

"Of course." Charles nodded. "I do occasional work for the council. I know my way around psychics. I know when someone's trying to manipulate me telepathically."

"And you let me do it without calling me out on it?"

He shrugged. "Didn't see the harm in it. It's not as if I objected to spending money on a pretty girl and getting a few dates out of it in the bargain."

"But we didn't—" She bit down on her lip.

"Have sex?" Charles shook his head and frowned. "Miriya, you need to give friendship—basic friendship—a bit more credit. Your company and conversation at dinner or the museum was payment enough. Besides, you came out here to find me anyway. That's just friendship, right?"

She gaped at him for a moment before relaxing into a grin. "Yeah, that's right." She took several steps away from him. "Why did you pull me into the room?"

"Because I heard him coming. Figured we could surprise him, but I guess that didn't work out quite so well."

"Freaking me out is not the key to surprising him."

"Point noted, though maybe you should learn to trust more."

"Trust people?"

"No, trust yourself and what you know about people. You're a telepath. You should have character judgment down to a science."

Miriya swallowed hard through the lump in her throat. She was completely out of her depth, but Charles's faith in her humbled her. She looked around the room and tried not to wince at the way the room spun slowly around her. Her head hurt too badly to focus her telepathic powers. "Any ideas how to get out of here?"

"No, unless you're a closet telekinetic."

"Nope, but I have this." She reached into her bra and pulled out her smartphone. She waved it at Charles, a cheeky grin forming on her face.

Charles laughed. "There's a reason amateurs are more unpredictable and dangerous than professionals. Most alpha telepaths don't carry phones. They don't need them."

She stared at her phone. "We could call the cops, but in a city like New Orleans, they've probably been paid by the Mistick Krewe."

"The council?"

"Already left a message with them. We could try again," she said, but even she heard the doubt in her voice.

Charles shook his head. "They'll get the message to where it needs to go. Whether they decide to act on it is an entirely separate matter."

"Do you have any friends in high places? The FBI? CIA?"

"Yes, but they know I'm a council operative. They're not going to send humans into a fight involving mutants."

Miriya glared at him. "So, we have a phone and no one to call for help?"

Charles glanced out the window, a thoughtful expression on his face. A slow smile inched across his lips. "Amelie Devereaux. Call her."

Miriya stared at Charles and shook her head. "Amelie Devereaux isn't going to take my call. She's the hostess of the party, for crying out loud."

"Look, her life is at stake here. She's got about ninety minutes left to live."

She muttered a curse and stalked away. A call to the phone directory confirmed that Madame Amelie Devereaux was unlisted, as was the Mistick Krewe. Of course, they were unlisted; the Mistick Krewe was a secret society after all.

Miriya paced the room, breathing deep and slow breaths to counter the unending shafts of pain pulsing through her skull. She had to reach Madame Devereaux, and if the phone was not going to work, then all that was left to her were her telepathic powers—the same telepathic powers that had not been strong enough to stand up to another alpha telepath.

She stood by the window, gulping in the cool air, bracing herself for the pain that she knew would follow. Minutes passed.

A sigh shuddered out of her. She would never be mentally ready. It was probably best to jump in and deal with the psychic costs, a breath at a time.

Miriya closed her eyes. Her hands gripped hard on the windowsill.

Her mind, still reeling from the psychic attack, reached out to touch the mind that had briefly connected with hers. _Madame Devereaux._

A moment of silence, then a startled response. _Yes?_

A wave of anguish spun nausea through her stomach. She had to concentrate, focus her rapidly fading psychic strength. Miriya gritted her teeth. _Your grandson. Not Scott._

Lionel?

_Trying to kill you, make it look accidental. Council's on its way._ Miriya swayed on her feet. Coldness surged through her. Her mind struggled to shape words. _Big fight—_

Where are you, child?

Her body crumpled, curling in upon itself, as she collapsed to the floor.

"Miriya!"

Dimly, she heard Charles's alarmed cry, but she could not respond. The world behind her eyes flashed blinding white before plunging into darkness.
CHAPTER EIGHT

Consciousness welcomed her with a breeze about her face. Her eyes still closed and her hand unsteady, Miriya swiped away the sensation.

Large, warm hands captured hers, the touch gentle. "Come on now. Wake up, honey."

She forced her eyes open but closed them when the world, streaked in psychedelic hues, swirled around her. Her skull throbbed as if someone had taken a crowbar to it. Gingerly, she touched her head. It was not in pieces, thank God. The brokenness was only on the inside.

Being a telepath had its drawbacks, and most of them became evident only after losing a fight to another telepath.

She cracked open an eyelid and winced. Charles's face wavered into focus. "What can I get you?" he asked. "Water? Food?"

"A new head."

"If you can make a joke about it, you're probably going to be all right." Charles grinned, supporting her as she pushed to a sitting position. Slow and careful movements helped minimize the sensation of her brain jostling in her skull and the nausea that accompanied it. Several deep breaths anchored her further, and within a few minutes, she felt steady enough to stand.

He hovered next to her, his supporting arm no more than inches away. She wobbled forward. "I think I'm okay."

"You need to take it easy for a bit."

"How long was I out?"

Charles glanced at his watch. "About ninety minutes."

"What?" Her jaw dropped. "The council—"

"I don't know if the enforcers are here, but if there's fighting, I haven't heard any of it yet."

"Nothing happened?"

Charles shook his head.

Miriya's shoulders slumped. She had expected something...anything...to happen. Had she only imagined her psychic conversation with Madame Devereaux?

_Possibly_. She bit back a hiss of frustration. How could she separate the real from the imagined through that haze of psychic agony? "We've got to get out of here."

"I've tried every door and window."

"But you've unlocked this door."

Charles shrugged. "From the inside, sure, but I can't get through the deadbolt on the other side. The door's solid oak."

"That's it? Just a deadbolt?" Miriya inhaled and pushed her mind out. Pain clawed at the edges of her consciousness, but Charles's arm around her shoulder steadied her. Her telepathic power moved invisibly through physical space, sifting through minds and brushing against psychic shields until it found an unshielded mind.

According to Jake, subtlety was the key in initiating contact with a non-psychic. People were more likely to trust gut instinct than a voice in their head. Guide them, one step at a time.

Miriya shaped an image of the grand foyer, and moved through it, past the milling guests and toward the staircase that wound up to the southern tower. The footsteps hesitated at the bottom of the staircase, but she lured them up with a hint of mystery and the thrill of the unknown. She coaxed those footsteps past other closed doors on each landing, and knew when the person stopped outside _her_ door. Fingertips traced the outline of the deadbolt.

Charles glanced sharply at the faint sound.

Miriya imagined the bolt drawing back, the motion slow and precise. The visual transferred from her mind to that of the person standing outside the door.

Moments later, the bolt slid back. The door swung open.

A young woman in a burgundy gown stood, slack-jawed, outside the room. She blinked, as if startled to find people behind the locked door. Her gold carnival mask fell from her hand.

Charles released Miriya, stepped forward, and picked up the woman's mask from the floor. He offered it to her before leaning forward to place a lingering kiss upon her cheek. "Thank you for saving us." His whisper was low, intimate.

The charming smile on Charles's face was one of his most potent weapons. Non-mutants, Miriya realized, were not unarmed.

The young woman's mouth moved several times before she found her voice. "Are you—? Are you all right?"

"We are now. Thank you." He glanced over his shoulder. "Miriya?"

Miriya nodded. The heel on her left shoe had snapped and her dress was beyond salvage, but fortunately, Charles was a tall man and his sweater covered the curve of her buttocks. If nothing else, she would certainly stand out in the crowd. "Let's go."

She led the way with Charles and the woman following. The stone steps were rough and cold against the soles of her bare feet, but she went as fast as she dared, despite a still-woozy head. She missed her footing twice, but Charles caught her before she tumbled headlong down the stairs.

"Slow down," he cautioned.

A scream, muted by distance, but shrill with panic, pierced the air.

The young woman yelped. "What was that?"

Miriya glanced at her. "Just get out of the house as quickly as you can. Charles, you too."

He arched his eyebrows. The look he gave Miriya questioned her sanity. "Not without you, babe."

"I came here to rescue you—"

"Right, but I'm particularly attached to that sweater you're wearing, so I hope you don't mind if I hang around to rescue it."

She scowled at him.

Charles shrugged. "I could make the case that it's not your fight either."

He was right. It was not her fight, but she could not stomach the idea of Madame Devereaux dying for her grandson's ambition. The old woman reminded Miriya of her grandmother, a matriarch who possessed old-world manners, stately grace, and undisputed charm.

Plus, Miriya wanted to take out the cost of her ruined dress on Lionel's hide.

She hurried down the staircase. "Let's just get to Madame Devereaux. If we can get her safely out of the house, the reason for the fight goes away."

Charles grimaced. His words slapped her with the force of cold, hard blow. "No, the reason for the fight doesn't go away, not if the enforcer, Jake Hansen, is dead."
CHAPTER NINE

Miriya raced past the unconscious people sprawled across the foyer. She could still sense their presence, which meant they were not dead. The council, it appeared, possessed restraint.

Nevertheless, the foyer and ballroom was a madhouse of screams and stampedes. Some guests raced for the exits, pushing and clawing through each other to reach the doors. Others refused to run, and they were locked in combat with the enforcers, who wore crimson-trimmed black uniforms.

Miriya ducked to avoid a side table telekinetically hurled across the room. At least no one had picked up the grand piano yet.

In that moment, the musical instrument turned into a 550-pound missile. It flew across the room and slammed into the door leading into the dining room, sealing it off with a thundering crash of jangled chords

Charles grabbed her hand. "Over there!"

On the far side of the ballroom, Scott Devereaux leaned protectively over his grandmother. Her eyebrows drew together in an annoyed line. She wore a faint, disapproving frown on her face as she surveyed the chaos. Miriya knew that type of frown. If she had seen it on her own grandmother's face, she would have started running for cover.

"And look! Lionel!"

Miriya glanced in the direction where Charles pointed. On the other side of the room, Lionel Devereaux pressed against the wall. He seemed oblivious to the fight that swarmed around him. His eyes locked on his grandmother and his brother.

Miriya pushed through the crowd, ducking under carelessly swung fists. Apparently, mutants were not averse to throwing in a physical punch or two to supplement the psychic damage they unleashed. She was several feet from Lionel when his expression grew taut and his dark eyes flashed.

Across the room, Scott screamed and reeled to his knees, his hands pressed against his head.

Miriya launched herself at Lionel.

He stumbled back and brought his hands up to protect his face from her. His eyes widened. "You!"

"You bastard. You ruined my dress!" Her pointed fingernails swiped out like talons, leaving bloody scratches down the side of his neck.

His eyes betrayed his stunned confusion.

In that exact second, her mind lashed out. Her telepathic powers sharpened and plunged forward like a stake through Lionel's mind. It smashed against his psychic shields. Miriya felt them quivered from the impact. A sliver, no more than a shard, broke away; a miniscule crack in Lionel's otherwise solid psychic defenses.

He drew in a deep breath and smirked at her. "Not good enough. You're out of your league. Go back to school before you attempt to play with the big boys."

"She's protected by the big boys." Charles threw his fist at Lionel's jaw.

Lionel's head snapped back, and he staggered against the wall. He pressed a hand against the side of his mouth and stared at Charles, surprised that a mere human had dared to attack him.

Miriya glanced across the room. Scott was trying to push to his feet, but the mask of agony on his face confirmed that Lionel had not broken off his assault on his brother's mind. The brawl drew dangerously close to Madame Devereaux. Scott, his teeth bared in a grimace, flung out his arm, hurling the two brawling men to the ground.

_A telekinetic._ Scott could protect his grandmother, but not if he was simultaneously fighting off a telepathic attack from his brother.

Miriya turned back to Charles and Lionel, locked in a fistfight. Charles could possibly win a physical fight, but not if Lionel used his telepathic powers.

She sucked in a deep breath. _Careful now._ Her mind glided over Lionel's, her touch feather-soft as she traced the surface of his psychic shields for the miniscule crack she had inflicted.

Found it.

An imperfection, however tiny, represented a weakness in the overall structure.

She closed her eyes to better focus on the mental image in her mind. The tip of a wedge positioned over the crack. The full force of her psychic ability took on the shape of a massive hammer, bearing down upon the wedge.

She threw herself into the psychic attack.

A thunderous smash rattled her skull and flung her backward.

