Pawn Read online

  Lynn had just discovered the beginnings of the truth of her birth and the surprising existence of two sisters. One, Faith, lived in Louisiana where she worked in the evidence department for the New Orleans police. The other, Dawn, traveled the world on all kinds of hair-raising missions as some sort of mercenary soldier, fighting for justice. Lynn left Miami and Nick behind to come to Phoenix to find out more about herself and the special school, Athena Academy, that their biological mother had attended. She'd known then that she couldn't go forward in her relationship with Nick until she had the answers she so desperately needed.

  As she drove she began to relax. Driving had always been the way she unwound when she'd been younger. The only difference was when she'd been living with Jonas she'd driven a new model red convertible with all the bells and whistles.

  She now drove a five-year-old sports car with a dented front fender, but she'd paid for it with money she'd earned and nobody and nothing could take it away from her.

  She breathed a sweet sigh of relief as she parked in front of her apartment building. She'd half expected to be followed home, but had seen no suspicious cars behind her.

  Familiar scents greeted her as she walked into her apartment. A trace of her perfume lingered in the air, mingling with the orange-scented furniture oil and the fragrant candles she loved to burn in the evening. The decor was simple, but suited her. She'd chosen earth tones in keeping with this desert place, much different from the lush tropical colors of the Miami mansion she'd shared with Jonas.

  She dropped her keys on the desk in the corner of the living room, then headed for the kitchen and leftover pizza from the night before.

  She zapped the pizza in the microwave, snagged a cold beer from the fridge, then sat at the table to enjoy her meal. But any peace the day had brought to her earlier had been destroyed by the unexpected events at the end.

  What had they wanted from her? It was important enough that they'd hunted her down, pulled her over and brought her in. They apparently knew her mind-set well enough to understand that she wouldn't have come in to see them on her own.

  Dammit, she had earned the right to be left alone. Even though she had known Jonas was a criminal, even though she had known he needed to be put behind bars, one of the most difficult things she'd ever done was agree to help the FBI put him there.

  Pizza half-eaten, she got up from the table and carried her beer out to the back patio where the night sky was filled with a million stars.

  When she'd first come to Phoenix over a year ago, she'd been on a quest to learn the truth about who she was and where she'd come from. What she'd discovered about her beginnings was like something out of a science fiction movie.

  Her past included a murdered mother, a secret lab with human experimentation taking place and enough conspiracies to make her head spin.

  But, in addition to the horrors she'd learned of, she'd also been united with two sisters who, like her, were part of an experiment, all three genetically enhanced with special gifts.

  She upended her bottle of beer and took a deep swallow. Damn the FBI and damn Mr. Richard Blake for making her think about things she didn't want to think about.

  Her computer mentally called to her, reminding her that she'd promised to have the Chastain Pharmaceutical Company Web site done in a month and it was a huge job. It was easy to lose herself in work, and that's just what she needed to banish all thoughts of the FBI.

  She carried her beer back into the house and went into the spare bedroom, which she used as an office. In the past year she'd gained a reputation as a top quality Web site designer and had managed to earn a living by using her computer skills. It was a job she enjoyed and that allowed her to pick and choose the hours she worked.

  As she waited for her computer to boot up she leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes, willing away the headache that niggled at the base of her skull.

  The day had begun so well. She'd had lunch with Kayla, a friend of her late mother's, who served as police lieutenant of the small town of Athens, Arizona. Then Lynn had driven out to Athena Academy and had walked the grounds of the school where the mother she never knew had once walked.

  Visiting the state-of-the-art college prep school nestled at the base of the White Tank Mountains brought a comforting peace to Lynn. It was a place of connection for her, a piece of her mother's history that Lynn cherished. She loved seeing the new science wing, which has been completed over the summer. Another friend of her mother's, TV news reporter Tory Patton, had given the dedication speech at the ribbon-cutting ceremony in July. Lynn had visited with more of her mother's dear friends afterward.

  She'd never meant to make her home here in Phoenix, it had just happened. She'd always intended to return to Miami and Nick. When she'd first left him to seek the pieces of her life that had been missing, they'd managed to call and e-mail each other frequently. But, time had a way of slipping by and long-distance relationships rarely had a chance of working.

  There had been no bitter blowup and destruction of her relationship with Nick, only the interference of different lives and different paths.

  She frowned, blaming the unexpected appearance of the FBI for the whisper of regret that now filled her heart.

  With her computer up and running she decided to check her e-mail before she got to work on the drug company's Web site. She pulled up her e-mail program and typed in her password.

  Her mailbox showed about two dozen new e-mails. Several she knew were work related, a couple were from cyberfriends, some spam that had managed to get past her filters, but there was one sender she didn't recognize.

  The return address read, [email protected].

  Lynn frowned, trying to decide if she should open it or not. She had filters and blocks on the system that shouldn't allow in any viruses or bugs, but she also knew she couldn't be too careful.

  Deciding to take a chance, she opened the message.

