"Can you describe who did this to you?" The man exhaled a slow, shuddering sigh. He didn't have long now. He looked up, eyes listless and glassy in the dark. He lifted his arm, slowly extending his finger to point somewhere past Brock's thick shoulder. "Him," he gasped, the voice thready and airless. "Behind you ... that's him ..." Kade and Brock swung their heads around in unison--just in time to see a huge Breed male running for the back acre of the junkyard. The vampire wore black fatigues and a long-sleeved black knit shirt. His head was shaved bald, the back of his na**d skull covered in an unmistakable pattern of dermaglyphs "Holy hell," Kade muttered. He broke into a run with Brock thundering at his heels. They bolted for the rear of the littered yard, but the Gen One male in front of them was ten times faster. He vaulted up onto a mountain of crushed cars in one swift leap, then he was gone. It wasn't Chase who'd brutalized the human and left him for dead, but another Breed male who was recently familiar to all of the Order. A Gen One who'd joined them only a few weeks ago. "Hunter," Brock growled. "Son of a bitch."
Chapter Fourteen
Claire felt a bit queasy from the flight as she and Andreas stepped off the Order's private jet in Boston later that night. It had been a long trip, mostly because of the chasm of uncomfortable silence that seemed to have opened up between Andreas and her. Fortunately her lack of sleep after the dreamwalking disaster with him had made her plenty tired on the flight from Denmark to the States. She slept most of the way but he had seemed much too edgy for rest. Even now, as he guided her across the private hangar toward a sleek black Land Rover that pulled up to greet them, Andreas practically vibrated with broody, dangerous energy.
"Tegan and Elise," he told her as a big tawny-haired Breed male and his petite blond mate climbed out of the vehicle. At the sight of them, Andreas's demeanor changed from the maddening aloofness he'd been subjecting her to on the flight, to one of warm familiarity. "My friends," he said, stepping forward to greet the golden, beautiful couple. In one of his brief moments of conversation on the flight, Andreas had mentioned that Elise had been mated to a director of the Enforcement Agency here in Boston. She'd lost him a few years past to an altercation with a Rogue while on the job, and had lost her only son more recently than that.
Claire wasn't privy to the details of how Elise had found happiness again with Tegan, but it was obvious from the glow of peace they both radiated as they approached that the two of them were deeply in love. Claire hung back as Andreas took the female's hand to his lips and brushed her fingers with a chaste but friendly kiss. She had no right to feel the least bit possessive of him, but the pang stabbed her a little as the pretty Breedmate took Andreas into a welcoming hug. Elise's mate looked nearly as affected as Claire felt. The tall, muscular Breed warrior had a hard-edged look about him, from the wild tousle of his golden hair, to the glittering gem-green eyes that watched over his woman with a combination of pride and purely masculine protectiveness. Andreas had said Tegan was Gen One Breed, and seeing him up close, Claire would have guessed it on her own.
His studied stillness called to mind the mien of a big cat; all those muscles might seem coiled and at ease, but it would take only a fraction of a second for him to spring into deadly action if he felt his world or the mate he openly adored were threatened in any way. "Hello, Claire. I'm Elise," Tegan's Breedmate said, releasing Andreas to come over and greet her with equal kindness. While the two males shook hands, Claire found herself engulfed in a quick, welcoming hug. Elise stepped back, her pale lavender eyes bright with intellect and warmth, her chin-length light blond bob framing her delicate face. "It's very nice to meet you. Even though our paths never crossed in the Agency, I am familiar with some of your philanthropic work in Hamburg. You've really done a lot for the Darkhaven communities over there."
Claire shrugged faintly uncomfortable with the praise, given the purpose of her emergency arrival in the States with Andreas. And although the two males spoke in low voices, she heard Tegan's murmured condolences on the deaths of Andreas's kin and the destruction of his Darkhaven. "I recall one of your young nephews and his shy Breedmate who'd been with child when I last saw you in Berlin a year ago," Tegan added, his brows furrowed over those fierce green eyes. Andreas gave him a sober nod. "They asked me to be godfather while you were there, I believe." "Yes," the warrior replied, a faint smile in remembrance before his expression darkened with sympathy. "We were all stunned to hear what happened. The attack won't go unmet, not if the Order has anything to say about it." Tegan sent the briefest look in Claire's direction, unspoken acknowledgment of her mate's hand in the tragedy that Andreas alone had managed to survive. Her sense of guilt and awkwardness increased, as did the tense knot in her belly. Her nerves were stretched peculiarly taut, putting an anxious flutter in her chest. Andreas put his hand on Tegan's shoulder as they continued their quiet conversation. "I want your word on something, my friend. If it turns out that Dragos is even remotely connected to what happened to my Darkhaven, I'll do whatever I can to help you get the bastard and shut him down. But Roth is mine alone. Can you give me that much?" The warrior inclined his head in a slow nod.
"I know the kind of hatred you're feeling. I've been there myself. I'm the last one to tell you how to deal with your own demons, but just be careful, yeah? Plenty of bastards out there deserve a good killing, but vengeance will consume you if you don't control it." It may be too late for that advice, Claire thought, watching Andreas's rigid stance and haunted, hardened gaze as the four of them made their way toward the waiting SUV His need to avenge his family and his human lover only seemed to be growing stronger, more volatile, for the fact that the justice he craved had yet to be realized. After the horrors he showed her in his dream, there was a part of her that understood his rage, even shared it. But from what she'd seen of him these past couple of days, she worried that his own life might mean nothing to him.