Dark Descendant (30 page)

better.

The full moon rode the sky like a beacon, only the occasional thin cloud dimming its

light. If my powers were moon-based at all, tonight they would be at their peak, and I had to take

advantage of them as best I could. I drove straight to Alexis’s home, the instinct to search there

too strong to deny.

Of course, I couldn’t just pull up in front and leave my car in full view while I went

exploring on foot, so I drove around until I found a church with a convenient parking lot. My car

looked uncomfortably conspicuous in the otherwise empty lot, and I had to walk the better part

of a mile to get back to Alexis’s house, but it was the best I could do.

I’d packed a bunch of odds and ends that might be useful—including my gun and my cell

phone—in a light black backpack, which I slung over my shoulders as I began the trek that I still

worried was a waste of time. The temperature was on its way down to freezing. I wished I’d

worn something warmer than lightweight black fleece, and I walked at a pace just short of a jog

to keep my teeth from chattering.

It was a long, tense, freezing walk. On foot in a ritzy neighborhood, dressed all in black

and carrying a gun in my backpack, I didn’t dare let anyone see me, so any time I caught sight of

headlights in the distance, I took cover.

By the time I reached the fringes of Alexis’s property, I was sweaty beneath my fleece,

although my cheeks stung and burned from the cold wind and I shivered with chills. I was struck

again by the certainty that Emma was here somewhere, the feeling stronger than ever.

Unfortunately, “somewhere” wasn’t going to do me much good. We couldn’t dig up the whole

place searching for her, so I was going to have to narrow it down.

Crouching in the darkness, I opened my backpack and pulled out a smooth black rock,

small enough to fit in the palm of my hand, but heavy enough to be an effective weapon. Despite the clear sky, the wind whistled briskly through the trees, taking the wind chill down to arctic

levels—and giving me a little cover. I waited for a particularly energetic gust of wind, then slung

my stone at the nearest security camera.

My aim was, of course, dead-on, though I’d packed extra rocks in my backpack just in

case. The blow from the rock didn’t break the camera—that was likely to bring someone out to

investigate—but it bent the mounting enough to point the camera away from my intended path,

creating a blind spot. If someone had been watching at the moment my stone hit, they might still

come to investigate—but they would more likely think the wind was responsible and not want to

venture out into the cold.

Taking a deep breath for courage, I slipped past the camera and onto Alexis’s property.

TWENTY-FOUR

My instincts were still
insisting that Emma was nearby. Unfortunately, I wasn’t having

much luck convincing those instincts to tell me
where
.

At first, I stuck to the woods that bounded Alexis’s property, not because I felt it likely

Emma was buried there, where roots would have made digging difficult, but because it was

easier to stay hidden. I traipsed through those woods for at least forty-five minutes, having no

idea what I was looking for but hoping to God I’d recognize it when I saw it.

No luck. If Emma was buried in the woods, I lacked the power to find her.

I turned my attention to the gardens and lawns that surrounded the house on all sides.

There weren’t any lights on in the house, so it was likely no one would see me if I ventured out

from the cover of the trees. Still, I hesitated to do it. I’d seen what Alexis had done to Steph, and

he’d been interrupted before he could finish. If he caught me trespassing on his property … He

might still technically have an agreement with Anderson, but I doubted that would protect me.

I squatted behind a bush at the very edge of the tree line, trying to work up the courage to

break cover. The cloud cover was growing thicker as the temperature continued to drop. There

were moments when the moon disappeared from view, and I worried that soon the patchy clouds

would turn into a heavy overcast. If I had any moon-driven powers, and if those powers

depended on actually being able to see the moonlight, they’d better hurry up and make

themselves known to me.

I was gnawing my lip indecisively when a flicker of movement off to my right made me

jump and gasp. I was frantically trying to unzip my backpack before I’d even finished turning

toward the sound, cursing myself for not having the gun in my hand already. Then I saw the doe

picking her way through the underbrush and almost laughed myself silly.

My heart was racing, my breath coming short and steaming in the frosty air. I sat down

on the cold ground, putting a hand to my heart, waiting for the flood of adrenaline to fade.

Braver than I, the doe ventured out of the woods and onto the outskirts of the manicured

lawn. She paused briefly to look at the house, as if assuring herself that the coast was clear, then

set off toward the man-made pond at a brisk, elegant trot. Still waiting for my heart rate to return

to something resembling normal, I watched her progress and felt reassured by the lack of alarms,

blaring lights, or barking dogs. My fear of venturing out from the woods was just a side effect of

stretched-taut nerves.

The doe reached the shore of the pond, and stood poised there for a long moment. Her

head turned in my direction, until I could have sworn she was looking me straight in the eye. The

light of the moon limned her with silver, giving her an ethereal look. I shivered as I remembered

that Artemis was often depicted with a deer by her side. Was the animal even real?

The doe quit staring at me and bent her head to drink from the pond. And suddenly, for

no reason I could point a finger at, I knew. Emma was in the pond. Not buried, as Konstantin had

claimed, but drowned. Tossing her into the water, weighted down with chains, required a lot less

effort than digging a grave and burying her. I wondered if the magic of the
Liberi
caused her to revive on a regular basis, and then drown again. I shuddered away from the thought, which was

too horrible to contemplate.

All right—I finally had a strong hunch where Emma was. It was based on absolutely zero

empirical evidence, and no matter how strong my hunch, I wouldn’t be shocked to find out it was

wrong. However, the only way to confirm I was right was to take a dip in the pond. The prospect

was far from inviting. The water would be freezing, and while the pond was relatively small and probably not very deep, it would take a significant amount of swimming to check the whole

thing. All the while out in the open and defenseless against attack.