A cry of wrenching pain tore from Lionel's throat. He collapsed beneath the punishing assault of Charles's fists and curled into a fetal ball.

Across the room, Scott straightened, relief in his eyes.

_Not quite done._ Unless Lionel was actually unconscious, he was not out of the fight.

Her telepathic power reached out once more, gently this time, drawing a curtain of darkness over Lionel's senses. His exhausted, overstimulated mind sank into unconsciousness.

Charles returned to her side and tugged her away from another fighting pair as they slugged their way across the room, their fight as much psychic as it was physical. "There's got to be a way to end this. Who's the enforcer in charge here?"

"I don't know." Miriya scanned the room. Faces blurred. "They're all shielded. I can't read their thoughts."

"Then use your eyes, for God's sake." Charles's head swiveled as he too searched the room. "That enforcer over there is standing back, watching. Could it be him?"

Miriya glanced at the man Charles identified. He was tall and thin, wearing a black enforcer uniform, a man with a shock of brown hair and a cocky grin.

A _familiar_ man.

Her jaw dropped. Her heartbeat stuttered. "Jake Hansen?" _You're alive!_

He grinned. The damned man had the audacity to _grin_ at her.

Miriya strode across the room, threw her arms around his neck to hug him tightly, and then stepped back and flung the palm of her hand at his cheek.

She saw from his eyes that he _could_ have stopped the slap, physically or with his telekinetic powers.

They both knew, however, that he deserved it.

"You stupid bastard."

Jake waved his hand. The air around them shimmered. Suddenly, the sound of the brawl subsided, as if someone had turned down the volume.

Miriya jerked to a stop. No way. Jake could not possibly have—

She reached out, her fingers gliding along the smooth surface of the telekinetic bubble that enclosed Jake and her.

Yes, he had. What _was_ he thinking?

On the other side of the invisible wall, Charles glared at Jake. He wore a look of disgust, and his lips moved, shaping the words, "What the hell?"

Miriya kicked at the telekinetic wall, but only managed to stub her toe. "Let me out."

Jake folded his arms across his chest. "Not until I'm sure you're going to hear what I have to say."

"Fine." She spun around and glared at him. "Why did you let me think you were dead?"

"Because some traps have to be sprung, as opposed to defused. I've got two people on Madame Devereaux. We're not going to let her get hurt."

Miriya noticed, for the first time, the two enforcers standing close to Madame Devereaux and her grandson, Scott. "I don't get it."

"People need to learn not to bait the council. A pointed lesson like this once in a blue moon is much more effective than putting down an uprising once a week."

Miriya bared her teeth in a silent snarl. "Do you even hear yourself? The council is behaving like a tyrannical emperor."

Jake grabbed her hand. "No, we're not. We're trying to keep mutants playing by the rules, the rules that make society safe for us all. I'll tell you what's happening out there right now, Miriya. Alex Saunders is in heated negotiations with the mayor and city council of New Orleans, arguing _against_ mutant registration. He's fighting for the privacy that everyone, including mutants, deserves."

"What's going to happen to the mutants here?"

"We're going to sit them down, and they'll get a lecture from Alex on the dangers of mixing alcohol and recreational drugs with alpha-level mutant powers."

"And Lionel?"

Jake's expression hardened. He glanced over to where Charles stood watch over the unconscious man. "Ah, Lionel's a different matter. The kind thing to do would be to take him into custody. The less kind thing would be to turn him back over to his grandmother."

From the hard glitter in Madame Devereaux's eyes, Miriya did not doubt the truth of Jake's statement. "What about Lionel's coconspirator in the council?"

"He's been dealt with." Jake's answer was terse. He did not elaborate. The telekinetic bubble flickered out.

Miriya looked around. Uniformed enforcers stood over the defeated revelers. Overturned tables, shattered chairs, and torn decorations littered the foyer, ballroom, and dining room. Spilled food and drink smeared across the walls and floors. The grand piano lay on its side.

Miriya picked her way across the ruins of the room to Madame Devereaux's side. The two enforcers who would have barred her way stepped back at a gesture from Jake.

The old woman offered Miriya a gracious smile. "Thank you for your warning, child."

"I'm sorry it did not come early enough to avert the fight."

She shrugged. "Interrogating alpha telepaths is both tedious and time-consuming. It was easier to have definitive proof of my grandson's ingratitude and treachery." She smiled again. "You did well against him."

Miriya allowed herself a faint smile. "Even mutant powers obey the laws of physics." Among other things, she had picked up a trick or two about fighting dirty from Lionel Devereaux. Victory, nevertheless, tasted sour in her mouth.

Scott spoke up. "Thank you, Miss Templeton, for your help." He glanced over at his still-unconscious brother. "I knew he was frustrated, but I never thought he'd actually turn against the family."

Madame Devereaux snorted. "He always had the capacity, the heart, for it. It matters not what is in here or here." She flicked her wrist and tapped her head to emphasize her words. "It's what's in _here—_ " She pressed against her heart. "—that counts. The emotions do not lie."

Miriya could not agree more, but not everyone was lucky enough to be an empath. Sick to the pit of her stomach and still fighting a raging headache, she turned around at the furor of activity by the entrance of the ballroom. A man in his mid-fifties and built like a football player strode into the room.

Jake's voice spoke in her mind. _Alex Saunders was a former pro-wrestler, not a football player._

Stay out of my head, Jake.

_Don't run away, Miriya,_ he cautioned. _Alex is going to want to have a word with you after this._

About what? We won the battle, right? And I helped. The precog was right, and I'm done.

_Battle?_ Jake chuckled. _This was scarcely a skirmish. And remember, the precog said you needed to be in place by the end of the year. The battle—the one that really matters—is still in the future._

Her jaw tightened. A muscle twitched in her cheek.

What good was telepathy if it could not penetrate the veil of lies that seemed to surround everyone? In fact, the greater the psychic skill, the greater the apparent deception. Treachery was the name of the game, and backstabbing was the way the game was won.

It was bullshit...pure and utter crap. She did not need, did not _want_ to live each hour of each day second-guessing the thoughts and motivations of the people around her, wondering how deep and how far to push to find the truth.

In most cases, the truth was hideous anyway.

If working for the council meant reaching her full potential as a telepath, she would almost rather reach lesser heights, but on her own terms and in tune with her own morality. She could grow on her own, choose when and how to exercise her mutant powers, and control her own life instead of worrying about a future battle she had no stake in and no intention of fighting.

Miriya sighed. _I don't want this. I don't want any of this._

Too late, Miriya. You're a fast learner, and you've shown a real talent for this kind of work. Alex is not going to let you go easily.

Director general or not, he can't hold a private citizen against her will. I'm not interested. Read my mind, and since you're apparently slow on the uptake, read my lips too. I don't want to be a part of the council.

She turned her back on Jake and walked out of the room. No one, not Jake, not Charles, and not even Alex Saunders, attempted to stop her.
CHAPTER TEN

Boston welcomed Miriya with a blast of frigid weather. She returned to her routine, her regular classes, and favorite restaurants.

Life, however, changed on her.

She had forgotten the difficulty of living with the persistent fear that she would be identified as an alpha mutant and subjected to the subtle injustices of a society afraid of mutants. Her head ached from the constant watchfulness over everything she said and everything she did.

The key, she reminded herself, was not to get caught.

Miriya resumed her life, except that it was now silent. Once again, she was a lone telepath flying under the radar, trying not to draw attention to herself.

The silence drained her, sucking the energy and delight out of each day. Each hour crawled, though the days passed inevitably and with excruciating slowness. She never imagined she would come to despise her own company.

Miriya slammed her book shut and slouched deeper into the chaise lounge. With a scowl, she surveyed her familiar living room. The bright and contrasting colors failed to cheer her as they usually did.

What the hell was wrong with her?

The problem wasn't about being an enforcer; the council had not contacted her since the fiasco in New Orleans, though Jake had left his phone number on her voicemail. It was far more fundamental; it was about being a telepath, an _alpha_ telepath.

Her life choices apparently came down to walling off her mind and drowning in silence or wading through the disgusting muck of someone else's thoughts. Miriya scowled. Those were _pathetic_ choices. Oh, wait, there was a third option: continue living in the web of deceit she had spun around herself, balancing on the fine line between the first two options.

Grinding her teeth, she picked up a pillow and flung it at the wall before releasing her breath in a sigh. Perhaps it wasn't about picking one of the three equally unappetizing options, but finding a reason to make those options worthwhile. Someone special, perhaps—someone who would keep no secrets from her, someone whose psychic company was worth the price of raw intimacy.

Miriya's mouth twisted into a grimace. If that person existed, he or she had likely been run over and killed by a truck. That kind of perfect connection could not possibly exist. It was just a stupid dream.

Her phone rang. She snatched it up and stared at the caller ID.

With a sigh, she accepted the call. "Hey, Charles."

"I have two tickets to the Boston Philharmonic—"

"Not really up to it."

"You haven't been up for anything for two months now. Come on, Miriya. You need stimulation. I'll even let you pick through my thoughts."

Her shoulders sagged, relaxing with a sigh. She supposed there was no harm in a night out. "Only if you promise not to front any fake thoughts to throw me off track."

"Would I do a thing like that? I'll pick you up tonight at six. I found a lovely French bistro I think you'll enjoy."

Another soft sigh flowed out of her. "Sure. Why not?"

At 5:45 p.m., she took the elevator to the first floor to wait for Charles. The elevator stopped on the tenth floor to let in a couple that had obviously been fighting. No telepathic powers needed—just a pair of eyes. The man's mouth was set in a grim line. The woman, her red-rimmed eyes puffy, gripped her clutch so tightly her knuckles were white.

Miriya's telepathic powers reached out, brushing against their unshielded minds. She drew her breath in sharply as the unvarnished truth, ugly as hell, tumbled out.

Moments later, the man released his breath in a sigh and reached out, his hand closing over the woman's. "It'll be all right. We'll be fine."

Miriya rolled her eyes and resisted the urge to snort. She hesitated for a moment before throwing the words into his mind. _She bought the positive pregnancy test off eBay._

He dropped the woman's hands as if burned. "You bought a positive pregnancy test!" His confused gaze flicked briefly to Miriya before returning to the woman. "You—" He stepped back from her. "What the hell?"

The woman blanched. She reached for him. "Please, Henry, it's not what you think. I just—"

The elevator door opened on the first floor. He turned his back on her and strode away.

The woman choked back a sob. Her sideway glance at Miriya sharpened into a glare. "You...you're a telepath, aren't you? You goddamned bitch! I'll sue you; I swear to God." She hurried out of the elevator and raced after the man. "Henry! Please, stop. Please let me explain."

Miriya dragged a trembling hand through her hair. Should she have said nothing? If she hadn't spoken up, the man would have walked into a marriage built on lies. When was it okay to interfere? When was it not?

She swallowed hard. She would have to live with either the blame for interfering or the guilt of not interfering, regardless of what she did.

And damn if she wasn't surrounded by first-class liars and deceivers, even the non-mutants. When it came down to it, she was one of those liars too. After all, she had lied her way from Maria Durand into Miriya Templeton.

Her mind in turmoil, she waited by the front door. Charles, prompt as always, showed up at six in a silver Maserati. Forcing her mind away from the unpleasant incident in the elevator and her newly found dislike for herself, Miriya smiled as she slid onto the cream-colored leather seats and ran a finger across the butter-soft surface. "How long have you had this puppy?"

He flashed her a grin and pulled away from the curb. "About three days. You like it?"

"Very nice. What happened to your Porsche?"

"Sold it to a friend." His voice tensed. "Actually, he got into an accident yesterday."

Miriya sat up straight. "Really?"

"Someone rammed him, deliberately, and then drove off. He's in intensive care—bad injuries—but the doctors think he'll make it."

"That's good."

"Yeah. The car's totaled though. He hadn't even gotten the title changed over to his name yet." _Maybe I should just give him the money back. At least half of it._

Miriya smiled. A warm feeling filled her. It was just like Charles to do something like that.

He glanced at her. "So, how are you doing?"

She shrugged. "Fine, I guess."

"Jake calls me at least once a week."

Miriya straightened in her seat, her heart thumping hard in her chest. "Really?"

"Keeps asking what you're up to. I think he's still hoping you'll join the council."

She rolled her eyes. "Hope he's not holding his breath."

"No one understands why you said no."

