The rest of the group came back for a planning session. First, they called up Google Maps on a laptop that was Bluetoothed to the room’s TV. Using Travis’s memory of Olivia and Gabe being carried from the house, they found a river view of the property. From there, they moved the map to the street side. No surprise that the estate was on River Road, along with a slew of other mansions. All were on large lots, which meant less chance of disturbing the neighbors. Before they got down to a tactical discussion, Jake said, “We should tell Olivia and Gabe our skills, and find out what they can do.”
Gabe was about to say he couldn’t do any mental tricks, when he felt an odd sensation like electricity buzzing through his body. His gaze shot to Olivia.
I’m feeding you energy, she silently told him.
He gave a small nod of acknowledgement, wondering if what she was doing could have any practical effect on him.
Yes, Travis answered.
Before he had time to dwell on the strangeness of the interchange, he somehow felt Olivia directing his focus toward a plastic cup on the bathroom counter.
To his shock, the vessel went skittering off the sink counter onto the floor.
While he was marveling at that new talent, Olivia reminded him of what happened during his stealthy approach to her estate.
“We can also hurl what we’re calling thunderbolts,” she said, giving him a pointed look. Well, she and Travis had. Not him. Travis had thought the man sneaking up on them was an attacker and had zapped him unconscious.
You think…I can do that? he challenged.
Yes. But we’d better not do it in here. When she walked to the door, he followed slowly, wondering if she could possibly be right.
When he looked around for witnesses, Jake said, “I rented the whole motel. There are no other guests. And Gabe and Elizabeth sent the guy in the office a strong suggestion to turn on the No Vacancy sign and go home. He’s cleared out.”
“You can do that?
“Yes. Some of us are better at it than others,” Craig put in. “I did a lot of it when I rescued Stephanie from the scumbag who thought he was going to marry her.”
Actually, I think I got Smith focused on drowning you—rather than getting rid of you in a fiery car crash, Travis added.
Gabe winced, then tensed when Olivia came up behind him and clasped him around the waist—making him flash on her and Travis practicing their defenses back at her estate.
After looking around to make sure no cars were coming up the road, she fed him energy, and they sent a jolt into a metal trash container near the Coke machine, making the container jump.
“I’ll be damned,” Gabe muttered.
Too bad we don’t have time—or a good place—for more practice, she answered.
He grinned, pleased to have exhibited some of the power that the others now took for granted. Would he ever feel entirely comfortable with them? For that matter, would he ever feel entirely comfortable in his own skin? He couldn’t answer that yet. First, they had to deal with the man who had tried to kill them.
“Good job,” Jake said. “Now we should share our talents with you.”
Back inside, the couples filled in the newcomers on what they’d been able to accomplish. They all had mastered thunderbolts. Craig, Elizabeth, and Matt were particularly good at mind control.
And as a group, they were much more powerful—like when they’d hidden their vessel while approaching Smith’s murder boat.
As Gabe had suspected, Rachel was the most talented of the group. He learned that she’d saved her own life, plus Jake’s and the two members of the group that he hadn’t met yet, Gabriella and Luke. She’d slowed down time when Dr. Solomon had blown up his own laboratory after Rachel and Jake had come to rescue the other two telepaths.
When everyone had catalogued their abilities, they got down to serious planning, with Gabe and Craig, the two detectives, providing the major input.
“We can’t be sure how this will go down,” Craig cautioned everyone. “You have to be prepared to change plans in the middle of the action if your assumptions blow up in your face. When I rescued Stephanie from her fiancé’s wedding farce, I was going to wait until the guests were all seated before trying to get out of there. But one of his men found the guard I’d tied up and left in the bushes, and I had to seriously move up the timetable.”
Gabe wanted to hear more of that story. But he knew it would have to wait until there were no more threats hanging over their heads.
Switching gears, he said, “Besides your hidden talents, we’ve got an interesting advantage.”
They all turned expectantly to him.
“Smith sent his men out to deep-six me and Olivia. He has no reason to suspect that we survived being tossed overboard with weights around our ankles. How’s he going to react when he sees us invade his property?”
