Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 138217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
She’d barely gotten her emotions under control when the traffic began to move. Slowly, but steadily. It looked like the authorities had opened up one of the three lanes on this side.
Her car started up, joining in the mandated flow.
Chapter 30
Black clothes. Maybe sweatpants and a hoodie with the hood pulled up? It happened so fast. But not a big person. Hard to tell if they were thin or just rangy with the baggy clothes, but definitely not bear-sized. Average, I guess.
No idea on height. I’m no good at that and they were on the road, with nothing to compare against.
—Eyewitness report as recorded by Detective Vo Zaitsev (today)
“EXIT ONTO EMERGENCY shoulder,” Theo instructed the car once she was close to the scene.
As she’d expected, the system didn’t question that order; it tended to be one of the built-in overrides when it came to mandated automatic navigation zones. Communicating seamlessly with the other vehicles around them, it shifted lanes with ease until it came to a stop on the emergency shoulder, mere feet from the Enforcement cordon.
The red beams of lasers sparked angrily against the morning light.
An officer in plain clothes immediately walked over to the window she’d already lowered. “You can’t stop here,” he said in rapid Russian. “Is your vehicle in trouble? If so, we can give you a ride out and you can organize to retrieve it once the area is clear.”
“This is Yakov Stepyrev’s vehicle.”
The officer raised his eyebrows, then stood up and spoke into the microphone dotted at his collar. Leaning back down shortly, he said, “You’re cleared to remain here. But don’t leave your vehicle. This is a live scene. Understood?”
“Understood,” Theo said, because she knew how to play the game when it came to people in power. No one ever expected trouble from the meek and mild persona she adopted in such situations—so no one watched her.
So easy it was to fool others into seeing her as not worth their attention.
In this case, however, she had no intention of breaking the rules. “Officer,” she said before he could walk away. “Is Yakov all right?”
“Of course. He’s a bear.” As if that was all that needed to be said.
She found that strangely reassuring.
A little of the tension leaching out of her muscles, she relaxed into the seat and observed the scene in front of her. A white tent blocked any view of the body, for which Theo was grateful. She’d had enough death in her life, didn’t want to see any more.
But not all of what was happening was obscured from view.
The forensic techs in their head-to-toe white coveralls, their faces covered with clear masks and their hair tucked neatly under the hoods of the coveralls, moved around the site in a quiet swarm.
Taking samples, shooting photographs, setting up evidence markers.
Enforcement officers outside the cordon wore the city’s dark blue uniform. A number spoke into phones, while their colleagues directed traffic. But she was most interested in three people in ill-fitting suits—two women, one man—who stood on the far left of the road, their attention on the forested area on that side.
Detectives. Waiting for Yakov.
Who was too fast for them to follow.
Climbing into the rear section of the vehicle through the seats, she grabbed a bottle of water from the storage area for when he came back, then returned to her seat. She expected to sit there for some time, but Yakov appeared out of the trees less than ten minutes later. His face was grim, the shake of his head a hard negative. After a short conversation with the dejected-appearing trio, he looked around, spotted her, and jogged over.
Theo had already shifted to the passenger seat and now passed him the bottle of water. “You lost the trail?” she asked after he’d emptied it, his body so hot with energy it was tongues of flame on her skin. “At another road, I assume?”
But Yakov shook his head again, a pulse ticking in his jaw. “In the middle of the forest.” Grit in every word. “I even went up a tree, thinking that perhaps he’d climbed up. Bears aren’t the best climbers, but I checked the canopy on every side, and even did a wider circle just in case. Nothing.”
Light dawned, the reason for his frustration crystal clear. “A teleport-capable telekinetic.” A nightmare of a person to hunt. Someone who could vanish and appear at will, constrained only by the level of their power.
“That’s not the worst of it.” Exhaling, Yakov threw the empty bottle into the back seat. “This stays between us, Theo.” Not a question. Not an order. Just . . . a statement of trust.
Warmth uncurled inside her stomach, flowed into her veins. “I won’t say anything.”
“I tracked one scent from the body to the place in the forest where I lost it—but I’m certain I scented two different individuals at that spot.”