The First Read online

  In his office, Jennison put down the phone slowly and stared at it. “Go after her.” He paused. “And him.”

  The man standing at attention on the other side of the desk started in surprise. “Sir?”

  “You heard me. Get rid of them both.” Sharply this time, leaving no room for disobeying.

  “Yes, Sir.” There was no hesitation this time. “It will be done.”

  As the door closed, Jennison sank slowly into his chair. No. No!

  Chapter Four

  It was no use. Aelia couldn't focus, and eventually she decided to go outside, take a walk, maybe it would help. She took an elevator down to the lobby and went out the back entrance of the building and into the park, then strolled up one of the paths winding through it. This time of the day the park was relatively empty, which suited her. The bagel cart was there, its perpetually cheerful vendor chatting with a lone customer. Nearby, several toddlers were playing under the watchful eyes of parents and nannies, and occasionally a jogger would pass her by, intent on the next step. It was all very ordinary, peaceful, and it took only a few short moments for her to relax.

  She heard a commotion and walked toward it absently. It was a protest. She wondered for a fleeting moment but then remembered there was a story about it in the local news. The city wanted to tear down a small structure near the edge of the park that was being used as a pub at night, saying it disrupted the peace, but people objected, saying it had been there for decades and was mindful of the residential neighborhoods that had sprouted up in the area over the years, and anyway during the day it served them as a pleasant restaurant. Now the pub was surrounded by police officers and city inspectors, and the protesters were agitated. Aelia was about to turn away when she heard shouts, a brawl erupted and before she could move away she was surrounded by an angry mob. Violence spread quickly around her, and she had no way out.

  Kyle moved quickly from within the crowd and half-hid a distance away. It was simple really. The protest was a welcome opportunity to finish the job elegantly. All he'd done was mingle with the protesters, and when they were close enough to one of the inspectors, he punched the guy, all the while shouting obscenities. The inspector, blind with anger, tried to punch back, but Kyle ducked and the inspector hit the protester behind him, who just happened to be a woman. The enraged crowd attacked the inspectors and the police officers and a riot ensued. Kyle was good at that, manipulating situations to suit his purposes. He could easily read people, find their weaknesses. And this particular crowd was easy to stir up. He now stood back, watching as the woman he was here to kill was swallowed by the out-of-control mob. Yes. It worked. It actually looked as though they might do the job for him. And if not, he could always use the confusion to finish it himself.

  Aelia stood trapped within the mayhem. She felt the chaos around her, felt the tension build inside her, felt herself react to both—

  And then it all stopped. Whatever it was that had been awakening in that place deep inside her now stirred, surged, then flowed through her with growing strength. Instinctively she closed her eyes and let it rise, felt it intensify within her, and within a split second too short to grasp she felt it connect through this moment, this place, to all moments and to infinite existence, on a level she had not known existed. She felt no fear, only a calmness, a certainty, stood oblivious to the rage surrounding her, aware only of what was happening within her, what she had become.

  And then she opened her eyes.

  Kyle watched in confusion. She just stood there, in the midst of all that rage, did not panic, did not scramble to find a way out. There was none of the fear he had expected. And then before his eyes she seemed to be . . . to become a light. No, it was as if she emanated a light, a flowing, warm light that was becoming bright, so bright, so strong. He could see it, feel it. He looked around him, but no one else seemed to see this, no one but him. He turned his gaze back to her, gripped with the impossibility of what he was seeing, and started in surprise when he saw that she was looking straight at him, quiet strength in her eyes. She held his gaze for a long moment, and then her eyes moved away from his and focused on the people raging around her. And when she spoke, he couldn't so much hear her voice as feel it.

  “Enough.”

