Absolution: The Clandestine Saga Book 4

by ID Johnson

  Howard didn’t answer. Instead, he and Meat climbed from the SUV and made their way to the entrance to the tunnel. The backseat was now empty save a pile of ashes.

  ***

  Andrew’s team might have needed some work when it came to stopping the enemy, but they were good at running interference. They had a Guardian named Stella who was a wonderful liar, though most of what she said to the police and the hospital officials was actually true. She explained that they were a special government agency sent there to protect Gibbon and that they happened to pull up just as the assailants were fleeing the hospital. There were no longer fifteen LIGHTS members present, however, by the time the police had arrived, as that would have been too difficult to explain. Only Stella, Andrew, and Reggie had stayed behind to help police and assess the situation.

  GeeGee had been rushed off to the Philadelphia Area headquarters, and their resident Healer had began to work on her leg. There was no open wound, since the bullet had bounced, but GeeGee was young and had been more frightened than anything else. Though Scarlet was no Jamie, she was able to put GeeGee under so she was no longer in pain. The Hunter who had shot her, Malcolm, was beside himself and inconsolable at making such a careless mistake.

  Andrew stood in the middle of the aftermath on the sixth floor, surveying the area. He ran his hand through his short blond hair and shook his head. The blood didn’t really bother him; he’d seen his share of that. But the fact that the dead were police officers, security guards, and nurses—people who dedicated their lives to helping others--that was difficult.

  There were two police officers covered by sheets directly outside of Gibbon’s room. They had identified the two security guards on this floor and two on the roof. There were two nurses in the stairwell that must have been the first victims according to the timeline the police had established. However, a replay of the surveillance footage showed two of the victims had been taken with the intruders. There was no camera angle to show exactly what had happened to the nurse and the detective that were missing, but the police had assumed they had been shot.

  While there were other patients and staff members on the floor during the assault, all of them had hidden in fear, except for Detective Abby Watson, who was being interviewed by police in another waiting room on the other side of the floor. Andrew was hopeful that he would also get an opportunity to speak with her before the sun came up.

  There had been no sign of he hospital helicopter that the intruders had stolen once it departed from the woods near the Delaware River a few minutes after it left the hospital. Likewise, there was no trace of the SUV that had sped off with the rest of the men dressed in black. Andrew’s bikes had lost them near Seventh and Walnut, and while Andrew wanted to go back to his own headquarters and regroup before going out and starting a manhunt, he didn’t think his team was capable of that. He was fairly certain their best option at this point was to wait for Aaron and his A-Team to arrive.

  Stella, who had been talking to a detective over by the nurses’ station, approached him. She was an African-American woman with a blond afro and a gentle smile. She stepped over, careful of the areas that the forensics’ team was analyzing, and said quietly, “I think we’re good.”

  Andrew nodded. “They all believe we’re a special branch of the government sent here to protect Gibbon?”

  “Yes, and they also think he was taken by terrorists,” she affirmed.

  “Interesting,” Andrew replied, his eyebrows knitting together. “Did you plant that?”

  “I didn’t have to. One of the patients down the hall said she heard them speaking in some foreign language. She was calling them terrorists, so the police were already prone to believe that. The FBI is on the way, however. So we should probably get out of here.”

  “Right,” Andrew agreed. There was no reason to take a chance on having to explain their presence again. “Where’s Reggie?”

  “He’s downstairs helping console some of the patients and staff who saw us burst through the door. We can get him on the way out,” she explained.

  Andrew looked around the area one more time, and when his eyes turned toward the nurses’ station, he saw Abby Watson standing there in a crumpled suite with a lost look in her eyes, which were focused directly on him. “Let me…” he began, but before he could finish the sentence, he was crossing over to her, leaving Stella watching him with a puzzled look on her face.

  “Detective Watson?” he said quietly. “I’m Andrew Cooper. I’m with….”

  “I think I know who you are,” she cut him off. “I want to talk to you. But not now. Not here.”

