Wrong Side of Dead

by Kelly Meding

It made a horrific kind of sense, and Felix had been the perfect distraction.

  “It’s Therian,” Phin said.

  “You can smell that?”

  “Yes. Our blood is … earthier.”

  I touched his shoulder. “We’ll find them, Phin. I swear to you, we’ll find them. Alive.”

  He met my gaze. Blinked. A single tear tracked down his cheek. His wings were back—another mark of his absolute fury. “Ava is the future of our race. I will kill whoever took them.”

  “And I’ll help you.”

  Chapter Four

  12:55 A.M.

  Eleri’s squad showed up ten minutes later. A vampire ally from before the Watch’s inception, Eleri was one of the few vampires I trusted with my unprotected back. Her squad was an interesting mix of ex-Handler Conrad Morgan, ex-Hunter Paul Ryan, a Cania named Crow, and a Felia named Sanchez Drake. With the squad was a Gifted human named Brett Lewis. Never officially a Hunter, Brett was often brought in to do freelance work for the Triads and had, likewise, been recruited into the Watch as a floater—not assigned to any single squad.

  Like Wyatt and me, Brett had a tap to the Break, and his particular ability was a kind of telepathy called post-cognition. He could sense recent events in a particular area, usually as a series of images and flashes, especially if high levels of emotion were involved.

  I was damned glad to see him.

  Phin offered clipped answers to Eleri’s questions while observing Brett, who had squatted next to the overturned books in the living room. Brett closed his eyes. I felt the snap-pop of his tap as he accessed the magic of the Break. Lately my ability to sense when others were using their Gifts had increased—a development no other Gifted could explain.

  Just one more quirk of being me.

  “A woman with curly hair was asleep here,” Brett said. “A noise startled her. A red feather. She fell, knocked over the books.” He was silent for several long seconds, then stood up. “That’s all I sense here.”

  “A red feather could be a tranquilizer dart,” Eleri said. “I imagine that sedation is the only method by which so many Therians were captured so quickly.”

  “You’re probably right,” Phin said.

  “Where else?” Brett asked.

  Phin led the way upstairs to Ava’s room. Brett was quiet for a long while as he examined the room, touching toys and the crib. He shook his head.

  “Nothing,” he said.

  “Are you sure?” I asked.

  He quirked an eyebrow at me, the message clear—was I an idiot for questioning him? “Yes. The child was probably asleep and didn’t feel anything.”

  “But the room’s a mess.”

  “Probably for show. To freak you out, which it’s obviously doing.”

  Okay, so I was starting to really hate this guy. Even if he did have a good point. The sight of this room had horrified me, and I couldn’t stop imagining the dreadful things that might have happened to Ava. It made the entire kidnapping that much more personal.

  “Across the hall,” Phin said. “There’s blood in that room.”

  Brett nodded. We followed him out. He took two steps into Joseph’s room and stopped. Gazed around. He shivered—nearly imperceptibly, but perfectly timed with a slight Break snap-pop sensation. Two more steps, closer to the bloodstain. He angled slightly, giving me a view of his partial profile, and closed his eyes.

  “An elderly man wakes. He seems startled. Concerned. He moves”—Brett’s eyebrows arched—“very quickly out of bed. A red feather hits the pillow. He’s fighting someone smaller, younger. He’s struck. Falls. There.” He pointed straight at the stain.

  “Who’s fighting him?” Phin asks.

  “They’re unclear. I can’t decipher faces, but they’re likely Halfies.” He opened his eyes and turned. “Half-Bloods are difficult to detect with my ability, because their emotions are radically altered from what they ought to be. They’re harder to pinpoint and therefore harder to see clearly.”

  It made sense. It was an annoying handicap, but it made sense.

  “Thank you for your assistance, Mr. Lewis,” Eleri said.

  “You’re welcome. Was anyone else in the house during the incident?”

  Phin shook his head, lips pressed tight, as unhappy with the results of Brett’s visions as I was. “At this hour?” he said. “No, it should have been just the three of them.”