  Athena sister Lynette,

  You have come to our attention. Your special, genetic skills are needed in our battle. As friends of Rainy we need your help. The Oracle Network awaits you. We will be in touch.

  Lynn stared at the note, her mind whirling. Delphi… Oracle… sounded like something from Greek mythology. It would be easy to dismiss the note as nothing but some sort of crazy ad campaign or spam except that it mentioned Athena, her special, genetic skills and the mother Lynn had never known.

  There were only a handful of people who knew that she had been created by a human experiment, that the experiment had been a success in that she had been born with superhuman speed and hearing and other strengths.

  Even Nick hadn't known the entire truth about the circumstances of her birth and her full capabilities, although he had suspected she was physically gifted.

  So, who had written the note and what was Oracle? She hit Reply. What is Oracle, she typed in, then hit Send. It took only a moment for her to get a message that the e-mail address of [email protected] was not a working address.

  "Curiouser and curiouser," she muttered. She spent the next half an hour trying to trace the e-mail address but came up with nothing. Definitely intriguing, but also rather suspicious.

  Was it possible the note was from the FBI? She narrowed her eyes and stared at the message. It was pretty coincidental that she'd been detained by them earlier then came home to find this cryptic e-mail.

  She closed the message, but was unable to still the new edge of agitation that rose up inside her. She didn't like things she didn't understand, things that didn't make sense.

  And she got the definite feeling that somehow the peaceful, quiet life she'd built here was about to explode.

  Raymore, Florida

  The ring of the telephone pulled Nick Barnes from the sofa, where he'd been cat napping for the past thirty minutes. He gazed at his watch and frowned. Who in the hell would be calling at midnight?

  He grabbed the receiver. "Hello?"

  "Is Haley there?"

  Nick's g
ut twisted at the sound of the deep male voice. "Sorry, you've got a wrong number."

  "I was just looking for Haley."

  "Nobody here by that name." He hung up the phone, his heart pounding with apprehension. Something was wrong. Otherwise he wouldn't have gotten that phone call.

  He got up from the sofa and grabbed his car keys from the kitchen table, then walked down the hallway and paused in the master bedroom doorway. Good, the phone hadn't awakened her.

  As he walked back down the hall toward the front door, he wondered what in the hell had happened. Whatever it was, it couldn't be good.

  They had agreed, when he'd gone deep undercover three months ago, that there would be no contact unless it was a dire emergency. The fact that the code had been used meant something terrible had occurred and that couldn't be good news for him.

  He left a note on the table that said he'd gone to get a pack of smokes, just in case she woke up and wondered where he was.

  As he left the house, as always, his gaze shot up and down the street, looking for anything suspicious, anything or anyone that didn't belong.

  Although Raymore, Florida, was only an hour's drive from Miami, it was light-years away in culture and flavor. Struggling economically the small town was populated by people on their way down rather than on their way up.

  It was also the place where an FBI undercover operation had been ongoing for the past year to break up a huge methamphetamine ring.

  Nick started the engine of his ten-year-old sedan, then pushed against a panel in the door that opened to reveal a secret compartment. Inside the secret compartment was a cell phone.

  As he headed away from the small bungalow he'd called home for the past three months, he punched in the number that would connect him with his contact.

  "Are you safe?" a deep, male voice asked.

  "I don't know. You tell me." Nick didn't know the name of his contact, had only spoken to him by phone once before, on the day he'd gone undercover. He knew the man only by his contact name of Haley, a name that would have nothing to do with his real one.

  There were only three people who knew where Nick was and what he was doing in Raymore. Buzz Cantrell, an agent who coordinated much of the undercover work within the agency; Frank Jessup, Nick's boss; and Haley, a faceless voice over the phone.

  "I'm alone in my car, on my way to a convenience store for a pack of cigarettes. What's up?" Nick's stomach remained knotted as he waited to hear what could only be bad news. As he listened to what Haley had to say, the knot twisted tighter. By the time Haley had finished telling him why he'd called, Nick had arrived at the convenience store.

  Nick disconnected the call and sat for a minute, trying to digest what he'd just heard. He didn't want to do it, but knew the men in charge would find a way of forcing his hand no matter how much he protested.

  He got out of the car and went into the store. As he paid for a pack of cigarettes, he continued to think about what he'd just been told. They were asking him to play a dangerous game. They couldn't pull him off the case he was working—too much time and effort had gone into setting him up in his current position.

  But, they needed him to do another job for them, one that could not be done by any other agent. It was a dangerous request, with dangerous consequences should it be discovered.

  He already knew that one false move on the case he was working would see him dead. The meth operation was headed by a handful of ruthless, amoral men who would think nothing of putting a bullet through his head should they entertain even a moment of suspicion. Now he'd been ordered to risk compromising his position.

  He got back into the car and restarted the engine at the same time he shook a cigarette from the pack. He hadn't been a smoker before he'd started this job, and he intended to quit as soon as this assignment was finished, but you couldn't go out to buy cigarettes and not smoke them.

