by Adrian, Lara
“When did she leave?”
The women exchanged uncertain looks. “About twenty minutes ago,” one of them said.
He didn’t know who, and didn’t offer any acknowledgment. His feet were already moving beneath him, heading at almost a run toward the corridor that would take him to her private living suite in the residence.
He rapped on her door. “Kaya?” When no answer came, he knocked again. Then tried the knob and found it locked. “Damn it.” He didn’t like the idea of intruding on her without permission, but he didn’t like the feeling he was getting about her absence even more. Exhaling a curse, he freed the lock with his mind and opened the door. “Kaya? Are you here?”
Utter silence. Her quarters were empty.
She was gone.
“Fuck. Damn you, Kaya.”
He knew by the cold understanding in his veins that he wasn’t going to find her anywhere in the command center. She had left base without telling anyone. That knowledge settled over him like a shroud.
In an instant, he was on the sunlit pavement outside the command center, flashing there with all the Breed velocity he possessed. He didn’t know where she might have gone. Or, rather, he didn’t want to think that he knew.
It took him only minutes to cross the city into Dorval.
To his relief, the ramshackle house down at the river that had been Angus Mackie’s most recent address was still vacant. All the rats had fled that ship the night of the Order’s raid and had evidently not returned.
Aric sped to the bar and found much the same situation. Empty building. No sign of the gang leader with the black scarab tattoo or any of his faithful followers. He came out of the tavern and raked a hand over his head, his heart rate finally decelerating now that all of his hunches seemed to have been wrong.
And thank fuck for that.
Some of the fury and dread that drove him down to this shitty neck of the woods began to ebb. At least it did until he glanced down the street and a glimpse of long dark hair and endless legs poured into dark denim caught his eye.
Kaya came out of a grimy auto garage with a grease-covered skinhead she appeared to know. No mistaking the piece of human garbage for anything other than one of Angus’s ilk. Kaya’s hand was locked on the man’s forearm as she spoke to him. She took some cash out of her pocket and gave it to him. Then she got into a piece of shit sedan parked at the curb and drove off.
Aric could hardly control his rage.
He wanted to wring answers out of the human with his bare hands, but Kaya was the only one who could tell him what he really needed to know.
His body vibrated with menace as he gathered the shadows around himself and followed her up the street. The instant she stopped at a traffic light, he tore open the passenger door and dropped into the seat beside her.
“I call shotgun.”
Her head swiveled toward him on a choked gasp. “Aric! What are you--”
“What am I doing here?” he finished for her, fury stripping his voice to its barest growl. “That’s exactly what I came here to ask you, Kaya. What the hell are you doing down here alone on Big Mack’s turf?”
Her brown eyes were bleak. “It’s not what you think.”
“Really?” He scoffed. “That’s good. That’s one huge goddamned fucking relief, Kaya. Because what I think is that you just crept away from base in broad daylight to meet up with one of the Order’s enemies. What I think is that the heat is getting a little too intense back and the command center and maybe our mole’s decided it’s time to run back to whatever hidey-hole she crawled out of in the first place.”
She looked away from him and shook her head, misery in the sound that escaped her lips. “I’m not a mole, Aric.”
“Unfortunately, it’s going to take a hell of a lot more than that to convince me now.”
“I’m not a mole,” she said, finally meeting his hard stare again.
“But you are on your way to see Big Mack now.”
“Yes.”
“Are you the reason he knew the Order was coming for him the other night?”
She swallowed hard, then lowered her head. “Yes. I’m sure I must be.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“That day when I went for a run, I ended up going to Mackie’s bar.”
Aric let his curse go. It was sharp and rage-filled, lashing out with such force Kaya flinched on the other side of the vehicle. He realized only now how badly he’d been hoping for her denial, despite the strength of his suspicions. Instead, what she was telling him was even worse.
“I didn’t go there looking to break the Order’s trust. I went there because I needed to see someone.”
