“I called Celine to see if she wants to join us. She’s not answering.” Ari put her cell in her purse. “I bet she’s avoiding us for dragging her out last night. It’s a shame she didn’t have a good time. I’d hoped she’d meet someone and get her mind off Dominic.”
Wait a minute. Didn’t Celine—her thoughts grew fuzzy, but then the answer emerged. No, Ari was right. After dancing at The Song, they’d attended an after-party. Celine wasn’t having a good time. Lauren had given Celine the keys to the Mercedes and she’d left. She and Ari had ridden home with friends they’d run into at the party.
“That reminds me, I should text her. I don’t need my car until later this afternoon.”
Ari bent down. “Why are there buttons on the floor?”
“Buttons?” Lauren picked up two. Ari added another to the pile. She hadn’t come across any missing on her clothes. “Not sure.”
Lauren noticed the watercolor of the cabin hung askew. She straightened it.
“That’s a shame. Looks like a relaxing place.”
Who’d said that? Why?
A vision of a dark haired guy who rated extreme on the eye-candy meter flickered. Desire spread warmth through her middle. Should she know him? Before she could latch onto it, the image dissipated.
“Hey,” Ari waved her hand in front of Lauren’s face. “You ready?”
“Yes, let’s go.” Lauren centered the vase on the entryway table and snagged her purse. Strange. She hadn’t thought about Mazree in a long time.
Chapter 4
Reid paced the short living room in the sparsely furnished, rented apartment. Afternoon sun peeked through the closed blinds, illuminating worn patches on the brown couch. The floor, covered in beige carpeting, creaked under his black high-tops. Cheap rent, unfriendly neighbors, and a location near the mall made the two-bedroom space an ideal command central. Strange how his apartment was located twenty minutes away, but now, two years in the future, someone else occupied it. The tapping of computer keys broke up the silence. Mace sat in the kitchenette area working on a laptop. He bopped to the blues guitar riffs playing faintly from the speakers. His muscular body dwarfed the ladder-back chair and four-seat table.
Two flat screens on the wall streamed multiple views of Thane tailing Xenia Allen through the shopping mall. The scientist’s lunch date with Jeff Miller continued with a stroll through stores instead of making the exchange. Jeff didn’t have the motive or the cash. Someone was using him as the go-between. Dalir’s supernatural insight revealed they couldn’t just snag the virus. They needed to take down the buyer.
“I want another look at the files.” Thane’s frustration came through in Reid’s earpiece.
If Thane believed the intel was lacking, it probably was overlooked. Reid picked up a canned energy drink from the faux wood coffee table. A news magazine from months in the future slid out from a pile of papers and dropped to the floor. The cover showed a devastated couple who’d lost both their children under the headline “Major Tragedy.” They couldn’t fail in stopping the virus from reaching the black market.
He tossed the magazine back on the table and gulped the last swallow from the can. “Mace, pull up what we got on Xenia. We need to comb through it again for subversive activity.”
“How deep?” Mace’s raised brow rippled the front of his brown, shaved head.
“If she tweeted a rant about her neighbor’s dog pissing on her lawn, investigate it.”
Mace rubbed his hands on his black cargo pants and rolled up the sleeves of his dark, button-down shirt. As he peered at the screen, he cracked his knuckles. “On it.”
On screen, Xenia’s companion stumbled. She led Jeff to a bench in the middle of the mall corridor. Then she left her shopping bag with him and hurried into the ladies’ room.
Reid studied the split views. The vials were in the shopping bag. Was this the drop that closed the deal? “What’s going on?”
“Don’t know.” Thane stepped out of foot traffic nearer the stores. “Get Mace down here. I—”
A dark haired woman approached Thane.
“Thane.” Reid looked closely at the screen. “Are you okay? Talk to me.”
“Yeah, I need a minute.”
In the midst of a mission, he needed a minute? Who was she? He grabbed the toggle and tightened the view. Damn. Blind spot.
On the other screen, Jeff stumbled around in circles screaming.
Thane broke off from his conversation with the mystery woman and ran toward the commotion.
Some of the shoppers stared at the spectacle. Others smartly backed away as the situation grew more out of control.
“Fuck. Me. What the hell? This bastard has lost his fucking mind.” Reid grabbed his semiautomatic pistol and tucked it into the holster clipped to the waistband of his black jeans.
Mace stood. “Need backup?”
“Negative. Grab Xenia. She went to the ladies’ room.” Reid called up his phase energy. It erupted over him and shimmered like thousands of tiny crystals infused with sunlight. A golden tunnel of light appeared in his vision, and he surged into it. Seconds later, he stood next to Thane. “We gotta get a handle on this guy.”