  As he headed back toward the bungalow, he thought again of what he'd just been asked to do. The only positive thing he had to focus on was that if this got him killed, at least he'd have an opportunity to see Lynn again before he died.

  Chapter 2

  Lynn was having a bad morning. Part of the problem was that she was trying to function on too-little sleep. Despite the fact that she'd tried to forget the unexpected appearance of the FBI in her life once again, she hadn't been successful.

  She'd tossed and turned all night, cursing them even as she wondered exactly what they'd wanted from her. She'd finally fallen asleep as dawn was creeping into the bedroom, then had awakened just before ten and had forced herself out of bed despite a headful of grogginess. After two cups of coffee she'd felt better prepared to face the day.

  She'd punched on her computer with the intention of working only to discover that the piece of technological machinery had gone wonky.

  It booted up just fine, but before she could touch another button it began indiscriminately opening and closing programs one after another. Her dancing dolphin screen saver, WordPerfect, Free Cell, Excel—every program large and small she had ever loaded into the computer flashed on and off the screen in mind-boggling succession.

  She stared at the screen, stunned, wondering what in the hell was going on. She punched keys, trying to gain control of the possessed computer, but it responded to nothing she keyed in.

  What was happening? When she'd opened that crazy Delphi e-mail the night before, had it somehow infected her computer with a new kind of virus?

  She was still seated in front of the computer screen when a knock fell on her door. She got up to answer, unsurprised to see her next-door-neighbor Leo Tankersly. He often drifted in and out of her apartment as if he belonged.

  "Hey, Lynnie." He walked through the doorway and headed for her kitchen, where she knew he'd help himself to her freshly brewed coffee.

  Leo had made it clear from the moment she'd met him seven months ago that he wouldn't mind if their neighborly relationship moved on to something more intimate.

  She stood in the kitchen doorway and watched him pour himself a cup of coffee. There had been times in the past seven months that she'd been tempted to let herself fall into a relationship with Leo, times when loneliness had made his attractiveness look appealing.

  And he was attractive. He was a big man, with broad shoulders and a headful of long, blond hair that made him appear lionlike. He had the clear blue eyes of an Arizona summer sky and an easy nature that made him comfortable to be around.

  He owned his own construction business, but was the least driven man she'd ever known. He worked when he felt like it, or when his cupboards were empty. For him, work was merely a means to an end, not a way of life.

  What had kept her from falling into a physical relationship with him so far was the fact that, as handsome as he was, as sexy as he looked in his jeans and T-shirt, there were no sparks for her, none of the visceral pull that she'd felt only once before in her life for a man.

  "You aren't speaking this morning?" he asked once he had his cup of coffee in his hand. He raised a furry blond eyebrow.

  "I'm having a bad morning," she said, unable to stop the frown she felt tug across her forehead.

  "How can it be a bad morning? The sun is shining, the coffee is hot and all is well with the world." He grinned, exposing slightly crooked front teeth.

  Lynn's frown deepened. Leo was one of those people who never had a bad day. Laid-back to the point of being comatose, he never expected anything and therefore was never disappointed. He was at peace with the universe in a way Lynn often envied.

  "Something's wrong with my computer."

  "Something's wrong with all computers," he replied. "Too much, too fast isn't good for anyone. Technology isn't always a good thing."

  "I'm serious, Leo," she said with a touch of impatience. She led him through the living room and to the tiny spare bedroom she used as an office.

  Leo took one look at her computer screen's activity and whistled beneath his breath. "Wow, what kind of evil virus
did you manage to pick up?"

  "I don't know. I can't even key anything in to see if I can find the problem." Once again Lynn stared at her screen.

  It was like nothing she'd ever seen before. It was at that moment a thought struck her. Was it possible her "friends" at the FBI had decided to wreak a little havoc in her life?

  It would be relatively easy for one of their computer techs to transmit a virus via the Internet directly to her machine. Even though she had the latest in security features on her computer, she knew no security was fail-safe and the FBI would have viruses that had never been seen before in their little cache of surprises.

  She couldn't imagine what they would hope to gain by doing something like this, other than reminding her of how powerful they were.

  "Have you tried shutting it off and rebooting?" Leo asked. "Maybe that will reset it or something." Lynn shrugged, leaned over and punched the button to shut off the power.

  "And while we're waiting for it to cool down or reset or whatever those things do, maybe we should just take a quick tumble in the bed." He grinned at her. "You look tense. There's nothing like a full-body massage to relax you. I'll use my body to massage yours."

  She laughed in spite of her frustration. "Leo, do you ever think of anything else besides sex?"

  "Food," he replied. "Speaking of which, do you have any of those cinnamon muffin things you had last week? They were awesome."

  "No. I haven't been back to the bakery since you polished off the last dozen."

  "Then if you aren't going to offer me muffins, you should offer me sex." A wicked grin curved his lips.

  Again Lynn laughed. "You might as well give it up. It's never going to happen."

  He held up one of his large hands as if to stop her protests. "Never say never. Who knows what fate has in store, and never might be something very different tomorrow."