Ghost Soldiers (42 page)

 

Maria stared at the black helicopter as dark shapes rappelled down into the smoke and fire. Dread opened her up, throat to groin. The Thorn. Back again, and between her and Karl.

She pushed her claws out, bared her fangs and started toward the corner of the warehouse. If she could get inside in time, she could find Karl, get him out of there before they found him. Anyone who got in her way would regret it forever.

Xie's hand settled on her shoulder. “It's too late. We can't stop them now.”

“Let go of me. I have to find him or they'll kill him.”

Bailey stared at her with wide eyes. “Karl's hurt, but he's not destroyed. He told me we have to get out of here.”

“What the fuck do you mean he
told
you?” she nearly screamed.

“Across the link. He wants us to get away. He wants you safe. He said he'd meet up, he'd find us. He wants you to trust him.”

The chop of the helicopter rotors grew louder. “That's bullshit. He can't find us. He's hurt. I saw him get burned.”

Xiesha grabbed her, turned her around and shook her. “He doesn't want you to die for him. He wants you safe.” She leaned closer, eyes furious, face scant inches from Maria's. “This isn't over. Trust him for once.”

“Leave him? That's a hell of a thing to ask of me,” she said, barely understanding herself through her fear and rage. “That's a hell of a thing.”

“Do you love him?” Bailey shouted over the thumping rotors, the screaming sirens and the crackle and roar of the fire.

A sob broke from her lips. She pushed away from Xiesha and glared at Bailey. “Of course. Goddammit, of course I love him. More than anything. More than anything ever.”

“Then give him this. Do what he said.”

Maria hesitated, pulled in two directions, feeling herself twist apart. God damn them for doing this to her. “I can't—”

Cojocaru walked out of the billowing smoke at the end of the access road, headed straight for her. Black-green flames writhed along his uniform before vanishing. He seemed not to care in the least that a Thorn helicopter hovered overhead a couple of hundred feet away.

Hands grabbed her, shoving her back toward the Benz. She fought against Xiesha for one moment longer, to hell with what Karl ordered, to hell with what any of them wanted. She'd fight her way to him, fight her way to him or die trying. It was her right. Her right as the woman who loved him. But he wanted her safe, wanted her to trust him, and so, in the end, she let them push her into the backseat and slam the door.

Xiesha jumped in the passenger seat. Bailey took the wheel. “The keys!” Bailey yelled. Maria pulled them out, feeling as disconnected and empty as if this were some feverish nightmare of her vampire dreams. She handed them over, her hands shaking so badly the keys on her ring jangled like sleigh bells.

The engine turned over, roared to life, tires screeched, and they raced toward the one escape path free of spell traps and barricades and caltrops. She couldn't even summon the urge to care whether cops had sealed it off. Empty. All she felt was empty and hollow, a sun-rotted plastic shell that would break at the slightest pressure.

Karl was gone.

Chapter Forty-Three: Resolve

Maria stepped out of the car. They'd finally stopped in Dorchester, on a dark street that dead-ended in a cul-de-sac and a salt marsh called Patten Cove. Silent houses and still trees lined the road behind them. The night air felt warm against her skin. The stink of smoke clung to her clothes and gave her a steady pounding headache, vampire healing powers or no. She'd never felt this tired or this empty, even in those dark hours when Delgado had owned her and everything had seemed blighted, all her hopes decaying before her eyes.

They'd escaped the police, but just barely. Xiesha had used magic to smash past a cruiser blockade and to stop another cop car from giving chase by blowing out all four of its tires. A police helicopter had pursued them, lighting them up with its searchlight, but then it'd unexpectedly veered off to the east after something else, maybe the Thorn's copter. For Maria, it was all nothing, of no consequence. If the cops stopped them, they'd regret it. She almost welcomed the chance to destroy something. To fill up the emptiness yawning inside her with something, even if it were only rage.

Bailey stood with the driver door open, leaning her arms on the roof and resting her chin on them. Xiesha climbed out beside her. Her mouth was little more than a slash across her face as she stared off toward the water, her gaze far away.

Enough of this shit. Maria turned to Bailey. “Toss me the keys. I'm going back.”

