“Fine, but can I come in thirty minutes? I want to shower.”
“I’m not leaving you here alone,” Charlie said. “Vampires know you’re in the country.”
Lucien began to remove his jacket. “I’ll stay.”
“No,” Eve said, a little too hurriedly. “You go. You need to be there.”
Lucien eyed her suspiciously.
“I’ll have Marshall send a guy.” Charlie dialed a number on his cell phone and stepped outside to make the call.
“Seriously, Lucien. Go. If I’m not there in thirty minutes, you can come back for me, all right?”
“Something’s going on with you. What are you not telling me?”
She took his hands in hers. “Nothing. I will see you soon. Hey, and thanks for the necklace. I can’t tell you how much it means to me.”
Charlie stepped back into the room. “Marshall’s sending over two men. They will be here in ten minutes.”
“We can leave when they get here,” Lucien said.
Eve huffed. “Don’t be ridiculous. You’re wasting time.”
“Let’s go, Valium,” Charlie said. “The sooner we destroy those boxes and find Aiden, the sooner all of our lives can go back to normal.”
Lucien hesitated briefly. “Fine.” He pulled Eve into his chest for a quick hug. “Hurry up, okay?”
She nodded.
Reluctantly, he let her go, but as Charlie drove him to the Deific, Lucien couldn’t shake the feeling that something more had happened than Eve was saying, something about the wolf.
Charlie pulled up near the warehouse and parked between two buildings. The sky was overcast, not enough to rain, but enough to block the sun.
“Alana followed the truck to that warehouse,” he said, pointing across the street to a red brick building. It looked old, and the only two windows on each side of a loading dock were broken.
“Were you planning on watching the building from here?” Lucien asked.
Charlie looked around. “Is there something wrong with that? We’re well hidden.”
“I am, you’re not. Any vampires within one block will hear your heartbeat.”
“That’s really annoying, you know that?” Charlie unbuckled his seat belt and reached into the back seat. He pulled out a backpack and unzipped the top. “I’ll go on a roof top a couple of blocks over and watch from there. You stay here. Here’s a radio. We’ll contact each other only if absolutely necessary, okay?”
Charlie’s cell phone rang. Eve’s voice was on the other end. It had been exactly twenty-seven minutes.
“I’m here, Charlie. Will you let Lucien know?”
Lucien wondered why she had called Charlie and not himself. This made him feel even more uneasy. She was avoiding him, but why?
“Sure. Get feeling better," Charlie said. "Can I speak with Marshall for a minute?”
A moment later, a scruffy male voice asked, “What can I do for you, Charlie?”
“Watch out for Eve, all right?”
“Of course.”
“Also, have everything ready for tonight. I want blueprints and the name of whoever owns the warehouse. And make sure Alana is there. I want her in on this.”
“Easier said than done.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Charlie asked.
“We haven’t seen her for two days and she’s not answering her phone.”
“Should we be worried?”
“I don’t think so. Ever since Michael died, she’s been taking off, but she always comes back.”
“Well, keep trying.” Charlie pocketed his phone.
“Are you sure Eve’s safe there?” Lucien asked.
“There’s nowhere safer that I know of.” Charlie opened his door. “Quit worrying. You can call and check on her later.”
***
After wasting an entire day watching an abandoned warehouse, Lucien found himself sitting in a small conference room listening to Charlie babble on about different strategies. He tried to stay focused on what was said, but it was hard to do, especially when all he wanted to do was check on Eve who was still in the upstairs room with the door closed.
In front of the conference room, a blown-up blueprint of the warehouse was pinned to a wall. Five other men and Alana sat with Lucien around a table. Alana’s skin was dark, but her raven-black hair was much darker. She looked as bored as Lucien, but passed the time by sharpening a wooden stake.
“Are there any questions?” Charlie asked, after finishing a lengthy discussion on what each person was supposed to do.
Lucien raised his hand.
Charlie sighed. “What?”
“Why have we wasted our time for the last twelve hours when we could’ve just bombed the place?”
Alana smirked, Charlie frowned, and the others looked at him with a blank expression.
Charlie gritted his teeth. “If you’d been listening, you would know that by observing the place, we’ve learned that there are twenty vampires in and around the building and no humans.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” Lucien asked.
“It means we can’t bomb the place because we want to take one of them alive. We need to find out all we can about where the virus is being manufactured so we can destroy Bodian’s lab. Plus we need to find this Dark Prince. Do you understand, or do I need to go over it again?”
“One more time, please.”
Ignoring him, Charlie picked up what looked like an assault rifle from off a nearby table. “Everybody gear up. Test your headsets before we go. We need to make sure there are no mistakes.”
On the way out, Lucien stopped Charlie. “I’m going to go check on Eve. I’ll be right back.”
“She’s been in that room all day. Let her rest. She could use it after everything she’s been through.”
Lucien looked up the stairs and focused his hearing. The steady rhythm of a heartbeat echoed down. She was asleep.
Charlie opened the door to go outside. “Seriously, leave her alone for a while. We’re going to be back in a few hours. You can see her then.”
