Deadly Game

Chapter 3

"Well at least you aren't lying to me." Mari held her breath, afraid to move. She'd gone from suspicion to belief and now she had to backtrack. Why would anyone be stupid enough to send in a skilled sniper to protect the senator when he clearly had a reason to see him dead? It made no sense.

Ken shrugged his broad shoulders. "Why would I deny it? I thought about killing him and saving everyone the trouble. So did Jack. But it smelled too much like a setup to me. If someone managed to kill him. we were right there, patsies to take the fall. Why would anyone order us to protect that man?"

"It doesn't make sense." she agreed, noncommittal.

"Out of curiosity, how can you be trained as a sniper when you're not an anchor? Briony can't use a gun against anyone without terrible repercussions."

"I have an anchor. He draws the aftermath of violence away from me."

"Your spotter."

She nodded, watching his face. Shadows flickered in his silver eyes, turning them charcoal gray, giving them a smoldering appearance, as if any moment they might shoot flames.

A muscle ticked in his jaw. He wasn't quite made out of stone, as he would have her believe.

"Is your spotter paired with you?"

Was there an edge to his voice? Not really, but there was a heightened alertness in him. "No, he's a friend. Was any of my unit killed back there?"

"I didn't ask. I can have Jack find out for you. It was odd that the moment you were shot, everyone in your unit backed off the senator and fell back to try to protect you. Why would they do that?"

Sean had to have been injured. He had been closest to her and should have gotten to her position before the enemy. She sent up a silent prayer that he was still alive. He was a good soldier and the closest thing to a male friend she had. "I can't answer that."

"I seem to be giving you a lot of information, but you aren't giving me anything in return."

She was giving more than she should have, and both of them knew it. "If it was just my life I was risking, I might tell you what you want to know. I don't have any loyalty to Whitney, or I wouldn't have gone AWOL and tried to get to the senator."

"You're protecting the others, the women, aren't you?" Now there was an edge to his voice, the ice cracking just a bit, enough to let out a wave of heat. "He's going to hurt them if you don't return."

She said nothing, her heart pounding. Was she that transparent? Whitney would kill one of them. He'd started with seven, all raised together in that miserable compound, a life of duty and discipline where few things from the outside world were permitted and everything was recorded. They'd learned to move in the shadows and time the cameras to avoid detection. They'd learned to talk late at night, congregating in the bathroom with water running and signing their conversations, until Marigold had discovered she could build a telepathic bridge and they could all communicate that way. Those women were her family. She'd accepted her life and had pride in her abilities, until Whitney had changed everything.

Cami had protested and tried to escape. She'd been caught and Whitney had ordered a name drawn. One of the other women, Ivy, had been taken away, and a few minutes later they heard shots. There was blood on the walls, but no one had seen the body. They tried to tell themselves he hadn't really killed her, but no one tried to escape after that.

"That's why you tried to kill yourself. If you were dead, he wouldn't have a reason to punish the others. And your unit knew he might kill one of the other women, a woman they might be paired with." He swore softly under his breath. "Someone has to kill that son of a bitch and fast. Why would you think the senator would help you? He's friends with Whitney. He's been helping him."

She raised an eyebrow. "You don't know anything about the senator."

Ken studied her face. He'd given her a lot of shocks very fast. She was doped up, her eyes unfocused, and the news of her sister had thrown her completely off guard. The revelations about Whitney garnered him a little trust. He knew his guesses about the threats to the other women had been right on. Whitney didn't care about his human subjects-they were all expendable. He frowned. Maybe not the women. He could make more supersoldiers. but it would be difficult to find women he had data on almost from birth. "Tell me about Senator Freeman."

"He isn't friends with Whitney. They don't like each other. I think they went to school together, but the senator's father and Jacob Abrams are best friends. The two of them have tried to keep Whitney from doing so many experiments. They've talked to him countless times. I've heard them. They told him he had to stop, that he was jeopardizing everything.

