Unleashed (Unmemorable Series Book 2)

by A. P. Jensen

  “What are you doing here?” Jackie asked Bones.

  “I was watching the Council headquarters when they were attacked. I came to give my report to Gerald.”

  “You...” Raven breathed and needed a moment to stop herself from screeching. “You watched the Battalion attack and did nothing?”

  Bones stared at her with fathomless eyes. “The Council and Battalion are our enemies. If they destroy each other, the better it is for us. My orders are to observe, not engage.”

  “You cold-blooded bastard!”

  Jackie grabbed her hand before she could pull out her throwing knife. When she tried to use her left, Bam Bam moved in to help Jackie restrain her. Bones was unaffected by her outburst and examined her as if she were an interesting toy.

  “A female Unmemorable. I never imagined such a thing,” Bones said in a gentle, musing voice. “The fact that we’ve crossed paths is strange. If what Gerald said is true and you’re screwing Henson, I can see why you’re emotional about the attack.”

  Raven tried to lunge, but Jackie and Bam Bam held her in place. “I get emotional when innocents are killed, but I guess that’s how you get off, you sick fuck.”

  Ace pinched her from behind. “Bones is a good guy. He helps the police.”

  “Helps them how? He hands over rape victims after he watches the men torture her?”

  Bones took a step forward and Luester blocked his way. Bones moved his emotionless gaze from Raven to Luester.

  “You’re in my way,” Bones said.

  “You can’t kill her. Jackie thinks she can break the curse,” Luester said.

  “So I hear. What do you need me for?”

  “We don’t...” Raven began, but Happy clapped a hand over her mouth. When she tried to bite, he gave her a steady look that stopped her teeth from sinking into his palm.

  “Olivie Belrose is the woman who cursed us. Raven thinks a descendant from her bloodline can reverse the curse and we need a tracker,” Harvard explained.

  “Confronting a Belrose could make matters worse,” Bones said.

  “We have to try,” Jackie broke in. “Raven’s the one from the prophecy. This is what we’ve been waiting for.”

  Raven’s eyes burned as she glared at Bones. She aimed a bunch of cuss words at Bones telepathically since Happy had his huge paw over her mouth. She found out Bones wasn’t on the same frequency when the others staggered. The Unmemorables gave her dirty looks and she subsided in furious silence. Apparently, her ranting ricocheted off of Bones and nailed the others. Why were they still looking to Bones for help? Did they not understand her story?

  Bones put his thumbs through his belt loops. “What do you have?”

  “The name Olivie Belrose,” Bam Bam said.

  Bones raised a brow. “That’s it?”

  “Cain would be able to track a Belrose with his talent,” Luester said casually.

  “You’re comparing me to a Henson?” Bones asked and there was a warning note in his voice.

  I don’t need your help, Raven cast at Bones, hoping to break through his mental fortress.

  Their eyes met and her heart speeded up. Bones’s face chilled her just as much as Angel’s did. She would wait for Cain, she decided a moment before Bones gave a small nod and walked upstairs. Happy dropped his hand from her mouth at the same time that Jackie and Bam Bam hastily backed away.

  “Now what?” Raven growled.

  “He’ll do it,” Luester said with a satisfied grin.

  “What? He walked away. I can’t...”

  “I don’t know what happened between you and Bones,” Luester interrupted. “But he’s our best bet for finding a Belrose descendant.”

  “Who knows if Cain will come back?” Happy said.

  She whirled on him. “What are you talking about?”

  “His people are the Council,” Happy said slowly, as if she were slow. “You think he’ll walk away when they’re down?”

  When she said nothing, Happy, Ace and Harvard headed to the kitchen, shaking their heads. She stared straight ahead and tried to contain the scream bottling up in her throat. Everything was spinning out of control. She didn’t want to be within one hundred yards of Bones and now he was the only one who could help since Cain was gone. Should she have gone with Cain? She didn’t know what was worse—twiddling her fingers in Vegas or having to work with Bones.

  “It’ll be fine,” Jackie said, giving her a light punch in the shoulder before he walked away with Luester.

  Big Daddy came down the hallway with Sunshine. She tried to get rid of her scowl as Sunshine engulfed her in a hug that cracked her back.