“You can't—Cojocaru, the Thorn, everything's on fire—”

“I don't give a fuck about any of that shit, and I most certainly
can
go back.”

Xiesha set a hand on her shoulder. “The human authorities are everywhere now. You'll have to force your way through them.”

“I can do that.” How had she ever left him behind? How could she have been so weak? It didn't matter that there'd seemed to be no choice. If he lost…if he died alone because she'd left him, she'd never find the heart to forgive herself. Everything forever would be dust and gray—taste of dust, colored gray.

“He's not destroyed, Maria,” Bailey said softly. “I can feel him across the link. He's in pain, but…”

Xiesha nodded. Maria looked back and forth between them, hating them both a little because they could sense something about Karl she couldn't. “Then we can still save him.”

“No, he's not in the city anymore.”

“What the hell do you mean?”

Bailey pointed east. “He's with the Order of the Thorn. On a helicopter. Over the ocean.”

“He's hurt?”

Bailey nodded. “But not gone.”

“I'm going after him,” Maria said. “I'm breaking him out. I'm bringing him home. Whatever it fucking takes.”

Bailey nodded again. “I can sense him through our link. I think I know where they'll take him. We can break him out if we plan it right.”

“Will they execute him?”

“I don't know,” Bailey said. “If Deor didn't kill him, I can only guess they want to give him a trial. If he were human, he'd be entitled to it by law, since he served the Thorn. So I don't know. But there's a good chance we can get him back.”

“I'll take it.”

Xiesha hesitated. “I swore to Karl I would keep you both safe. I promised him.”

“Then keep us safe while we rescue him.”

“That's not what he intended.”

“C'mon, Xiesha,” Bailey said. “He needs us now.”

“I won't leave him to hang.” Maria's voice thrummed low and fierce. “I'll never leave him again. I made a mistake, running off, even if staying was crazy. But I'm gonna make things right.” She clenched her fists. “Goddamn it. Make things
right
for once.”

Xiesha looked from her to Bailey and back to her once more. Maria could see the war going on inside her—between duty and honor and what she wanted for a friend.

She spoke gently this time. “If Karl didn't die, then keeping us safe wasn't any last wish, Xie. We can sort it all out once we rescue him and haul his ass home.” She grinned, starting to feel better, shaking off the gray depression that clung to her like a cold, wet sheet. To
do
something again, to have a mission and a purpose…she
needed
it. “Besides, when was the last time us girls obeyed any guy completely and without question?”

“Right,” Bailey said. Maria looked at her. They shared a smile.

Xiesha finally nodded and glanced at Bailey. “My sense of him is too broad. I can scry, but they'll be shielding. Can you lead us to him?”

“Of course.”

“Then what are we waiting for?” Xiesha asked. She climbed into the backseat of the car. Bailey started to get back into the driver seat, but Maria held her hand out. “My car. I drive.”

Bailey grinned and tossed her the keys. Maria ran around to the driver side of the Benz and jumped in. The engine purred to life. She gunned it.

“Wait for me, Karl,”
she thought, sending her mind-voice out over the sea to wherever he might be.
“Just hold on and promise you'll wait for me.”

For a brief moment, she even believed he heard her. She left stripes on the asphalt and went to get him back.

About the Author

Keith Melton is the author of the Nightfall series, including the books
Blood Vice
and
Run, Wolf
,
as well as the comedy Urban Fantasy series the Zero Dog Missions. He lives in the Pacific Northwest.

To learn more about Keith, please visit www.keithmelton.net.

Look for these titles by Keith Melton

Now Available:

 

The Zero Dog War

 

The Nightfall Syndicate

Blood Vice

Ghost Soldiers

 

Nightfall Wolf Clans

Run, Wolf

The first bullet is always free. After that, you gotta pay.

 

The Zero Dog War

© 2011 Keith Melton

 

Zero Dog Missions, Book 1

After accidentally blowing up both a client facility and a cushy city contract in the same day, pyromancer and mercenary captain Andrea Walker is scrambling to save her Zero Dogs. A team including (but not limited to) a sexually repressed succubus, a werewolf with a thing for health food, a sarcastic tank driver/aspiring romance novelist, a three-hundred-pound calico cat, and a massive demon who really loves to blow stuff up.

