Deep Within Me (The Prophesy #2)

Chapter Seven

At thirty-four, Maria Guzman was in the twilight years of her profession as a stripper, at least in the better clubs. Her body was still well toned, belly flat, thighs sleek, thanks to the rigorous exercise regimen Carreon expected of all his performers. However, there were also faint horizontal lines on her forehead, ones fanning from the outside corners of her eyes and those bracketing her mouth. A heavy smoker known to party hard on her days off, Maria had too many bad habits that were clearly catching up with her.

From reading her file, Carreon learned the club had hired her when she was twenty-three. Her twelve-year anniversary was coming up quickly. She had two children to support, twin boys who were now seven years old.

When she’d returned to the club a short while ago, bleary-eyed yet eager to earn the extra cash, she hadn’t mentioned her kids. She’d dressed for sex rather than a striptease, wearing nothing beneath her long coat, which now lay over Ernez’s chair. Her jasmine fragrance, laced with musk, filled the office.

Upon her arrival, Carreon hadn’t wondered if she’d gotten a babysitter for her boys or whether that person knew she’d been headed here. Ernez had warned Maria not to breathe a word to anyone. If she had, he’d learn about it eventually and then she’d be out of a job, including this special project.

Surely not wanting that at her age, Maria had kept her tongue. She probably hadn’t even said good-bye to her sons before taking off.

Carreon hadn’t considered who would care for them if his experiment didn’t work out or whether they’d miss their mother.

In the office’s harsh light, he regarded the pale stretch marks on Maria’s hips and belly. She’d attempted to cover them with glittery makeup. No doubt hoping whoever was going to mount her in the coming hours wouldn’t notice her imperfections in the rest of the club’s muted lighting.

They probably wouldn’t have if the story Ernez had told her had been true. The patrons would have likely slipped their tips beneath the leopard skin armband Marie wore on her left biceps. Her high heels bore the same pattern. Carreon supposed the heavy makeup on her lids and lashes were to make her appear catlike. Her eyes, an ordinary shade of brown, stared at the ceiling, seeing nothing on this side.

She was as dead as a human could possibly be.

She’d broken several nails when she’d fought Ernez. The backs of his hands bore deep gouges from her assault. The pain hadn’t stopped him from strangling her. In that, he was like Carreon when he’d murdered Liz. The only difference between the two acts was that Ernez had come up on Maria from behind while she’d answered one of Carreon’s innocuous questions, a diversion to keep her off guard.

“You do well today and we might put you and Trinidad together on stage,” he’d lied, noting how Maria kept eyeing Trinidad, curious or jealous as to why she was also here. “Some girl-on-girl action. Would you be interested?”

She’d looked downright eager, wanting to please her boss. “Of course. Whatever you want, I’ll be happy to—”

Her words had ended on a gasp with the black scarf Ernez had looped around her throat, one supplied by Trinidad. Confusion, panic, outrage, and finally anguish had danced across Maria’s almost-pretty face. Was the misery because her larynx and hyoid bone were breaking, ending her future? Had she been thinking of the twelve-year anniversary she wouldn’t have a chance to celebrate?

Perhaps she’d been wondering who’d raise her kids.

Now, Maria Guzman lay on the office floor, arms and legs sprawled, breasts and cunt bared. Unlike Trinidad, she hadn’t waxed off her pubic hair but had trimmed it. Those delicate curls looked like a dark smudge against her dusky skin. So unlike her mane that she’d highlighted with reddish-brown streaks. To further enhance her image as a wild animal?

Possibly.

“Bring her back,” Carreon ordered Trinidad, not trying to hide his impatience.

She pressed her palms harder against her coworker’s throat. She’d been at it for five minutes or more and all she’d accomplished was to eliminate the dark bruising around Maria’s neck. Her face’s purplish discoloration had also receded. However, the woman hadn’t breathed, hadn’t returned from the other side.

Carreon recalled those times he’d watched Liz healing his men. With those who’d been nearest to death, she’d had to strip and drape her body over theirs, all of her flesh touching them, their mouths joined in order for full restoration to occur.

“Blow air into her mouth,” Carreon directed. “Lay on top of her. Touch every fucking part of her body.”

