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Disclaimer: The Pretender and its related characters don't belong to me. There is no money involved here and no copyright infringement is intended. This is all just my humble way of paying tribute to a really entertaining show that I miss a great deal. 03/30/03



Bridge of the Abyss Part1


By Phenyx

"The angel of light and the angel of darkness are to wrestle on the bridge of the abyss. Which of the two shall hurl down the other?" - Victor Hugo



-

Sounds of a desperate scream filled with anguish wrenched Miss Parker into consciousness.


She sat bolt upright in bed, slick with sweat as she clawed at the quilt tangled beneath her. Disoriented and terrified, she gasped for breath while her heart pounded painfully against her ribcage. She swallowed hard, grimacing against the pain it caused. Only then, when she discovered the rawness of her throat, did Parker realize that the terrible shrieks echoing in her ears had been torn from her own troubled soul.


A quick glance at the clock revealed that the time was 4:19 AM.


Trembling badly, Parker threw back the covers and shakily made her way to the restroom where she splashed several handfuls of cool water on her face. Her frightened wide-eyed reflection stared back at her from the mirror as she tried to calm the frenzied shaking of her limbs.


Parker closed her eyes and took a deep relaxing breath. She tried to analyze the dream and approach her fear in a detached manner but the images had already begun to fracture and dissipate. Parker did her best to hold on to the dream, to cling to some memory that had frightened her so badly. It suddenly seemed very important that she remember. But all that remained of the vision was a vague, indefinable horror and a single whispered sentence that hung in her mind forebodingly.


"What a beautiful day."


In and of itself, the phrase seemed innocuous enough. Yet as she whispered the words out loud, Parker felt the flesh along her arms prickle as though someone had just walked over her grave.


Sighing heavily, Parker wandered back to the bedroom to glare at the tumbled bed covers. There would be no more sleep for her tonight, she knew. Not that a lack of sleep was anything unusual. Parker hadn't had a decent night's sleep in months.


Since Mr. Parker's death four months ago, life had taken on a strange disjointed quality. Raines was in charge at The Centre and spent an inordinate amount of time trying to build a relationship with Miss Parker. He'd even gone so far as to schedule family counseling. Lyle joined in on these sessions and the two men seemed to have formed a tight bond.


During their last appointment, Raines had tried to convince Parker that he had spent years resenting the deception regarding her true parentage. His anger at the situation had been the root cause of the rivalry between him and Mr. Parker. Parker hadn't believed a word out of the slimy devil's mouth. She had left the counselor's office feeling nothing but contempt for everyone involved.


The entire scene had literally made Parker ill. She hadn't gone to anymore of the appointments.


Parker had railed against Raines ever since the day Mr. Parker had died. She refused to acknowledge the wheezing ghoul as her father. The man she had always called "Daddy" would be the only father she would ever know.


Despite the lies and deception her father had always given her, Miss Parker still grieved over his loss. The older man had haunted her dreams nearly every night since she had last seen him. But none of her nightmares had left her as shaken and frightened as this one had.


Although it was still several hours before she was expected at work, Parker went to the kitchen and started a pot of coffee to begin her day. Perhaps the normalcy of her daily routine would help ease the nervousness dredged up by the nightmare.


Parker sipped at her coffee cup and flipped through yesterday's newspaper. She had read the issue the previous day, but today's paper had not yet arrived. Sighing heavily Parker pushed the newsprint aside in frustration. Her eyes wandered guiltily toward the phone.


Miss Parker glanced at the business card in her hand. Frowning with indecision, she turned it over and over with her fingers. The placard was a plain ivory color, completely blank except for the ten-digit phone number printed in the center of the card. Parker had committed the number to memory though she had actually dialed it only once.


Upon her return from Africa after Parker's ordeal on the Island of Carthis, she had found this card propped against the telephone in her livingroom. Sheer curiosity had driven her to dial the ten numbers.


"Hello, Miss Parker." Jarod's voice had purred through the phone at the time.


Parker sighed in resignation. "How did you know it was me?" She'd asked him. "Am I the only one with this number?"


"Caller ID is a wonderful thing." Jarod's smirk was audible in his voice.


"My number is blocked from that system, Jarod." She had told him.


Jarod chuckled. "There are ways around that."


"What do you want, Jarod?" Parker had asked.


"You called me, Parker."


"You left this number, knowing that I would dial it." Parker grumbled in exasperation.


There had been a brief silence before Jarod finally said, "I thought you might like someone to talk to. You've been through a lot in the past few days, learning what you've learned, losing your father." He'd paused for a moment before adding, "I thought you might need a friend."


