“All righty now, tell me again. What the hell did them damn things look like?” Heather took a giant bite out of her bacon cheeseburger, and for a moment, Cassidy marveled at her skills.
“Uh, well, they were people, but they were completely jet black, like they’d been through a crisper. But they weren’t burned. I mean, they weren’t charred or anything. Just black. Except for their eyes. Those were red. And their clothes were weird. Some of them, anyway. Some of them looked like they were wearing clothes from a really long time ago, like villagers in an old movie or something. They crawled down the sides of the buildings, like spiders sort of. And they had claws. Maybe you should just jump into my head and then you could see for yourself.” She took a small bite out of the hot ham and cheese sandwich in front of her but she wasn’t really hungry.
“Okay, sounds good to me. Pull ‘em up.”
Cassidy felt a
Brandon grabbed the pizza he’d ordered and hurried out of the trainee apartment building, back to his own, but he kept an eye out for Cassidy the entire time he was walking, hoping he didn’t run into her again—literally or figuratively—since that had been one of the most painful experiences of his whole life. He couldn’t believe how far downhill their relationship had gone in just a matter of days.Back in his apartment, he dropped the pizza box on the coffee table and went to the kitchen to grab a soda and a napkin. While he felt a little like a loser eating pizza in his apartment by himself again, he didn’t want to go to any of his friends’ places because he didn’t know if Cass would be there. And since most of them were her friends first, it seemed a little bit wrong to make her be the one who couldn’t hang out anymore.He had a seat on the couch and picked up the remote, contemplating whether or not he could han
Cassidy did her best to shake off her encounter with Brandon, but even after a quick sprint on her treadmill, she still felt wrong about the whole situation. She wanted to reach out to him, to call him, to let him know she was sorry for keeping secrets from him. Maybe she should’ve told him what Alex had said, or about what Christian was up to. She knew the biggest strain on their relationship had been the fact she wasn’t telling Brandon everything, and her own experience told her how unsettling it was to know someone you care about is keeping something massive from you.It was too late to go back and tell him now, though. And if she let him read Alex’s letter, he might be even more mad at her than he was already. As for Christian, she needed to check in with him. It had been a couple of hours, and there was a chance he was ready for her to get help.Still dripping sweat from her sprint, she sat down on the couch and closed her eyes. “You ok
“Thanks for meeting with me. I know your time is valuable, so I’ll get right to it. I have some disturbing footage from a hunt in Hungary last night. Mila sent it to me a few hours ago. I’ve been trying to figure out what I’m looking at, but I must admit, I haven’t got a clue. Part of me thinks we should just wait a few days until Aaron and Cadence get back, but I decided to go ahead and let you see it. Maybe we can figure it out together,” Hannah said.“That sounds slightly terrifying,” Elliott mumbled. “Something you’ve never seen?”“I know. I thought I’d seen just about everything imaginable,” Hannah admitted. She pulled up the video Mila had sent her from the hunt on a large screen behind her on her office wall and swiveled her chair to watch it with them.The footage wasn’t steady at all, an indicator that the person recording was running, but eventually, Hannah knew,
Everyone flew out of their chairs at once, hugging the happy couple and welcoming them back. “You look so tan!” Aurora said, squeezing Cadence tightly.“Spend two weeks on a beach and that’ll happen,” Cadence replied with a laugh.“What are you doing back early?” Jamie wanted to know, stepping aside so Elliott could hug Aaron. “We weren’t expecting you just yet.”“Do you want us to leave?” Cadence giggled.“No, just a surprise,” the doctor reassured her.“We just... needed to get back.” Aaron’s tone told Hannah something was on his mind, and she wondered if maybe Mila had managed to get ahold of one of them.“Well, it’s great to see you. We were just discussing a few situations that have been going on in other areas....” Hannah stopped talking as she noticed Cadence’s expression for the first time. The Hunter Leader w
Cadence was silent as they walked from the office building back to the apartments. Aaron didn’t ask her anything, and she was glad, because she really didn’t know what to say. Ever since she’d awoken in the middle of the day with those horrible images in her head, she hadn’t been able to think of anything else. Seeing that she hadn’t invented the creatures in her own mind was even more terrifying than believing she just had a warped imagination.They reached the apartment building and headed for the elevator. Lots of friendly faces greeted them, and it was evident everyone they bumped into wanted to stop and chat, but the McReynolds were on a mission. Cadence hadn’t bothered to contact her sister to see if she was home, and as the elevator climbed to Cassidy’s floor, she hoped she was because she wanted to talk to her quickly and then head back over to the office building so that they could get to the bottom of this—not that she
Cassidy nodded like she thought that was true. Where this left them, Cadence wasn’t sure, but she was glad to know her sister was aware of the situation. “You need to come with us to the office. We’re having a meeting, and you seem to know more about what’s going on than anyone else, including Hannah.”“Okay,” Cassidy said, but her voice sounded timid, completely unlike her.“What is it?” Cadence asked.“Nothing, only... I hope Hannah doesn’t get upset that I was helping Eliza out behind her back. And I hope Mila doesn’t get mad at Eliza that she didn’t reveal her source. I think... I think Eliza might be getting help from someone else, too, like an Independent or something. But I don’t know. I think that’s where the ‘guy’ part of Gimu originated.”“I thought you said it might be ‘girl’,” Aaron questioned.“It mi
They all took seats around the conference table in their usual positions, except Christian’s chair was empty, and so was the one next to Cassidy, where Brandon would be sitting if he were there. Cadence regretted excluding him now. Aurora wasn’t there yet, which would give them each a few minutes to get their thoughts together. “Anyone else want coffee?” Elliott asked, standing and heading back out to reception where Mrs. Carminati always had a fresh pot and plenty of K cups.“I’ll take a cup, if you don’t mind,” Hannah chimed in. She was the only one, and as she reminded Elliott how she took it, Aaron got up to grab a stack of papers off of the printer she imagined he must’ve sent there while they were still in Cassidy’s apartment, it was so thick.“Sorry I’m late,” Aurora said, rushing through the door and taking her seat. “I got hung up. New recruit with lots of questions caught me.&
“I sent Christian a text, but who knows if he even took his phone,” Aaron continued.“Surely he did,” Aurora said. “Who goes on vacation and doesn’t take their phone?”“I hope he did, but until he gets in touch, I’ll be a little concerned about him,” Aaron said.“Why? He just threw you in a portal.” Cassidy was clearly not over the situation, even if Christian had done his best to redeem himself later.“I’ve known Christian a really long time, Cass. He doesn’t always make good decisions. In fact, he makes a lot of really horrible, dangerous decisions, but that doesn’t mean I want him to get hurt—or worse.”“I don’t think he’d say the same thing about you,” Cassidy mumbled, and Aaron chose to ignore it.“Well, I for one could care less if he fell off the face of the earth.” Elliott said it like it was