  “All right.” Brett hesitated. “With your permission, Mr. el Chimal, I’ll check the other rooms.”

  “Feel free.”

  Brett excused himself from the room. Phin’s cell phone rang. He made no move to answer it, so I yanked it out of his back pocket. Astrid’s name was on the caller I.D.

  “This is Stone,” I said.

  “Stone?” Astrid replied. “Why—?”

  “He’s preoccupied.”

  Phin shot me a grateful smile. He was struggling to remain outwardly calm, and I could easily imagine the inferno churning beneath. Although his Clan had lived peacefully in the city for decades, they were a warrior race. Sitting still and waiting were not in his nature. He wanted his family back.

  “What’s your status?” she asked.

  “Brett Lewis just confirmed that Halfies were involved. Joseph is wounded, but we don’t know how badly.”

  “Halfies seem to be a common thread in all the disappearances, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence—”

  “That we ran into Felix and crew tonight?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I had the same thought. Has he said anything?”

  “No.” She hesitated. “We’re about to begin interrogating him.”

  A tiny part of me wanted to be there; the rest of me was glad to be far away from it. Interrogating Halfies used to be one of my favorite pastimes, but seeing the face of someone I used to consider a friend staring back at me from the other side of the table … no.

  “Who’s interrogating him?” I asked.

  “Marcus and Wyatt.”

  I flinched. “Does Kismet know?”

  “Yes. I’ve forbidden both her and Gant from watching.”

  Not a bad idea. She and Milo did not need to see their old teammate tortured for information. And if Felix did know anything about these kidnappings, Marcus wasn’t going to be kind. I’d seen the were-cat in battle, and I’d seen his jaguar form rip throats out of Halfie teenagers.

  “Has anyone else gone missing?”

  “No. Everyone connected to a member of the Watch has been taken to a safe location, and the Assembly has been informed. The Clan Elders are seeing to their people.”

  “Good.”

  “How’s Phineas?” she asked in a voice so quiet I almost didn’t hear her.

  I glanced at the man in question—glaring out the bedroom window—then slipped into the hallway. I was halfway downstairs before I replied. “He’s pretty close to the breaking point,” I whispered. “I’m damned close to snapping, myself.”

  “I know what they mean to him.”

  “Yeah, just the future of his entire race.”

  Astrid sighed, and in the sound I detected … sadness? “The Felia and the Coni are not natural allies, but we all grieved for his Clan’s destruction. We want them back, Stone. All of them.”

  “Me, too.”

  “If Felix gives us anything, we’ll let you know.”

  “Okay, thanks.”

  I turned at the bottom of the stairs and nearly crashed into Brett. He stood by the living room wall, eyes closed, one hand touching a framed photo hanging at eye level. It was a candid shot of myself holding a squirming Ava, with Phin and Aurora in the background. I remembered the day it was taken. As Ava’s godparents, Phin and I had been invited to dinner so we could perform the official “bonding” ceremony. It mostly involved making a solemn promise to protect Ava and see to her future, and drinking a cup of stinky tea.

  Looking at her apple-cheeked face, with the same dark curly hair as her mother, my stomach ached for her safety.

&
nbsp; “Stone?” Astrid said.

  “One sec.” I pulled the phone away from my face. “Brett?”

  His eyelids flew up, and he blinked hard, eyes dilated so wide that only a thin circle of brown lined the irises. “Someone else was here,” he said.

  My heart thudded. “With the half-Bloods?”

  “At the same time, yes.”

  “Who?”

  “His face seems familiar, but I don’t know who he is. He’s human, though.”

  Little icy fingers danced up my spine. “Are you sure?”

  “Not one hundred percent, but close. He stood here and looked at this photo. He watched everything that happened.”

  “Did he speak? Interact? Anything to tell you who he is?”

  Brett shook his head. “I don’t get the soundtrack, just the blurry highlight reels.”

  The simple fact that this mystery man had looked at that particular photo creeped me the hell out. “What did he look like?”

  “Tall, thin, dark hair. Quite handsome, but sad.”