"I've never needed one before." She had growled at him.


Jarod had sighed sadly. "If you change your mind, you know how to reach me." He said.


Staring at her phone now in the early predawn gloom, Parker could not shake the eerie feeling caused by the disturbing dream. She did want to talk to someone.


"Who are you kidding?" Parker whispered to herself. She didn't want to talk to just anyone. She wanted to talk to Jarod.
The wind picked up outside her window, blowing tree limbs across the panes of glass with a scraping sound. Mesmerized by the repetitive motion, Parker was startled to notice fine budding leaves on the tree. The long cold winter had finally released its grip on the world. Spring was coming.


A sudden flash of lightning brightened the room, blinding Parker for a moment. The crash of thunder that followed startled Parker so badly that before she realized what she was doing, her fingers had grabbed up the phone and started dialing.


The other end of the line was picked up after the second ring.


"Hello?" a low sleepy voice said.


Parker sighed. She felt better already. "What do you know?" She purred mischievously. "For once I get to wake you in the middle of the night."


Jarod's throaty chuckle brought a small curl to Parker's lips. She didn't bother to analyze her reasons for calling him. And she didn't bother to wonder how the simple sound of Jarod's voice had chased away her anxiety.


"Are you okay?" Jarod asked.


Parker could hear movement from the other end of the connection. In her mind's eye she could see Jarod rearranging himself in bed so that he could talk more easily.


"I'm fine, I guess." Parker said with a sigh.


"You don't sound fine, Parker." Jarod scolded slightly.


Parker shrugged as though Jarod could see her.


"Are you having trouble sleeping?" He asked with uncanny accuracy.


Parker sighed again. "Nightmares." She said.


"They can be a bitch." Jarod said in understanding. "Always sneaking up on you when you least expect them."


"Do you have them often?" Parker asked meekly.


"Only when I sleep." Jarod replied nonchalantly. "Was it bad?" He asked.


Parker curled up in her chair, hugging her knees to her chest. "I can't remember the dream." She said. "But it scared the hell out of me."


"I hate nightmares like that." Jarod admitted sympathetically. "You wake up in the dark with some unknown, undefined fear niggling away at your psyche."


"How do you deal with that feeling?" Parker asked.


"I pack my stuff and move on." Jarod answered honestly. "When I get the urge to run, I run."


Parker leaned her head against the forearm resting on her knees. Even through closed eyelids, she saw the next flash of lightning. Thunder boomed loud enough to make Parker flinch.


"It's raining there." Jarod said when he heard the sound.


"Brilliant deduction, Wonder-boy." Parker drawled sarcastically. "You must be a genius."


"Give me a break, Parker." Jarod laughed. "I'm not fully awake yet."


"So, the Lab-rat can dish it out but he can't take it eh?" She growled at him. Parker heard a rustling sound over the line, followed by a metallic clinking that she couldn't quite identify. "What are you doing?" she asked curiously.


Jarod hesitated before answering. "I'm putting my pants on."


Parker frowned in confusion. "Why bother? I can't see you."


Parker could sense the shrug in Jarod's voice. "It seems so vulnerable somehow, to be talking to you in nothing but my boxers." He said in a chagrined voice.


"You wear boxers?" Parker teased. "I always imagined you were a briefs kind of guy."


"You imagined me in my underwear?" Jarod asked with genuine surprise.


Parker chuckled at the shock in his voice. "I don't think I like where this conversation is going." She scolded playfully. "I didn't call to engage you in phone sex, Jarod."


"Phone sex?" he asked. "I've heard that term before."


"Well I am not going to be the one to explain it to you." Parker gasped in exaggerated indignation. "Call a 900 number."


"I've tried that." Jarod said. "But I don't think Miss Cleo can really see the future."


Parker laughed out loud.


"Feeling better?" Jarod chuckled.


"Yes." Parker admitted.


After a long comfortable silence, Jarod said, "The sun's coming up."


"I can't see the sun through this storm." Parker said in return.


"I'll share my sunrise with you if you like, Miss Parker." Jarod said gently.


"I should go." Parker declined. "I need to get ready for work."


"Are you sure?" he urged. "The colors are magnificent this morning."


"I'm sure." She said. "Thank you, Jarod."


"Anytime, Parker." Jarod said.


