Avenge (4 page)

The other new addition to our team was
Lola. She was the epitome of a girly-girl who always wore dresses
with cute Mary-Jane’s and never left the house without full hair
and makeup. Not that she needed it, she was a natural beauty.
Cassie smacked Adam twice to keep him from staring. Lola grew up
during the 1950s and died in a car accident like me. She was 26 and
never married, hoping to make it big in Hollywood as a movie star
like Bette Davis or Audrey Hepburn. She might have looked delicate,
but the woman was fierce. Her tenacity earned my respect when she
covered my back and took a werewolf scratch across most of her
torso to protect me during a fight on her very first mission. After
being injured, she proceeded to punch the teeth right out of the
wolf for ruining her dress. Yeah, she was a keeper!

Unfortunately, the formation of our
expanded team came with new leadership. Elizabeth and James shared
the leader responsibilities now.

“
Having two leaders means
we can divide ourselves into teams and cover twice as much ground,”
James explained when he made the announcement. “Zander, Adam, and
Cassie—you’re with me. The rest of you will work with Elizabeth
whenever we split up for missions.”

“
Is this some type of
punishment for ripping my dad’s Roberto Clemente signed baseball
card? Or locking my sister in the bathroom for three hours and
calling it ‘babysitting’? Some other childhood crime?” I grumbled.
“I swear she only picked me for her team so she can have a new
reason to remind me that I’m a failure or not ‘living up to my
potential.’”

With each mission we went on, my
powers grew and became fortified. I could now successfully hold six
shields while fighting and keep them up for over an hour. As
impressed as I was at my abilities most of the time, Elizabeth
thought I wasn’t trying hard enough. There may have been once—or
twice (okay four times) Max physically restrained me from slapping
her silly.

“
She likes you, Luce,”
Cassie reassured me when I found the news out. “It’s just deep,
deep down. I think you remind her of herself in some
way.”

“
That is the
most—“

“
Lucy? You with us today?”
James called, snapping me out of my thoughts. I hadn’t heard a word
he’d said and could have kicked myself for it.

“
Sorry, guess the coffee
hasn’t kicked in yet. What were you saying?”

“
I was saying we should
congratulate ourselves for successfully retrieving six souls during
this last mission. The Retrieval team has processed them and they
have since moved on to their final destination. While two were
taken against their will, four willingly turned themselves over for
a chance at living forever, and one of the four was a hardcore
sadist who enjoyed hurting others. The Omega was happy to have him
returned and from the look on half the Council’s faces, they’d been
looking for him for quite a while and will probably enjoy his
punishment.”

I nodded, not wanting to interrupt. I
was already embarrassed by my behavior and got a wink from Cassie.
I winked back and turned toward James to try to pay closer
attention.

“
Marco, do you have any
news on our mole situation?”

“
If I did, you would know
about it already. Move on.” Marco’s nostrils flared and the tips of
his ears were the shade of a ripe tomato. We all knew he was
feeling guilty that he didn’t have any information by now, and it
was boiling over to everything else. He took it as a personal
failure that someone could evade his extra senses for so long, and
his nerves were constantly on edge.

“
Is there anyone you feel
we can cross off our list of suspects? Anyone absolutely
innocent?”

A little hope flashed in Marco’s eyes
and he sat up a little straighter in his seat. “As a matter of
fact, I can report on a few. Finnegan O’Malley is clean. The man
actually asked me how to get on this team because he wanted to take
out more ‘evil bloodsuckers’ as he called them. Of course I denied
that such a team existed, but you know the Commons
room—“

“
Yeah, it breeds more
gossip than a high school girls’ bathroom,” Cassie snorted. Marco
glared at her and she bit her lip to keep from saying anything
else.

“
As I was saying,” Marco
continued. “Niall Thornbury can be checked off the list too. He has
been out of the realm for the last two weeks due to a new
assignment with the angels and didn’t even know we left on that
last mission. I’m pretty sure we can eliminate Shelby Lew from the
list, but I’m waiting for final confirmation on that. I should know
in the next couple of days.”

“
Awesome! So how many
confirmed good guys now?” I asked excitedly. Narrowing the search
meant we were closer to finding the real culprit and Jessica’s
soul. The others might have thought that I was silly for still
believing we could find her unscathed, but the smallest possibility
fueled me and kept me from breaking down when I was at my
lowest.

James crossed the names Marco gave him
off of the list we’d created on the far wall and added two more to
the tally. “Sixty-two. Not nearly enough. We have double that still
left on the suspect list.”

“
Well, crap on a cracker,”
Deflated, I sighed and crossed my arms over my chest.

“
No,” Zander spoke up,
surprising most of the group since the laid-back kid usually didn’t
take the lead. “This is a marathon, not a sprint. Sorry, Lucy. I
know you want your sister back now, but the larger mission is to
shut down the operations of all those who are stealing the souls,
and we can’t do that without finding the spy. We’ll get there.
It’ll take time.”

I scoffed, but didn’t reply. Time is
something that we had, but with each day that passed my sweet,
innocent sister’s soul became blacker and more corrupt. How long
could a person have evil all around her before it seeped inside and
became a permanent part of them?

Max gave my hand a squeeze in
agreement with Zander. “He’s right. This was a success, so no
pouting.” He turned away from me and focused on Elizabeth,
“Majesty, any new leads we can start to research or focus
on?”

