Keeper Chronicles: Awakening (29 page)

“Need anything else, Hunter?” the girl asked, a squeak in her voice. She retreated as soon as her package had been delivered.

“No.” Colette hesitated. “What’s your name?”

Blushing, the girl looked at her feet. “Jenna.”

Colette glanced over at Nicholas who’d already taken the laptop and begun flipping through screens. “Well, Jenna, thank you for this.” Studying the girl’s hesitation, like she didn’t want to fully commit herself to knowing anyone else. She’d felt the same way after her sister died. “Do you live here?”

Jenna nodded.

“Where are your parents?”

When she answered, her voice was barely a whisper. “Dead. They were killed during a storm two years ago. The Elder lets me live here as long as I’m good and help out.”

“I’m so sorry, Jenna.” Colette held out her arms. The girl ran into them like she’d not had a hug in years, squeezing so tightly Colette couldn’t breathe. Awakening the blood so young—no wonder the girl was shy. All her emotions would be amplified painfully until she learned greater control.

When Colette let go of the embrace, the girl stepped away though Jenna didn’t run as far this time. She’d been about to ask the girl another question when a feeling chilled her to the bone. “Nicholas...?”

“Get down,” he hissed.

Grabbing Jenna, she crouched next to the bed, covering the girl with her body as the staccato of automatic gunfire popped above them. Adam. He must’ve followed her after the accident and been using the time to determine the best plan of attack. She needed to end this now. No more hunting, no more failure.

The demon wearing Adam’s body had to die.

“Under the bed,” she ordered, shooing the young girl whose screams of fear sounded sharp in her ears.

The wooden wall near Nicholas’ head exploded, torn apart by gunfire as he barely ducked in time. Return fire sounded as someone shouted orders. Despite the guards on the upper walkways, those below in the un-roofed rooms and offices were trapped in a shooting gallery. Adam had chosen his position on the roof well.

Colette would have to do something about that. The bastard deserved to pay for what he’d done. She couldn’t, however, do it in that outfit. Stripping out of her clothes till she was only wearing her underwear, socks, and shoes, she looked around for something she could use as a weapon. “Jenna?” she hissed, a bullet ripping through the plywood near her shoulder. “Do you have a knife or gun or something?”

“A knife,” the girl whispered from under the bed.

“Toss it to me.”

The girl slid a switchblade across the concrete warehouse floor.

“Colette? What are you doing?” Nicholas’ voice was tinged with desperation. “You can’t face him alone.”

Of the two of them, she was the killer more so than him and had the greater physical prowess. Nicholas had a tender heart underneath all the hurt. His gift for mechanics and technology was far more valuable to their cause than her strength. She killed demons; he made sure they didn’t kill others.

“I love you,” she said, extending the knife blade and putting the handle in her mouth.

“Colette! You’re going to get shot!”

She didn’t look back.

Ducking, she sprinted down the hall a hundred yards until she was far enough from the spray of gunfire to risk climbing the wall. She needed a corner—something she could use as a boost. Running, she jumped off one corner, over to the other side, and then used the leverage to spring up high enough to grab the top of the opposite wall. She pulled herself up to a crouch.

Since none of the rooms had ceilings, she could run along the top of the wall toward the warehouse wall nearest where the gunfire came blasting through some of the upper windows. It also made her a target.

Adam saw her.

She ran. One bullet grazed the top of her shoulder as another clipped her leg. Colette never stopped, sprinting to the edge of the constructed walls and leapt for the outer walkway, pushing off with all her strength despite the wounds. The gap between the last of the interior walls and the walkway, nearly fifteen yards across, sailed by in the blink of an eye. Her fingers wrapped around the bottom of the metal walkway; with a small grunt of pain she swung her legs over the edge and pulled herself up.

Not far from her, one Keeper was dead, his blood dripping through the metal grate. Two more had been killed on the opposite walkway. Her back against the wall, gun fire raging all around her, she looked down through the open ceilings to the rooms below hoping someone would be smart enough to point her direction. Nicholas, still pinned down with Jenna, glanced over Colette’s right shoulder.

“Thank you,” she mouthed.