"Senator Freeman violently objects to the things Whitney has done," she continued. "In front of Whitney, he chastised his father for making them a part of the experiments. There's no way the senator would betray our men and our country for Whitney. If his plane went down in the Congo, and there's any kind of a tie between Ekabela and Whitney, then it was probably because Whitney wanted the senator dead. Jacob Abrams probably gave the order for you to go in and rescue the senator, not Whitney."

You heard of Jacob Abrams? Ken reached out to his brother.

Big banker. Loaded. Maybe more than Whitney. Definitely a billionaire and has a lot to do with the world money market. Considered a genius. Don't know much else about him, but I'll run him by Lily. She'd know. Why?

Mari dropped his name, said he's a friend of the senator's and both aren't too happy with Whitney, that he's going to jeopardize everything. Have Lily check to see if the senator's father, Whitney, and Abrams all attended a school at the same time.

"You're talking to someone," Mari said, pressing a hand to her temple. There was accusation in her voice and a reprimand in her eyes.

"My brother. Didn't you always talk to your sister when you were together?"

Mari frowned, thinking about it. It had been so long ago. Telepathy had been strong between them. Of course they'd talked, hardly thinking about it, sharing every thought. Was she jealous of his brother and that strong bond? Or was she leery because he was the enemy? She should know, but if she were honest with herself, she had no idea what the answer was. She suspected jealousy.

Frustrated and embarrassed at her lack of discipline, she attempted to shift her leg. Gut-wrenching agony slid through her. She choked back a sound by shoving her fist in her mouth and biting down hard on her hand. She turned her face away from Ken, unable to stop the tears burning in her eyes.

His hand was there instantly to steady her. "Take a breath. You're probably due for your meds again. You've been shot. We had a surgeon work on you after Nico, and being genetically altered, you're bound to heal at an exceptionally fast rate, but you're going to have to give yourself time." Jack, we need meds in here now. She's so pale she looks like she's going to faint.

I'm coming. Hold your pants on.

"I don't have time. Didn't you hear me?" She couldn't remember what she'd told him about the other women. If she didn't get back, Whitney might harm them. She couldn't take any chances; she had to go back. The pain was growing, moving through her system, making her unable to focus properly. There was something about the genetically enhanced system that allowed them to clear drugs much more quickly, and this time, it wasn't a benefit.

"By now Whitney knows you were shot. He'll try to go through the chain of command to find you. Whoever runs our teams is going to get slammed with questions and demands. Whitney won't touch the other women because he can't replace them. The men are expendable-not the women."

"Whitney had my friend killed when Cami tried to escape."

He was silent a moment. "Did you witness if anyone see him?"

She shook her head. "Only the blood after."

"You didn't see a body and Whitney is a master of illusion. My guess is she was taken to another of his facilities."

"But you don't know that."

"No. but we've had a lot of time to study Whitney."

"Really?" Her voice dripped with sarcasm. "I lived my life in his compounds, with his experiments. He's a megalomaniac. He believes rules don't apply to him and that he's smarter than anyone else. He believes everyone else is a sheep and that he can manipulate them with ease. And he can-and does all the time."

"He's one man, Mari," he said gently.

"If men like the senator and Jacob Abrams can't keep him under control, how can we? If he ordered a hit on either one of them, he has the means to get it done."

"Maybe," Ken conceded. What the hell is the holdup. Jack? She's shaking and beginning to sweat.

Jack hurried into the room. "I'm sorry. Kadan called."

"He could have waited." Ken's voice was gruff. He pushed the needle into the IV. "You'll feel better in a few minutes," he assured Mari, his thumb sliding over her skin as if it were an accident. "If not, we'll bring in the doc."

There was real concern in his voice, but his face was as expressionless as ever. She couldn't help looking at his brother's face. Jack had a couple of scars running down one side of his face, as if Ekabela had gotten his hands on him and just gotten started. They only served to add to his good looks. It gave him a rough edge that was intriguing. Ken's face was a grid of scars, giving him the appearance of someone very frightening. A child might run from him.

She felt his eyes on her and turned her head to catch him staring at her with glittering eyes. She flashed a small smile. "You two look amazingly alike. He has that stubborn set to his jaw that you do."

