Rinse [manxman]

Chapter Twenty-Two

"Dakota, we have Goss," Luca said, his voice cracking through the communicator in my ear. "He isn't resisting... Actually, he's fine with us killing him. He just wants to talk to Blake first."

Dakota frowned and cocked a brow at me.

I shrugged, unsure of why he wanted to speak with me. "It couldn't hurt," I said. "If he tries anything, we can kill him."

"Where are you guys?" Dakota asked, looking toward the elevator doors.

"His office."

"We'll be up in a second. Blake will talk to him, but one step out of line and we'll shoot him." The line went silent, and Dakota looked over at me. "Whatever he wants, he can't stay alive. He's been too much of a threat, and there's no guarantee he won't try to capture Qizade and Xeniden again."

I nodded. "Agreed. After all these years of knowing him, though, I can't imagine what he wants to say to me."

Dakota shrugged, and then turned toward the elevator to head up. I grabbed his shoulder, halting him.

"Wait, didn't you say someone else was down here?"

"They're gone," he said. "About halfway through, they left."

"Left how? Did they die or...?" I trailed off, raising a brow.

Dakota shook his head. "It's more like they vanished. It could have been an astral projection."

"The only person I know with astral projection abilities strong enough to feel like another full presence is Goss," I said, pushing the elevator button and stepping onto it as the doors opened.

"It could've been."

It was only after we'd taken Boone out that we'd gotten the call from the others that they'd located Goss. If they'd captured him before that, they would have notified Dakota. In the scenario that Goss's astral was the other presence, everything aligned from the time that Goss left to the time the others found him.

"Hey." I looked up at Dakota, frowning. "After Boone ordered me to rip your heart out, what happened?"

Dakota raised both brows, surprised. "You don't remember?"

I shook my head. "As soon as I started coming toward you, I started having these weird flashes. I felt you, and then I kept getting visions. The next thing I knew, you had Boone on his knees, and I was getting ready to kill him."

"Well, you snapped out of it. You kept getting closer to me, and I told you that you were stronger, you could beat him, and then you just stopped. Boone ordered you again, but you attacked him and broke his hold on me. I came to back you up and pinned Boone..." Dakota cocked his head to the side. "I think your triggers changed. Earlier, when you killed those guards, you were in the middle of it, but right when Boone threatened me, your magical trigger finished changing."

If my triggers changed, it made the most sense that it would happen when I was under Dakota's influence. It was already intoxicating, so it stood to reason that it would be enough to drive my magic as well. And of course it would only happen when Boone threatened his life. For so long, I'd trusted Dakota to keep himself alive, but when it came to my powers, Dakota didn't stand a chance. Using everything he'd given me was the only way I could keep him alive.

From apathy to Dakota's warmth... It was almost as stark a contrast as Dakota and Boone.

"I think you're right," I said. Actually, it was likely that the trigger had been changing for a few days. After the episode where I projected my memory onto Dakota, or Dakota's stress response intercepted the memory, that was when everything had changed—right then and the next evening, when he actually projected emotions onto me. "The other night, when I projected that memory onto you, I think that was the catalyst for the trigger change. You projecting feelings onto me the next night was fuel to the fire."