"What part of 'I want to control my own life' is so hard for you to understand?"

Charles shook his head. "Control is an illusion. Pete had control of the Porsche, but none over the SUV that rammed him." He flashed her a lopsided grin. "All my social connections and money couldn't get me out of trouble at the Mistick Krewe party. I needed an ex-girlfriend to come save me. Seems to me, the best control anyone can hope for is to surround yourself with good friends and hope they care enough to help you out every now and again."

Miriya smiled. "Friends like you?"

Charles laughed. "I was thinking of friends like _you_."

Her smile widened as she relaxed in her seat. Out of habit, her telepathic powers swept out, scanning the minds in the cars around her. "So, you were telling me about this bistro." She paused, her brow furrowing. "You're being followed, Charles."

He cast her an alarmed glance. "What? Who?"

"His name is David Seward."

"Doesn't ring any bells. Why is he following me?"

Miriya zeroed in on the unshielded mind in the large SUV several cars behind the Maserati. David's thoughts and memories flashed through her mind, like pieces of a storyboard. She wrenched them into cohesion.

She blinked hard, sucked in a deep breath, and glanced around sharply. "Pull into that parking garage."

Charles gave her a hard look, swung the steering wheel, and directed his car into the garage.

"Park as close to the mall entrance as possible. We're going in."

"Miriya—"

"He rammed your Porsche, believing you were in it. He's going to ram your Maserati too. We have to get off the streets."

"And into the mall?"

"There are security guards at mall entrances. He has a gun."

"What?" He slid the Maserati into a parking lot, and they quickly got out of the car.

The SUV, only twenty feet away, accelerated. Its headlights brightened into a blinding glare as Charles ran toward the mall entrance.

"No!" Miriya shouted. He would never make it.

Her telepathic powers lashed out, wrapped around David Seward's mind, and squeezed consciousness from it. _Dive right,_ she screamed at Charles.

He dove to the right, tumbling between parked cars. The out-of-control SUV twisted into a spin before rear-ending the guardrails at the mall entrance. Alarmed security guards rushed forward to surround the vehicle.

Miriya ran to Charles as he pushed slowly to his feet. She grasped his arm, steadying him. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he murmured, brushing down his clothes. He looked over his shoulder. "What the hell was that?"

"It was hard to figure out. He's at least borderline crazy, but does the name Dataflex, Inc. mean anything to you?"

Awareness gleamed in Charles's eyes. "I acquired Dataflex...or rather, my company acquired Dataflex. The regulators okayed the deal about a year ago, and we finally closed on it last month."

Miriya glanced at the security guards swarming around the crashed SUV and sighed. "He lost his job."

"Damn it."

"You didn't know?"

"I own Brandon Industries, but I don't make the management decisions. Hell, I even left Dataflex's management team in place to keep running the shop."

"The job loss tipped him over the edge. He had a divorce a year ago and lost both his kids in the custody battle. He's just gone to court to try to get them back, but without a job—"

"He has no shot at it," Charles finished.

Miriya nodded.

"And you got all that from scanning his mind?"

She sighed. "I picked up lots of bad habits after New Orleans, including scanning minds around me, just in case. New Orleans turned me into a paranoid bitch."

"Who possibly saved both our lives today." Charles managed a weak grin. "Paranoia is a good color on you." He glanced at his watch. "Can we take a rain check on the dinner and the opera? I need to handle this."

"Sure." Miriya waved him away. She did not need to scan Charles's mind to know that he was probably going to use his wealth and influence to minimize the amount of trouble David Seward was in.

What she did not expect was the security guard who approached her minutes later. "Excuse me, miss?" His manner was polite, his tone deferential. "Mr. Brandon says you were the alpha telepath who warned him of Mr. Seward's intentions. We need to get a statement from you, please."

_Damn it._ She was in a world of trouble. She would be arrested, charged with God-knows-what, sued for damages. Miriya squeezed her eyes shut. "Sure." Her voice trembled.

The statement part was simple. The lack of challenge from the security guard though was surprising. He took everything she said at face value. It did not make sense until he wrapped up his questions ten minutes later. "Thank you, Miss Templeton. I'm sorry to take time away from your enforcer duties, but we needed this statement."

_Enforcer._ He thought she was an enforcer with the Mutant Affairs Council. Perhaps Charles had told the security guard as much to make the questioning simpler.

She leaned against the car and watched as David, still unconscious, was transferred to an ambulance. Charles was smoothing things over with the authorities, but her presence and her contribution were not among those things that needed smoothing over. No one had challenged her decision to knock out David, or questioned the resulting near-accident as his SUV spun into the guardrails.

It drove home the difference between being an unfettered alpha mutant, always under suspicion of wrongdoing, or being an authority figure, a trusted representative of the government. The change would not resolve all her self-doubt over how she used her telepathic powers, but it would buy her breathing room and the luxury to help her friends without being hassled.

She pursed her lips. She could do "different," at least for a while.

Perhaps it was time for another chat with Jake Hansen.
CHAPTER ELEVEN

Ten months later...

The icy bite of the night wind chased Miriya into the lobby of Hotel Washington. The revolving doors did not so much usher her gracefully into the subtle warmth of a temperature-controlled room as hit her in the face with a wall of heat.

She tugged off her scarf, unbuttoned her long coat, and hoped her nose would not start dripping. Damn, she hated winter.

A uniformed doorman inclined his head. "Welcome to the Hotel Washington."

She smiled at him. "I'm here for the party."

"Of course. Please take the elevators to the eleventh floor. Someone there will take your coat." He waved his hand at a wall of elevator doors. "And Merry Christmas."

"Thank you." She reached into his mind and snatched the time. Eight fifteen. Not as late as she had feared. Jake had warned her that arriving late at the Mutant Affairs Council annual Christmas party would be a faux pas—if only because all the good alcohol would be gone.

Perched on four-inch heels, she walked through the hotel lobby, past the white and black leather furniture and red centerpieces. The Hotel Washington was listed on the National Register of Historic Places, but the ultra-modern lobby offered no hints of it.

The elevators—absurdly tiny and ridiculously slow—did.

She chafed against the antique technology, but the man and woman sharing the elevator with her either did not notice or were not bothered. The tuxedoed man seemed young, scarcely out of high school. The woman with whom he clasped hands and nuzzled noses looked two decades older, though her red gown showed off a trim figure.

They were headed to the party too, and for that reason alone, Miriya resisted the urge to be a telepathic busybody. It would be embarrassing, not to mention rude, to collide into someone else's psychic shields, especially if they were stronger.

The elevator doors opened onto the eleventh floor. The couple stepped out, and Miriya followed them to the rooftop bar. Classical music piped through unseen speakers, and the scent of cinnamon and cider filled the air. Candles complemented the blue and red mood lighting, but the view of the Washington Monument drew her attention. The spotlights that drenched its base faded into a pale glow by the time the light reached its apex.

Someone's arm slipped around her waist. "You can see the Treasury building and the White House from this other window."

Miriya turned and smiled. "Hello, Jake." She eased out of her coat and handed it to a waiting hostess.

He grinned at her. "You look awesome. Green always did look good on you. Cool earrings." Jake swiped the dangling jewelry with a finger, causing it to brush against her shoulders. He turned slightly to look at the couple who had been in the elevator with Miriya. They were at the bar, the man's hand resting against the small of the woman's back. "I see you met Andrea and John."

"Who?" Miriya asked. They walked across the Italian marble floors toward the other set of large windows overlooking the Treasury building.

"Andrea Hunter and John Pendleton. Council-trained alpha telepath and alpha telekinetic."

Miriya's brow furrowed. "Aren't we all council-trained?"

Jake shook his head. "It's just a technical term. Most of us got our psychic powers at puberty, but not the council-trained. They were born with their mutant powers and were, for the most part, raised by the council."

"Hmm. Are there many of them?"

"Just four. No, five. I always forget to count Danyael because he doesn't work for the council. Mutant powers gained too early are troublesome. Most don't survive it." He gestured at the window. "Check it out."

The White House looked pristine in the distance, its white paint pearlescent against the dark blue of the night. Miriya smiled. "Very nice."

"A heck of a photo-op if not for all the crazy people at its gates."

"What? Are they protesting a war that I don't know we're fighting?"

Jake rolled his eyes. "It's December twenty-second."

Miriya stared at him for a moment. "Oh, _Galahad_." She looked at the mob clamoring outside the White House. "Are they _still_ at it?"

"It is the twenty-fifth anniversary of Galahad's creation."

"Precisely. Twenty-five years. Time to move on, people. Find something else to obsess about."

"How can they when Purest Humanity is always adding fuel to the fire?" Jake's tone changed to mimic the deep baritone of Jason Rakehell, the president of the largest pro-humanist organization in the world. "'The clones and in vitros are taking up your spots in elite private schools and colleges. They're stealing your jobs. They're the reason you're working for minimum wage at a fast food joint instead raking in the big bucks at Goldman Sachs.'"

Miriya chuckled.

Jake went on. "'The mutants are conspiring to take over the government. They are setting up elite military units—'"

"Yeah? Where's the hazard pay?"

Jake resumed his normal tone. "I know, right?" He shook his head. "I can't believe they buy into this crap. Neanderthals were smarter than these idiots, though those leaders at Purest Humanity aren't stupid. They know Galahad's the ideal incendiary point. The genetically created perfect human being? Play it up. It's the best way to make people feel even more insecure about their position in the grand hierarchy of life."

"Jeez. It's still stuck in that lab where it was created. No one even knows what it looks like. We ran out of interesting things to say or speculate about Galahad two decades ago. It really is time to find a new obsession."

"No kidding. Here, let me get you a drink from the bar. What do you want?"

"A Riesling, if they have it, or any other white."

"Coming right up."

Jake returned several minutes later with a glass of wine, by which time Miriya had a chance to greet the other enforcers she had met over her seven-month tenure with the Mutant Affairs Council. He had to wade through the crowd gathered around her.

"You're quite the popular chick," Jake remarked, offering her the wine.

Miriya shrugged. "New blood. More interesting than the stodgy old folks around here."

"Or maybe it has something to do with your reputation as a rule-breaker who gets things done."

She grinned at him over the rim of her glass. "Hard to follow rules if you don't know what they are."

Jake smirked. "That excuse might have worked if you weren't an alpha telepath."

A buzz of conversation erupted by the bar. Voices spiked, terse and anxious.

An undercurrent of urgency surged through her. Her smile faded. "What's going on?"

"Don't know," Jake said, but he too sounded tense.

Everyone in the room turned toward the large television behind the bar. Images resolved into an inferno consuming a large octagonal building. People shouted over the loud crackle of flames, and the flashing lights of emergency vehicles lit the screen as uniformed policemen, firemen, and EMTs scurried around injured people.

Words scrolled across the bottom of the screen. "Pioneer Laboratories attacked by Purest Humanity supporters."

Miriya's eyes widened. "Galahad..."

Jake grimaced. "Not good. They're going to kill it."

A soot-stained reporter appeared on the screen, the microphone held close to his lips. "Intense heat is preventing fire crews from entering Pioneer Labs. It is believed that at least a hundred people, most of them from Purest Humanity, and Galahad, are still in the building."

The camera swung away from his face and zoomed in on six vaguely humanoid shapes emerging from the burning ruins of the lab. Bulky torsos. Elongated limbs. Misshapen bodies. Grotesque faces.

The creatures broke formation, and without hesitation threw themselves at the humans—cops, ambulance workers, news reporters—and savaged them, tearing and smashing. Screams shrilled through the open microphones, punctuated by scattered gunfire. Through it all, Miriya heard the vicious growls and snarls of the abominations, a guttural series of moans that sounded like incoherent words.

The attack lasted no more than a minute, but the massacre seemed eternal, until an abomination hurled the body of a cop directly into the camera. The screen went black. There was a brief flicker, and then the news anchor, comfortable and safe in the newsroom, reappeared on the screen. His face was pale, his speech stuttering as he tried to explain the madness captured by the final moments of his news crew.

"Oh crap," Jake muttered.

That, in Miriya's opinion, was a hell of an understatement.

Alex Saunders's voice cut through the low buzz of conversation filling the rooftop bar. "Andrea, John, Jessica, get over to the lab. Find those creatures and stop them. Erin, I need—" He broke off, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a smartphone. The short conversation concluded with a "Yes, sir."

He disconnected the call. "The mob in front of the White House is out of control. The head of security needs our help to disperse them. Jake, you and your team are on it. No casualties."

