The Children and the Blood (22 page)

Harris blinked. He hadn’t heard about that.

“Regardless,” Brogan continued. “I thought you’d like to be the first to know.”

For the moment, Harris ignored the last comment, grateful only to have a lead. “When were they taken?”

“A day ago. I’m told the school belonging to that logo falls within your jurisdiction, as does the building by the older girl. Thus far, we haven’t turned up anything on the men in either picture and, to be honest, we don’t even have the girls’ names…”

As he trailed off, Harris looked up. “What’re you wanting here?”

“Your assistance,” Brogan went on smoothly. “Your Internal Affairs department presumably needs answers for yesterday’s events, and I highly doubt they will find any to suit them. As I said, the elder girl and her associates are damnably good at covering their tracks. And when that happens… where do you think Internal Affairs will come?” He paused. “You will never be able to prove what you saw. And so we wish you to work for us.”

“Going after the girl?”

“The younger one.”

“What?”

“Our previous encounters indicate the younger girl might not be like her sister. She may well be an innocent in this situation, leaving her in greater danger from others of the elder’s kind. And yet, for all her brutality in attacking your partner and whatever the news says, the older girl does seem to have some feeling for the child. We believe she and the boy may have been separated unintentionally. And now, they cannot reconnect. But if we were to have the younger child…”

Brogan smiled. “Her sister would come to us. And thus, we could save the younger and stop the elder, all at one moment.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Family is important to her kind. Very important. The girl
will
come if she learns we have her younger sister. And then we can stop her.”

Brogan watched him. “So, Detective. May I tell my associates we have your help?”

Harris looked down at the photos, the laundry list of violations of the law he was considering scrolling through his head. It was a long list, starting from the major crimes and dwindling down to the relatively minor infractions, all of which would spell the end of his career. Jail was certain. Possibly for life and then some with all the sentences added up.

Just like that, twenty years of an exemplary career would be down the drain.

He’d given everything to the job. He was the job. And the job was keeping the innocent safe. The department would have his badge. He’d probably be fired, regardless.

But even if they didn’t, would it matter? Could he go back on the streets with what he knew? What would it be like, the next time he arrested someone, wondering all the while if they would spontaneously combust or do God knew what else? How could he work? He’d be retired or forced to resign within a year.

Because people didn’t go up in flames. People didn’t walk away after liquefying metal on their skin.
People
didn’t do that.

He studied her face in the enlarged photo. Pale. Ghostly. Still looking scared.

What were you frightened of this time? he wondered. The man with the camera, putting you one step closer to being caught?

Because you certainly weren’t ever afraid of me.

His gaze rose to Brogan’s. “Her name is Ashley,” he said. “And yeah. I’ll help you.”

Ashley stared out the window as the morning sun crept over the horizon to welcome in another day. On her lap, Tala’s head rested, the weight of the dog leaning into the side of her knee. Flopped over her shoes and positioned awkwardly between the seats, Mischa snored softly and dreamed, occasionally twitching as she chased her phantom prey.

The others had traded off driving as the hours passed, and never stopped too long anywhere. When their turn was over, whoever had been driving took the place of the person in the rear of the van and quickly fell asleep on the bench seat till the next driver’s turn was done. They never asked her to take the wheel, didn’t even seem to entertain the idea, but kept to a schedule all their own with barely a word needing to be spoken.

She’d slept for a while, waking only as the others changed places. The dogs had huddled around her halfway through the night, responding to some unknown impulse of their own. But she was grateful for it. They were oddly soothing and, in the dropping temperature of the night, comfortingly warm.

Idly, she ran her fingers through Tala’s dense fur, her gaze on the morning light. The dog leaned into the touch, putting more pressure on her leg and then heaving a satisfied sigh. Ashley gave the animal a tiny smile. She’d never had a dog near her before; never even petted one that she could recall. It was nice. She’d miss Tala and Mischa when this was done.

