by S. J. Day
“Hey,” she said, smiling. “We all talked it over and we’ve decided we’re going to stick around tonight. We tried reaching the commandant, but she’s gone for the day. If we had gotten a hold of her and she agreed to let us come back, we would have headed up to Alcatraz. But since we couldn’t reach her, we feel like it is best if we stay. All we have is our reputation. We need to protect it.”
Reed’s hand settled at Eve’s lower back, intensifying the rush of his thoughts in her mind. He wasn’t at all happy with the turn of events.
“Completely understandable,” he said. “And admirable. But Eve’s been called away and won’t be available to join you tonight.”
Setting her boot heel on his toes, she shifted her weight to that side. You’re an ass. You could have at least talked to me about it first.
You’ve been there, done that, he countered, pushing her off his foot with a firm but gentle hand. No more.
Why not? If it’s safe enough for them, it’s safe enough for me.
Not as safe as Gadara Tower.
I won’t argue that, but I can speak for myself.
“I haven’t decided,” she said to Linda, smiling, “whether I’ll be leaving or not.”
Reed’s fingertips tickled her spine. “She’s needed in Anaheim.”
“Tonight?” Linda asked, frowning.
“No,” Eve said.
“Yes,” Reed interjected.
Eve shot him a warning glance. “We’ll have to discuss it.”
“Okay.” Linda looked warily between them. “Let me know. We’re going to head over there around midnight. You should be mostly done with whatever you’re doing by then, right?”
“Sure,” Eve said.
“Doubtful,” Reed qualified.
Linda returned to Roger and Freddy, who were cavorting in the empty driveway. Freddy in particular was rambunctious in a way that was out of character with his behavior so far. Eve’s gaze narrowed on him. He caught her looking and settled down.
Reed led Eve back to the house. They went to the men’s side, where Hank had set up shop. The occultist was seated at a folding card table that was serving as a makeshift desk. In the guise of a man, Hank’s gaze met Eve’s.
“Your friends across the street left—”
“—something here for me?” she asked, cutting him off.
He eyed her for a moment, then nodded. “Yes.”
She accepted the compact disc he held out to her. Their fingers touched and he read her, seeing more than she wanted him to. But also what she needed him to see.
“Interesting,” he murmured. “Let me know what you find out.”
She stared at his red hair, thinking of the last redhead she’d talked to. When Hank pulled away, she caught his wrist.
His brows rose. “Clever girl.”
“Will you do it?”
Hank smiled. “Yes.”
Reed moved over to the kitchen, where Montevista had set up a satellite video phone. Eve wondered why they didn’t just use a webcam, but that question would have to wait until later.
Moving down the hall, she returned to the room where she’d seen Richens’s laptop earlier. It was still there, as were all the rest of the men’s bags. She closed the door and sat cross-legged on the floor. It only took a couple of minutes to power up the laptop, then she slid the CD into the drive and waited for the photos on it to load.
Her sister had once told her that she’d hacked a disposable digital camera and used it multiple times on vacation. Eve didn’t ask Sophia how it was done, but she’d asked the Ghoul School kids if they knew. Michelle was familiar with the process, so Eve left Claire’s camera with them.
The photos began to appear on screen, thumb-nailed within some type of photo editing software. Eve skipped over the two of Gadara Tower, and also the ones taken of Monterey Bay and the entrance sign to McCroskey. She clicked directly on the last known photo of Molenaar and Richens, the one taken that morning before they began their excursion into Anytown. With bright eyes and big smiles, the group was arranged like an old elementary school class photo, with two rows of students—men at the top, women at the bottom. Raguel stood regally to the side, his elegance undiminished by his gray sweat suit. The students had all pulled up their sleeves, displaying their armbands for posterity.
Eve blew up the photo and examined each student carefully.
“Bingo,” she whispered.
Her mother hadn’t been able to see the mark on her arm, because it was undetectable by mortal eyes. Secular technology was also unable to register them. So when Eve’s eyes discovered the edges of the mark peeking out around the silver plate of a student’s armband she knew she’d found what she had secretly hoped she wouldn’t—a fake Mark, hiding in plain sight. Only it wasn’t whom she had suspected. It was worse.
Everything fell into place.
“Sneaky. But I caught you.”
She heard footsteps thudding atop the hardwood floor of the hallway. Hitting the eject button on the disk drive, Eve closed the window for the photo software and folded the laptop shut. She scrambled to her feet just as the door opened and he walked in.
“Hollis. What are you doing in here?”
Eve tried to appear nonchalant. “Just checking my e-mail.” But mental images of the corpses of Molenaar and Richens flashed incessantly and something must have shown on her face.
His friendly mien changed. His lip curled and he snarled like a wolf. Another Mark appeared behind him.
Eve feinted to the right, then bolted left, shouting for help. He lunged, tackling her to the floor.
Her skull hit the hardwood and the lights went out.
Reed stared at the text messages on the screen of Raguel’s smartphone and felt his stomach knot.
KIEL, SARA—13:08—1K
On my way. Will arrive at LAX early tomorrow A.M.
Ask Abel to turn on his phone.
