Unleashed (Unmemorable Series Book 2)

by A. P. Jensen

  “I’m not going without Raven,” Cain said.

  “Well, bring her too, damn it,” Bernt said impatiently.

  “Rich ordered an attack on her in Vegas and she doesn’t feel safe around any of you. It’s your own fault that I can’t come in,” Cain said and tightened his hold on Raven when she shifted.

  “I don’t remember...” Rich began.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Raven said in disgust. It was annoying not being able to slam someone into the ground for past deeds they honestly couldn’t remember.

  “Really, Cain, it’s not like you to be emotional,” Pris chided.

  I told you, Bam Bam piped up, even his own mom knows Cain’s as cold as they come.

  “You’re different,” Bernt said with heavy disapproval to his son.

  Cain eyed his parents and grandpa. “You said what you wanted to say. I’m not coming in. I want you to leave.”

  There was a long silence and the three Hensons glanced at one another. Raven saw the surprise and calculation on his parents’ faces, but Rich looked pensive.

  “You can’t talk to us that way,” Bernt ordered.

  “I can when you don’t respect my wishes,” Cain said. “You come here armed and without warning. I promised safety to the others I brought with me and you showing up makes me sound like a liar. I don’t appreciate it.”

  “Who did you bring to see G-Ma?” Bernt asked suspiciously, looking Raven up and down as if she were a dirty stripper.

  “That’s not the right question,” Rich said quietly. “The real question is why.”

  “You need to leave,” Cain said.

  “I haven’t seen G-Ma for years,” Rich said with a genial smile that Raven didn’t buy for a second.

  “You know she won’t let you into the house,” Cain said. “No games, Grandpa.”

  Rich’s eyes went from her to Cain and then comprehension lit his black eyes. “Well, shit,” Rich drawled, “she’s an Unmemorable. No wonder the visions aren’t clear now that you’re tied up with her.”

  “An Unmemorable?” Bernt echoed sharply. “A female Unmemorable?”

  We’re coming for you, Jackie said.

  I’m fine, she said and braced herself as Pris snatched a knife from her belt.

  We’re not going to let the Council snatch you right in front of us, Luester argued.

  As if he sensed their telepathy, Rich looked around wildly. “They’re here, aren’t they?”

  “You need to leave,” Cain repeated.

  “The prophecy. That’s why you came here,” Rich pieced together and then recoiled as if he’d been shot. “You’re not trying to break the curse, are you? I can’t have that.”

  Duck, Happy said.

  “No!”

  She launched herself at Rich and knocked him over as a bullet whizzed through the air and was lost in a pile of snow. Pris inhaled deeply and stared at the rooftop. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a silver star, which she launched like a frisbee. It whistled menacingly through the air as it swung toward the roof where Happy was perched. Raven heard Happy swear in her head as the star sliced his arm. Pris held up her hand for the star, which came back to her like a boomerang. Pris caught the silver star and Raven saw that half of it was covered in blood. Pris raised the star to her lips. Raven drew her gun and fired. The star sparked as the bullet hit it and tumbled through the air toward Jackie who caught it as he strolled forward.

  Bernt and Pris drew their weapons and Raven faced off with them. Cain stood by her side. Bernt’s finger twitched on the trigger and Cain’s gun didn’t waver as he pointed it at his family. Raven’s heart fluttered in her chest as she waited for the battle to begin.

  How many others are in the SUV that drove up? Jackie asked.

  I see two shadows, Harvard reported.

  Jackie pocketed the bloody star and stopped on Raven’s other side. “Nice to see you, Rich.”

  Rich frowned and tossed his ruined cigar. “You’re a bit young to be leading the Unmemorables.”

  “Stand in for my father,” Jackie said easily and pulled out two guns. Bernt tried to step in front of him, but when Jackie clucked his tongue, he froze in place. “You’ve been hounding us for generations. You held our women hostage when they were pregnant with Unmemorables and threatened to abort the children if we didn’t ally ourselves with you. Tell me why I shouldn’t kill you now.”

  Raven’s hand tightened on the gun. Shit. She should have let Happy take Rich out. Who could be that ruthless?