She sidestepped to her right until the flash of muzzle fire appeared directly overhead. She’d only have one shot at this. While he seemed oblivious to her location, his position about fifty feet up the mostly demolished glass windows gave him the advantage. She couldn’t jump that high even if she wanted to. Not and disarm him at the same time.

Colette needed him to come to her.

“We know about her,” she yelled. “We know about your pregnant girlfriend.”

The gunfire stopped. “You don’t know anything, darling!”

“You’re wrong. See, I remembered you last night from when I interrogated you at the bar a few weeks ago. Remembered that unfortunate girl you were kissing so frantically. Even gave her description to the local authorities. Right now a team of Keepers is on their way to get her and kill your offspring. Seems you’re not as clever as you thought. You might as well give up; you’re outnumbered and outsmarted.”

The shadow of his form materialized in the glass above her, pulled in by her taunt. Leaping back from the wall, she spun, aimed for where the shadow of his head was, and threw the knife. Thanks to her extra strength, it punctured the glass. The shadowy form stumbled backwards, screaming. A hit.

She wouldn’t get another chance like this to kill him.

Wedging her fingers and toes into dents in the concrete or breaks in the upper windows, she climbed like a spider up to where he had been and looked through the empty window frame.

He was gone.

Shit.

Feet smashed into her chest, catapulting her backwards off the side of the warehouse and slamming her into the walkway below. The impact stole her breath, paralyzing her for the precious seconds she needed to get away.

Adam followed, her knife in his hand, crushing her wrists beneath his feet as he landed on top of her. She screamed as the bones popped.

“Too bad you aren’t a little younger,” he said crouching down in her face as his blood dripped on her from a gash in his cheek. “The more innocent they are, the sweeter their marrow tastes. The last old Keeper I ate had been a stubborn one—his marrow smelled like worn leather. I have a feeling you’ll be the same.”

The soft click of metal bounced off the walkway next to them. A grenade.

Colette grinned. “Too bad you’ll never get to find out,” she said, rolling sideways off the metal walkway.

The drop from the walkway to the floor of the warehouse was at least thirty feet. The explosion happened when she was about halfway to the ground, and the force and heat of the blast seared her naked flesh, slamming her into the concrete floor that much harder as the fireball pressed her down.

Shielding her head, she closed her eyes and braced for impact.

****

When she woke, Nicholas sat in a chair near her bedside, two days’ growth of beard darkening his otherwise perfect jaw. Jenna slept in his arms.

Rubbing her eyes, she tried to sit up. Her wrists had healed from where he’d broken them, at least enough to help pull her into a sitting position in the darkened room. The faint glow of a lantern illuminated a small circle of the room like a protective spell. They were still at the warehouse.

“Take it easy,” he whispered, looking over at her with a warm smile. “You had quite a fall.”

“How long...?”

Nicholas shrugged. “Not very. Two days.”

“And the demon...did we kill it?” she asked, afraid she already knew the answer.

“No. We found a trail of blood leading away from the warehouse. I tracked it a few miles while the doctors worked on you, but it didn’t get me anywhere definitive. Elder Sloan circulated Adam’s picture to law enforcement and all trains, busses, and airports, but no hits yet.” He hesitated, then reached out and brushed some hair from her face. As he looked at her, his eyes practically exploded with suffering.

She wanted to say something, ask him what was wrong, but the words stuck in her throat. So she settled for talking about what they always discussed: demons. “I know where he’s going,” she claimed.

“You do?”

The soft tap of footsteps on metal startled her before she remembered the guard detail posted on the upper walkways. She took a breath. “We met him before—at that bar where the girl had been killed and stashed near the dumpster. I hadn’t put together that they were the same person until I saw him again.”

“You don’t think he’s gone back there, do you?” he asked, credulous.

“I think this whole time, he’s been intentionally leading us away from there. Distracting us from his real game.”

“What do you mean?”

Wincing, she paused as a rush of pain shot up her arms. “I mean, he’s got a girl back there pregnant and stashed away somewhere. These murders up the coast, this chase, it’s all been a distraction. He was leading us away from his real prize.” Colette closed her eyes and took a couple deep, calming breaths. “He knows I know, now. He’ll go back and try to move her. Hide her somewhere else until she’s ripe. For all we know, he’s done it already.”