  Those closest to her seemed to falter and turned, confused, to look at her, which sent a ripple through the crowd. She walked through them and they fell back, making way for her to pass through. She approached a man who was still grasping the lapel of another’s shirt, his other hand raised in a fist, and put a gentle hand on his arm. She was smaller than he was, slighter, and yet he slowly lowered his hand. “Enough,” she said again, her voice soft. “You're hurting him.” Then she looked around her. “You're hurting each other. Why?”

  No one answered but Kyle saw them all looking at one another, confused, men and women alike, as if they were waking up from a trance.

  “Yes,” she said. “See? You're all the same People. Stand together, help each other.”

  The two men who'd been fighting only a moment before looked at each other, both visibly ashamed. Incredibly enough, around her people began helping one another get up, pick up their belongings. Subdued voices spoke, inquired, apologized. Offered help.

  Kyle looked at them, gaping. She had defused it, the chaos he’d created, just like that. She—

  She turned again and looked at him. And where a moment before her eyes were filled with compassion, the compassion and strength that had stopped the fighting, now they were filled with anger. At him. Anger, and a question that he felt resonating through him.

  Why?

  He took several steps back, her eyes and his still locked. His, he knew, were filled with shock.

  He turned and fled.

  No more than mere feet away, Benjamin Laree stood, staring. He had followed her as she left her building, almost missed her because she went out the back but caught sight of her in time. He had taken care to stay a safe distance away, all the while making sure no one came near her. He had to be careful she wouldn't see him, it would be hard to explain his presence there if she did. And so far he’d managed to follow her without incident. He thought she'd seen him at the supermarket the day before and had hid quickly, but she‘d simply left so he figured he was fine, still undetected. Although he wouldn't be surprised if she did realize he was there, all considering.

  He'd seen her approach the protest and had recognized the potential risk, but then all hell broke loose so quickly that he didn't have time to get to her. From his position he saw the man who threw the punch, and then everything happened all at once. The small crowd erupted in anger and enveloped her, and at the same time he saw the man who had instigated it all slip away and stand aside, watching. Watching her, Benjamin realized with apprehension. He began to move toward the crowd to get her out but halted in surprise when she herself stopped the rioters. He stood mesmerized at what had happened next, at her, at the light he could not believe he was seeing, at the force he felt from her, at the perpetrator he saw turn and half run. From her.

  He wanted to follow this man, but his first duty was to her. He watched her stagger away from the protesters, who were now helping one another and breaking off into small groups, some already leaving, dazed, not noticing that she was walking away. He followed her more closely this time, worried, but the man, whoever he was, had apparently left, and she made it safely home without any further incident.

  As soon as she was safe in her apartment building he slumped against its wall, allowing the shock to take over. It was true, it was all true. It was Her. She really was here, She really existed. He took out his phone and made a call.

  The man at the Amalfi Coast answered immediately. “Benjamin, is She all right?”

  “Yes, Sir, but I believe there is someone after Her.”

  “What? Tell me.”

  Benjamin told him everything. What he had seen, what She had become.

  “So, it has begun.”

  The young man heard
the awe in his esteemed mentor's voice, and this only increased his own wonder at what he had seen. Then something struck him. “Yes, but, Sir, I don't think She has any idea.”

  The line was quiet for a long moment. “Yes, that makes sense. All the more reason why we must protect Her, Benjamin. We must bring Her here immediately. I'm sending you some help. In the meantime, you must speak to Her.”

  “I wouldn't know how to, how do I explain—”

  “You must, we cannot wait any longer.”

  “Yes, Sir. And, Sir?”

  “Yes?”

  “This man? He's one of them, he's got to be. But I think, I don't know, She seems to know him.”

  “How so?”

  Benjamin told him how she somehow knew that this stranger was responsible for what happened, how she had looked at him, singling him out from the rest of the crowd, how she had, in effect, chased him away. How he'd looked at her, his reaction.

  “I think . . . it was almost as if he saw it. The light. But that couldn’t be, could it, Sir?”