  “It was a bluff,” Rich said and lit up another cigar, clearly unconcerned by the guns trained on him.

  “It’s an unforgivable crime in our book,” Jackie said.

  He didn’t sound like the adrenaline junkie she met several weeks ago.

  “You’re a bit young to be taking this personally,” Rich said.

  The Unmemorables went icily quiet in her mind. Not a good sign. She waited for Rich to be riddled by bullets.

  “Since I was one of the kids who would have been aborted, I take it kind of personally,” Jackie said almost apologetically. “Silly of me, I know, but if my father hadn’t gotten the women back, I’d be dead.”

  There was a long silence. Pris glanced at her father-in-law and Raven thought she saw a flicker of shock in her blue eyes. Bernt’s expression was impassive. Rich didn’t look bothered by having his past deeds thrown in his face. He cocked his hip and took a long drag on his cigar.

  “This doesn’t mean shit now, but back then I was losing the war with the Battalion. I had a vision of those women and knew they were connected to the Unmemorables. When I found each of them pregnant, I realized what they were pregnant with. Taking those women was the only way I could get your attention and I lost a quarter of my men in the process. I’ve learned since then.”

  “Have you?” Raven asked scathingly. “When you met me in Vegas you had Pris attack me in an abandoned alley. I nearly killed her and you just stood there and watched.”

  Pris looked offended and opened her mouth to deny such a thing, but Cain shot his mother a quelling glance.

  Rich shrugged. “I’m not perfect.”

  “You sure aren’t,” Jackie said. “It wasn’t smart of you to bring a child here when there’s ‘hostiles’ around. Are you so arrogant that you thought whoever was here would bow down to you without a fight?”

  Pris, Bernt, and Cain jerked their heads toward the SUVs. Pris took a step forward, but came to a halt when a bullet slid into the dirt in front of her.

  “She’s innocent,” Rich said to Jackie.

  Child? Raven sent out, but there was no response from the other Unmemorables.

  “Who is it?” Cain demanded of his parents.

  “Maggie,” Pris said in a stifled voice.

  Cain turned to Jackie. “That’s my sister. She’s not a part of this.”

  Jackie was in a staring contest with Rich. “Why’d you bring her?” Rich didn’t answer and Jackie addressed Cain. “What’s her power?”

  “No one’s power can affect Maggie,” Cain said.

  Jackie and Raven tried to digest that. Cain turned to Rich and his eyes were heated.

  “You manipulated all of this to use Maggie? She’s eight!” Cain spat.

  “She wanted to see you,” Rich said with the cigar wedged between his teeth.

  “What’s your game?” Jackie asked Rich. “Why did you come here?”

  “I came to talk to Cain.”

  Cain took a step toward his grandpa. “I’m not coming back.”

  “The Battalion will find you,” Rich said and blew out a cloud of smoke. “Sooner or later, they’ll attack. You’ll come back.”

  Cain shook his head. “No, I won’t.”

  A car door slammed and Harvard led a woman and girl toward them. Pris looked at Bernt who shook his head ever so slightly. The young girl had a riot of black corkscrew curls and shining blue eyes. Despite the gunshots and tension Maggie squealed when she saw Cain. Cain caught Maggie in his arms whe
n she hurled herself at him.

  “Cain! I’ve missed you so much!” Maggie cried and wrapped her arms around his neck.

  Cain’s big hand splayed on her back. “I’ve missed you too.”

  Raven felt off kilter. Children had never been a part of her life and Cain had never mentioned Maggie. The woman who’d been in the SUV with Maggie had an uncertain smile on her face as she watched Cain and his sister.

  “I can make you a nice offer,” Rich said into the short silence.

  Raven tightened her hold on the gun. “I can make you one too.”

  Rich grinned. “G-Ma doesn’t know anything about spells and curses. She can’t do anything for you except tell you the prophecy and the vision that she had. I know people.”

  “And we know you, so, no thanks,” Raven said dismissively. “Leave.”

  “I don’t want to go!” Maggie protested.

  “You can stay,” Rich said and they all stared at him. “We’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “I’m not leaving my daughter,” Pris said and started toward Cain.

  “Yes, you are,” Rich said and Pris stopped in her tracks. “Let’s go.”