  She had a look about her that resembled a sapling in a windstorm, bent and weathered, but not broken. He slowly nodded his head, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a business card. “Call me when you’re ready.”

  Watson took the card and slipped it in her pocket with an absent nod. As he turned to go, her hand caught him, and Andrew turned back to face her. “Do you think… do you think there’s a chance that Dixon might still be alive?” she asked.

  He considered her question carefully. Aaron was with him on the IAC, and before he replied, he wanted some advice from his superior. Finally, after a brief conversation, he said, “No, miss. I don’t think so.” There was no reason to tell her that he was probably still breathing, but he would never be the same again.

  Watson’s head dropped, and her hand slowly fell from Andrew’s arm. “I didn’t think so,” she said quietly. “I still want to help you if I can—tell you what I know.”

  “You call me when you’re ready,” he replied with a weak smile. “Take care, Detective Watson.”

  He turned and walked away, meeting Stella in the hallway and making his way back downstairs, all the while knowing that if Abby Watson saw what he thought she must have seen, there was no way she would ever be the same again either.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Cadence hadn’t really slept for the second night in a row. She had been up past 3:00 with Aaron trying to get the Philly team on track and figure out where Giovani may have disappeared to, but it had bee a comedy of errors, and she couldn’t help but wonder what in the world they needed to do to get these area teams on target. Once she finally did go to bed, she had tossed and turned and had possibly gotten two hours of restless sleep--if that.

  At 7:30, she arrived at the office she shared with Aaron. He had already been there for hours talking to various members of their team via IAC, trying to determine who should be involved and who shouldn’t. Even though Cadence didn’t typically drink coffee, she stopped at Mrs. Carminati’s Keurig on her way into the office. It was going to be another long day.

  He was sitting at the conference table with a pile of papers spread out in front of him, clearly in deep thought. He glanced up as she came in, but she could tell he was in the middle of a conversation, so she chose not to disturb him just yet, sitting the coffee she had poured for him down away from the papers and taking a seat beside him. The bitter, scolding hot liquid didn’t go down well, and she remembered why she didn’t usually drink it.

  After a moment, he smiled at her and leaned over and kissed her. “Did you get any sleep?” he asked, a concerned expression on his face.

  “Not really,” she admitted. “I tried, but I just couldn’t stop thinking about last night.”

  “Yeah, it was quite a debacle,” he sighed, sitting back in his chair and rubbing his forehead.

  There was really nothing she could say in response to that, so she said, “Tell me what you have in mind for this morning.”

  “Well,” he began, “I assumed you’d want Meagan and Aurora with you, so they should be here in a few minutes, along with Hannah and Jamie. I went ahead and told Shane he could come, too.”

  “What? Why?” Cadence asked, surprised.

  “He knew about it from Meagan, and he made a good point—how is he ever going to prove he can handle these types of road trips if I never give him an opportunity?”

 
“By not being a dumbass on local hunts, maybe?” Cadence argued.

  Aaron laughed. “While that’s true—usually—he did a pretty good job for Aurora and Hannah last night, so I thought we’d give him a chance. We can let him supervise part of the Philly team or something.”

  “Your call,” Cadence shrugged. “As long as he stays out of the way and doesn’t get himself killed, I guess I don’t care.”

  “Jamie said Brandon and Cass were asking to come this morning, and I agreed to it so long as they just observe and don’t say a word. I thought it might be a good chance to find out if they can follow directions or if either of them happens to take after you.”

  Cadence opened her mouth and then closed it sharply once before saying, “I want to argue with that, but I can’t. Okay. Who else?”

  “We’ll have Cale and Morgan on via FaceTime feeds, as well as Andrew from Philly,” he said gesturing towards the giant TV screen on the wall. “Stormy will be listening in on the IAC, but she’s already in the air headed that way, as is Christian.”

