"Yes, sir." He turned to go.
The detective's car stopped and he climbed out. His door thunked closed. "Hunter!"
Nathan ignored him. Browning could handle the man. When he got in his car he was thinking about enemies, prey, and Kai.
His immediate task was to interview Shaw's employer and coworkers. He didn't expect to learn much; at most he might find out if Shaw was known to be Gifted. That was the way of investigations. Most of what you learned wasn't useful.
But his gut had a different priority.
He'd do both, he decided. It wouldn't take long to swing by the apartments, and Kai wouldn't have a client this early. She'd be home.
Minutes later, he parked and ran lightly up the outside stairs. His shoulder barely twinged. He'd tell her that. She'd be glad to hear that her surgery had worked so well.
He knocked. Nothing.
Knocked again. No answer.
Fear was a startling acid. It flushed thought from his system so fast that for a moment he stood stock-still and saw her bloodless body instead of the bland metal of the door.
Only for a moment. Then his mind performed one of its more human tricks and sneered at him. Was he going to imagine her dead every time she wasn't where he'd expected?
His mind was less amenable to order than his body, but he hushed it as best he could. After a second it produced a more useful thought: She might be running.
Of course. Kai ran when she was stressed or upset. It helped her deal with her Gift as well as her emotions, and both had been given a workout last night.
She'd have her phone with her, he thought as he padded back down the stairs. His was in his car. He could call her, find out where she was. Or he could track her.
The decision floated up from his middle without input from his brain. Tuning in to her scents - both the physical and the psychic - was as automatic as adjusting the focus of his eyes. He set off at an easy lope.
Chapter 6
Sweat stung Kai's eyes. She had her contacts in, so she blinked furiously instead of rubbing and wished she'd remembered her sweatband. One corner of her mind contemplated laser surgery for the hundredth time, but most of her remained cradled in the steady, reassuring thud of her feet against the ground.
When she ran, when she focused on the physical, her thoughts stayed close, tight to her body. She scarcely noticed them at all, and the residue of others' thoughts slipped past, unseen. The world turned crisp, its edges purely material and lovely to her.
"Kai."
The voice behind her jarred her out of her near-trance. She lost the rhythm, found it again, and raised a hand to acknowledge Nathan's greeting. Though she kept moving, she couldn't find the smooth, centered place she'd been floating in. Her thoughts rose around her in a mist of worry-gray.
Why was he here? He was on duty. Was this official? He could have called, but he'd come to find her. Had they misidentified the body earlier and it was someone she knew, after all?
Punctuating the gray were pops of yellow: Nathan. Nathan's here.
She lacked the wind to sigh. She'd pushed herself hard enough this morning, she supposed. Her thighs were burning. She slowed to a jog.
"What's up?" she asked as Nathan drew alongside her, not the least bit winded. He never was, which had irritated her at first. She was more resigned now. He did sweat, at least. In the summer. If he ran more than a mile or two, that is, and it was really hot. Like a hundred.
"You're out running. A killer wants to drink your blood, and you're out running."
"My blood?" Startled, a little frightened, she looked at him. He faced ahead, his features set in an odd frown. But his thoughts - ! They weren't muddy - Nathan's colors were always clear - but they were sure jumpy. Indigo twitched into purple, slid back to blue, flashed into green flickering with tips of angry red.
"You'd make a good meal for it. You've a strong Gift."
"But you don't have any reason to think it's after me, personally. Do you?"
The thought-fish around him slowed and flattened. His voice turned wry. "No. I was... generalizing."
Overreacting, more like. Which was very interesting. She jogged along in silence for a moment. "I take it the newest victim was Gifted."
"I suspect he was, but a body drained of life and blood doesn't tell me that."
"Does it tell you other things?"
"Almost always. This one... didn't." Trouble bubbled beneath the even surface of his voice. She saw it in the dark swirls that lifted from him, then fell again. His breath huffed out in a rare show of frustration. "This wasn't at all what I came here to tell you. I don't know why I... no, I do know. It just... surprises me."
He was seesawing, saying one thing, then another; and that was not like him. When he fell silent she wanted to stop, grab him, and shake a few more words out. She settled for a civilized prompt. "And that reason would be... ?"
His feet hit the ground three more times before he answered. "I was frightened. I went to your door and you weren't there, and I was afraid for you."
She could have sworn her heart slid around in her chest in an unnatural way. "That's natural, I guess. You'd just come from a murder scene."
"I'm not used to it. Sometimes I... friends are rare. I don't find one often."
Now he was squeezing the heart he'd just sent sliding. She couldn't think of what to say. The urge to grab him hit again, but this time she wanted to hold him. To just hold on.
He discovered smiles again and offered her one. "Usually I'm the one who has trouble with words. I seem to have stolen yours this time."
"They'll come back." Eventually.