He dipped a cloth in cool water and sponged the beads of sweat from her forehead. "How long do you think we have before they find this place?"

"With Whitney's connections? If you used a helicopter and any aid at all from military or black ops personnel, he'll have the information in hours."

"That's what I thought too. We moved you once after the surgery, but we had to use a helicopter. We're going to have to move you again."

"Let them take me back."

"No." His voice was soft, a hiss of sound, low and mean, sending chills through her body. "We've already called the helicopter. When you wake up, we'll be in another safe house."

"And it will be a matter of hours before he has that information. Eventually he'll catch up with us and someone will get killed."

"We'll keep moving until they can take you off the IV. Doc says another twenty-four hours. We can buy that much time."

It hit her then what he'd said. When you wake up. "You drugged me."

"I'm not stupid. The minute you thought your people were anywhere near, you would use telepathy to call them. Of course I drugged you. Do you think I didn't see your body when they cut your clothes off? Somebody beat the hell out of you with a cane." His voice was so low she could barely catch the flashes of repressed rage. He dragged his shirt up to show the crisscross of scars, long and deep, making a patchwork quilt of his body. "I know what it feels like to have someone cut and skin you like an animal-to treat you like you have no rights and no feelings-that you're nothing at all."

"Stop it."

He swung around so she could see the mess that was his back, the numerous skin grafts and the terrible scars that remained of a once beautiful man. He spun back around, his face close to hers, his silver eyes, fierce and steady and totally implacable. "I saw what they did to you and you're not going back there."

"Stop it." her voice came out in a whisper. "Don't say anything else." He had reduced her to that helpless creature, crawling across the floor, determined she'd never beg for mercy, never give what was demanded of her. She saw herself through those silver eyes-not the soldier who commanded respect, but that animal, half-mad with pain and despair, torn and bleeding and without hope.

Of all the people in the world, it had to be Ken who saw the mess Brett had made of her body. I can keep this up all night, Mari; eventually you'll give me what I want. It will just hurt a lot more, but I don't mind that. Ashamed, she pulled the blanket closer around her as Brett's words echoed in her mind. Of course he hadn't touched her face. Whitney would have killed him. but sooner or later. Whitney's threats wouldn't be enough to deter Brett. In a way she felt sorry for him. Whitney had programmed him, turned him into an animal who no longer thought about right or wrong, only what he wanted-and he wanted Mari. He would be on the team that came for her, and he would kill anyone who stood in his way.

She reached down to touch her hip. There was a bandage there. They'd found and removed the tracking device Whitney had implanted. She should have known they would find it. She had been certain her team would be able to find her quickly, using that tracking system, but now they would have to rely on Whitney-or Abrams and his military contacts-and that would take some time. There were few trails leading to the GhostWalkers and no one carried identification. If they died during a mission, they were buried quietly, without public fanfare, because no one knew they existed.

Ken jerked down his shirt, covering the scars running down his belly, disappearing even lower into his jeans. He leaned over her. his hand spanning her throat, fingers stroking a caress over her silken skin. His whisper was soft, lips against her ear so that his breath was warm, fanning curls of heat through her body. "I don't live by anybody else's rules. I make up my own."

She wrapped her fingers around his wrist, a bracelet that went halfway around, but her fingers dug into his skin, into the ridges of his scars as her lashes drifted down. "Don't let anyone else see me. Especially not Briony."

Ken closed his eyes and pressed his forehead against hers. It was sheer hell to be so close to her and not touch her. Even with blood and sweat and the drugs, her scent drove him crazy. Whitney's experiment into pairing through scent was more than a success. But even more than the physical need, he felt the urge to protect her. Maybe it had been the sight of her broken and battered body when they'd cut off her clothes. Maybe it had been the sound of Nico and the surgeon swearing, or Jack's hiss of rage. All he could remember was feeling the impact like a punch to his gut, and then later, when they'd rolled her over to examine her back, he felt his heart being ripped from his body.