"No," Jake muttered under his breath. "But there are lots of ways to fill a hospital ward without killing anyone. Damn, those pro-humanists are crazy. Attacking Pioneer Labs _and_ the White House?"

Miriya shook her head. "They're furious. I would be too if my friends just got torn up by monsters created in a lab."

Alex continued. "The metro police are reporting scattered incidents of fighting between humans and derivatives, and it's likely to escalate. I want all mutants _off_ the streets, especially alphas. Pro-humanists have been spoiling for a fight for too long. I'm not going to give them a chance to go after mutants."

"Aren't we going to defend the derivatives, sir?" Jake asked.

"We're going to stop the fighting _without_ taking sides, even if all of you think the pro-humanists started it and have had it coming. Kimberly—" He looked at his executive assistant. "—will coordinate an orderly extraction of all mutants from Washington, D.C. We'll need everyone's help to clear the city. The party's over, folks."

~*~

Early the next day, gritty-eyed from lack of sleep, Miriya strode into Alex Saunders's office.

He looked up. "Miriya. All done?"

"Almost," she confirmed. The heels of her boots clicked sharply against the hardwood floors. "Everyone has checked in. The alpha mutants have been relocated to our North Carolina installation, per your orders, and everyone else is comfortably ensconced in guest suites here or in the Baltimore office."

"Then what's the problem?" he asked, anticipating the "but" in her sentence.

"We caught the power signature of an alpha mutant who has not checked in. Actually, we saw it once last night, just after midnight, but for a variety of reasons, thought it might have been just an error in the readings. It flashed again, just a few minutes ago."

"Who is it?"

"Danyael Sabre."

Alex's eyes narrowed immediately. "Danyael? What is he doing here? He's based in New York City. When did you say he came down?"

"Likely last night. I went back through our records here and in New York, and searched his energy signatures. There's strong evidence that he was in New York City until late yesterday evening. The machines recorded strong traces of his secondary power signature in Brooklyn, at the free clinic where he works. But after midnight, his primary power signature showed up here, in McLean, followed by a secondary flash. We thought it might have been a mistake with the machines. They do screw up every now and again."

"Not with an alpha empath though. Their signatures are too powerful to be a machine glitch."

Miriya acknowledged the implicit rebuke with an incline of her head. "And then his primary flashed this morning, once again in McLean."

"Damn." Alex leaned back in his seat. "What could he be doing here?" he mused aloud.

Miriya did not offer a response to his rhetorical question. "I've contacted his controller in New York, who is in a bit of a panic that Danyael somehow managed to get out of New York without her knowing. She insists he has been historically easy to manage and responsive to the requests of the council."

"He is." Alex's mind was shielded, but something flickered in his eyes, something disturbingly close to fear. "Find him, Miriya, and bring him in."

"Or put him down?" she asked explicitly.

Alex winced. For several moments, silence filled the space between them. He finally nodded. "Only if there are no other options available to you."

She did not have to be a telepath to sense his unease and his reluctance. Danyael Sabre was just an empath, wasn't he? "Do you have any advice for me?"

"Just be careful, Miriya, and don't get overconfident. There are depths to Danyael's power that he doesn't typically draw from, but they're available to him. If you need to take him down, do it fast, because if he actually cuts loose, he'll most certainly drive hundreds of unprotected minds to suicide."

She blinked. Surely Alex could not be serious. Hundreds of unprotected minds to suicide? Just who _exactly_ was this Danyael Sabre?

Well, she would soon find out. She nodded, turned on her heel, and strode out of the office.

Either way, she knew she had nothing to fear. The alpha precognitive's vision wanted her in place within the council by the end of the year, which meant that the pivotal battle would not take place until the following year at the earliest. Whatever the outcome of her meeting with Danyael Sabre, she would survive it. The meeting, even Danyael, was insignificant in the grand scheme of her life.

~*~

Danyael's energy signature led Miriya to a Spanish-revival mansion that presided over three acres of prime real estate in McLean, Virginia. Her quick scan of the home and its residents offered little by way of psychic resistance, with the exception of Danyael. His psychic shield shimmered with the undercurrent of extraordinary power.

Her brow furrowed as she strolled unchallenged through the gardens, tracking him like a scent hound. Miriya knew, from Danyael's council records, that he was twenty-eight and worked as a doctor in a free clinic in Brooklyn, New York. He had been born with his mutant powers, and for twelve years, he was abused by his caregivers. His uncontrolled psychic abilities incited love and hate in equal measure, twisting both into cruel obsession.

Like many alpha empaths, Danyael should have died young, but Lucien Winter, scion of the influential Winter family and sole heir to its fortune, then only fifteen, saved Danyael from the orphanage. Lucien protected Danyael until he was diagnosed as an alpha empath and learned to control his powers.

Lucien's help notwithstanding, to survive as long as he had, Danyael must have been particularly tenacious of life.

The real question was whether he was as skilled as he was tenacious.

As luck would have it, the patio doors opened and the low-frequency hum of Danyael's psychic signature shot up a few notches. Danyael himself.

Miriya crouched by the bushes. If the empath had seen her, he gave no indication of it. She smirked. How careless of him. It appeared that, like all alpha mutants, he tended to rely more on his psychic powers than his physical senses.

Danyael prowled the length of the patio beside the curved edges of the swimming pool, clearly disturbed, even distressed. She did not need any empathic or even telepathic skills to figure that out. Anyone with eyes would have noticed it from his restive motions; from the tension in his lean muscled frame; and from the way he clenched and unclenched his fists as he tried to work through his anxiety and stress.

Up close, the edges of his energy signature were jagged, though nothing slipped past his ironclad control. She allowed herself an appreciative smile. His pale blond hair contrasted with his dark eyes; both highlighted his sculptured features. Danyael's beauty was of the sort made for blood feuds, his profile so flawlessly perfect that it could have driven angels to tears of envy. He was also doing his damnedest to hide it. He probably did not make many friends with his ingeniously designed psychic shield that continuously emitted emotional cues to deflect interest away from him.

Miriya inhaled sharply, bracing herself to make the initial contact with him, but halted when the patio door opened again and another man, _inconceivably Danyael's twin_ , stepped out. She gaped, stunned into inaction for several precious seconds, before probing the other man's unshielded mind for answers.

A flurry of confused images pounded through her mind. Their voices united to scream one name, "Galahad."

The destruction of Pioneer Labs and the disappearance of Galahad started the entire mess. Danyael was behind it all. There was no point in talking or even hoping that he would come in quietly, no point in giving away the advantage of surprise.

Alex Saunders's words echoed in her mind: _Take him down; do it fast._

Rallying her powers, she spiked an attack into Danyael's mind to shatter his shields, and followed up with a blast that should have splintered his conscious mind into fragments.

Danyael screamed in anguish and reeled to one knee, clutching his head in both hands in agony, but his shields did not collapse. They did not even waver.

_Damn it_. She had taken out other alpha telepaths with the same attack. How could a mere empath withstand it?

Galahad raced forward. "Danyael!" he cried with alarm, leaning over Danyael, supporting him through the wracking shudders.

"Telepath..." Danyael's warning was forced past clenched teeth.

Galahad tensed. He straightened, his dark eyes scanning the area. For a split second, his gaze darted past her before locking back on her. "Zara! Lucien!" His cry set off panicked alarm in the house.

Miriya tensed as Galahad sprinted toward her. No need for secrecy now. She pushed to her feet, prepared to send a psychic blast into Galahad's mind, but froze. Fear so overpowering, so pungent she could smell it on her skin crawled through her, its icy claws sinking into her spine.

Some distant part of her mind, still rational, screamed at her that Danyael, who struggled to rise to his feet, was actually fighting back. He had latched on to the psychic trail left by her attack and followed it back to her mind. Miriya felt Danyael snaking insidiously past the psychic barriers that would otherwise have kept him out, before unleashing his own particular brand of hell.

Galahad reached her, but inexplicably, he grabbed her and in a smooth motion, pushed her toward Danyael, toward the house. She stumbled, falling beside Danyael as two people—a young man and a young woman—ran out of the house and raced past her to join Galahad. She looked past them and saw what Galahad had seen—six grotesque, vaguely humanoid forms loping rapidly across the lawn toward the house.

The escaped monsters from Pioneer Laboratories.

A strong hand closed around her wrist. Miriya jerked her gaze up. Danyael's dark eyes were pools of pain. "Help me." He broke off his attack on her emotions as swiftly and cleanly as he had launched it.

She sucked in a gasp of air as her emotions cleared, freeing her mind and body.

"Link us," he said. "All of us."

Miriya searched his face. Her mind touched his. Her eyes narrowed as she grasped the edges of his plan. "You're crazy!"

"I have to try." He forced the words through another hiss of barely suppressed agony. "Those creatures tore through an entire police force. They'll tear through my friends unless I can keep them alive long enough to win the fight."

His plan went against all of her better instincts, but Galahad and his companions were out of time. She closed her eyes. Like rippling tentacles, her powers surged out and latched onto the unshielded minds of Danyael's three companions. She glanced over at him. His psychic shields dropped, permitting her entry. She reached into his mind, latched on, and met his gaze with new respect. It was an act of extreme courage, of stunning vulnerability. He had freely opened his mind to her, giving her full access to help his friends, even if it meant that she could easily destroy him.

We have found him...Brothers...Kill humans...Kill humans.

Miriya shook her head, her blond hair swaying as she braced against the flurry of incoherent images and maddened thoughts coming from the creatures. Scarcely ten feet away, Galahad, Lucien, and Zara fought against the creatures that came at them from all sides. The three humans were power and grace personified, trained elegance and precision of the finest martial arts disciplines pitted against brute strength and inhuman speed. The odds were stacked against the humans, but unnatural calmness flowed from Danyael through Miriya to the humans, reinforcing their ability to face the creatures without fear.

A massive claw, stained with dried blood, raked across Lucien's abdomen, tearing through skin and flesh, but he did not cry out. Next to her, Danyael tensed and shuddered. His secondary powers—his empathic healing ability—surged through her and into Lucien, absorbing both the pain and the effects of the injury, sealing Lucien's wounds even before blood had a chance to spill.

Miriya's mind reeled. Danyael did not just control emotions. He could heal with a psychic touch.

Awestruck, she stood at the heart of power, the central link between Danyael and his friends. His primary and secondary mutant abilities flowed effortlessly through her, reinforcing courage, whisking away pain and injury, offering healing and succor.

Danyael weakened.

Miriya lost track of how many near-death experiences he absorbed. She crouched protectively over him as he curled into a fetal ball, shaking so hard it seemed he might shatter. He could not even cry out each time one of his companions took the brunt of an attack that washed through the psychic chain directly into him. All his energy seemed focused on dragging another gasp of air into his lungs.

The other people in the house rallied and rushed outside. A young woman on the balcony braced a large handgun against the railing, took careful aim, and fired a single, precise shot.

One of the creatures roared in pain as the bullet slammed into its forehead. Breaking away from the core of the fighting around Galahad, Lucien, and Zara, it clawed through an older man and then scaled the wall to reach the young woman. Someone in the house shrieked a warning.

Danyael pushed to his feet and lunged after the creature, grabbing its leg as it leapt for the balcony. Snarling and flailing, it lost both its balance and grip, and fell to the ground.

Miriya cursed aloud as the creature collapsed on top of Danyael and clambered to its feet. Beneath it, Danyael stirred weakly and convulsed, coughing blood, as another brutal attack—this one sustained by Zara—surged through the psychic chain. He did not resist as the creature lifted him off the ground with no visible effort. Danyael's head fell back; his eyes were closed. He was scarcely breathing.

The creature pulled a clawed appendage back and poised to rip through his flesh. _Kill humans...kill humans._

Miriya blasted a psychic jolt with surgical precision into Danyael's brain, straight into the primitive limbic system, into his subconscious where his innate instincts and innermost emotions resided. She screamed out a single, terse order: _Fight!_

Danyael gasped, shuddering back into full awareness. His eyes opened, and he stared into gaping jaws that dripped saliva and blood. He reached forward, grabbed onto the creature's shoulder with one hand to brace himself, and drove the heel of his other hand into its temple. Danyael's voice shouted into her mind. _Shields up! Break the link!_

Miriya tore her mind away from his and severed the psychic chain fractions a second before Danyael's shields yanked back up. His mind and emotions were once again fully protected behind exquisitely perfected barriers. He pulled the plug on the dam that kept his most destructive emotions walled away. Physical contact was all he needed to direct his pain, and he wielded it with deadly precision as he drove it into the creature.

