Ultimate Weapon Read Free Page B

something was rolling the rocks away, one after the other. Something like Rachel. Fancy that.
    Tam wrapped her arms around her knees. Her body ached, every muscle rigid. Her heart felt like it was going to explode, it raced so fast.
    Moonlight streamed in the huge windows of her bedroom. She had chosen every detail of the room to calm, to soothe, having pictured an uncluttered, tranquil haven where she could feel safe and peaceful. What a fantasy. Sleep was a dangerous place for her to go.
    The electronically programmed blinds would automatically close shortly before dawn to keep the room dim so Rachel would sleep longer, but the moonlight seemed blinding to her, casting shadows as cold and sharp as knives.
    Tam looked down at the lump in the bed beside her. Rachel stirred, fussed in her sleep. Tam laid down alongside her, and stroked the child’s back. She wasn’t sure it was appropriate to take her nightmares into bed with the innocent toddler, but Rachel wouldn’t sleep on her own for love or money.
    When she was being honest, though, she recognized that excuse for the cheap justification that it was. She just liked to be close to Rachel. She loved to watch her sleep, see the rise and fall of her little chest, the beatific relaxation in her face. To touch and snuggle that warm body. And she liked to be there when Rachel reached for her in the night. Right at the child’s fingertips. Instant gratification. The least she could offer, considering what Rachel had been robbed of up to now.
    Just watching her was restful. Maybe she couldn’t get a decent night’s sleep herself, but watching Rachel get one was the next best thing. Tamara could lie there and feel that miraculous sensation that had taken her hostage in the aftermath of the organ pirate adventure. That hot softness in her chest. The melting.
    The problem was, the rest of Tam’s emotional defenses were melting right along with her heart, and she was by no means ready to live without them yet. Scary.
    Rachel rolled over and reached out, flinging a skinny but surprisingly strong arm over Tam’s neck, dragging her into a strangling, baby-soap, sour milk, and toothpaste-scented hug.
    Tam grabbed the little girl, comforting herself with the warmth of that snuggly, wiry body. Rachel vibrated with life, glowing like a little sun. Being close to her fed something inside Tam that had been starving. Something she had thought was stone dead.
    Rachel needed her so badly. Or rather, Rachel needed someone, and it had been the toddler’s questionable luck that Tam had been the one standing there, at the crucial psychological moment. Snap, click, and hey, presto…the kid was stuck to her like glue. And out of nowhere, Tam had suddenly come to crave being needed in return.
    So strange. Where did that come from, after a lifetime of deliberately not giving a shit? After making not caring into a high art?
    Rachel was barely three years old, and she’d had more crap luck than a lot of people pulled in an entire lifetime. Tossed into a sty of an orphanage at birth, scooped up by rapacious organ pirates to be broken down for parts, locked in a stinking windowless pen with a pack of desperate kids for months—it didn’t get worse than that.
    Until you added in the fact that somehow, she’d managed to pull Tam Steele out of a hat for an adoptive mother. Yippee, what a prize.
    And if that wasn’t enough, the mother she had chosen was getting twitchy and paranoid. Which was to say, more twitchy and paranoid than usual, which was really saying something, given her impressive list of mortal enemies. It was a strange sensation, but she couldn’t shake it. For weeks, she’d felt her grunting reptile brain looking back over her scaly reptile shoulder, telling her she was being watched.
    Paranoia or genuine danger? Impossible to tell. Her instincts were good. But the emotions that had broken ranks and gone nuts inside her might have knocked even that out of whack.
    She might never