He had known there were monsters in the world-he'd met a few, destroyed a few-but who would want to do this to a woman? Someone like his father. Abruptly he pulled his mind from going in that direction.

"Are you all right, Ken?" Jack asked, touching his arm.

"I swear, Jack, this is like going through it all again. First the deer and then Mari. I don't think I'll ever close my eyes again."

"We've got to get out of here. We don't dare stay any longer."

"I'll stay behind. You take her to a safe place and get some rest. I'll make certain they can't come looking."

"You can't kill them all, Ken. And in any case, we don't know who the bad guys are. She said they weren't there to kill the senator-that they were supposed to protect him. If the order came down that way, they're no different than we are. They want her back because we don't leave a GhostWalker behind."

"One of them did this to her."

"We don't know which one."

Ken straightened slowly and turned to face his brother. "She doesn't want Briony to know."

"Briony's not a child. I don't lie to her, not even for you, and you can't ask me to, Ken." Jack spread out his hands. "Let's get her on the helicopter and we can sort all this out later. We'll take her to the small house Lily rented for us and stay there a tew hours. The van will meet us there and we can disappear with her."

"Are you bringing Briony in?"

Jack shook his head. "It's too dangerous. She's pregnant and Whitney wants her. I'm not willing to risk her life, although she wants to see her sister. She's staying with Lily now at the big house, and Kadan and Ryland's team is guarding her while we make a run for it."

"You mean while we figure out how best to use Mari in our little game with Whitney."

Jack pushed the gurney toward the door, ignoring the bite in his brother's voice. "She'll go back the first chance she gets. Ken. You can't trust her. You heard her. You saw her. She's not Briony, as much as they look alike. This one is tough as nails and could rip your heart out if you take your eyes off of her. Don't you forget that. At this point I wouldn't trust her with Briony's life, let alone yours."

"I haven't forgotten." Ken slung his rifle around his neck and checked his guns and ammunition belt. "I just am not willing to turn her back over to whoever hurt her like that."

"Don't identify with her. She's our prisoner. And she could easily cut your throat-or mine. We don't know anything about her. She's capable of running a con just like we are. She was trained as a soldier, so her first duty is to escape."

"Copy that. Daddy." Ken said.

Jack halted so abruptly Ken ran into the bed. Their eyes met. a slash of steel swords clashing over Mari's head. "I'm going to look out for you. Ken, whether you like it or not. You think I don't know how shook up you were looking at the deer carcasses? You're identifying with them."

"Maybe, but I'm not letting anyone take this woman back to Whitney."

"If she goes back, we can follow her, rescue the others, and cap Whitney's ass," Jack pointed out. "It all sounds good to me."

"Has anyone ever told you that you're a bloodthirsty son of a bitch?" Ken asked.

"Yes," Jack assented. "More than once."

"Well, it's true." Ken lifted Mari into his arms while Jack steadied her leg and took the medical rigging. The helicopter was a few yards away. Nico waiting, rifle ready as he searched the area around them for an enemy. "You always think in terms of killing, Jack. I thought once you were with Briony, you'd get out of that habit."

Jack shrugged. "It's easier than jawing at everyone the way you do. By the time you finish talking to them, we realize we have to kill them anyway. I just save you all that trouble."

Ken scowled at his brother. "You do realize everyone thinks you're the pretty boy, now that my face is scarred. It doesn't go well with your Dr. Death image."

"Pretty boy!" Jack glared at him. "If I didn't have my hands full, I'd shoot you for that comment."

"You mean to tell me Briony doesn't tell you how pretty you are late at night when the two of you are all alone?"

"Don't think I won't take you out," Jack threatened.

Ken flashed a sudden grin, genuine this time. "She does, doesn't she?"

"She thinks I look rough and tough," Jack corrected.

"Hey, Nico," Ken called out as they boarded the helicopter, no easy feat with trying to keep Mari's leg from being jarred. "Don't you think Jack here is a pretty boy?"

Nico glanced at Jack's face and grinned. "Yeah, he's a hot babe, all right. Must make all the women folks crazy."

"You can both go to hell," Jack said.

