MINE TO POSSESS

“Jesus.” Lucas’s scowl was in his tone.

“Logic says,” Judd continued, unperturbed, “he’ll go to those likely to know Talin’s location, not run to this place she hasn’t been to in days. He won’t fall for the Rina gambit.”

“You’re thinking with the trained mind of a soldier,” Dorian said. “Larsen isn’t a soldier, he’s a scientist playing at murder. He was smart at the start, I’ll give you that, but the recent slipups all smack of an amateur overreaching himself—the failed attack on Max, the way the bodies were dumped, even the mess he or his goons made of Talin’s apartment.”

“Psychological warfare.”

“No.” Clay shook his head. “I had a look today. What they did was savage, like bullies trying to scare a child.” Losing those pictures had to have hurt Tally. Clay intended to replace each and every one. “There was a senselessness to the whole thing.”

Lucas’s anger was a naked blade when he spoke. “You’re thinking we have ourselves a sociopath using experiments as cover to prey on children?”

“Yeah.” That was what he had never been able to understand—and what had probably confused Tamsyn—about the photos of those fragile, broken bodies. There had been too much glee in the way the victims had been brutalized. Someone had hurt those children simply because he could. “Worse, I think he’s slipped the leash—no one in the Council superstructure would’ve okayed anything but the total disappearance of the victims. Larsen wanted them found because he wanted the attention.”

“If that’s true,” Dorian added, “it means things are seriously shaky in the PsyNet.”

“Because they’ve had too many mistakes escape lately?” Lucas asked.

“Think about it. Before Enrique”—Dorian’s tone was a chilling frost as he named his sister’s killer—“we hadn’t heard of any violence in the Psy. But after him, we had that serial who was hunting Faith and now this.”

At the time that Faith was being stalked, Clay had been so close to going rogue, he’d suggested leaving the Psy to clean up their own mistakes. He hadn’t cared about anything. Now, God, how he cared about Tally. She could drive him crazier faster than any other person, he thought with a smile, but when she melted, she was pure honey.

“There have been other incidents.” Judd’s comment cut into his thoughts. “Killers they’ve managed to hush up, others who have become more active.”

“Why the sudden signs of disintegration?” Lucas asked. “The assassination can’t be the cause—it only just happened.”

“Dissent is building up, starting to have a flow-on effect—the PsyNet is a psychic construct. Anything that happens in it has an impact on the minds of those linked to it.”

“You saying the more the PsyNet destabilizes, the more vermin we’re going to see?” Dorian blew out a disgusted breath.

“Yes. Notwithstanding its own murderous tendencies, the Council’s iron fist—in conjunction with Silence—kept the majority of the viciously insane contained.” He paused. “There’s always a price for freedom.”

Lucas swore. “If the Council falls, the backlash will hit humans and changelings as well as the Psy.”

“The greatest danger lies in the uncontrolled dismantling of Silence. In the chaos, we could lose millions from all three races.”

“You’re defending Silence?” Dorian’s asked in open surprise.





CHAPTER 42


“Silence was set up for a reason. I’d be dead now if not for it.” Judd’s tone was matter-of-fact. “It’s ultimately proven false, but we can’t go back to how things were before conditioning began—the killing, the insanity.” His fists clenched.

“How bad will it get?” Clay asked.

“Measures are being put in place,” Judd said, “but the fallout will be … substantial. Not only deaths from the psychic shock, but from the awakening of a thousand monstrous desires, things that were suppressed by Silence. Like this scientist—before the cracks in the Net, he would have never acted on his instincts.”

Clay bared his teeth. “Means the sociopathic bastard’s not thinking clearly anymore.” Psy made excellent serial killers because they rarely made mistakes. But if this one was fragmenting … “He’ll come here, he’ll want to hurt the woman who stopped his fun.”

“What if he and his associates don’t turn up tonight?” Judd asked. “Do we return tomorrow? And the day after?”

“Yes.” Clay looked at the Psy. “You have a problem with that?”

Judd smiled and it was the ice-cold smile of the assassin he undoubtedly was. “No. I like kids.”

“How do we do this?” Dorian asked. “Get Judd to tear into the head guy’s mind?”