  When the man at the Amalfi Coast finally spoke again his voice shook. “Bring Her here now, immediately.” After a pause, he added, his voice low, “And try not to hurt the man following Her. Bringing Her here safely takes precedence over everything, but . . . try.”

  Benjamin was perplexed. “Sir, if he has the chance he will kill Her.”

  “No, Benjamin. He won't.” The certainty in the quiet voice left no place for argument.

  Ending the call, the white-haired man stared at the phone, frozen in place. It couldn’t be.

  Could it?

  Once again Kyle found himself getting into his car in a hurry to leave, and once again he was rattled. But this time it was far worse than before. He couldn't accept what he'd just seen, but he couldn't deny that it happened, either. His mind reeled. This couldn’t be real, such things just didn't happen. That light . . . no, people were just people, they didn't radiate that kind of—what was it that he had seen, had felt? He had no idea, couldn’t begin to understand. He shook his head. He didn't sound like he was making any sense, not even to himself. He felt frustrated, out of control. He'd never before run away from anything, and here he’d been forced to get away from her, his mark. Again.

  He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. There was a perfectly logical explanation for it, there had to be. She was just an ordinary woman. Otherwise he would have known. Jennison had spent years preparing him for her killing. He'd tell him if there was anything out of the ordinary. Which there wasn't, because such things did not exist. Not in the real world. No. It must be him, there must be something wrong with him. Maybe because of this mission, the importance it had had throughout his life, the expectation that he would be the one to finish this. Yes, that was it. And the best way to end this was to, well, end it. He would distance himself from the situation, regroup.

  And then return to finish this once and for all.

  Aelia’s head was throbbing badly. She was dazed, and made her way home without really seeing where she was going. What happened there, in the park . . . Her mind was jumping from one thing to the next, not knowing what to grasp on to. The brawl, that feeling inside her, the man . . . both men. The one who was out to hurt her—the same man who had watched her in her study, he simply felt the same—and the one watching out for her. Nor could she begin to understand how she knew this. It was all foreign, confusing. All except for what she did back there, stopping that chaos. It simply happened, was a part of her, and it felt right, so right. And that raised more questions than anything else. Her mind reeled with the impossibility of it all, and thoughts intermixed with memories her exhausted mind could not keep away, trying to find a reason, an explanation.

  She knew she was different. She never belonged. Even as a child she felt she was in the wrong place and wanted to leave, go elsewhere, search for something, though where and what were a mystery to her. And the feeling never went away, not even when she grew up. Nor did she truly blend into society around her. She never went with the mainstream, never gave in to the opinions of others. She did what she felt was just and right and spoke for the truth, no matter the cost to herself.

  It took her years before she realized that she was not finding her way. That she was running into walls, that walls were appearing where they weren't a moment before. That she was constantly forcing her way through, as if she was a rogue element that had no place in the very life she lived. But she was strong, and within her there was something that would never bend, an unbreakable will that pushed her on. And so she kept searching, calling out from the depth of her being and longing for an answer. But there was none.

  Until Rome.

  When she had stood in the ancient cathedral it was as if her mind had linked with someone, something. For the first time in her life, it was as if her mind worked on its natural frequency. It felt right. Belonging—but to whom?

  Now back here, in what she deemed her real life, she felt disconnected again, out of place, but it felt worse than ever because of those rare moments in Rome. She had always been so good at pushing this feeling aside, but it was more difficult this time, near impossible. She had adamantly put her mind into it, sure there was nothing else for her but that same life she always returned to, that nothing would change.

  She was wrong.

  She vaguely realized that her building was looming above her and headed up to her apartment, her privacy. Her hiding place. On the way up she leaned her forehead on the cool elevator wall. Her headache was getting worse.

  So was her loneliness.

  In the gray four-by-four on the way back to the rented house that served as his headquarters for this mission, Kyle was once again going over what happened. He couldn't let it go no matter how logical he tried to be, how focused, and this only shook him more. He'd never been affected this way. And he certainly never reacted emotionally to a target, he was always detached and cool. Nor had he ever questioned Jennison's orders before. Until now.

