Charles (Darkness #8) (10 page)

“
O
kay
, just stay behind me. This is no time to play hero.” Charles pinned Ann with a hard stare he’d learned from the Boss. Ordinarily, she would’ve scowled really hard and made some cutting remark, but this time all she did was stare up at him with hazy eyes.

They were no more than fifty yards from the front of the facility as the darkness consumed the last of the day. According to Ann, the smell of the sweet serum was powerful, overcoming her senses and muddling her thoughts. Her eyes were a little clearer tonight than they had been last night though. The effect on her wasn’t as strong. Either his blood and magic was giving her a buffer, or she was getting used to it and able to fight the effects.

They wouldn’t be there long enough to figure out which it was.

Charles checked the expensive camera hanging around his neck. It was set to night vision so as not to make a flash. He also had his phone, but still no service. He squinted into the light filtering through the trees from powerful lamps at the front gates.

A paved road to his right saw a car passing every ten minutes or so, no doubt employees heading home for the night. This was the perfect time to move closer and get what he needed. The hustle and mass exodus, together with guard shift changes, would be keeping everyone preoccupied.

“Okay.” Charles took another breath and brought Ann in close, hugging her tight. He felt a soft warmth seep through the link, one of love and trust. His heart swelled and his breath grew heavy, never really understanding the depths of her affection until he had been able to get past all her snarky defenses and
felt
them.

“Just stay with me, okay?” he whispered as he laid his cheek on the top of her head. “You’ll be fine.”

He felt her nod into his chest.

“Okay,” he said again, preparing. He let the hard viciousness of battle chase away the soft sentiment from having her close. With the possible danger ahead of them came a clarity to his thoughts and senses. He was ready to protect what was his at all costs. “Let’s do this.”

He took her hand as he started walking, tugging her so she’d walk
directly
behind him. If there was a trap, he wanted to be the one to fall into it. When he was sure she would comply, he let go, watching his steps and scanning for any human tracks.

They made their way through the trees easily. Light now littered the ground, blaring through the branches and lighting the road a few feet to their right. More cars streamed slowly by, the drivers staring straight ahead. Not one person looked in Charles’ direction.

Charles crept to the tree line and hunkered down, reaching behind him and grabbing Ann’s shirt, pulling her down beside him. She blinked ahead groggily, shook her head, formed a scowl, and then lost her focus again. She was fighting it, but like any drug, whatever she was ingesting was winning.

Ignoring the raging fear and unease he felt through their link, the effects of her fighting what was happening to her, Charles started snapping pictures of the fence and what lay beyond.

The front of the building had a guard box with two guards in it, checking ID’s visually as well as scanning the badges through a machine. And that was to leave. Charles was sure that security would be at least as tight to enter as well. A parking lot inside the gates still held at least two dozen cars.

The main entrance to the facility had another keypad beside two large glass doors. Light shone down on the entrance. Cameras dotted both the walkway and the doors, covering every angle.

It would be tough for a human without magic to get in here. It would be almost impossible for a shifter.

Charles grabbed Ann’s upper arm and lifted as he stood, pulling her up beside him. These people were obviously protecting a great secret. It was great news, because outside of this facility, Charles bet not many people would know about it. All this security, in a remote location, meant the big powers probably didn’t even trust their employees.

The better news was that for all they thought they knew, and all their intelligence, they were still just humans. Humans without access to their magic. They didn’t know what
else
lurked in the night. They didn’t know about people like Sasha or Paulie.

They didn’t know what kind of retaliation they were inviting by capturing shifters,

Charles tugged Ann closer to the gate, hating how much she stumbled. Hating what that airborne drug was doing to her.

He crouched again at the corner of the road and the tree line, pulling Ann down behind him. He snapped off a bunch of pictures of the guards and the cars, of the entrance, and things he didn’t even think were relevant. Too much information was better than not enough. He then did the same with his phone, just in case, focusing on space and possible points of entry. Anything they couldn’t see had already been written down and pointed out by the guard Charles had interviewed.

