Ravyn's Flight Read online

  “Damon?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Did you fight in the Third War?” Her voice was muffled.

  “Yeah.” He didn’t know why she asked, but he’d talk if that made her feel better. “I fought five and a half of the seven years.” Damon kept his voice soothing, hoping it would help her relax. They both needed more sleep tonight, but he knew she wasn’t ready to settle down yet.

  “It was bad,” Ravyn stated.

  Damon didn’t say anything.

  “My mom told me people believed the turn of the millennium signaled the beginning of an age of peace.”

  “Yeah,” Damon said, unable to keep the cynicism from his voice, “and in the forty years since then, there have been three wars and there’s sure to be a fourth since nothing got resolved.”

  They both stayed quiet and Damon found himself thinking about fighting in another war. Dread welled up and he felt a stab of relief when Ravyn broke the silence.

  “What I remember most about the Second War was the shattered look in the soldiers’ eyes. Even the ones who stayed in the rear area had this feeling around them, as if their souls had been wounded. I heard the Third set new levels of barbarism.”

  “How do you know so much about the Second Oceanic War?” Damon asked, deciding to ignore the last half of what she said. He didn’t want to remember just how barbaric those final years of fighting had been.

  “My mom was a doctor. She was stationed on the front for the Second War and our quarters were in the rear area.”

  His hand stilled. “Your mother was a military doctor?”

  “Yes. A surgeon.”

  “Which front?”

  “Mexico.”

  “Hell.”

  “It could have been worse,” she told him. “Mom could have been assigned to the Middle East Theater of Operations or the Southeast Asian TO.”

  “They also could have sent her to the European front,” Damon countered. Although Europe had been the hottest area in the First War, it had been relatively quiet in the Second and Third. The Southwest front, however, had taken a beating in the Second Oceanic War as the Coalition forces had attempted to breach the United States by moving up the Pacific coast of Mexico.

  Ravyn might have lived in the rear area, but he knew California had been hit in a number of air attacks. He remembered her age from the file he’d read, and doing some quick calculation, he figured out she would have been four when the Second War started, seven when it ended. Hell. Not exactly a peaceful childhood.

  “Where was your father?” He hoped she had one civilian parent. If both were military, she would have spent a lot of time in childcare with other kids who had two parents serving.

  “My dad died just before the Second War broke out.”

  Frowning, he untangled his hand from her hair and tipped her chin up so she looked at him. “You’re telling me that your mother was on the front lines and she was your only parent?”

  Ravyn must have heard the censure he tried to keep out of his voice. “She was an experienced surgeon, Damon. She’d been on the lines for the First War. They needed her at the front.”

  “You needed her.”

  Ravyn tried to turn her head away, but he kept hold of her chin. This explained why she was so self-reliant why she thought she had to be strong. No child should have to live knowing she could be orphaned at any minute. The brass had tried to keep single parents out of the battle zone, but doctors were always at a premium. It probably would have merited some debate, but in the end, if the doctor was willing, single parent or not, she would have been assigned to the front.

  “It wasn’t just the two of us. Mom remarried when I was five and then I had a stepfather and brother.”

  Something in Ravyn’s voice made him suspicious. “Let me guess. Your stepfather was military too and on the front.”

  “Not quite.”

  “Why don’t you tell me what I got wrong.”

  She hesitated, then shrugged and said, “Gil was Spec Ops.”

  Damon cursed. Just one word, but it conveyed everything he felt. Her stepfather hadn’t been on the front lines; he’d been behind enemy lines. Memories of some of his more dangerous missions flashed through his mind and his regard for Ravyn went up again. She’d grown up understanding the fragility of life, the uncertainty of what the next day held.

  “It wasn’t that bad,” she told him quietly. “Both Mom and Gil survived the war and I had my big brother to watch out for me. And believe me when I say Alex took the job very seriously.”

