Obsidian Souls (Soul Series) (27 page)

The huge chateau came into view, and we slowed. I had a little bit of trouble stopping as suddenly as they did. I guess this was common with beginners, because Caden angled in front of me to help slow me down.

“Wow, that was fantastic!” They were all smiling at my newfound enjoyment.

“It’s awesome,” said Mike. Alex nodded his head in agreement.

The high from realizing what I could do dimmed quickly when I saw the large gate from my memory. “It’s electrified.”

“That’s not a big deal. Just a minor discomfort,” Mike said. “But I’m not sure you’re quite ready for that.”

“No, she’s not. It might be easiest to toss her over.”

“You want to throw me? I’ll break something.”

“I’ll have someone catch you on the other side.” Caden looked at me as if I was the one being absurd.

“We are going to jump.”

“Can’t you just jump with me? Or do one of those things you did in…”

“Mike, hop over and get ready to catch her.”

I watched as Mike leapt over. It was so awesome to watch that I got distracted and didn’t see Caden coming in behind me until he had me in his arms and was tossing me over the massive fence. I went flying through the air and Mike caught me easily. After I landed safely, I realized it had actually been kind of fun. “Are we going to do that when we leave too?”

Mike just smiled as he put me on my feet. I watched Alex jump over and then Caden. It was better than watching gymnastics at the Olympics. “Am I going to be able to do that?”

“Eventually, but we don’t want to find out now while you could get killed by the current running through the gate. Mike, Alex, you guys take the east wing. I’m going to take Lex with me and cover the west. We meet back here in twenty minutes.”

They took off, and I followed Caden as we slowly approached the large mansion.

“What exactly are we going to do?”

“We’re going to tap the place.”

“Why?”

“Because if they are planning something, I want to know when, where, and how.”

The idea of Caden wiping the floor with them appealed to me on a very basic level. I still had trouble even thinking of the couple of nights here. The possibility of seeing Carl, even from a distance and with Caden by my side, rattled me. Even with all the negative bad feelings, the idea of someone coming to hurt Caden, Mike, or any of the guys made me want to beg for peace.

“I thought that first night when I came to the bar, you guys were on the brink of working things out? Couldn’t you just start talking again?”

“No.” He paused as if hesitating to s
ay what he wanted to say, and he
looked at me. “As long as you are with us, they won’t back off. Even if they can’t have you, they think you’ll tip the scales in our favor.”

“How do you know this?”

“Charlie has been snooping around. He’s picked up a lot of chatter.”

“I know Rufus had said he wanted me to have children for them but can’t they find someone else?”

“No. Not like you.”

“I might seem like I’m similar to you guys, but let’s face it, I’m turning out to be a slow learner at best. At worst? I might be a total dude. I can’t hear like you or do anything really. The only thing I’ve done so far was to be able to run really quick, and I couldn’t even stop on my own. Oh yeah, and I can glow. Great for those overcast days.”

“You’re special, I can sense it and so can they. Now come on. We have to keep moving, or we aren’t going to get anything done.”

We had been circling the house and stopped to kneel under a large window. I was about to raise my head and look but he pulled me down and shook his head. He put a finger up and looked like he was listening.

“There are people in the house but nobody’s in the room.”

He pulled out a razor knife and scored all along the window frame

“Aren’t there alarms?”

“Yes, but they aren’t on. They think they don’t need them.”

“Are you sure?” Visions of us fleeing popped into my head. It didn’t look right though. Caden was a hold your ground type of man. He wouldn’t flee. It would probably be just me, screaming my head off, running down the hill and frying on the gate I just missed by an inch.

“I would sense the electrical current if it was on.” He opened the window with a pocket knife, and jumped up over the sill into the room then turned back toward me and motioned for me to come in.

Wow, this was breaking and entering, I thought to myself. This was a serious line I was about to cross. Getting caught on someone’s lawn is one thing, but this could be jail time.

Caden was standing there, looking at me with his hands on his hips.

“Are you kidding me?” he whispered.

“It’s breaking and entering! I don’t want to go to jail!”

“You aren’t human! They aren’t human! Nobody calls the cops in this world.”

I felt a little better after that and struggled up to do a belly crawl over the windowsill.

“You could have jumped that,” h
e said as he reached down and helped me before I made an undignified face plant on their expensive rug.

“So what happens if they do get intruders?” I asked as I climbed to my feet and stood a little more dignified.

“They kill them.”

“What if someone broke into your bar?”

“It depends?” he shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly.

“On what?”

“My mood mostly.”

“Have you killed anybody that broke in?”

“We don’t have time for small talk. We’ve got to find a place this won’t be seen.” He held up a tiny little object that wasn’t any bigger than a coffee bean.

“Really? Murder is small talk?”

He waved his hands around, “Not a good time.”

“I was just saying.”

“Can you just say it later? When we aren’t bugging our enemy’s house?”

“This is Rufus’s office? I wasn’t in this room.” It had bookcases lining one wall and a massive desk in front of it. A set of chairs sat facing the fireplace off to the side with a small side table next to one of them.

“What about under the lip of this table?” I asked.

“I think someone’s coming, so it will have to work.”

He stuck it under the table and motioned me toward the window. Instead of just jumping, this time he grabbed me around the waist first, and brought me with him. Such a little action shouldn’t have aroused me but it did. He might not want to continue what had been started, but my body didn’t want to hear that. I was a bit irritated. Couldn’t he have finished what he had started first, then tell me he wasn’t interested? I tried to think of something else but it wasn’t working. We landed softly on the ground, and he let go of me and stepped away to shut the window.

