Breed of Havoc (The Breed Chronicles #3)

by Lanie Jordan

  Linc shrugged. “I know you don’t want to hear it, but that’s exactly what I think. One guy trying to get on the property, using Chris as a scapegoat, and then someone else following us in New Orlando? Do you really believe in coincidence that much?”

  “You’re wrong. This has nothing to do with the other thing. This has nothing to do with Chris.” She grabbed his hand and got to her feet. “Let’s go.”

  “See you later,” Chris said and followed Tasha out.

  I gave a short laugh. “That went well.”

  “She’s scared Chris will get kicked out if Director Greene thinks he’s involved.”

  “But he’s not and Greene knows that.”

  “What’s logical isn’t always what you think or feel. Logically, yeah, she probably knows he won’t be kicked out. But emotionally…”

  “Is something else.”

  His eyes were locked on mine, hard and dark. “People do stupid things when they don’t think clearly.”

  “Really?” I let out an exasperated sigh. “You’re going to bring this back around to me? How many times do I have to say I’m sorry? I already admitted you were right. What else do you want, Linc? Invent a time machine and I’ll go back in time and fix it. But until that happens, I can’t do anything but say I’m sorry. Again.” Words I’d said probably a hundred times in the last twenty-four hours alone.

  “And what do you want me to do? Pretend I’m not bothered by it? Pretend everything is okay?”

  I threw my hands in the air. “Why isn’t everything okay?”

  “Jade, I love you, you know I do, but you were completely reckless. You’re courageous, and that’s something I love about you, but what happened in New Orlando was too much.”

  My stomach twisted into knots. Was he breaking up with me? Was he breaking up with me, right here in the cafe court? I stared at him. My eyes heated and my heart started to pound. And then I got mad and my fingers curled into fists. I was not going to cry and he was not going to break up with me like this. “So help me, Lincoln Stone, if this is a breakup talk, I’ll kick your ass.”

  “Get real.” He rolled his eyes. “I’m allowed to be pissed off at you and not want to break up with you. You’re a good person, Jade, but that doesn’t mean you’re not reckless.”

  “How am I reckless? One mistake, Linc,” I said, holding up a single finger and forcing myself not to stab him in the chest with it. “I made one mistake and you’re acting like it’s a regular thing. I’m not perfect.”

  “For crying out loud. Last year, you went up a tree after a baby demon.”

  “Because the rest of you were ready to shoot it down!”

  “You fought off my demon—”

  “What?” Like Tasha’d done only moments before, I grabbed his hand and yanked him outside. I didn’t say anything until we were clear of everyone, but as soon as we were, I dropped his hand and rounded on him. “You were the one who went rogue on that one and got yourself knocked out cold, so don’t even go there.”

  “Okay, fine. Point. But this year, you have a Burrower demon come after you and you don’t run in the opposite direction like any other normal person—”

  My back went rigid. Even if he wasn’t trying to break up with me, I was still debating kicking his ass. “Thanks for the reminder of how abnormal I am. It’s not like that doesn’t live in my thoughts daily. It’s not like I don’t have enough people saying or thinking that about me, but it’s always nice to hear it from friends.” I laughed. “You know what? When you’re done acting like a jerk, come find me. I’ll be somewhere else, being my usual abnormal self.”

  I walked away, muttering under my breath. For someone who was busy being pissed off, he was sure going out of his way to piss me off. Wasn’t he supposed to be the angry party here? Wasn’t I supposed to be the confused and apologizing one?

  Linc ran in front of me. “That came out wrong.”

  “Oh? And how exactly did you mean it to come out?” Lately, because I was, impossibly, feeling less and less normal, him pointing it out hurt. They weren’t new words. Man, how many times a week did I hear or think them myself? But I never expected them from him. So was it a Freudian slip or just a poor choice of words?

  He sighed now and ran his hand over his head. “Look, during your first Phase, you were chased down by one demon, and then you were bitten by a vampire and almost died. Last Phase, you had demons coming after you like you’re a living, breathing demon magnet, and you have other demons that like you in a warm-and-fuzzy kind of way. Now… Come on, Jade.” He tossed his hand up. “This Phase has been weird. You’re getting new abilities, defending demons—and I get that, so don’t jump down my throat. But it’s different. And then you chase down a strange, unknown man in New Orlando. A man who had a gun.”