Slowly, carefully, I edged back into the full cover of the woods. If Emma really was in

that pond, I would need help getting her out. I was less certain of her location than I’d have liked

to be, but I figured now was a good time to call Anderson and share my theory. Obviously, he

knew more about the
Liberi
and their powers than I did. If my evidence was enough to convince

him that Emma was in the pond, then I’d feel a lot more confident that I wasn’t just imagining

things. And if I wasn’t just imagining things, then it was time to call in the cavalry and get

Emma out of here.

About forty minutes later, I was so numb from cold I felt
like I might have frozen in

place. That’s when Anderson appeared suddenly and without warning at my side. I about had a

heart attack, and a strangled scream escaped my throat as I backed hastily away and tripped over

an exposed tree root, landing on my butt.

Like me, he was dressed all in black, with a black knit hat pulled low over his forehead.

Hard to spot in the dark, for sure, but I should have seen
something
.

He grinned down at me, apparently enjoying the spectacle I’d made of myself. “It’s just

me.”

I closed my eyes and sucked in a deep breath, searching for calm. How had he just

appeared out of thin air like that? Emmitt and Jamaal had both pulled similar stunts, and I’d

assumed it was an ability unique to
Liberi
who had death magic. Then again, no one seemed to

know who Anderson’s divine ancestor was, so perhaps he was himself a descendant of a death

god, though apparently an obscure one if no one recognized his glyph.

I opened my eyes and glared up at him. “You’re lucky I managed to swallow that

scream,” I told him. “This expedition could have been over before it started, all because you felt

like being a comedian.” Probably no one would have heard me if I’d screamed—I’d told

Anderson to meet me in the woods at the property line, right near the realigned camera—but it

was the principle of the thing.

Still grinning, he reached out a hand to help me up. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I kind of

forgot I was in stealth mode until it was too late.”

I brushed dead leaves and pine needles from the seat of my pants. I wasn’t sure I believed

him, but I didn’t suppose it much mattered. I glanced into the woods behind him, but saw no

other lurking
Liberi
.

“You didn’t bring any backup?” I asked incredulously. When he’d put enough faith in my

hunch to agree to come himself, I’d assumed he’d bring at least a couple of his other people in

case this turned into a fight.

“It’s easier to be sneaky with just two of us,” he responded, and I knew at once he was

lying, maybe just because it was such a lame explanation.

I gave him a hard look. “What aren’t you telling me?”

The look Anderson gave me in return was just as hard. “Things you don’t need to know,”

he said, and took a step forward as if he thought the conversation was over.

I grabbed his arm. “Hey, if I’m putting my butt on the line for you, I deserve full

disclosure before I go charging in there.” The sneaking about I’d been doing so far had no doubt

been dangerous, but not half so dangerous as an actual attempt to extract Emma from the water.

Assuming she was even there.

Anderson twitched his arm out of my grip. “Come help me, or go back to the house. It’s

your choice.” He plunged forward again without a backward glance.

Common sense told me to get the heck out of there. I couldn’t begin to guess what

Anderson was hiding, but chances were it was going to come back and bite me in the butt. That’s

just the way my life works.

But common sense and I haven’t been on speaking terms for a while now, so instead of

trekking back to the car and heading for safety, I followed Anderson deeper into the woods.

When I caught up to him, I adjusted our course so we’d come out as close to the pond as

possible.

We paused for a while when we came to the edge of the woods, both peering into the

heavy darkness left by the moon’s disappearance. Still no lights on in the house. It would be

pretty funny, in a sick sort of way, if after all this fearful skulking around, it turned out that

Alexis wasn’t even home.

“Any idea where to start looking?” Anderson asked me as he sat on the ground and

started unlacing his boots.

“What are you doing?”

“I don’t plan to swim in my hiking boots.” He pulled off one boot, along with the sock,

then started working on the other one.

“That water has got to be freezing!” I protested, and I meant it literally. Even in the

darkness, I could see the thin crust of ice that was forming along the shore.

“You think I can get her out of the water without getting wet?” Off came the second boot,

followed by his utilitarian black jacket. “The clothes won’t keep me warm if they’re wet, and I’d

rather have something dry to put on when I get out.”

The thought of setting even a toe in that water made my teeth chatter, but of course he

was right. And unlike a normal human being, he wouldn’t die of hypothermia.

“Of course, I’m not exactly looking forward to it,” he continued, pulling his sweatshirt

off over his head, “so if you can give me a general idea where to look, I’d appreciate it.”

I know I’ve said before that Anderson is rather unprepossessing, but seeing his nicely

muscled chest and sculpted shoulders made me rethink the assessment. Then he slipped out of

his jeans, leaving himself naked except for a pair of black briefs that clung very attractively in all

the right places. I decided I hadn’t just been wrong, I’d been
dead
wrong. Without the

camouflage of his scruffy, unflattering wardrobe, he was very nice to look at indeed.

Which was
so
not what I needed to be noticing right now.

The surprising view had momentarily distracted me, and I all but smacked myself in the

head to get my brain working again and remember what he’d asked me. I glanced at the pond,

trying to listen to my gut in case it had a message for me, but there was nothing. The clouds had

thickened enough to hide the moon, and even the certainty that Emma was in there had faded

with its light. I was going to be completely mortified if I made Anderson swim around in that

frigid water for nothing.

“Maybe if you go in where I saw the deer?” I suggested doubtfully. The second thoughts

were pounding at me now, telling me this was the stupidest idea I’d ever had. I only came

looking for Emma on Alexis’s property because I wanted him to be the one who had her, and I