DeMarco might have been less well known among the non-SCU community of psychics than his partner, but that was because his FBI career for some years before he met Hollis had consisted of a number of highly secretive deep-cover assignments. Since leaving that more stealthy life behind, he was definitely becoming better known.
Physically he was rather overpowering on many levels. He was very large and clearly possessed the kind of strength that could never be earned in a gym, but what any woman would notice immediately was his thick blond hair, extremely sharp blue eyes, and perfect classical handsomeness. It was as if his still, watchful face had been carved from stone by a master sculptor.
Olivia had felt just a little frightened of him initially, which tended to be her default response to large, unfamiliar men, but the first time she’d seen him lean down to say something quietly to his partner, his stone face softened and made very human if only for that fleeting moment, her fear had left her.
Galen, another large and powerful man who also made her feel wary, had not made an appearance in the last hour or so; Olivia could remember hearing him say something to Bishop about weapons, and she assumed—without wanting to spend any time at all thinking about it—he was off gathering whatever it had been decided the team would need.
Both Bishop and Miranda were also absent from the room for the moment, called away quietly by a dark man they hadn’t introduced for some reason he hadn’t explained. Olivia was more than a little worried about that, but she did her best not to think about it until she had to. She considered it a cowardly trait, doing that, but it was the way she’d dealt with scary things her whole life, and she doubted very much that would change anytime soon.
Instead of thinking about scary possibilities, she allowed her gaze to wander from person to person, their scattered positions around the room not, she hoped uneasily, a sign of a team that didn’t know how to be one.
Tory—Victoria Stark—stood alone near one of the big windows, not taking advantage of what looked like a long, comfortable window seat as she gazed out at the view without, it was obvious from her preoccupied expression, taking much, if any, notice of it. She was younger than Olivia but seemed older, with all the calm, self-control, and shrewd watchfulness Olivia felt she herself lacked. She was of medium height, on the thin side but much, much stronger than she looked, and possessed silvery-blond hair cut short and expressive green eyes.
Sharing Olivia’s couch was Reno, serene as always. She didn’t look as if she’d pretty much crossed the country twice in a jet in less than twenty-four hours and with no more than brief stops, neither the least bit rumpled nor seemingly in need of sleep. Nor did she appear at all disturbed that one of the three men who had been aboard that jet when it had landed at the airstrip earlier had been sending her hard glares since they had arrived here—and probably, Olivia thought, all the way from Alaska.
Not quite ready to brave those glares even if they weren’t directed specifically at her, Olivia looked across at the other couch, which was occupied by the two other men who had arrived with Reno, the wide space between them more indicative of an automatic reluctance to get too physically close to anyone because of their abilities than of any personal animosity.
Sully Maitland she knew well. Born an empath and a strong one, he was still, at thirty-two, working to strengthen his shields; it was one of the reasons he chose to live on a fairly isolated horse ranch in Montana. He was six-two and powerful, dark hair graying at the temples a sign of struggle more than years, and the most intense golden eyes Olivia had ever seen in a human face.
She had seen something very like them once before, but those intense golden eyes had belonged to a tiger. And not one caged in a zoo.
Like Olivia, Sully was cursed with headaches and blackouts, and like her he considered the blackouts something of a blessing as long as they happened in private rather than public and there was something soft to fall on. It was, he’d told her once, the only real peace he had, since otherwise the feelings of every soul within a hundred yards of him battered at his shields like an only slightly muffled, extremely painful tide, whether he was awake or asleep.
Sully didn’t have a “frequency” that limited his range; the only thing that limited him was distance. Inside a hundred yards—almost exactly—he felt everything from any person who didn’t have a very powerful shield (or rare all-receptive rather than projecting or transmitting abilities, like Reno), and from most animals.
It was one of his unique traits, that he could sense the emotions of animals. Not thoughts, he claimed no ability to communicate with them as such, but he knew what they felt. Not all animals, but most. Including birds, especially, for some reason, crows.
It was why the cattle ranch he had inherited had become instead a horse ranch where not even the chickens were slaughtered and no hunting or trapping was allowed.
Sharing the couch at that careful distance was Logan Alexander, wary and somewhat aloof, as he generally was around other psychics. Olivia knew him, but she wouldn’t have claimed to know him well. She knew he didn’t want to be what he was—a medium, born with that ability. And since, during the single emotional outburst she could ever remember hearing from him, he had confessed that spirits quite literally haunted him, all the time, everywhere, giving him no peace, she really couldn’t blame him.
Logan was a good-looking man and probably, Olivia thought shrewdly, drew women as quickly as his abilities repelled them. He was thirty, six-one, and possessed shaggy black hair and oddly light blue eyes that were almost hypnotic. He was frowning now and had been since he’d arrived, but Olivia had no idea if it was because spirits were bothering him here—or because they weren’t.
From the corner of her eye, Olivia saw Reno move restlessly to glance back over her shoulder with a slight frown marring her normally serene expression as she somewhat ruefully eyed the final member of their team.
Or . . . perhaps not.
Dalton Davenport had been born a telepath. And he quite likely would normally have developed at least a shield of sorts by the time he reached his current age of thirty-three. But Dalton was one of those unlucky souls whose psychic abilities had been misunderstood and feared by those around him from very early in his life, before he hit his teens. Abandoned by family when too young to even try to defend himself, he had lived the secretly feared horror of many psychics: Medically diagnosed with supposedly dangerous mental “disorders” that were judged to pose a danger to himself and to others, he had been kept on an ever-changing regimen of strong medications—and institutionalized.
For nearly twenty years, until Bishop had found him.
So nobody could blame Dalton for the fact that he had begun pacing almost from the moment he’d arrived, along with Reno, Logan, and Sully, less than an hour ago. They couldn’t even blame him for the fact that he had not stopped pacing for an instant and had remained stubbornly unresponsive while all the necessary introductions had been made, keeping his distance and holding on to the glare that was directed often at Reno, but saying nothing.
The problem was that Dalton not only lacked a shield to protect himself and block the thoughts of those around him: He broadcast his own thoughts and emotions. Strongly. And since anger tended to swallow up most other emotions and thoughts, what was coming off Dalton in almost palpable waves was only that. He was angry. He was so very angry. All the time.
And anger was one emotion most telepaths and empaths could not shut out no matter how strong their shields were.
Looking around at the others in the room, Olivia saw Hollis wince and rub her left temple, her blue eyes following Dalton’s pacing with both sympathy and pain.
Then she looked up at her partner, and Olivia barely caught her quiet words as he bent his head attentively.
“Can I just apologize for all the time I spent broadcasting? Honestly, I had no idea it was like this. So painful. Why didn’t you tell me?”
DeMarco smiled faintly. “Different situation.”