Shadowed

by Connie Suttle

  "Adele, I wish I could be there to help."

  "I know, honey. But Ashe will be there to help in a couple of weeks, and maybe Sali too, if he wants."

  "He wants to—he's already said so," Ashe said, brightening immediately. "And it doesn't hurt that he can spend some of his money on lunch at Betsy's." Ashe didn't say that Sali was jealous because Marco would get to spend his summer in Dallas, working for Mr. Winkler. "Dad, have you heard anything else on Amy's murder—the cashier from the grocery store?"

  "No, son. But it's a little too soon, yet. Have some patience—you've already helped more than anyone expected. And just so you won't worry, those two agents will have compulsion placed before they get away from the area."

  "Is that necessary, Dad? I think they can keep secrets."

  "We're not going to take chances." The finality of Aedan's tone informed Ashe that there would be no argument on the subject.

  "How ticked off are Chad and Jeremy gonna be over having their cars taken away? I guess Chad's was just a hypothetical car at this point, but it's almost the same."

  "If they bother you, go straight to the Principal or a teacher right away."

  "Like Principal Billings would do anything." Ashe was back to depression.

  "Ben Billings is contractually obligated to protect all the students, not just some of them," Adele said, lifting her plate and soup bowl off the table and carrying them to the dishwasher.

  "Contractually obligated?" Ashe shook his head. "That's not the Principal I know. He was almost dancing a jig when he handed that note to me last year."

  "Ashe," Aedan's voice held warning.

  "All right. I'll go study for my History final." Ashe carried his dishes to the dishwasher and loaded them in before slumping toward the steps leading to his downstairs bedroom.

  * * *

  "I hate grounding him," Adele said once Ashe's bedroom door closed downstairs.

  "It's like grounding an adult family member," Aedan nodded. "Hard to do and harder to enforce. I get the idea that Marcus wouldn't have been so harsh with Sali if he hadn't gone off with Ashe."

  "What?" Adele stared at Aedan in alarm.

  "I think he doesn't trust what Ashe can do, somehow."

  "But he's gotten into those crime scenes because Ashe can do those things," Adele snapped, rising and hugging her arms tightly about her waist.

  "He's ex-special ops, Adele. He can respect a weapon, but he doesn't have to trust it."

  "You're calling our son a weapon, Aedan? Listen to yourself."

  "Do you think for one moment that others wouldn't see him the same way? I spoke with Trace and Jason, Adele. They told me they've seen the way those two agents—Lawford and North—look at our son after he gets them into those crime scenes. That's why compulsion will be placed; Nathan and I have discussed it already. Their Director is retiring, and if he thinks to place our son in danger, he'll get a visit as well."

  "Aedan, one day Ashe is going to be an adult and he's going to make up his own mind. Would it be so bad if he worked for the government like some vampires and werewolves do? I imagine they'd pay him well for his efforts."

  "My love, that decision may be taken out of our hands."

  "You mean the Council, don't you?"

  "Or the Grand Master. He knows whatever William Winkler knows, you can bet on that."

  "I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but I'd rather see him work for the Grand Master."

  "I'm hoping the Council doesn't learn of his talents." It was Aedan's turn to rise and pace. "Radomir owes Ashe blood debt and has promised not to volunteer the information, but if it is requested, he will not only be compelled to give it, he will be punished for withholding it." Aedan referred to the Council Enforcer who'd come the previous year to investigate the murders in the Cloud Chief and Cordell area.

  "I'll have nightmares, now," Adele moaned. "Tell me they won't take my boy away. He's so young. They can't—they won't," she didn't finish. The possibilities were too horrible for her to consider.

  "Vampire law states that someone must be eighteen years of age before the Council may conscript. That age should be raised, in my opinion. Meanwhile, we will attempt to keep the boy from their sight as long as we can."

  "He's not yet fourteen and already he's lost so much of his innocence, going off to those crime scenes. Ashe has been hunted and shot by that psychopathic teacher and those aberrations he associated with—and now the Council may take my child away? Turn him into something even I might not recognize?"

  "I was an Enforcer. Was I so terrible when you met me?"

  "You're different and you know it."

  "Perhaps not. I have to go, love. Trace and Jason are waiting to be relieved."

