Edge of Danger - Rhyannon Byrd

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      Frustrated that she had so little control over the violent, visceral cravings of her Merrick, Saige ground her teeth and focused instead on keeping her body moving as quickly as possible, her speed so much greater than a human’s, despite the fact that her awakening had only recently begun. She still looked the same…still sounded the same, but inside…inside she was becoming something so much more than what she’d been. Her senses were sharper, the vivid, breathtaking details of the surrounding jungle swarming her mind with a brilliant, chaotic flood of information. Colors exploded with electrifying focus, her hearing so precise she could detect the nocturnal animals scurrying for shelter in the underbrush.

      Certain that she could sense the stranger closing in behind her, Saige pumped her legs with greater force, ignoring the sharp burn of pain in her muscles as she shoved at the thick, damp leaves that crowded in on her. The small, silver compass that she wore around her neck thumped repeatedly against her pounding heart, beneath her sweat-damp shirt, and for a moment she wished that it was the cross, which could supposedly be used as a source of protection for anyone who wore it.

      Wincing as the jungle flora scratched against her arms and legs, Saige figured a little protection would have come in handy right about then, but the cross was already gone. After finally uncovering the second Marker’s resting place that very morning in the stifling, humid depths of the rain forest, Saige had secretly sent the cross to Colorado in the care of a fellow colleague named Jamison Haley, then purposefully remained behind as a decoy. It’d been a risky move, but she was banking on the expectation that if they were out there watching her, the last thing in the world the Casus would expect her to do, after discovering one of the Markers, was separate herself from the powerful talisman.

       Which apparently wasn’t the smartest move, now was it?

      Obviously not. She might have managed to throw them off Jamison’s trail, but at the expense of throwing herself into what looked to be one heck of a fire.

      “But it’s not like you had any choice,” she muttered to herself, casting a quick glance over her shoulder before narrowing her gaze back on the darkening forest. Untold dangers lurked in its shadowed depths, her Merrick blood altering her vision, allowing her to see far better than her human eyes had ever done—and yet, she still couldn’t say what lay ahead in the coming flood of night. She only knew it was there….

       Enemies are coming who will take me from you.

      When she’d laid hands upon the mysterious weapon, those were the words its voice had whispered through her mind, eerie and ancient and soft, so unlike the “voices” or “images” she usually picked up. But then her strange little talent for reading physical objects was most often a lark…a fluke. Only in her work did it tend to give her something meaningful. An object unearthed from hundreds of years ago, if not more, revealing its secrets to her as Saige first touched her fingers to its surface.

      It was when it came to everyday life that the excitement faded. She would pick up a ketchup bottle in a restaurant and find herself privy to the internal thoughts of the last person who’d held it. Did I turn the iron off? Are these calories going straight to my thighs? Should I have the ice cream for dessert…or the apple pie? Hardly earth-shattering revelations, and she’d gotten good at shuffling the mundane facts in and out of her mind, like a revolving door, giving them little notice. Only when touching something from the past did she pay attention—focus and search for more.

      Like when she’d found the first elaborately carved cross—or Dark Marker, as Saige had learned they were called—in Italy last year, and it had told her of its power: that it was one of the ancient weapons meant to destroy her enemies, as well as a source of protection. Saige had been awed by its warmth against her skin, by the beauty of its intricate design, and she’d vowed to search for the others with the use of the maps she’d found wrapped in an oilcloth, buried beside it. Worried that her discovery of the Marker was a portent of things to come, she’d wanted her mother to have the cross’s protection, and so she’d left the talisman with Elaina Buchanan while on a trip home to South Carolina. Now that her mother was gone, Saige only hoped the right decision had been made in passing the Marker on to her eldest brother, Ian. Her mother had written a letter asking that the cross be left in Ian’s possession, and Saige had found it impossible to ignore Elaina’s last wish. Knowing how much Ian had always despised any talk of the Merrick, all she could do was pray that the first Marker wasn’t lost…or thrown out, because there was no doubt they were going to need it. Especially now that she knew there were others who wanted the powerful, mysterious weapons.

      After hearing the second Marker’s chilling words of warning, Saige had known she had to do everything she could to protect it. With the rest of the international research team having headed back to their various home countries the week before, she and Jamison, an archaeologist from London, had been the last remaining members to stay behind, continuing on with her private search. Over the course of the past year and a half, Saige had come to know Jamison well, and he was one of the few of her colleagues she actually considered a friend. Young and studious, the freckle-faced Brit wasn’t exactly a warrior, but what he lacked in brute strength he more than made up for with brains, and Saige trusted him implicitly—which was why she’d entrusted him with her precious find. She would meet up with him on Tuesday afternoon in Denver, and then once reunited with the cross, her plan was to track down her brother Riley and force him to take the Marker whether he wanted it or not, knowing he could protect it better than she ever could.

      It would have been nice to think that Riley, a county sheriff in the Rocky Mountains, would invite her to stay with him, so that they could go through this nightmare together, but Saige had no illusions. She knew her brothers had loved her in their own way, but her and Elaina’s obsession with the Merrick had driven a painful wedge between them, a rift that had only widened as they’d grown older. She hadn’t talked to Ian in years, and even though she still saw Riley from time to time, their relationship continued to suffer. They hadn’t spoken since Elaina’s funeral, nearly six months ago, but the wounds from their argument were still fresh in her mind, seeping and raw. He’d called her obsession with the Merrick a ridiculous waste of her life, criticizing the dangers she kept subjecting herself to, traipsing all over the world in search of answers to a past that they had sure as hell better hope never touched their lives. Though Saige knew there was a part of him that believed the stories they’d been raised on, Riley was hardly willing to accept the truth about their bloodline with an open heart. He believed, but he wasn’t happy about it, harboring a bitterness that Saige had never shared…nor completely understood. A bitterness that had made his last words to her the most painful of all, as well as ones she wouldn’t ever forget…or forgive.

      And above all, he’d made it clear that she was in this alone.

       Which you should be damn used to by now.

      Saige scowled at the silently sighed words, refusing to waste time feeling sorry for herself, no matter how scared she was. And there was no denying her fear, the sickly emotion coating her skin in a slick, clammy film. After spending her entire adult life in preparation for this moment, now that the time of the awakening had finally begun, terror consumed her. She wanted nothing more than to crawl into a safe pair of arms and seek comfort…solace. If not from her family, then from someone who at least cared about her. Who would wrap her in his arms and hold her tight, sheltering her in his strong, possessive embrace, even if only for a few stolen hours of peace.

       Dream on, Saige—because in case you didn’t notice, this isn’t a fairy tale.

      Other than her mother, the closest she’d ever come to having anyone take an interest in what happened to her was the Watchmen, but even they’d abandoned her now. There’d been a moment back at the bar when she’d thought there was a chance the gorgeous stranger was another of the mysterious “watchers,” like the man who’d disappeared earlier that week, but it was a benchmark of their organization that they always kept their distance, never getting as close as he had. Saige figured she should know, considering she and her brothers had been under surveillance for years, if not their entire lives, by the shape-shifters whose job it was to watch over the ancient bloodlines.

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