The creature froze, its mouth open in mid-roar. The sound died in its throat. Its hands flexed, dropping Danyael to the ground. He scrambled away from it, but it scarcely noticed. It moved again, first slowly, as its mouth opened wider to release a heart-rending wail of misery. With increasing speed, it tore into itself. Bloodied nails raked furrows into its deformed face, clawing out its eyes. The hands moved frantically across its body as it ripped through its chest cavity, all the time uttering a wrenching moan of desperate sorrow, the kind of sorrow that could end only in suicide. With inhuman strength, it used two hands to pull apart its ribs, breaking them, and then reached in to yank out its still-beating heart. It stared at the organ with an expression of pitiful relief, and then dropped to its knees before crumpling to the ground. The bloody, malformed heart rolled out of its hand to stop at Danyael's feet.

With a loud gasp, Miriya released her breath. Danyael could not just heal with a touch. He could also _kill_ with a touch.

The other creatures halted their attack, staring at the corpse with shock and horror. _Brother...Brother._ The wail began, an aching howl that echoed among the creatures. _Humans kill...Kill humans...Kill humans now...No, leave now._

Miriya did not know which creature issued the order, but as one, they all turned and loped away, cutting across the lawn and vanishing into shadows as they neared the tree line. As suddenly as the attack had begun, it was over.

Only Danyael's pained, harsh breathing punctuated the silence.

Lucien looked up at the young woman on the balcony who had fired the weapon. "Xin. Call the police; tell them what happened and that those things are on the loose somewhere in this neighborhood. Under no circumstances are the police permitted inside the house." He pushed past Miriya, and knelt by Danyael, supporting the mutant as he slowly tried to rise. "Danyael. Are you all right?"

Lucien grimaced as Danyael coughed up blood with such force that he staggered and would have fallen if not for Lucien's grip on him. "Damn," Lucien cursed aloud. "Help me get him to his room."

"No, wait. Carlos..." Danyael looked over his shoulder at the older man who had been torn apart by the creature and was curled in a rapidly growing pool of blood.

"Someone else will have to get to him."

"Not enough time," Danyael insisted.

Zara raced past them and knelt to gather the dying man in her arms. "Hang in there." She pressed her hand against Carlos's torn chest and glanced back over her shoulder at Danyael. "Help him!"

Danyael dropped to his knees beside Carlos. His face was pale, his breathing labored. Miriya watched, stunned. How much damage had Danyael sustained? How much more was he planning to take on, damage that he would then have to work through on his own, without help from anyone?

Her eyes widened as he touched Carlos. The psychic glow of Danyael's empathic healing powers was weak, faint. It spluttered, rising and falling with every pained breath. It flowed out of him ungrudgingly, but it was a trickle compared to the powerful surge that had kept his friends alive through the fight. Apparently, his healing capability was limited by how much he could endure, and he could not absorb any more. His body had been pushed past all limits of human endurance. Any more, and his life would be at risk.

Carlos gasped, choking on the blood rapidly filling his lungs. He reached out, grasping Zara's hands, clinging on to her like a lifeline. The rapid gush of blood slowed but did not stop, as Danyael's powers trickled through the ravaged body. The open, raw wounds did not close. Carlos's breath rattled in his throat, a weak, dying gurgle.

Zara glared at Danyael. "Why aren't you healing him?"

"I...can't anymore," Danyael whispered in defeat. He slumped into Lucien's supporting arms, shuddering as he turned his face away. A cough racked his body. He convulsed, spitting blood—dark and viscous—into his hand.

"That's not good enough." Zara grabbed his shirt with two hands and shook him hard until Lucien intervened by pushing her back. "You cower, you hide through the entire fight, and now when he needs your help, you can't come through for him?"

Danyael paused and looked at Zara. Pain filled his dark eyes before he squeezed them shut. His teeth gritted; he reached out to Carlos once more.

Lucien held him back. "Enough," he said.

Zara gripped Carlos's hand. "He is dying!"

Lucien pulled Danyael away. "I'm not going to let my best friend kill himself trying to save Carlos. He's done here. Galahad, give me a hand."

Galahad moved to Danyael's other side, and together the two men helped Danyael into the house.

Moments later, Miriya watched as Carlos died in Zara's arms. Zara choked back a sob as she leaned over Carlos's body and closed his eyes. The virulence of her thoughts, targeted against Danyael, caused Miriya to recoil. _He's pathetic, weak_ , Zara's mental voice spiked with fury. _He let Carlos die._

_Ungrateful bitch!_ Miriya spun on her heel, ready to knock some sense into Zara, but was halted by Danyael's voice speaking quietly in her mind.

_Not her fault. Mine._ With those weary words, Danyael's mental voice trailed into exhausted silence.

Miriya reached into Zara's unshielded mind without permission, flicking quickly through images captured forever in her memories. She saw Danyael as Zara had seen him, huddled on the patio, shaking as she, Lucien, and Galahad fought off the creatures.

The distinction of whether Danyael was shaking in fear or shuddering in pain seemed not to have occurred to Zara. She saw him as weak, incompetent, a failure. She did not seem to know or care that the reason she was standing tall, arrogant, and proud instead of crawling on the ground trying to stuff her entrails back into her stomach was because Danyael had protected and healed her through the battle at nearly unthinkable cost to himself. How could she be so blind?

The reason was perfectly obvious: Zara had been tampered with. Her behavior had all the trademarks of it. She was single-mindedly irrational to the point of interpreting all new information in precisely the same vein. No one—not even a prejudiced human—was actually capable of being that clueless. Danyael's psychic shield was doing exactly what it had been designed to do, exacerbating a negative opinion into heightened dislike.

On the other hand, Miriya could not conveniently blame Danyael's psychic shield for her own lapse into female oblivion. She had attacked him without provocation, and now, it was apparent, without any basis either. Whatever was happening there, it was clear that Galahad was not a reluctant captive. He obviously considered himself among friends.

Miriya's smartphone rang. She took a few steps away from the small crowd gawking like curious children at the corpse of the creature. "Yes, I'm still alive," she announced preemptively into the phone.

On the other end, Alex Saunders released an explosive sigh of relief. "Thank God! The machines picked up what I assume were your initial attack and Danyael's counterattack. And then the machines went completely crazy for about five minutes, tracking your power signature and Danyael's in perfect resonance, almost as if you were amplifying his, like two waves cresting to create an even greater wave. We've never seen his secondary healing powers spike that high before."

"I'd be surprised if you had." The corner of her mouth twisted in an ironic smile.

"And then he cut loose, didn't he?" Alex finished, his tone quiet. "It happened once, when he was much younger, and didn't have as fine a control over his powers. You probably won't believe the power readings we recorded here. What happened, Miriya, and why are you still alive?" he asked bluntly.

"Probably because he wasn't targeting me." She shook her hair back from her face and glanced over at the corpse on the patio floor. "The abominations—the ones that escaped from the lab—showed up just seconds after I attacked Danyael. He concluded that surviving needed to be part of our revised agenda for the day, so we decided to work together, just for novelty's sake."

"And the abominations?"

"One's dead. Danyael drove it to suicide when he 'cut loose,' as you call it. It wasn't pretty. The others fled. And, Alex." She hesitated briefly. "There are other things going on around here."

"Spill it, Miriya. You know I hate secrets."

"Yes, me too. It appears you left out quite a bit when you debriefed me on Danyael's capabilities."

"What do you mean?"

"His shields are insanely strong."

"He's a defense-class alpha empath, and he's double-shielded. What were you expecting?"

"I've broken through defense-class alpha telepaths with far less effort, but that's the least of it. Danyael followed my telepathic attack back to my mind. Since when could empaths do things like that?"

"They can't," Alex said firmly. "Danyael is an alpha empath. He has no telepathic capabilities."

"Well, then you need to consider rewriting the alpha empath playbook, because not only did he manage to sneak past my shields, but we also linked telepathically, seamlessly, and he psychically healed his friends through me. I've never seen an empath pull off such a clean telepathic link before."

"Danyael's very capable."

Nevertheless, she heard doubt in his voice and decided to push her case a bit harder. "Telepathic-level capable?"

"No, he is not telepathic. Trust me. We ran all those tests on him when he was first identified as a mutant, and there is no alpha empath playbook. There are far too few of them to make any generalizations on what they're capable of doing."

"I know what I saw," Miriya said. "I think Danyael is overdue for another review. An alpha empath with secondary healing abilities and minor telepathic capabilities? That kind of mutant would be a little too capable and too dangerous to leave out there. We can't run the risk of someone snatching him up."

"You are blowing things out of proportion, Miriya. I know the results of Danyael's tests. He's not telepathic, and we're not going to yank him out of whatever normal life he's managed to make for himself."

"I'd say 'normal' is about to go poof for him. Galahad, Pioneer Labs' missing pet project, is here, and he looks just like Danyael."

"What do you mean he looks just like Danyael?"

She shrugged. "They look like twins—identical twins. It's far more complicated than we'd originally envisioned. I need to stay around, see it through."

"I don't want mutants involved in this."

"It's too late for that, Alex. Danyael _is_ involved in this. And if you're going to have an alpha empath running loose during this crisis, it may not hurt to have a telepath around to reinforce his shields, if it gets to the point where he can no longer sustain them."

Alex inhaled sharply and was silent for a while. "How badly hurt was he?"

"He'll probably want to stay in bed for a month, though I doubt he has the luxury." She chuckled softly before turning serious again. "Alex, just how strong is he?"

"He's stronger than people expect," Alex Saunders said without any hesitation. "And he is stronger than he knows." Alex paused for a moment. "Take good care of him, Miriya."

~*~

Miriya kept out of the way of Lucien's staff as they began the arduous task of scrubbing blood off the patio tiles, though she waited by the pool until Lucien Winter returned. Lucien was considered one of America's most eligible bachelors. Less well known was his friendship with Danyael Sabre, though a friendship of that caliber should have made the gossip columns. In view of Danyael's extreme reclusiveness, she supposed she should not have been surprised that it did not.

She looked up as Lucien approached. He was good-looking, as most in vitros were; his dark hair was slicked back from a face set in grim lines. No question, he was considering banishing her from his property.

Miriya stepped forward and introduced herself with a faint smile. "I'm Miriya. I'm from the government and I'm here to help." Her grin widened slightly. She had always wanted to say that.

Lucien's stern expression did not waver.

She continued. "Actually, I represent the Mutant Affairs Council, and you may be aware that we've issued a recall on all mutants in the D.C. area."

"Recall?" Lucien echoed. "Why do you refer to your kind as if they're defective products?"

Lucien defended mutants instinctively, Miriya realized with surprise. Good for him. Lucky for Danyael. She shrugged. "Many people consider us defective products, but I digress. When Danyael did not respond to the recall, I was sent to investigate and bring him in."

"Dead or alive?"

"Alive, preferably, but dead was an option for me too." She waved her hand toward the corpse of the abomination. "I realize now that the situation is more complex than we had originally anticipated. I have been assigned to assist in any way I can to resolve this."

"Resolve what, exactly?" Lucien yanked his fingers through his hair. "There's a gene war breaking out in D.C., monsters are roaming my neighborhood, and my best friend shares a face with the most wanted man in the world. Which one of those problems did you want to tackle first?"

Miriya laughed. "Why don't you fill me in on what happened?"

"Why don't you just pick through my mind for the details?" he challenged.

She tilted her head to one side, assessing him. "You don't like what I did to Danyael. I acknowledge that I was wrong and hasty, and I will apologize to him. I am a telepath, and I won't apologize for using short cuts that are available to me. Power is power, whether it comes from the genetic lottery or from extreme wealth. Like it or not, you and I are more alike than you would prefer to admit." Miriya smiled again. "It is indeed a pleasure to meet you, Lucien Winter."
CHAPTER TWELVE

Ten minutes later, Miriya, Zara, Lucien, Xin, and Galahad regrouped in Lucien's study. Miriya, slouched in a large chair, looked around the room. They could not possibly have been a more diverse mix of people—a mutant, a human, an in vitro, a clone, and someone in a category of his own.

A quick mental assessment confirmed Miriya's gut feeling that Lucien Winter was the most normal of the unusual crew that had formed ranks around Galahad.