Trinidad appeared briefly amused at his unorthodox request, but did as he wanted. She angled her mouth over Maria’s, pouring her breath inside the woman. Her hand went to Maria’s breast, fondling it, then journeyed down her belly to her mound. She slipped two fingers into the woman’s sheath.

Carreon stepped closer, searching for faint signs of life, that Maria was return—

There. Her fingers. Had she lifted them?

He focused on her hand, his frown deepening at how it shifted…because Trinidad’s faint rocking motion had caused it.

“Keep blowing into her mouth,” he demanded, an image filling his mind of Liz having done the same with Zeke. Until her breath had filled him, Neekoma hadn’t responded to her healing.

During the next few minutes, Trinidad’s noisy exhales competed with the music throbbing from the club. A charade put on for Maria’s benefit. Carreon had wanted her to believe his VIP clients were waiting for her in the otherwise deserted bar.

Trinidad’s foot tapped in time with the tune even as she tried to resuscitate her co-worker. Ernez stopped tending to his lacerated hands when he noticed Carreon watching him. Uneasiness swept over the younger man’s face. He ignored his own injuries and watched the two women.

From the other room, the bass clapped suddenly and repeatedly, sounding like something monstrous striking the building on all sides. A gasp followed it.

From Ernez? Carreon turned back to the young man, glaring at him.

Ernez didn’t notice. He stared at the door as if Satan himself was playing drums on the other side of it. Or perhaps he was worried that a cop might happen by. One they hadn’t paid off, who would be curious as to why music blared within the establishment at this hour, and who might not take kindly to seeing a dead woman on the floor.

More bass. These vibrations were even stronger than the others, registering in Carreon’s belly. They paused for a second. During it, there was another sharp intake of air, though not from Ernez.

Carreon regarded Maria, warning himself not to expect too much.

Her chest actually rose with her next gasp.

He stared, relief, then joy flooding him. Trinidad had actually brought the woman back.

“Turn that shit off,” Carreon ordered Ernez.

He hurried out of the office into the club.

Carreon concentrated on Maria. As quickly as his hope had risen, it now fell. She was breathing, but her eyes were still vacant, her limbs slack. The same as Oscar’s and Anthony’s had been when Liz’s father claimed he couldn’t heal the men.

“The damage to their brains was too extensive because of their wounds,” he’d said. “There’s nothing I or anyone else can do for them.”

Because he’d held back. He’d lied.

“Keep trying,” Carreon ordered Trinidad.

Annoyance darkened her expression.

“Now,” he insisted.

“She’s alive,” Trinidad argued. “Breathing on her own. Exactly what you wanted.”

“Bullshit. I want her back to the way she was when she came in here.”

“Why?” She sat back on her heels, palms on her knees, thighs spread widely, cunt exposed. “I found her annoying.”

He smiled at her cockiness then sobered just as quickly. “Restore her to the way she should be.”

“And if I can’t?”

“I don’t accept failure.”

“You should have thought of that when you told Ernez to strangle her.”

Before Carreon could comment, or grab and squeeze Trinidad’s throat to prove he’d lost all patience with her fucking banter, Ernez returned. The club was now blessedly silent, which accentuated the way Maria wheezed. As though she were drowning in air.

“Go on,” Carreon ordered Trinidad.

On an exasperated sigh, she lay on Maria again and ministered to her, breathing more air into her mouth, touching each part of the woman’s limp body.

For a moment, there was a spark of awareness in Maria’s expression. A what’s happening? look. It extinguished quickly, leaving that same vacant stare.

Minutes later, Carreon finally snapped, “Enough.”

Without objection, Trinidad rolled to the side and rummaged through Maria’s purse, pulling out a pack of Camels. The unfiltered kind that gave the most kick. With her cigarette lit, she pulled deeply on it as one would after great sex. Ignoring the previous warning that she wasn’t supposed to smoke in here.

Trinidad’s insolence was the least of Carreon’s concerns. He’d deal with it later when he could focus solely on her, teaching obedience, submission to his will. Lessons he’d enjoy and she’d endure.