“I think he was already worried about Travis’s ghost—and fearful of what he considered our supernatural powers,” Olivia added with a hitch in her voice. “Maybe seeing us again will give him the scare of his life.”
“An excellent angle,” Jake said. “Just don’t get overconfident about playing ghosts. He might have some tricks up his sleeve you don’t know about.”
Olivia cleared her throat, and everyone turned toward her. “Smith struck me as the kind of guy who doesn’t take chances. I mean, he kept drugging me when somebody else wouldn’t have thought it necessary. She paused before blurting out, “I wish we had some idea of what defenses he has. He could hit us with something we haven’t taken into consideration.”
“Good point.” Rachel nodded and turned to Gabe but was clearly addressing Travis. “You were able to move through the house unseen. Did you see anything we have to worry about?”
As he was learning to do, Gabe mentally stepped back and let his alter ego do the talking. “I saw a control room with a lot of screens. A man was always on duty watching them. He’s got views all over the property. Including the boat dock.”
“I was prepared for that,” Craig answered. “We have to disable the exterior cameras when we come in. Anything else?”
“He also had a lot of electronic equipment. I don’t know what that was for. I suppose it could be for communications. But electronics isn’t my field. It could be something dangerous to us.”
“I don’t like it,” Jake mused.
“Remember his trick with the football helmets,” Matt added.
“Which is?” Olivia asked.
Matt laughed. “You know those old jokes about mental patients shielding their brains with tin foil? He took it to heart and lined helmets with aluminum foil. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get any mental suggestions through to his men when they were wearing them.”
Elizabeth nodded. “If they have on helmets, we’ll have to assume we can’t influence them.”
They went on to speculate about what defenses Smith might have ginned up against an invasion of psychics. But nobody had a definitive answer.
Finally, Jake cut off the planning session. “Again, we can’t be ready for every contingency. But I do know we should have a meal before we head for Smith’s place.” He gave Olivia and Gabe a considering look. “The two of you have to stay out of sight on the off chance that Smith or one of his men would recognize you. I’ll go into town and pick up some food.” He turned to Gabe, “You’re the only one from around here. Where’s the best place to get something quick and good?”
Gabe tensed in confusion. He wasn’t from around here. He was from Silver Spring.
Okay for me to answer? Travis questioned inside his head.
Sure. As he replied, he was wondering if the two personalities inside his brain would ever mold themselves into one.
“The Crab Claw, down by the downtown dock,” he told Jake.
“Thanks—let’s look at the online menu, and we can place an order.”
While the members of the group were making selections, Travis said inside Gabe’s head, This isn’t The Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
What is it?
I don’t know yet, but I’m hoping we can…get comfortable with each other.
Could they?
If not, Gabe was afraid he was going to end up in a mental hospital. Maybe he could be a unique case study and make some psychiatrist famous.
The private conversation was interrupted by Jake asking for their order.
Crab cakes okay? Travis asked.
Yeah. And onion rings.
Perfect.
Jake looked over at Craig, “Why don’t you drive me into town. I’ll pick up a second vehicle while you go down to the dock and rent a cabin cruiser.”
“And you’ll both use false IDs and make sure that whoever handles the transactions can’t remember who you are,” Rachel added.
“Right,” they both answered.
Jake looked at Craig. “Then you come back here while I pick up the food.” He switched his attention to the others, “And while we’re away, the rest of you get some rest.”
Olivia was glad to return to her room and lie down. She was feeling like her nerves were crawling out of her skin. And the attack of uncertainty wasn’t just about confronting the man who’d captured and tortured her.
Although she’d never admitted it, she’d always been lonely until Travis had pushed his way into her life. No one else would be able to understand what they’d had together. Well, the others had the same kind of special bond, but nobody else had experienced their unique relationship. Now that had been obliterated. Travis was still here—in a way, but the intensity of what they’d shared was gone.