  The world grayed out at the edges, and I blinked hard to keep from falling over from a sudden wave of vertigo. “Was he wearing a long black duster?”

  Brett frowned, eyes narrowing. “That’s an odd detail to guess in the middle of summer.”

  “Shit.” My stomach dropped to my feet. I put the phone back to my ear. “Astrid?”

  “What’s happening?” she asked.

  “I need you to send a photo of Walter Thackery to Phin’s phone right now.”

  “On it. Why?”

  “Because I think he was here tonight. I think the bastard’s involved.”

  The best photo we had of Thackery was six years old, but that didn’t matter. Brett identified him as the special guest star in the kidnapping as soon as the image appeared on Phin’s phone.

  I don’t remember moving or sitting, only realizing that Phineas was crouched in front of me, holding my hands and saying something, and that I was now on the living room sofa. Walter-fucking-Thackery had held me captive for twenty days, tortured me in order to watch me heal, and cut off my goddamned pinkie finger—all in the name of science. Those twenty days left me a very different person from the one who went with him in order to prevent him from releasing dangerous beasts on an unsuspecting city.

  To stop him from murdering Phineas in cold blood.

  A coven of gargoyles on the hunt for one of their own had attacked the mobile lab where Thackery had stashed me. Max, a former ally of mine, had been among the gargoyles who rescued me, and he brought me back to the city. Thackery had been at large ever since—just over a month now.

  Someone put a glass of water in my hand. I sipped without tasting it. Everything felt distant, not quite real, not even Phin’s constant, comforting presence. He squeezed my knee. The near-ticklish sensation shocked some sense back into me, and I met his steady gaze.

  “There you are,” he said. “With me?”

  “Yeah.” I forced my hand to loosen its grip on the frosted glass before it shattered. “I think so. Did I pass out?”

  “Not exactly. You seemed to go catatonic for a moment, though.”

  I groaned. “Awesome.”

  “No one is judging you, Evangeline. They know what Thackery did.”

  I waved my left hand in front of his face. “Because I walk around with the evidence every single day. God, I can’t believe I freaked out just now.”

  “I’m more disinclined to believe he’s involved, but Mr. Lewis insists Thackery is the man in his vision.”

  “It doesn’t make any sense. Thackery despises vampires. He wants to see them all dead. Hell, he thought he could use my blood to cure the infected, so why would he align with half-Bloods?”

  “One of many questions we’ll ask when we find him.”

  I only wished I had Phin’s confidence. We’d had no previous luck locating Thackery—not while he was blackmailing me, and not after I was taken. The man wasn’t stupid. In fact, he was pretty much a genius, especially when it came to his genetic meddling. He had a plan, and he had an endgame in mind. Finding him would not be easy.

  No, finding him will be fucking impossible—unless he wants to be found.

  “Everyone makes mistakes,” Phin said.

  It took me a moment to realize I’d said that “fucking impossible” thought out loud. “He hasn’t made one yet.”

  “Then he’s due.”

  “Maybe.”

  Everyone missing was connected to me in some way. They were also all Therian. No humans had been taken, and I could think of several who would have been easy targets. “Why all Therians? If Thackery is really involved in this, why would he want them?”

  Phin shifted positions so he was sitting next to me on the couch, one hand still on my knee. “He wouldn’t have been so precise with his choices if it was merely for experimentation.”

  “True.” But it didn’t make me feel any better about the idea of a small child in the hands of a madman. Or anyone else at his mercy. “He can do his experiments and fuck with me at the same time.”

  “You believe this is personal?”

  “Don’t you? Thackery chose people connected to me, connected to the Watch, when he could have snatched any of hundreds of other Therians in this city. The bastard doesn’t do anything randomly.”

  Phin nodded, thoughtful. “Another bargain, perhaps?”

  I shuddered at the thought. His last two bargains hadn’t gone well for any of us. The first had been the trade of inanimate objects—two of his experimental serums for the crystal housing a demon. The second had been me for the safety of the city. “Both times, Thackery contacted us almost immediately to make his demands,” I said.