“Finish her off,” Carreon ordered Ernez, gesturing to Maria.

“He should leave her here,” Trinidad said.

Carreon looked over. “Why?”

Did she want to practice on the woman? Had Trinidad considered, as he had, that she might strengthen her gift by using it?

“Who healed for you before you came here last night?” Trinidad asked.

“What business is that of yours?” Carreon answered.

She filled her lungs with more smoke, releasing it with her words. “My guess is you’ve lost that person. To Neekoma? I heard rumors earlier about a battle with his men over a woman called Liz.”

Carreon said nothing.

Trinidad picked a piece of tobacco from her tongue. “I’ve heard she’s not only a healer but painfully honorable.” She smiled as though she found the thought decidedly naive. “You want her back.”

He didn’t answer.

She regarded Maria. The woman’s chest rose and fell with her labored breathing while the rest of her body had absolutely no muscle tone. “Before Ernez finishes Maria off for good, I think there’s a way you can use her to get Liz back.”

Having joined Liz and Jacob at their table, Zeke had encouraged Liz to eat.

“You need to keep up your strength,” he said.

“I’ve had enough, really.” She pushed her barely touched plate aside.

He brought it right back. “We don’t waste food here. We’ve stored a lot, but we still need to send our men out for provisions at times. They’re always risking an ambush from Carreon’s men just to make certain everyone here is well fed.”

Zeke’s heavy dose of guilt worked. Liz finally finished everything on her plate.

He and Jacob escorted her from the dining hall. No one watched them depart, not even Kele. She’d left the kitchen minutes before. On the way to Dr. Munez’s room, Zeke, Jacob, and Liz happened upon the women who’d voted for them to leave. Each of those ladies avoided eye contact and conversation, ducking into whatever rooms happened to be available, closing and locking those doors as they passed.

Jacob pretended not to notice the lingering resentment. Zeke did the same. Liz sighed repeatedly.

At the door to her father’s room, Zeke spoke to his brother. “Don’t leave. This will only take a minute; then I want to see the prisoners.”

“Do they need to be healed?” Liz asked.

Zeke was about to exchange a glance with Jacob but thought better of it, not wanting Liz to see and interpret it as something bad. That would come soon enough. “No. Your father’s already seen to everyone. We have something we’d like to talk to you about.”

Her eyebrows drew together. “What?”

“Let’s go inside.”

He gestured her into the room. Jacob watched Liz with that same yearning expression he’d worn in the dining hall. Zeke’s chest ached with sorrow rather than jealousy. He loved them both and wished this hadn’t gotten so complicated, but it had. However, right now all that mattered was Liz’s continuing survival.

“Don’t leave,” he murmured to Jacob.

His brother screwed up his face. “I’m not, all right?”

“Make certain Kele doesn’t come anywhere near here.”

“Why would she?” Jacob seemed surprised at Zeke’s worry. He spoke quietly as Liz and her father embraced. “Kele knows she’s lucky you let her stay with the clan. I don’t think anyone could be more ashamed. It’s my guess she’d risk her life to protect Liz and her father as she did with us last night.”

Deep down, Zeke believed the same, until the disturbing images from his vision returned. That hand around a knife. Blood on the blade. The thumbnail polished a deep red or black.

He went into the room, closed the door, and spoke to Liz’s father. “Do you want to start this or should I?”

“Start what?” she asked.

“You can’t heal anymore,” Dr. Munez said.

Liz regarded the man then Zeke, her lack of emotion saying she’d suspected this intervention. “Why not?” she argued with her dad. “You can’t possibly mean I’ve lost the ability to do so. That’s not true.” She gestured to his leg. “I healed your ankle.”

“Then you passed out in the Jeep,” Zeke said.

She frowned. “I did not.”

“Yes, you did,” her father said. “You don’t recall it, but I saw. Zeke shouted your name several times. You didn’t respond, not until I laid my hand on your shoulder and poured more of my healing gift into you.”

Even though she kept shaking her head to deny her father’s words, blood continued to drain from her face.

Zeke went to her. “You better sit down.”

Liz pushed his hands away and stepped back. “What does my healing have to do with any of this?”