“Let’s go,” Alana snapped as she passed.
“It’s good to see you again, Alana,” Charlie called after her.
Lucien glanced one last time toward Eve’s door. Something big was bothering her, that he was sure of. But he could only solve one problem at a time. Clean up the mess from his past, then he could focus on helping Eve.
40
Lucien ducked behind a building with Charlie by his side, the brick warehouse only feet away.
Charlie spoke into his headset. “Get ready, ladies. In and out as quickly as possible. On my mark. One … two …”
Lucien moved past him before he could say three. He walked to the front entrance, completely ignoring Charlie’s plan. A vampire guard stepped out to meet him, but Lucien didn’t give him a chance to speak. He withdrew a wooden dagger from his sleeve and stabbed him in the heart. A second guard rushed him. Lucien crouched low, ready to fight, but before he could, a blast of electricity came from behind Lucien, rendering the charging vampire unconscious.
Lucien gritted his teeth and turned around.
Charlie lowered his gun. “Sorry to ruin your fun, Lucien, but we need one alive. Tie him up.”
A tall blonde man moved quickly to the vampire on the ground.
Glass shattered from the other side of the building. Charlie’s men must have heard the commotion and assumed it was time to enter. Lucien lifted the garage bay door. The warehouse was pitch black.
Charlie was behind him, searching for a light switch. “Where is it? It should be here.”
Lucien peered into the massive room using his vampire vision.
When Charlie couldn’t find the main lights, he whispered into his headset, “Lights on.”
From across the warehouse, three small streams of lights appeared. Charlie stepped in front of Lucien, but Lucien stopped him. “Tell your men to get out of here, now!”
“Why?”
He aimed the gun toward the ceiling and fired. The room ignited with sprays of oranges and reds. Lucien heard Charlie’s heart skip a beat when he saw at least a hundred vampires hanging from the ceiling. They were staring hungrily at them. Salvia dripped from their mouths, and several hissed.
“Pull out!” Charlie yelled to his men, but the vampires were already dropping from the ceiling like flies. Several electric guns fired, but there were too many of them.
A man on the other side screamed. Lucien moved to help him, but Charlie pulled him back and proceeded to bark orders into his headset. Charlie kept his gun pointed at the opening of the door, and when vampires poured out, he fired along with three other men.
More gunfire popped from the rear of the building. Alana was nearby, kneeling over an open black case.
He jogged over to her. “What are you doing?”
She withdrew a rocket launcher and positioned it on her shoulder.
“I liked your plan better,” she said as she pulled the trigger.
A missile shot out and exploded into the side of the building. Charlie and the others were thrown back several feet. Alana reloaded and fired again. The blast from this one threw both of them to the ground, but Alana quickly recovered and scrambled forward to load the gun again.
Lucien sat up. The warehouse was completely engulfed in flames, only the screams of vampires escaped. He rushed to stop Alana from reloading, but she pushed him back.
“Get away from me!”
She was about to pull the trigger again, but Lucien knocked her to the ground and jumped on top of her. She struggled against him.
“What’s your problem?” he yelled over the roaring flames.
“Get off me,” she growled.
“Will you be good?”
Alana glanced away, but she didn’t argue. Lucien stood and stretched his hand out to help her to her feet, but she jumped up on her own and stormed away.
Charlie came up behind him breathing heavily. “These were the same group of vampires that killed Michael.”
Then Lucien understood her anger. If anything ever happened to Eve, he would destroy everything in his path, too. He watched Alana’s long, black hair disappear around a corner.
“Regroup in front,” Charlie said into his headset. He was pressing his hand into a cut above his right eye.
Four men walked toward them; two never showed up. An unconscious vampire lay next to Charlie.
“Let’s get him back to the Deific where we can question him. We need to find out where they’re manufacturing this stuff.” Charlie turned to a red-headed man. “When it’s daylight, come back to see if you can find Caleb and Lincoln.”
The man nodded, looking grim.
It was three in the morning when they finally returned to the Deific, almost nineteen hours since Lucien last saw Eve. He hurried upstairs, taking the stairs three at a time. He could still hear her steady heartbeat. Very quietly he opened the door. And then he opened it some more, his legs growing weak. The room was empty except for a lap top sitting on top of a bedside table. From its speaker escaped the faint beating of a heartbeat.
“Charlie!” he yelled.
Charlie bounded up the stairs. “What is it?” He looked around the room, confused. “Where’s Eve?”
“That’s what I’d like to know.”
Charlie walked around the room inspecting the closet and windows. “Couldn’t you sense she was in here?”
“I thought she was. I could hear a heartbeat!”
“But there’s no one here. And by the looks of it, I don’t think Eve was here longer than five minutes.”
Lucien turned up the sound of the heartbeat on the laptop. “This is what I heard. Like I said, I thought she was here.”
“She deliberately tricked us. But why?”
Lucien’s mind raced while he tried to figure out where she could’ve gone. This is bad. He shouldn’t have left her alone. He knew something was wrong.
Lucien quickly dialed her number, but it went straight to voice mail.
“What happened this morning?” Charlie demanded.
