And suddenly Angelica could think of something that had happened in the last few days. Kline.
Kline had taken her blood. The question was for what reason.
Forty-Eight
Kline watched as the one called Falcon disappeared inside the building. He waited and he didn’t come out.
He retrieved his phone from his pocket and pressed 1.
“The team is all inside.”
Lucilius allowed the words to linger over the line a moment. “Good. Gint has one more task tonight, but this will ensure we have the upper hand.”
“Go ahead as planned?”
“Yes,” Lucilius said. “I’ll deal with Gint. You get me my inside man.”
Kline hung up and scoped out the area. He’d already picked out the one called Echo as his man. He’d simply need to get him away from the group tonight and spend some one on one time with him.
After searching the ground for weak points, he became aware of her nearing heartbeat. He stilled his own and listened.
She’d come for him. Her anger allowing all her senses to be fully developed.
He turned just as Angelica appeared on the roof from the elevator.
“I’ve come to take back what you took from me,” she said, her eyes flashing under the building’s spotlights.
“What do you mean?” Kline asked, fear momentarily crossing him. She planned to fight him, and he didn’t want to hurt her.
“Your little blood sample has caused the entire future to change. I need it back to prevent the Reckoning.”
Kline gazed at her and thought how beautiful she looked angry.
“The sample was already destroyed. It was just enough to perform the test.”
At that moment, Kline flew backward. He fought to regain control midair and rolled himself forward.
“What test? What are you doing with it?” She forced out angrily, assuming a fight stance.
Kline stood and dusted himself off. “You are 93 percent Custos blood. Something we believed impossible.”
“Who are you?” she asked. “Are you a Dark Soldier?”
Kline could see her searching for a weak spot. He needed to take her off the offense, or he’d have to hurt her and they were too close to the end for her to be injured.
“I’m a Custos. A pure-blooded Custos.”
“Liar,” Angelica said, raising him off the ground. “They don’t exist.”
Kline lowered himself to the rooftop. “Why not? Because the Vindica says we don’t? The Vindica has plenty to hide, as I’m sure you will find out now that you are their leader.”
“So let’s say in a crazy moment I was to believe you,” Angelica asked, looking him over. Her thoughts were open to him as she was too angry and volatile to close them off completely. She noticed his height, his eyes, his physique. She searched for something that made him less human, but he’d been chosen to mingle with humans because he resembled them, except for his aging process being all Custos.
“Why do you keep yourselves hidden?”
“The Vindica betrayed us long ago,” Kline said, putting his hands up in a gesture of truce. “We normally live quietly in our tribe. Reximortum has brought my boss here.”
“So… so…” Angelica’s mind was working. “Why were you helping me?”
“Helping you helps my people. Our leader is worse than your Reximortum.”
“Your boss?” Angelica asked, putting her hands down, even though he could still feel the tenseness.
Kline nodded. He’d revealed more than enough for now. He must think of his father. He’d heard nothing from his people to assume his safety. But he also knew it imperative she trust him.
Angelica exhaled deeply. “So exactly what happened to my blood sample?”
“Lucilius, my boss, had a geneticist come in and do a simple test to check how much Custos DNA creates your genetic make up. The sample was destroyed after. The Custos don’t want our blood being made available.”
“What would happen if people were able to get it?”
Kline shrugged. “I haven’t been trained in the field of science. I’m a combat sentry.”
“Okay.” Angelica’s eyes were distant as her thoughts ran with her. “What does it mean to be 93 percent Custos?”
Kline grimaced. “Lucilius wants to test again. He believes the small amount makes it inaccurate. I overheard him say that it would take generations of breeding with Custos to achieve that level. Custos are forbidden to breed with humans, so these situations are monitored.”
“And if it is accurate?”
Kline exhaled slowly. “It means the Custos will not allow you to live freely. Potentially, you are just as much Custos as I am, but you are female. Females are a rarity in our tribe.”
Angelica stared him. “So you’re saying I’d be like Custos property?”
Kline glanced to the streets of New Orleans. The old world colliding with the modernity of technology: all new sights for him when he’d reached New Orleans. “We are not so modern as you. Our tribe follows ancient laws and nothing much changes as things do here.”
“Well, that sure in the hell isn’t going to happen.”
Kline grinned. “My mother didn’t appreciate it much either. She tried to change our customs for women, but Lucilius killed her.”
Angelica’s anger released for the first time. “I need to go before I’m missed, but I think I understand what you want from me now. I will try.”
“Let me show you something before you leave,” Kline said, moving toward her, questioning her with her eyes.
She nodded.
He moved behind her. “Let me teach you to fly.”
“What?” she quivered beneath his touch as he wrapped his arm around her middle.
They rose from the roof and he hovered them, moving them toward the edge.
“The trick with telekinesis is to bend gravity to you.”
They tipped over the side.
“What are you doing?” she asked, clutching him tightly with her arms behind her.
“To go down, use the gravity as a force, imagining it as an invisible floor beneath you.”