  Damon could hear affection in her voice as she spoke of her stepbrother and he forced himself to let the rest go. It had happened years before and his outrage wouldn’t change her past. He should consider himself lucky Ravyn had the background she did. This situation was made a lot more tenable because of her behavior. The thought of trying to get through this with some spoiled princess like his brother’s wife almost made him shudder.

  He ran his fingers from her chin, along her jaw to her ear before letting her go. He moved a few feet over and settled back, both hands linked behind his head. “I’m sorry,” he told her, looking up at the sky. “I shouldn’t have commented on your family. It’s not like mine wins any prizes.”

  And unlike his parents, he thought, Ravyn’s mother had wanted her child near.

  From the corner of his eye, he watched her wipe the remnants of her tears from her cheeks. He should have done that for her. She eased herself slowly to the ground and turned on her side so she could look at him. “Tell me about your family.”

  Damon stared at the stars and tried to think of something to say. They might be related by blood, but he didn’t feel a kinship to any of them. Not since his grandfather had died. Their life philosophies differed drastically. His parents and brother lived to increase the family fortune, while money had never meant much to him. “There’s not a lot to tell,” he finally said.

  “Do you have any brothers or sisters?” she persisted.

  “Yeah,” he said quietly, knowing she needed the sound of a human voice right now. “I have a brother.”

  “Are you close?”

  “No.” Damon knew Ravyn wouldn’t let him leave it at that. “Maybe it’s because he’s five years older, but we’ve never had any common ground.”

  “Alex is ten years older than me,” she said quietly.

  Damon turned on his side, propped himself up on an elbow and looked at Ravyn. “Are you best buddies or is your relationship more parent-child than brother-sister?”

  She was quiet for a long time before she said, “You’re right. Alex was a parent to me in a lot of ways. After Mom and Gil died, he even became my guardian.”

  “I thought you said they survived the war?”

  “They did.” She let out a long sigh before saying, “When I was fourteen, they took a second honeymoon. The hotel they stayed at had a partial collapse in the middle of the night.”

  “The Vegas Alps disaster?”

  “Yes.” Her voice held the echo of remembered pain. “That was twelve years ago. I’m surprised you remember it. Most people don’t unless I mention it.”

  Damon frowned slightly. She’d looked away from him, centering her attention on the ground in front of her. He wanted to reach out and touch her, to take away even that small remnant of hurt, but she’d put a distance between them without so much as moving a centimeter.

  “I remember,” he told her when her eyes finally shifted back to his. He debated whether to add more and decided to tell her the rest. “I was in my first year at Yale. A bunch of us had reservations at that hotel the following week for spring break.”

  Again, she was quiet for a moment before asking, “So where did you end up going instead?”

  “The rest of them went to Florida, where else?”

  “You didn’t go?”

  Damon shifted a bit farther from Ravyn. “I couldn’t. It seemed wrong to go somewhere and have fun when people had died. When it hit so close to home.” He ju
st about groaned when he saw she had tears in her eyes again. Damn, he knew he should have kept quiet. The loss of her mother couldn’t be easy to talk about even though it had happened so long ago.

  “You were pretty sensitive for a teenager,” she said thickly. Then she surprised the hell out of him by reaching out and running her fingertips fleetingly across his hand.

  In his shock, Damon nearly jerked his arm back. Instead, he cleared his throat, uncomfortable with the idea that she thought he was sensitive. Soldiers were not sensitive. He opened his mouth, but closed it in a hurry when he realized how close she was. He wasn’t quite sure how she’d managed to move without him being aware of it, but the thought went right out of his head when she placed two fingers lightly against his lips.

  “I know,” she said, her voice low, “you’re dying to deny you’re sensitive. To tell me you’re a Spec Ops officer, not some sissy. I know you’re tough, Captain.”

  He couldn’t quite tear his gaze away from the soft smile she had on her face. Ravyn caught him flatfooted again when she pressed her lips against his cheek.