Ken turned away, depositing Mari carefully on the small gurney locked in place. Jack secured the medical gear and Nico took the pilot's seat. They waited for the doctor, who hurried after them carrying the rest of the supplies they needed. Eric Lambert was a good doctor and often aided the GhostWalker teams, although he wasn't physically or psychically enhanced. He knew a lot about gene therapy and was interested in Whitney's experiments and had a high clearance, so he was often the man Lily sent out into the field to protect the GhostWalkers. He was the surgeon who had saved Jesse Calhoun's life when he'd been shot several times deliberately in both his legs, and Jack and Ken had a soft spot for him, simply because Jesse was their friend and they had few real friends in the world.

Ken moved over to make room for him. "Are you up for some excitement, Doc?"

"No. Don't shoot anybody."

Jack snorted. "See, it isn't just me. He knows you talk a lot of bull and in the end you shoot them anyway."

Ken narrowed his eyes as Eric got up to check his patient. "Her pulse is stronger than I thought it would be with the dose we gave her. I'd like to take some more blood samples. I think she heals a lot faster than we anticipated. Whitney included an extra pair of chromosomes when he was altering all of you and that gives him a lot of genetic code to work with. The more I study all of you, the more I realize we don't know a third of what you can do."

"You took enough of her blood," Ken objected. "She's been used as a guinea pig for Whitney's experiments all of her life. I don't think it's necessary for us to do the same to her."

As always. Ken sounded mild, but Eric heard the warning note in his voice and glanced at Jack, who simply shook his head. Eric settled back in his seat. "We need to really understand what's going on with all of you," he pointed out. "If she heals faster and can push drugs through her system faster, we need to know. We wouldn't want to be in the middle of a complex operation and have one of you wake up on us."

Eric sank down on to the bench and gripped the seat as the helicopter took off. He'd never liked flying. Ken remembered, and they should be grateful that he was always willing to come when one of them was injured, but instead. Ken felt an unreasonable wash of emotions he couldn't quite identify.

He clenched his teeth at the unbidden images that rose the moment Eric planted the idea of waking up in the middle of an operation. Was that the kind of experiment Whitney conducted on a regular basis? From all accounts he loved science and lived for little else. Was his mind so twisted that he might subject a human being to that kind of torment again and again just to see the results? Ken had been tortured-he knew what it was like to feel the slice of a knife going through his skin while he was wide awake and unable to fight back. The idea that Whitney might have done the same thing to another human being in the name of science made him ill.

A tremor went through him and he had to fight back a wave of nausea. Why was it all coming back after all these months? His belly throbbed, and lower, much lower, he could feel the mind-numbing pain, an agony crawling through his body, hear laughter echoing insanely through his head. Was he finally losing his mind? The rage inside of him, kept so carefully bottled up, surged up through his belly and into his throat until he wanted to scream and tear someone apart with his bare hands. Beads of sweat dropped from his forehead onto his arm. He never saw blood as red anymore, so he couldn't tell whether the droplets were sweat, simply an illusion, or real blood the way his mind wanted to see it.

"Ken." Jack said his name sharply.

Their eyes met across the gurney as the helicopter vibrated, shaking them as they flew through the air, just skimming the treetops. Ken could hardly bear to see the knowledge and compassion in his brother's eyes. His mouth went dry, but he managed to pull off his slight grin, the one that he kept in reserve for moments like this. He was all right. He was just fine. They'd taken his skin, his looks, even his manhood, and made his body into something out of a horror movie, but he was just fine. No nightmares, no screaming, just a flash of a grin, telling the world a monster didn't live and breathe inside of him, raking him with claws, demanding to get out and annihilate everyone around him.

Sometimes Ken thought that monster would rip open his belly from the inside out. Jack thought he wanted to talk everyone to death. He was the good twin. The easygoing twin, the one that got along with everybody. His fingers curled into two tight fists and then, aware of what he was giving away to his sharp-eyed brother, he spread his fingers out in front of him. Steady as a rock. He could always count on that. His hand might be scarred, his fingers not as flexible as they should be, but Ekabela and his sadist friends had made the mistake of mutilating them but not taking away his ability to shoot. They were too eager to get down to the real pleasure of cutting him in other, much more painful and frightening places.

