Sizzle and Burn

they’d delivered.
    He was way beyond being a low-rent stage act now. The drug had not only given him the additional talents of a para-hunter, it had enhanced his already existing powers of illusion. They told him that he was something new and different in the world of paranormal talents: a level-ten hunter-illusionist. He deserved some respect but he wasn’t getting it from January.
    “Failure is not tolerated within Nightshade,” January said.
    Rage, infused with the frustration that resulted from the missed kill, twisted through him. It was all he could do not to break January’s neck. It would be so easy.
    Unfortunately, January was the source of the drug. Until he figured out how to obtain the formula from someone else within Nightshade—the mysterious person January reported to, for example—he was stuck having to take orders.
    “I didn’t fail,” he said. He stared hard through the SUV’s windshield at the night-darkened street. “You saw what happened. A car pulled into the lot. I was caught square in the headlights. I had no choice but to leave the scene. You said yourself we can’t afford to attract the attention of the cops.”
    “I was watching you. Jones had you on the defensive. Obviously the old-woman illusion wasn’t working.”
    “It worked.”
    It had slowed him down, though, and it had been out of control. That really worried him. He was afraid to tell January that, in the heat of hand-to-hand combat, he had been unable to hold the illusion. It had winked on and off erratically like a broken flashlight.
    “You tripped and fell,” January said.
    There was a reason January had been given that particular code name, he thought. Cold as a glacier.
    “Things like that happen in a fight,” he said. “It wouldn’t have changed the outcome. Jones isn’t anywhere near as fast as me.”
    “He’s a mirror talent. He was anticipating your every move.”
    “That’s not true. I was closing in. The problem was that damned car.”
    “I hope you understand that your failure to perform to expectations reflects poorly on me. Jones survived tonight. That means I will have to have an unpleasant conversation with a certain individual. Need I remind you that both of us are dependent on that individual for our supply of the drug?”
    He forced himself to remain silent. He had one critical advantage. January could be replaced but that was not the case with him. He was a one-of-a-kind lab experiment. They had explained to him that illusion talents of any level were extremely rare. An illusion talent who possessed a psychic profile that could, with the right chemical stimulation, be expanded to include a high-level hunter talent, was the stuff of myth and legend.
    He was on the way to becoming a walking legend within the organization. Nightshade needed him.
    “I’ll take care of Jones next time,” he said.
    “I’ll decide whether or not you get a second shot at Jones.”
    He did not argue. Instead, he started to make his own plans.

Twenty-six
    B y the time Zack ended the call she was simmering.
    “Mr. Jones, I take it, is not a sympathetic employer,” she said. It had been all she could do not to yank the phone out of his hand and give Fallon Jones the benefit of her opinion.
    Zack shrugged. “I think of him as a client, not an employer. I work for him on a contract basis. As far as I know, all of his agents and analysts handle it that way. He doesn’t have a regular staff. Doubt if he could get anyone to work for him full-time. He calls in whatever talent he thinks he needs.”
    “That’s not the point.” She spread her arms wide, exasperated. “You almost got killed tonight. Judging by your end of the conversation, it didn’t sound as if Fallon Jones cared a jot about your welfare.”
    “Fallon is all about the bottom line. As long as I’m alive and kicking, he’s only interested in the next move.”
    “He doesn’t sound like a very nice person at all.”
    “Fallon is…Fallon. To know him is to appreciate him.”
    “Bet he doesn’t have a lot of friends,” she muttered.
    “Well, no, but that doesn’t seem to bother him much.”
    She sighed. “What happens next?”
    He looked down at his duffel bag and then raised his eyes to meet hers. “Given recent events, it looks like I’ll be staying with you for a while. Where do you want me to put my stuff?”
    She had known this was coming, she reminded herself. And he was only here because of the danger. This was business,