  What the fuck? Bam Bam said.

  Fishy, Happy added.

  Cain pointed a finger at Rich. “You’re not leaving her here.”

  “Maggie’s not safe with you?” Rich taunted.

  Cain’s mouth hardened. “Of course she is.”

  “Since you’re never coming home, we’ll let her spend the day with you and we’ll pick her up tomorrow around four o’clock. Toodles,” Rich said and walked toward his SUV.

  Bernt grabbed his wife’s hand and had to drag her after Rich. Pris’s eyes were wide and frightened. She and Cain looked at one another for several seconds and then Cain nodded. The woman who sat with Maggie in the SUV looked distraught. There were tears in her eyes as she waved at Cain and the little girl.

  Are we letting them leave? Luester demanded.

  You want to start a gunfight with a kid and unarmed woman around? Jackie asked.

  “Bye, Jane!” Maggie shouted.

  Jane? Raven eyed the woman who looked like a kindergarten teacher in disbelief. Really? She wasn’t sure whether she should feel insulted or happy. Jane looked like a freaking goody goody with her crocheted cap with a large daisy on it, a matching scarf, and poinsettia boots. Jane shot Cain a wistful glance before she rushed to the SUV, grabbed Maggie’s duffel and handed it to Harvard. Jane blew kisses at Maggie who was too busy talking to Cain to notice.

  The Unmemorables watched the SUV pull away. Jackie gave orders to sweep the surrounding forest to make sure there weren’t any more Council spies. Raven slid the gun into her pants and tucked her hands in her pockets to warm them up. Her hands were stiff and cramped from her grip on the gun during the ordeal.

  “Raven, this is my sister, Maggie,” Cain said.

  “You’re Raven?” Maggie asked excitedly and Raven frowned.

  “Yup.”

  “She’s pretty,” Maggie said to Cain without looking away from Raven.

  “Yup,” Cain said again.

  “Y’all come inside!” G-Ma hollered from the front door. “Food’s hot! Cain, you got my baby girl?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  G-Ma cried when she hugged Maggie and led them into the dining room. None of the Unmemorables joined them, and when she tried to go outside to help, Cain gripped her hand and kept her beside him. Although Cain’s voice was light, he was pissed. Rich was a bastard, no doubt about it. Raven mentally weighed the faults of the Battalion and the Council and found them both equally evil.

  Maggie kept up a steady stream of chatter that filled the otherwise silent kitchen with warmth and happiness. The young girl hadn’t been affected in the slightest by what happened outside. Raven listened to the Unmemorables’ telepathy and relaxed a minute before three of them came in to eat. They were on edge and suspicious of Maggie’s presence. The Unmemorables didn’t want to stay here, but driving at night down a snow-covered mountain wasn’t smart. It was best to stay and keep a lookout. The Unmemorables came to eat in shifts, and when she volunteered to patrol telepathically, they shut her down. She wasn’t sure whether they didn’t trust her or they didn’t want to take the chance of her being exposed.

  “G-Ma, can we take one of the guest rooms?” Cain asked.

  “Of course, dear, I had both of them made up,” G-Ma said.

  Cain retrieved their duffels from the car and led Raven down a short hallway with two rooms and a bathroom. The room was simple with a window and double bed. She grabbed her clothes and showered before she walked into the empty bedroom. She placed a knife she nicked from the kitchen on the nightstand along with Angel’s gun and got into bed. Now that she could sleep, she couldn’t drop off. She would have gone back to the kitchen, but she wasn’t up to talking to G-Ma, the two-hundred-year old who thought she had a great destiny or the little girl who came from Bernt and Pris. Raven sided with the Unmemorables—Rich definitely had an ulterior motive for leaving Maggie here.

  When Cain came into the room, she played dead. He grabbed his clothes and left to shower. Raven talked mind to mind with the guys and found the connection to them reassuring rather than creepy. She was restless and once again offered to take a shift. Jackie turned her down and informed her that they’d take turns sleeping in the SUV. She turned toward the wall and took deep breaths to make herself go to sleep. It didn’t work. Her mind was a jumble of questions and emotions. When Cain came back into the room, he slid into bed beside her. He wrapped his arms around her and brought her back against his chest.