“Each time you pour your gift into anyone,” Zeke said, “you drain yourself. That never happened before the reanimation, but it’s doing so now.”

“So what?” She said to her father, “Even if I deplete myself to the point of death, you can keep reanimating me.”

“No fucking way,” Zeke said. “We don’t know if it will work a hundred times or even once more. We can’t take that chance.”

She seemed surprised and concerned, as if she’d never considered such a complication, though not for long. “Surely there’s a way around this. You need me. If you get hurt or…” She covered her mouth with her hand, clearly unable to finish, horror in her eyes.

Zeke softened his tone. “It’s all right. Nothing’s going to happen to me. Your father’s here. He can—”

“No.” She dropped her hand. “What if he can’t?”

“I’m old,” Munez said, “but I do have a few more years left.”

Liz made a sound filled with heartache. Her eyes got shiny. “Don’t say that. Don’t ever even think it, please. There must be something I—we can do so I can still use my gift.”

Zeke considered what he’d thought of earlier. When he had a chance, he’d present his plan to her and Jacob. Now wasn’t the time. “We’ll work on it.” He went to the door and spoke to Liz. “Stay here until one of my men comes for you.” Zeke glanced at her father.

The older man nodded that he understood and would make certain she obeyed.

“Wait,” she protested.

“I can’t.” Zeke closed the door on her and joined Jacob in the hall.

His brother leaned close and whispered, “What went on in there? Did you tell her she couldn’t heal anymore?”

“Yeah.”

“How’d she take it?”

“Not well.”

“I can imagine. So what does happen when she heals now?”

Zeke felt wearier than he ever had. As succinctly as he could, he explained the problem to Jacob.

His brother looked like a man who’d just been given a death sentence by his doctor. “Is she all right now?”

“She’ll be fine as long as she doesn’t heal again.”

“Ever? What if something happens to her father? Can he heal himself?”

“It doesn’t work that way.”

Jacob muttered an obscenity. “We have to fix this.”

“I’m working on it. Where are the prisoners?”

Jacob stared at the door to Munez’s room, worry, yearning, frustration playing across his features.

Zeke elbowed him. Jacob frowned. “What?”

“Our prisoners. Where are they?”

He regarded the closed door once more. Liz said something, her voice muted. Her father answered, his words also impossible to understand. “One of the safe rooms,” Jacob mumbled.

“I want to see them. Come on.” Zeke took his brother’s arm and led him down the hall. Twice, Jacob glanced over his shoulder at the room.

Zeke suppressed a sigh. Jacob in lust was bad enough. Jacob in love and worried was almost too awful to see. “What’s been going on with the prisoners?”

“Nothing.”

“And that means?”

Jacob pulled his arm away from Zeke. “Some of the men tried to get them to talk. They wouldn’t tell us shit. Paul suggested torture. The guys were all for that. I talked them down. Said we’d leave it to you.”

“I’m not going to torture anyone.” Zeke refused to sink to Carreon’s level. Right now, he simply wanted to get a good look at them.

He and Jacob went down three more halls. In the middle of the last, Jacob slowed and rested his hand against the wall. The hidden door swung inward. Within the small room, Paul and Kele sat to the left. Assault rifles rested on each of their laps.

Despite Kele’s weapon, relief whispered through Zeke when he saw that her nails were unpolished. Probably always had been.

More than a bit of remorse crossed her features. Studiously, she avoided looking at Jacob. That one action told Zeke that even if she hadn’t relinquished his brother in her mind, she wasn’t going to make a play for him again. She’d seen where her jealousy had led and seemed to have no desire to return to those days.

“Do you want me to leave?” she asked. “I will if you want.”

Zeke gestured Kele back into her chair and regarded the prisoners across from them, disturbed by what he saw. Or rather, what he didn’t see.

Neither of the men had hair long enough to blow in the wind. They’d shaved their heads like Carreon’s. Their features were rough rather than handsome, their clothes a solid black rather than blue denim. They also appeared older than the man in Zeke’s vision, possibly mid-thirties.

Did they know who the other man was? Would they tell him?

Hatred filled their eyes even though the clan had brought them food.

