“Good enough. I’m pulling into the bottom level.”
“And where will you go?”
“I’ll just park down here,” he decided calmly, “and then I can disappear.”
“Okay, I’ll tell Merk. Watch your back.” With that, Terk hung up.
Damon parked in between two cars, leaving himself plenty of room to get in and out as needed. He slipped out, closed the truck door quietly, then, moving around the other vehicles, came up to the stairs. He quickly shifted downstairs, looking to see what was there, but it looked like a ground-level access area only. Frowning at that because it was not really accessible by car, it was still a hell of a place for people to sneak in, if they wanted to.
He saw stairs and an elevator. “I wonder if you have access to the main buildings from here,” he muttered. He wouldn’t be at all surprised. And from the building perspective, it gave access for everybody in the main buildings. He walked over in the dark because these were just concrete car parks. Didn’t appear to be any lighting, until darkness settled in, and then emergency lighting would shine. The door itself was locked; he checked it and realized he could easily unlock it, but that’s not where he was going right now.
Sliding back through the shadows, he headed to the stairwell and just then heard a tap above him. He froze, and then the tap came again, twice. He responded with a code that he and Terk knew, but Damon wasn’t expecting anybody else to know. When it was answered, he realized that Merk had an awful lot more in common with Terk than Damon had expected.
And before Damon realized it, a quiet voice was at his shoulder.
“How is my brother?”
Damon didn’t turn, but he whispered, “He’s fine but dealing with a lot of trauma right now.”
“I’m surprised to see you here,” the man said, a hint of suspicion in his voice.
Damon stiffened at that, turned, and faced a man who looked so much like Terk that it shocked him. He studied the face in front of him, seeing the change in the glint of the eyes, a slightly heftier build of someone who worked out harder and heavier than Terk did, but with the same strong jaw, the same cut cheekbones, and that gaze that pierced him in place. “You must be Merk.”
“What gave that away?” he drawled.
Damon flashed a grin. “Any sign of him?”
“In the parking lot.”
“The parkade?”
Merk shook his head. “On the ground lot.”
“Did he exit the truck?”
“No, hasn’t left yet.”
“What do you think he’s waiting for?”
“My guess would be you,” he said in that same slow tone.
“Damn.” Damon shook his head. “Looking at you, it’s kind of scary.”
“Twins are like that,” he noted, “but there’s just enough differences that you shouldn’t make a mistake between us,” he stated, almost a note of warning.
“That won’t happen,” Damon declared. “Terk has some mad skills. I don’t know what you’ve got.”
“Mad skills in a very different way,” he stated calmly. “My brother has always been the one with the otherworldly skills. But don’t get ahead of yourself. I’ll take you out in two seconds flat if I don’t like what you’re doing.”
Damon stared at him and recognized a warrior within the same space he was in. “I’m not your problem, but someone took out our team, and those are the assholes I want. Just so we understand each other,” he stated.
Merk’s body untensed.
Damon realized that he had passed whatever test Merk needed in order for Damon to be of assistance. “Did you see or get any visual on whoever is driving?”
“No,” he replied, “except for a baseball cap.”
“The notorious baseball cap,” Damon muttered. “What a pain in the ass those things are.”
“Very effective. We’ve sure used them more than a few times ourselves.”
“Exactly,” Damon agreed, “but I don’t know what kind of attack we’re looking for.”
“Anything that works.”
“You realize that it’s quite possible it could be a psychic energy attack, like that which took out the rest of our team, and that you could potentially be affected by it.”
“Not as much as you. I don’t have energy abilities to get blocked,” he noted calmly. “It’s one of the reasons I’m here now.”
“And you’re okay not to see Terk?”
“He’d be pissed if I tried to see him,” Merk admitted. “He wants to know that I’m safe.”
“Has he always been that way?”
“Always,” he stated. “He went his own way because he had his own path to walk, and I couldn’t help him with it, and sometimes that was damn hard. But he has always been a protector and always been somebody who tried to keep his personal life out of it.”
“Somehow I doubt that you’re any different.”
“Nope, I’m sure not,” he said, “but now both he and I have higher stakes. I have a partner, and he apparently has a child on the way.”
Just enough anger was mixed with a note of humor for Damon to realize that Merk was as shocked by that turn of events as Terk was. “Who the hell knew something like this would happen?” Damon muttered.
“It’s one thing to not know it would happen, but who had any idea that somebody would even think of doing something like this?”
“Whenever you end up with assholes,” Damon murmured, “you end up with assholes willing to do whatever it takes.”
Just then, with his senses open as wide as they could be because they were only operating halfway, he sent out a probe through the parking lot, looking for any signs of life. As he did so, he sensed somebody staring. “Definitely somebody out there.”
“Yep, there is,” Merk agreed. “I watched the vehicle drive in.”
“So he didn’t see you come in here?”
“I think he probably did, and he’s also waiting for me to come out.”
“Hmm, that also means he saw me come in.”
“Yep.” And Merk didn’t say anything more about that.
Just a noncommittal yep, and Damon had to love it. This was somebody who understood both the good and the bad of the way it had played out. That they could have a problem, or it could be a solution. “He’s probably looking for both of us, just to see what or who it is that you’re meeting.”
“I would expect so, but if they didn’t have any tracker on your truck, they’ve got it now.”
“I won’t take it back again,” Damon replied carelessly. “That was always part of the plan.”
“Good, I’d still like to make sure that we take this guy though.”
“Agreed. We need answers, but we’ll need somebody alive to get them.”
“You think he’ll let himself get taken?” Merk asked, with a note of amusement.
“Well, I wouldn’t, would you?”
“Hell no. But, on the other hand, I’d never expect to get taken in the first place.” And, with that, he moved out.