Then the brutes had lugged her back to this dark room and left her here for hours. Food had come, but she didn’t eat it. She couldn’t eat it. Even if she had been able to see it in the complete darkness, she didn’t think her groggy and battered body could stomach it. The water bottles they threw in were all she dared to handle.

After that they had come for her again, and it had started all over. She’d lost count of how many cycles of the same treatment she’d endured.

Between the interminable bouts of interrogation, she had nothing but barren time to think. Think about everything.

Just a few days ago, she was finishing up her last spirited swimming practice in Palo Alto. Drying off from a great workout. Two hours in the pool and she’d broken some of her personal-best times. Her coach had been ecstatic, and pleaded with her to keep going. But she’d said no. Though her times were better than they’d ever been, she’d needed a break. Mentally she had become exhausted thinking about what the Olympic trials would mean to her. Her coach had wanted her to stay sharp, but she needed to step back before the sharpness nicked her. Time with Bobby would have unwound her tight thoughts and kept her focus on track with her impressive output in the pool.

How quickly things had derailed. Now she had some kind of mysterious mind power from a serum Bobby had created. Her brother had been killed for trying to make sure it didn’t fall into the hands of the very people keeping her captive, testing her like some interminable lab experiment and treating her like she was the world’s worst enemy.

And she was alone.

Rubbing her arms, then instantly regretting it as her skin prickled from the drugs she had been given, Harper thought about Rome. Had he been subdued after she passed out? Or had he brought her into this hideous hole? She desperately preferred to believe the former, but knew deep in her exhausted gut it had to be the latter. The fright on his face had been obvious. Rome believed she was a threat. Which was precisely the reason he was sent to detain her and bring her here in the first place.

He’d promised he wouldn’t, but that all had changed when she used her strange power to save them. It had been difficult, and she hadn’t even been sure she’d be able to do it, but she didn’t see any other way out of Bobby’s house. So she’d done it. And it worked. The only problem was, it had turned Rome against her.

She’d deliberately kept her power from him, hoping she’d be able to somehow explain it once they’d learned more about what was going on. She’d put her faith in him, having no one else to trust, and he’d betrayed her. One moment, the man had held her close while her grief overflowed, and the next, he’d pushed her back into her worst nightmare.

Could she really blame him? Honestly, she herself was frightened by the power surging through her mind and body. But he’d asked her to trust him. She had, and look where it had gotten her.

Never again. She would do this on her own. Just as she’d vowed that night in the forest. She was truly alone.

Sitting in the cold darkness now, Harper realized that it didn’t matter. For whatever reason, they were keeping her alive. Only taking her to the edge of her limits, allowing her to look over the cliff, see the valley of death, but never plummeting into the merciful void.

They needed her. Whatever this serum was that Bobby had been working on, they wanted it. That meant Bobby didn’t want them to have it. That he wasn’t involved in all of this trouble.

That would keep her going. Keep her believing that she would somehow survive this and get the revenge she was beginning to crave. The only thing she wanted now was to make everyone involved pay for it.

It wasn’t just for Bobby anymore. It was for what they were doing to her. For Rome bringing her here. For being accidentally injected with that serum and having a destructive energy surging through her mind. She didn’t ask for this, never expected it. But she would finish it. Find her answers and find vengeance.

A clank and a grinding noise diverted her attention. They were here again. A bright artificial light cut through the pitch-black, shining directly in her eyes, blinding her as she squinted against the sudden beams. She raised her hand to shade the light until she could adjust her vision.

Footsteps clomped grimly against the solid concrete floor. Two sets of arms grabbed her on each side and secured her hands with cold metal clamps, then dragged her upright and out into the cool, dimly lit hallway. Harper’s sight cleared and she noticed the usual fourman posse had been joined by six more black-clad goons. These guys looked a little unusual somehow, but it was hard to say what was different about them. The normal four passed her off to the big six.

Leading her roughly down the corridor, they surprisingly turned right instead of the dreaded left that had become her customary routine. Was that good or bad? Of course, bad was relative. How much worse could it get?

After climbing countless flights of uneven stairs, they reached a level area and turned down yet another eerie hallway. At the far end, a sliver of natural light poked through the bottom of a thick metal door.

Harper was a touch curious. Was she not coming back this time? Fine with her. Again, how much worse could it get? Unless they were taking her away to kill her. That could definitely be worse. She hazily hoped she was wrong and they were just going outside. One modest breath of fresh air would sure make her day. Although there wasn’t much that wouldn’t make her day right now.

The closer they came to the door, the more it looked like they were going outside. Her mind faintly rejoiced. Sunlight at last.

“What are you doing here?” Jeff Donovan’s distracted question hit Rome the second he walked in his boss’s office. Jeff hadn’t even looked at Rome, his attention on the papers in his hand.

What indeed? Rome had asked himself the same question nearly every second since he’d arrived at the isolated government facility. Located just outside of downtown Portland, only those who needed to know were aware the site existed. Underground and hidden from the unassuming world. Though not many up on the surface would want to know what went on down there. Lucky bastards.

Which was the real reason he couldn’t stop himself from coming. Rome didn’t sit down, instead leaning against the unadorned wall just inside the door. “Just checking in,” he answered with cool but fake nonchalance. Since the moment he dropped off the unconscious Harper Kane three days ago, he’d been restless. Edgy and unable to sleep, he couldn’t stop thinking about her. About the cold despair in her fascinating green eyes and the barren tone of her husky voice as she rasped an apology for the horrific act she’d committed.

“Checking on what?” Jeff asked curtly, resting a page facedown on his desk, continuing on to peruse the next. Jeff’s abruptness had that same anxious tone he’d tasted when the man had given him the job.

Most of the time, Rome highly appreciated Jeff’s nononsense brusqueness. And even more of the time, he didn’t much care what happened past the completion of the job.

But not this time.

“Just curious.” Rome tried to inject an appropriate amount of casualness in his attitude. “What happened to the woman?”

“We’re taking care of her,” Jeff answered in his normal cold monotone as he read.

Not good. Not good at all. Rome knew exactly how they took care of people where there were no prying eyes of official intelligence and even less accountability. Down here you did what you had to do to get what you needed from your captives and your methods were your own.

It was what he’d been afraid of since an hour after he’d left her here three days ago. And really, what had he expected? He’d washed his hands of her once he saw what she was capable of. As confident in his skills as he was, Rome knew he couldn’t handle anything with that kind of power. He’d watched her kill eight men with it. He knew in that intense moment why Jeff had wanted her dead or alive. She was dangerous.