Betrayed by Francine Pascal Page A

shoved his gun back in its holster and peered over the banister, hoping to spot the masked man in the increasing darkness of the building’s back lot. He could hear the urgent tapping of shoes against metal, headed toward the next level down. The man was moving so damned fast. Tom knew he’d never catch him at this rate. He had to do something drastic. Something that could make up for the lost time…
    A jump. A full one-story jump down to the next landing to cut him off. It was the only choice. But Tom knew he wasn’t his daughter. He’d kept himself in top condition, of course. An agent of his caliber had to. But top condition for a man in his forties…
    No time for doubt. Tom grabbed onto the edge of the fire escape and swung his entire body over the banister in one swift move, feeling the cold wind and the gravity take hold of him and tug him down to the next level. He knew his feet wouldn’t hit the platform first. He wasn’t going to land on the platform. He was going to fall onto it. But if he stayed focused, he would have the perfect thing to break his fall: a man in a black mask who was running way too quickly.
    â€œOompf.”
    Tom’s body was bombarded from head to toe by every conceivable surface. Cold black iron, muscular flesh, the wool of a sweater, the rock-hard bones of a knee and an elbow. The two rather sizable men had clashed and rolled up against the edge of the fire escape in a painful heap. For all Tom knew, he’d broken both his legs. Pain was spreading out indiscriminately to every one of his appendages. And the man was already slipping out from under him, as though this world-class collision had barely fazed him. He tugged slowly but surely out of Tom’s grip, until all Tom had left to hold on to were his clothes. Tom’s hands were just about the only things that were fully functioning right now, so he used them to grip the bloody black ski mask and rip it from the man’s face before he broke free.
    I’ve seen this face before, Tom realized. The square, chiseled jaw, the spiky jet-black hair, eyes that were so blue, they were almost purple, and that sickening grin—he’d flashed that disgusting smile the moment Tom had gotten the mask off. Tom never forgot a face. Never. That was something of a prerequisite for the Agency. The only problem was…it was the face of a dead man.
    Tom flashed back to that nearly fatal evening at Loki’s Chelsea loft. The night Gaia had learned of Sam Moon’s death. The night Tom’s brother had held a gun to his head and nearly pulled the trigger. He distinctly remembered Loki killing this man. He remembered him putting a bullet right through the center of his head. So how exactly could he have survived? How was that possible?
    â€œYou’re getting way too old for this, Tom,”the boy said, flashing his wicked grin. Despite how desperately Tom wanted to punch him in his fatuous face, he couldn’t possibly have agreed more. He was getting too old for this. He was sick and tired of this game. So sick and so tired…
    Tom struggled to peel himself off the cold iron, but his limbs were shot. He slipped back down onto his hands and knees. “You tell Loki, if he wants to kill Tatiana, he’ll have to send someone better than you.”
    â€œJesus, you’re pathetic,” the boy said with a horrid chuckle, watching joyfully as Tom struggled with his throbbing legs. “You think this is some freaking movie of the week? This whole thing is over, Tom. It’s done. Gaia will be dead by ten o’clock tomorrow morning.”
    Tom’s eyes shot up to meet the boy’s. His statement sounded so definitive, so absolute, that Tom couldn’t even hide the fact that it had shaken him to the core. “What are you talking about?” he demanded, raiding the youth’s vacant eyes for the truth. “Where’s Gaia? What has he done with