Mind Game (GhostWalkers #2)(79)
Author: Christine Feehan

Dahlia was in the middle of a seizure when he found her, the violent energy burning through her veins, convulsing her body again and again. He knelt beside her, took her hand, hoping to draw the energy away from her.

“How bad?” Kaden came up behind him.

Knowing it couldn’t be helped, but that Dahlia would hate anyone seeing her so vulnerable, Nicolas indicated for Kaden to take her other hand. Between the two anchors they were able to draw the last of the violent energy away from her body until she lay still.

She turned her head away from them and was sick repeatedly. Nicolas handed her a wipe from his pack. She took it with shaky hands. Her head was pounding, a ferocious pain that refused to let up. “I don’t think we judged the distance very well.” It was a poor attempt at humor, but the best she could do under the circumstances.

Nicolas’s stomach knotted at her words. He lifted her, ignoring her protests, and took her to the boats. “We’ll find a place to shower and change clothes. You can rest while I go shopping for you.” It was all he could think to do. Even holding her, she was hunching away from him, avoiding his gaze, keeping her face averted from Kaden.

“The transport will be waiting,” Kaden reminded.

“Let it wait,” Nicolas said grimly.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Logan Maxwell was stocky with wide shoulders and bulging muscles on his arms. His ice-cold blue eyes assessed the group of men as they approached him in tight formation, weapons drawn, facing outward, tracking the area around the airfield.

“Expecting trouble?” he greeted.

“Yes,” Nicolas answered, nodding toward the gun in the pilot’s hand. “Aren’t you?”

“I was expecting Dahlia, not an army.”

“We’re escorting her. We’re her bodyguards.” Nicolas kept eye contact, two males staring one another down.

Max kept the stare going but raised his voice. “Dahlia? You all right?”

In spite of having cleaned up and dressed in the clothes Nicolas brought her, Dahlia was still pale and wan from the seizure. Her headache was a killer. She just wanted to lie down and sleep as she always did after such an event. The men had her cut off from the pilot, separated by their bodies and guns. She forced a casual shrug. “I’m fine, Max.

They’re all just a little overprotective after what happened to Jesse,” Dahlia answered. “They insist on coming along.”

Max refused to break eye contact with Nicolas. “Not if you don’t want them to come. Say the word.”

“You think you can take us all?” Sam asked, amusement in his voice.

“You never know,” Max answered.

Dahlia sighed. “I can’t take it when you all act like this. It’s embarrassing. I’m tired, my head aches, and I’m sick of all of this. I’m getting on the plane.”

“Not yet,” Nicolas said and signaled Tucker and Sam to enter first. “Stay close to me, Dahlia.” He didn’t look at her when he gave the order, didn’t take his eyes from the pilot, but he was very aware of her. How fragile she seemed. How far away from him, although they were close enough he felt the brush of her skin against his.

“There’s no one on the plane,” Max said. “She always flies alone with just me.”

“Not anymore she doesn’t,” Nicolas answered, his obsidian eyes as hard and as unflinching as rock. “Not since someone in the NCIS sold her out.”

Max stood very still, and then he slowly holstered his gun. “Dahlia, have you spoken with the director, told him about this?”

“No, but he has to be thinking the same thing. It wasn’t all that hard to figure it out. Someone killed my family and burned down my home, Max. No one knew about me other than a few people at NCIS.”

“Including me,” Max said quietly.

Dahlia shrugged, hating to voice the suspicion out loud. She had very few friends, if one could call them that. They were acquaintances really, but she didn’t have enough to throw them away. And she’d always liked Max.

“Her last mission was a setup,” Nicolas supplied, his black gaze unswerving.

A muscle jumped in Max’s jaw. He swore under his breath. “Jesse Calhoun is my friend, Dahlia. I’ve always felt responsible for you. You should have called for backup. Once I fly you somewhere, my orders are to stand by to fly you back, which is exactly what I did. You never said a word.”

“I was late.” She said it softly. “Two hours late.”

Max swore again.

“Get in the plane, Dahlia. I don’t like how exposed you are out here,” Nicolas ordered. “We can sort it out in the air.” Although he was grateful she obeyed him quickly, it was unlike her to do so without a comment on his arrogance, and that bothered him. Dahlia beaten down was too much for his heart to take. He stayed very close to her, almost pushing her with his body in an attempt to get a response from her, but she kept her head down.

The men moved in the same tight formation, Dahlia locked in the center while they escorted her to the waiting plane. Max followed her into the small compartment. “You should have said something, Dahlia. You should have at least reported it to the director. Henderson would have had me bring you in to protect you.”

“No one was supposed to know about me, Max,” Dahlia pointed out. She sounded weary, sad. Already moving away from them all. “What does that tell you? And how did they know where I lived?”

“You can’t think someone at the NCIS is involved.”

“When they sent a team in to find me at the safe house in the Quarter, someone took a shot at me. They knew right where to find my home in the bayou, Max. It isn’t that easy to find.” She didn’t look at him but kept her face averted.

Nicolas put his arm around her and drew her close, the grief in her voice twisting at his guts. “You can see why we’re not taking any chances.” He had already done his best to probe Logan Maxwell’s mind, but the man had strong barriers up. The same kind of barriers Lily Whitney had taught the GhostWalkers through mental exercises. He recognized the mark of Special Forces, a warrior trained and honed by battle. Maxwell wasn’t the type of man to back down easily, and Nicolas doubted if he could be bought.

They settled in the plane with Max behind the controls. “Jesse know about these men, Dahlia?”

“Nicolas is the one who pulled him out of the fire, Max,” Dahlia said quietly. “And if Jesse lives, it was Nicolas who saved him.”