  He was, he knew, better trained than most. He grew up on a small, well-kept farm, and was raised only by his father—his mother, his father told him, had died giving birth to him. He had no other family. The closest thing he had to an extended family were his father's friends from the military, men from elite units like his father had been in in his younger days. All were already serving in the organization when Kyle was growing up. They'd stayed at the farm many times during his youth and had taken the time to teach him what their training had taught them. They'd even taken him camping in the toughest terrains worldwide, to teach him the art and craft of survival in any conditions. But most of his training was given to him by his father himself, who'd insisted early on that Kyle keep in shape and acquire the type of capabilities a seasoned soldier would envy. And he had the body for it, too. He was tall, well-built, and had stamina that could not be matched by his peers. Already as a teenager he could outfight every adult he knew.

  By the time Kyle graduated from high school he was a match for any soldier in any military in the world. But his father wanted more than that. He wanted Kyle to be in a league of his own, and that included training his highly intelligent mind. Intelligence should be constantly honed just like the body should, he'd taught his son, and by the time Kyle graduated, at the top of his class, he already had unparalleled knowledge of military strategy and human nature.

  He was raised to be a killing machine, and his father had made no attempt to hide this from him. But while his father was a strict man, he loved Kyle. His entire world revolved around his only son, and while he planned every aspect of the boy's life and did not let him stray from the path set for him, he also made sure that Kyle always knew he was loved and protected. That he had roots, a family to come back to.

  By the time the organization called on him to serve it, he was already better than many of its seasoned operatives. Kyle the man, now a formidable force, did just that, answer the organization’s call. He did its bidding without question, as his father had
told him he would one day be expected to do, and never strayed from the path his father and Jennison, then already the facility’s director, had set for him. Nothing and no one could sway him.

  Until now.

  Until her.

  He braked hard and turned the car around, going back.

  Aelia wasn't entirely sure how she got back to her apartment. All she knew was that she felt exhausted, had to rest, just for a moment. She stumbled to her bedroom, fell on the bed, and was instantly asleep.

  She was back in the circle, and as she looked on all the women merged into one and became a light, the light that had beckoned her before. Gentle, warm, it had a shape now, human almost. It spoke to her again, and as it did it changed, its form becoming increasingly distinct, increasingly familiar, as if she was looking not into the depth of the unknown, but into eyes. Her eyes. Her form. The light advanced and she gasped as it flowed through her, into her, becoming one with her—

  She woke up with a start.

  And for the first time in her life, she woke up feeling whole.

  Chapter Five

  This would end now. He would not be stopped, not this time. This time he was ready, nothing could surprise him anymore. He would kill her, complete his mission successfully, and never tell a soul about what he had seen or about her effect on him. Her killing would end whatever it was, whatever she was, whatever games his mind was playing on him. He would then track down that guy who'd been following her in the park and find out what he was all about, and eliminate him, too, to minimize any residual risk.

  He never went in without a plan, and, as always, his approach of the situation was measured. He considered breaking into her apartment, but that would only do if she was not there and he was free to wait until she returned and he would surprise her. If she was home it would be out of the question, he wasn't familiar enough with the place to be sure he could break in without alerting her and giving her time to call for help. Either way, killing her at home wasn’t ideal. It would be better to do it somewhere public, some place messy enough to make the collection of forensic evidence substantially more difficult than in her apartment, where it would be just the two of them. And perhaps more important, it would make it easier for him to disguise her kill as random, and random crimes attracted less attention, if at all. In that sense, sniping was the perfect balance between these two factors—a clean kill that indicated the target might have been deliberately chosen, and still would not give a clue as to the reason, or the perpetrator. His sniper's rifle was still in the car, so perhaps that was the best solution. Now that he was ready, he was confident that she would not surprise him like she did last time.