Must Love Hellhounds

Ames-Beaumont learned of it while he was uncertain about her role in Katherine’s kidnapping . . .
    Maggie smiled grimly. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had been killed for knowing too much. She stole a glance at Blake. His eyes were closed, and he was pressing his clenched fist to his forehead. If she had to guess, he was giving himself a heated telling-off.
    But maybe, she thought, maybe he’d meant it when he’d offered to stand between her and Ames-Beaumont. If it came to that.
    Not, of course, that she would let him. But it was still a good feeling.

Chapter Four

    “She’s awake,” Blake said quietly.
    Maggie blinked away her highway stare and glanced over at him. A few minutes ago, he’d been asleep. His eyes were still closed, but he’d raised his seat from its reclined position.
    “She’s moving slowly,” he continued. “In the bedroom at the back of the caravan. She’s not tied, but the door won’t open. They’ve left her a basket of food, bottles of water. There are windows, and they’ve been darkened with some kind of film. She’s waving. No one in the other cars is noticing. The setting sun is on the left.”
    “Heading south,” Maggie said hoarsely. A shiver kept running up and down her spine.
    He was seeing, she realized. He was looking through his sister’s eyes.
    Blake nodded. “On a divided highway. Two lanes each direction. The car behind them has South Carolina license plates. So does the one passing it.”
    And she and Blake were only halfway through New Jersey. The RV had at least twelve or thirteen hours on them.
    But not as many hours as it could have had. Whoever had taken Katherine would have been farther if they’d driven straight through. They’d pulled over either to rest or to wait for someone.
    “There’s a water closet. The window doesn’t open. She looks all right in the mirror. No bruises.” The monotone recitation broke for an instant, and he laughed. “That’s right, Kate, flip me the bird. She’s got an injection site in her neck, the same as mine. They took blood, too. And she’s looking at the toilet, so that’s my cue to head out for a bit.”
    Maggie’s heart pounded. She couldn’t think of a thing to say.
    Blake was silent for a few seconds. Then he told her, “She can’t see through mine.”
    “Whose are you seeing through now?”
    “Yours.”
    Maggie stared out the windshield. Sickness clawed at her stomach—she wasn’t sure why. Revelations like these were one of the reasons why she’d taken a job with a vampire. She couldn’t have gone back to normal life after finding out about dragons, or Guardians. She’d have always been looking, and wondering.
    She drove and waited for the sick feeling to resolve. It finally did.
    Her reaction wasn’t in response to his ability, but the implications of it. Blake possessed a form of remote viewing. What nation wouldn’t want to use that for intelligence gathering—or take steps to prevent it from being used against them?
    Jesus. No wonder Ames-Beaumont was so obsessed with protecting his family. If he hadn’t been, every government in the world would have been trying to exploit them—or destroy them.
    “And this is the reason Miss Blake was taken,” Maggie realized. “And it’s why they haven’t asked for a ransom. What can she do?”
    She hadn’t really expected an answer. And she didn’t anticipate the ease with which Blake delivered it.
    “She locates things,” he said. “Items, not people.”
    That took a second to sink in. Once it did, Maggie frowned. “Then it could be anyone, looking for anything.”
    “No. It has to be someone with resources, access to information, and organized. To begin, they knew she was on holiday in America.”
    Maggie nodded. Yes, she’d have used the same opportunity—the target was alone and on foreign soil. “But not military. They wouldn’t be heading down the interstate in an RV. Probably not a vampire, because he wouldn’t need James to take Miss Blake, and he can’t drive during the day.”
    “And there are at least two of them. Katherine was on the road when James was in New York last night.” His long fingers tapped against his knees, and a thoughtful expression creased his brow. “It could be a demon driving, if James was the one who drugged her.”
    “You think it was a demon? We’ve got to call in the Guardians, then.”
    Blake turned his head, met her eyes. Using her vision, she realized, to know where to focus