They had what they needed.

“Let’s go.” Charles pulled Ann up again, like a ragdoll, and backed away from the road. When the trees obscured them, Charles turned and glanced down at Ann.

She stood loose and limp, staring at nothing. Her battle to fight the confusion had failed. She stumbled blindly, with no clue of what lay around her. Even the emotions coming through the link were lacked any real clarity.

Charles took Ann’s hand and pulled her behind, towing her. He noticed a notch in a tree as they passed, a newish slash cutting the bark. He stopped for a moment to take a picture, seeing a pulley at the top with a cable threaded through.

The trap hadn’t been sprung.

His brows furrowed as he continued on, wondering why. Perhaps it hadn’t been reset?

Ten feet away he found another slash with the same setup. He took pictures of that, too, the makeup of the trap slightly different, and the gash in the side of the tree to anchor the cable much older.

It didn’t spring, either.

“I don’t like this,” he mumbled to himself.

“What?” Ann asked quietly.

He glanced at her, seeing her eyes less hooded and the dullness less apparent. “You better?”

“It’s clearing a little.”

Charles pointed to the tree with the older scar before moving on. “These traps aren’t springing. I don’t know why.”

“Maybe they just haven’t been reset…”

Charles grinned as they kept moving. “That’s what I was thinking. But why not?”

An area cleared of mulch underfoot opened up in front of them, the forest floor looking like it had been swept recently. Only new pine needles and a pinecone littered the area. He took a few pictures, before moving on.

“I wonder what that was for,” Ann mumbled.

Charles glanced back, and saw that she was checking out the area like he had, and slowed. She shook her head and walked on, about seven feet behind him. He started again as she did, when a sound like a spring attached to a rocket blasted out. He jumped and spun in time to see two nets, one from each side of Ann, wrap around her body.

A thrill of fear went through him, echoed in their link, as he stepped toward her. The ground opened up beneath her feet, a door swinging downward. She fell with a scream, struggling with the netting wrapped around her.

Charles skidded to a halt at the mouth of the hole, looking down into a black pit at least fifteen feet deep.

“Noooo!” Ann said through clenched teeth, struggling with the net. Her body was changing, though. Green enveloped her.

The other serum was active.

“Shit.” A list of spells ran through Charles’ head, but nothing would help with this. Nothing would hold that door open if it decided to close.

These people were about to find out what really went bump in the night…

As Charles prepared to jump down, a metal grate slid across the opening, cutting him off.

“No!” he yelled, bending to his knees to rip at that grate.

“Get help, Charles,” Ann said through painful grunts. “Don’t stay. Get help. Get Sasha.”

“I won’t leave you here, Ann!” Charles answered through clenched teeth.

“Get hrrrrp.” Her face changed, her jaw lengthening and growing fur, turning into a mountain lion.

Helplessness and desperation raged through Charles as the link, the new link he shouldn’t have been comfortable with yet, was dulled into nothing. He couldn’t feel her emotions in an animal state, just that she was alive.

“No, Ann,” he begged, ripping at the grate with pain welling up in his chest. “Please, no.”

The cry of a mountain lion blasted up at him. Gold feline eyes shocked into him from the pit. She stood on all fours, baring her teeth. If he hadn’t known better, he’d have said she’d shed all her fear with her human body.

Get help.

He’d do better. He’d get the most vicious, crazy bastards he knew, and he’d come back and blow this whole place to hell.

“Stay alive, baby,” he said down to her, his heart ripping out of his chest. “Stay alive. I’ll get you out of here, okay? Just hang on.”

A feline grunt answered him, those gold eyes cleared of all the haze.

She’d fight. Now that she was in the middle of it, she’d fight. He knew it as well as he knew his own name. She might’ve been afraid of what might come when she was a human, but in her primal form, she was hell with claws. Intelligent hell with claws. Who held a grudge.

That’s my girl.

A heavy door squealed within the pit. Ann turned that way, taking a few steps back.