  * * *

  Ashe floated over the five mobile homes lined up neatly in the pasture behind his home. His father was joined by Nathan Anderson as they walked toward the small tent Trace and Jason had erected to provide shade during warm afternoons. Ashe, as mist, had zipped past the tent, finding Marcie Pruitt there, talking with Jason and Trace about the worms they were having trouble with in the vegetable garden. He'd heard Marcie ask both werewolves if they'd like to come to her home for dinner. Jason accepted, Trace didn't.

  Figuring that his mother might check on him soon, Ashe swept through the nearly moonless night, misting through the roof of his home and then through the floor of the kitchen to get to his bedroom underneath. Sure enough, his mother was just about to knock on his door.

  "Ashe, are you studying?" Adele asked through the solid wood of his bedroom door.

  "Yeah." Ashe opened the door after becoming solid again. His computer showed a page depicting the Civil War in the background.

  "If you want a snack before going to bed, let me know," Adele smiled at her son before closing the door again. Ashe knew she was checking to see if he were doing exactly what he had been doing—turning to mist and getting away from the house. Shivering a little over almost getting caught, Ashe sat down at the computer and began making notes on the Battle of Antietam.

  * * *

  "I overheard some discussion in Principal Billings' office this morning—I think the teachers are beginning to pick their favorite essays and argue their case," Cori set her tray down, brushed long blonde hair back one-handed and plopped down next to Ashe during lunch.

  "Hear any names mentioned?" Sali looked up from his tray of spaghetti and meatballs to stare at Cori.

  "Not really," Cori hedged, using a knife to quarter the large meatball a cafeteria worker had set atop a mound of spaghetti. "But Mrs. Rocklin and Mr. Dodd are arguing for the same paper. And I heard the word him, so it has to be one of the guys."

  "Bet it's Rowdy," Sali muttered dispiritedly. Rowdy Hankins was a senior, an A student and had been accepted into Brown University. Word had it that one of the faculty there was a werewolf just as Rowdy was, and the Grand Master had cleared the way for the studious young wolf.

  "Sali, don't get all depressed," Ashe said. "Want my roll?" He pushed his tray across the table toward Sali.

  "Sure." Sali grabbed the yeast roll off Ashe's tray and added it to his own. "But a roll doesn't make up for a cell phone," Sali stuffed spaghetti in his mouth.

  "Yeah." Ashe began to wind lengthy noodles around his fork. "Man, being grounded sucks rocks."

  "Losing the essay contest sucks boulders," Sali offered.

  "It sucks in Regolithic proportions," Ashe countered.

  "You know, I'm not even going to ask what that means," Cori speared a quarter meatball and ate it. "Marco will be here around the time you two come off your prison sentence."

  "Nobody knows the trouble I've seen," Sali sang off-key.

  "Maybe we can hook Mr. Thompson up to the bars of your jail cell and bust you out," Ashe laughed.

  "Mr. Thompson in a harness? Are you kidding?" Sali grinned at the imagery. "I thought people hooked horses up for that."

  "Well, there's no chance of getting Wynn or her mom, so you'll have to settle
for a buffalo," Ashe ate another forkful of spaghetti.

  "Cause the itty, bitty bat is in jail too," Sali said.

  "Hey, now," Ashe pointed his fork at Sali.

  "Remind me again whose fault it is that the werewolf and his bat sidekick are in the slammer?"

  "Oh, yeah," Ashe said.

  "I'd have done the same thing if I could," Cori said. "It was a nice gesture, Ashe. Too bad you got caught."

  "Well, confessed," Sali said. "After that cashier at Jerry's got killed. We saw her that afternoon."

  "That's what Daddy said," Cori nodded. "Amy always talked to us whenever we went in to buy anything."

  "She talked to everybody. Knew everybody, too," Ashe agreed. "That may have gotten her killed."

  "That gives me the shivers—that being so friendly gets you dead." Cori shook herself.

  "How's Marco?" Ashe changed the subject.

  "Ready to take on a werewolf and a shapeshifter," Cori glanced up in time to see Jeremy and Chad staring at Ashe.

  "You're dead meat," Chad hissed at Ashe before Mr. Dodd began walking toward Ashe's table. Jeremy hauled Chad away before Mr. Dodd could catch any of the conversation.