  “Merry Christmas!” Sunshine shouted. “It’s Raven!”

  She squeezed her eyes shut at the overwhelming volume. “Yes, it’s me. How are you, Sunshine? Did you get what you wanted for Christmas?”

  Sunshine nodded emphatically. “You’re going on an adventure!”

  Raven stared at Sunshine for several blank seconds before she looked at Big Daddy.

  “Where you off to?” Big Daddy asked.

  “Nowhere right now.”

  Sunshine waved his hands. “Caroling! Christmas. Snowball fights!”

  Big Daddy put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry to hear what happened to the Council. We haven’t seen an attack like this in decades.”

  She looked into his kind eyes. “Are you guys going to do anything?”

  He didn’t say anything for a long minute and then, “It’s Gerald’s call and he hasn’t initiated anything. We’ve never taken a side in this war.”

  “But some of them were innocent! Maggie...” she had to stop and clear her throat because emotion welled up in her throat, “She's eight.”

  “I’ll talk to Gerald, but I won’t go against his orders,” Big Daddy said and walked away.

  She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, desperately grasping for control. Today had been a doozy. She didn’t know where she stood with Cain and she couldn’t deny that Happy’s statement made sense. If the Council were in dire straits, would Cain come back to her? Would she leave the Unmemorables to go to him? She started when Sunshine clasped her hand.

  “Everything’s gonna be okay,” Sunshine said.

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because you’re a hero.”

  She gave him a sad smile. “I don’t feel like one.”

  “That’s how all heroes feel,” Sunshine said and tugged her out the front door.

  Raven didn’t question where Sunshine was taking her. She had the feeling he sensed her emotional turmoil. Sunshine led her around the massive garage and they strolled hand in hand in the relative quiet. They walked beneath barren trees and their breaths gusted out in small clouds of white. Sunshine tilted his head back and smiled at the sun as if it whispered secrets to him. That tight ball of anxiety in her chest eased the slightest bit. Sunshine didn’t have a care in the world and his quiet presence calmed her.

  “Dad got me new pencils,” Sunshine said.

  “That was nice of him,” she said.

  “I’ve been drawing.”

  When he didn’t continue, she prompted, “What have you been drawing?”

  “You and other characters.”

  “Other characters?”

  He beamed at her. “You’re going on a big adventure! Heroes always have companions.”

  She opened her mouth to ask him another question when she heard the pop of gunfire. She yanked Sunshine to the ground, pulled out her knife and crouched over him. Her eyes scanned the surrounding trees. She was in the middle of a freaking forest and they’d been strolling for nearly fifteen minutes. Why the hell were there trees in the desert anyway?

  “Fun!” Sunshine chirped and seemed fascinated by two twigs in front of his nose.

  “Shh,” she whispered. “Can you connect to my mind, Sunshine? We don’t want to make a sound.”

  Sunshine used a twig to draw in the dirt. For several moments, she didn’t think he’d heard her
and then she heard the theme song for Batman in her head. Sunshine was humming it in his mind. Raven wasn’t sure whether he connected with her intentionally or accidentally, but she didn’t care. All that mattered was that they could communicate silently.

  Stay here, she said firmly and patted his back for emphasis.

  Sunshine drew random lines in the dirt. She launched herself at the nearest tree and climbed it like Spiderman. She kept her mind blank. If she thought too much about how she was doing this, she’d fall. She perched on a branch and looked around. Again, she heard the faint, sharp blasts of gunfire.

  I’ll be right back. Call me if you need me, she said telepathically.

  She had to project her voice over the Lord of the Rings soundtrack that Sunshine switched to. She wasn’t sure he heard, but she assumed he’d let her know if there was trouble. She remembered the way the Unmemorables leapt through the trees like monkeys. No time like the present to see if she could do it too. She took a deep breath and took a running jump. When she landed on the next branch she went with her momentum. Her body knew what to do and instinctively chose the branches that could handle her weight.

