Will wasn’t so sure of that anymore, not after he’d so publicly made himself a pawn last night. The doubtful look on Aidan’s face said he didn’t much believe it, either.
“I don’t like it. Don’t like you going alone, and don’t like having to sit here and do nothing.”
“You are doing something. If the humans—or even the vampires—start a panic down here, we’re all in trouble. The only way Omega works is if we’re in it for the long haul, we think through a strategy, and everybody stays calm.”
“Holy hell.” Aidan sat on the bed with a huff, then nodded at some inner decision. “OK, where’re you going to start looking?”
Good. Aidan had seen reason. “I figure he went to one of the tunnels last night if he was able to find Glory,” Will said. “I left your greenhouse alone when I burned the houses, thinking he might go there. But I’m going to look for him first in town.”
Krys came out of the bathroom, looking as upset as the rest of them. She had definitely been crying; she hadn’t been turned long enough for the tear ducts to stop working. “Why in town?”
“Because we left something behind, and I’m betting if I remembered it, so will Mirren.”
“What?” Krys sat beside Aidan on the bed. “What’s important enough to go back for when Matthias probably has people all over town?”
“Lucy.”
Aidan dropped his head into his hands with a groan. “Shit. You’re right. I can’t believe we forgot her.”
Will looked at Krys, who was focusing on a spot on the rug. “You know we can’t bring her down here, Krys. And we can’t let her go.”
She nodded. “I know.”
“Can you do it?” Aidan eyed Will with more sharp understanding than was comfortable. Will didn’t know the answer to that question. Truth was, he hoped Mirren got there first and killed Lucy himself.
“Sure, no problem.” He avoided Aidan’s gaze and turned toward the door. “You tried to contact Mirren again since you woke?”
“He’s not answering, but it’s probably because of the distance. Ten miles is about as good as the mental stuff gets, and we’re farther than that. But the bonds are still tight. See if you can find him. You want Randa to go with you?”
Will opened the door but looked back over his shoulder. “Hell no.” Truth is, he could probably use her smarts, but she was too annoying. And if he embarrassed himself by not being able to put Lucy out of her misery, he didn’t want Randa to see it.
Will made his way back to the car by eight and decided to help himself to a dark-blue, Korean-made sedan for his return to .Penton. The ’Vette was a beauty, but it wasn’t made for stealth. He drove dark country back roads and parked the car about two miles east of downtown.
Three times, he sensed movement in the woods and scented other vampires. If he scented them, they also scented him, but so far, no one had cared enough to try tracking him. At Aidan’s house, he circled to the backyard, slipped in the greenhouse, and checked the tunnel beneath it.
They’d been here, both of them, and recently. Will scented blood and tracked it to a woman’s shirt. It smelled of Glory and of gunshot residue. A bullet hole had torn through the shoulder, so it wasn’t a killing wound. Since they weren’t here, he had to assume Mirren had been able to treat the injury, which meant he was still healthy himself.
Once he’d checked the suites to make sure they weren’t there, he went back out through the greenhouse and took the wooded trail downtown. Downtown Penton looked like a bomb had been detonated in the middle of Main Street—or several bombs. The superette was still intact, and most of the small stores on either side of the theater. The municipal building had been turned to rubble.
Will made his way toward the back of the building, coming up short when he felt the cold steel of a gun barrel pressed against the back of his neck. “Welcome back, William.”
He scowled. He’d know that slimy drawl anywhere. “Ford. Nice to see you again.”
“Guess the Slayer should’ve killed me when he had the chance.” He pressed his body against Will’s back, his breath hot on his neck next to the gun. “You know what Daddy promised me if I caught you.” He reached around Will and squeezed his crotch. Will gritted his teeth to keep from gasping in pain. “I have a feeling it’s going to take a long time to break you properly too.”
Will would slit his own throat with his own knife before that bastard touched him for real. “Sounds fun, Ford.” He spoke through clenched jaws. “Ready to go? Haven’t been to Miami in a while.”
“Oh, I’m more than ready, but I think you need to get rid of that smart-ass attitude. This might help.”
Ford’s hand moved without warning. “What—”
The sharp pain hit Will’s back a second after he felt the knife pierce his skin. Shit. His legs gave way, but Ford held him up by the hilt of the knife.
“That’s better. Don’t seem to be laughing too much now.”
The pit of Will’s stomach churned, but he gathered his wits, thinking past the pain. With a grunt, he swung his right leg back, hooked it around Ford’s knee, and jerked it forward. The shorter man fell with a thud, and Will gasped as the knife slid out of his back. The wet stickiness of blood was almost instantaneous, but Will scrambled for his own knife and plunged it into Ford’s chest. He didn’t think about it the way he had in New Orleans. Just angled the knife in and up to pierce the heart. He collapsed next to Ford’s body and tried to regroup. Damn, that hurt.