  “Sounds good,” Cadence said, despite her trepidation at working with Stormy again. She was looking forward to seeing Cale, even though it might be a little awkward. Still, she knew he could help them. “And?”

  “And Eliza is also in route to Philly—so she’ll be joining us over IAC as well.” Cadence groaned, and he continued. “I know, I know. But she’s already involved—at your suggestion—so we may as well let her see it through. She won’t be leading anything, and I’ve already told her that if she screws up one iota she’s going back to Siberia, no questions asked.”

  “I’m so glad you’re having such frequent conversations with your ex-girlfriend,” Cadence said, plastering a sappily fake smile on her face.

  “Hey, Cale will be there, too, so maybe the four of us can go out on the town and catch up.”

  She laughed. “That would be a load of fun!” Even though she hadn’t dated him for long, the thought of Cale spending any time with Eliza made her nauseous, and since the dragons were still at war from yesterday, she pushed the thought out of her mind. “What about Laney?”

  He exhaled sharply, telling her this must be a touchy subject. “I sort of wanted her to come. She’s been chasing him forever, after all, but she is busy in Africa still. And I’m hesitant to put her in the field with you under the circumstances.”

  Cadence was surprised. “What do you mean?”

  He hesitated again, and she wondered if there was something he wasn’t telling her. “I just want to proceed with caution when it comes to her. If we can leave her alone and let her keep doing what she has been doing, then I think we should leave it at that. I told her about it, and she didn’t seem like she was dying to join us. Besides, that’s such a long flight, I’m not even sure she’d make it in time.”

  “Speaking of time, how long will it take Giovani to turn Gibbon?”

  “Honestly, it’s probably already done,” Aaron admitted. “But turning him is one thing. Making him loyal is something else entirely. That may take a while.”

  “So we need to find him before that happens.”

  “That would be nice, but I don’t think it is likely. I don’t think we’ll find Giovani until he’s ready to be found. And when we do find him, Gibbon will be unlike anything you’ve ever faced before.”

  Cadence swallowed hard and nodded sharply. “I can do it.”

  “I know you can,” Aaron agreed, “or else I wouldn’t even let you go. But we cannot make the same kind of stupid mistakes we did last night. No one goes on this hunt that we don’t completely trust not to do anything moronic.”

  Before Cadence could respond, there was a knock at the door and Jamie came in followed by Cassidy and Brandon. “Hi!” Cadence exclaimed, jumping out of her chair. “How are you guys?”

  “Never better!” Brandon exclaimed, and she couldn’t tell if he was being serious or sarcastic. She gave him a hug and then wrapped her arms around her sister as well.

  “You feel different?” Aaron asked Brandon, clasping his hand.

  “Nah, I’ve always been like this.”

  That was definitely sarcasm, Cadence thought as she gestured for them to take seats. The table was plenty big enough for everyone they had invited so Cassidy sat down next to her sister, in the chair Elliott used to sit in, with Brandon next to her. Jamie went around and sat next to Aaron. “Everyone else should be here in just a few minutes. Remember, no talking during the meeting.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Cassidy said, a bit of attitude in her voice.

  “May we blink?” Brandon asked.

  “As long as I can’t hear it,” Cadence replied.

  “What’s all this?” Jamie asked gesturing to the papers in front of Aaron.

  “Oh, maps, mostly,” he replied. “Pictures of the two victims taken from the scene as well as Gibbon and Giovani. We were also able to identify one of the Vampires fleeing the scene through that side door. Ex-Black Op named Frank Howard.”

  “Interesting,” Jamie said studying Howard’s picture. “So it was military then?”

  “I guess you could say so, though it’s not as if these Vampires are still the war heroes they were before they Resurrected,” Aaron responded.

  “What do you mean?” Cassidy asked. “Oh, wait—can I talk now, before everyone gets here?”

  “Of course,” Aaron answered her, pretending he didn’t realize she was being a bit snide. “We have a theory that Vampires are not really the same people they were when they were alive. There’s not much of a way to prove it.”