He growled. There was so much shit piled on him right now, he could barely breathe through it. Cain was running through his brain on the periphery, using his experience to deal with the influx of information from the seraphim and handlers. It kept Reed edgy and infuriated. Why hadn’t he been selected for advancement, when Cain obviously wasn’t capable of functioning without his help? “Montevista, I think—”
A yelp from Eve at the rear of the house stiffened his spine to the point of pain. Midpivot, a deluge of information poured into his mind, a confusing disjointed morass that made him stumble.
He was in motion before his brain fully understood why, rounding the makeshift dining table and bolting toward the hallway. His shoulder bumped into Hank’s, who was also responding, and his heel was clipped by a pursuing Montevista. They were nearing a bottleneck when Eve stepped out to the hallway from one of the bedrooms. Seeing the stampede, she winced and looked sheepish.
“Are you all right?” Reed barked, hating the fear that gripped him.
“I’m fine.”
“What are you screaming for, then?”
“Uh . . .” She shifted nervously. “Big spider. Huge.”
Montevista exhaled and leaned into the wall. “You scared the crap out of me, Hollis.”
Hank’s voice came low and somber. “Anything I should know?”
She frowned at him for the length of a heartbeat, then her face cleared. She smiled. “No. Nothing.”
He nodded and walked away.
“You slayed a dragon,” Reed said, curious enough to probe her thoughts but finding her as calm as if she were dozing, “but freak out over a spider?”
“I told you it was big,” she said defensively.
He released his tension with a frustrated exhale and caught her elbow. “Come on, then. Show me where it is and I’ll move it outside.”
He reached for the doorknob.
“No!” She stayed him with a viselike grip on his wrist. “I’m over it. Forget it. Really.”
Reed stared for a long moment. “You sure?”
She nodded. “Yes, I�
��m sure.”
That worked for him. He had enough to worry about without adding spiders—big or not—to his list. Like preparing both himself and Eve for Sara . . . If it was possible to do anything more than brace themselves for the impact. “The conference call is about to start. You coming?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” she said, smiling.
They headed back to the dining room.
CHAPTER 17
It seemed like hours before the kennel finally fell silent. Alec pushed up from the wheeled, black-leather office chair and shifted into the hallway. The destruction in the main area was plentiful. Blood and tissue covered every surface. Very few of the pups remained in recognizable form. Most were in pieces. Only two were capable of movement—a faint twitch of a tail and an ear. They’d be dead within minutes due to copious blood loss.
Alec tried to shift into the underground dog run, but was prevented by more warding. He could shift freely once he was inside, just as he was able to shift within the kennel. It was the gaining entry part that caused trouble.
Returning to the office, he activated the hydraulic lifts in the cages and shifted to the nearest one. He was lowered into the maze, his nostrils flaring at the scent of death and decay that permeated the space. He moved carefully through the vast underground complex, which was dimly lit and cooler than the kennel above. The walls here were metal, the ductwork-covered ceiling low, and the floor more polished concrete. He cursed when he found a liquid nitrogen tank where embryos were being stored.
“I don’t want to know how Charles got the goods to make those,” he muttered to himself.
He searched the lablike room and found a heating element. Five minutes later the various cans that held the embryo straws were sitting in a deep metal tray set atop the hot plate. Alec wasn’t going to take the chance that they might be rescued. The last thing the world needed was a legion of rampaging, ravenous, indestructible-by-Marks hellhounds running around. He would rather burn the place down, but until he killed Charles, he didn’t want to risk any smoke signals. In this case, literal ones.
Satisfied that he’d crippled the breeding operation, Alec took the subterranean tunnel that led to the garage of Charles’s castlelike home. Because the structure was built atop a small rise in the center of the community, the Alpha was both cushioned from his enemies and able to view the extent of his domain.
From the exterior, the home was majestic and lovely. Gray brick covered the exterior, which was distinguished by two turret-shaped corner staircases that connected the three stories. A large, rolling green lawn and imitation gas lamps lining the driveway gave the home a storybook quality. A coat of arms featuring a black diamond decorated the space above the front double doors. There was nothing to tell mortals that a demon ruled from here, quietly biding his time until he could attempt to destroy the world.
Pausing a moment, Alec took time to appreciate his situation. While there were plenty of mortals filtering through the gated community—postal workers, gardeners, pool cleaners, baby-sitters, and the occasional police patrol—it wouldn’t have been easy for him to get this far as a Mark. And getting to the pups? That would have been impossible. Yet Jehovah had given him this task—a task he’d needed an archangel’s gifts to accomplish.
The Lord worked in mysterious ways . . .
Alec shifted into a lower-floor guest bathroom. The stench of rotting souls was overwhelming in the house, as was to be expected. Every pack member traversed the halls here on a regular basis and Charles—an unmated wolf—was known for his insatiable appetite for sex, which kept a large quantity of women in the house.
That was why Alec started in the master bedroom.
The private domain of the Black Diamond Pack Alpha suited a wolf. Wood paneled walls, tan carpet, and forest green drapes gave the impression of the great outdoors. As Alec expected, two women lounged there, naked and decorated with details that betrayed one as a witch and the other as a wolf. A console at the foot of the bed was raised, revealing a hidden television. They were too busy giggling over a talk show to notice him standing in the shadows of the unlit sitting room. Charles was absent.