Nicholas took her hand and gave it a squeeze. “We’ll just have to beat him back there.”

“Okay.” Muscles stiff, she tried to toss the blankets off herself and stand when he stopped her.

“Not yet. We can leave in the morning—take a helicopter. You need your rest.” He hesitated, glancing down at the young girl in his arms. “She worships you, you know.”

“What?”

“Jenna. I couldn’t get her to leave the room for the last couple of days. I think she’s enamored.” His smile, instead of being mocking, was genuine.

Colette’s heart skipped a beat as she studied his face. He’d never shown interest in children before—not even a cursory greeting or discussion. She’d gotten a feeling that it was something he’d wanted with his first wife before she’d been killed and hadn’t wanted to broach the subject. They were Hunters, after all. Hunters didn’t have children. “She’ll get over it,” she said carefully.

Taking off his glasses, he rubbed the bridge of his nose. “What if she doesn’t?”

For a moment, she could taste the girl’s marrow in her mouth. Feel the sweetness of Jenna’s innocence glide across her tongue. Taking a deep breath, she forced those emotions away. Forced away the demon’s lingering essence inside her. Jenna would be just his type of snack. Her voice hardened. “She will. The girl’s not safe around us—no one’s safe around us until Adam’s dead.”

The girl blinked and rubbed her eyes as if awakened by the talking. Jenna’s smile grew larger than the room as she threw her perfect little arms around Colette’s neck. “You’re awake!” the girl practically screamed.

Untangling herself from the child, she sat back, distancing herself. “I am. Were you hurt in the attack?”

She shook her head. “No, thanks to you. You saved me.” Jenna hesitated. “When I’m old enough, I’m going to join the Hunters like you.”

“No.” Colette forced herself to swing her legs around, wincing at the pain. She’d need to do Yoga for a month to get her flexibility back. “I refuse to let you join the Hunters. This is not a lifestyle anyone should choose for themselves.”

Jenna crossed her arms. “But you chose it.”

“Yes, but that was different. I didn’t have a choice. My sister...I didn’t have a choice.” Running one hand through her straight hair, she swallowed the bile rising in her throat at the thought of her sister. Her real clothing sat on the floor on the other side of the room. When she stood to go get them, however, her legs collapsed beneath her.

“Colette!” Nicholas knelt next to her and took her in his arms. “You never listen, do you?” he asked, his voice gentle. “And what’s worse is that I haven’t been listening to you. You’re not happy, are you? This life is aging you beyond your years.”

She looked over at where the girl stood in the corner, afraid. “Do you ever have doubts?” she asked her husband. “Do you ever think that there might be something more for us than this?”

“Two weeks ago, I would have said no. Now...” Letting the word hang, he followed her gaze over to the beautiful young girl—no, the broken child—who wanted to be a Hunter. “Now, I’m not so sure of anything anymore.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“Are you certain she doesn’t mind?” Rebekah asked, slathering raspberry jam on her toast as she watched Gabe from the bed. When she woke that morning, he’d already been up for a few hours and made her breakfast. To her surprise, it’d been his idea that she spend a few days on the island training, just the two of them.

Grabbing the second plate, he pulled up a chair in front of her and sat backwards. “Moore? No. She understands. Besides, until your training is finished, she’d have to be there anyway as backup.” A forkful of eggs disappeared in his mouth.

“No one was with me last week while you had me chopping down a tree.”

He winked conspiratorially. “Just because you don’t see something doesn’t mean it isn’t there.”

She threw a piece of fried potato at him.

Feigning injury, he rubbed his stubbly jaw where the offending food landed. “Ow. I guess I deserved that, huh?”

“Yes,” she said, unable to keep from grinning. “What about Mia?”

Gabe smiled back, the sunlight from the room’s small window warm on his face. “She says to take all the time you need. She’ll handle the contractors and remodel.”

Something fluttered in her stomach. At first she thought it was butterflies, then the fluttering grew stronger and she had to cover her mouth with her hand. Not again. Not here with Gabe.

“Are you okay?” He started to set his plate aside and stand.