Passionate Obsession by D.M. Mortier

Chapter Eighteen

Mac

After parking the helicopter in a secure area near Gatwick, I ran the few miles to rendezvous with the jet bringing in Justin and his family. Kat was clear in my ear as she told me how many men were on the airplane and on ground security. However, she still had not found where Justin’s personal effects were being held.

I watched as the plane taxied onto the runway and, came to a complete stop before at least fifteen armed men and women surrounded the aircraft. I waited as Kat continued to search the airplane for Justin’s watch and shield. I couldn't move his entire family and Justin without his help. The jet had been on the ground for five minutes when the door opened.

“There’s a blond man standing next to Justin, who is guarding a small carry-on and holding on to it very tightly,” Kat whispered. “I can’t pinpoint that the shield is in there, but if you can get to it and take a look—”

“I don’t have time for that, Kat.” I knew my voice was a bit sharp and impatient, but I was watching Justin’s wife and daughter being escorted off the jet. I cussed long and hard at how vulnerable Nakia looked with her pregnant belly. I wanted to go in and take them immediately, but it wasn’t the optimal time to take them. I couldn’t imagine the fear that Justin must be feeling right now. Just the thought of Kat and my boys in a similar situation had me sweating and terrified out of my mind.

Justin’s wife and daughter were almost to the bottom of the stairs leading from the jet, with Dr. Forbes and their armed escorts not far behind, when my diverting surprise pulled up onto the tarmac. BBC, CNN, and Al Jazeera vans stopped next to the jet, and correspondents poured out with the homing urgency of a moth to a flame toward Dr. Forbes.

“Dr. Forbes, word has reached us that you are detaining an American family from Miami and brought them here to London. Is this true? Is this the family?” one correspondent yelled out.

“Dr. Forbes, what does the CIA have against due process?” another correspondent asked.

“Does the CIA operate on U.S. soil now?”

The questions were coming fast and furious. And given the current state of the public’s view on police treatment of people of color, Dr. Forbes was flustered and was trying her best to defuse the situation. She must be feverously wondering how this top-secret information got leaked so fast. I wondered whether she would err on the side of caution given that she had no way of knowing how much information was already leaked.

Justin’s wife, Nakia, was now adding fuel to the fire by turning on the waterworks and dramatizing the detention of her family without any known legal reason for the detention. Nakia looked regal and elegant as she pleaded her case. She was such a strikingly beautiful African American with silver-grey eyes, long straight hair, and flawless honey skin. The photographers clearly loved her looks, and their cameras were snapping furiously while she eloquently spoke. Nakia’s pregnancy only enhanced her ethereal beauty and made her appear more fragile.

I used the confusion and impromptu news conference to board the jet. As soon as I entered the jet, I felt Kat’s presence so palpably that it almost rocked me back on my ass. I instinctively knew that her astral self was inches away from me. It was almost as though I could feel the warmth of her body emanating toward me. I realized then that Kat had been telling the truth about not spying on me. I remember now that I had sensed her in Giselle’s flat. The strength of our connection was comforting and chilling at the same time.

As Kat had warned me to expect, Justin was handcuffed and shackled, and the men guarding him were now looking uncertain as to how to handle the presence of the press. He was a prominent attorney, taken out of the country without due process. There was no way they could chance taking him off the plane like this. They had no way to control the press. And they had to be shitting bricks in anticipation of the reprimand from Langley that would certainly come when this scheme got aired to the international community.

While one of the men was talking agitatedly to someone on his mobile, probably someone from Langley, the other man stood close to him trying to listen in on the conversation and was not paying attention to Justin.

Within seconds, I used their distraction to break the shackle at Justin’s feet and the handcuffs from his hands, and I pressed a gun into Justin’s palm while disarming and incapacitating the two guards before they even knew what was happening. They dropped unconscious to the floor of the jet.

Still in super speed and in the shield, I zipped through the jet, ensuring that everyone on board was also of no further threat. The two pilots, a female attendant, and two other male agents were now unconscious and likely to remain so for a good while.

Removing my shield, I was slightly amused to see the stunned look on Justin’s face.

“Where the fuck did you come from, and how did you know they had us?” Justin grinned and grabbed me in a bear hug. “So happy to see you, man. I was going crazy trying to figure out how to get word to Colt.”

“I’ll explain all when we get the fuck out of here. Do you know where they stored your shield?”

“My shield?” Justin looked at me in confusion. “How did you…” He shook his head and then grabbed the case that Kat had referred to and started rampaging through it.

“Mac, you guys need to hurry up because Dr. Forbes and her crew have just bundled Nakia and Jayla in a car,” Kat told me urgently in the earbud.

“Got it!” Justin stood from the case triumphantly, the watch dangling in his hand.

“We have to move. They have already placed your family in a car.”

Just then, I heard several footsteps coming up the stairs at a fast clip.

“Someone’s coming. Put your shield on,” I instructed Justin as I turned my shield on and prepared to meet our visitors at the door of the jet.

In our shields, Justin and I deplaned, walking past two agents who were entering the jet at the same time. The reporters’ vans were just leaving, and Dr. Forbes stood next to a SUV with dark-tinted windows, a scowl of impatience riding her face. Even as she stared up at the jet, obviously waiting on her men to escort Justin from it, Justin climbed into the SUV, dumping the driver out as he smoothly commandeered the vehicle from right under Dr. Forbes and her armed guards.

Nakia’s exclamation of “what the hell?” was almost comical, as she had no idea that Justin was her new driver.

With Justin in the driver’s seat, I told him how to get to the helicopter, which was almost a mile away from the jet. However, I needed to give him some time to get his family out of here. As soon as his SUV pull out, predictably Dr. Forbes threw up an alarm and demanded he be pursued. They didn’t dare brandish weapons on a car with a child and pregnant woman.

