“Oh, God,” Mira whispered. “The mother’s bloody footprints lead all the way to the bedroom at the end of the hall.”
“Yeah,” Aric answered, his booted feet moving leaden beneath him as they approached the pastel-colored room that stood as silent as the grave ahead of him.
In his mind, the logical sequence of the attack played out in horrific detail. The morning delivery, used as a trap to lure Elena Champlain to the door alone. The first assailant pushes his way inside, dropping the ruse of a package and crushing it under his boot as he knocks the female down with his fist, splattering her blood on the wall.
Her mate flashes downstairs in that next instant, the blood bond and her likely screams alerting him to the danger. He kills the delivery man to give his Breedmate a chance to run for safety--but the assailant wasn’t alone. The others push inside now, at least one of them armed with ultraviolet weaponry. They ash Jonathon Champlain. Another ashes their young son, who would have been just old enough to be a threat to an unarmed human. To a man carrying an ultraviolet weapon? The child would be as inconsequential as a gnat.
Any Breed male allergic to sunlight, no matter his size or skills, would be no match for a tiny bullet filled with liquid UV.
As for the lady of the house, Aric had a sickening feeling that her death was far less merciful.
The door to the nursery was wide open. He entered, and it was all he could do not to stagger back on his heels.
The female lay on the floor, brutalized, her clothing torn off. Stab wounds and slashes all over her body. In the crib, her infant son had been reduced to a blackened scorch mark against the soft white sheets and smiling stuffed animals.
And on the walls, written in the Breedmate’s blood, were shocking messages of hate.
Breed whore!
Death to the bloodsuckers!
Ash them all!
There were dozens more, each more graphic and uglier than the next. Aric didn’t bother to read them all.
But Kaya and Mira were.
He saw their horror reflected in their eyes as the entirety of the slaying washed over them.
Kaya looked as though the slightest touch would knock her over. Her face was bloodless, shell-shocked. Her dark brown eyes were glazed and welling with unspilled tears.
Mira blew out a soft curse. When she spoke, her voice was hardly more than a whisper. “Please collect all of the spent UV rounds, Aric. We should bring them back for Niko to analyze. I’m going to . . . I need to go outside for a minute.”
“All right.” He nodded once, accepting his grim task with total solemnity. “Kaya, you should go too.”
At first, she didn’t move. Didn’t so much as blink.
Aric reached out for her, his touch landing lightly on her shoulder. She flinched, a bone-deep jerk of movement that seemed to startle her out of the horrified daze that gripped her. Her gaze lifted to his, bleak and unreadable. He couldn’t resist cupping her trembling jaw in his palm.
“Go on with Mira,” he gently instructed her. “You don’t need to see any more of this.”
She gave him a wobbly nod. Then, unspeaking, she pivoted and left him to finish his work.
CHAPTER 15
Kaya hung her head over the sink in her quarters’ en suite bathroom and splashed a handful of cold water over her face. Her stomach heaved, threatening to revolt for the second time since she had returned with Aric and Mira from the Darkhaven in Pointe-Claire.
They’d been back at the command center for a couple of hours and she still couldn’t purge the horrific scene from her mind. The blood and death and hatred. The unimaginable cruelty of the ones who’d perpetrated the slaughter of that innocent family in their home.
But her stomach turned for another reason too.
One that put a coldness in her veins as she gathered her shower-damp hair into a long ponytail, then donned running gear and headed out of her room to the mansion corridor outside.
She had to get away from the confinement of the command center’s walls, if only for a short while. She needed space and time to process everything that had happened, not only today but ever since Aric showed up in Montreal.
More than anything, she needed to look for some clarity . . . no matter where that search might lead her.
Aric was coming out of a guest room at the other end of the hallway as she headed for the central staircase that led to the large foyer. He held a tablet in one hand, his comm unit in the other.
“Hey,” he said, his deep voice soothing with just that simple greeting. “I was on my way to check on you. Thought I’d head down to the war room to dig back into the reception images and look for Mercier’s Opus contact.”
“Oh. Right.” It seemed like a week had passed since they’d begun that task together. If only it felt so long since she’d lain naked and pleasured in Aric’s arms. She could hardly look at him now without reliving the bliss of his touch . . . and the erotic power of his body as he moved inside her. She cleared her throat. “I was, um, just going out for a little bit. After this morning, I could use a long run.”
“You want some company?”
“No.” She only hoped her reply didn’t sound as abrupt as it felt on her lips. “I won’t be gone long. If anyone asks for me, will you let them know I’ve gone out?”
“Sure.” He nodded. “When you get back, come down and join me. We need to nail this Opus bastard now more than ever.”
She wouldn’t deny the importance of excising a cancer like Opus Nostrum. If they had supplied the UV ammunition used in today’s slayings--and there seemed to be zero doubt about that--then the Order should show no mercy to anyone with
