Chapter 324
Time was up. A barrage of bullets lit up the street below us, and I knew Margie’s team had come into contact with those advanced forces. “Be careful!” Cadence said, pulling me over to her. She kissed the top of my head and then squeezed Brandon’s arm before nodding at Jamie in a show of confidence.
Aaron followed her the last few steps to the fire escape. “Becky wanted to send backup from HQ, but I told her not to. We don’t know for sure where Holland is, and she could be planning an attack there. Remember, Cadence, this was a rescue mission, not the attack. Our objective is to get everyone out alive.”
“Right,” my sister said, but I knew she wasn’t thinking about that. she wanted to get Carter again. I couldn’t blame her. I would’ve been thinking the same thing. “I love you,” she said just as a scream filled the night sky. I felt with my mind and saw that it was Steph, and she was hurt badly. Her arm was severed, and she was lying on the street.
Aaron told Cadence goodbye, and she and Elliott disappeared over the side of the building. I could hear my sister’s whisper soft landings on each platform while Elliott shook the building, and it would’ve made me chuckle if I didn’t know we were out of time, too. I needed to tell Aaron what was about to happen, but I wasn’t sure how since he would probably question why I’d let Cadence go off without all of the information, and I wasn’t sure I had an answer for that.
We stood in silence for a few minutes as the fog began to dissipate and flickers of light filled the sky from time to time as shots were fired. When I knew a Vampire had gone down, I would send my sister a message using my telepathy, letting her know the remaining number. But I was about to get busy as I was sure now that the other forces were about to descend upon us.
Aaron was standing near the brick wall, next to the fire escape, his hands on his hips, sighing like he really wished he was down there in the thick of things. It must’ve been hard for him not to even be able to see things well enough to give directions. I had a feeling that the situation was about to go down when all of the hair on the back of my neck stood up. Once again, the clock had run out of sand.
“Don’t worry about missing the fight,” I said, mostly to Aaron but really to all three of them. “It’s coming to you.”
Aaron slowly turned to look at me. I was next to him, my arms folded, confident that we could do this, though I didn’t quite know how. Brandon was on my other side, and Jamie was standing behind me, like they were trying to protect me without even realizing I was in danger.
I could see Aaron was about to ask me what I was talking about when he realized the fluttering we were all feeling in our stomachs was intensifying because we were no longer alone.
“I didn’t want Cadence to worry,” I began, not sure how to word what I needed to say. “But… leaving before probably would’ve been a better idea.” I knew we wouldn’t have made it to the car, but at least we would’ve all been together, and maybe then we would’ve had a chance to make it out.
No one said anything. We all just turned and looked behind us. The fog that had been rolling down the streets was here now, hovering over the surface of the building behind this one and infiltrating our space like a white cloud billowing in before a storm.
“How many?” Aaron whispered to me.
I had been trying to determine that myself. “Not sure. Twelve. Maybe fifteen.”
“Holy crap,” Brandon muttered. I guess he felt like that was too many for the four of us. They couldn’t kill the three of them though. And I had no idea if they could kill me, but I didn’t think so.
“Holland?” Aaron asked, taking a few steps closer to the advancing monsters.
“No, but some freaky doctor,” I replied. Holland was still out there on the perimeter somewhere, but I had a feeling if we started to be successful, she’d be on her way shortly.
“How did they get up here?” Jamie asked as we heard footsteps on the other side of the rooftop.
“They came up over there on the adjacent building and floated across,” I explained.
Brandon pulled out his Glock and took a few steps away as the footfalls became louder. “Of course they did. Cass, you should probably stay back.”
I was just about to argue that I wasn’t a princess, and I could hold my own, when I saw Aaron pull out a familiar object. “Well, for this, you should.”
It was a grenade, just like the one I’d thrown at Gibbon. We still didn’t know if it could burn me, and I wasn’t about to find out. “In that case,” Jamie said as I backed up, and Brandon and the doctor got in front of me to shield me from any silver nitrate that might spray my direction.
I realized Aaron actually had two grenades. He pulled the pins on both of them and tossed them into the fog. Shrieks filled the air the second the grenades went off. His aim had been good as it caught a great deal of the Vampires one way or another. I was glad to know the grenades worked against them, but when he pulled his Glock out, I realized he didn’t have any more. I also remembered what he’d said about decapitation earlier. Shooting them wasn’t going to end them. We’d have to find a way to behead them. I wished I’d brought a knife to this gun fight….
Two hulk-like men stepped out of the fog, and I took an inventory. The doctor was burned but not dead. He was cowering in the back. There were a half-dozen more who had survived the grenades, which meant Aaron had eliminated about half of their forces with those little gems. Not bad.
The bullets did nothing against the two giants, so I didn’t bother to get my Glock. Instead, I got my hands in what Aurora called “ready position” and waited until I could see a target. Aaron hurled himself at the hulk closest to him, and I almost cheered when the giant went flying backward, knocking over a shorter Vampire, pinning it to the ground.
I didn’t have too much time to watch what Aaron was doing, however. A tall Vampire woman with long stringy hair stepped out of the fog in front of me, and I realized this was my time. She looked more like a storybook witch than a Vampire, but I knew what she was. Her fangs were bared, and instinctively, mine came out as well as we ran at each other.