Her heart beat fiercely against his arms as he lowered them to the sidewalk below. Her smell intoxicated him and he longed to kiss her neck left bare with her hair blowing wildly about.
And then their feet touched the cement, and she pulled away but stayed within his space to feel his heat. He felt her longing to kiss him and the confusion the emotion brought.
“I must go,” she said finally.
“Good luck,” he whispered, knowing she heard.
Forty-Nine
Voices hummed in Angelica’s ears from all the people gathered behind the yellow crime scene ribbon. She concentrated on not covering her ears with her hands to shut them out. After a forty-five minute standing wait, John’s breathing was labored. His anxiety was contagious though. He’d believed Rex would stop killing the young girls after Angelica had been named Valor, but here they were being summoned to a crime scene.
John tapped his cane on the cement. “He’s coming our way.”
Angelica glanced at the unshaven face strolling their way. His black hair stuck up at odd angles, and his white shirt flapped over wrinkled black pants. He looked a mess but his hardened physique gave the mess a different context.
His gray eyes scanned the gawking people behind the yellow tape. “Thanks for coming John. I needed an answer ASAP before I get off track with the investigation.”
“Not a problem, Gavin. I’ve brought Angelica Acacia to help.”
Gavin glanced over his shoulder toward the hovering officers. “I’ve heard of you.” He nodded his head at her. “We don’t have much time. The victim has the same MO as the others, but she’s not on the list.”
Angelica rubbed her hands together against the chill. “The list?”
John nodded. “Detective Gavin is our insider. He has a memorized list of all Vindica members.”
Gavin shifted from one foo
t to the other, on edge.
“She’s not a member?”
Gavin shrugged. “Possibly, since more of you keep popping up. I need a positive ID though.”
John shifted his weight on the cane. “You said same MO?”
Gavin flipped open a notepad he’d clutched in his left hand. “Young woman, twenty-one, walking alone at night, no physical signs of a struggle, as far as we can tell no fingerprints and the murder weapon is a wooden stake.”
Angelica’s fingertips trembled. “A stake?”
He met her eyes for a moment, but then he returned to studying the movements of the crime scene. “Two others like her, and three other supernatural incidents. Previous five were on the list.”
Angelica’s stomach churned and she was glad he was standing between her and the body. She’d been spared a vision of this staking, probably because she’d been distracted by her search for Kline.
John sighed. “Angelica will need to touch something of the girl’s to tell.”
Panic clinched her insides. For once she hadn’t seen the murder and now she would have to recall it by touching a dead girl’s item.
Gavin studied her. Angelica couldn’t glimpse his thoughts through his thick shield. “Crime scene is all over the area. I can’t have her fingerprints on anything.”
John clutched Angelica’s elbow for a moment for balance. She needed to get him back to Landon House. “If we have to research it the old fashion way, it could take hours or days.”
Gavin shook his head. “I don’t have days. I need to steer the investigation before it goes in a direction we don’t want. Serial Killer status is already on the table, which will bring in outsiders.”
Angelica looked around the scene. Some still glanced in their direction. “Drop your notepad.”
He glared down at her, his eyebrows furrowed. “Excuse me?”
She studied his reflective eyes. She could see the green flecks surrounding his pupil. “Drop your notepad.”
He studied her a moment longer before dropping the notepad which thumped to the sidewalk. Angelica stooped down, her fingers only brushing the notepad. Her fingers connected to the concrete and a spark charged through her body.
He stooped down beside her as the cement rippled under her fingertips. Faint shadows of images layered together, overlapping. Her head throbbed attempting to sort them out.
“When did it happen?” She struggled to get the words past her lips as she felt herself sinking into the muddle of the past, weighed by the centuries of history in the area.
“About 12:30 A.M.”
His smooth hands covered her hands, and she felt an anchor to the present.
She stroked the cement and sunlight eroded. Darkness encased the now empty street. She could feel Gavin’s absorption of the scene, so he was gifted. His thoughts revealed he couldn’t experience visions on his own, but he was able to absorb the visions of others through contact.
Two streetlights cast a dim glow around them. A car horn echoed from a distant street, and a low cloud hovered just above their heads.
The drumming crept into the stillness. Though faint, Angelica scanned the street to spy its entrance. A lone figure approached from the right of St. Peters Street. Her long dark hair flapped in the breeze as she crossed her arms tighter against her chest. She glanced over her shoulder at the empty street, her pace increasing. She felt as though she was being followed. The drumming advanced. Angelica’s eyes burned straining to see the lurking stranger.
The woman stepped under a street lamp and Angelica sucked in her breath at the resemblance. Long black hair, pale complexion, and crystal blue eyes a shade darker than Angelica’s. Below the layer of fear, Angelica felt the young woman’s humanness. She wasn’t Custos or hybrid.
A towering figure clothed in a dirt brown muslin robe loomed against gray brick. Angelica bit her lip as the drumming echoed in her chest. She blinked against the anxiety gripping her, straining to keep her fingertips anchored to the concrete.
