Bound by Revenge (Guardian Series) (18 page)

“Oh, Deanna, of course. I remember you. I just didn’t expect to see you.” Tom lied. He didn’t want to risk offending her, and losing his chance. He must have had a little too much to drink at that party. Even so, it was hard for him to imagine forgetting such a hot chick.

“I just got back into town, so I came right here to find you. You wanna go for a ride?” She suggested, batting her eyelashes at him and rocking from her heels to her toes and back again.

She reached out and grabbed Tom’s hand, linking his fingers with her own.

“Trev, you go on without me. Deanna will take me home.” Tom was quick to dismiss his friend. It wasn’t that often that a beautiful goddess showed up to sweep him away and he wasn’t about to throw it all away to hang out with someone he saw every day.

“You sure you don’t want company.” Trevor pinched Tom on the back of his arm. “Maybe she has some friends.”

Tom swatted Trevor away.

“No, no company. We’re good. Go home.” Tom pinned Trevor with a forceful stare. There was no use trying to persuade Tom. The decision had already been made and there was no room for a third wheel.

“Sure, I’ll call you later.” Trevor snickered before he finally took the hint and headed off to the parking lot in the opposite direction.

“I’m glad I found you so easily. There are a lot of people here.” Deanna looked around at the rambunctious crowd as they walked onto the sidewalk in front of the school. “I hadn’t realized just how many people would be coming out at the same time. If you hadn’t come out right then, I probably would’ve missed you entirely.”

Tom squeezed Deanna’s hand lightly and walked in the direction she’d approached from.

“Are we heading back to my place?” Tom asked, still trying to figure out how well Deanna knew him. It would have had to be pretty well if he’d brought her to his apartment before.

“Nope, not yet. I have something special planned.” Deanna turned to face Tom and put her hands on his waist. She raised his shirt up just enough to dip her fingers underneath and trace the tips along his skin right under his belt. He immediately forgot his quest to remember. Suddenly, it just didn’t matter. She could be speaking Chinese for all he cared, as long as she kept doing what she was doing.

Tom equaled her in height, at about 6’1”, which allowed Deanna to examine his features straight on as he closed his eyes, reveling in the physical contact. His features were strong, but not yet as chiseled as they’d be in a year or two. He still had that innocent air of a young man, discovering the world. His body on the other hand, was all man. She could feel his muscles tighten under her fingertips. Unable to control herself, she moved her face in to suck his lower lip into her mouth. She nibbled it for just a second before pulling away.

His lips tasted sweet, and the hard swell that pressed against her, made her own body throb in response. This was the last thing she needed and she knew her brother was watching her. She’d just tell him that she was doing what she needed to in order to get Tom to follow her. It certainly would help. Even
her
hormones were responding to the contact.

“We need to get going.” Deanna whispered, suddenly desperate to get this job over with. Tom didn’t hesitate to follow. He was eager to see what else this day had in store.

As soon as Aron saw them begin their approach, he jumped out of the front seat, went to the back of the van and opened the door. He hopped in and quietly shut the doors behind him. The back was completely blocked off from the front, ensuring that Tom wouldn’t see that there was anyone there with them.

They had decided to take the van, just in case Tom wouldn’t go willingly or gave Deanna any trouble once they were en route. If Deanna had any difficulty at all, Aron would step in, and hold Tom in the back until they got to safety.

From the looks of it, that wasn’t going to be necessary. But it was always best to have a backup plan. Things had a way of going south fast.

“This is it.” Deanna smiled innocently at Tom, as he took in the sight of the large boxy van.

“You got a mattress in the back.” He asked playfully, motioning to the windowless doors at the back of the van with his head.

“Not a chance, buddy. Is that all you think about?” She laughed as she stepped up into the driver’s seat.

Tom’s eyes gleamed as he took the seat beside her. “Not usually. I guess it’s just something about you.”

Deanna believed him, oddly enough. He seemed sincere as he watched her pull out into traffic. It was hard to believe that this boy could have anything to do with the rogue demon faction and their pet humans. But she trusted Arratta and if he told her it was true, then it must be.

The inside of the van was as sterile and unwelcoming as you’d expect from the exterior. The black vinyl seats were sticky and uncomfortable and Deanna felt like she should be wearing a tool belt in order to be allowed to drive the thing.

The ride went by quick. Faster than Deanna could stand since she actually enjoyed spending time with Tom. She knew that would be over the second they pulled into Morgan’s lair. There would be others waiting for them there. Including her oldest brother Marius. Just the thought of handing Tom over to her brother made her cringe.

Instead of spending the day training, as expected, Bradley called the rest of the guardians to the office. He told them that there was some important business they needed to attend to and that it was best if it happened at the office.

“I’ve had just about enough of daddy’s cryptic messages.” Abby looked over at her brother who was concentrating on the road.

“What do you want me to say, Abby? That everything’s fine, he just wants to talk to us about one of our old cases? Cuz I’m pretty sure that’s not what it is.” Alex forced the words through his lips making sure she could hear every bit of annoyance in them.