  "Everything all right here?" Mr. Dodd stood at the end of the cafeteria table, his eyes on Ashe and Cori.

  "Yeah. Everything's fine," Ashe shrugged.

  "All right." Mr. Dodd moved away to stop a food fight in its infancy between third-graders.

  "I guess it's a good thing we're grounded right now. We might have a fight on our hands if we weren't," Sali said, turning to watch Chad and Jeremy sit at a table near the cafeteria windows.

  "They're supposed to be grounded too," Cori said. "But Susan Wilkes said she saw them wandering around outside yesterday when Jeremy's mother went into Cordell to run errands."

  "Not surprised," Ashe said.

  "If they have no conscience about setting somebody's house on fire and nearly killing three people, you know they're not going to stay inside," Sali huffed. "Mom watches me like a hawk, now."

  "My mom is a hawk, and she calls or knocks on my bedroom door every half hour," Ashe sighed gloomily, recalling how he'd almost been caught after misting out of the house the night before.

  "I heard something else," Cori toyed with her fork.

  "What's that?" Ashe and Sali both turned to the pretty, blonde senior.

  "That your Aunt Marcie and Mr. Landers had dinner together last night."

  "Yeah. I overheard Mom and Aunt Marcie talking about Jason," Sali said. "I think Aunt Marcie likes him a lot. Says he's a gentleman."

  "You knew and you didn't tell anybody?" Cori snapped at Sali.

  "Hey, now, panther-pants," Sali snorted. "Is it any of your business?"

  "Don't call me that." Cori rose in a huff and stalked toward the tray drop.

  "Sali, don't pull Cori into your feud with Wynn and Dori," Ashe warned. "Cori is my friend, too."

  "Can't help it," Sali muttered, staring at his nearly empty plate. Ashe watched as Cori walked stiff-backed out of the cafeteria before turning back to Sali.

  "That's Marco's girlfriend, in case you're forgetting," Ashe added softly.

  * * *

  "This is more amusing than I initially imagined," Renegar was busily crashing cars in one of Ashe's video games. "It is much better when I know I am not actually damaging anything."

  "Like that's possible," Ashe leaned over and stabbed his controller violently, doing his best to compete with Renegar, who was the first real video game competition he'd had in a while.

  "It is certainly possible with my kind—we are quite powerful," Ren was moving along with Ashe, trying just as hard to compete. "You are quite good at this—I thought it might be simple to defeat you."

  "Thought you'd be bored, huh?" Ashe jerked his hand and more automobiles crashed.

  "Truthfully, yes."

  "I'm having fun, too. For the first time in a long time at this," Ashe admitted.

  "I like having a friend outside my race," Ren chortled as he crashed several automobiles at once. "This demolition game is quite entertaining."

  * * *

  Elizabeth waited until her mother was out of the house before searching through Mary Ellen Frasier's purse for a credit card. Elizabeth's father was watching a baseball game on television and oblivious of his daughter's stealthy rustlings. There had to be a dress shop in Cordell—had to be—and Elizabeth was going there just as quickly as her mist would take her.

  * * *

  "Francis, where is Elizabeth?" Mary Ellen had arrived moments earlier and failed to find her daughter inside the house. Lizzie wasn't outside—there'd been no sign of her and those two werewolves were sitting beneath their tent, watching Edward, Keith and Bryce toss a football in the newly grown prairie grass surrounding their temporary housing. Francis grunted noncommittally before Mary Ellen's words registered, forcing him to look up from his baseball game.

  "She's here somewhere—Lizzie never went out the door," Francis rose from his easy chair and cast a worried glance at his wife. "Did you check the windows?"

  "All of them. Francis, go get those—men," Mary Ellen couldn't bring herself to say what Trace and Jason were a second time. "The windows and the back door are all locked. She had to walk out the front door." Hysteria found its way into Mary Ellen's words. Francis charged out the door as Mary Ellen screamed Elizabeth's name.