With the bankruptcy vultures circling, Homeland Security throws her a high-paying, short-term contract even the Zero Dogs can't screw up: destroy a capitalist necromancer bent on dominating the gelatin industry with an all-zombie workforce. The catch? She has to take on Special Forces Captain Jake Sanders, a man who threatens both the existence of the team and Andrea's deliberate avoidance of romantic entanglements.

As Andrea strains to hold her dysfunctional team together long enough to derail the corporate zombie apocalypse, the prospect of getting her heart run over by a tank tread is the least of her worries. The government never does anything without an ulterior motive. Jake could be the key to success…or just another bad day at the office for the Zeroes.

Warning: Contains explicit language, intense action and violence, rampaging zombie hordes, a heroine with an attitude and flamethrower, Special Forces commandos, ninjas, apocalyptic necromancer capitalist machinations, absurd parody and mayhem, self-deluded humor, irreverence, geek humor, mutant cats, low-brow comedy, and banana-kiwi-flavored gelatin.

 

Enjoy the following excerpt for
The Zero Dog War:

I double-timed it up the stairs off the foyer, thumping my way toward Gavin's rooms. I wanted nothing more than to get this over with ASAP, and I'd just raced up to the second-floor landing when I rounded the banister and crashed right into Captain Sanders. For one moment all I could think about was muscles and the smell of gun oil…until I realized he held me steady, his large hands on my upper arms. I shoved back from him, and he let me go. I could feel my skin grow blazing hot.

“Excuse me.” I stepped farther away. He'd come early. I hadn't expected him until tonight. Something else to deal with, and my list already floweth over.

He smiled, but he had a way of looking at me that made me feel as if I were the focal point of the universe, as if he waited for every word I might chose to speak. I didn't like it. The word
disconcerting
sprang to mind.

“I'm sorry,” he said. “I should've been more careful. I was looking for you.”

“I'll let you know when I find me.”

He cocked an eyebrow, but his smile didn't falter. I took a deep breath and willed my heart to airbrake back to a normal speed. A muscle in my cheek might've twitched with my effort to suppress my stupid schoolgirl-crush reactions. I clamped down even tighter. I had a job to do and a team to run. I sure as hell wouldn't allow this distraction to endanger either.

“I wondered if we could sit down together and go over a few tactical scenarios before the briefing,” he said. “Make sure we're on the same page.”

“I'm still tracking down my people.” I glanced at my watch. “And I'm scheduled out until about…eight twenty-five. And hey, that's when your briefing starts. How unfortunate.”

His smile slipped a notch. “Maybe afterwards—”

“Look, Captain Sanders—”

“Call me Jake. Save syllables.”

“Fine.
Jake
. I'm busy running a team,
Jake
. Not a lot of time to attend your little
tête-à-tête
.” Hail, and all witness Captain Andrea Walker behaving like an ass—yet, I couldn't stop now. Inertia was a horrible thing.

He didn't seem daunted as the wattage on his smile dialed back up to blazing. “May I call you Andrea? In private, of course.”

God. Damn. It. Men, you let them pick up the ball and they ran off the field with it, yelling how they'd won. “I'm more comfortable with Captain Walker,
Jake
, thank you.”

“All right, Captain Walker.”

We stood so close, with no one else around. My skin felt afire, flushed, and sweat dampened my armpits. The urge to drop my gaze from his eyes pulled at me like an iron chain, but I refused to look away. Dominance games? I could play them all week, and he'd soon find out if he didn't stand down. I stepped back from him again, putting even more distance between us. Any farther and I'd fall down the stairs—but I still didn't blink, so point to me.

He didn't pursue. “I'm confident we can map out some strategies to maximize our team assets.”

“
Our
team assets? Look,
Jake
, those are my people. Mine. I'm responsible for them, for keeping them safe and getting them back here every night after we go out and bust our asses, blowing shit up. I call the shots. I'm the only Captain Ahab around here. You can dispense advice when I damn well decide I need the input of a magical Green Beret.”