“What now?” Cadence asked, checking her IAC to make sure he wasn’t alarmed at the progress of one of the other teams. His son, Brandon Keen, who also happened to be a good friend of Cadence’s, as well as her sister’s boyfriend, was out with another Hunter, Aurora Howe, so a few panicked thoughts flickered through her mind until she was sure he was okay.
“Rats,” Elliott said softly.
“What’s the matter?” she asked, assuming he was just using one of his old colloquialisms from the 1950s.
“No, rats!” Elliott repeated, and she realized he meant there were actual rats in the tunnel.
“What?” Cadence screamed. “Aaron said there wouldn’t be any rats!” There wasn’t much that freaked her out anymore, not since she’d taken to beheading monsters for a living, but she still hated rats, and her understanding was that Elliott wasn’t a big fan either, bu
Cadence used her entire body to fling the creature up and over, holding onto it with her knees, one hand on each jaw. It bucked and tried to pound her into the concrete beneath them, but her efforts were enough for Elliott to plunge the knife into its chest cavity. He took the blade out and stabbed again, several times, and Cadence could feel the animal start to weaken. Silver knives had worked better than anything else on the shapeshifting Vampires they’d encountered both in Melbourne and in Butler, Missouri, when they’d gone on a raid there right before Paul was taken prisoner. It was working here as well. After a few more jabs, the Vampire crocodile let out a loud sigh and crumbled into ash all over Cadence.She lay there stunned for a few seconds, not sure what to make of the entire reptile situation. Eventually, she came to her senses and jumped up, brushing the residue off as Elliott pocketed his weapon. “Never in my life…” she muttered, n
“That’s incredible!” Christian Henry gushed, looking at images of the vampire-crocodile Cadence and Elliott had dispatched on their Houston trip. They were back in Kansas City now, and even three days later, Cadence could still feel the rats crawling on her skin, despite dozens long, hot showers, and several apologies from her betrothed, none of which made it seem as if he was actually more sorry than amused.“What is it though?” Jamie asked, sitting next to Christian in the conference room where the team had gathered to go over recent missions. There’d been so many lately, these fly-by raids, as Aaron often referred to them, it was impossible to stop after each one and go over everything that had transpired. Since the retired Guardians from Roatan had come up to help, the Kansas City team had been dispatching groups across the country to work with the locals to take care of as many of these pockets as possible, and the meetings were more o
“We’ve got two dozen Guardians there now, back to watching on rooftops, the same sort of procedure we ran when Cadence and Cassidy were at risk,” Hannah continued in her even voice. “I’m certain they’ll be fine in the short term, until we can shut this business with Holland down.”“We don’t seem to be gettin’ a whole lot closer to that,” Elliott muttered, tapping the end of a pencil he probably wouldn’t need for anything against the table.“I don’t think that’s a fair statement,” Aaron said in his calm voice. “We’ve gotten nearly two thousand Guardians to come up from Roatan. We have a good handle on Melbourne now, we’ve taken out eighty-two pockets of Vampires in the last month alone. The ones that are congregating, the ones Holland intends to use to invade our headquarters, are on their heels.”“Yeah, but those are the only ones that ma
Shaking her head once more, Cadence pushed herself up from the table. “Aurora, you wanna come over around 7:00 tonight, and we’ll go over some things?”“Uh, how about you come to my apartment?” The nerves in her voice couldn’t be missed, and Cadence realized she was avoiding Aaron.“Okay,” she replied thinking the location probably made no difference as far as content was concerned. “My kid sister still in the gym?” she asked Elliott who usually had a pretty good handle on where Cassidy was.“Yep. Shane should be about done with the sims though.”Cadence glanced at the time on her IAC and saw that he was right. Cassidy would be forever indebted to her if she made it over in time to pull her out of any of her training session with Shane, but Cadence knew how close Cass was to being released from training altogether and decided to let the Guardian finish up. She only had one more observ
When Cadence reached the building that housed the gym, a steady stream of new recruits was headed down the hallway toward the showers. She looked for her sister among them but didn’t see her familiar face.“Hi, Cadence!” Tara said seemingly out of nowhere, though Cadence realized she’d been so busy looking for Cassidy she hadn’t noticed the other girl. Her brown hair was in a ponytail and a few tendrils were matted to her face with sweat, but she didn’t look nearly as tired as the other kids—recruits—and Cadence imagined that was because she wasn’t. Another argument for going through with the procedure.“Hi, Tara,” she said, pressing a smile to her face. “How’s it going?”The other newbies in the hallway seemed to suddenly realize who they’d been walking past and there were some oohs and ahhs. This was an entirely new batch from what Cadence could tell, although she’d
“Earth to Cassidy?” Cadence said, once they were away from the historical figure.“What?” Cass asked in a tone reserved for teenage girls. “I’m not deaf!”“Uh, you are infatuated, though. Does Brandon know about this?”Cassidy narrowed her eyes and folded her arms across her chest. “I am not infatuated. I just happen to take an interest in US history, unlike someone I know who totally takes it for granted and only got As because she sucked up to the teacher.”Cadence decided now was not the time to argue with her sister about her schooling or try to let her know she was gushing all over a man old enough to be her great-great-who-knows-how-many-greats-grandfather, particularly when the age difference between herself and Aaron flickered through her mind. Instead, she said, “Look, we need to chat. How long will it take you to hit the showers and meet me over at mom and dad’s?&rdquo
Cadence made her way to the apartment Brandon shared with Elliott and was about to knock on the door when she remembered she’d said she’d speak to her mother. Since Liz Findley didn’t have one of those “eye computers” as she put it, Cadence decided to take the elevator one floor down and speak to her mother herself, in person. It might actually be faster than her cell phone.“Hey!” Brandon shouted after her as she was about to board the elevator. “What’s up?”“Sorry!” Cadence stopped and turned back, taking a few steps in his direction. “Cass and I were going to chat in your apartment, but I remembered I need to go talk to Mom first. I’ll be back.”“Okay. Where is Cass? Still talking to Aaron Burr’s side project?” He snickered like the fact that he hadn’t been killed by a friend and brought back from the dead somehow made him a better catch than the
Hearing familiar voices coming from the apartment, Cadence decided not to knock and wasn’t surprised when she was able to open the door. Brandon and Cassidy were sitting on the sofa while Tara, Dax, and Lucy were sitting on the loveseat and chair respectively, a couple of pizzas on the coffee table. The teens didn’t even end their conversation as she walked in, though it didn’t matter since Cadence had no idea what they were talking about. Something about birds, blindfolds, and a river. “Hey, Cass, Mom wants you home soon, so can I interrupt?”“Sorry,” her sister said, as Dax finished his sentence, and no one jumped in with another comment, at least not while Cadence was asking for quiet. “What is it?”Cassidy didn’t seem agitated, just preoccupied. Cadence dropped down to the armrest near her, though she’d be speaking across Brandon. She glanced around at the others and decided it wasn’t anything