IGNEY PACED IN A circle, looking down each hall in turn.Where were they? Had he miscalculated? Were they willing to lose the woman so long as they got the man?His orders were clear. Get both the man and the woman.The woman was a symbol. Too many young people had taken to the streets because they listened to others like her.The man though, he knew things.Killing the woman was personal. Chasing her had cast him in a bad light. But the man was more important in the grand scheme of things."Fuck," Igney muttered. He glanced at a pair of men striding for the doors. "You. Come here."The men never glanced at him. Because they didn't understand him?He whirled to face Alban. "Where are the others?""I don't know where Delem and Michil are." He grimaced. "I haven't heard from them since we split up to search the building."That wasn't good.Igney had heard a lot of gunfire. Was it possible the other men he'd brought with him were dead?If both Chayan and Pasley escaped, leavin
EKKO CLUNG TO THE stretcher bearing Silas out to the parking lot.She hadn't realized how bad his injuries were. He was barely keeping his eyes open. Tears leaked out of her eyes as she kept pace with the two paramedics. Silas covered her hand with his as they came to a stop at the bumper of an ambulance.Paxton, Brett and Vito were sitting inside. They were worse for wear and grim, but seemed okay.All around them police were marching uninjured people they'd arrested to sit in a line next to a chain-link fence blocking the sidewalk. The night was lit up with swirling lights that made her head spin."Where's Chayan?" she asked. Her heart was tearing in two, aching for both men.A little distance away an ambulance took off, sirens blaring. She hoped it was the one with Pasley in it."Ma'am, I need to look at that wound," a paramedic said to her.She held tight to Silas' hand. "What about Chayan? Older man, little taller than me? Salt and pepper hair?"Silas had said he was fine.
IT FELT LIKE THE weight Silas had been carrying around in his gut had now attached itself to his eyelids. He floated in darkness, no longer asleep but not yet awake. Someone had called this twilight once, though he couldn't recall who. Something wouldn't let him go back to sleep. There was something he needed to do. It was urgent.What the hell was it?That nagging question hounded him as he ever so slowly gathered his strength.He wasn't aware of time or how long it took to wrestle one eyelid open, but at long last he peered out of his darkness into...more darkness.Well that was just dandy. What the fuck?He blinked that one eye again, letting his vision adjust. He was in a room and there was a light on, it just didn't do much.Machines beeped and whirled around him.That was a sound he could never mistake and it told him the first piece of his puzzle. From there the others fell into place, one after another.He was still in the hospital.He'd been hurt.There was a fight.
Two months later. Ekko's Apartment, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.EKKO STARED AT THE table with the spread of food laid out.Was there enough? Did she need more? Would Coco and Paxton like it?She reached out and adjusted the tray of cheese so it was at more of an angle instead of perfectly aligned to everything else.It looked too neat."Stop." Silas took her hand and spun her toward him, capturing her against his chest with strong arms around her waist."It looks like I'm trying too hard." She smoothed her hands up and over his shoulders."Stop. It's just Paxton and Coco.""Your best friend and his fiancé, who I haven't met yet.""What?" Silas' face scrunched up. "You've talked to her dozens of times.""In the background of you and Paxton talking. That doesn't count." She pulled away from him and proceeded to turn dishes a little this way and that."You do realize Coco spends most days digging in elephant shit and stuff, right?""Silas." She scowled at him."What?" He gr
Volume 1: Dangerous AttractionTRAVIS RATION HUNCHED over the hotel desk and flipped to the first page of the autopsy report. The lights from the Vegas strip cast globes of colored light onto the paper, but the glitz and glamour held no sway for him. Only the poor woman in the photo.She was blonde. Like the rest. Pretty. A Vegas native named Linda. She'd been social, so her disappearance had been noted within hours by friends and family, but by then it was too late. Whoever was abducting blonde, attractive young women was good. And if the list of missing blonde women was a hint, the perpetrator had operated in the Las Vegas area for years-without anyone connecting the dots. Or maybe LVPD had and didn't want to face it. They wouldn't be the first to ignore a killer to preserve tourism. A killer who only took one victim a year was easy to hide.There was a serial killer in Las Vegas, and no one wanted to admit it."Hey man, ready to go?" Mason Clark, a new hire to the Aegis G
BLISS STEPPED INTO THE Vegas Police Department and removed her sunglasses. She blinked away the sunspots and glanced around. The place was hopping first thing in the morning-people picking up their drunken friends, prostitutes and petty thieves posting bail. Most hadn't even been to bed yet, but that was the nature of Vegas.She strode to the counter, twisting the strap of her purse in her hands.Why had she waited?"Excuse me?" she said when the officer at the counter didn't acknowledge her."Yeah?" The man didn't even look up from his paperwork."My sister, she's missing." She laid a photograph on the counter and slid it across."How long has she been gone?"Gone. Not missing.Bliss swallowed her irritation. Popular theory was that a person had to be MIA for seventy-two hours before they could be considered missing. Popular theory was wrong, and so was the idea that Wendy was just-gone. Someone needed to be searching for her now."She's not at her house, and she's n
TRAVIS WAS FAR TOO big to fit in the only unoccupied booth in the café. He didn't dare suggest somewhere farther from the PD for fear the woman across from him might faint or cry or something. She'd seemed on the brink of falling apart outside, but she'd rallied and followed him to the café without so much as a tear."Here's your coffee. Can I get you anything else?" The waitress deposited a carafe on the table along with cream and sugar."No, thank you," he replied.The woman across from him shook her head. Her shoulder length brown hair swished around her face, all glossy looking. For some crazy reason he wanted to touch it. To run his fingers through her pretty hair and see if it felt as soft as it looked. He kept his hands to himself. Girls like her didn't need men like him in their lives."Bliss, right?"She nodded her head, sending those strands moving again."Yeah, sorry, I didn't introduce myself did I? I'm Bliss Giles." She cupped the empty ceramic mug with both ha
BLOOD.The stone below the bed was stained with blood.Wendy gripped the bars as her stomach revolted. Bile coated her mouth, and the muscles in her abdomen and chest tensed in irregular rhythms. Dying might be less painful."Lady, hey lady, you got to calm down." Stumpy was in the cell right behind her. He only had one foot. The other leg was mostly gone."Take a deep breath." That order came from the old one. He sat on the floor, never moving out of his pile of rags.The lights were back on, which wasn't much of an improvement. It illuminated the horrors her mind had created, making them real. Like the blood."Is he going to kill us?" she asked.It was the first time she'd spoken directly to the men."Us? Probably," Stumpy said."Why?" Her knees gave out, and she sat down with her back against the bars drilled into the stone and faced her fellow prisoners. For the first time in months, she wanted something.She wanted to live.Depression had clouded her judgemen