Ghostwalker 04 - Conspiracy Game

you go in, I do too.”

    A sound awoke him, something out of tune with the familiar night noises. Jack lay for a moment fully alert, all senses flaring, seeking the disturbing break in the rhythm of the night. He rarely slept for any length of time, and always very lightly. A low, one-two hoot
    —like an owl, without the proper resonance—sounded from somewhere nearby; not the yard, more likely the forest just before the entrance to his home.
    Jack dropped his feet to the floor in complete silence. He caught up his jeans and shirt, pulled them on, and strapped on a long leather sheath containing a razor-edged knife. A Smith and Wesson in his hand, he padded silently to the door. He moved down the hall unerringly in the dark and eased through the door to his brother’s room.
    He touched his twin’s shoulder lightly. Ken was already alert, dragging on his jeans, aware of the need for silence. They used hand signals, as they had since they were children, preferring to use telepathy when distance separated them. Ken caught up his rifle, a night scope, and a box of shells.
    Jack chose to leave by a side door, moving into the night silently, stealthily. He signaled Ken to high ground and then made his own way through the yard, a shadow among the shadows, first a boulder, then a tree, a part of the night.
    Once in the cover of the forest, Jack picked his battleground carefully—good cover, good escape routes, a clear shot for Ken. Jack whistled softly, calling in the intruder. Ken would use a scope to get the exact number of intruders.
    “Jack.” The voice was a soft hiss of a sound. “It’s Jebediah, Jack,” the voice continued.
    “Jebediah Jenkins.”

    “Come on in,” Jack said softly into the night, a challenge more than a welcome. He closed his eyes briefly, fighting back the memory of Briony, of soft skin and sheer ecstasy, a haven of pleasure that took him outside himself and the hell he constantly lived in. He was never going to be free of her.
    He’s not alone. Ken’s voice filled his mind.
    Jack sighed softly. Surely Jebediah wouldn’t be a big enough fool to come after him because he found out about Jack sleeping with Briony. The idea was too childish for words, and not Jebediah’s style. Let them come, Ken.
    The wind shifted just a bit, just enough for him to catch their scent. Need slammed into his body, pheromones spinning out of control, enfolding him in her feminine allure. Briony was with Jebediah, and her scent called to him, heady and intoxicating, threatening his tight control. Jack let his breath out slowly. How could he ever give her up a second time? He wasn’t a man who lived by rules. He wanted Briony, and the temptation to take her, to keep her, to tie her to him irrevocably was overwhelming. He had no doubt he could do it. He’d warned her. Why the hell hadn’t she listened? And what was wrong with her brother that Jebediah didn’t keep her safe—away from Jack, a continent away?
    Jack waited there in the darkness, seeing the heat of their bodies before they stepped through the foliage to approach him. He needed to be watching Jebediah, but he couldn’t take his eyes from Briony. Stay on him, Ken. I’ve got the girl.
    She was everything he remembered and more. He’d filled his nights and his days with the memory of the feel of her skin, her body surrounding his, the fierce, almost primitive need to possess her. Stark, raw emotion surged and poured through his veins until his blood pounded with heat. Mostly he remembered the way she looked at him—as a man, so that he could see himself in her eyes—the man he should have been, if he’d met her years earlier.
    She looked like the most beautiful woman in the world to him, and here he was, up in the mountains where no one would ever be able to take her away from him.
    Her hair was short and thick, platinum and wheat, sassy and inviting so that he itched to bury his face in the soft strands. Her eyes were as large, as beautiful as he’d remembered, so dark they were nearly black. As she and her brother approached him, she reached out to Jebediah, taking his hand, as if she was afraid. Jack could see the strain around her mouth, the shadows in her eyes. As she neared, he caught the minute difference in her scent. Even more feminine, as if chemical changes in her body had occurred since he last saw her. He remembered his own scent mixed with hers, powerful and appealing. The raw sexuality of their union, lust and