Page 5 of Polestar (The Global Paranormal Security Agency #3)

FIVE

T hey rode to the port in the same car she’d arrived in the day before.

Ana sat in the backseat with Raya. From her vantage point, she studied Bjornson’s profile.

Pilot. Driver. Polar bear shifter.

Magnus had tied his long blond hair back in a French braid, exposing tattoos adorning the side of his neck below his hairline and behind his bearded jaw, disappearing below the collar of his leather jacket.

She couldn’t see which vintage grunge band was on his t-shirt today.

What is that cologne he uses?

She blinked, turning her face away from her temporary teammate, toward the passenger window.

Focus, Ana. It doesn’t matter what he smells like. He’s your colleague and you have work to do. Do your job, crush the trafficking ring, and go back to your desk in California.

Her gaze drifted back. She couldn’t recall the images that had flashed through her mind when they’d touched, when she’d been too distracted to close herself up.

Just the vision of whiteness before she’d passed out.

Her cheeks flamed.

I can’t believe I passed out like that. Or the stupid things I said right before.

Awkward start. It was the fever.

She nodded to herself.

Yes, just an awkward start. Set it aside and don’t be weird about it.

Resuming her gaze out the window, the port came into view.

Stacked containers hid the body of the ship, but the tower was unmistakable.

At one time, she’d been fascinated with ships of all kinds, because Antony had been a sailor and loved all things water-going.

Not anymore.

I hate this.

Her fingers flexed over her thighs as she rubbed her palms along the fabric of her pants.

Memories crashed through her.

Not mine.

Shared memories she gleaned from survivors and crew alike.

Prophetic images that warned her of Antony’s accident.

Not the same.

She had to separate the situations from each other. One was work. The other was personal.

She squeezed her eyes shut. Drew a deep breath through her nose and eased it out between her lips.

Pressure on her forearm drew her attention.

Raya Burns’ hand rested on Ana’s sleeve, her expression one of compassion. She didn’t say anything.

Raya knew.

She knew because she’d seen it, too.

Ana had seen it all first through Raya’s memories.

Survivors trapped in shipping containers on the freighters. Barely fed or hydrated, dirty and cold, some sick. All headed for a life of enslavement to the highest bidders. Bidders that comprised human and paranormal buyers alike.

Anytime paranormals were involved, the GPSA was called in. And this team had been tracking this specific ring for some time before Ana had called Carson Perenga in to investigate a murder case that led them all together. Here.

She never could have imagined that the mutilated bodies that had turned up in her community on the west coast of California would bring them to this.

An international human trafficking ring, facilitated and organized by paranormals, which had led them to Raya Burns and her team.

The things she had seen in Raya’s memories bit deep into Ana and still hadn’t let go.

It changed her. Resolved her will to do all she could to help stop it.

Until Antony.

She’d changed, and she’d lost everything.

Ana forced a wan smile for Raya and whispered, “I’m good.”

The look Raya gave her said ‘bullshit’ but she maintained her silence and released Ana’s arm.

Bjornson stopped the car outside the port office. The official on duty came out to meet them.

“Show time,” Connor said, before stepping out of the car, Ana right behind him.

“Magnus, stay with Ana, no matter what. I’m going to look around while Connor entertains the officials,” Burns said to Bjornson.

Even if Burns couldn’t shift during the day, she still knew how to get around unseen. She knew how to be the ghost she became after nightfall.

A moment later, Ana sensed Bjornson at her back.

Used to working alone and taking care of herself, it surprised her that she found comfort in his presence as she turned her gaze toward the freighter looming above the port.

Sure, she’d worked with Carson, Lirikai, Raya, and Ian McLachlan on the last leg of the case, but that was different. Carson was like a big brother to her. Everyone else… sort of grew on her.

But this felt different.

The scent of Magnus’ cologne mingled with the sea breeze encircling her.

Not now, Ana.

Focus.

She frowned at how easily she was becoming distracted by this man.

Not even Antony had distracted her in this way. At least, not until his death.

A surge of guilt warred with the sense of relief at realizing something other than the accident occupied her mind.

Neither were appropriate, at this time.

There was work to do.

Balance. Focus. Work.

The port official led them to another building on site, further away from the ship.

