Drew leaned toward him and lowered his voice. “It’s easy, just say no and go home.”
I think everyone in the room sighed with exasperation. Drew and Gavin would be at war forever. The only time I’d ever seen them get along was during my rescue. When it came to hunting or fighting the enemy, they were synched and worked together like a well-oiled machine. Otherwise, the deep rooted animosity Drew held for Gavin was never going to go away.
Gavin finally met Drew’s eye. “Sorry, bro, everyone else wants me to help. I’m in.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Then let it go, man. I didn’t ruin your life, I didn’t ask to be born. So get over it.”
Oh crap.
The look on Drew’s face pretty much bypassed ‘If looks could kill’ and went right on to ‘Someone is going to be murdered’. I tried to squeeze his hand to calm him, but he stood up before I could grasp it.
“Drew, calm down.” Oscar rose from his spot at the table and circled around us until he was beside Drew. “Look at me.”
Drew turned his head toward Oscar, meeting his eyes.
“Now, calm down.”
“I don’t feel calm.”
Oscar nodded as if he understood. “You will. Take a deep breath, sit down, and let’s discuss the mission.”
Without another word, Drew dropped down into his chair. As Oscar’s hold on him released, Drew snapped out of the fog of compulsion. His eyes moved from person to person in the room and finally settled on Oscar. “Dude, don’t use your siren crap on me.”
“It was for the best,” Oscar told him, sinking back down into his chair.
“You suck.”
“So do you.”
Luke cleared his throat, obviously relieved that Oscar had intervened and intercepted what could have been a really bad fight. “Let’s get back to business.”
I leaned forward on the table and rested on my elbows. “We have blueprints for the Talon Building. We have everyone in this room, plus Christina and my brother, and we are thinking we will move in about three days.”
Surprised, his eyebrows shot up. “Wait, back up a minute. When did you get a brother? I thought you were an only child.”
Great, I’d forgotten that Gavin didn’t know about Zander. “It’s a long story, but basically he is my brother on Trevor’s side. We ran across him when we were trying to find the rouge vampire killer. He was out killing vampires and saving innocent people, which in turn was bringing more attention to the Hunters. When we found him we discovered that he was Trevor’s son, my older brother.”
Incredulous, Gavin shook his head. “And you actually trust this guy?”
Saw that coming. “Not entirely. I trust that he isn’t in cahoots with the vampires, though. We know he is all about getting rid of them, so that is enough for me to trust him to go on this mission with us.”
“Crazy.”
“Yeah,” I agreed.
Gavin nodded. “What is the plan for actually killing the vampires? There are a lot of vampires in the Talon Building.”
I chewed my lip for a moment, wondering how he was going to feel about the plan. “We are going to blow it up.”
Gavin’s eyes widened. “Civilians? Innocent people?”
“The attack will take place around three a.m.; most likely there won’t be anyone out on the streets. Most of the structures in the vicinity are small restaurants and shops. Behind the building is an old warehouse that hasn’t been used for years. It’s empty and takes up most of the block behind it. The office buildings across the street have security, but Oscar is going to go in and tell the security officers that they get the day off and to go home.”
“I don’t know about blowing it up.” Gavin’s eyes narrowed in concern. “The blast might be a lot bigger than you expect it to be. This is risky for the innocent bystanders.”
I shook my head. “We are going to try and clear the area first.”
“I don’t know.”
Drew sighed dramatically from beside me. “Well, boy genius, what do you propose we do?”
Gavin accepted the challenge. “Maybe we should just burn it down.”
Again, I shook my head. “That won’t work. We want the vampires to die. If we light the place on fire they will just run or put it out.”
“If we can get inside, we could ignite several different places, not just one, and we can fight those who are left.”
“It might work.” Nicholas nodded. “They will be running scared and seeing us would surprise them.”
“Yeah, they will be more concerned with surviving the fire than they are with looking for Hunters,” Alice quipped. “And with more than one of us able to create fire, we have an advantage.”
