There was something or someone stalking her, waiting for her to come into its web. Her heart accelerated with fear for those she called family. Her nurses, or guards, she had never really defined them, but they were all she’d known most of her life. Milly and Bernadette. They were mother and sister and friend and nurse to her, women who insisted she learn to do things she always pretended to dislike. She often teased them that crocheting and knitting were for old women, that the sewing they did made them squint.
No one knew about her or her home. She was human, yet not normal, so different she could never be accepted in the world. Nor could she ever fit in and live comfortably. She had a vague idea of her childhood, but mostly she remembered pain. It lived and breathed in her body as if alive. The only way to turn it off was to go to her sanctuary, her home. And someone hunted her, using her home as a trap.
The knowledge blossomed, nearly consuming her brain, a stark reality she couldn’t avoid. Her mission had had unexpected complications, but she’d made it out and knew no one followed her. Had they found another way to find her home? Everything that could go wrong had certainly gone wrong, but she knew absolutely she hadn’t been followed. Jesse Calhoun, her handler, was certain to be waiting for her. He was lethal and fast when he needed to be. Jesse interested her because he was the only other human being she knew of with capabilities close to hers. And he was also telepathic, so why wasn’t he warning her of the danger?
Dahlia knew how to be patient. She pushed the pain aside and waited there in the swamp, inhaling to try to catch a scent. Listening for a sound. There was only the occasional plop of a snake dropping from overhead branches into the murky waters. Still, she waited, knowing movement drew the eye. The faint smell of smoke drifted to her on the breeze.
Her breath caught in her throat. There was only one building that could feed a fire. She needed her home. She couldn’t survive without it. If they took her residence, they might as well put a bullet in her head. Dahlia took two steps to her right. She doubted anyone knew the way through the swamp. Anyone waiting for her would be expecting her to be coming in by boat. Most likely they would be watching the dock. She stepped carefully on the trail, knowing she could sink into the bog if she took one misstep. An alligator growled somewhere close. Dahlia merely glanced in the direction of the sound, a quick acknowledgment of the creature’s presence.
She took another cautious step forward. She counted ten steps and stepped to her right again. Moving through the swamp was nearly automatic. She counted steps in her mind, but was really concentrating on the smell drifting on the slight breeze. Dahlia peered through the night, her instincts sharp and alert. Something waited for her, something terrible, and a dark dread was taking hold.
She approached her home from the north, the only real safe passage through the swamp. Twice she had to wade knee-deep through the black water, using the cypress trees to guide her progress. Dahlia was careful to make no sound, blending with the night creatures, tuning to them so the insects continued in harmony and the frogs croaked with annoying repetition. The last thing she wanted was to give her position away by having the animals go abruptly silent. It took stealth and calm to move in their world and not disturb them. Dahlia could do it, but it required all of her concentration when her heart was pounding in alarm.
The smell of something smoldering choked her as she approached the sanitarium. She could make out the cloud of black smoke rising and orange-red flames pouring from inside the building. The sanitarium was built on solid ground in the center of the small island. A walkway led from the dock over spongy marsh to the higher terrain where the building was located. Dahlia had taken two steps toward her home when the first wave of energy hit her so hard it drove her to her knees.