The girl stumbled, grabbing her head as she keeled over. She crawled forward glancing over her shoulder. She didn’t understand. Spotting the approaching figure, she stumbled upright, fighting against the pain tearing through her body.
His hand emerged from the folds of the robe and she rose, hovering a foot from the sidewalk.
She cried out as he spun her around. His left hand emerged from the cloak holding a two-inch stake. It levitated moments in the air before he flung it through the air. The woman gasped as she watched it approach and closed her eyes as it pierced through her middle.
Angelica studied the brown cloak as he released her to the ground. His face was not visible in the night’s shadows, but his oversized hand was ornamented with a single silver band. Angelica glanced back at the girl and the pooling blood jolted her hand away from the pavement.
Angelica sank down on her backside. Black spots appeared in the streaming sunlight as bile rose in her throat. She hated it. She never adjusted to the sight of death, of the life draining from a body. She’d seen enough to know it would never be experienced in comfort.
Detective Gavin stood. He was shaky, but Angelica could feel an angriness pulsing. “She didn’t fight back.”
Angelica sighed. He could only see what she rewound, not what she thought. “She didn’t have any gifts. He thought she was…I think he thought she was me.”
Gavin paced the yellow tape. “So she wasn’t on the list, but she has the same killer. I have to say I’m getting tired of not catching this killer. If you can’t handle it, maybe we should try.”
John leaned forward. “That would be a disaster for both parties and you know this.”
“How? That girl lying over there didn’t stand a chance.”
Angelica stood, her legs quivering beneath her. “Here’s where I’m confused. I’ve had visions of these attacks. Louis was murdered by three individuals in black cloaks. Rainy was attacked by one black cloak and so was Laura, the girl out on the Bayou. When Gabney and I were attacked, it was the brown cloak individual, same as these three women. I recognize the heartbeat.”
Gavin stared at the crime scene. “Maybe we’re talking two different perpetrators.”
She lingered over the store sign advertising tourist items and palm readings as she waited for the nauseousness to settle. “And maybe there are two different purposes. We have to know more about the victims.”
Gavin glanced her way. She could sense the queasiness in his gut. He didn’t want to run into her for a while. “I’ll work on that, but I need to get back now. Let me know if you come up with anything.”
She watched him swagger back to the other officers. He had his own ideas about catching the killer though. She’d need to do something before he got himself killed.
John’s grip on her elbow tightened. “Angelica, I’ve only known one other person able to do what you just did and he’s been dead for fifteen years.”
She cringed. “I know.”
“What are you not telling me?”
Angelica’s lip trembled. He’d been her favorite. “I was six, and he took a liking to me. He wouldn’t teach anyone anything because he said everyone was unworthy, but he watched me when Lily did shifts at the diner, and he taught me a few things.”
“I can’t believe he never mentioned you.” John’s grip let up. “Stanley Harrison was a good friend of mine. I spoke to him every week.”
“He died days after we left. He was the only one I tried to warn, but he said he had more talent in his thumb than any dark soldier.”
He’d squeezed her chin, and gave her that big goofy smile he’d give her when she was sad. She’d laughed, believing for once that he was strong enough to survive when they came for him. Remembering may be a Custos trait, but the pain that accompanied the memories felt all too human.
John laughed. “Sounds like Stan. Listen, one day, when you’re ready of course, I would really like to hear everything you remember. I have a feeling we can make sense of things f
or each other.”
Angelica steered Landon down the street, calmness returning as they left the scene behind. “One day sounds good.”
Fifty
Loose ends. So many of them to ensure he achieved success. It all came down to timing though. Preventing the Reckoning involved controlling Valor’s decisions, as the letter from Madame Lulu had confirmed his suspicions and left more than a few problems to solve. Lucilius would have to be dealt with as well, and he’d worked out a solution for that, but first his son must be handled.
Rex waited until the lone patron had cleared the Voodoo shop before he motioned his Dark Soldiers inside.
He heard the shuffling and a crash as something hit the floor from the back storeroom and sent his men to retrieve the culprits.
While waiting, he looked around at all the items cluttering the shelves and thought of how useless these stood against real abilities. If the world knew this, they’d understand real fear. It would do him no good right now for the world to know though, so he must get ahead of the Reckoning.
His men returned with Arneaux and a struggling Simone. Rex had to respect her feistiness. It reminded him of his Lily when they were young during that one squabble at Landon House over some items that had been stolen. Falling in love with her when they were young had been like running up against a brick wall and sticking to it.
“What do you want?” Arneaux asked, fighting his anger.
Rex moved toward them. “I’ve come for the girl, as an insurance policy.”
“My daughter?” Arneaux fought against the soldiers holding him. “You can’t have her.”
“Ah,” Rex said, smiling. “I didn’t say you had a choice, but since I’ve never had a problem with you, I may return her when I’m done. That is if you keep your mouth shut until it is all over.”
Valor: The Custos Saga Page 21