He shifted his gaze away from his brother. Jack could read his mind. Hell, they'd been slipping in and out of each other's mind since they were toddlers. Even then it had been self-preservation. They learned at an early age to count only on each other. Jack knew him too well. He knew that the monster that lived inside of both of them was all too close to the surface these days. Jack had to be worried that Ken was not going to able to keep it contained. Insanity was a very real possibility he had to face.

Dr. Peter Whitney was a man with far too much money and power. He didn't believe the rules were for someone like him, and unfortunately he had the backing of some very powerful men. Jack and Ken. like several other men in the military, had fallen for his enthusiasm over his psychic experiments. It made perfect sense at the time-to take men from all branches of the service with Special Forces training and test them to see if they had potential to use psychic abilities. The doctor would enhance the inherent talent and create a unit of men who could save lives with their abilities.

Whitney hadn't said a word about gene therapy and genetic enhancement. He hadn't mentioned cancer or brain bleeds or strokes either. He certainly had never admitted he would pit the men unknowingly against one another. And never once had he mentioned a breeding program, using pheromones to pair a supersoldier with a woman.

Ken nibbed his pounding temples. Whitney hadn't screened them very carefully-or maybe he had. Maybe he knew about Jack and Ken's father and how he was so jealous and obsessed with their mother he couldn't bear to share her with his own children. Obsession was a very ugly word, and Whitney had certainly compounded the demon the twins fought on a daily basis. They had vowed they would never chance becoming the man their father had been, yet they had both been chosen, without their knowledge, to participate in Whitney's breeding experiment.

Of course he knew about the old man, Jack said. He's the reason Whitney chose us. We're wins. He's paired us with twins and he's kicking back waiting to see the results.

You're fishing, bro. Ken replied. You want to know if I'm somehow affected by Mari's scent.

Aren't you?

Ken glanced at his brother. He couldn't tell-and that meant neither could Mari. She had a chance then, a slim one, but still a chance when he'd thought they were all lost. He didn't watch tragic movies and he sure as hell wasn't going to live a tragic life, nor was he going to allow Jack and Briony and certainly not Mari to live one either. Whitney be damned and his experiments too. If necessary Ken would go hunting the man.

Aren't you? Jack repeated.

You'd know it if I was, wouldn't you?

Jack swore under his breath. That's not an answer and you know it.

Ken shrugged, making it as casual as he could. Evidently, my genes are not quite as in demand as yours.

Jack narrowed his eyes and frowned at his twin. Suspicion pushed at Ken's mind. Jack was not in the least bit satisfied with his answer.

You're acting possessive of her.

I shot her. She's Briony's sister. Not just a sister, her twin sister. If this doesn't end in a good way, do you really think Briony's going to be okay with that? You can't get anywhere near Mari, because if she dies, Briony will blame you whether she wants to or not; it's human nature. You cant, Jack. You have to let me handle this one.

Jack shoved his fingers through his hair, a rare moment of agitation. It's not right. Because you're looking out for me, you'll destroy your own relationship with Briony.

I'm not married to her. And that's what we do. We look out for one another.

Keep that in mind if you decide to take any unnecessary risks just to protect me with my wife.

I didn't know there was such a thing as an unnecessary risk. Ken flashed a small, cocky grin at his brother and was relieved to see him relax.

Nico set the helicopter down on a small pad just above the house Lily Whitney-Miller had rented for them. A brilliant woman, she was the only orphan Peter Whitney had raised as his own daughter, and the betrayal of all that she had known and believed had been devastating. Married to a GhostWalker, Ryland Miller, she'd opened her home, a huge estate, and her resources, to the GhostWalkers. It was Lily who had found ways for them to build shields to protect their brains from continual assault. And it was Lily who had put Flame's cancer into remission. And it was always Lily who stayed one step ahead of her father to keep the GhostWalker teams safe. When they didn't know who else to turn to, they called on her.