Gavin tilted his head and looked to me in confusion.
“Show him,” I told her softly.
There were three pumpkin spice jar candles sitting in the center of the table. Alice flicked her wrist and pointed at the candles. Immediately all three of them ignited, their tiny flames flickering up as they reached for air to fuel them.
“Nice!” Gavin exclaimed, surprised that Alice wasn’t just a normal girl. “What other kind of tricks do you have?”
Her eyes twinkled at the challenge. “Chloe?”
“All right, but you know we aren’t supposed to do this in the house.”
I looked to my grandfather and he nodded, giving us the go ahead. “Just this one time.”
Alice raised her hands, pulling up her shield. The air shimmered with magical energy all around her and the shielded area rippled just enough to prove its existence.
Quickly, I pulled up a fireball and tossed it at her. Everyone around the table watched with awe as the flames absorbed into the shield and disappeared without harming a hair on her head. Gavin and Nicholas were the most impressed, since they’d never had previous demonstration of Alice’s powers.
“Sweet!” Gavin blurted out.
“That’s amazing,” Nicholas marveled.
Alice smiled and put away her shield. “Thank you. It takes lots of practice, but I figured it out.”
Drew tapped his foot impatiently. “Let’s just get this over with. So are we bombing or burning? I’m good either way. If we burn, we have to be prepared to fight. With either choice, we will be on a time limit because the fire department and police are sure to come as soon as any fire alarms are tripped.”
Luke leaned against the counter, swirling a spoon in a mug full of herbal tea. “Even burning is going to cause explosions. There are things inside the building that are extremely flammable, they probably even have a weapons room in there somewhere.”
I nodded. “Yeah. Guns, ammo, probably even their own explosives.”
“I guess we should vote on it.” Luke set his mug on the counter. “Either way, innocent humans will be at risk. We will do everything we can to keep them safe, though. All right, who is for burning?”
Gavin, Oscar, and Nicholas raised their hands.
“Bombing?”
Alice, Drew, and myself raised our hands.
“Looks like you’re the tie breaker, Luke.” Nicholas patted Luke on the back.
Luke’s lips turned up in a crooked grin. “Well then ... I say that we do both. Smaller bombs, smaller explosion. Fire on the higher floors can work its way down while we blow the lower levels.”
Awesome. Sometimes my grandpa really rocked.
“And since I’m the tie breaker, no one gets to disagree,” he added.
After hashing out a bunch of details, we decided to wrap it up. “I’ll walk you out,” I told Gavin as he slid into his jacket.
I glanced at Drew and watched his eyes narrow, but he said nothing and gave my hand a squeeze.
Gavin and I exited the kitchen together. “I’ve missed you,” he whispered after we were safely out of earshot.
I opened the front door and we stepped over the threshold to stand on the stoop. “I missed you, too,” I told him. “It feels strange not having you around the communi
ty.”
“I agree.” He reached out and took my hands in his. “I don’t understand this sometimes.”
“You don’t understand what?”
“Us. I know that in reality we haven’t spent that much time together, but something about you and me that just connects ... something that is there when we are together and when we’re apart. It’s like you took that piece with you, leaving me a little empty inside.”
He had just stated the exact feelings I had for him. I couldn’t ever put a finger on what it was; we had only had a few dates and a couple kisses. How did that form the feelings I had for him and that he apparently had for me?
I didn’t vocalize this though. He didn’t need anything to further the need to make good on his promise to fight for me.
“Why are you saying this to me right now?” I asked.
He smiled his cute little grin. “Because I don’t know when we will get to be alone again. But,” he added, “we do need to be alone sometime so we can talk this out.”
My heart lurched and butterflies fluttered in my stomach. I pulled my hands from his to eliminate any temptation. “Gavin, there is nothing to talk out. I’m with Drew ... I love him and he needs me just as much as I need him, so there isn’t anything to talk out with us. We can be friends, good friends, but nothing more.”