  “Really?” Cassidy asked. “What do you think they are?”

  “Some sort of demonic manifestation,” Jamie answered. “Something that takes on the same characteristics of the person but isn’t really them.”

  Cassidy took in that information and mulled it around for a moment before she asked, “So, you don’t think you really killed Jack, then? You think you killed some demon who had taken over his body?”

  Cadence wasn’t prepared for the question. She considered her answer for a moment. “I honestly don’t know,” she finally replied. “I mean—maybe it wasn’t Jack. But it seemed like Jack to me.” She studied her coffee cup for a moment, not wanting to say more, and she felt Aaron’s hand on her leg beneath the table in an effort to reassure her that she had not been the one to end it all for Jack.

  Meagan, Shane, Hannah, and Aurora arrived a few moments later, and after congratulating Brandon on his Transformation, they all took their seats and waited for the team members joining them virtually to dial in. First, Cale’s handsome face popped up on the TV screen. He greeted them all warmly, and Cadence did her best not to blush when he specifically said hello to her. Despite being madly in love with her fiancé, she couldn’t help but feel a slight attraction to the handsome doctor.

  Morgan joined them shortly, saying hello to everyone and remarking about how much Brandon looked like his dad. Remembering Cadence’s rule about not talking, he just smiled, and then Andrew came on and everyone was present and accounted for.

  “I want to thank you all for joining us this morning,” Aaron said by way of starting the meeting. “As you know, we have a very serious situation on our hands in Philadelphia, and I have asked all of you to join us because I know that you all have something that you can contribute to our efforts in defeating Giovani.” There were lots of nods of agreement from those members present, and Aaron continued. “Why don’t we start off with a quick recap of everything that happened last night, Andrew?”

  The Philly Area leader was obviously exhausted, but he cleared his throat and began to rehash the events of the night before. “Well, we received the information from Aaron yesterday evening around ten o’clock our time that there was a possibility that Giovani was in the area, and there was a chance he was going to attempt to turn Gibbon. We didn’t really know what to expect—would he turn him in the hospital or take him? We have never really handled anything like that before. So I pulled my top
team members together, about fifteen of them, and we began to come up with a game plan. We had to figure out what weapons we had available, get the layout of the hospital, etc. By the time we got everything together and were able to proceed to the hospital, it was about one in the morning.”

  “Wow, that took a really long time,” Morgan chimed in.

  Andrew could see her on his own TV screen, and he seemed to stare at her for a moment before replying, “We wanted to be cautious. We weren’t sure what we would be facing, and we had no idea that Giovani was actually planning on moving on the hospital that night.”

  “Can you tell us what you found when you got there?” Aaron asked, not acknowledging Morgan’s exclamation, but not dismissing it either.

  Again, Andrew cleared his voice, as if remembering the incident was painful. “When we arrived, Giovani was already in the process of extracting Gibbon. A helicopter was taking off overhead when we pulled into the parking lot. With Aaron’s help, I deployed my team to cover the exits, and I led a team of three into the hospital to attempt to stop the perpetrators as they were fleeing the building. But we weren’t successful.”

  “I’m confused.” It was Hannah this time. “Were they fleeing in a helicopter or on foot?”

  “Both,” Andrew clarified, “though we didn’t know for sure at the time. I thought it was unusual that a helicopter would be taking off during an emergency situation like that, one where the police were on their way. So I assumed Giovani had something to do with that. And Aaron told us there were four men trying to make an exit down the back stairwell.”

  “So, Giovani has a helicopter?” Cale asked in his sexy British accent.

  “Yes,” Andrew nodded, “I believe so.”

  “He does,” Aaron confirmed.

  “Brilliant,” Cale mumbled. “I guess we may need my birds as well then?”

  “I think that would be a wonderful idea,” Aaron assured him, not bothering to mention that Cale’s helicopters were his main reasoning for even inviting him in the first place.