Zara Itani, a mercenary, was apparently responsible for freeing Galahad from Pioneer Laboratories. For a natural human, she was both attractive and highly skilled, though her non-optimized genetic stew made her a swirl of contradictions that would have caused any telepath's head to spin.

The other woman, Xin, was the clone of Fu Hao, a 3,200 BCE Chinese queen, high priestess, and general. She moonlighted on Zara's cases while working for the NSA during the day. Miriya was not certain how Xin kept her loyalties straight, but she appeared far more grounded than Zara.

Galahad, on the other hand, was almost a blank slate, his personality subdued because of spending his entire life—all twenty-five years of it—in a laboratory. He watched, he listened, and—as Miriya well knew—his mind churned, absorbing information, processing it. His perception of the world filtered through the lens of those who surrounded him. Miriya sighed; Zara, a borderline sociopath, was going to be a horrible influence on Galahad.

And of course, there was Danyael, though Miriya was grateful not to have to deal with him at that moment.

Lucien shut the door of his study and walked over to Zara. He laid a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry about Carlos."

Zara turned shimmering violet eyes up at Lucien. "Danyael let Carlos die."

Lucien shook his head. "You know it's not as simple as that."

"Couldn't he just heal Carlos? How could that be too much to ask?"

"After keeping the rest of us alive? Do you even know what he did for us?" He stared at her, searching her face for a long silent moment, and then shook his head in disbelief. "You have no clue, do you? Keep hating his guts if you want, but at least hate him for the right reasons. We'd all be dead if not for him." Stepping past her, he sat down behind his desk. "This is Miriya. Miriya, Xin, Zara, and Galahad. Miriya's a telepath; she's been assigned by the council to help out."

"A mutant." Zara's eyes narrowed.

"Considering a mutant saved your life, you could be a bit more grateful," Miriya retorted.

Zara shot to her feet. "Grateful? You've unbalanced our world. You use your mutant capabilities to create advantages for yourself no one else has, and then play God. You choose who succeeds and who fails, who lives or dies. You and your kind are the reasons the economy and the financial markets have been teetering on the brink of chaos for almost a decade now. You've derailed international relations and diplomatic negotiations. You have no respect for secrets or for the rules."

"That's right," Miriya said. "What you consider diplomacy and intrigue, we consider bullshit and a general waste of everyone's time. And while you're listing all the wonderful things we've done for the world, don't forget to include the fact that mutants eliminated the Islamic terrorist threat once and for all, and are largely credited with checking China's rise to power. If not for us, you'd all be speaking Mandarin right now. Or Arabic."

Xin chuckled softly and turned it into a cough. Zara spun around to glare at her.

"But let's get to the heart of the matter," Miriya said. "You're not actually the bigot you appear to be." She gave Galahad a meaningful glance. "You hire clones, date in vitros. You even have friends who are mutants. You acknowledge that we're occasionally a pain in the butt if we're not on your side, but you've found ways to work around us, and you're fairly effective at doing so."

Zara's scowl deepened. Her fingers wrapped around the grip of her handgun.

Miriya hoped Zara's actions were reflex. She kept her eyes locked on Zara as she continued. "More importantly, you know as well as I do, this is not really about humans versus derivatives. It's about the haves versus the have-nots. And, in spite of your human heritage, you're actually among the haves. You're beautiful, intelligent, extremely skilled, and are probably mistaken for an in vitro most of the time. You have the best of both worlds—the access most mutants are denied and the ability to succeed, which most humans don't have. Your issue isn't with mutants. It's just Danyael you can't stand, so don't waste your time taking it out on me."

Miriya paused, scanning through Zara's tumultuous thoughts. "I am sorry about Carlos. I know you considered him a good friend."

Zara inhaled, the sound a jagged, breathless half-sob. Her eyes were moist as she met Miriya's penetrating gaze for a moment and then looked away.

Lucien sighed. His thoughts whispered through Miriya's mind. _Great, now I feel like a bastard for coming down so hard on her. She counted on Danyael to save Carlos. Of course she would be furious with Danyael_. "Did you want to take a few minutes, Zara?"

Zara waved him on. "No, go on. We don't have much time."

Miriya saw Zara shudder as she deliberately set Carlos out of her mind and focused on the problems at hand. So cleanly and swiftly did she cut him off, it was almost as if Carlos had never existed. Her ability to segment her life was amazing, Miriya concluded, though likely necessary, given her work as a mercenary.

Lucien took charge of the meeting. "All right, we've been trying to figure out how Danyael's related to Galahad, and more importantly, why. Pioneer Labs is the obvious link. Danyael and Galahad are about three years apart, which incidentally, is the same period of time when we have no public records of Danyael's life."

"What happened when he was three?" Miriya asked.

"He was pulled half-drowned from a river in West Virginia. No one came forward to claim him."

"So Danyael's not his real name?"

"Not the one he was given at birth. For that matter, no one knows his real birthday either, but Xin has been digging around for more information." He looked at Xin. "Any luck?"

"We think Danyael's mother threw him into the river," Xin said.

"His mother?" Lucien looked stricken.

"I had Danyael look at photographs of all female employees at the lab at that time. None triggered any emotional feedback," she reported. "I'm running background checks now on all employees, males included, to see if there are reports of missing children some twenty-five years ago. It'll take a little longer." She leaned over in her chair to peer at her computer. "Nothing so far. If this search fails to turn up something interesting, I'll include areas around Mill Run River. We'll get there eventually."

"Why don't we just ask Roland Rakehell and Michael Cochran?" Zara asked, referring to the two scientists who had created Galahad. "This beating around the bush is ridiculous. There is an easier way, and that is to take both Galahad and Danyael to them and demand to know what happened. And with your telepath here..." She waved a hand toward Miriya. "She can pick the truth out of their minds, even if they decide not to talk."

Miriya nodded. There was definitely something to be said for the most direct route.

Zara's cell phone rang. She stared at the caller ID. "It's Jason Rakehell. He led the Purest Humanity attack on Pioneer Labs."

Miriya rolled her eyes. The Rakehells had to be the most screwed-up family in America. Roland Rakehell had created Galahad, and his son, Jason, had established Purest Humanity, the largest pro-humanist organization in the world, devoted to destroying his father's work.

Lucien frowned at Zara. "Did he see you leave with Galahad?"

Zara nodded as she accepted the call. "Jason darling." Like the brush of silk against skin, Zara's voice smoothed, transforming from the brusque, strictly business approach she had utilized thus far into a purely feminine, coyly mocking tone that could aim a punch straight into a man's gut.

"Don't fuck with me, Zara." Jason shouted so loudly that everyone in the room could hear him even without the benefit of a speakerphone.

She winced and held the phone away from her ear. "I wouldn't do that, Jason. You weren't that much into it, if I recall."

Miriya searched Zara's mind, scanning her memories. Zara had once dated Jason; in fact, she had been engaged to him. Impressed, Miriya stared at the assassin; wow, she really did get around.

"You know why!"

"Not really. A real man wouldn't let something as petty as unsettled scores against his father get in the way of a good lay."

Lucien caught a glimpse of Miriya's smirk and winced. _I've always appreciated her frankness, but I can certainly see how or why someone else wouldn't. I don't know how she maintains that warmly feminine purr while viciously emasculating a man._

_Practice, I bet,_ Miriya replied with a soft laugh.

"Where is Galahad?" Jason's voice shouted through the phone.

"Oh, he's safe and warm with me." She winked at Galahad, a mischievous gleam in her eyes. "He's beautiful, too, stunningly beautiful. In all your rants against him and your father, you never mentioned how breathtakingly gorgeous he is. It's probably a good thing, or I might have broken into Pioneer Labs earlier to steal him."

"I want him, Zara."

"I don't think he's interested. He's not really inclined that way." Zara laughed softly. She looked at the piece of paper Xin held out to her. _His cell phone signal is coming from Georgetown._ "And by the way, Jason, send the cleaning crew to pick up my place after you're finished trashing it."

"You've got that psycho clone with you again, haven't you?" Jason snarled into the phone.

"He just called you a psycho," she mouthed at Xin with a grin.

Xin shrugged, chuckling silently.

"Jason, Xin has a bigger claim to fame in her current life than you do in yours. Your blanket hatred of anything that isn't a naturally born human is growing tiresome."

"If you knew—"

She cut him off. "I do know." The purr vanished from her voice. Her tone was clipped, terse, and vibrated with annoyance. "I've heard it often enough. You were a neglected child; your father was obsessed with his pet project, Galahad, and left you home alone... What you've always failed to mention is that you were left at home with all the luxuries money could buy and in the company of devoted nannies. If you think your life was so miserable and you can't get over how deprived you were, maybe you could consider switching places with Galahad. You are a tiresome, self-centered prick, Jason. If you want Galahad, come and get him, only you'll have to get through me, and we both know I can beat you in any fight, any day of the week."

"That's telling him." Xin laughed as Zara hung up on Jason.

"No, it's not." Zara wore an expression of disgust. "He can't be told, or he would have regained his senses long before it came down to the burning of Pioneer Labs."

"Lucien called him a tiresome prick too, yesterday."

"Yeah, well, Lucien's usually right about people," Zara conceded with a grin at her friend. "Let's add Jason to the list of complications. He's dangerous; he commands a host of paranoid pro-humanists. The world would be better off without them, but I could have trouble explaining that to the police."

"I could wreck him financially," Lucien offered solicitously.

Zara smiled. "Tempting. Very tempting."

Miriya nodded. "We should at least remove him and his pro-humanist buddies from the equation. He's muddying the waters, and we don't need that."

Galahad looked over at Lucien. "Are people truly so bloodthirsty?"

Lucien shrugged. "Only the females." He ducked the pen Xin threw at his head. "And you object, Xin? Weren't you a military general in a former life?"

"That was a long time ago." She smiled at him. "I could have changed, you know. It's been three thousand years after all, give or take a century or two."

Zara cut in. "I vote for taking Jason out. We don't have to kill him, just check him into a hospital for two weeks or so."

"Danyael's not ready to move," Miriya pointed out.

"So?" Zara tensed at the mere mention of his name.

"We don't go without him."

"We don't need to take him. This isn't a group outing."

"Were you planning on taking me along?" Miriya asked.

"Of course."

Miriya shrugged. "I'm not going anywhere without Danyael. I'm here to help you, but more importantly, I'm here to make sure Danyael's shields do not collapse, or to shield him if they do. An empath of Danyael's caliber _without_ shields could make what's happening in D.C. right now look like a Sunday school picnic."

Zara opened her mouth to retort, but a knock on the door drew everyone's attention.

A young housemaid peeked in and looked at Lucien. "Excuse me, sir. The police have arrived, and they want to speak to you."

Lucien pushed to his feet. "I'll take care of this. Galahad, stay out of sight. I know there aren't any pictures of you out there yet, but let's not take any chances."

Galahad nodded.

"Do we just wait?" Zara asked a little testily.

"You're welcome to hunt down those things from the lab, but I wouldn't recommend it," Lucien shot back. He walked out of the study, closing the door behind him.

Zara scowled and sank into her comfortable leather chair. "Surely there must be something we can do," she said to no one in particular.

Patient waiting was clearly not part of Zara's skill set. Miriya could identify with her sentiment, but after the near fiasco when she attacked Danyael without waiting to assess the situation, she was willing to take things more slowly. "Tell me about yourself, Galahad."

He smiled. "I'm not sure there's much to tell."

"You've lived a different life from the most of us. That's interesting in and of itself. Will you relax, Zara?" Miriya directed her question at the other woman without actually looking at her. "It's not your fault. What happened to Carlos isn't your fault. And just to be clear, it's not Danyael's fault either."

Zara froze for an instant but recovered quickly. She glared at Miriya. "Stay out of my head."

"That's really hard. You're projecting very loudly." Miriya looked at her. "We've got enough issues as it is, and there's really no time for you to take a guilt trip on how you might be even partially responsible for what's happening out there."

Their gazes locked, flashing violet against icy green.

From behind her computer monitors, Xin looked up. "Play nicely now, children," was all she said. "Danyael's resting and doesn't have the time or energy to heal anyone."

Zara stalked from the room. Galahad inhaled deeply, released his breath in a soft sigh, and followed.

Miriya chuckled the moment the door closed behind them. "About time."

"You did that on purpose?"

"They needed to talk," Miriya said, and then left Xin to her work while she perused a book from Lucien's extensive collection.