Ana eased the tension in her shoulders.

She’d board the ship later. People first.

As she trailed Connor and the official, she extracted her grandmother’s crucifix and rosary from her jacket pocket. Looping the rosary around her wrist, she gripped the crucifix and beads in her palm, then checked her other pocket to ensure her phone hadn’t slipped out.

Her thumb worried the smooth garnet beads as she sought balance, whispering her mantra with each breath.

Balance. Focus. Feel.

Her senses expanded around her, testing.

The general bustle of the place. The crisscross of natural and human energy.

The official’s sadness. Connor’s determination. Bjornson’s concern.

She sucked in a breath as they stepped into the building.

She’d been expecting it, but it still took her breath away. Every time.

Inside, emotional energy corralled and turned over on itself. A heavy cloud.

It’ll be worse on the ship .

They walked through an industrially decorated lobby, along a short corridor and through a double set of doors. Cots and chairs lined the large room where dozens of people slept, sat, or conversed. Medical personnel and local law enforcement were busy doing their jobs.

“They arrived in the wee hours. Near starved and filthy. Some are still getting cleaned up or having their first proper meal in weeks,” the port official said.

Ana breathed through the suffocating storm cloud of collective heightened emotion. Her attention turned to a young woman curled up on a cot, staring at the empty one next to her.

Despair oozed from her.

Fear rippled toward Ana from a young man seated on the floor with his back pressed to the wall.

Anger rolled around the room as someone else raged at a police officer who was trying to take a statement.

Ana remembered to breathe. The ridges of the crucifix bit into the pad of her thumb.

Connor and the official were a dim memory as she moved around the room.

Bjornson, silent, moved two paces behind her.

Another young woman stood, leaning against the far wall, facing the room.

Numb.

Different.

She focused on this one.

Ana moved toward a table with a water carafe to fill a glass, then approached the young woman. Once she was in front of her, she realized the woman was much younger than she’d initially thought—a teen? Seventeen? Younger?

“Thirsty?” Ana held out the glass.

The girl turned her haunted gaze to Ana, lifted to Bjornson, then back to Ana and the glass. She shook her head.

Encouraged that the girl understood English, she pressed on.

“Can we talk?”

The girl shrugged.

“There’s an empty office we can use,” Bjornson murmured next to Ana’s ear.

She turned to see the open door he indicated.

“There, okay?” Ana asked the girl.

Her gaze flicked toward the vacant room before she pushed away from the wall and preceded Ana toward it.

Still holding the glass of water, Ana straightened her shoulders and drew several steadying breaths as they followed.

You can do this, Ortega .

Set up for conducting business or interviews, the small room held a chair on one side and two on the opposite.

The girl dropped onto one of the two plastic chairs.

Ana set the glass on the table before her, then settled on the chair beside the girl, facing her.

Bjornson moved toward the back of the room, where he stood vigil.

“Do you mind if I record our chat? I’m an investigator.”

Another shrug.

Ana extracted her phone from her pocket, found the voice app, turned it on, and set the device on the table. “I’m Analiese Ortega. What is your name?”

“Sascha,” she mumbled, accent thick.

“Where are you from?”

“Varandey.”

Ana repeated the answers for clarification on the recorder. “Have the authorities contacted your family yet?”

“No. I have none.”

Ana studied Sascha’s face. It was gaunt with a lack of basic needs. Her face and hands bore bruises, cuts, and scrapes. Ana suspected there’d be more under her clothes.

“You fought.”

Sascha nodded. “I didn’t want to get on another ship.”

“Another ship,” Ana repeated, thoughtful. “May I hold your hands?”

Sascha’s gaze flicked to Ana’s face, to her upturned palms with the crucifix and rosary and back to her face again. “I don’t pray.”

“No praying. Just talking.”

“You are… a seer?”

“Something like that.”

After another moment’s hesitation, Sascha placed her frigid fingers over Ana’s. Ana slid her hands forward, palms up under Sascha’s. She drew another deep breath to allow the remnants of her mental barrier to fall away. She held Sascha’s gaze as their energies fizzed.

Ana’s hands felt as though they were frosting over, and she fought against a wave of fatigue.

Sascha’s numbness was her own mental barrier, protecting her.