An empty plate and coffee cup were stacked on the nightstand from the breakfast one of them had enjoyed. The other had barely started to eat.

Why? Had he held back, thinking the food was poisoned or drugged? Had he waited until his partner had finished to see what would happen?

The man shoveled a forkful of scrambled eggs and hash brown potatoes into his mouth and chewed slowly. Manacles held his and his partner’s ankles to the chairs on which they sat. Each had his left hand secured to the arm of the chair, leaving the other free in order to eat.

Zeke spoke to them. “If Carreon’s not at his stronghold, where would he be?”

The man on the right, who was bulkier than his companion, stared at a spot on the wall above Kele’s head.

The other spat. The food in his mouth sprayed Zeke’s jeans.

Paul stood so quickly, the legs of his chair scraped the floor. He pointed his weapon at the one who’d spat.

“Easy.” Zeke put his hand on the barrel, lowering it. Icy determination rather than rage coursed through him.

Paul growled, “A couple of bullets to his knees, like what they did to Samuel, will get him to talk.”

The man spat again.

“No,” Zeke said. “We’ll let Carreon deal with them like that.”

The prisoners exchanged a glance then regarded Zeke cautiously.

“After you’ve been here awhile, we’re going to release you,” he said. “Right into Carreon’s lap. No matter what you tell him really happened here, he’ll believe you talked. You told us all of his secrets. What do you think he’ll do about that?”

The men’s swarthy faces turned pale.

“You have two choices,” Zeke explained. “You tell us what you know and join us, or face Carreon once we send you back to him.”

“You’re lying,” the bulkier one growled.

“Care to find out if that’s true?” Jacob asked.

They exchanged another glance with each other.

Now that Zeke had their attention, he asked, “Which one of Carreon’s men is in his late twenties with dark hair, longish past his ears? He’s a pretty boy, not like you guys. What the ladies would call handsome. What’s his name? Who is he?”

Jacob turned to Zeke and whispered, “What the hell are you talking about?”

Ignoring his brother, Zeke coaxed more images from his vision. “He’s wearing a T-shirt, denim jacket, and jeans…possibly hiking boots. He’s—”

Zeke stopped. The prisoners, Paul, Kele, and Jacob faded away. In the place of this room, he saw the desert landscape outside. A bone-dry breeze whipped around him, stirring up sand and dirt, the sound nearly as loud as the static from his vision. He smelled the earth baking beneath the oppressive sun.

Overhead, a bird squawked.

The young man from his previous vision held up his arm to shield his face. He mouthed something Zeke couldn’t hear. His expression made it seem like a plea or a—

Zeke’s breath caught as a bullet tore through the young man’s belly. Another ripped through his heart. He stumbled back and fell to the ground, dust puffing up around him.

No.

Liz leaned over the young man, wanting to bring him back. As she did, her lids grew heavy, her shoulders slumped. Zeke screamed for her to stop. She didn’t hear. He ran toward her, but no matter how much distance he traveled, she was still too far away, the life force draining from her, leaving her—

“Zeke.”

He blinked and stared at Jacob, who’d gone as white as their prisoners had a moment earlier.

“What did you see?” Jacob asked.

Zeke wasn’t certain what any of it meant. As always, his fucking visions showed just enough to confuse him, taunting him with clues he couldn’t yet read.

“Jacob!” Ike’s voice called from the hall. “Are you down here?”

He stuck his head out the doorway. “Yeah. What’s wrong?”

“Is Zeke with you?”

He went into the hall. Ike and several of the other men were there, each armed with an assault rifle.

Bile rose to Zeke’s throat. He forced it down. “What happened?”

Ike spoke before the others could. “There’s a man not too far from the tunnel’s entrance. Our cameras just picked him up. Looks like a hiker. Could be a trick. Maybe Carreon told him to dress that way. Our guys are already headed out there to see—”

“What’s he wearing?” Zeke asked.

“Jeans, a white tee, denim—hey,” Ike interrupted himself as Zeke bolted down the hall, followed by Jacob. “Where are you going?”

Outside. To keep his men from shooting the man, and Liz from having to revive him. To find out who the fuck he was. Why he’d been in Zeke’s visions.