Parker sat at the table and stared in wonder at the phone for several long minutes after ending the connection. Finally, shaking her head at the irony of it all, Parker went to get dressed for a day of pretender hunting.



~~~~~
"I should have stayed in bed." Parker groaned to herself with a heavy sigh.


Though the coffee she had just spilled was no longer hot, the stain spreading across her silk blouse was painful just the same. The cup had been sitting on her desk unattended for nearly twenty minutes. As a result, Parker had been spared what could have been a nasty scalding. But the expensive white blouse would never be the same.

Tossing aside her suit jacket in an attempt to save it from the rivulets still oozing across her desk, Parker growled angrily as Sydney entered the room.

"What!" she yelled as she futilely tried to salvage the paperwork she'd been working on all morning.

"I was looking for Broots." Sydney said calmly.

"He isn't here!" Parker snapped between clenched teeth. A trail of cold coffee reached the edge of the tabletop and cascaded to the floor, speckling Parker's shoes. "Damn."

"Would you like some help?" Sydney asked.

If looks could kill, the ice-cold glare Parker shot at the psychiatrist would have dropped him like a stone. "Get Carl in here." She hissed.

Sydney disappeared, returning a moment later with Parker's new personal assistant. The young man was efficient and good looking. His curly golden- blonde hair and azure blue eyes gave his young face the innocent look of a cupie-doll. But Mr. Lyle had assigned him to this duty. As a result, Parker didn't trust him. She suspected that Lyle was trying to infiltrate her team with this eager young spy.

Parker never gave the young man any task worthwhile. She heaped his desk with meaningless and trivial minutia with the calculated intent of driving him away.

"Clean up this mess." Parker ordered. "And find me another shirt."

"Yes ma'am." The clean cut Carl said.

"Sydney is looking for Mr. Broots. Locate him." Parker called over her shoulder as she stalked into the restroom. If she could get the blouse into some water right away, perhaps the coffee wouldn't leave a permanent stain. Perhaps.

Nearly half an hour later, Parker surrendered. The silky garment was a lost cause. Sighing with frustration, Parker heaved the sopping wet shirt into the washbasin in disgust. The resulting splat sent droplets of water into the air to land on the camisole she wore. A long-suffering hiss of resignation escaped her.

Parker grabbed a nearby towel to dry herself when there was a soft knock.

"Miss Parker?" Broots called. "I've brought your shirt."

Throwing modesty to the wind, Parker yanked the door open and angrily snatched the cotton blouse from Broots' stunned hands. She stormed across the office as she pulled the shirt on and buttoned it rapidly.

Parker turned a moment later to find Broots staring at her. "Show's over, pin-head." She sneered as she fastened the buttons at her wrists. "Why are you still here?"

Broots blinked and began to stutter. "C c c c Carl said you were looking for me."

Parker shook her head. "Sydney was." Glancing meaningfully at her watch Parker added, "Where have you been anyway?"

Broots moaned. "I've had a terrible morning." He began. "The power went out at my place so there was no alarm to wake me up. Debbie missed the school bus. Then on my way in to work, I got a flat tire."

Parker hadn't really paid any attention earlier. But looking more closely now, she could see that Broots was drenched. The storm that had begun early this morning hadn't let up. Rain had been falling in heavy sheets all day.

"Luckily, I had already dropped Debbie off at school. But it took nearly an hour to change the stupid flat." Broots complained.

Miss Parker couldn't stop the smirk that began to curl the corners of her mouth.

"It's not funny." Broots whined.

"Yes it is." Parker countered. "Grab a towel." She ordered.

Broots briefly stepped into the lavatory and plucked a dry towel from the rack.

"It looks like we both got up on the wrong side of the bed today." Parker sighed.

"No kidding." Broots agreed as he tried to wipe away the moisture on his clothes. He sighed heavily. Tossing aside the towel dejectedly, Broots headed for the door. "What a beautiful day." He grumbled sarcastically.

As the office door closed on Broots' retreating form, Parker stared after him in sudden shock. His parting words hung in the air ominously. Parker shivered. Anxiety rose in her throat though she couldn't understand why.

Pulling her coat back on, Parker hugged her arms around herself in an attempt to fend off the abrupt iciness that chilled her bones.



~~~~~~


"Well?" Parker snapped.

Young Carl cringed visibly. Sydney, standing in the hallway at Parker's side, almost felt sorry for the blonde assistant.

"I'm sorry, Miss Parker. No one seems to know where Mr. Lyle has gone." Carl said.

"Dig deeper." She demanded. "He's up to something. I can feel it."

"No one has seen him since the status meeting this morning." The young man explained.