Everything that had happened with him flooded back to her. When she’d first felt his presence, she’d been afraid of him. Then they’d come to some kind of uneasy accommodation. That had turned into a deep need, each for the other. As the relationship had progressed, they’d grown closer and closer. He’d been able to—she wasn’t sure what to call it. Attach himself to her? Live through her? It was far from ordinary. And it certainly wasn’t ideal to have a lover nobody else could see or hear. But it had worked for them. They’d been as close as two people could be. He’d come to be within instant reach. And he’d helped save her from drowning.
When he’d said he could also save Gabe, she’d urged him to do it. He’d warned her that Gabe would never be the same. And he wouldn’t either. She hadn’t known what that would mean, but she’d desperately wanted Gabe to live, because his only crime had been helping her find Travis’s killer. In the urgency of the moment, there hadn’t been time for explanations. Maybe even Travis hadn’t known what was going to happen. But when he’d brought Gabe back to life, everything had changed.
Instead of being attached to her, Travis was now part of Gabe. That had to be a good thing. He was no longer dead. He was a living, breathing man again—as part of Gabe. But could the two men happily exist in the same body? Would the transformation be too much for them? She didn’t know, and she was sure they didn’t either.
From observing the other couples forged from Dr. Solomon’s experiments, she could see what she had lost. They were all so close. And now she was cut off from her soulmate. Even though he was right here.
A wave of deep sadness swept through her. She could never get back the closeness of having Travis with her the way he had been. That was gone forever. He was now part of Gabe Bowman, a man who probably hated having a parasite attached to him. Was that how he thought about Travis? Or would he come to see the other man as value added?
She laughed bitterly. Maybe her newfound happiness was over before it had had a chance to really take root.
Could she and Gabe/Travis forge something else together?
There was no way to formulate an answer yet. Having come to no firm conclusions, she tried to sleep, but her mind was still churning too much for her to relax.
It was almost a relief when Jake and Craig came back, and the group pulled a couple of tables together so they could eat in one room.
She watched the couples automatically choose seats next to each other, leaving two adjoining chairs for her and Gabe.
She gave him a shy look. As far as the group was concerned, they were paired up, yet they weren’t the same as everyone else.
She watched Jake, who owned a restaurant in New Orleans, take a bite from a crab cake sandwich and chew. “Different from our seafood style,” he announced.
“Trust you to critique the food,” Rachel teased, her remark slicing through the tension they were all feeling.
“Gabriella would do it too—if she were here,” Jake answered in mock defense.
Olivia supposed he and Rachel were trying for normality. But it wasn’t quite working.
Gabe felt guilty as he tried to choke down some crab cake and onion rings. He knew this was the first food Travis had eaten since Smith had captured him, and he wasn’t letting the guy enjoy his dinner.
Sorry.
We’ll both feel more like eating when this operation is over.
He’d managed to finish half the crab cake and most of his onion rings when Craig brought them all back to business.
He put down his sandwich and said, “I’ve set up two teams. One for the land approach and the other by the river. Gabe and Olivia, Elizabeth, and Matt will be Team A—coming in by water, since…” he stopped and looked abashed for a moment. “Since Travis knows the river.”
“Makes sense,” Gabe said.
Since the trip was shorter by road, team B, consisting of Rachel, Jake, Craig, and Stephanie, would wait at the motel until the boat was on its way to Smith’s mansion. This would also give them a chance to make sure telepathic communication between the teams was working.
After eating, they packed up and put all their clothing and equipment into the SUV.
Before leaving, they wiped every surface in the motel that they had touched, and took their trash to a dumpster a couple of miles away.
They set out on the mission not long after dark. There were few boats on the river, but Gabe did see some marine lights in the channel.
He watched Olivia, Matt, and Elizabeth standing beside him in the wheelhouse.
“We’ve got communication with the other team,” she announced.
“Good.”
“We’ll keep checking in.”
“Okay,” Gabe answered. He didn’t have a big role in the communications. He was still too new to talk mind-to-mind over any distance. But he marveled that he was the captain of the A Team. Although he was the new guy in the group, Travis had made his living on the water. He was the one who had the knowledge of the river and the properties along the bank. He was also the one who had the most to fear. He knew from firsthand experience that Smith had more tricks up his sleeve than the others could imagine.