As the helicopter settled to earth and Nico shut it down, Eric slipped from his seat and once more bent over his patient, stethoscope to her heart. His hand slid down her arm until he found her wrist, searching for her pulse.

Ken's gaze jumped to the palm sliding over Mari's bare flesh, and a roar of protest started deep in his belly. Primitive and ugly, the monster inside gnashed its teeth and clawed for freedom.

"Didn't you just listen to her heart rate?" Ken asked, keeping his voice even. "Is something wrong that you're not telling us?"

Eric turned his head with a small frown. "She lost a great deal of blood and we could only give her-"

His voice broke off abruptly as Mari caught his hair, jerking his head back and down toward her. Her hand slid from his hair to his belt, extracting the knife there and whipping it around his throat.

Jack already had his gun out. aimed between her eyes. "I'll fuckin put a bullet in your head if you don't drop that knife right now." His voice was low and frightening and he meant every word.

Mari tightened her hold on the knife, pushing it against the doctor's throat. "Take out the IV. You shoot me and I'll still have enough time to cut his throat."

"Maybe, but I don't think so." Jack said. "And either way you're still dead."

"Let's all calm down here." Ken moved into her sight. His eyes were pure mercury, a slash of liquid steel. "This can only end badly, Mari, and no one wants that." He was gliding across the helicopter, a silent, graceful flow of muscle and sinew that was as intimidating as hell.

"Stop moving," she bit out between clenched teeth, tightening her grip on the knife until her knuckles turned white.

Stay the hell away from her. Ken. Don't you damn well get between us. I'll kill her right now, Jack warned.

There's no need for this; she can't go anywhere.

"I fuckin' mean it. Ken. I'll take her out."

"Just be calm and think about this," Ken said. He didn't look at his brother or acknowledge the warning, and he didn't stop moving. "You still have a catheter in. How far do you think you're going to get with that?"

"The doctor is going to tell you how to take it out. I mean it, Doc, rip the IV out and do it now."

"Jack isn't a nice man, sweetheart," Ken said. "He looks handsome and talks soft, so people sometimes get the wrong impression about him. Remember when I was telling you how he pulled me out of Ekabela's camp? He was captured and escaped. Now, anyone in their right mind just keeps running, especially when they're in the middle of rebel territory, but not Jack." His voice was low and conversational, as if they were sitting across a table from each other, not staring down death.

He kept coming, a silent stalker, making her feel small and vulnerable. Was he within striking distance? He didn't appear to have a weapon, yet she was suddenly terrified. Not of the fact that she might cut a man's throat, or that Jack would shoot her, but of those glittering eyes that never left hers, eyes so cold she shivered.

"Stay away from me," she said, her voice choking.

"Jack went back into that camp and rigged everything to blow. He stole weapons and sat up in the trees and picked them off one by one. He killed over-" Ken exploded into action, moving so fast he was a blur, his elbow slamming into her head as his hands locked hers around the knife, jerking it down and away from the doctor, his enormous strength pinning her wrist to the gurney. For a moment everything went black and a million stars danced in front of her eyes. His thumb jabbed hard into her pressure point and her fingers jerked open in reflex.

Ken removed the knife and tossed it to Eric, but retained possession of her wrist. "Stay the hell away from her."

Jack swore aloud, a long and creative curse that was anatomically impossible. Ken glanced at him. "Watch your mouth."

"Don't you fuckin' tell me to watch my mouth. What the hell were you thinking? You walked right in front of my gun and you did it on purpose, you son of a bitch."

"I was thinking I'd defuse the situation," Ken replied, his tone as mild as ever. "She's supposed to escape. Jack. That's what we do when we're captured. I figured she'd try it eventually. I just didn't think it would be this soon." He glanced at Eric, who was still rubbing his throat and looking horrified. "There's no doubt she can push drugs through her system with remarkable speed, is there? You got your answer without taking more blood."

Ken was touching her. his ringers a vise around her wrist, so she felt the anger in him, a river of it running deep and fierce, when on the outside he appeared as cool-as cold-as ice.