I bit my tongue to keep from laughing
at his use of her formal title. He must really want something to
suck up in this manner. I wondered what he was up to.

The queen gave me an exasperated look,
but answered Max’s question. “It has come to my attention that
there has been a surge of vampire activity in the South. I have
been in contact with the leaders of teams from Alabama, Louisiana,
Georgia, and Mississippi. We have begun pooling our intelligence to
gain the upper hand, but nothing is concrete yet. It might be a
week or more before I have anything substantial to go
on.”

“
That’s good.” Max nodded,
a hint of a smile on his face. “James, with no viable leads in the
immediate future, I propose that we take a respite. We have been on
missions or training for upcoming missions for the last month
straight without more than a few hours off. I say, for the next
week we get a break.”

“
I know that you all have
been working tirelessly, so I agree. A break is necessary. We need
to be rested and ready to go as soon as Elizabeth verifies a few
things.” James tapped his fingers on the desk while he thought. I
crossed my fingers—and hell, my eyes and toes too for good
measure—hoping he’d let us have some much-needed R & R. “You
all have four days. Be back here not a moment later.”

At his announcement, everyone in the
room leapt out of their chairs and headed for the door. The meeting
had just begun, but with the word vacation front and center in our
brains, James knew we were a lost cause now. Max grabbed my hand to
lead me away, but I hesitated a moment.

I kissed Max on the cheek and
whispered in his ear, “Give me a minute with him.”

“
I’ll meet you outside.
Don’t be long.” The look in his eye told me he already had plans
for our time off.

I licked my lips in anticipation and
nodded, giving him a final wink as he headed for the
door.

“
James, can I talk to you
for a minute?”

“
Of course, Lucy. What do
you need?”

“
I wanted to check in with
you. I know that you and Amelia haven’t seen each other recently
and when I saw her at lunch the other day she barely even
acknowledged me. Did something happen?”

“
Lucy, I appreciate your
concern, but I’d like to keep my personal life private.”

I placed my hand on his
forearm and squeezed gently. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to pry. It’s
just that I haven’t seen you smile in weeks.
We
haven’t seen you smile in weeks,
and we’re worried about you.”

James turned away and I knew I struck
a chord. “We—about a month ago we stopped seeing each other.” He
swallowed hard and shuffled some papers on the desk.

“
Oh, James, I’m so sorry.
Why didn’t you come to us? We would have been there for you.” I
took his hand in my own and comforted him the best way I could, but
he wasn’t one to open up or admit weakness, so I wasn’t sure if I
was helping.

“
I appreciate your concern
Lucy, but I’m okay. Really. I’ve had some time to analyze what went
wrong and decompress, so I’m much better.”

“
James, I know that you’re
the strong silent type, but it’s okay to lean on your friends every
once in a while. It’s what we’re here for. We care about you and
don’t want to see you hurt.” I paused for a few minutes to think.
There had to be something I could do to cheer him up. “Listen, I
don’t know what we’re doing yet, but come with us on vacation.
It’ll be good to be surrounded by people who care about
you.”

He turned to me and tilted his head,
offering a smile. “Your thoughtfulness is exactly what I needed.
But I can’t go. I have to stay here and do a few more things. Plus,
I have a meeting with the Council that I can’t miss. You all go and
enjoy your time off.”

“
We will have our
bracelets, so if you change your mind give us a shout. You know
you’re always welcome.”

“
I do know. Thank you.” I
gave him a quick hug and a final wave before rejoining Max. I knew
he’d want me to talk about what happened, but out of respect for
James I kept it to myself.

Chapter Four

“
Good morning, my love.”
Max wrapped his arm around my waist and pulled me closer. He
nuzzled his nose into my neck, tickling the fine hairs and sending
a shower of goosebumps down my body.

“
It is now. I can’t think
of a better way to wake up,” I breathed heavily. He was trailing
kisses along my collarbone. Turning my body, I arched back to grant
him more access. We’d been living together for a while, but with
our hectic travel schedules, we didn’t get much alone time. At
first, we were waiting for the right moment. But as the days ticked
by, our mutual frustration at not yet being intimate grew. Not that
we didn’t try, but our friends were always over, or we were out.
There was never a quiet evening at home alone or a lazy morning
sleeping in. I longed for nothing more than intimate, alone time
with him today of all days. I’d waited months for this.

“
You know,” he started,
tracing the outline of the spaghetti strap holding the top of my
pajamas in place. “There’s nothing more I’d like to do today than
to spend all day in bed with you, birthday girl.”

I turned to him, mouth agape. “How did
you know? I never mentioned my birthday since I…well, died. Adam
told me a while ago that it’s not something Patroni celebrate
anymore.”

“
Because loving you means I
want to know everything there is to know about you. And this is the
first year that you haven’t had a birthday. I knew it would be a
tough one for you, especially given how horrible the rest of this
year has been.”

I wrapped my arms around his neck and
kissed him deeply. “There may have been a lot of terrible things
that happened since I died, but none of them hold a candle to how
amazing it’s been finding you. I wouldn’t trade that for the
world.”

I ran my hands down his bare back,
tracing the contours of the smooth, hard muscles. Max moaned
against my mouth as we kissed. “Okay, okay. If you get me started,
there’s no way I’m going to want to leave this room. It’s going to
be near impossible already. But I have a present for you, so get
dressed and meet me in the living room.”