  I let out a breath, trying to stave off the claw of anger that clutched my stomach. “You’re bringing up all this crap from before, like it was all my doing. Like I set out to do those things. I didn’t. You think I wanted to get bitten by a vampire? That was the worst pain I’ve ever felt in my life.” Did he honestly think I liked any of this?

  “Jade—”

  I took a step forward. “Do you think I like having demons come after me or finding ones that like me? Do you think I want to play guinea pig to scientists, even ones as nice as Doc or Dr. Cherry? Do you think I like having them and Greene and whoever else act like I’m the last hope for the world? You know I hate this shit. All of it, Linc. The stuff about this John guy, the stuff about me. I hate it.”

  “I know.”

  “Do you?” Before, if someone would have even suggested Linc thought I liked this, I would have called them crazy. Now I was wondering if I wasn’t the crazy one.

  “I know you don’t.”

  “You were right before when you said I haven’t come to terms with everything, but how can I when it’s thrown back in my face all the time? Do you know what it’s like hearing something’s normal for you that’s not normal for anyone else? God, Linc, do you know what’s it like hearing you try to convince me—or maybe you’re trying to convince yourself—that I’m normal when I’m not?” It was almost worse than being called different somehow, because he said it again and again, like saying it a lot would make it so. But it didn’t. “I’m not perfect, I make mistakes. Sometimes I make stupid ones. I’m dealing with everything the best I can. It’s all I can do.”

  He started to pace. “I get that, I do. But am I supposed to just be okay with everything? Am I supposed to pretend that I’m not scared or worried about or for you? I don’t like seeing demons go after you. I don’t like seeing you go after demons.”

  “We’re one year away from being demon hunters, Linc. One year. Hunting demons is, literally, the job description. It’s what I signed up for and it’s what I’m going to do.” I laughed. “Hell, it’s what you and every other person here signed up for. You got your demon, Linc. I haven’t, and I’m not stopping until I do.”

  I hadn’t seen him like this before. The pacing, the weird looks, the yelling. It wasn’t normal Linc behavior and honestly, I had no idea how to handle it.

  “I know, I know.” He stopped pacing and scrubbed his face. “Shit.”

  “Seriously, what the hell gives?” Him all but ignoring me for the last day had sucked. It’d pissed me off, but I got why he did it. But the rest? I didn’t get that, not at all.

  He looked up, his eyes dark. “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

  I blinked. “What?”

  “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

  I sighed and ran my hands through my hair, mostly to keep them from going around his neck. “I don’t want you to be sorry. I just want you to tell me what’s going on. I understand why you’re mad about the New Orlando trip, and you’re right about that, because I shouldn’t have run after the guy. But are you really mad about everything else? Do you really blame me for that stuff? Because I can’t help who I am. I can’t help what I am.”

  “No.” He shook hi
s head. “I’m not mad about the rest.”

  “Then talk to me, because I’m trying really hard to understand, but I don’t know where this is coming from.”

  Now he sighed. “I never accounted for you.”

  “Uh, thanks?”

  He fought a small smile. “What I mean is, when I joined, I never gave dating much thought. It wasn’t on my radar at all. I figured sure, it’d happen, either here or after training, but I didn’t really consider it. And I never thought about dating someone like me, someone else training to be a hunter. I didn’t know what it’d mean, and for some reason, it didn’t hit me until we were back from New Orlando.”

  Wasn’t I supposed to be the confusing one? “I’m not following.”

  “It’s hard seeing demons go after you. It’s one of the hardest things I’ve done, seeing that and not doing something or not being able to. First the vampire, then the Sawthorn. Even the Burrower, though that ended up being more amusing than terrifying. You’re not like anyone else I’ve ever met, Jade—and don’t start on me,” he added quickly when I opened my mouth to yell again. “You’re not like anyone else I’ve ever met, because you’re braver and stronger than I pictured anyone being. In my head, I know it’s a good thing. I know that’s a big part of why I fell for you, why I love who you are, as a person, a friend, a hunter. In my heart, those are pro qualities. But in my head, they’re cons, too.”