He shook his head and leaned down to kiss my cheek. His lips were soft and cool, lingering on my cheek. I closed my eyes and then pulled back, breaking contact even though I wanted to turn my head and return the kiss.
He took a step back away from me and whispered, “You know this isn’t how this ends, Chloe. In the very end it will be you and me.”
With that, he hopped down the steps and jumped into his Jeep, leaving me standing on the porch wondering if I had actually just made things worse than they were before.
~~~***~~~
Later that night, I was left tossing and turning in bed again. Alice was sleeping soundly, as was everyone else in the house. I flipped back the covers, slid out of bed, and moved as quietly as I could across the cold floor. As I was reaching for the door knob, a noise startled me. I switched on my super hearing and discovered it was the faint strum of a guitar.
I crept out of my room, quietly following the sound of the guitar down the stairs, where I discovered it was coming from the garage. The melody was soft and deep, the kind that usually accompanied really depressing music, which was a kind that I rather favored. I was about to reach for the handle of the garage door when I heard a voice along with the music.
“These walls that I’ve built, no one could climb. They kept me protected, where love wouldn’t hurt me. They kept me alone, my past left behind. But you ... you broke them down and set my heart on fire. You broke them down, you broke them down.”
Oh my God, it was Drew.
“I’ll be a better man, I’ll fight for you forever. Your love keeps me strong, your love ... keeps me moving on.” The strumming paused. “No ...” I heard him mumble and another pause. Within a few seconds he strummed and sang again. “I’ll be a better man, forever is how long I’ll fight for you. Your love keeps me strong, your love ... it’s what keeps me moving on.” He paused and muttered, “Much better.”
He was writing a song ... and it sounded like it was about me. Oh my God, how much more romantic could you get? I wanted to see him. To watch him playing, but I didn’t want to let him know I was there. My hand was pressed against the door and I felt tears running down my cheeks. Desperately I wanted to burst the door open and run to him.
After a few minutes more, I heard him set the guitar down and the latches of his guitar case click. Time to go. I hurried back up the stairs to my room as quietly as I possibly could, not taking a breath until I was in my room and had the door shut behind me.
Wow. I knew that Drew cared about me, he even said he loved me, but to hear him put it into song was another story. Sometimes, I thought that Drew still kept treating me like a little sister instead of a girlfriend; that maybe his feelings for protecting me were mistaken for love. However, the moment I heard him sing, I knew that he was the way he was because of the wall he had mentioned. He had a hard time caring because it only got him hurt in the long run. If I was the only one who could break down his walls and get inside, that really meant something.
I let out a huge, love struck sigh and lay down underneath my covers once more. Unfortunately, sleep did not come any easier than it did before.
~~~***~~~
The blueprints were spread across the table with Luke, Drew, Gavin, and Nicholas all hovering over them.
“It looks like we can come in through this entrance.” Luke pointed his pencil at a spot on the papers. “It’s basically their basement, so we go in through the basement and up through this door.” He moved his pencil and made a tiny circle to mark the entrance he was describing.
Alice, Oscar, Christina, and I stood at the counter filling clips with ammo while we watched them hammer out the details.
“Did Zander call you yet?” Christina asked.
“No, and I don’t want to talk about it right now. I want that night to be over.”
She set a full clip off to the side and picked up an empty one. “Jeez, I didn’t mean to hit a nerve. He just feels bad.”
I slammed my full clip into my gun. “Christina, since when do you give a crap who feels bad about anything? Secondly, if you do care, I’m still pissed at you for calling Drew.”
“I don’t care about any of that. I just wanted you to know because he is your brother.”
“Right.”
She shut up. We both knew we could bicker all night long and not get anywhere. After thinking about the whole situation later, I found it ironic that maybe I actually liked the Christina who didn’t give a crap better than the one who did.