“Someone who runs with Big Mack?” His voice sounded wooden, but whether it was from anger or shock, he wasn’t sure. He refused to allow that it might be due to the sudden strangulation of his heart as he struggled to process the fact that the woman he loved was about to tell him she was in league with the Order’s enemies. “No one who associates with those murdering cowards is worth your time. If I had my way, I’d cut a bloody track through the heart of every last one of them.”
He saw her slight flinch as he said it. There was shame in the expression she turned on him. And regret. “Aric, I was born and raised with people like him. My mother was one of them, hate-filled and nasty. That was my world too. It was the only world I knew for a very long time.”
“You’re not like that,” he pointed out.
“No, but I’m tied to that world. As much as I despise it, there’s a part of me that might always be tied to that world.”
Aric recalled everything she told him the night they made love on Summit Hill. She’d divulged that her childhood had been brutal, hate-filled. But now he was certain there was a missing piece to the puzzle of Kaya’s past.
“This person you went to see at Mackie’s bar. It’s someone important to you?”
“Yes.” She slowly shook her head. “I hadn’t seen her in a long time. Not since we were sixteen.”
Sixteen. The age Kaya had been when her mother was murdered and she was forced to kill in retaliation and self-defense before fleeing for her life into the city.
“After I saw those murders at that Darkhaven, I knew Big Mack’s people were responsible. What I didn’t know was if my sister had been aware of it too. It was a question I needed her to answer before I decided to shut her out of my heart and my life for good.”
“Your sister,” Aric murmured. “Both of you sixteen when your mother was killed.”
Kaya nodded. “My identical twin. Her name is Leah. Or, rather, it was her name. Now they call her Raven.”
“You have an identical twin who’s been running with Big Mack and his cronies all these years?” Aric felt like he’d just taken a punch to the side of his head. “Ah, Christ. The security guard at the Rousseau estate. The one who turned out to have ties to Mackie. The one who claimed he knew you . . .”
She stared at him, miserable. “He thought I was her. He cornered me and then everything happened so fast.”
“This secret of yours was the reason our mission went south that day.”
“I know. I wanted to say something, Aric, but I was scared.” She reached out to him, her palm coming to rest lightly on his cheek. “Aric, I love you.”
The words lashed him now. “You lied to me.”
“No.”
“You lied by saying nothing,” he bit off harshly. “You’ve been lying to us all.”
“Aric, I wanted to tell you. I planned to tell you just as soon as I saw Leah one more time--”
“Stop.” He drew back, his eyes hot with burning amber sparks. She was saying everything he wanted to hear, but there was still one large question looming. One there would be no coming back from, depending on her answer. “Tell me what you know about the ambush that waited for us at Lars Scrully’s place.”
“I don’t know anything about that.”
“How did you leak our plans to Opus? Or did you only have to le
ak them to Angus Mackie and he took care of the rest?”
“I didn’t do any of that. I would never betray the Order to Opus Nostrum. Not to anyone. I would never betray you either.” She shook her head. “Aric, you have to believe me.”
“No, Kaya. I don’t. Not anymore.”
Her brow pinched as if she were in pain. Maybe she was. And maybe she was still lying, pretending to be wounded and laughing on the inside for how easily she could fool him, the male of a species she’d been schooled to view as something less than human. Monsters to be hated and destroyed.
Behind them, an angry pickup truck driver laid on his horn as the light changed. Aric impatiently waved the other vehicle around, baring his fangs at the belligerent scowl of the man as he passed them. The truck swerved and jolted before the driver stomped on the gas and fled in terror.
When Kaya glanced at him, he was glad for the savagery of his transformed face. Let her see him--really see him. Let her know what she was professing she loved.
“Where is he?” he demanded. “Angus Mackie. You need to tell me where to find him. I know you know, Kaya. If that skinhead back at the garage didn’t willingly tell you, your hand on his arm was enough to siphon the truth from his so-called mind.”
She looked worse than terrified. “Aric, you can’t come with me.”
