Deadly Game

and gets funding for some of these projects. He has to report the results and sugarcoat it so Whitney's extremes are never brought to the light. I'll bet the breeding program is called something altogether different. The president and the committee of senators are certainly not going to approve anything with the word breeding in it.'

'Everything we do is classified,' Ryland said. 'No one knows we do it, and no one is going to admit it. If we take out a drug lord in Colombia, or tip the scales of power in the Congo, the last thing the government wants is for anyone to know we were there. There's the entire point of having us. GhostWalkers don't exist.'

'So why are we being pitted against one another?' Jack asked. 'Why was Mari's team told about the assassination attempt when our team was already on it? You know the admiral is talking to the general, and whoever is giving orders to Whitney's team has to know what we're doing at all times. How else was Mari's team tracking her?'

'The other thing I think we're going to have to accept,' Ken said, 'is that Whitney has his own team, men reported dead, men who have, like us, gone through the School of Warfare, special ops training, and had plenty of experience. Whitney tested their psychic abilities and profiled them, just as he did all of us. Something in their profiles appealed to him, so he set out collecting his own little army of supersoldiers. Jack and I ran into them when he sent them after Briony. Jack recognized one of them from when he tested. He was supposedly killed in Colombia right after a mission he went on with Jack.'

Lily frowned at them. 'What would be different about those soldiers?'

Ryland and Ken exchanged a long look. There was a small silence. Lily straightened. 'Don't keep me in the dark. I know my father has lost his grip on reality. I know something has to be done about him. I need to know all the facts.'

Ryland stroked a caress down her hair. 'The fact is, some soldiers enjoy killing. It doesn't much matter whether it's a soldier or civilian, they like the rush having the power over life or death gives them. We think he's collected a few of them, enhanced both their psychic and physical powers, and now he uses them for his own end. He has to be sinking into paranoia at this point, Lily.'

'So you think he has soldiers no one knows about for his own personal use as well as a team considered black ops that he can command when orders come down.'

'Yes, that's exactly what we think,' Ryland said.

'Where do Mari and the other women come in?'

'They were originally, from childhood, educated and trained as soldiers. He needed them to continue his experiments as well as have women he could study who hadn't been raised in families,' Ken said. 'When he decided it was too difficult to hook the women up with the men he had intended to pair them with…'

'I know that he did choose women and men by their genetic abilities and IQ as well as the strength of their psychic gifts and what those talents were,' Lily admitted. 'I've been reading quite a lot on it ever since I became pregnant.'

'He's gone to plan B,' Ken said, keeping his voice flat and calm and nonjudgmental, when he felt his rage cold and utterly deadly, building with a strength that shook him. 'He's forcing the women to be with men they aren't paired with-men who are obsessive about them, but who the women have no real feeling for.'

Lily's hand went to her throat in a defensive gesture. 'What do you mean forcing? Rape? Are you talking he's condoning the rape of women?'

'It's science,' Ken said.

'I think I'm going to throw up,' Lily said. 'He's given children cancer, sent men into jungles to be tortured-I can't take this. I don't know what to do.' She began to cry silently. 'How can he do these things? I kept thinking if I worked hard enough to make up for the things he did, I could somehow make it better, but I can't. He doesn't stop. He just keeps doing horrible, unforgivable things.'

'Sit down for a minute.' Ryland took her hand and led her to a chair 'This is too much for you right now, Lily.'

She shook her head. 'No, I have to know. You can't keep anything like this from me. When I was growing up, I knew he was always pushing boundaries, but I believed he knew right from wrong. When I discovered we'd all been taken from orphanages, that he bought us for experimenting on children, I knew something terrible was going on with him.' She pressed both hands protectively to her stomach. 'He wants the babies, and if he has the chance, he'll take them. You're all right. I know you are. I know it.' She sounded lost, hopeless.

There was a small silence. Lily sighed, her lips firming. 'We have to get the women out of there and we have to protect our children from him.'

'Lily,' Ken said, 'I believe he has psychic talent of his own.'

'He always said he didn't.'

'But no one can read him. and how could he possibly know which infants had psychic talents. He had to have sensed it in some way. There's no other answer. That's probably why he's always been so obsessed with the subject,' Ken insisted.

'He would never admit it. not to anyone.' Lily said. 'He wouldn't want to be considered anything but a man of science. Psychic talent is still considered freaky, and Peter Whitney would never, at any time, want someone to laugh behind his back.'

'Anyone laughing at Whitney is at risk to disappear,' Ken said. 'I understand you're torn about this, Lily, but the truth is, unless Whitney dies, none of us are ever going to be safe, and neither are our children.'

'He needs help. We can put him in a hospital.'

'He knows too much. You know he's considered one of the smartest men on the planet. He knows secrets and he has powerful friends. He could name names. They'll never leave him in a hospital.'

Lily shook her head and remained silent. Ryland kept his hand on her shoulder in an attempt to comfort her. She knew they would have to kill her father. His experiments would never stop until Whitney was dead. She was finally accepting that there was no real way to save him, and Ryland wanted to spare her the inevitable grief.

Ken felt sorry for Ryland. Ken wasn't married to Mari. Mari wasn't carrying his child. He hadn't even had time to get to know her, yet he felt protective. Ken hadn't known he had protective genes in his makeup, or even tenderness. He hadn't known lust could be so sharp and urgent and intense. That it could crawl inside a man and eat him from the inside out. He hadn't known lust could be wrapped up in dark emotions, black jealousy and obsession, the need to control and dominate. He hadn't known softer emotions could cut through everything dark and ugly inside of him and make him want to be a better man-make him need to be better so that he was worthy of one woman-the only woman.

Ryland had found those things with Lily, and Jack had managed to discover them with Briony. Ken might want to be a better man, but he wasn't certain he was strong enough to overcome his darker tendencies. Mari wasn't a submissive woman like her sister. She didn't have a soft, sweet nature, willing to compromise and soothe Ken's rougher side. Mari would fight his dominant nature, wanting freedom and control, and he would never be able to concede. The more she fought him, the worse he would get, until he would be like his father, a monster without equal, until their fights were real and it became a clash of wills to see who would win.

Not if you fall in love with her, Ken. Jack's telepathic voice interrupted his thoughts. You haven't figured that into the equation. Briony didn't exactly change me, but she brought out the best in me.

And if there is no best? Ken glanced down at the pale face lying so still beside him. She looked too young for a man like him. It was different when she opened her eyes, and he saw her too-old eyes- where he read the same edgy hunger and need. Then he could imagine himself with her, even if it was only briefly, but not like this, not when she was so small and fragile-looking.

Then the old man won after all, Jack replied harshly. And you let him.

Fuck you, Jack.

Right back at you. You've never walked away from a fight in your life. This is the biggest, most important battle you'll ever have. You're going to leave her to Brett? Or Sean? Hell, if you do, Ken, you don't deserve her and you're not man enough to have her. She needs someone who will stand up for her.

Shut the fuck up.

You only swear when you know you're full of shit.

Ken glared at his brother. You walked away from Briony.