“What crawled up your ass? I’m just talking here. Ignore me if you must.” She retorted straining her neck to face Sam and Vance in the back seat.

“Do you guys have any guesses? What do you think’s going on?” Abby asked.

“No clue, but I’m sure we’ll find out in a second.” Sam shrugged, looking up at the rather imposing façade of Andrean Consultants.

“No time like the present.” Vance added, jumping out of the car as soon as Alex pulled it into the parking space with his name posted on the wall in front.

The offices were hopping, business as usual. But instead of stopping to work with their teams, they went past and straight up to the conference room to meet Bradley.

The conference room was the largest space on the executive floor. It was the one area where there was enough room to hold meeting with all of their group leaders at the same time. Now, with just the four guardians, the space seemed even larger. On occasion, they’ve laid out strips of rectangular tables across the length of the room, giving enough space for people to sit on both sides of the tables in three rows. But right now, with no large meetings planned, one large oval table sat in the exact center of the room right in front of the entrance.

“I guess we’re early.” Vance said and looked at his watch.

“No, you’re right on time.” Bradley stepped out from the farthest corner.

“Oh, hi daddy. We didn’t see you there.” Abby faced her father expectantly and waited for a quick explanation.

“Have a seat, everyone. We have a lot to talk about.” Bradley spoke as though he were getting any regular meeting underway. It was a tone that Abby and Alex had been familiar with for years.

And, out of habit, each of them reached down to pull out their briefcases, in preparation for all the case information they were about to receive.

“Don’t write any of this down.” He stopped them. “Now that we’re all on the same page, taking unnecessary notes will only leave us with extra hassle, having to worry about keeping the pages out of human hands.” Bradley chided.

“So what are we looking at here?” Vance said in the laid back tone of someone completely relaxed with their situation. Again, he was sitting in the familiar pose, one arm slid over the back rest of the chair, leaning back, knees falling open, legs stretched out.

I know what I’m looking at
, Sam thought to herself, before berating herself for ignoring what had to be a pretty serious matter.

“There was another attack. Well, we’ll call it an attempted attack. But it still resulted in a number of innocent deaths.” Bradley said, looking at each of the guardians.

“How do you know?” Alex asked his father.

“I have contacts at the police station.” Bradley curled one side of his lip up at the question.

“Oh.” Alex leaned back in his seat in a poor imitation of Vance’s pose.

“There was an attack on the library yesterday afternoon.” Bradley pulled a black dry erase marker out of his suit pocket and rolled over a blank white board. “Smithwood Memorial Library seemed to be the target, for some reason unknown to me.” He drew a six inch square in the center of the board representing the library.

“But the leanthans never made it inside.” He drew a smaller rectangle attached to the bottom of the square to represent the stairway where the fight occurred.

“The three assailants made it down the street and up the walkway, presumably to attack someone inside the library.” Bradley lectured, drawing three x’s in a triangle inside the small rectangle to illustrate their locations.

“Did you check on everyone inside the library? Find out what the leanthans could be after?” Vance suggested.

Bradley nodded, his lips twisted in a grimace. “There were six people inside: two librarians, two college students, one male and one female, and a mother with her six year old son.” He listed, ticking each one off on his fingers.

“And at least one of them has ties to the demons? Or to some facility the leanthans could make use of?” Vance coached Bradley to finish his thought.

“None of them have anything to do with this war. Believe me, I’ve looked into every single possibility. These were just innocent people who wanted to spend a little time surrounded by the comforts of books.” Bradley shifted his weight to the other foot.

“So why didn’t they make it inside?” Sam asked, more curious about what actually happened than what was supposed to happen.

“They started fighting among themselves on the stairway.” He sighed, circling the x’s he’d made on the board. “First it was just an argument with a little bit of old fashioned fist fight mixed in. Then it escalated to firearms.”

“And they shot some humans in the crossfire?” Sam asked, feeling impatient with her current position. If they were willing to fight in the middle of the open, a lot of people were going to get hurt.

“Not exactly.” Bradley continued. “A crowd developed, people who wanted to watch the fight. But when it got more dangerous, the group tried to disperse and a few humans were trampled in the process.” Bradley’s face blanched with disgust. “They weren’t actually killed by the hands of the leanthans. They were killed by their own poor judgment.”

“But they wouldn’t have died if it weren’t for the leanthans.” Abby stared at her father with wide accusing eyes.

“Don’t worry, honey. I know. That’s why we’re here.” He returned her gaze with equal force.

“So, we know what happened to the humans. Do you know what happened to the leanthans?” Sam prodded, trying to keep dragging the conversation in the right direction.

“That’s the interesting part,” Bradley started. “Two were killed with bullets from the other’s gun.”

“And the other?” Sam asked, forcing him past the pause.

“The other was shot from a different angle, with a different weapon. Someone was inside the library to kill him right as the police pulled up.” Bradley drew a small square over the location of the window where the gunman had been.