“Come with you?” His chuckle was cold with malice. “I’m dropping you back at the command center, then I’m going after Mackie alone. When I’m finished, Big Mack and all of his followers will be nothing but bad memories and a lot of bleeding flesh and bones.”
Her face blanched. “Aric, you don’t understand. You can’t do any of that.”
“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t.”
“Because my sister is with him. Aric, she’s pregnant.”
CHAPTER 26
Aric took the wheel, and Kaya directed him to the place Mackie’s friend at the garage had surrendered to her unwillingly through his thoughts. The abandoned house sat on a weed-choked empty lot near the city dump.
“A fitting refuge for excrement like Big Mack,” Aric muttered as they parked the vehicle behind a rusted old water tower and prepared to execute the rough plan they’d discussed on the way. “You may not see me, but I promise I’ll be close.”
She nodded, reassured by his presence even if the conflict between them felt as wide as a cavern.
As soon as they were out of the car, Aric dissolved into shadows.
Kaya walked to the front porch of the sagging one-story eyesore and knocked on the door. A tall, scrawny man answered several moments later. Stringy hair covered his mottled skull, and beneath the scraggly brows that climbed high on his forehead at the sight of her, his bleary eyes blinked rapidly in confusion.
“What the fuck?” He blinked, then rubbed his eyes and blinked again. “You ain’t Raven.”
“No, I’m not.” Kaya smiled pleasantly, her hand resting at the small of her back where the pistol she’d brought with her from the command center was tucked into the waistband of her jeans. “Step aside. I’m here to talk to my sister.”
No sense pretending, she and Aric had decided. They were going to take Leah out of there and they were prepared to do so with guns blazing.
The aged junkie at the door gave a vigorous shake of his head. “Big Mack won’t like this. Raven ain’t takin’ visitors right now.”
“I say she is.” Aric’s deep voice and bared fangs as he emerged out of the shadows near the open door sent the man scrambling back into the house.
Mackie’s poor excuse for a guard frantically reached for the gun holstered at his hip. Mistake. Aric shot him dead in an instant.
He glanced over at Kaya, his eyes ablaze with battle rage. “Ready, partner?”
She nodded. “Let’s go get her.”
At the same moment, the house erupted in chaos following the sound of gunfire. Two men charged from the back. Kaya took out one with a bullet to the head. Aric got the other. Indistinct shouts joined the panicked sounds of half a dozen men caught unaware by the invasion.
“Leah!” Kaya shouted. She didn’t know where to look for her, only that the man at the garage knew Mackie had her sister with him at his hideout following the failed raid. She could be anywhere. Kaya only hoped her twin wouldn’t be coming at them as an enemy. “Leah, where are you?”
A blast of bullets from a semiautomatic ripped into the bowed wood paneling near Kaya’s head as she and Aric pushed farther inside the small house. They ducked out of range but only barely. Splinters rained down into Kaya’s hair.
“Leah!” Aric called now, his low bellow vibrating the floorboards beneath Kaya’s feet.
Then she heard it.
The smallest cry coming from somewhere down the far end of the hall. Female. It was Leah. And she sounded to be in pain.
Aric shot a big man who barreled out of a bedroom ahead of them. The body sprawled across the floor, blocking their clean path. The woman’s cry came again, more distinct now.
They hurried toward a closed bathroom door at the end of the narrow passage. Aric kicked it in with his boot. The thin door shattered off its hinges. And there, huddled in the filth of the avocado-tiled prison was Kaya’s twin.
“Oh, my God. Leah.”
She was handcuffed to the sink pipes like an animal, a gag tied around her mouth. Her clothing was torn and dirty. Bruises rode her left cheekbone. A scab covered an ugly split in her swollen lip.
Kaya’s heart lurched at the sight of her sister’s abuse. She hurried to her side along with Aric, who made quick work of the cuffs with a mental command that broke the locks open while Kaya unfastened the tight knots of the gag.
Leah’s sob as the punishing restraints fell away shredded all of the misgivings she’d ever had for her estranged sibling.
