Page 114 of Golden Eagle

A little thing, and nothing he should have dwelled on in this moment, as he, Lanny, Alexei, Dante, and Will Scarlet walked in, but he did notice it, keenly aware of his own missing partner. Of the awful yawning gap at his shoulder where Sasha should have stalked, his right hand, the back against his own in a dangerous situation.

He’d looked doubly betrayed when he realized that Scarlet was coming with them. Will had sensed it, and clapped him on the shoulder, and said, “I know, old chap, but, if it’s any consolation, if not for my master, I’d be a complete liability as well.”

Sasha had actually glared at Nikita then.

He couldn’t think about that now. They had a job to do. And as they went through the airlock, and emerged in the lobby, he’d more or less strapped all unhelpful thoughts down and brought up the awful, oily power Rasputin had given him. Dante had confessed to being able to compel somewhat;mostly I just charm bed partners, he’d said.

Nikita and Alexei were the strongest. They’d drunk from the fount directly, and thestarets’staint burned bright in their blood.

The receptionist behind her sliding glass window glanced up as they entered, expression growing startled. They didn’t look like patients. “Excuse me, can I–” she started, and Nikita took three long, quick strides up to the window and locked gazes with her. “Buzz us through into the back,” he commanded, and heard the faint ring of the compulsion in his own voice. He felt her mind with his own, and bulled his way in; he’d be queasy about it later, but that was later, and this was now. “Wait for us.”

Her eyes widened and went glassy; her pupils shrank to pinpricks as all the tension left her face. She nodded, slow and dreamy, and got to her feet. Pressed a button on the wall, and that was followed by a faint buzzing, and the click of the door unlocking.

They went through into a narrow, carpeted hallway that could have belonged to any normal doctor’s office, with portraits on the wall and soft lighting, and the receptionist stood waiting, lax and unfocused in the way of the mindlessly obedient.

Would Sasha look like that? he wondered. If it was a pearly gray morning, and the air was cold, and Nikita stretched out a hand and murmured,Come back to bed, baby. Would Sasha look like this? Like a marionet lurching along on strings?

“Nik,” Lanny hissed.

He’d come to a halt, and the receptionist was blinking, shaking her head, coming out from under his influence.

He swallowed hard, and called the power back up; felt it flood him, felt it force all thoughts of his mate aside.

“Very good,” he told the woman, tipping her chin up with a finger, pouring his influence straight into her face. She went glassy again. “Give me your ID card. Then go back out front and resume work. Forget my face. You never saw me.”

She nodded and drifted off, leaving him with her plastic ID card clenched tight in one fist.

Alexei surged up to walk beside him as they continued down the hall. “Can you not concentrate?” he asked, colder, haughtier, more bitter than he’d ever been.

A little warning chimed in the back of Nikita’s mind, but it was something else he had to push aside for later.

“If you can’t do this properly–” Alexei said.

“I can.”

“Hmph.”

He remembered the way, for the most part. They passed several doctors in lab coats, and he compelled them all. “You didn’t see us.” One he robbed of an ID before compelling him, too.

The receptionist’s ID got them into the security office; they locked themselves in, and Will went to the array of monitors, all of which showed live footage of various locations within the sprawling building.

“Now, if I’m right,” Will said, leaning over a chair and tapping at a keyboard. “They won’t have any of the lab footage here on these servers. There’ll be a secondary security office, somewhere deeper in the building. You wouldn’t want random guards seeing the sorts of things they’re doing to children.”

“Christ,” Lanny murmured.

“But we can narrow it down, hopefully. I don’t know if you boys have ever compelled a whole group of people for very long before.” He sounded doubtful. “But I’m thinking time will be at a premium.” He clicked a few more keys. “Okay. I’ve erased the footage of us coming in here and disabled the cameras on the front house side of things.”

He pulled a palm-sized walkie-talkie out of his jacket pocket and spoke into it. “Flash drive going in.” And he thumbed a drive into a port on the monitor.

The walkie crackled and Much’s sullen voice came through. “Five seconds.”

Then, as Nikita watched, the computer started toglow. Not just the screen, but the sides of the monitor, too; the cables snaking down to the keyboard and the modem. A faint blue wash that pulsed a few times, and then faded.

“What the hell was that?” Alexei asked.

“Little something Much and Tuck have been working on. Little electronic enchantment. If you can compel a person, why can’t you compel a machine?”

“Because that’s not possible,” Nikita said.

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