Brain Storm, Cat Gilbert [read books for money TXT] 📗
- Author: Cat Gilbert
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By that, I had to assume he meant he hadn’t told Hughes we were coming. It was the second time he claimed he hadn’t done that. I wondered who he was trying to convince because I wasn’t buying it.
“Not far enough, it seems,” I said, holding out my cup for a refill as Mama D came around with a fresh pot. “They were on us pretty fast.”
“You were far enough ahead to catch them off guard and get me out. Problem is, they had already implanted the tracking device, so it didn’t take them long to find you.”
I looked over at Mac, not sure I’d heard Brown correctly. He nodded at me, confirming what Brown had said.
So that was something new. I had already figured out they were still tracking him after we tossed his clothing, but thought it was mentally. Apparently, I’d given them too much credit, but I guess that was better than underestimating them. However, the fact that they’d implanted a tracker meant they knew what we were up to. Hughes might have guessed that we’d come to the Agency, but there was no way he would have guessed we’d come for Brown or that we would blunder onto him. Brown had told him everything or maybe I had it all wrong and Brown was the one calling the shots. This was getting more complicated by the minute, and I could feel the pressure build in my head. I needed help, but I couldn’t trust this guy. He needed to go. Now. My decision must have shown on my face, or he was reading my mind because he jumped right back in with both feet before I could tell Mac to take him back to wherever they’d had him stashed.
“Look, Taylor. You’re absolutely right to doubt me. I knew they’d done it, but I didn’t say anything. I didn’t really relish the idea of being tossed out onto the road or being left there at Hughes mercy. I wanted a way out, and I took it. I’m not proud of what I did, but I’d do it again if it meant getting away from Hughes.”
“Why you?” I came back at him, angry at being played. “Why would he take you? How could he even know we were still alive? I seem to recall a pretty bad fire back in Little Rock. One where we all died.”
The buzzing from him suddenly surged in my head, and I could practically taste his terror. He shook his head, and looked down at the floor, avoiding my gaze, without answering. I leaned back in my chair, coffee in hand, determined to wait him out as long as my head didn’t explode.
“You are not the only Client,” he said, finally breaking the silence. “There was a girl, named Abby. She had the amazing ability to find lost things. He used her to find you. I was her Handler. He needed me.”
I sat stunned as his words sunk into my mind. He wasn’t lying about this, although I wish he had been. There had been a girl... she’d had an amazing ability... Brown’s terror, the horror he felt? Suddenly the pieces all fell into place, and I knew.
She was gone. They had used her to find me and then if Brown’s terror was to be believed, Hughes had killed her. Killed a child to get to me. Brown knew it had happened. Maybe he’d even seen it. I knew the horror that he’d felt because I’d felt it too. I could feel it in him now, simmering on the edges of his mind. But he hadn’t stopped it. Whether he was in on it or not, he’d let it happen. The rage came fast and hot, flaring out and flowing through me. That I would find Hughes and make him pay was the last thought I had as blinding pain arched through my head, bringing me to my knees, screaming in agony.
“This is exactly why I didn’t want to tell you.” Brown’s words were the last thing I heard as the darkness overwhelmed me.
* * *
I CAME TO on the sofa in the living room, disoriented and totally disgusted with myself. The pain behind my eyes was intense, substantially less than earlier in the kitchen, but it was definitely there. The sadness, however, the feeling of guilt and loss was nearly overwhelming. A girl named Abby was gone, and I was to blame. Hughes may have killed her, and Brown may have let him do it, but I was the reason she’d been in danger, to begin with. I was the one responsible.
I was trying hard not to lose the omelet I’d just eaten when Brown leaned over the back of the sofa, looking at me with an ‘I told you so’ expression on his face, which was pretty much the last thing I wanted to see.
“You’re going to have to learn to have at least a modicum of control.”
If he’d known how badly I wanted to throw up right then, he’d have been very impressed with my control. He had a point, though. This passing out thing just had to stop.
“Go away,” I gritted out, not wanting to see him. He moved back, but didn’t leave, instead turning to talk to Mac like I wasn’t there.
“Just how out of control is she? Can’t you handle her any better than that?” he snapped at him.
“I don’t handle Taylor. She’s perfectly capable of handling herself,” Mac shot back. “Frankly, I think she’s holding it together pretty well, all things considered.”
“Well, you think wrong. If this is how she holds it together, I’d hate to be around when it falls apart.”
I spotted a book lying on the coffee table next to me and had a sudden impulse to throw it at Brown’s head. No sooner had the thought crossed my mind than the book was flying through the air, disappearing out of view behind the sofa.
“Good shot,” Trinity mumbled, as I heard cursing and a thud as the book hit the floor. I leaned up on one elbow and wiggled around to see her sitting next to me on a chair. Jonas was parked on the fireplace hearth across the coffee table from me, grinning.
“Do that again, and I’m out of here.” Brown leaned over the back of the sofa, glaring at me.
I glared right back and reached out for another book, only to have Jonas snag it mid-air.
“Well, now. Barely even had to think about it that time, did you?” His tone changed completely, and he walked around the sofa, past Mac, who’d been standing by my feet, to go and sit on the hearth near Jonas.
Feeling at a distinct disadvantage, I sat up, propping myself in the corner of the sofa, and tucked my legs around me. Mama D appeared and handed me a cup of coffee, heavily laced with cream. I raised my brows in question and took a cautious sip. She’d put something in there besides cream, and it was really good. Really good. She just smiled as I looked up in appreciation and settled in on the other end of the sofa.
“I’d watch myself, if I were you, Dr. Brown.” Trinity had her lawyer voice on, deep, deliberate and threatening. “The jury’s still out, and you’re not doing so well. Perhaps instead of creating problems, you might try to resolve a few instead.”
Amen to that. I couldn’t have agreed more. Brown looked as though he might argue for half a beat, but the open hostility in the room reinforced both her words and his precarious footing and he wisely chose to keep quiet. She waited long enough for him to become uncomfortable before she went on.
“Now that the crisis is over, I’d like you to explain what happened in there. Is there something wrong with Taylor?”
“There’s so much wrong with her, I don’t even know where to start.” Jonas slapped his thighs and started to pull himself up from the hearth, his intention to thrash Brown obvious to everyone in the room, including Brown himself. “Look, don’t get mad at me for telling the truth. It should be pretty obvious there’s a problem. She’s been thrown in at the deep end of the pool, and she’s been flailing around, trying desperately to stay afloat. Problem is, all that flailing around? It’s going to kill her.”
“What do you mean it’s going to kill her?” Trinity was all over him. “I want to know exactly what is going on, and I don’t want any more analogies, Mr. Deep End of the Pool. We may not be a genius like yourself, but neither are we heaped in a pile at the other end of the intelligence scale. So explain yourself. What, exactly, is going to kill her?”
Trinity was in rare form, spitting the words out like a machine gun. She’d watched me hit the floor in the kitchen, and she was stepping up to the plate, taking the lead. I was perfectly content to let her run with it. If anyone could ferret the truth out of Brown, it was Trinity. If she had any problems, Jonas was standing right there, more than ready to beat the truth out of him and Mac looked more than ready to lend a helping hand. Brown was in big trouble and genius or not, I wasn’t sure he was smart enough to know it.
Apparently, he was smarter than I thought because he stood up and moved away from the hearth, keeping an eye on Jonas as he answered Trinity’s question.
“She doesn’t know how to use what she’s got. She’s forcing it, and when she does, it damages her.” He moved over to the sofa and sat down on the opposite end, redirecting his focus to
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