Xin shook her head. "Sometimes I think mutants are even weirder than clones. And humans are by far the weirdest of all."

~*~

Miriya lingered in the library until Lucien's voice whispered through her mind. _Miriya?_

What is it, Lucien?

We could use some of your opinion-altering capabilities out here. The detective insists on talking to Danyael and has threatened to bring him in for questioning. The cops can't do that, right?

Not unless Danyael has actually committed a crime, which he hasn't. All mutants fall under the jurisdiction of the Mutant Affairs Council. I'm on my way.

She set her book aside and hurried to the front door. Lucien stood outside, facing down a heavy-set detective and his team of cops. Miriya arrived in time to hear the detective say, "Well, there's no one here now from the council, is there?" The man sneered at Lucien. "We're bringing him in. Tell us where he is, or do we need to obtain a warrant to search your house?"

Miriya stepped forward onto the paved driveway. "Actually, I'm a representative of the Mutant Affairs Council. Danyael Sabre is under my watch."

"You?" The detective snorted. "You're just a girl."

"Are you calling me short?" Miriya asked, a testy tone in her voice. Her telepathic powers lashed out, and the detective dropped to the ground, screaming, his hands clutching the sides of his head in agony.

The other policemen stared in shock and horror. Some of them rushed toward Miriya, drawing their weapons, but they were felled by a single precise telepathic blast straight into their minds. As they lay groaning on the ground in pain, Miriya pulled out the badge that identified her as an enforcer in the Mutant Affairs Council. "The next time," she said to the humiliated detective, "just ask for my identification. You're relieved of duty, officer." She turned to the other policemen, who were staring at her with reluctant awe and no small degree of sullenness. "Who's the most senior officer here?"

A baby-faced officer stepped forward. "I'm Sergeant Brooks, ma'am."

Miriya smiled warmly at him. "You're in charge now. Please coordinate with Lucien's chief of security to protect the house in case those creatures return. If there are any issues, I'd like to hear about them right away."

"Yes, ma'am," he responded with a great deal more enthusiasm than he had previously displayed.

"Nicely done," Lucien said as they watched the young officer give orders to his men. The detective was skulking back his car. He appeared shrunken, his shoulders hunched. "I take it 'How to make friends and influence people' wasn't part of your enforcer training."

"I was absent from class that day," Miriya said with a flippant smile.

"I thought that those telepathic abilities would have allowed you to be a bit more subtle."

"Oh, you mean like the Jedi mind trick? I could have, of course, but then what would have been the fun of it? Ordinarily, I don't go out of my way to hit people over the head with my power or authority, but he had it coming. He's slime. I wouldn't trust him around women."

"Are you serious?" Lucien glanced over his shoulder at the detective. "Should we report him?"

"Just for thinking nasty thoughts about what he'd like to do with whips and chains to non-consenting women? We can't, Lucien. He hasn't actually done anything illegal. Yet."

"Zara would say that the point of having power is to prevent those things from happening in the first place."

Miriya shrugged. "It's a good philosophy, but she's not accounting for willpower. I've learned not to underestimate it. That officer is a jerk. His mind is a sewer, but willpower has kept him on the straight and narrow. Willpower is what got Danyael through that fight—well, that and an incredible tolerance for pain. More to the point..." She looked directly at Lucien. "Is what you would say."

"Why is what I believe important?"

"Because you've appointed yourself Danyael's protector. Many—likely including Zara—would conclude that the best and safest option is to lock Danyael up, because he is a huge threat, even though he hasn't done anything wrong. Ten mutant containment facilities have been built in the United States in the past three years, and they're all overcrowded. The population grows daily. The council is doing everything it can to minimize the appearance of mutants as a threat, but paranoia is making the rounds here. Mutants—and most certainly Galahad—are first in the line of fire. Clones and in vitros won't be far behind."

"I won't let anything like that happen to Danyael," Lucien said.

"That's good to hear. I hope you're up to the task of protecting him, because he will likely need it. There's just no way sharing a face with Galahad could be anything but profoundly bad news."

"Lucien!"

He looked up at Xin's voice and saw her waving at him from the balcony. "She's found something." He returned to the house, Miriya beside him. He stepped into the study and closed the doors. "Anything interesting?"

"We may want to accelerate our plans to take care of Jason Rakehell." Xin waved a slim hand at the computer monitoring the news frequencies used by pro-humanist groups, including Purest Humanity. "He's just issued a call to arms, and has apparently figured out that you're harboring Zara and Galahad. He doesn't mention Galahad, but the coordinates he's delivered to his members are right here in McLean, just a mile down the road. Either he picked the wrong house, which is unlikely since he's not actually that stupid, or he's using that place as a meeting point prior to converging on this house."

"I'll let the cops know," Lucien said after scanning the Purest Humanity news feed. "Xin, find out where Jason is right now. It'll take his mobs a while to gather, and in the meantime, we're going to take the fight to him. Where's Zara and Galahad?"

"In her bedroom," Miriya responded, her voice sweet. She did not elaborate. She did not have to.

Lucien hesitated. Miriya chuckled at the image that went through his mind. Dark against light, the contrast startling, beautiful. Zara, slim and lovely, her skin the color of golden dusk, coiled around Danyael—no, Galahad—Lucien corrected mentally. The image did not change though. _Damn, I'll have trouble getting that picture out of my head now_. "I'll get them after I debrief the cops. Miriya, you've probably got the strongest shields. Can you wake Danyael?"

Miriya picked the location of Danyael's bedroom out of Lucien's head and made her way up the stairs. She knocked on the door, not really expecting a response. With her strongest psychic shields locked around her mind, she opened the door, slipped in, and shut it behind her.

Her telepathic powers uncoiled, and she gently slipped a hook into Danyael's unprotected mind. The act violated every tenet of privacy, but it was likely the only chance she would ever have to understand the alpha empath.

He was too powerful, too deadly. She could not afford to be wrong about him. The _world_ could not afford to be wrong about him.

Miriya closed her eyes and inhaled as she rooted deep into his psyche and searched his memories.

Waves of unrestrained, uncensored emotions pushed against her shields, but they were not what she had expected from Danyael. She had anticipated a great deal of anger and bitterness, the kind of emotions powerful enough to drive others to suicide, but he had locked the pain and terror of his childhood away so deeply that conscious effort was required to access those emotions.

Instead, she sensed his loneliness, and to her surprise, emotions that were akin to pleasure, gratitude, and hope. He enjoyed his work and found contentment within the limited boundaries of his life. He did not have many friends, but cherished the ones he had. He had no plans for the future, no expectations for a marriage or a family, but he was grateful for the semblance of normality that he did have. He focused on getting through one day at a time, always with the hope that someday he would look up, look back, and be awed by how far he had managed to come.

In his sleep, Danyael stirred as if he were aware, on some level, of Miriya's psychic violation. He had no defense against her. Everything about him—from his strength of will to his hard-won emotional equilibrium, from his fractured heart to his unyielding compassion—she knew far more deeply, far more intimately than anyone ever could.

The emotions do not lie.

A smile came to her lips. She blinked tears from her eyes.

He amazed her. He was everything she respected, everything she wanted to be.

Something in her warmed and melted.

It was inevitable. Loving him was inevitable.

A smile that wavered on her lips reflected the wobbling of her heart. _I guess you didn't get run down by the truck after all._

"Danyael." She shook him gently. Three hours of sleep would not have made any dent in his exhaustion, but it was all he could afford just then.

It took several minutes to coax his conscious mind to awareness, but she sensed when he was awake enough to draw the emotional and mental barriers around him. The pressure against her psychic shields vanished as if all the emotions that had hung so heavily in the room moments before had been sucked up by a vacuum cleaner. His dark eyes—the pain locked deep within—flickered open and focused on her.

"I know we haven't been officially introduced," she said gently. "First, I'd like to apologize for attacking you earlier today. I was impatient and acted in ignorance. I'd like a chance to start over. I'm Miriya, and I'm with the Mutant Affairs Council."

He averted his gaze. She did not need access to his thoughts to know what he was thinking. He did not trust her. No, it was more than her. He did not trust the council. Well, no surprises there. Some days she did not particularly trust the council either.

_Danyael_. It was easier for him to think than speak just then. _Good...to meet you._

"We have a bit of a crisis, and we need you to join us. How soon do you feel up to getting out of bed?"

Miriya eavesdropped on his internal debate as uncensored answers flew like nervous, fluttering sparrows through his mind. She winced at the exhaustion evident in his thoughts. _Next week...five days at least...maybe three. Don't have that kind of time. One day, perhaps just overnight or a few more hours. I can do this...Just take it an hour at a time._

He finally mustered the strength to respond out loud to her question. "I'll be down in ten minutes."

He did not just amaze her. He humbled her.

Miriya nodded and stepped back, leaving the room to give him physical privacy. Mental privacy, however, was no longer an option for him, not with her psychic hook in his mind. Danyael would likely not discover their connection for a while, but he would eventually. No doubt, he would be furious at the psychic intrusion, but God knew, regardless of what he said, Danyael needed friends far more than he craved privacy.

Danyael needed her even if he did not know it.

Her thoughts and emotions churned. What would it take to be his friend?

Miriya drew in a deep breath and lingered outside his bedroom door, prepared to wait.

~*~

Nine and a half minutes later, Danyael stepped out of his bedroom. Miriya, slouched against the opposite wall, looked up, studying him. Their eyes met across the breadth of the corridor. His shoulders slumped with exhaustion, but he seemed steady on his feet. His expression, however, was guarded, and his body language screamed, "Hands off."

Fortunately, she was not easily deterred. She grinned at him. "You okay?"

"I'll be all right."

Her eyebrows shot up. "Yeah, well, it's good to know you'll be all right some time in the indefinite future, but how about right now?"

The soft sound of his laughter caught her off guard. Compelling and infectious, it warmed her and drew a matching chuckle from her. The muddy swirl of stress and tension gnawing at her eased. Who knew that making an empath laugh could have such positive aftereffects?

"You sure you don't need any help?" Miriya asked.

"I'm fine."

"Have it your way." Her gaze flicked to a closed bedroom door on the other side of the hallway. In spite of her best efforts, she twitched.

Danyael glanced at her and raised his eyebrows.

"Zara and Galahad," she said.

"Ah." Danyael nodded. He and Miriya walked down the corridor toward the curved staircase. "Good for them. They're perfect for each other."

Danyael's emotions flickered. Despite her intimate psychic connection with him, Miriya could not put a name to that feeling—a startling burst of color and light that made her senses reel before fading into the depths of his flawless equilibrium. She paused for a moment before responding. "I can't believe you managed to say that without irony or malice. Zara's a man-eater—"

"She respects strength. She needs a partner who isn't intimidated by who and what she is. Galahad's the perfect human being—no one could be more suited to her."

His voice was steady, his tone even, but the soft exhalation of his breath almost sounded like a sigh. Miriya stopped walking and tilted her head to look at Danyael. "You're not intimidated by her either."

"No, but she hates me."

"You're an alpha empath. You can change her feelings, can't you?"

"Yes, but what's the point? I can't change the reasons her feelings exist. She'll come to her senses once logic catches up with her emotions, and she'll hate me again."

"And you're okay with that?"

Danyael shrugged. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Because it's hard to live with hate."

"She's the one living with hate, not me."

Miriya's mouth dropped open. She had thought that she was well adjusted. Now she knew she had nothing on Danyael.

He continued walking as if he had not noticed her reaction. "Besides, to change her feelings, I'd have to absorb them." He shook his head. "It's too hard to distinguish between someone else's hate and self-hatred once it's in me. I spent years digging myself out of that pit; I'd rather not go back."

"So you're not—"

"Masochistic and suicidal? No, I'm not. I do what needs to be done, but as an empath—"

"There's a real physical and emotional cost to what you do."

Danyael nodded.

Miriya stared at him. He seemed relaxed, no trace of tension in his expression or his stance. His thoughts were equally at peace.

"So why did you try to save Carlos when you knew you had nothing left to give?" she asked.

He drew in a deep breath. "Because he meant something to Zara."

His dark eyes gave nothing away, but his emotions flickered again—that same dazzling burst of light and color.

Miriya gaped at him. The explosion of a world coming to life in the dark void of space—was that what _love_ looked like to an alpha empath?

Danyael could not possibly be falling in love with Zara, could he?

