The Ultimate X-Men by Unknown Author Read Free Book Online

an outlaw in his own hometown.
    Remy would never have guessed he had been drawn back here because of Cornelia.
    As if picking up a rag doll, he lifted Cornelia’s thin young body from the damp street. Her head started to roll back, exposing the huge slash across her neck, and he quickly braced her head against his arm, making her seem more like a lover passed out from too much drink.
    He didn’t know how, but some way he needed to get her to her father. Hayward owned a large home in the Garden District, near where Remy used to have a home. A home he had hoped to settle in with his wife. A home he lost when he lost his city.
    “Put her down, LeBeau,” a voice said from behind him.
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    He spun and again her head lolled back, showing the huge gash.
    His hand under her quickly grasped the cards in his coat pocket and waited as a figure stepped from the shadows of a courtyard door.
    Remy almost staggered back as the face of the intruder came into the faint light.
    Julian Hayward stopped a few feet from Remy, never taking his gaze from the Cajun X-Man.
    “Your daughter?” Remy said, lifting the light weight of Cornelia slightly.
    “I know, son,” Hayward said. “But you are not the prey we hoped to catch with this bait. Now put her down and step in here with me. I will explain.”
    “You killin’ your own children, hommeV ’
    Hayward laughed. “Corey, honey. Reassure the poor man.”
    Suddenly in Remy’s arms the girl’s body moved. It so startled him, he almost dropped her.
    Somehow she lifted her head, closing the huge gash across her neck as she moved. “Thanks for caring,” she said in a whisper. “You are a dear and I would enjoy staying in your arms, but I can’t. Now please put me down.”
    Then her head rolled back and she was again the body of a dead girl. No pulse, no blood, no life. A huge gash sliced across her neck.
    Remy stared at the now lifeless body in his arms, his mind not believing what he had just seen. Yet, it had happened. He glanced at Hayward and the father nodded, indicating that Remy should put her down.
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    Carefully, Remy placed the body of the young girl back in the gutter and stood.
    “Now, quickly,” Hayward said. “Come with me.” He turned and moved back into the courtyard and the black shadows beyond.
    Dazed, Remy followed through the courtyard door. There had been a number of times over the years in New Orleans when he knew someone he had once thought dead to be still alive. His wife, Belle, was one. But he had never had a corpse come to life in his arms. At least not until tonight.
    And Hayward had used the term bait? His own daughter as bait? And what was he trying to catch with a dead girl? Who or what would want a dead girl?
    Too many questions.
    Remy, with only a glance at the body in the mist, stepped through the dark courtyard door and was instantly blinded by intense white light. One hand came up to shade his eyes while the other went inside his pocket for his cards. He had the ability to change the potential energy in an object to kinetic energy, creating an instant bomb.
    Crouching, he blinked hard and fast, forcing his eyes to focus on his surroundings more quickly than natural.
    There seemed to be no danger.
    Slowly, he turned around. The door he’d stepped through was nothing more than a black archway. He couldn’t see anything through it, let alone the cobblestone street and the girl’s body that he knew was only a few feet away.
    “Over here, LeBeau,” Hayward’s voice said.
    Remy hesitated while glancing around. The huge room
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    was filled with thousands of computers and machines and at least fifty people, all wearing white lab coats. Only Hayward and Remy and the computers broke the stark whiteness of the room. Every person in the room seemed to be focused on their own task. No one paid him the slightest attention.
    With one more glance at the blank door into the street, Remy moved over where