The emotion behind that barrier pressed upon them both, waiting for a fissure that Sascha wasn’t ready to crack.

Yet.

Ana held firm, seeking.

Finally, after long moments, images flickered through.

But she wasn’t seeing survivors like Sascha.

It was the familiar nightmare of Antony’s naval vessel.

Ana released Sascha’s hands, flexing her fingers.

Focus Ana. Focus!

She tried again.

This time, gaunt faces appeared as she searched Sascha’s emotional memories of the last few weeks.

Despair. Fear. Rage.

Ana pressed deeper, seeking the faces of the perpetrators. Whispers of locations. Anything that could send them in the right direction.

Nothing.

Suddenly, the visions changed. Ana no longer guided the flow of memory and emotion. Sascha’s numbness dissipated and everything else surged forward, stealing Ana’s breath away.

She went rigid under the onslaught as Sascha’s memory jerked back to the last beating at the hands of the guards. The last beating because a small group of men stopped it, fought back, protected her and the others in the dank room.

Their faces were familiar to Ana.

“Save them!” A disembodied voice shouted at her.

She flinched away from Sascha again, severing the energetic connection.

Balling her fists on her lap, she drew several deep breaths.

“Who were the men that protected you?”

“I don’t know,” Sascha said, trembling.

“The room wasn’t on a ship.”

“No. It was some kind of transfer place.”

“Can you tell me more?”

Sascha shook her head as her body trembled.

Ana didn’t want to push her too hard, but she wanted to know more about this transfer place.

“Can’t you hear him?” Sascha said, eyes fixed behind Ana’s left shoulder.

Ana glanced over her shoulder. She saw no one else.

“No. Who is there?”

“I don’t know who he is. He just keeps screaming at you,” she sobbed.

Save them.

Ana straightened. She’d heard it just once. She was so focused on Sascha, she didn’t sense anyone else.

Still couldn’t.

“Can you describe him?”

Sascha shook her head, squeezing her eyes shut. “No, I don’t want to… dark hair… uniform of some kind. Same as the guys that protected me. Please, I don’t want to talk anymore.”

The numbness dissipated and emotion surged forward, overwhelming the space surrounding them.

Ana gasped as Sascha sobbed.

“Okay, Sascha, thank you. Thank you for talking to me,” Ana said, voice soft as she struggled to reconcile the girl’s emotions washing over her.

She closed her eyes, drew a deep, steadying breath, and when she opened them again, the chair across from her was empty.

As it had always been.

Elbows braced on her knees, she leaned forward until her forehead rested on her trembling hands.

“Are you all right?” Magnus’ deep voice was quiet in the small room.

“Yes.” She glanced at her phone on the table next to the untouched glass of water.

She picked up the phone to speak into it.

“Interview with bi-located victim in shock before she returned to her body.” Ana’s hands continued to tremble as she described the interviewee and what they said, since she couldn’t be sure how much the recording would pick up of the conversation.

The phone slipped from her fingers, bouncing on the carpet.

Magnus scooped it up, sat across from Ana, and held it for her to finish her report.

When she finished, she turned the recorder off.

“Is it always like that?”

She shook her head. “You’re pretty calm for someone that just watched me talk to an empty chair.”

“It was a first.” His lips quirked. “Who was the other person?”

“I-uhm… don’t know.” She swallowed.

Antony.

No, it couldn’t be Antony. Wouldn’t be Antony.

I can’t sense anyone else.

“Probably another victim that didn’t make it. But she mentioned a group of men trying to protect them in there. Uniforms. She mentioned ‘some kind of uniforms’ .”

Magnus nodded. “If you’re good to continue, I’ll contact Kane and find out if there are reports of missing servicemen, which doesn’t fit the usual abductee profile.”

“No, it doesn’t. But yes, I’ll move on to the other survivors. We have a long day ahead of us.” She rubbed her palms down her thighs and gripped her knees.

Magnus placed a hand over one of hers. “Let me know how I can help.”

Her gaze flicked up to his.

You can’t.

“Thank you,” she said, standing. “If I think of something, I will.” She slipped her phone into her pocket and moved toward the door.

Drawing a breath, she straightened her shoulders and stepped back into the room of survivors to interview.