“Good work, Junior.”
Will had never been happier to hear Mirren’s crabby sarcasm in his life. He looked up to see the big guy himself standing at the back entrance to what was left of city hall. Looking around his shoulder, wearing a shirt he’d swear was his and with her arm in a makeshift sling, was Glory.
“Knew you’d come after Lucy—is she…?” Will didn’t even want to say it.
“She died in the explosion.” Mirren put his arm around Glory and pulled her against him. “We were planning to hit the road, hide out a while. But now that you’re here, I don’t know.” He frowned and looked down at his mate. “What do you want to do?”
A tear rolled down Glory’s cheek. “Take us home. To Omega.”
CHAPTER 40
“Aw, fuck me.” Mirren rolled over and cracked his head against the wall. “Will did this on purpose when he put
us in this room. He bought the furniture.”
Glory laughed. They’d gone through Mirren’s first daysleep in Omega and discovered the hard way when he awoke that the standard-sized double bed wasn’t cut out for anyone his size to do much in other than be unconscious with his feet hanging off.
She kissed him. “We’re going to have to get more creative with the sex, vampire.”
Mirren gave her a look that made her toes curl. “We can do that.”
Glory knew she shouldn’t feel happy. They were living underground now, about seventy people, forty of them vampires. All who had survived the explosions and had been willing to go into Omega. Which meant every vamp had to go a little hungry, and every human had to donate a little more plasma to the greater good.
The whole group would be meeting in a couple of hours, to plan a strategy for getting the people out who wanted to leave and for figuring out a way to survive. Will wanted to go back to his father’s house, feigning a change of heart in order to gather information. So far, Aidan wouldn’t hear of it. No one, even Will, thought he was safe from Matthias anymore.
Cage was a better candidate, Glory thought. He’d come to the US from England only a couple of months ago so nobody on the Tribunal knew him. He hadn’t been in Penton long, but he’d come specifically to be part of Aidan’s scathe. The vampires in Europe, he said, were watching what happened in Penton closely, thinking it might be a model for them to follow until the pandemic vaccine crisis was over. He’d already volunteered to try to infiltrate Matthias’s organization himself, and Aidan was considering it.
Only, the Penton model wasn’t doing s
o well right now. No one knew what Matthias would make of seventy people disappearing into thin air—or how long it would take him to figure out something like Omega existed and begin hunting it. Glory didn’t think it would take long at all. Matthias didn’t strike her as a man to give up easily, nor was he patient.
In the meantime, there were thirty humans here who had to be fed and kept healthy. “So, I have an idea.” Glory sat up in bed, laughing when Mirren tried to turn on his side and almost ended up on the floor.
“Mattress on the ground?” He kicked at the footboard, which resulted in a loud cracking noise.
“Don’t break the furniture. I’m going to take over the food.”
Mirren rolled his pillow into a ball, punched it twice, and stuffed it under his head. “What food?”
“The kitchens here in Omega.” She’d been exploring them while he was daysleeping. “I’ll plan menus that’ll make sure all the people here—well, the ones who eat—stay healthy. Since we have so many fangs to feed, you know.”
Mirren frowned. “You don’t have to—”
What a stubborn man. “I know I don’t have to, but this is what I love to do. Plus, I’ll feel like I’m contributing, and when we get out and are able to set up Penton again, well, I was going to ask you and Will if you’d finance a restaurant for me because we’ll need one. You know, the woman who ran the café, Laurel, went back to Atlanta and—”
“Stop.” Mirren held his hands up.
Yeah, Glory knew what came after that word. “Aren’t you going to slap your hand over my mouth to get me to shut up?”
Mirren raised an eyebrow. “Hell no. Last two times, you bit me and trapped me into a marriage.” He leaned forward until his mouth was a whisper from hers. “Besides, I have a better idea on how to keep you quiet.”
Yeah, well. They’d have a talk about that. Later.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thanks to Eleni, Melody, Jessica, Nikki, and the whole Montlake team for bringing the Penton vampires into the daylight; to Marlene, for always keeping the faith; to Dianne, for both good advice, poster management, and Ludlams; to Amber, for emergency beta reads in the dead of night; and to the Auburn Writers Circle—Larry, Pete, Julia, Mike, Shawn, and Robin: You knew you’d have to hear more “yucks” eventually!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Susannah Sandlin is a native of Winfield, Alabama, and has worked as a writer and editor in educational publishing in Alabama, Illinois, Texas, California, and Louisiana. She currently lives in Auburn, Alabama, with two rescue dogs named after professional wrestlers (it was a phase). She has a secret passion for quilting, reality TV, and all things paranormal. Absolution is the second installment of her sensual and thrilling Penton Legacy series.
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