Alec kept moving, shifting from room to room, growing more uneasy by the moment. Aside from servants, the home appeared to be empty. Where the hell was everyone? When an Alpha was in residence, his home was usually crammed.
Pausing in the office, Alec searched the desk but found nothing of note. Just rosters, dues spreadsheets, mating and birth records—the tools of a healthy pack. So he returned to the bedroom, shifting to a seated position atop the console television with his legs dangling in front of the screen. He spread his ebony wings with their gold tips and waved at the naked ladies.
The women screamed.
He knocked out the spiky-haired blonde with a single burst of lightning from his fingertips to her chest. He leaped atop the brunette and covered her mouth with his hand. She stared up at him with wide, horror-filled hazel eyes. Every infernal with the most basic of training knew who he was on sight.
“Howl,” he warned darkly, “and I’ll stab you through the heart with a flame-covered silver sword. Nod, if you understand.”
She moved her head in the affirmative, her tousled curls tumbling around a pretty face.
“Where’s Charles?” He removed his hand.
“He left.”
“You should try telling me something useful,” he murmured. “Like where he was headed.”
“I don’t know, Cain. I swear. He left in a hurry.”
“Why?”
“Whatever the reason, it has to be important. When he’s in full rut, nothing can drag him away.”
“What was said to get his attention?”
“Devon, our Beta, said he had an important phone call. Something about Timothy.”
“Who’s Timothy?”
“His kid.” She swallowed hard. “The one you killed.”
Alec’s gaze narrowed. “Did you overhear the call?”
She pointed to the sitting room. “He took it in there. I couldn’t hear him, but he wrote something down. Then he dressed and grabbed a change of clothes. That’s all I know. I promise.”
An Infernal promise was worth about as much as used toilet paper, but the smell of the wolf’s fear was potent. If there was anything that passed as truth with Infernals, it was that they’d do anything to save their own skin.
“How long ago?”
“Twenty minutes, maybe.”
Touching her neck, he sent a surge of power through her that rendered her unconscious. He leaped from the bed and moved into the next room. There was a small writing desk with an old-fashioned corded phone. A blank pad of paper and a pencil waited for the next note or message, while a desk lamp sat unlit and oddly placed, as if it had been shoved aside hurriedly.
He picked up the pad and pencil. Rubbing the tip of the lead lightly over the page, he revealed the imprint of the prior messages.
Right at commissary
Right on Pvt. Mitchell
Left on Garrison Way
White van, black Suburban
Directions to the duplex where Eve was staying. Why? The consensus was that Charles was responsible for the terrorizing of Raguel’s class. If that were true, why would he be jotting down Eve’s location as if he didn’t know it? And why would that information, which he should have already had, cause him to leave two willing women in bed?
Alec shifted back to the motel. He freed Giselle, whom he’d once again cuffed to the sink. “Come on.”
She scrambled to her feet and ripped the gag from her mouth. “Is he dead?”
“Not yet. But the pups are.”
“All of them?” Her tone was both awed and horrified.
“Yes.”
“Oh, man . . .”
A surge of alarm struck him, a rolling wave of emotion from Eve that halted him midstride. He reached out to her, but the sensation was gone as quickly as it had come, leaving behind a quiet, peaceful stillness.
�
��Hurry up,” he bit out, urged to haste by the mystery.
“Where are we going?”
“Monterey.” He returned to the bedroom.
“Yay!” She clapped. “That’s south. We’re finally getting somewhere.”
“Don’t get too excited.” He touched her and tried to shift to the other room, just to see if he had the skill to move them both. He made the trip. She didn’t. He shifted back, cursing.
Giselle’s eyes were lit with amusement. “Doesn’t work on Infernals. Our cooties don’t travel well with angels.”
“I’ll have to leave you here, then.” He glanced at the clock. It was shortly after four. “The way things are going, we might all be dead soon. You should go do something you always wanted to do before you croak.”
“Ha! Archangels can’t die. And you’re not getting rid of me. Cain of Infamy turned into Cain the Archangel, and I had to be in the vicinity when it happened. I’m half dead already. At least with you I have a chance of saving the other half.”
Alec pulled the car keys out of his pocket and set them on the dresser. “Archangels aren’t invincible.”
“Might as well be,” she scoffed. Then a stunned silence permeated the space between them. “Wait a minute . . . Something happened to one of them, didn’t it? Which one?”
“You can head down to Anaheim. I’ll let them know you’re coming.”
“That’s why you’re an archangel now, isn’t it?”
He pulled out some cash and set it next to the keys. “Grab everything that’s here and take it down with you. I don’t want to have to come back here, if I can help it.”
“Cain, damn it! Talk to me.”
He moved into the adjoining room and took a last look around, praying that he wasn’t forgetting something. With the enormity of information passing through him—from the handlers underneath him and the seraphim above him—he was barely keeping his own thoughts straight.
“Are you a machine?” she cried. “Don’t you care at all about what this means? I’m not ready for the world to end yet.”