  “Are you being sweet now?” He was making my head spin. “It’s getting hard to keep up with.”

  “No. I’m being honest.”

  The last of my anger flew away, like air from a popped balloon. “You’re ruining my mad again. You’ve got a bad habit of doing that.”

  He took my hands in his. “Pro or con?”

  “I’m still deciding.”

  “Look, the bottom line is this: seeing the woman you love fighting demons and monsters that want nothing more than to kill her isn’t exactly easy. I can and do handle it, because it is what we’re here for. It’s still hard to see, and I don’t say anything because I figure we’re both in the same boat on that.”

  “We are,” I agreed. Even knowing he was safe, I’d wanted to run to him, to get him away from the demons at the demon facility. I didn’t like seeing him staring them down, regardless of the situation. And last year, when the Sawthorn had broken free of its restraints, I’d wanted to kill it to protect him.

  “Seeing you go after an armed man… It shouldn’t be, but it’s different. It should worry me less, but it doesn’t. I forget sometimes.”

  When he didn’t elaborate, I said, “Forget what?”

  “We train hard and focus on demons so much that I forget about people, that they’re just as bad as demons sometimes, if not worse. Most demons are mindless—they are what they are and do what they do without conscious thought. And because of that, they’re predictable. See human, attack human. That’s their thing. But people…they’re unpredictable and have a choice.” His grip tightened on my hand and his eyes were focused on mine. “That guy in New Orlando chose to follow us. Whoever tried getting Chris in trouble, whether it was the same guy or not, chose to do that.”

  “People suck sometimes.”

  “They do.” He paused. “Not counting Rachel and Felecia, when’s the last time you were actually scared or worried over a person?”

  I started to answer—I opened my mouth to, with the words right there, and then I realized I didn’t have the answer. It wasn’t something I thought about much in years. Demons were the main ‘bad guy’ focus at the CGE. We read, discussed, and trained for dealing with them—not people. We were so used to dealing with literal monsters that I forgot people could be monsters, too. It’d been a long, long time since I saw them that way. “At The Pond, I guess. I wasn’t ever really scared scared of anyone there, though.”

  “But you get my point.”

  “I do. You don’t like seeing me in danger anymore than I like seeing you in danger.”

  “I don’t. But if you can handle it, then I can. But we need to be vigilant, like the director said, about people and not just demons.”

  “I suppose this is where you add ‘And you shouldn’t run after strange men who are following you’?”

  “Basically. With a small reminder that if you do, I’ll kick your ass, Hall.”

  “Deal.” I bit my lip. “Are we done fighting?”

  “For now.”

  I thought with the big fight being over I’d feel better, but I didn’t, at least not entirely. “Do me a favor?”

  “Yeah?”

  “The next time you have problems with something, don’t hold them in, okay? If you’re mad, can we just get the fighting part over with and not wait on it?” I could handle the fighting and being yelled at. I didn’t like it, but it was better than barely being talked to and having the last two years worth of issues—things I didn’t even know were issues—brought up again.

  It was better than what I was feeling now, which was even more confused about everything and not sure where Linc actually stood. He’d been saying from the beginning he was okay with me, with my DNA and everything else, but was he really? I hadn’t doubted him before, not for a second, but now…now I did. He’d held all of this stuff in, and despite saying he wasn’t mad about any of it…why else would he have mentioned it?

  He shot me a small smile. “I won’t, I promise.”

  “Okay.”

  “Come on.” His arm went around my waist and he pulled me close. “We should go study.”

  I forced the weird feelings aside and smiled. “Careful, Linc, you’re starting to sound like me.”

  His eyes narrowed slightly, but then he grinned. “Or we could go watch a movie. I rented a new one—”

  I laughed. “That’s the Linc I know, love, and often want to strangle.”