“We got another one,” a mid-range voice said as a door opened a crack. Charles would remember that voice.

“It still trapped in the nets?” There was a man behind the one Charles could see.

“Mostly. It’s standing, though. It’s acting like those others—no sign of fear.”

“Those others gave us trouble, Ralph. Best hit it with the shock first.”

“Nah. I got a tranq dart fit for an elephant.” The door opened farther, shedding light in the pit.

Charles saw that Ann was in a cage of sorts, metal bars all around her. The top was open, but the grate made it impossible to escape upwards. A lock held a gate closed. The space was about ten feet by ten feet, with the cage taking up most of that.

Charles snapped off pictures with his phone since the light would disrupt the night vision of the camera. He took pictures of Ralph as he raised a stun gun at Ann, firing off the promised tranquilizer dart. She didn’t make a sound as it struck her. Instead, she stared at them while remaining in the proud stance of a great cat.

Her back legs wobbled, but she didn’t fall. She continued to stand and stare, as if challenging an intruder to her den.

“Shoulda gone down by now.” Ralph looked at his gun in confusion.

“Hit it with another. These things are smart. We don’t want to take any chances like the last time. Sam can’t see out of one eye.”

“I know, I know.” Ralph dug in his pocket and came out with a package. “Yup. These are the right ones. Should put this creature out for a whole day, minimum. Why didn’t it go down…?”

“Hit it with another!”

“I don’t want to kill the thing,” Ralph spat back. “We wouldn’t get our bonus with a dead critter on our hands.”

Charles looked at the grate again, wondering if he could get it open. If he could it would be easy to kill those guards and take back Ann.

“I’d rather lose a bonus than lose my life. Hit it with—”

“All right, all right…” A
pop
sounded, drawing Charles’ attention back.

Another dart hit Ann’s side. She stood firm for a moment, before her legs started to wobble again. She swayed, looking proud before finally falling.

Charles’ heart started beating faster. Something was breaking inside of him as he witnessed her taken down right before his eyes. He couldn’t help her. He couldn’t get down there and save her.

“There it goes…” Ralph stepped toward the cage as Ann fell, giving a weak growl as she did so. “A fighter, this one. Was probably a military guy, like the other group.”

“Get the cattle prod, just to be sure,” the other guard said.

Charles sucked in the elements, pulling at fire the hardest, mixing it with air. His tattoos swirled with color as he looked down at two dead men. It was Ralph that noticed, looking up in confusion, and then wide eyes.

Charles shed everything about him that could identify with humans. Anything connected with soft-willed compassion, with temperance and peace, he let go. Then, feeling Ann’s magic pulsing through him, he boosted his killer instincts. He gave himself over to his primal side as he stared down at the dull blue eyes of Ralph, dead man number one.

“What the—” Ralph cut off before the smell of urine wafted up. Piss puddled around Ralph’s feet.

Charles sent down his own cattle prod, shocking Ralph with the spell Sasha had used since day one. The electricity zapped him, throwing him back.

That’s when the other guard looked up, dead man number two.

Charles let the shadows crawl around him, shrouding him in darkness. He amped up his presence, seeing the terror in the eyes of his prey.

They would never forget this moment. They’d be haunted by the fear of him until he cut their worthless lives out from under them. Because they knew Ann was a human. That she was a person. They knew all the
creatures
they captured were still people. It was bad enough to treat animals the way they did, but this facility was going a step beyond with human experiments. And the experimentation wasn’t even for the greater good of humanity, it was to figure out what made shifters different so the scientists and executives could bottle it up and sell it to the highest bidder.

Rage overcame Charles as he stood, shadows masking him from the human eyes below. He turned and walked away from the woman he loved with his heart ripping out of his chest.

Because he did love her. He’d loved her since the beginning. He knew that now. There was no thought in it. No second-guessing. She was the woman that had always had a tight hold on his heart, he just hadn’t been ready to see it.

Well, he was ready now. He just hoped it wasn’t too late.