Miriya searched his mind, her psychic touch passing through his memories like the fleeting breath of butterfly wings.

His first encounter with Zara hours earlier had left him breathless, shaken. He had expected a muddy swirl of gray smeared across the morally questionable aura of an assassin. Instead, Zara's emotions shimmered with the vivid color and brilliance of precious stones set against a background that blended darkness with light without conceding to shadows.

In his eyes, the eyes of an alpha empath, Zara wasn't just beautiful. She was a masterpiece, and she dazzled him, compelled him.

Oh, damn. _That_ relationship had disaster written all over it. She had to talk Danyael out of it, but if she broached the topic, he would realize that his deepest emotions were transparent to her, and she wasn't ready for _that_ confrontation. She had to bide her time. "So, what are we going to do about Galahad? Zara and Lucien don't seem inclined to turn him in."

"There's nothing for him to go back to even if Pioneer Labs didn't burn to the ground. Life as an experimental test subject isn't worth living."

"But do you really think there's a place for him out here in the world?"

A muscle twitched in Danyael's cheek. "Perfection is tied to purpose. What was he created to do?"

Lines furrowed Miriya's brow. "You believe he's dangerous."

"We're all dangerous. The only difference is that we're known quantities. No one knows how dangerous Galahad has the potential to be. With his optimized genes and his miserable life experiences so far, he could just as easily save the world or crush it."

"We'll have to make sure it's the former and not the latter. Do you have a plan?"

Danyael shook his head. "Not really. We'll make it up as we go and trust that, together, we'll be strong enough to deal with whatever comes our way."

He paused at the top of the stairs, and so did Miriya. She looked down at the hand he extended to her, and then up at his face. His smile was faint, but the warmth in it matched his eyes. He had made the first move toward closing the distance between them. She grinned and met him halfway.

The casual clasping of hands sealed their friendship and her fate.

~*~

Across town, in the comfort of her Georgetown penthouse, Erin Bryne's eyes flashed open. A smile inched across her face. Her vision of the much-anticipated battle edged from a guarantee of defeat to a promise of victory. "Not for a few years yet, Miriya," she murmured. "You have time yet to enjoy Danyael's friendship. Be kind to him and win his trust. He will need you before the end."

**CONTINUE YOUR ADVENTURE IN THE WORLD OF THE DOUBLE HELIX WITH A FREE COPY OF** _PERFECTION UNLEASHED_

http://www.doublehelixbooks.com

_"The Double Helix is the kind of series you'd expect to see with a movie deal. I loved, loved, LOVED it. I fell in love with the characters and will be reading all four books again in the future...a treat I reserve for my favorites."— _Full Time Reader, Amazon Reviewer__

_"I wish I could award more than 5 stars. This phenomenal series continues to astonish and delight."_ **—Hillel Kaminsky, Amazon Reviewer**

# DOUBLE HELIX

Available at all major e-book stores

The four books of the Double Helix series ( _Perfection Unleashed, Perfect Betrayal, Perfect Weapon,_ and _Perfection Challenged_ ) should be read in order for maximum enjoyment. The other novels are standalone, but fit into the timeline as follows:

Miriya

Thirty years into the First Genetic Revolution, society's tolerance for human derivatives is wearing thin. Clones and in vitros are regarded with suspicion, and mutants with resentment. Yet in spite of the hostile environment, some alpha telepaths—like Miriya Templeton—have thrived.

Her luck is running out.

Destiny has set her life on a collision course with Danyael Sabre, the alpha empath who can kill with a touch. Whether he becomes friend or foe, whether he and she live or die, will depend on the choices she makes. On her decisions hang the outcomes of the Second Genetic Revolution. Miriya, however, does not believe in destiny, nor want any part of the revolution. It is up to the enforcer, Jake Hansen, to convince her otherwise, and he is running out of time.

Perfection Unleashed (Double Helix #1)

When the perfect human being, Galahad, escapes from Pioneer Laboratories, the illusory peace between humans and their derivatives--the in vitros, clones, and mutants--collapses into social upheaval. The first era of the Genetic Revolution was peaceful. The second is headed for open war.

The alpha empath, Danyael Sabre, does not feel compelled to risk his cover of anonymity and get involved, until he finds out that the perfect human being looks just like him.

Two men, one face. One man seeks to embrace destiny, the other to escape it. But destiny has a name--Zara. Assassin.

Perfect Betrayal (Double Helix #2)

Danyael Sabre, an object of desire, would much rather not be. An alpha empath by birth, a doctor by training, and an empathic healer by calling, he is stalked by the military that covets his ability to kill, not heal. Bereft of two days of memories, he goes on the run under the protection of an assassin, Zara Itani.

The more he uncovers of his lost hours, the more he doubts everything that once anchored him. He knows only that he endangers those around him and that he is falling in love with Zara, who hates him for reasons he no longer remembers.

As forces--both powerful and ruthless--threaten those he cares for, Danyael has only two options. He can betray his values and abandon the path of the healer, or he can wait to be betrayed, not by enemies, but by his friends.

Zara

The alpha empath, Danyael Sabre, languishes in a maximum-security prison. His life sentence should spell emotional freedom for the assassin, Zara Itani, but true to her contrary nature, she travels the solitary and hazardous path from hate to love even though it is far too late for her and Danyael.

Meanwhile in her hometown of Beirut, international political conspiracy simmers on the brink of renewed military conflict. Zara's loyalties will be tested; her beliefs challenged. She could start a war, or she could stop it.

Tell me who you love and I will tell you who you are....

Zara will finally discover who she is, but what will it cost Danyael this time?

Perfect Weapon (Double Helix #3)

An alpha empath, Danyael Sabre is powerful, rare, and coveted, even among the alpha mutants who dominate the Genetic Revolution. Betrayed by his friends and abandoned to a life sentence in a maximum-security prison, Danyael receives freedom and sanctuary from an unlikely quarter--the Mutant Assault Group, an elite mutant task force within the US military. Physically crippled and emotionally vulnerable, Danyael succumbs to the warmth of friendships and the promise of love he finds within their ranks.

Friendship and love, however, demand his loyalty, and Danyael rises to the challenge of training and leading the assault group's genetically modified super soldier army. The super soldiers are faster and stronger than the military's human soldiers; their animal instincts spur ferocity and fearlessness in battle. Who is the perfect weapon, though, the super soldiers or Danyael, the alpha empath, who can, with a touch, heal or kill?

Adversaries swarm like vultures around carrion; the pawn is once again in play. The threads of betrayal that sent Danyael to prison spin into a web, ensnaring him. When a terrorist group strikes Washington, D.C., how far will Danyael go to defend a government that sent him to prison to die?

When the Silence Ends

When you choose your friends, you also choose your enemies.

Seventeen-year old Dee wants nothing more than to help her twin brother, Dum, break free from the trauma in their childhood and speak again, but the only person who can help Dum is the alpha empath, Danyael Sabre, whom the U.S. government considers a terrorist and traitor.

The search for Danyael will lead Dee and Dum from the sheltered protection of the Mutant Affairs Council and into the violent, gang-controlled heart of Anacostia. Ensnared by Danyael's complicated network of friends and enemies, Dee makes her stand in a political and social war that she is ill equipped to fight. What can one human, armed only with her wits and pepper spray, do against the super-powered mutants who dominate the Genetic Revolution?

America, nevertheless, is ripe for change. Exhausted by decades of belligerence between humans and their genetic derivatives, the clones, in vitros, and mutants, society is on the verge of falling apart or growing up. Which path will it choose, and can a mere human, her sassy attitude and smart mouth notwithstanding, light the way to a better future?

In her quest to help her brother become normal, Dee will learn what it means to be extraordinary.

Carnival Tricks

In a world transformed by the Genetic Revolution, Kyle Norwood is an honest-to-God human and proud of it. His deadly skills come from hard work and not genetic sleight of hand. An easy mission to protect two Proficere Labs scientists turns into a shoot-out that leaves a scientist and a federal agent dead. Worse, the research data the scientists were carrying disappears.

In a world where human derivatives are hated and feared, Sofia Rios is almost human. When a fight during her waitressing shift turns fatal, a dying scientist launches her into the shady world of scientific espionage. The unwilling trustee of research that people would kill to obtain, Sofia turns to the man who steps out of the shadows to protect her, even though he appears as dangerous and disreputable as the people who hunt her.

Together, Sofia and Kyle must unravel the truth behind the illicit information she carries before one or both of them are killed. Their mutual attraction sparkles, but the spark could just as easily become an explosion if Kyle ever finds out that Sofia is a despised telekinetic.

Perfection Challenged (Double Helix #4)

An alpha empath, Danyael Sabre has survived abominations and super soldiers, terrorists and assassins, but he cannot survive his failing body. He wants only to live out his final days in peace, but life and the woman he loves, the assassin Zara Itani, have other plans for him.

Galahad, the perfect human being created by Pioneer Labs, is branded an international threat, and Danyael is appointed his jury, judge, and executioner. Danyael alone believes that Galahad can be the salvation that the world needs, but is the empath blinded by the fact that Galahad shares his genes, and the hope that there is something of him in Galahad?

In a desperate race against time and his own dying body, Danyael struggles to find fragments of good in the perfect human being, and comes to the wrenching realization that his greatest battle will be a battle for the heart of the man who hates him.

Xin

When the trail of Danyael Sabre's stolen blood exposes illegal scientific research at a Chinese laboratory, it unleashes a designer drug with terrifying side effects and imperils the decades-long peace between China and America.

NSA analyst Mu Xin, the clone of a Shang-dynasty queen, steps into the fray to stem the chaos, but in a land where ancestral worship and beliefs in incarnation exist alongside cutting-edge genetic engineering, will Xin find herself trapped or liberated by her past?

The Double Helix Collection

Finally available as a single collection, the five books in the _Double Helix_ series have gathered over 100 Amazon reviews with an average of 4.5 stars.

"Higher octane than Heroes. More heart than X-Men."

His genetic code sourced from the best that humanity offers, Galahad embodies the pinnacle of perfection. When Zara Itani, a mercenary, frees him from his laboratory prison, she offers him a chance to claim everything that had ever been denied him, starting with his humanity.

Perfection cannot be unleashed without repercussions; Galahad's freedom shatters Danyael Sabre's life.

An alpha empath, Danyael is rare and coveted, even among the alpha mutants who dominate the Genetic Revolution. He wields the power to heal or kill with a touch, but craves only privacy—an impossible dream for the man who was used as Galahad's physical template.

Galahad and Danyael, two men, one face. One man seeks to embrace destiny, and the other to escape it. But destiny has a name. Zara. Assassin.

The eight-time award-winning _Double Helix_ series, consisting of _Perfection Unleashed_ , _Perfect Betrayal_ , _Perfect Weapon_ , _When the Silence Ends_ , and _Perfection Challenged,_ will defy your notions of perfection and humanity and plunge you into a world transformed by the Genetic Revolution.

About the Author

Jade Kerrion defied (or leveraged, depending on your point of view) her undergraduate degrees in Biology and Philosophy, as well as her MBA, to embark on her second (and concurrent) career as an award-winning science fiction, fantasy, and contemporary romance author.

Her debut novel, _Perfection Unleashed_ , published in 2012, won six literary awards and launched her best-selling futuristic thriller series, _Double Helix_ , which blends cutting-edge genetic engineering and high-octane action with an unforgettable romance between an alpha empath and an assassin.

_Earth-Sim_ and _Eternal Night_ won first place Royal Palm Literary Awards in the Young Adult and Fantasy categories respectively. Readers have clamored for sequels, and Jade will get around to them when her To Do list opens up (sometime after 2020.) _Life Shocks Romances_ features Jade's sweet and sexy contemporary romance series, which proves that, at the very least, she knows how to alphabetize books.

If she sounds busy, that's because she is. Jade writes at 3 a.m., when her husband and three sons are asleep, and aspires to make her readers as sleep-deprived as she is.

http://www.jadekerrion.com

Other books by Jade Kerrion

The Double Helix Collection

Perfection Unleashed

Perfect Betrayal

Perfect Weapon

Perfection Challenged

When the Silence Ends

Miriya

Zara

Xin

Carnival Tricks

Other Science Fiction and Fantasy

Earth-Sim

Eternal Night

East of the Sun

Life Shocks Romances

Aroused

Betrayed

Crushed

Desired

Ensnared

Flawed

Graced

Haunted

Inflamed

Jilted

Kindled

Lured