  “Goodnight.” She rolled away, her back to him, before he was able to gather his wits enough to react.

  Slowly, Damon brought his hand up and briefly touched the spot she’d kissed. He could swear it buzzed. All he could do for quite some time was stare at her. When he realized her deep, even breathing meant she had fallen asleep again, he returned to his back and tucked an arm behind his head. He was going to have to watch himself. Her nearness had been too disturbing, her touch too exciting. Even now every cell in his body vibrated with pleasure and all from a simple, innocent peck on the cheek.

  Damon willed his mind to still, his body to calm, but they didn’t obey him. He’d had more control over himself in the middle of his first firefight as a green second lieutenant. The realization did not please him. Neither did the knowledge that he wouldn’t be getting any more sleep that night.

  With an effort, he managed to wrench his thoughts away from Ravyn. What came to mind was even more unsettling. He saw his team, his friends, in the clearing. Even with his eyes open, he could see them as clearly as he had when they’d found them. His jaw tightened until a muscle began to tic.

  What had the power to disarm and murder six of the toughest men in the Western Alliance?

  Damon scowled into the night. Crossing one booted foot over the other, he ran through what he knew again. It didn’t take long. The list of unanswered questions took a lot more time. Most puzzling of all was the pattern in which the bodies had been arranged. What was it? He could sense it was important. Squinting, he brought the scene into his mind’s eye and studied it.

  A lightning bolt!

  Damon sat upright in a hurry. Shit. His men had been arranged in a zigzag pattern that was supposed to represent a lightning bolt. Unfortunately, this bit of knowledge didn’t make anything clearer. It just raised more questions.

  He tried to remember the placement of the CAT team’s bodies. It had been so damn dark in that room. Damon closed his eyes and focused even more intently. Nothing came to him and he shook his head. They weren’t laid out in a lightning bolt, or even a series of lightning bolts. He knew that. Finally, he tried to picture the scene from an aerial view.

  Damon opened his eyes and ran a hand over his chin.

  That couldn’t be right. No damn way.

  He was dealing with a psycho. There was no question about it. Yet he couldn’t conceive of even the sickest being arranging nineteen bodies in a giant flower. Now that he’d recognized it the image was undeniable. A giant flower complete with a stem and leaves. And all made out of mutilated bodies.

  Silently getting to his feet, Damon paced the perimeter of their camp. Whomever, whatever, they dealt with, he didn’t think the killer was human. Not with the choices he made defying any kind of logic Damon had ever learned.

  What if the Old City wasn’t really abandoned? What if this being was one of the original settlers? Or a descendent of the original settlers?

  He stopped and settled back against a tree. The night sounds of Jarved Nine soothed him. The low hum of insects; the slight scurrying of nocturnal animals. As long as he heard those sounds, Damon was sure there wasn’t danger present.

  Before he could block it thoughts of his friends filled his head in a kaleidoscope of images. The look in Carter’s eyes as he’d taken his wedding vows. Lopez beaming with pride as he’d shown off pictures of his kid’s first day of school. Eng, normally Mister Calm, worried about proposing to his girlfriend. Bauman full of plans for his folks’ ranch when his enlistment was up in a few months. Petrelli grinning from ear to ear as he’d told the team his wife carried twins. And Spence changing his mind every five minutes on whether his daughter’s birthday cake should have teddy bear decorations or cartoon characters.

  Damon leaned his head back and stared up at the moon. How was he going to tell their families about the deaths?

  He’d left them in the clearing. The thought pierced through his heart. Scavengers would get to the bodies. The pain in his knuckles made him realize how tightly he’d clenched his hands. He forced himself to relax finger by finger.

  The families weren’t going to have much to bury, but there had been no other choice. His first responsibility was to protect Ravyn, to get her safely back to Earth.