  She stopped when the gunfire grew louder. She settled on a branch and saw a splash of red dripping down the trunk of a tree. She slid down and touched the liquid. She realized it was paint a moment before a hail of paintballs came her way. She ducked and hid behind a tree. She turned down Sunshine’s soundtrack in her mind and heard masculine chuckles and catcalls. The idiots were playing paintball. Red and blue paintballs littered the ground around her in a steady stream. She sighed when the gunfire didn’t stop. So they wanted to nail her, did they? Payback for beating their asses last time? Lucky for them, she was in a mood to battle.

  She snatched a tiny blade from her ankle. Aside from the sound of paintballs hitting objects, there was no sound in the forest. Both teams were communicating telepathically and it didn’t take a genius to figure out that they switched their focus from each other to her. Now that she knew Sunshine was safe, she switched her mental frequency. She went on tiptoes as if that would help her get better reception. She hit gold and gasped when she was bombarded by twenty voices. It was like being in the middle of a bar fight with guys whooping, yelling and cussing. She immediately yanked out of their frequency and tuned back into Sunshine. She relaxed when she heard the soundtrack for X-Men.

  She closed her eyes and cleared her mind. She shifted a little when she sensed the guys moving into better positions and ducked when a paintball hit the tree two inches from her eye. She took a deep breath and tossed the knife. There was a sharp hiss as the blade cut someone’s shoulder and a gun hit the ground. She held her hand up for the knife and caught it when it came back to her.

  The paintballs stopped and she knew they were trying to regroup. They didn’t betray their presence by even a whisper of sound so she was forced to rely on her sixth sense. Thank God Jackie insisted on this in Utah. She didn’t question her instincts, she exploited them to the hilt. The Unmemorables rallied and crept in together. When they were within range, she let the boomerang knife fly again. More guns fell to the ground. She caught the blade again and sucked in a breath when they decided to rush her instead. Almost as if Sunshine was in tune with what was happening, he switched to Requiem for a Tower. She dodged paintballs as she grabbed three guns and took off through the forest. She knew they easily kept pace above her and when one of the paintballs hit her ankle she pivoted and fired. They were out in plain sight since they hadn’t anticipated that move. She shot as many of them as she could in the crotch. When eight of them fell to the ground like dead birds, she collected their guns and waited for the others to arrive.

  Raven’s worries melted away as she waged war in the most intense paintball battle of all time. She took turns retreating and then rushing the Unmemorables. She managed to hold her ground by building a makeshift fort that was being steadily annihilated. She was scanning for an escape route when the steady pound of paintballs abruptly stopped. She peeked over her shield and saw Jackie, Luester, Bam Bam and Ace.

  “Really?” Jackie said.

  She scowled. “What?”

  “We have work to do and you’re playing paintball?”

  She waved her gun. “We’re not playing. This is serious shit.”

  “Why the hell are you shooting them in the balls?” Ace demanded.

  She tossed her hair. “They’re sexist.”

  When they all stared at her like disappointed uncles, she reluctantly left her fort. Bam Bam grinned and shook his head when he saw her stash of guns.

  “You’re a combination of Jason Bourne and Rambo,” Bam Bam said and tossed his arm over her shoulders. “One day you’re gonna have to teach me the Clarity thing.”

  “I don’t understand it myself,” she said and tensed when she saw the Unmemorables in the trees. They were armed to the teeth and she couldn’t stop her smirk when she saw that they were splattered with paint. They didn’t retaliate, but she knew she had to watch her back.

  Sunshine was in the same spot where she left him. She pulled him up and dusted off the dirt before she put an arm around his waist.

  “I like the Lord of the Rings soundtrack,” she said, looking up at him with a grin. Kicking ass had done a lot to alleviate her frustration. “Come on.”

  She tried to move him toward the mansion and realized she needed his cooperation. Sunshine cocked his head as he looked down at the dirt. She did the same and realized the ground was filled with a maze of lines.

  “Adventure,” Sunshine said in a serious voice and pointed at the dirt.

  She took a step back to see the big picture and realized she needed more height. She released Sunshine, scaled the tree and looked down. What looked like random lines up close turned into a masterpiece of art. She looked down at a picture of a creepy lake and forest. She glanced at Sunshine who was chasing a squirrel. How was Sunshine capable of drawing something of this scale and detail when he couldn’t put feelings into words? Raven tuned out of Sunshine’s frequency and into her personal group of Unmemorables.