Deactivating my shield, I intercepted the parade of SUVs filled with agents and Dr. Forbes. With the picture in my head of the Hulk in the Avengers punching and smashing everything in sight, I gave an inspired performance in punching the first SUV as it approached me going at least sixty miles per hour. It was gratifying to drive my fist into the hood, bending it in half and slamming the SUV into the vehicles behind it.

The domino effect was nothing short of pure Hollywood as the loud wreckage instantly subverted any chance of pursuit. It would have been perfect cinema if I had the ability to fly out of there. Instead, I reactivated my shield and ran at superspeed to meet the helicopter.

I arrived at the helicopter and found Justin already in the cockpit. I grinned at the predictability of that as well. Although he had no idea where we were going, Justin would still insist on being in the pilot’s seat.

Nakia seemed to still be reeling and stunned from the sudden rescue. Her smile on seeing me was a bit shell-shocked as I climbed into the helicopter beside Justin. “I should have known you were here somewhere,” she murmured fondly.

I chuckled and gave an affectionate reciprocal wink. She and Imani were the only two women, other than my wife, that I would walk through fire for. However, it was the guarded look in Justin’s gaze that made me pause. I knew that Justin and Colt had suspected something, but today he had hard evidence. Even though Nakia and Imani had seen me in action before, and probably had seen more than Justin had just seen, I had never revealed my powers to the brothers. And it was clear that their wives had kept my secret, even from their husbands. I was impressed. It was a bit worrying that Justin might take my secrecy as a reason to distrust me now. “I know that I can rely on you to forget what you just saw,” I told him quietly through the headset as we became airborne.

Justin grunted and concentrated on getting the helicopter in the air. In seconds we were passing over Dr. Forbes and her agents. “You did that?” Justin asked drily, pointing at the mangled mess of SUVs on the tarmac below us.

“I didn’t want them following you.” I grinned, appreciating Justin’s easy acceptance.

“Colt’s going to be so pissed that he missed this.”

I laughed, already anticipating Colt’s disgruntled expression on missing out on any action that Justin and I engaged in. Colt was of the impression that because he and I were friends first that I shouldn’t have any adventures with Justin without him.

We arrived back at the flat to find Kat with her hands full trying to contain Liam and Colin. Kat had told me that when she astral projected that she was unaware of things happening around her. Looked as though the boys took advantage of her distraction.

There were broken furniture, partially eaten snacks, half cups of drink, and toys everywhere. Looks like there had been at least a dozen toddlers in residence for several days unsupervised, instead of two little boys left unattended for a few hours. Yeah, the boys were not good at being cooped up in any small space. When that happened, things tended to break easily.

“Didn’t I tell you guys not to try me today?” Kat growled at them in a low voice. She didn’t have to raise her voice to get their attention. With their enhanced hearing and hyper-sensitivity to emotions, the boys would know that their mother was two seconds from spanking their butts. No matter their strength, the boys hated that because Kat always found creative ways to deliver that spanking.

“Aw shucks, Mom, we were playing spy games,” Liam whined.

“Yeah, and the bad guys would’ve won if we didn’t destroy their hideout,” Colin explained, staring at the sofa with renewed interest.

“You two are too old for this mess,” Kat hissed.

The boys started to slowly pick up some of the debris from the floor of the flat, mumbling under their breaths to each other.

“Man, I hate this getting older stuff,” Colin huffed out.

“Yeah, getting older sucks,” Liam agreed.

“I want this place cleaned and put back to order in five minutes, or both of you will be grounded for life,” Kat gritted out.

I bit back a laugh because the little guys looked up at her, looked at Justin and his family, and then looked again at Kat as if to say: “How the hell are we supposed to clean this in front of them?”

Kat clearly didn’t give a shit at the moment. She was pissed and couldn’t care less if anyone saw their power.

“Kat, let me take care of them. Can you show Nakia where she and Jayla can freshen up?”

Kat gave me a hard stare. “Supervise, but they do the work.” She then turned and smiled at Nakia. “Sorry, you know how these kids can drive a woman crazy.” She wrapped her arms around Nakia and hugged her.

“Yup, I feel you,” Nakia murmured, hugging her back as though they hadn’t seen each other in years instead of a few days ago. “Your boys have a lot of energy.” Nakia laughed at her own understatement.

“Ya think?” Kat made a face and then smiled at Jayla. “Hi, baby. How are you?”

“I’m fine, Aunty Kat,” Jayla said quietly with a shy smile on her angelic face. She was such a mix of her mom and dad. Her skin was a few shades lighter than Nakia’s with her father’s emerald eyes and her mom’s pouty lips and facial structure. She was a beautiful child.

Kat hugged her close against her belly. Just the thought that anyone could think to hurt such a precious child was beyond comprehension. I was glad that my and Kat’s gifts had saved them. I had to give serious thought to how our gifts could help so many other children who were not as lucky as Jayla today. I just needed to find a way to come clean to Kat. The longer I held on to these secrets, the harder it was for me to tell her.

“Food will arrive shortly,” I told Kat and Nakia. “Once you freshen up in the guest room the food should be here.”

“I want to know what’s going on though,” Nakia said determinedly as she followed Kat to the guest room.

I smiled at her gently. “Sometimes, I’m not sure what’s going on either.”

As soon as Nakia and Jayla left the room, the boys went at turbo speed. Their bodies were mere blurs as they put the room in order. The look on Justin’s face was priceless.

“Damn, I’m almost terrified to know what the hell Kat can do,” Justin muttered.

“Trust me, you don’t want to know.”