Free Hunting the Shadows by Alexia Reed Page A

desk with a box of Leila’s personal belongings. Reaching inside, she pulled out photos. “Cameron checked out by the way. His alibi has been confirmed.”
    He’d assumed it would, but he wasn’t going to take a chance. “Why are you here, Ajay?”
    “You don’t remember her, do you?” Her soft question made him frown. He couldn’t remember a lot of his past and it wasn’t worth the migraine trying to pick at it.
    “Why would I? She wasn’t part of our team.”
    “Ok.” She was quiet a moment. He could practically see her restless energy as she shifted her weight in the chair. “I wanted to make sure you were all right.”
    J.C. narrowed his eyes, pinning her with a glare at the cryptic words. He was about to ask what the hell she was talking about when the headache he’d been battling shifted over his skull with full force. His vision blurred and the morgue darkened. He stumbled, slapping a hand against the counter to stabilize himself and, when everything doubled, missed and fell forward to his hands and knees.
    Ajay’s cry was like a whip against his temples. She rushed to his side.
    J.C. touched his forehead to the floor as the room spun. He could do nothing to protect himself. His mind went blank, instinct overriding all thought. Images layered over images in his mind, overloading his system.
    He had no defense against his past.
    J.C. gasped, forcing himself to breathe when his lungs began to burn. It was too much. He lashed out, expelling the energy that built and tiles flew up around him. There was no way to ground himself.
    Hopes. Dreams. Pain. Nightmares.
    They all swirled through him like a storm. He remembered now. Leila. Ashton. But more than anything, he remembered her . Amy.
    Her presence was there. How had he not felt her moments ago? She was strong, not giving him a chance to close up. Despite the fact that he was at his threshold for pain, he felt her soft, soothing touches.
    Stefan’s attack when they were sixteen blindsided him before he could prepare himself.
    His back burned as though reliving the scarring, the sharp stab of pain as cuts split his skin from an invisible assault—a punctured lung, a serious knife wound to his ribs, various broken bones, they were only the start of what torment his body would go through again. The only difference was that this time, it was all in his memory.
    The betrayal hurt the most. Stefan had done nothing but look down at him on the ground with pale, icy eyes before walking away. Mackenzie found and drained her energy in an effort to heal him. She’d saved his life, but he’d still ended up in Medical.
    His mind shut down. Pitched forward into oblivion, J.C. lay on the floor, unmoving until the pain receded and the electricity from his neurons jerked his muscles to life and restarted his system.
    Sound came back first—Ajay calling his name. J.C. forced his eyes open and found himself flat on his back with her leaning over him.
    For a moment, he simply stayed there, not trusting the attack to have subsided completely. What the fuck had happened?
    The migraine had shifted from his temples and was fading away.
    What had the telepath done to him? He had to know and she was going to tell him.
    When a blinding pain came at him again, he knew it wasn’t his. It was different, muted by terror.
    Something was wrong with Amy.
    Pushing himself unsteadily to his feet, J.C. brushed off Ajay’s concern. He opened his mind completely, searching for Amy.
    The taste of her fear flooded his senses. Cold air brushed at his skin.
    Almost as though expecting the window to be open, he turned around in the morgue. Outside, the sky was dark with angry clouds, the wind whipping the branches of a nearby tree against the glass.
    He reached for the link she’d created in his mind and grasped it before it slipped through mental fingers. Her connection was weak, drifting in and out. He shut all other senses down, focusing on her.
    “What’s wrong?” When Amy didn’t