“The explosives will have to go here, here, and here, and then follow this route,” Luke drew a line with his pencil, “to the next floor down.”
Drew, Gavin, and Nicholas nodded their heads. “Sounds like a good plan to me.” Gavin patted Luke on the back. “Drew, we need to work on those explosives and make sure everything is ready.”
Drew stood up straight and stretched his back. “All right. Let’s get this over with.”
I had to admit, he was at least making the effort, which really made me feel better.
“I’m coming with you guys.” Oscar set his clips aside and caught my eyes as he lifted his head. From the look, I knew that he was only going with them so he could mediate any problems. Great, now Oscar was a babysitter. That must be pretty disappointing for a man who used to be a history teacher.
I gave him a nod to show that I understood what he was doing. Christina tossed a section of her hair over her shoulder. “Bye boys.”
Drew came over and bent down to give me quick kiss. “I’ll be back soon,” he whispered.
I reached up and gripped the front of his T-shirt. “You better be nice.”
“An angel.” He winked and I released him, not believing for a second that when it came to Gavin he was capable of being anything close to an angel.
“You ready?” Gavin asked, running his eyes over me from head to toe behind Drew’s back. His way of telling me that he was sticking to his promise.
I tried to ignore it, giving Drew a push. “Get out of here and go build me some bombs. I’ll see you later.”
“Something every man dreams of hearing from a girl.” Drew covered his heart with his hand as if he was sincerely touched by my comment, and headed for the kitchen door. “Come on.” He waved over his shoulder for Gavin and Oscar to follow him.
“You boys behave,” Luke called out to them just before the front door slammed shut. When he heard Drew’s truck start he shook his head. “Those two are going to be the ones who give me a heart attack one day. I’m tellin’ ya, the tension is so high that my blood pressure goes up just being in the same room with them together.”
I hurried over and gave Luke a pat on the shoulder. “T
hey aren’t that bad! It’s more annoying and juvenile than it is serious. I don’t think they would really hurt each other.”
“I realize that, but the bickering is endless. It makes me wonder if it’s worth it to have Gavin on this mission.”
“We do need him,” I replied. “As much as it would help the situation for him not to be around, we do need him.”
Luke nodded and began rolling up the blueprints. “Nicholas and I are going downtown to recon the area again. I want you girls to go down to the ranges and practice for a while. Tonight we will restock the ammo again.”
“All right, Grandpa.” I gave him a quick kiss on the cheek.
Alice left her clips on the counter and opened the fridge. “Do you want me to prep anything for dinner?”
Luke shook his head. “I’ll take care of it when I get back.” Luke liked to cook and you could tell he enjoyed it by how good the meals tasted, but he and Alice were at war for the kitchen. They seemed to have come down to some kind of compromise where Alice is allowed to bake and Luke takes care of the meals.
“All right, be sure to let me know if you need me to do anything.” She shut the fridge and went back to the counter with Christina.
“I will.” Luke rose with the blueprints rolled up and stashed under his arm. “We’re heading out now. Call me if you need me.”
Nicholas followed him out. “See you girls later.”
Christina finished up with her last clip and stacked the ammo boxes. “Okay, girls, let’s go practice.” She holstered her gun and slipped some of the clips into her purse.
Grabbing my bow and quiver from the corner of the kitchen where they were propped up, I slung them over my shoulder. “I’m ready.”
We walked over to the range armed to the hilt with guns, swords, my bow and quiver, and one very heavy backpack full of ammo. “Christina, why didn’t you bring your car?” I moaned under the weight of my backpack.
“Because I happen to like walking.” She hefted her own pack by the shoulder straps.
I eyed her feet. “Even in those torture devices?” She had on a pair of strappy wedge sandals that were about three inches tall. “Aren’t your feet cold?”
“No,” She shook her head. “I’ve learned to endure any type of weather for the sake of beauty and fashion.”
The Arcadia Falls Chronicles: Omnibus (Books 1-6) Page 12