“She saw a wolf and got frightened. I’ve never seen her so afraid, but she wouldn’t tell me why.”
“A wolf? She’s never mentioned a fear of wolves before.”
“I’m going back to the motel. Maybe she went there.” Or at least left a clue as to where she went.
“I’m going with you,” Charlie said, following after him.
As soon as Lucien stepped out of the car in the motel parking lot, he knew Eve wasn’t there, either. Like he expected, the motel room was empty and on the bed was a note. It read:
Lucien,
I had to do something very important. Hopefully I will be back before you read this. Please don’t worry.
Eve
“Where do you think she went?” Charlie asked.
“I have no idea, but we need to find her.”
Charlie studied the note. “Let’s wait a few more hours before we push the panic button. Eve said she’d return. Let’s give her the chance to do just that.”
“Not with Aiden out there looking for her. She doesn’t know him like I do. Call someone at the Deific and have them start making calls—see if she flew anywhere or took the train. And you start using your psychic gift or whatever it is to see if you can sense anything. I’m going to drive around to see if I can pick up her scent. Meet back here in one hour.” He didn’t give Charlie a chance to argue.
Lucien sped down the empty city streets of Dublin, gripping the steering wheel tight. Where would she go? He thought of the wolf and how frightened she had become. A black wolf. It meant nothing to him. He made a hard right onto a country road. Eve said she had only been to Ireland once so she couldn’t have known anybody here.
Lucien slammed on the brakes. She wasn’t in Dublin. He was wasting his time. He flipped the car around and sped back to the motel.
Charlie was in Eve’s room, speaking into his cell phone. “That’s great, thank you.”
“What did you find out?” Lucien asked when Charlie ended the call.
“Shortly after we left, Eve hired a private jet to take her back to the states, all the way to Manchester, New Hampshire. It must’ve cost her a fortune.”
“That’s where her parents used to live, right?” Lucien said, recalling everything Eve had said about her family.
“More north, but basically, yes. Eve was only there for about three hours before she flew back here on the same jet.”
“When did it arrive?”
“About two hours ago.”
“So she’s here? In Dublin?” Lucien asked.
“We have no reason to think otherwise.”
Lucien tried calling her again, but there was no answer. He groaned in frustration. “Why isn’t she here or at least calling one of us? Can’t you sense anything?”
Charlie shook his head, the muscles in his jaw bulging big.
“Why the hell not?” Lucien said. “Aren’t you supposed to be psychic?”
Charlie threw his up arms. “I don’t know what is going on. Ever since I arrived here, I’ve been off. This place is making me crazy!”
“Argh! So how are we supposed to find her?”
“Wait a minute,” Charlie said. He lifted his finger to Lucien. “You could find her.”
“That’s your brilliant plan? What do you think I’ve been trying to do?”
“No, not like that. The way Eve found you after you got your ass kicked in Seattle.”
“What are you talking about?”
“She never told you?”
“Told me what?”
“That it was us, or her, that saved you that night. How else did you think you got away?”
Lucien was quiet. He remembered the two vampires who had overpowered him by cutting him with a Saranton knife. The wounds wouldn’t heal, letting all the blood drain f
rom his arms. When he had lost consciousness, he remembered being strangely comforted, knowing he would no longer have to endure life. Then, conversely, he had awakened in an alley with his wounds entirely healed. It wasn’t the first time he’d felt something or someone intervene in his life. Suddenly it all made sense.
“It was Eve. All this time she was with me. But how?”
Charlie shrugged. “She never told me exactly how. She just said there was a bond between you two. Whenever she fell asleep or concentrated hard, she could find you. If she could do it, then you should be able to do the same.”
“But vampires can’t use magic.”
“You’re wrong. Henry can, and he’s a vampire. Eve also told me that she could sense magic in you.”
Lucien shook his head, even though he remembered Eve telling him the same thing.
“Would you just try?” Charlie asked. “This is Eve we’re talking about. Just go to sleep and dream about her.”
“I don’t sleep.”
“Right. Well, then just concentrate really hard.”
He cried out in frustration. “We’re wasting time!”
“Do you have any other ideas?”
Lucien sighed and lowered his tight shoulders. “Fine. Leave me alone.”
After Charlie left, Lucien fell back onto the hard bed that still smelled of lilacs in springtime. He couldn’t believe the light he’d been feeling for the last year had been Eve. He thought back to the first time he’d sensed her presence. He had been standing on the pier, watching an approaching storm, when all of a sudden his skin warmed. He’d sensed a light—light was the only word he could use to describe the feeling—but could see nothing. The strange sensation had been so uncomfortable that he’d turned away from it.
If only he would’ve known it was Eve. But then again, if he did know it was her, he probably would have tried to kill her for intruding on his life. Eve knew him so well that she knew she had to make him come to her, slowly and without provocation.
Lucien missed Eve so much his chest ached. He pictured her in his mind: every detail, every stray hair, her smile, the way her hands couldn’t sit still, but most of all, he thought of the way she looked at him with complete trust and unconditional love.
The Devil's Angel (Devil Series Book 2) Page 23