  Chapter 11

  "Got a hit on her mother's credit card here, at Janie's Dress Shop," Nick Lawford directed Trace and Marcus into the dress shop in question. Trace, Jason, Marcus and Micah had all sniffed around the Frasier's mobile home, detecting no fresh scent from Elizabeth. Marcus asked Linda Jansen and Ramona Hill to sit with Mary Ellen; Micah Rocklin stayed in Cloud Chief to keep a close watch on Francis Frasier, who blamed the werewolf guards for allowing his daughter to escape. Marcus contacted Agents Lawford and North, who'd started the wheels of investigation turning immediately. Mary Ellen's credit card was missing from her purse, and a quick check on recent charges led the agents and the accompanying werewolves straight to the only dress shop in the small town of Cordell.

  "May I help you?" Jane Scott, owner of Janie's Dress Shop didn't see men inside her business often. Jane, with salt and pepper gray hair, was stylishly dressed in a pale gray suit she sold in the store. She was folding T-shirts for a display when the four men walked inside her shop.

  "Ma'am, have you seen this girl?" Agent Lawford held up a recent photograph of Elizabeth Frasier. Jane stopped folding for a moment and squinted at the picture.

  "Just this afternoon," Jane nodded. "She spent six hundred dollars here, then stuffed all the clothes she bought inside one of the large tote bags we sell. And then she asked if I would call a taxi for her." Jane snorted at the idea that anyone would think Cordell might have a taxi service.

  "When did she leave? Do you recall?" Lawford asked.

  "Around four-thirty, maybe? Two more customers came in around the same time." Jane finished folding a turquoise T and patted it into place on a display table.

  "Did you see which way she went?"

  "North, I think. Why do you want to know?"

  "Possible runaway, ma'am," Agent Lawford's voice was flat and unemotional. "Stole her mother's credit card and slipped out of the house."

  "The credit card was stolen?" Jane seemed more concerned over that than a runaway teen.

  "She may be in danger," Trace added, since the agents hadn't expressed the urgency of the situation.

  "I'll check with the businesses north of here and ask if they saw her," Marcus walked out the door. Derik North frowned at Marcus' retreating back.

  "I'll go with Marcus," Trace figured they'd gotten all the useful information they were going to get from the dress shop owner. His and Marcus' noses might tell them more than the agents were likely to get.

  "If you think of any other information, let us know," Agent Lawford handed a business card to Jane. Jane blinked, open-mouthed, as the two agents rushed out the door. Depa
rtment of Homeland Security was printed plainly across the top of Nick Lawford's card.

  * * *

  Ren had left two hours earlier and Ashe, unable to explain the discomfort he felt, nearly jumped when his mother knocked on his bedroom door before walking inside. She hadn't been home long; it was after seven and sunset was still more than an hour away.

  "Honey, that was Marcus on the phone," Ashe's blue eyes met his mother's light-brown ones and he shivered.

  Ashe crawled inside the agents' van fifteen minutes later. "Ashe, Elizabeth Frasier got away from us somehow, even though we can't get any fresh scent that shows she left the house. Went straight to Cordell and bought a bunch of clothes," Trace said as Ashe buckled in and Marcus closed the door.

  "I was afraid of this," Ashe murmured.

  "Afraid of what?" Marcus glared at Ashe from his seat in the center of the van.

  "I can turn to mist and mindspeak, and I'm like them," Ashe jerked his head toward the row of mobile homes behind his house. "It makes sense that at least some of them might be able to do those things, too."

  "This is a nightmare," Marcus growled and turned to face the front again.

  "You think that girl turned to mist and got out that way?" Trace asked softly.

  "It makes sense; that's how I got grounded," Ashe grumped unhappily.

  "It sure does," Trace settled back in his seat. "Mrs. Pruitt is helping us guard the rest of those kids while we go to the last place the girl was seen."

  The last place Elizabeth Frasier was seen ended up being a gas station and convenience store on the northern edge of Cordell. Agent North had stayed behind earlier to question the employees. They'd watched Elizabeth Frasier climb into a sports car with two young men after tossing her new tote bag into the back seat.

  "The car was black, but the right front fender had gray primer paint on it and it hadn't been repainted yet," the owner of the service station said. "The girl came in askin' us if we'd drive her someplace, but we're not that stupid."

  "Did you recognize the boys?" Ashe, Trace and Marcus walked up as Derik North asked the question.