"Whenever my brother starts sneaking around," Parker grumbled. "I get worried." She turned a deadly glare on the light-haired man. "I don't like worrying, Carl. Find him."

Parker folded her arms and stormed off down the hallway, leaving the two men behind.

Carl sighed. "She hates me."

Sydney smiled gently. "She snaps like that at everyone, you know."

Crystalline blue eyes turned toward Sydney in disbelief. "But she doesn't talk to you that way, Doctor."

Sydney chuckled. "No." the older man admitted. "She rips into me much worse."

The younger man frowned. "I'm part of her team, now. Why does she shut me out?"

Sydney sighed. "Mr. Lyle brought you on board. As a result, she inherently mistrusts you."

"But I work for Miss Parker," Carl argued. "Not her brother."

With a reassuring pat on the shorter man's shoulder, Sydney said, "If that is true, Carl, she will learn to trust you in time. Her confidence is never given. It must be earned."

With that, the gray-haired psychiatrist walked away. Carl frowned as he watched the doctor get on the elevator, presumably headed for his office in the sim lab.

The young man walked back to his desk. As he slid into his seat, Carl frowned dejectedly at the closed doors to his left. The doors led to Miss Parker's office, a room he'd been ordered to stay away from unless he had definitive instructions to the contrary.

"You don't come in here unless I invite you in." Miss Parker had hissed at him when they first met.

Carl desperately wanted to be useful to his new employer. He didn't quite understand the relationship between the Parker siblings and he resented being made an unwilling pawn in their rivalry. Carl didn't know why Mr. Lyle had hired him for this job but he suspected that the intent was to frustrate and anger Miss Parker.

"Maybe she likes blonde boy-toys." Stephen had said off-handedly.

Carl had been so pleased to get this job, so excited that he could hardly wait to share his news. But, as usual, Stephen had dashed all the excitement out of the moment with the cruel comment.

"It's good money, Stephen." Carl had argued. "I'll be able to pay my share of the bills and still have extra cash."

"It won't last, C." Stephen had laughed.

"It will." Carl had promised. "I'll do a good job."

Stephen shook his head sadly. "Carl, an assistant is someone you come to depend upon. Powerful people lean heavily on personal assistants to help them get day to day errands accomplished." Steve had wrapped Carl in a warm embrace as he chuckled. "You aren't the type of person people depend on, C. You're too needy. You depend too heavily on others."

"I don't." Carl had denied weakly.

"You do." Stephen purred. Running a seductive caress down Carl's spine, his tall lover growled into his ear. "Admit it."

"I don't." Carl whispered.

"Admit it." Stephen breathed as he began removing Carl's shirt. "You need me."

Of course, in the end, Carl had submitted. Stephen's need to crush his lover's ego was sadistic in nature and Carl knew it. But as pitiful as it sounded, the sex was always worth a little self-humiliation.

However, in the light of day, away from their shared bedroom, Carl felt that he needed to prove his lover wrong. He needed to succeed as Miss Parker's assistant. He was determined to become an integral part of her team. Carl would find a way to earn his employer's confidence.

