Last Guard by Nalini Singh

Chapter 46

Dear Dima, I’m very happy you like the rocket-powered wheelchair design I sent you. At the moment, I’m in Delhi, but we can discuss it more after I’m back home. Also, I’m trying to think bear thoughts, but I need more time to get it right. Being a bear isn’t as easy as it looks.

—Message from Canto to Dima

KALEB LISTENED ASPayal laid out what the anchors had discovered to the Ruling Coalition.

“This is no magic bullet that will erase our problems,” she said on the comm, “but it will buy us a little more time. If the clock was hovering a few minutes to midnight, it’s now been turned back by fifteen minutes.”

Ivy Jane Zen, her face thinner than it had been only months ago, her exhaustion imprinted on her skin, said, “It’s enough. For all of us to catch a breath.”

Nikita parted her lips as if to argue, then shut them. No one else refuted Payal’s statement, either. Because Ivy Jane was right. Yes, they’d all wanted a solution, but that solution had to hold. Or it would all fall apart again—perhaps at a time when the PsyNet didn’t have so many powerful Psy willing to work together for their survival.

Had this happened in the time of the Council, half the population would already be dead, sacrificed because they weren’t powerful or connected enough.

“In that fifteen minutes, Designation A has a demand.”

Nikita raised an eyebrow at the wording of the statement but, oddly for Nikita, kept her silence once again. Something was going on there. Perhaps Anthony’s influence? No, the head of PsyClan NightStar knew nothing of anchors. Had to be another person closer to Nikita who held sway with her.

Possibly her daughter.

“We can now ID young As before they initialize.” Payal’s words were massive boulders crashing into the earth. “What we want is the Coalition’s backing to formally tag those children as newborn As and maintain a health watch on them as they grow.”

She wasn’t asking their permission, Kaleb thought. The As would do this. They just wanted to know if they’d have the support of the Coalition.

“Accepted,” Aden said, speaking for the first time. “If you need Arrow escorts during the checkups, I’ll make them available.”

“And if you need Es to scope out the emotional situation,” Ivy Jane added, “you can have us on call.”

Arrow-Empath-Anchor.

Looked like a new kind of network was being born right in front of him.

“I see no issue with this,” Nikita said, and Anthony concurred.

“Children should never be hurt or tortured or killed.” Kaleb held Payal’s eyes, knowing her secrets without knowing them. “The simple fact that a child is an A should protect them as a result of A now being a hotly coveted designation.” Payal’s ascension to the Council, her repeated interviews, as well as the interviews given by a number of other As, had helped achieve that outcome.

The Psy now understood that it was on the shoulders of anchors that they all stood. That many As required high-level care from those around them didn’t alter the fact that they were critical to the PsyNet’s survival.

“I’m glad we are all in accord on this point.” Payal’s voice was as crisp and detached as always—yet Ena had mentioned that Payal had bonded with Canto. A little piece of family information dropped into the conversation, a quiet statement that Payal was now part of the wider Mercant family.

Just like Kaleb.

Do you think anyone realizes the Mercants are slowly growing into the most powerful family in the Net?asked the woman who’d been with him throughout this meeting. Silver runs EmNet. They call you family and have claimed the bears as kin. Now they have within their ranks the leadership of the anchors.

I don’t think it’s a pursuit of power, Kaleb said. I think it’s the other way around. I pursued them because of who they are. Loyal. Intelligent. Relentless. If they become an even bigger power than they are now, the Net has nothing to fear.

Warmth along his bond with Sahara. Admit it, you have a crush on Ena.

The twisted darkness in him laughed, delighted with her. I will take that secret to the grave.

Her laughter filled him to the brim, even as the Coalition meeting broke up. As Payal’s face blinked out, he was certain he saw her wince. Likely another Net rupture, but nothing echoed to him along the pathways of the Net, so it couldn’t have been a significant one.

He teleported home to Sahara.

PAYAL’Snose was bleeding, and a pulse pounded at the back of her skull. She cleaned up the blood with quick efficiency. This had happened a few times before, when she’d waited too long before taking her dose.