  Do Sunshine’s pictures mean something? she asked as they clustered around Sunshine’s drawing in the dirt.

  Jackie and Bam Bam examined the illustration carefully.

  “Sunshine’s always drawing comics, but this is . . . unusual,” Jackie said.

  “Why are all the trees all broken and dead?” Bam Bam asked.

  “He keeps saying we’re going on an adventure. I don’t know how he knows that,” Raven said and slid down the tree.

  “He senses stuff,” Luester said and clapped his brother on the back. “Where is this, Sunshine?”

  Sunshine’s smile dimmed a bit. “That’s where the villain is.”

  “What villain?” Ace asked.

  Sunshine waved the twig in his hand and mumbled incoherently.

  “I know I’m new to all this power/magic shit, but is this a sign or something?” Raven asked slowly.

  “It could be a scene from a movie he saw,” Ace suggested.

  “That’s Manchac Swamp.”

  A herd of Unmemorables were in the trees, examining Sunshine’s drawing as well.

  “Manchac Swamp?” she repeated. “Where’s that?”

  There was a long silence and then one of the masked men said, “Louisiana.”

  “At least it’s on this continent,” she mumbled.

  “Maybe Sunshine is just fooling around,” Ace suggested. “Sunshine isn’t a hunter, he just likes to draw.”

  Luester looked like he wanted to punch Ace, but didn’t contradict what he was saying. They made their way back to the mansion as the sun began to set. They entered through the kitchen and stopped when their noses were assailed by the smell of meat. Happy bustled around the kitchen with a freakishly white apron. When the guys tried to sit at the table, they had to dodge spatulas and meat pounders.

  “Don’t you dare sit at my table like that, you filthy bastards!” Happy roared.

  They all
trooped upstairs. Jackie led Raven to the room she’d spent a night in previously. Her duffel was on the bed and she hopped into the shower. She was brushing her hair when her cell rang. She picked it up on the first ring.

  “Cain?”

  “Everything okay?”

  Raven sank onto the bed. She hadn’t realized how much she wanted to hear his voice until this moment. How had she gotten hooked on him so quickly? “Yeah, I’m fine. What about you?”

  “Still on the road. There’s at least twenty missing including Maggie. I have to go to headquarters first and pick up her scent.”

  She wondered if that’s how Bones’s tracking talent worked. She shifted uncomfortably and said, “I need to say, I didn’t choose them over you. I...”

  “We’re not going to talk about that.”

  His voice was so abrupt that she stopped immediately. She felt as if he jabbed her in the face. She didn’t know how to deal with this Cain. He sounded hard and cold and so unlike the man she’d come to know.

  “If anything happens, contact me,” he said.

  Raven was so stunned by the sudden end to their conversation that she stared at the phone in disbelief before she tossed it. The bedroom door opened, but she didn’t bother to turn around. Sunshine hummed as he sat beside her and grabbed her hand.

  “You hurt,” he said.

  She gave him a shaky smile. “I’m fine.”

  “Heroes have dark times.”

  “Sunshine, I’m not a hero.”

  Sunshine nodded as he continued to hum and ran a hand through his hair. He closed his eyes in pleasure and her lips twitched as she watched him. Darkness couldn’t consume her with Sunshine around. She totally understood why the guys gave him his nickname. She sighed and bumped her shoulder lightly with his.

  “I’m hungry. Let’s go to the kitchen.”

  “Food!” Sunshine shouted.

  Sunshine chattered about the powers of his favorite Superheroes as they walked down the hall to the glass elevator. Sunshine didn’t release her hand. Intuitively, she knew Sunshine needed a maternal touch. She didn’t grow up with a mother and knew what it felt like to want one. They walked into the kitchen in the middle of a briefing. Gerald stood in front of long tables that were filled with men. Gerald didn’t pause in his speech, but his eyes narrowed when they fell on her. Some of the Unmemorables looked around and sneered at her. Jackie, Luester, Bam Bam and Ace sat at the end of one table. She wasn’t happy to see Bones there. She pushed Sunshine beside Bones and sat on his other side. Sunshine released her hand so he could grab some candied nuts. She tactfully moved his sketchpad onto her lap so he wouldn’t get it dirty.