  Eleri entered the living room, her expression impassive. “We followed two imprints of new tire tracks down the lane,” she said, “but they disappeared once the vehicles reached the main road. Depth and spacing indicate a van or a utility vehicle, but we cannot ascertain more than that.”

  A van or a utility vehicle was used to spirit away three kidnapped Therians—duh. If ever information could be more useless … “Thank you,” I said.

  “You are welcome. My squad is returning to the Watchtower. Do you require transportation?”

  “Yes, thanks,” Phin said.

  I didn’t want to leave, but we’d do no good here. Aurora, Ava, and Joseph were gone, and we weren’t likely to find them unless Walter Thackery wished it. Two months into her life and I’d already managed to fail Ava, just as I’ve failed almost everyone else I’ve been responsible for.

  Some fucking Aluli I turned out to be.

  On the trip back, I somehow got stuck in the rear bench seat of the SUV between the window and Paul Ryan. Phineas had shifted into osprey form—to save seating space, he said, but I was jealous of his clever way of avoiding conversation—and was perched in the small rear compartment with his pants and shoes.

  I gazed out the window at the passing mountains, and then the outskirts of the city, trying to ignore Paul. We’d managed to mostly avoid each other these last few months, and for good reason. He’d been a one-week rookie in the Triads when I was first resurrected, and his twitchy trigger finger had gotten Wyatt killed. Granted, a gnome healing crystal had brought Wyatt back, but that wasn’t the point. And he’d helped out at Parker’s Palace and fought hard at the Boot Camp slaughter, but I still wanted to dislike Ryan on principle.

  And he was still twitchy. He shifted on the crowded seat, hands tapping on his thighs, like someone in the middle of a sugar high. Or someone who wanted to say something and kept changing his mind. I resisted the urge to elbow him in the ribs. Hard.

  Lucky for him, I dozed off for the last half of the trip. I jerked awake as we pulled into the parking area. As soon as the side door slid open, Phineas flew out and away. I was the last one out of the SUV. The cold cement floor sent a shock through my bare feet, reminding me that I needed to find shoes and a change of clothes.

  “Stone?” Paul’s voice stop
ped me short.

  I turned and shot him an impatient look.

  “I’m real sorry about your friends,” he said. “Not just Felix, but the Therians, too.”

  “Um, thanks.” I didn’t know what else to say. We were in no danger of becoming BFFs or anything, but the sentiment was a pleasant surprise.

  He nodded, and then followed the rest of his squad out of the lot.

  I cast around for Phin. He’d gone off on his own, probably to calm down before going back to work. I kind of liked the idea. I could use a little relaxation, too, so I didn’t take my temper out on someone who didn’t deserve it. The gym was a good place to do that.

  My room, alas, was on the opposite end of the mall from the gymnasium rooms. We always kept extra sweats around, though, so I forewent a trip for clothes and headed the other way. My path took me past Operations. A buzz of conversation drifted through the open doors, and I slipped by quickly.

  “Stone!”

  Shit. I stopped, looked over my shoulder. Baylor had poked his head out of Ops.

  “What?” I asked.

  “You reporting in?”

  “I already reported to Astrid,” I replied. “Eleri can report the rest of it. Unless Walter Thackery happens to call with ransom demands, I don’t want to talk to anyone for at least half an hour. Okay?”

  Fortunately, Baylor was used to my snappish tendencies. “Okay. Where’s Phineas?”

  “Around, probably blowing off steam.”

  He nodded, then went back into Operations. The entire mall was outfitted with heat sensors in order to keep track of the two hundred–plus people who came and went on a daily basis. If Baylor needed to locate Phin, an osprey-sized heat signature would be easy to spot on the internal security system.

  I made it to the gym without further incident. Some of the free weights were being used. I ignored the funny looks my outfit earned me, snatched a pair of sweatpants and a cotton T-shirt out of the community locker, and put them on with practiced ease. The sticky leather skirt came off as the sweatpants went up. Tank top off after the T-shirt was on. All skills I learned in Juvie, when privacy was at a minimum and you wanted to flash as little skin as possible in a room full of others.