She had about two more days before things went critical.

Canto entered her office, the two of them having come up with a residence schedule that worked for their anchor points.

Two weeks in one zone, two weeks in the other. Both anchor points would remain stable, and they could live together. They could do that for a lifetime. Karishma had asked to stay at her school for the time being, since it was familiar and comfortable, but when she came to Vara for the holidays—which she was excited to do—Payal would stay in Delhi for the duration.

All these plans they had.

Because she was going to survive. Payal was a survivor. So was Canto. “Any word from the Aleines?” she asked, making no attempt to hide her pain.

He knew. He always knew.

White lines around his mouth, he said, “Ashaya says it’s an incredibly complex piece of work. They will break it down and be able to engineer it backward, but it’s a question of how long it’ll take.” He came around her desk. She swiveled her chair so she faced him. “The Aleines are working all possible hours. They know we’re fighting a ticking clock.”

“Two women who I’ve never met are fighting for me. I would’ve never imagined such a thing possible before you.” She touched her hand to the bristles of his jaw, the wildness in her angry at the shadows under his eyes, the tension across his shoulders.

Put there by a man so in love with control that he’d rather his heir die than live without him. “I’ve sent word to every branch of the Rao empire alerting them to the transfer in power—and the circumstances of my father’s death. It’s possible his scientists might reach out to me.”

Payal hadn’t expected such family-defeating arrogance of her father—he’d always been about building an empire, an unbroken line. But he’d also thought he’d hold on to power forever, so dying with the secret of the drug might not have been a purposeful decision.

Payal might die because her father had believed himself immortal.

FORTY-EIGHThours later, with pain a constant throb in the back of her skull, Payal continued on with putting a line of succession in place. Too many lives and livelihoods depended on the Rao empire for her to leave it to flounder. She hadn’t yet notified any of the parties, but she had taken up Canto’s offer to have Arwen in the room when she had meetings with various people.

She let it get around that she was interviewing him for a possible secondary assistant position, and he played the part, taking notes and fetching documents as needed. Ruhi, sure of her position since Payal had made it a point to tell her that she was to remain the most senior member of the office staff, had taken him under her wing.

One thing was non-negotiable: the succession could not be put on Karishma’s shoulders. Payal’s sister was an artist, a gifted one. She no more understood business than Payal understood how to put paint together in such a way that it came alive on the canvas. But ownership of all Rao enterprises would remain hers, to be passed on to her children if she so wished.

Payal intended to leave the oversight of her plan in Canto’s hands.

He refused to discuss it with her, gritting his jaw and changing the subject anytime she tried to bring it up. But she knew that should the worst happen, he’d take care of it, take care of Kari. Because he was in her corner. Always.

“Payal?” Arwen hesitated in the act of rising from the chair across from her own.

The two of them had finished their final meeting of the day, and he was now free to do as he wished. He’d mentioned going to see the art that lined the walls of the lower floor of Vara.

Her headache dull rather than sharp thanks to medication, she looked up. “Yes?” Protectiveness was a pulse in her veins. There was a gentleness to Arwen that made her want to wrap him up in cotton wool.

Eyes of clear silver searched her face. “You’re not mad with Canto for how he’s acting, are you?” He swallowed. “He loves so hard—and the idea that he might lose you, it’s making him act angry and grumpy. He feels helpless and he hates that beyond anything.”

“I know.” She still touched their bond compulsively, felt it grow stronger with every hour that passed. “I don’t know how to shield him from this, Arwen.” It devastated the feral girl in her that Canto would hurt after she was gone.

Because it turned out even a survivor couldn’t outrace this clock.

Eyes shining with wetness, Arwen shook his head. “You can’t shield from life—that’s what got our race into trouble in the first place.”

She was still thinking of his words when Canto rolled his chair into her office. Darkness was falling outside, the lights of Delhi beginning to flicker to life. Stopping her work the instant he appeared, she rose to go over to him.