Her thoughts turned back to their destination as the nascent smile died. In a few hours, she’d leave the only four people in the world she still knew and disappear. A woman she’d never met would take her away and then…

Safety. As the miles passed, she’d started to wonder what the word meant. A place to stay. Somewhere the monsters wouldn’t find her. Somewhere to stop for a bit, and try to understand what had happened.

Somewhere that would never be home.

She swallowed, struggling to push the thought away. The past few days had been like a flood, sweeping her along. Forty-eight hours ago, or maybe a bit more, there’d been home. Now it was gone. And in all the changes, she’d just hung on, waiting for it to end and something that made sense to begin.

Even if she was starting to think that wouldn’t happen. She didn’t like this new world away from the farm, because in it, Lily and her father and everyone she’d loved didn’t exist. No one knew them. No one remembered them. Not these people in the van. Not this strange woman she’d be sent off with in a few hours.

Just her.

Other people would have funerals. Memorials. Burials and gravesites and mourners who at least said how sad it all was before they went on with their lives. There wasn’t even that. Without even pausing, without even noticing the difference, the world had moved on as if everyone in her whole life had never lived. As though with their bullets and fire, the men who’d destroyed her family hadn’t erased anything worth remembering at all.

Her nails bit her palm, driving back the tears. Crying made her feel like she was drowning, and giving into the pain just made everything else more real.

Tala nudged her hand to draw attention to the fact the petting had stopped. Mournfully, the animal eyed her, looking more like a sad puppy than a creature the size of a wolf. Drawing a shaky breath, Ashley ran her fingers through the dog’s fur, focusing on the simplicity of the action while the miles sped by.

As the sun inched toward noon, the van left the highway and curved along an off-ramp into Nashville. Around turns and down nameless streets, Samson navigated till he reached a public parking lot at the edge of a quaint shopping district. Spider grabbed her bag as the others climbed out, and Bus woke in the back seat, blinking at the city and doing his best to regain consciousness quickly.

“Stay with Mischa and the van,” Carter told him. “We’ll call once we check it out.”

Bus nodded, scrubbing his face with a hand and then climbing toward the driver’s seat.

Carter motioned the others onward, and then fell in beside Ashley as they started down the road, Tala on their heels.

In evenly spaced intervals, flourishing trees shaded either side of the street. Brick buildings lined the road, their awnings and colorfully painted window casements shining in the sunlight. Boutiques and cafés filled the lower levels, with apartments and smaller shops on the next floors, but beneath the modern trappings, the history of the district showed through in the engraved names of long-gone businesses in the buildings’ uppermost stonework.

“Shenandoah owns a bookstore at the end of the block,” Carter told her, jerking his chin toward the other side of the street. “She’s lived above it for over a decade now, and I don’t think any of us expected her to–”

Ashley glanced at him as he cut off, and then she looked back at the store. The shop seemed the same as any other, with a handwritten welcome sign and merchandise artfully displayed in the window. On the second floor, another window was raised and white curtains fluttered beside a decorative birdcage with its door open wide.

Samson turned from his vaguely hostile study of the passersby and tracked Carter’s gaze. The younger man swore. With a swift glance back and forth, he headed across the road.

“Come on,” Carter said, all lightness gone from his tone. Taking Ashley’s hand, he pulled her with him as he followed the others into a service drive between the buildings on the opposite side of the street.

Behind the stores, the alley turned, extending the length of the block. Dumpsters lined the brick-walled confines, past due for emptying and supporting more bags against their sides. Ignoring the mess, Samson and the others started toward the rear of the bookstore, and Ashley swallowed hard to see Spider fingering a gun beneath her coat.

“Stay behind me,” Carter said quietly.

She nodded, biting her lip as his hand inched toward a weapon as well.

The back door of the bookshop burst open. Half-running, half-falling, a red-haired woman stumbled down the steps. Her gaze raked the alleyway and then caught on them.

“Carter!” she screamed, scrambling up and racing toward them down the alley.

Ashley gasped as guns came out all around her.

Two men stepped out of the shop.