“I’m going to look for Mackie,” Aric said.
“Be careful.” It was Leah’s voice that spoke the words that were also on Kaya’s tongue. Leah glanced at both of them, remorse in her dark brown eyes. “Angus has weapons hidden everywhere.”
Aric nodded curtly, then vanished.
~ ~ ~
As furious as he had been for the fact that Kaya hadn’t trusted him enough to share the truth about her sister and her past with him, Aric’s rage had gone nuclear at the sight of her pregnant twin shackled like a dog inside Mackie’s newest hideout.
It was too easy to see Kaya in the pretty, battered face that stared up at them so helplessly and broken. Too easy to think of Kaya being subjected to the punishing hands and lecherous cravings of men like Angus Mackie and his ilk.
For that, every man in this place would die.
Aric moved through the house as a stealth assassin, keeping to the shadows except to fill each of Mackie’s men with lead. And now he had only to find the king of the rats.
Aric swept through the place, leaving no corner unturned.
And then he spotted the bastard.
Unshaven, dressed in only a pair of saggy yellowed cotton briefs, his hairy belly drooped in front of him and jiggling as he ran, the purportedly fearsome Big Mack made a hurried dash for the basement door. It banged behind him, followed by the hasty thudding of Mackie’s bare feet on old wooden steps.
Aric snarled and leapt across the distance. He was just about to throw the door open with his mind when a shotgun blast exploded the panel in front of him. He dodged the spray and of wood and shrapnel in time to avoid the worst of it, then he dove through the opening and body slammed Mackie to the bottom of the stairs.
The fat coward screamed as Aric seized hold of him by the throat. His fangs felt as immense as daggers in his mouth, his eyes lighting up Mackie’s face like an amber spotlight. “Not so brave now, are you?”
“What the fuck!” His eyes went wide, full of shock and terror. “Daywalker?”
“That’s right,” Aric snarled. “Your worst nightmare.”
Not far from where he had Mackie pinned, crates that looked disturbingly similar to the ones the Or
der had recovered from the van at Scrully’s estate were lined up on the concrete floor of the basement. Easily a dozen of them.
He growled a curse and tightened his chokehold on the gang leader. “Now, before I eviscerate you, you’re going to tell me where you got this UV. I’m guessing from that black bug you’ve got tattooed on your right tit that your buddy Fineas Riordan hooked you up before the Order wasted him.”
“I’m not telling you shit.” Mackie gritted his teeth, struggling against Aric’s unyielding hold. “You’ll have to kill me. If I squeal, Opus will make sure I’m dead.”
Behind him on the stairs, Aric heard Kaya’s soft footsteps. “The house is clear.”
Aric nodded tightly, dragging Mackie up off the floor by his throat. “You and Leah all right?” he asked, looking at her because he needed to see for himself.
Kaya had come to the bottom step. Leah stood behind her halfway down, looking like a ghost version of her vibrant sister. “We’re okay.”
“Good. As soon as this sack of pus tells me what I want to know, we can be out of here.”
“Fuck. You.” Mackie sputtered.
Kaya walked up next to Aric. “There’s another way to get the information we need.”
She touched the human’s flailing arm and asked him the same questions Aric had. But now Mackie’s mind was open, his thoughts spilling loose at just a suggestion from Kaya. “Riordan supplied the ultraviolet weapons and rounds. Mackie has had contact from Opus, but never in person. He doesn’t know any of the members.”
“In other words, he’s useless,” Aric said, hardly disappointed to have the license to end the bastard. But there was still one very important question that he suspected Mackie could answer. “Where is Opus getting all of their intel on Order movements?”
Kaya sucked in a breath. “They have someone on the inside. Mackie knows it.”
“Who?” Aric demanded, squeezing his throat nearly to the point of crushing it.
The human attempted a chuckle. “I love seeing you bloodsuckers chase your tails. Almost as much as I like seeing you smoked in a pile of ash under my boots.”