He came back and pointed to the second floor. “That’s Rufus’s bedroom. I’m going to jump up and see if it’s empty. If it is, I’ll come back down and get you.”

I watched him easily jump to the second floor and balance on the outer corner of what looked like an inch of windowsill. He gave me thumbs up and opened the window then jumped back down.

“Okay, I can either carry you up, or you can give it a try?”

“Do you think I can do it?” I asked eyeing the teeny tiny landing.

“Yes. Aim through the window. I’m not sure you’ll be accurate enough to hit the ledge.”

“What if I can’t make it all the way up?”

“Then I’ll be right here and catch you.”

I looked up at his face, and I knew he would. He was the type that wouldn’t let anyone close to him fall. Too bad he didn’t want me in a way I could live with. I could’ve gotten used to this. Maybe even had a couple little demon babies. He would make beautiful babies. I looked away and focused on jumping before I got all sentimental about could’ve beens. I took a deep breath and tried to psyche myself up.

“I just jump? Like normal jump?”

“Yes.”

I squatted down first, thinking it would give me more momentum like Neo did in the Matrix, and Caden was looking at me oddly, but he refrained from saying anything. I pushed upward, and I went flying through the window. I landed a bit clunky but that was okay. I’d done it.

I stood up and made my way back to the window. Looking down for Caden, I found him leaning against the side of the house. He pointed down the lawn where several watch men were walking, and he raised his hand signaling he’d be up in five minutes and then waved me away from the window so I wouldn’t be seen.

I felt edgy being in here alone. The only thing that made me comfortable at all in this house was having Caden at my side. Although he was close by, it wasn’t close enough to set my nerves to rest. I stood a few feet away staring at the window, waiting for him to jump up any minute, when a hand covered my mouth and nose, and a thick arm circled my waist.

“And what would you be doing here?”

It was Carl. I panicked frantically and clawed at his hand trying to breathe.

“You’ll be good?”

I nodded, willing to agree to anything in order to get air.

“Are you sure? You really made a fool of me last time.” His hand still blocking my air.

I nodded again. There was a difference this time. Last time he had attacked me, it was done to get something he wanted. This time, there was anger behind it. I could feel it rolling off of him, he wanted a reason to hurt me.

He finally moved his hand slightly lower, just beneath my nose, keeping my mouth covered, but I was able to suck some precious air in. I could feel the tears now flowing down my face, as I stood
paralyzed
in fear. I was too afraid of dying to try to fight. I couldn’t go through this again. I was beyond thinking rationally.

He lifted me and walked over to the window, either to shut it or look outside, I wasn’t sure, because before he did either Caden was in front of us. His eyes met mine for a split second and then Carl was dead at my feet.

I started hyperventilating as I looked at his lifeless body. His head ripped from his torso in a gruesome manner, laying a foot from his body. Blood was quickly pooling on the expensive carpet.

“We’ve got to go.”

I couldn’t speak so I just nodded my head numbly. We moved toward the window, and he grabbed my hand as we jumped at the same time. I was too panicked over Carl’s dead body, to have time to worry over the steep jump we were making. I hit the ground softly, as if the earth had lost some of its gravity. He hurried me to the meeting spot where we were supposed to meet the other guys. We had to be at least ten minutes before the allotted time, but the guys were there already. I could hear yelling coming from the house and floodlights were lighting up the grounds. An alarm siren was screeching into the night.

“What the hell is going on in there? The place is going crazy,” Mike asked as we headed back.

“I killed Carl,” Caden explained, then turned back to me. “Jump,” he said as he grabbed me around the waist and propelled me up with him to make sure I had enough spring to make it over the electric gate.

We landed then flew through the woods and got back to the bikes in no time at all. I felt like I was in shock the whole way back to the bar. Joey, Dave, and Nick were waiting in the main room when we got there.

“What happened? There’s some serious shit coming over the lines,” Dave asked.

I looked to Caden not understanding how they knew it went bad so quickly.

“We monitor the phone lines.”

“Then why did we have to go tonight?” I asked.

“They never discuss their plans on the phone.” He turned back to the guys. “We got interrupted, and I had to take Carl out.”

I looked down at the floor, knowing it wasn’t the whole truth and not wanting my bad poker face to sell out Caden. He didn’t have to kill Carl. He had killed him so easily; it was hard to imagine he couldn’t have handled it some other way.

“What do you mean had to?” Dave asked.

“If he said he had to, then he had to,” Mike said, speaking directly to Dave.

“And it didn’t have something to do with her? We’ve done countless runs like this before and there has never, ever been a problem until now,” Dave asked, but it wasn’t really a question, as much as an accusation.

Alex stepped forward in between Dave and Caden, hopefully heading off another confrontation.

“It was coming anyway Dave,”
Alex said, standing in front of Dave. “We’ve been playing cat and mouse with these guys for decades now. This is a hell of a lot bigger than her, and you know it. It’s beyond time it was handled. I’m sick of what they’ve been getting away with. We walked the line out of respect to some of the old timers and a truce that they have not lived up to. It’s
past time. I’m glad Carl’s dead,
” Alex finished and then went to the bar and poured himself a whiskey. “To Carl’s timely demise.” He raised his glass in a solitary toast and threw it back alone.

“Can I get one of those?” I asked walking over to the bar. I’ve never been much for whiskey, but it seemed fitting tonight. Slowly, one by one, all the guys joined us until we were all standing at the bar, throwing back whiskey.