Blood drained from Ashley’s face. They felt just like the people on her farm. Exactly the same.

On both sides of her, the others opened fire.

The bullets flew past the red-haired woman, and sped at the two men calmly walking down the stairs.

And hit nothing. A great, clear wall of absolutely nothing, from which the bullets ricocheted harmlessly away.

At her side, Ashley heard Spider swear. Carter clicked at Tala, and the dog surged forward as he continued to fire. Rushing the men, Tala barely made it half the length of the alley before a burst of energy sent her flying back to land in a yelping heap on an overflowing dumpster nearby.

Sobbing, the woman strained to run faster.

Ashley just stared.

Energy swelled. Clear, crystal, and impossible. It surrounded the men, growing stronger with every heartbeat.

She saw Carter wince and heard Spider curse again. “Shen!” the girl shouted amid the racket of gunfire. “Get–”

The energy smashed down on the woman like a hammer. For a moment, Ashley watched a shell glisten around her, as though taking the blow. Then it shattered, and fragments of iridescent light flew toward the men.

And disappeared.

Like a puppet without strings, the woman crashed to the ground.

The others shouted. Swore. Gunfire echoed all around her. The monsters looked up from the dead woman and cocked their heads at Ashley curiously, while the energy swelled up around them ten times stronger than before.

She couldn’t move. She was in the middle of the alley. She needed to move, and she couldn’t even breathe.

The energy grew.

Something slammed into her from the side. Carter’s weight carried her into the shelter of the garbage bin, while the brick wall behind where she’d been standing fractured and showered debris on the alley.

“Stay down!” he shouted.

She nodded numbly. Across the alley, Spider and Samson crouched behind another dumpster, firing in turns while the other reloaded with ammunition from Spider’s bag. Contrary to her promise, Ashley peeked around the garbage bin.

“Bus, get here now!” Carter yelled into his cell before rising and shooting at the men standing idly over the dead woman’s body.

The garbage bin across from her launched into the air, taking the others with it. A few yards away, Spider crashed into a pile of garbage bags and then tumbled to the ground. Instantly, the girl rolled to her feet and rushed for the cover of the building’s corner.

But in the center of the alley, Samson lay motionless. Blood seeped from gashes on his leg, and his gun rested beyond his outstretched hand.

She stared. A blast tore through the air beside her, narrowly missing Carter. Trapped at the alley corner, Spider screamed for Samson to move.

It was so fast. So very fast. Between one heartbeat and the next, the energy rose around the men again.

Samson opened his eyes. Gasped. Looked toward the monsters. And Ashley could feel the strike coming.

Bolting from the cover of the dumpster, Ashley threw herself at the gun. Her hands wrapped around it, and rolling awkwardly, she flung her arms out and squeezed the trigger till the weapon clicked emptily.

Bullets spun away from the shield surrounding the men.

And the monsters paused.

Lunging from behind the garbage bin, Carter grabbed Samson’s shirt and hauled the man with him as he rushed after Spider, with Tala running on three legs to follow.

Energy flooded up around the men. Scrambling to her feet, Ashley ran, skirting the corner as the edge of the building shattered in her wake. Debris flew around her, grazing her face and showering the concrete.

The van screeched to a stop at the alley entrance. Racing to the vehicle, Spider threw the side door open, ripped a panel from the floor and then spun, a submachine gun in her hands. She swung up to one side of the door, clutching the overhead railings as Carter hurried Samson inside.

“Get in!” she shouted at Ashley.

Eyes wide, Ashley darted around her and tumbled into the van, Tala coming right behind. In the street, people huddled behind doors and inside shops, and in the distance, sirens howled as police rushed to the scene.

The men came around the corner.

Bus hit the accelerator.

Hanging from the side of the vehicle, Spider unleashed a torrent of bullets at the two men, cutting off as the alley was lost from sight.

Spinning the wheel, Bus sent the vehicle careening around a corner, and then crushed the pedal to the floor. Swinging into the van, Spider dropped into the seat and then yanked the door closed.