Hitting the Target Read online

  Mia’s fear abruptly turned to white-hot anger. She leaned across the desk and glared at the Commandant.

  “You leave my Neemah alone! I’ve done everything you asked—everything! You just leave her alone!”

  “Naturally, my dear—I wouldn’t dream of harming a single gray hair on her dear old head.” The Commandant gave her a wide, insincere smile. “I tell you what, why don’t you go home and get a good night’s sleep and consider your new assignment again? Then report to me here tomorrow and we’ll see how you feel about it.”

  Mia bit her lip. Was he giving her a choice about doing this? His words seemed to indicate that he was but after all the threats he’d made, she didn’t know what to believe.

  “I am tired,” she admitted in a low voice. “I’ve been working double shifts for weeks.”

  “Well then, get some sleep. Oh, but first, I must show you the alien male who will be your target—if you decide to accept your assignment, that is.”

  He snapped his fingers and the golden glow of his brass lamp was abruptly extinguished, leaving the room in dim gloom. Before Mia could protest, an image was projected onto the wall across from the desk. At first, she couldn’t understand what she was seeing. A tan face surrounded by a mane of golden-brown hair and eyes the clear green of a tropical sea looked into hers. He was big and muscular and frighteningly familiar.

  Mia felt like her heart might stop dead in her chest. It was him—it was the man she’d been dreaming of for so long.

  And he was her target.

  Chapter Three

  Mia felt numb as she took the last tram home to the gray concrete block high rise and the shabby little flat she shared with Neemah.

  How could she do this? How could the Commandant expect her to leave her grandmother and her home—the only home she’d ever known—and go to the strange, decadent South to seduce a man she didn’t even know?

  But you do know him, don’t you? whispered a little voice in her head. After all, you’ve been dreaming about him for months, Mia.

  She pushed the thought away. It was ridiculous—just dreaming about someone didn’t mean you knew them—didn’t give you any kind of an intimate connection with them. And anyway, that was beside the point. What she really wanted to know was, how could a man she’d only dreamed of be real?

  Well, maybe she wouldn’t have to find out. The Commandant had seemed to back away from his threats at the end of their interview. Maybe he would allow her to refuse the assignment, as she hadn’t been able to refuse the first he had given her, Mia thought as she let herself into the small flat.

  “Mia child, is that you?” she heard Neemah call as she closed the door behind her.

  “Yes, Neemah. I’ll be just a second—I want to take off my wet things,” Mia called back.

  The walk from the tram station had been especially miserable tonight and not just because she had the Commandant and the stranger and her new assignment weighing on her mind. The temperature had dropped and a cold, wet snow had started to fall which seemed to soak through her coat and gloves almost at once.

  Teeth chattering, she stripped of her gloves, slipped off her coat, and hung it over the back of one of the rickety kitchen chairs. Recklessly, she flipped the stove to electric and turned it on high. Then she stood as close as she dared to the glowing coils of the stovetop, rubbing her hands together and trying to get warm.

  Just as she was beginning to feel less like a human icicle, her eye caught on her grandmother’s spice rack. The spice rack which had been neat as a pin and perfectly arranged according to Neemah’s exact specifications only that morning…

  Mia felt her heart jump into her throat as she saw that everything was now out of order. Some of the sweet spices had been swapped for the savory ones and a few of the jars were turned around or even upside down.

  Looking around the small kitchen, she saw more things out of place. The hot-mitts weren’t by their accustomed spot by the stove. Instead, someone had thrown one into the corner and the other was on top of the ancient cooling chest beside the sink. The curtains were disordered too—closed tight to hide the plasti-glass window instead of open to let in the light, the way Neemah liked them.

  There were other things too—small but noticeable. It wasn’t as though the tiny kitchen had been robbed—there was nothing missing. But there had been enough changes made that they caught Mia’s eye and sent a chill of fear down her spine.

  Because she knew they were meant to catch her eye.

  Someone had been here—maybe even while she was having her interview with the Commandant. Someone—probably an agent of The EYE—had wanted her to know they could come and go inside the little flat without anyone the wiser.

  “Mia child? You all right?” her grandmother’s whispery voice floated to her from the other room.

  “Just fine, Neemah—only trying to warm up,” she called back through numb lips. Though at the moment, she felt as though she’d never been warm again.

  Quickly, she straightened the little kitchen, putting the hot-mitts and the spices all back in their rightful places and turning off the stove. Then, trying to arrange her face into a carefully neutral mask, she went to find her grandmother.

  Neemah was sitting in her overstuffed chair watching the box, just as she’d been when Mia had left for work.

  “There you are child—are you all right?” Her grandmother looked up at her, squinting with worry. “You’re so pale—look like you saw a haunt!”

  So her face must not look as neutral as she’d hoped. Mia took a deep breath and tried to smile.

  “I’m fine, Neemah—it’s just a really cold night out tonight.” She cleared her throat. “Um, when was the last time you were in the kitchen?”

  “Oh, I guess around lunchtime when I made sourberry stew.” Neemah smiled. “There’s plenty left for supper too. I saved enough for both of us—I’ve been sitting here watching the box and waiting for you to get home so I could heat it up.”

  “And you put everything back? The spices and things I mean?” Mia couldn’t help asking.

  Her grandmother frowned. “Of course I did, child. Haven’t I always taught you that the cooking’s not done until the kitchen is clean and everything is back in its place?”

  “Yes…yes you did, Neemah.”

  Mia felt sick. So she was right—the agents of The EYE had been here while she was talking with the Commandant. They’d slipped in and out without a sound and Neemah hadn’t even known.

  And who knew how close they had been to her vulnerable grandmother? Neemah was tough but she was a little old lady—there was no way she could fight off an attack by trained agents of The EYE.

  The Commandant had left her an unmistakable message—she really had no choice here at all. She was going to do his bidding again. There was no way around it—no way out for her. If she didn’t do as he asked, her grandmother would be killed or worse, sent to the basement of The EYE for torture.

  She would have to go through the Great Barrier and meet the strange man—the one from her dreams—and spy on him for The EYE.

  There was nothing else she could do.

  Chapter Four

  “So how are things on Ormyu Five going?” Sylvan, the Head Chancellor of the Kindred High Council smiled at Treygar of the Lei’on Kindred from the viewscreen. “Are you making headway with the new trade? And have you had any trouble with the country to the north? The People’s Republic I think it’s called?”

  Trey sighed and ran a hand through his long hair. Many Kindred—like the Blood Kindred of which Chancellor Sylvan was one—kept their hair military short. But he was a Lei’on Kindred and his people, few though they were, always wore their hair long and flowing around their shoulders. This was a mark of the beast they kept inside—a reminder that without proper control, any one of them could become their other selves in a heartbeat.

  Trey didn’t worry about his beast, however. He had made peace with it at a young age and now it gave him strength when