But for now, Carl would have to settle for finding her brother.


~~~


Miss Parker glared out the window of her office. The storm that had blown into the area this morning had eased up slightly. The pouring rain had been reduced to a drizzling mist. The day had been gloomy and overcast. As a result, night fell with alarming rapidity.

So engrossed was she in her musings that Parker was startled when a voice spoke behind her.

"Miss Parker?"

Swirling around in her chair, Parker glared angrily at her young personal assistant. "Did I give you permission to come in?" she hissed.

"I knocked." Carl swallowed. "You must not have heard me."

Parker frowned. Raking a cursory glance down the young man's frame, she shook her head ruefully. Carl was boyishly handsome with his blonde hair and tight little frame. But his eyes were disturbingly bright blue, giving Parker the impression that she was talking to a porcelain figurine.

"Is it important enough to risk my wrath, Carl?" she growled.

"I think so." Carl answered.

Parker had to give the little cretin credit. He managed to withstand one of her most withering looks.

"I found this." The young man said, sidling up to her desk to hand her a crumpled slip of paper.

Parker snatched the note from his fingertips and read it perfunctorily. It was a memo from the Triumvirate to Mr. Lyle.

"Your plan for subduing the rebellious nature of the subject has been approved. It is preferred that the terminations occur in one event in order to avoid suspicion from the authorities. The methods used shall be left to the discretion of The Centre." The paper read.

On the bottom portion of the paper, a pencil led had been brushed carefully across the sheet, revealing an impression caused by writing on an overlaying page. Two lines were barely legible, a time 11 PM, and an address, 24642 Hempford Drive.

"What is this?" Parker asked.

Carl shrugged. "I found it in Mr. Lyle's wastepaper basket."

Rereading the brief message, Parker felt the hair on the back of her neck begin to tingle. "This is only a street address." She grumbled. "There could be hundreds of streets with that name across the United States."

The young man smiled beautifully at her. "Well, a Centre jet left Blue Cove early this afternoon headed for Indiana."

"Find me a Hempford Drive in Indiana, Carl." Parker ordered. "And hurry, we've got less than four hours."

Carl scurried back to his desk with a grin of triumph on his face as Parker grabbed up the phone to arrange transportation and a flight to the Hoosier state.

Twenty-five minutes later, armed with a detailed map of her destination, Miss Parker dashed across the tarmac toward a waiting airplane. Five minutes after that, they were airborne.

Anxiety pulsed through Parker's veins as she barged into the cockpit. "How long?" She demanded.

"We should be landing near Fort Wayne in about two and a half hours, Miss Parker." The pilot told her.

Heading back to her seat, Miss Parker studied the map in her hand. Once the flight ended, she would have to drive another forty-five minutes to reach the rural area indicated by the address. The timing was too tight. She had a mere fifteen-minute window in which to find Lyle's target and prevent the "termination". Her nervousness increased another notch.

There was nothing Parker could do but wait out the next couple of hours. Her fingers drummed spastically on the armrest as she watched the blackness speed passed her window. With sudden inspiration, Parker dug her cell phone out of her pocket and dialed.

"Hello?" Jarod answered on the first ring.

"Jarod?" Parker asked.

"Well, well, well." Jarod cooed. "Twice in one day. I'm honored, Miss Parker."

"Shut up and listen." She snarled. "I've uncovered something important. Lyle is planning to kill someone. It's a Triumvirate sanctioned assassination."

"Who?" Jarod asked in a clipped voice.

"I don't know, but the memo I saw said something about a single event resulting in terminations, plural. Meaning more than one life is at stake." Parker said. "I have an address that I think may be the location but I'm still several hours away. I may not get there in time."

"And you thought that I might be closer." Jarod finished for her.

Parker shrugged. "I had hoped you might be." She admitted. "How far are you from Fort Wayne, Indiana?"

There was a pause as Jarod did some quick calculations. "I can be there by midnight." He said finally.

"This is going down at 11." Parker sighed in frustration.

"Then I'll be there by eleven." He said firmly.

As Parker gave Jarod the address of their mutual destination, she could hear a door slam in the background. The sound of a car starting hissed across the line just before Jarod hung up.

"Hurry, Jarod." Parker pleaded to the empty seats as irrational desperation clawed at her.

It didn't occur to Parker that Jarod had never questioned her urgency. She had called him, essentially asking for help, and Jarod had responded unquestioningly. Equally astonishing yet lost in the frenzied thoughts of her mind, Parker never doubted that Jarod would come.


~~~~


It was a quarter to eleven and Parker was caught in a traffic jam.

Red and blue lights glimmering through the darkness ahead of her suggested that there was an accident of some sort, blocking the road. Parker gripped the steering wheel of the rental car tightly. With each tick of the clock on the dashboard, her heart pounded more rapidly. The line of cars inched along with aching slowness.

Finally, the police cars and a tow truck came into view. Parker's progress came to a complete halt as an officer stopped traffic to allow the truck to back across both lanes. Hanging off the road, half in the ditch was a silver pickup truck with a broken axel.

It took several minutes for the truck driver to hook the wench up to the little pickup. As the truck began to haul the damaged car out of the ditch, Parker's headlights illuminated the neon blue racing stripe that ran the length of the silver vehicle.

The bright blue color was so vivid that Parker was ridiculously reminded of the color of her young assistant's eyes. Silver paint twinkled against the blue.

Parker was abruptly blinded by a flash of red-orange light inside her head. Her body arched in pain as she was suddenly assaulted by her little brother's panic. Ethan's mind screamed to hers in a psychic wail. In the confines of the car, Parker screamed an echo of Ethan's mental agony.

Just as quickly as it had come, the presence of her little brother vanished from Parker's mind. Severed from Ethan with a frightening swiftness, Parker was left trembling in her seat.

She looked at the clock illuminated in the darkness and saw the time click over to 11:01.