  But he wasn’t leaving Jarved Nine without getting justice for his friends. Damon straightened. He would hand Ravyn off to the rescue team and then go hunting. He’d been trained to track, trained to kill and that was exactly what he was going to do.

  “An eye for an eye,” he vowed quietly.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “You ready?”

  Ravyn started slightly at the brusqueness in Damon’s voice before nodding. It was a wasted effort since he’d already turned and picked up the pack. He didn’t look at her again before starting off.

  So that’s the way it’s going to be, Ravyn thought. She wrinkled her nose at his back before obediently trotting after him. She should have guessed this would happen. If the subject ever came up again, she’d remember to pick a different word than “sensitive.” Something more manly. Biting back a smirk, she decided the best course of action would be to act as if nothing were amiss. It would confuse him if she didn’t seem to notice a difference in his behavior. She loved keeping Alex on his toes and it looked like she was going to have the same fun with Damon.

  He turned to check on her and caught a smile on her face.

  “Beautiful morning, isn’t it?” she said as a diversion.

  With a grunt, he looked forward again.

  Actually, it barely qualified as morning. The sun wasn’t quite peeking over the mountains yet. Technically, she knew they were hills, but they looked like mountains to her. They’d reach them today, no doubt, and the thought of hiking through them was daunting. Still staring off in the distance, Ravyn stumbled over an exposed tree root, making enough noise to capture Damon’s attention. He stopped and raised his eyebrows.

  “I’m fine,” she told him, blushing slightly.

  His eyes traveled the length of her body, then he nodded and continued walking.

  Ravyn made sure to watch where she put her feet this time instead of worrying about the terrain ahead. At least here the ground wasn’t clogged with undergrowth the way it had been most of yesterday. The easier walk was a relief.

  For a second, Ravyn thought she smelled coffee. Her mouth watered before she realized the odds of finding coffee brewing on Jarved Nine were about on par with waking up and finding the last few days had been a bizarre nightmare. She turned her head to examine the path they traveled, to distract herself, but the first thing she saw was a patch of sinestas. The flower Sondra’s wreath had been made from. She could still see them spattered with blood.

  The reminder of her dream sent a quiver of desolation racing through her body. It hadn’t been a replay of when she’d found her friends’ bodies, although some of it had really happened. This time Damo
n had been killed, laid out on an altar as a sacrifice. She was still shaken by the depth of pain that image evoked. Just thinking about anything happening to him...

  Ravyn shuddered. Only the embarrassment of breaking down again kept her from wailing. She struggled to close the door on her memories and finally visualized erecting a brick wall to keep them contained. She watched the ground, focused on putting one foot in front of the other. This time she couldn’t block her thoughts. Flashes kept sneaking past her barriers. She’d no sooner banish the image of the bodies, when she’d recall yanking the flowers from Sondra’s hair or the feel of blood coating her.

  Somehow it was worse, though, when she thought of how she’d seen Damon in her dream. It made Ravyn feel guilty.

  After all, she’d only known him for a few days and she’d known her teammates for months, and in some cases, years. Yet her soul felt ripped apart when she thought of anything happening to the captain.

  Her hands curled into tight fists, her nails digging into the palms, as she fought against the tidal wave of remembrance. Even with her eyes open, though, she couldn’t focus on the vibrant life surrounding her, only the emptiness of death.

  Surreptitiously, she wiped her eyes. Her thoughts slid to Sondra’s birthday party. The guys had been giving her a hard time about turning thirty. Ravyn smiled slightly even as more tears fell. Sondra had laughed and told them all that getting older was better than the alternative. Ravyn turned a sob into a cough, hoping Damon wouldn’t notice.

  The evening had been boisterous and full of laughter. After dinner, they’d gathered in the communal room to watch movies and that had been when she’d slipped away. Ravyn bit down hard on her lower lip, hard enough to draw blood. She wasn’t aware that Damon had stopped, that she had automatically stopped as well, until he took her by the shoulders and gave her a gentle shake.