  “I didn’t know about the hostage situation with the pregnant mothers,” he said.

  “He’s just as bad as Angel.” She waited for him to defend Rich, but he didn’t.

  Cain buried his face in her hair and took a deep breath. “Everything he does is calculated. You know why he left Maggie here?”

  “No.”

  “No power works on Maggie. Whatever makes you super, she makes you normal.”

  “Son of a bitch. He has an eight year old spying for him? Isn’t that a bit young?”

  “He’ll do whatever it takes to obtain the Unmemorables. Since she can remember all of you...”

  Raven itched with the need to flee, but there was nowhere to go. She could go outside and freeze or stay where she was. She rolled over to face Cain. “We have to figure out how to break the curse. It’s why Angel and Rich want me.”

  “Being forgettable is the main factor, but there’s more to the Unmemorables. They work as one unit. I sensed them moving around tonight. They were in sync and organized.”

  She didn’t feel comfortable telling him the Unmemorables’ telepathy secret. It was part of their mystique and the less people knew about their talents, the better. Even she couldn’t explain how it worked. She could tell some of the guys weren’t thrilled that she was in on their secret and she didn’t want them to regret bringing her into the loop by telling Cain.

  “You were already on edge before they arrived. You okay?” Cain asked.

  “I thought G-Ma would say I wasn’t the one from the prophecy.”

  “You hoped.”

  “Yeah.”

  “We’re in this together.”

  “I don’t understand the prophecy, and I’m offended that anyone would think I want to start a war or control the Unmemorables.”

  “Prophecy’s never make sense until everything’s said and done.”

  “Fantastic.”

  Cain kissed her long and deep. “I was in the house and all of a sudden the Unmemorables went quiet and walked outside without saying a thing. They split up, pulled guns and I knew. I was so damn scared that my parents...”

  “Pris tried to knife me, but she missed.” Cain closed his eyes and she wrapped her arms around him. “I beat your mom once. I can do it again.”

  “I don’t want you to go that far,” he growled. “Why should you have to defend yourself against my family
? If we break the curse, they’ll recognize you and know you’re mine.”

  “Do your parents always do what Rich says?”

  “My dad idolizes Rich and my mom follows my father.”

  “And you?”

  “Before you I always did what I was told.”

  She could imagine why the Unmemorables were afraid of Cain. If he carried out Rich’s deeds all these years as a stone cold enforcer they wouldn’t believe he could change overnight. She examined his face and then her eyes narrowed.

  “What was Jane doing here?”

  Cain’s lips curved. When he didn’t speak, she slapped his chest and tried to get out of bed. Cain turned on his back and held her over him with his hands wrapped around her waist.

  “Jealous?”

  “Why the hell would I be jealous of a mousey housewife?” She tried to yank his hands off of her without success. “Why’d they bring her? You said Rich does everything for a reason.”

  “To rile me, probably. In his visions, he’s seeing me with multiple women since he can’t see your face. He probably thinks I’d come home if I saw Jane and Maggie.”

  “So you broke up with Jane recently?” she fished.

  He shrugged and she tried to wriggle away again. When he chuckled, her temper erupted. She grabbed his fingers and yanked back in the same move she used on Angel. Cain released her before she broke his hand, and when she strode to the door, he came up behind her and pinned her against the wall with her hands locked behind her back. She used some fancy moves that he countered easily. She froze when Maggie and G-Ma’s voices sounded in the hallway. Cain felt no such qualms. He thrust his hips against her butt and she stiffened up like a nun.

  “Stop!” she hissed.

  Cain lifted her nightgown. She bucked and tried to dislodge him, but he didn’t mind that his sister and great-grandma were right outside their door. He slid his hand between her legs and rubbed while she tried to get away. Her hands clenched into fists as she tried to control her lust, but that was a lost cause when he knew how to make her mindless.

  “Do it,” she said through gritted teeth.

  Cain whirled her around, hefted her up against the wall and slid into her. She wanted to moan, but she could still hear them talking in the hallway. What the fuck were they talking about? She tilted her head back as Cain got to work and she clutched handfuls of his hair.