When the policeman waved her through a moment later, Parker was weeping. She was too late. Lyle had succeeded.


~~~


Parker rounded a bend in the road twenty minutes later and saw a farmhouse in flames. She didn't need to see the address to know that she had found her destination.

As Parker stepped out of the car, she saw a tall shape silhouetted against the flames. Stumbling to his knees in the yard, Jarod clutched a woman's body in his arms.

Afraid of what she would see, Parker approached slowly. Shrouded bodies littered the yard. A red and white-checkered tablecloth covered one mound. Bare feet stuck out at the bottom. A blue plastic tarp covered another. Two matching sheets, dragged off of the nearby clothesline concealed two more shapes. The bright yellow and blue floral pattern of the coverlets shifted gruesomely in the flickering light of the fire.

Feeling as though her limbs were made of stone, Parker dragged her attention toward Jarod. Soot covered and singed, Jarod had obviously gone into the burning house again and again. But he had found no survivors.

In his arms, Jarod held a red haired, middle-aged woman. Parker recognized her immediately. The strange tilt to her neck and the sightless stare of her eyes gave proof that Jarod's mother was dead.

Parker couldn't speak. Her voice croaked from her throat as though it belonged to someone else. "Ethan?" she asked hopelessly.

Jarod didn't answer. He stared vacantly in from of him, trembling.

Parker looked fearfully at the covered corpses around her. Crouching beside the nearest one, Parker lifted the sheet from the form and gasped tearfully. The boy had been badly burned. One side of his face was a mirror image of the young man Jarod had once been. The other side of the boy's visage was a blackened char of oozing flesh.

Desperately struggling to rein in her emotions, Parker eased the shroud back into place. Glancing at the next sheet, she cringed as she noticed the dark stain that had spread across the flowered print. Moving slowly, knowing she would regret her actions, Parker pulled the sheet away.

It was Ethan. He had evidently been close to the explosion. His body had suffered from a large impact. His throat, shoulder and upper torso had been viciously torn by some jagged object. There was a great deal of blood.

Parker did the only thing she could do. Cradling Ethan's head in her lap, Parker grieved for her little brother. She stroked her fingers through his hair as she wept. Looking up wearily at the chaos around her, Parker cried even harder.

"It isn't fair." She moaned. "This just isn't fair."

Parker glanced at Jarod, reaching out to him with her eyes in order to share her sorrow. But Jarod just sat there. He shed no tears. There was no anger. He just sat in shocked disbelief with the dead woman in his lap.

The screech of tires against the asphalt brought Parker to her senses. Two cars had just pulled up. Raines stepped from one car and Lyle from the other. Half a dozen sweepers accompanied them.

Gently easing herself away from Ethan's body, Parker stood and stalked dangerously toward the approaching men. She dashed across the lawn and threw herself at Lyle.

Wrapping her hands around his throat, Parker tackled her twin and forced him to the ground.

"You filthy bastard!" she screamed. "He was your brother too!"

Parker punctuated her words by banging Lyle's head against the ground.

"He was your brother too!" She railed again.

"Get her off me!" Lyle gasped as Parker began to choke him.

Two sweepers hauled Miss Parker away from Lyle as he coughed and choked. Screaming with rage, Parker kicked and cursed at them.

"Forget her," hissed Raines. "Get Jarod."

Dumping Parker on the ground like a bag of trash, the sweepers went after Jarod. They had no trouble catching him. Jarod sat motionless, letting the men grab him easily.

"Come along, Jarod." Raines wheezed. "It's time to come home now."

His eyes glazed with shock, Jarod allowed the sweepers to drag him from the ground. He let the sweepers lead him away. As the guards steered Jarod toward the waiting cars, Parker rushed to his side.

"I'll take care of them, Jarod." Parker whispered fervently. "I'll see to it that they are treated with dignity."

Jarod stared at her without comprehension.

"I'll make sure they stay together as a family." Parker promised.

"Let the cleaners take care of this, Parker." Lyle croaked through his swollen larynx.

Parker pulled her gun from its holster and pointed it at Lyle. "Any Centre employee who touches them is going to get a bullet between the eyes." She growled.

"We have what we came for, Lyle." Raines said. "Let's go. Leave her to her precious corpses."

As the men all clambered into the two cars and drove away, Parker fell to her knees. Despair threatened to overwhelm her and she struggled with her emotions. There was still much to do before she could allow herself to grieve fully. She would need to protect the bodies around her from the ghoulish plots of The Centre.

Parker wouldn't allow anyone to molest her brother or his family. She owed Ethan that much.

She had promised.









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