Chapter 56

“We need a better place to meet,” Jo stated as the entire team crowded into their hotel room. There were simply too many people to hunker around a coffee table in a shabby hotel in the frigid tundra of northern Russia. “It’s too bad the log cabin isn’t closer to the mines.”
“It’s too bad we are even in Russia to begin with, but it is what it is,” her brother retorted, his arms folded across his chest as he sat staring at her from a chair across from where Jo perched on the armrest of the couch.
“Did I mention how thankful I am that Aunt Cass saved you?” she said dryly. Cadon only shook his head slightly, his eyes narrowed. “What have you got on our next target, Dr. Ryan?” Jo asked. She’d deployed a team, headed by Cale, to gather as much information as possible about the mine in question, which was about fifteen miles from where they were gathered.
“It seems to be a lot like the last operation we infiltrated,” he said, moving toward the map on the coffee table as he spoke. “One way in, which is here. It’s not as covered as the first one, but not as open as the last, either. There are trees and shrubs nearby which will give them plenty of cover, and of course, if they have scandium bullets, which we have to assume at this point that they do, then all of us will be vulnerable.”
“Emma is still working on some sort of a shield that will counteract the scandium, but she hasn’t gotten it perfected yet,” Jo reminded all of them, in case they weren’t aware that the tech guru was back in a lab in Moscow working on a solution to their scandium issues.
“So… we just have to be fast enough to dodge bullets?” Mikali asked. “Sure… no problem.”
“Hey, Hunters have always had to put up with the possibility of being shot,” Meagan said from her seat on the edge of the bed behind him. “It’s just part of the job.”
Mikali turned to look at her, his eyes narrowed. “It’s part of the job for you because you had us to keep you safe. The chances of a Vampire killing a Hunter go down when a Guardian is there to protect them. It’s the way of the ternion, the way it has always been. Now, everything is all out of sorts.”
“It’s not good,” Jo said, jumping in before they could get into an argument, “but we’ve faced difficult challenges before. We just need to be aware of all of our vulnerabilities, and do what we can to take enough Vampires out before they have a chance to strike. Cassidy will be a big help with that, but I’d rather not bring the cave ceiling down this time if we can avoid it. We need to know what’s going on inside of these places, and we can’t know that if we can’t get in.”
“Seems like we got lucky with the first place,” Ping muttered. “I wonder why they didn’t have any of their magical bullets.”
“They had no idea we were coming.” Leo spoke as if he had it all figured out. “By the second time around, they’d already decided we’d make good target practice for their new toy.”
“Regardless of why it was easier the first time, our job is never easy. I would feel more comfortable if we had more titanium bullets, in case the Assassins show up again, but I don’t know if we’ll be able to get our hands on any more today, and we need to go in tonight.”
“Are you going to leave some of us behind to babysit the turncoat?” Cadon had made it clear that he didn’t think it was a good idea to bring Ryker along with them wherever they went. He would’ve been fine with locking him in one of the cells at the first mine they infiltrated, the way the reserva de sange Ryker was moving would’ve been locked up, if he’d gotten that far. In the day and a half since they’d brought him back with them from the bus incident, he’d refused to tell anyone why he had been there or exactly what he was working on, and Jo hadn’t ordered Cass to take a look, but if he didn’t start talking soon, she just might have to. There was more to the bastard than met the eye. Setting him loose was a bad idea, and locking him up was against the mild code of ethics she tried to live by.
“We can’t take him with us,” Jo said, shrugging, “and I sure the hell am not going to cut him free again. Every time he gets away from us, trouble ensues.”
“Wasn’t it just the once? And… didn’t we go looking for that trouble?” Shayna didn’t say much at meetings. As far as Jo knew, she didn’t say much period, but it was clear she had an attitude about Jo’s decision not to leave Ryker be.
“It’s more than that,” Jo assured her, not that she felt as if she needed to justify herself to anyone. “There’s more going on with him than we are aware of at the moment, and until we figure out exactly what it is he’s up to, we need to keep him on a leash. So, yes, we’ll need to leave a couple of people behind to keep an eye on him.”
“Why a couple?” Leo asked, his upper lip snarling. “You think one measly human is going to overpower one of us and take off?”
“No, but I think sitting around babysitting an irritating asshole can be annoying, and if I only leave one person behind, that means no breaks,” Jo retorted. “Are you volunteering?”
“Hell no,” Leo said quickly.
“I’ll stay behind,” Ping said quickly, raising his hand. “I think it’s evident, of all of us, I have the least amount of experience--and skill.”
“The only way you get experience is through experience,” Mila reminded him, encouragingly. “Which means you shouldn’t stay behind.”
Jo wasn’t exactly sure how they’d gotten so far off topic. Cale had been telling them about the site, and the next thing she knew, they were talking about the one person in the world she least wanted to discuss. “Let’s get back to the attack, and then we’ll decide who stays,” she suggested, running her hand through her hair.
“But don’t we need to know assignments before we discuss the attack?” Cadon asked.
“Which means we need to know who’s not going to be there.” Scott nodded in agreement, and Jo glared at each of them.
They were right, though. They needed to sort that out first. This was why she hated being the leader. All of this complicated decision making business was not her cup of tea. She just wanted to go in and kill Vampires, not discuss the logistics of how best to do so. “Are there any volunteers--other than Ping?”
Sun raised her hand, and Jo tried not to roll her eyes. If Ping couldn’t stay because he needed the experience, then what made her think she could?
“I’ll stay,” Meagan said. “I definitely don’t need the experience.”
“I will, too, if you want,” Dax said. He still wasn’t himself after his wife’s death. Not that Jo remembered what he had been like before, but she could see he was a shell of a person.
“Perfect. Now, moving along….”
It took another hour or so, but eventually, Jo managed to work out a solid plan with the others, despite her brother constantly pointing out what wouldn’t work and what was going to go sideways. In the end, she thought she had a pretty good strategy in place and a team that would do what needed to be done in order to get as much information from this raid as possible--without getting themselves killed.
That was always a worry, but as they went out to see if there were any locals with titanium bullets they might be willing to give up, which was a stretch, Jo had a bad feeling that things were going to go sideways that night, and unlike the last time when the Healers had acted quickly, and Cassidy had been in a good position to use her powers to get everyone out safely and still get the job done--sort of--there was no guarantee that would happen again.
In her gut, Jo had a horrible feeling that this hunt was going to go awry, that someone was going to get hurt badly, or worse, not make it out alive.