  *~*~*

  Over the next week, Linc and I resumed our talks about John and Mystery Man from New Orlando (behind Tasha’s back to continue avoiding her wrath). We’d asked Chris if he remembered seeing a tattoo on John, but he’d said it was too dark and the guy had been wearing a long sleeved shirt. He chimed in when he could, though Tasha seemed to have Mystery-Man-Talk radar and pulled him away if he spent too much time alone with us. (‘Too much time’ being anything over two minutes.)

  Tonight, the first Sunday in April, was my last meeting for the mentor program. The P4s would be getting their treatments in a few weeks. By the time me and the other P3s started our fourth Phase, the P4s’ six-month quarantine would be over. That was, according to Peter, Greene’s plan all along.

  A few minutes into the meeting, I silently wondered why I was still there. No one was openly rude to me (excluding Rachel), but the meetings had basically turned into an open forum for chatting about the treatments and no one really asked questions anymore. It wasn’t that I minded, but I really hated just sitting there, probably looking as stupid as I felt, while everyone else chatted.

  “They really don’t hurt?” one of the guys asked—again.

  “You’ll be unconscious for the whole thing,” Peter answered for the second time that night. That question got asked more often than anything else, almost each meeting.

  “And afterward will only feel like growing pains. Aches and tired muscles.” Adam grinned suddenly. “You’ll feel old, like Peter.” There was a small bang and Adam yelped. I saw him reach under the table, all the while glaring at Peter. He cleared his throat, still glaring. “Like I said, you’ll feel old, not like Peter.”

  “Obviously the treatments don’t come with courage,” I said, laughing.

  Adam’s gaze fell on me. “Brave talk, Jade. You don’t have to work with him every day and put your life in his hands.”

  “I’m still not scared of him. Or you.” That wasn’t exactly the truth, but neither was it a complete lie. Peter was badass, there was no denying that. And when he tried, he could be intimidating. But overall, unless he was hunting or angry, he wasn’t very scary. Mostly. And Adam was…well, Ad
am. I couldn’t be scared of him.

  Peter leaned back in his chair and raised an eyebrow. “Is that so?”

  Matt grinned ear-to-ear. “You could take him, Jade.”

  Crap. “I didn’t mean that—”

  “I bet she could,” David said.

  “No, really, I just meant—”

  Matt jumped out of his seat. “Do it, chica.”

  I sighed as most of the people in the room started talking at once, some saying I could do it, others saying I’d get my butt served to me. Rachel was, not surprisingly, among those who thought I’d get my butt kicked. In fact, she wanted me and Peter to fight so it would happen. The ones who weren’t saying anything were either shaking their heads or looking at me like I was crazy and couldn’t decide if it was the good kind or bad kind.

  I stared back at them, silently wondering how many of them, like Rachel, just wanted to see me get my butt kicked. Everyone else—even the ones who were looking at me like I was the not-all-there kind of crazy—had this smug, you’re-gonna-get-yours look on their faces, but it wasn’t when they looked at me. It was when they looked at Adam or Peter.

  “Come on, Jade.” Adam grinned at me. “Unless you are scared.”

  “Of you? Get real.” I laughed before I could stop it. And then I fought another laugh when Adam’s grin turned into a scowl.

  Adam was a good hunter, but he was probably one of the least scary hunters I’d met. Dale and Harry, even if they hadn’t been good hunters (and they were), they at least looked intimidating. Adam…didn’t. At all. He was too young, maybe, and he had good-guy written all over him, like the demon hunter version of The Guy Next Door.

  “I think,” Peter said, grinning ear to ear, “a challenge has been raised.”

  Adam looked so bewildered and baffled that I started laughing again, this time unable to stop. “Look,” I said, between bouts of giggles, “you’re a good hunter, I know you are, but…”

  Taking slow steps toward me, he crossed his arms over his chest and tried (failing miserably) for a stern look. “But what?”

  “But… You’re you! I’m sorry, but you’re just not very scary. You screamed like a girl when you broke your leg during the demon ride along.” Okay, that was probably mostly an exaggeration, but now I had to give him a hard time, didn’t I?