“I have one question for you,” he said.
“Shoot,” she said, picking at her chicken and rice with chopsticks. The smell was sharp with soy and ginger. Her lips were shiny with it, tongue darting intriguingly.
“Your feet.” He lifted the one nearest him to examine her toes. They looked alien, knobby with calluses. With mock severity, he added, “Frankly, I’m concerned.”
She giggled and kicked him. “They’re supposed to be that way, or I wouldn’t last ten minutes en pointe. I’ve worked very hard for my ugly feet, and I won’t hear you say a word against them.”
“In that case,” he said. “I love them, too.” Guitar players got thick calluses on their fingers, so he could relate a bit.
It was amazing, peaceful, to be with her like this. Happy, naked, laughing at inconsequential things.
Annabella was animated as they talked, her eyes shining, denying whatever hell tomorrow might bring, and he let her. They finished eating and made the bed their world, like a white island of happiness away from everything else. Annabella, sex, Chinese food. Couldn’t be more perfect. He wanted these stolen hours to last forever, too, though the club had closed some time ago and once again he was faced with an unwelcome dawn.
Inevitably, Segue came up. Talia and Adam and the babies.
Annabella lounged on the pillows, an arm behind her head, gazing at him with sleepy eyes, though neither of them wanted to actually sleep. “I was too mad to ask before, but what was with all the soldiers in our room?”
Adam’s room. “I was questioning them, trying to get the truth about our failed mission out of them. One of them is responsible for the wraith attack.”
“You were using your Spidey sense?” She flipped to her side, her hip and waist curving beautifully, tantalizingly, and she knew it. The shirt puckered and he could see her rose-tipped breasts, which by the gleam in her eye, she knew, too.
Custo shifted closer, parting the shirt. “Yes. There is someone inside Segue gunning for Adam. One of those soldiers had to have tipped off the wraiths to his position at the theater last night. Adam was almost killed.”
“At my performance?” She looked horrified and sat up.
“The informant’s actions are not your fault, Annabella,” Custo said, tugging at the shirt to bring her back down. “The wraiths would have attacked Adam anywhere.”
She resisted the pull. “Did you find him?”
“Nope. As far as I can tell, none of them went out of their chain of command.” Custo sat up, too. Annabella obviously wasn’t going to cooperate until she knew the whole story. He regretted bringing up the subject at all. “I figured it had to be one of them. There is no one outside the team who knew of our plans for the evening.”
“Except Talia,” Annabella said, a furrow of thought forming between her eyebrows.
“Okay, except Talia.” But she didn’t count. Talia would never betray Adam.
Custo put his hand inside the tux shirt to see if he could get Annabella’s nipples to harden. A couple flicks of his thumb ought to do the trick…
“And her doctor?” Annabella persisted. “Did you question him?”
“Her doctor is a woman, Dr. Powell.” Gillian had been with Segue almost from inception. She’d seen firsthand what Jacob was capable of, and she’d been there when the wraiths attacked Segue en masse. If not for Talia, Gillian would have never survived the day. She, more than anyone, would know how critical Talia and Adam were to the wraith war.
“Okay…did you question her?” Annabella made an exasperated face.
“She wasn’t privy to the details of the security for the night.” Now could they move on to better things? And then much better things?
“Well, did Adam discuss plans with Talia? With Dr. Powell present?”
“He shouldn’t have.” But Custo could picture Adam at Talia’s bedside, entertaining her, keeping her up to date on the goings-on of Segue, to which they dedicated their lives. Maybe he told her about the performance. Maybe he let slip his role in the night’s security.
“But did he?” Annabella pressed.
“It would be a stupid mistake.” Adam was always so careful. He was meticulous in granting access to information, everything coded and double coded with redundant measures on top of that. To speak freely in front of the doctor would negate all that, no matter how trusted she was.
Annabella smiled ruefully. “People make stupid mistakes all the time.”
“You’re saying Dr. Powell is the informant, the traitor within Segue.” Alarm zapped down Custo’s nerves. He’d have looked for a system hack next. Never in a million years would he have considered the doctor. Adam didn’t make mistakes; he would be scrupulous where Talia was concerned. Maybe he thought Talia, with her gift to read emotions, would be alert to Gillian’s intentions. But surgical gloves would take care of that. Of all the times for Adam to start screwing up…
“I think she should be questioned at least.” Annabella sighed heavily, looking forlorn.
Custo wanted to stay, too, shut out the world and be content. But the thought of Talia, helpless on bed rest at the mercy of her doctor, had him scrambling for his pants to get his mobile phone. He had to ask Adam. Now.
Annabella rose and began picking through her clothes in the background, swearing at her bra. He wished he’d asked her before. Some things became so simple from a different perspective.
The traitor had inside information on Segue movements because Adam told her himself.
Custo punched autodial. It was well past four A.M., but he knew Adam would pick up immediately. Adam never slept.
“Here,” Adam said. His voice was low, so Custo guessed he was with Talia and that she was sleeping.
“What about Dr. Powell?” Custo asked without preamble.
There was a long pause on the other end. Too long. Then, “Oh, shit.”
Chapter Eighteen
ANNABELLA knew how cold and frightening the concrete cells under Segue could be, especially with that smell, which now she knew was arrested decomposition, wraith. The stench was particularly gag-tastic in the interrogation room where Adam had incarcerated Dr. Powell until Annabella and Custo could arrive and take a minute to change their clothes. Dr. Powell, green in the face, kept adjusting her lab coat over her blouse and fidgeting in her chair, crossing and uncrossing her ankles. The woman seemed both defiant and terrified.
From within the adjoining observation room, guilt nagged Annabella: she’d basically put the woman in the cell herself. But Adam was right: caution first, apologies later. Which meant Annabella probably had to forgive him for her own heartless incarceration. Damn it.
Custo asked a few pointed questions and sent Adam a slight nod. Traitor.
Mystery solved. Now to get at why. This would take longer, an ordeal of careful questions. Annabella and Adam would just have to wait until Custo was finished before getting the real story.
Custo relaxed into a thorough interrogation, careful not to tip off Dr. Powell to the fact that he could read her mind, or the doctor would go to her “happy place” and he’d get nothing usable out of her. Apparently minds could be pretty hard to read. A very small consolation, as far as Annabella was concerned.
Annabella’s stomach rumbled. If nothing else, her adventures with Segue were excellent for her dancer’s diet. The Chinese had been delectable, but she’d burned through it hours ago and was back to starving. The gravity of the situation and Adam’s rigid posture kept her from saying anything. Clearly not the time. And anyway, she’d been fighting her appetite’s demands since she was fourteen. She could wait a little longer.