He glowered at her but wove his fingers through hers. “You look exhausted. Have you eaten?”

“I love you.” No more hiding from that huge emotion, no more cowardice. “Do you know?”

“Yeah.” It came out as rough as his bristled cheek. “But it’s nice to hear it.”

“Shall we go for a walk in the streets of Delhi?” She wanted to show him her city, the vibrancy and the chaos and the stark contrast of new and old.

Canto’s eyes held no galaxies, his jaw a brutal line, but he nodded.

He was a tense, alert presence at her side as they exited through the main gates of Vara.

Which was why it didn’t surprise her in the least when he said, “Stop,” in a cold tone to a short and skinny man who’d darted toward her—from behind a tree outside the gates. He wore a satchel crosswise across his body.

The man skidded to a halt, his dark eyes shifting to Payal. “Miss Payal, I have information for you,” he said in the local dialect.

Canto had subtly angled his chair so he—and his hidden weapon—were in front of her.

Wait, Canto.Payal put a hand on his shoulder. I think I recognize him. The memory was a few years old, and she couldn’t quite place the man, but he wasn’t a stranger. “Why are you lurking outside? You could have contacted me in other ways.” As the Rao CEO, she wasn’t easily accessible, but neither was she insulated from the outside world.

He looked around, as if searching for watchers. “I wasn’t sure who to trust.”

Canto, able to understand the dialect because she was permitting him to link to her in a way that was beyond telepathic, said, He’s Psy. Good shields, but nothing martial or extraordinary. No weapons that I can spot, though the satchel is suspect, and his body language isn’t threatening. More scared.

Payal processed that, said, “All right. Let’s speak.” And because she saw his jittery gaze and constant swallowing, she invited him through the gates of Vara. Once safe from outside eyes, she led him into the garden and said, “You can speak freely. My home has been cleared of those not loyal to me.”

Payal didn’t seek devotion from those who worked for her, but she did want to know that she could walk the halls of her home without worrying about a knife in the back. To Sunita, the member of staff who had been so very loyal to her, she’d offered a generous pension should the woman wish to retire, but Sunita was basking in her promotion to head of domestic staff and had no intention of retiring.

It was a promotion long overdue; skilled and hardworking Sunita had been overlooked too many times in favor of Pranath’s favorites.

“What is your name?” she asked the man who’d stopped her, the garden lights a soft glow against the falling night, and the leaves of the guava tree rustling in the gentle breeze.

“Nikhil Varma.” Perspiration dotted his dark skin, though it wasn’t a hot night by Delhi standards. “I’m a cleaner. Chemical and medical waste.”

Payal inclined her head. “A job with a degree of risk.” It was significantly higher paid than general cleaning, but it meant bulky protective gear and a chance of exposure if something went wrong.

“I work at a Rao subsidiary,” he said, and used the back of his hand to wipe off his brow.

“Is there a problem with the cleanup standards?” All of Rao was meant to be following the long-agreed-upon international environmental standards that protected the earth. Psy, changeling, or human, breaches of those laws were punished harshly and could tarnish the Rao name. Even Psy didn’t enjoy living in polluted surroundings.

“What?” His eyes widened. “No, no. I do my work. I do it well.”

“I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. Which subsidiary do you work at?”

“Raja MedChem.”

“That isn’t one of my companies.” Payal had the name of every major and minor company listed in an internal mental database.

“That’s just it.” Nikhil darted a look toward Canto before shifting his attention back to Payal. “We heard in the lab that you’d sent out a change-of-ownership notice to the entire business, but nothing came to Raja MedChem. We waited and waited, but still nothing.”

He wiped his forehead again. “I’ve been the cleaner there for years. No one considers me a threat. They talk around me … and I heard them talking about just quietly taking over the lab. Changing the documents to make it look like they were always independent.”

I have to admire their ability to seize the day. Canto’s telepathic voice held a growl.

“I appreciate this information,” Payal said, a hot, urgent thought blooming in the back of her mind. Canto. A secret lab.

Fierce exultation in the bond that connected them.