Chase ordered them two sodas. He remembered she drank diet, and for some reason, the thought made her feel good. They chatted about mundane things, knowing others were listening.
But when the vamps left, the conversation got a little less mundane.
“Did you get anything from the vision that might help us?” Chase asked.
Della let herself be pulled back into the memory that could easily break her heart. “They said something about someone wanting to make them murderers.”
“I know.”
“Do you think someone’s making assassins out of fresh turns?”
Chase shook his head. “They could, but you’d need to trust anyone you sent out to do something like that.”
“The noise?” Della said. “It was like some construction equipment above them.”
He nodded. “But it could have been anything.”
She trailed her finger down her cup. “We need to tell Burnett about it. We never even told him about the other one.”
“If you think it will help, go for it. I just don’t see what good it’ll do.” He grabbed a napkin and wadded it up in frustration. “What I don’t understand is why the ghost is doing this. Putting us there for no reason. We’re not getting anything that will help us find them.”
Della felt the same way, but then suddenly, she knew the answer. “But we care.”
“What?”
“We care. She wants us to care about them.”
Chase exhaled and looked down at his drink. “Then she’s succeeding.” He stabbed his straw into his cup.
They both grew quiet, as if trying to come to terms with caring. Then Chase looked up at her and she could tell he’d moved his thoughts away from the vision. “Why didn’t you fake your death like most everyone else?” he asked.
She shrugged. “I had Chan, and when my parents took me to the hospital because I was sick, I ran into some other supernaturals and they gave me the number for Shadow Falls. Holiday’s not big on vamps faking their death.”
He nodded and stared at his soda for a while. “But it obviously hasn’t been all that easy for you. I’ve heard you complain about your dad … and your aunt. And the one parents’ day I was there, you … looked pretty miserable sitting with them.”
She exhaled. “There were times I thought it might be easier the other way, but after hearing Natasha, I don’t know. Holiday may be on to something.”
He nodded. “Did you lose other people, too?”
Remembering the conversation they had both been privy to between Natasha and Liam, Della suspected he meant a boyfriend. “Yeah. I had someone.”
“Were you close?”
“I thought we were. I was wrong.”
“He hurt you?” he asked, and his eyes grew a tad brighter with obvious anger.
“Yeah.” She turned her drink in her hands, tracing a drop of condensation down the glass, finding the courage to ask the same question. “What about you?”
“I was only fourteen.” He paused as if that was the answer, then he added. “But yeah, there was someone.”
“Did you love her?” Della asked.
“Young love,” Chase said. “She was a friend of my sister. I’d had a crush on her for a long time. She’d finally stopped looking at me like the younger brother.”
“Do you ever go see her? I mean, I know she thinks you’re dead, but have you ever just watched her from afar to see how she’s doing?”
“No.” He cut his eyes down at his own glass. “She died.”
“How?” Della asked, her chest feeling full.
“She was on the plane with us when it went down.”
Della’s heart really crunched with pain then. “I’m sorry.”
“Me, too. But I saw her, sort of.”
Della picked up her straw and stirred the ice around. “You mean as a ghost?”
He made a face. “I guess that’s what you would call her. I was in pretty bad shape from the crash, and I was sort of there … with them. Or halfway there, if you know what I mean?”
She nodded. “I do. The same thing happened to me when I was … being Reborn.”
“I’m glad you decided not to stay there,” Chase said.
“You, too,” Della admitted.
He smiled. “You know, I think she knew about you.”
Della made a face. “Your girlfriend? How could she have known about me?”
“She said they could peek into the future and that I’d meet someone who was a real challenge.”
“That doesn’t mean it was me,” Della insisted.
He chuckled. “I don’t think I’ve met anyone who is more of a challenge.”
She lifted her third finger up off her glass just a bit.
He saw it and laughed. “I had fun today.”
She bit down on her lip. “I’m paying you back for the ticket. Who knew they could charge four hundred dollars?”
“Yeah, but I was going fifty miles over the speed limit.”
Della frowned. “I was going fifty miles over the speed limit.”
“And you enjoyed every second of it,” he said. “I’d pay twice that much to see you having fun again.”
“Yeah, but you’re not going to pay it. I’m getting some compensation for working this case and I’ll reimburse you.”
“See, you’re a challenge,” he said. “I’ve got plenty of money, Della.”
“And you’re just a rich pain in the ass,” she said, but she couldn’t help but smile at him. Damn if her partner wasn’t coming off as more of a prince than a toad right now.
* * *
That night, Della laid in bed with the Smurfette doll sitting on the bedside table staring at her.
Why did the stupid thing mean something?
Because he’d bought it for her. Because he’d been embarrassed and still bought it for her. Because it was apparent that he’d been thinking about her when he saw it.
She recalled Holiday’s words of warning. Just be careful.
She would, she told herself.
Before she let any of this get carried away she wanted …
What did she want?
The answer came to her. She wanted to know for sure that she trusted Chase. Wanted to make sure that he wasn’t keeping more secrets.
While she was listing off wants, she grabbed her phone just to make sure she hadn’t missed a call from her mom.
No call.
She half-ass debated calling again, but then it just hurt too much.
If her mom didn’t care enough to call back, Della wasn’t calling her.
* * *
Thursday, right after classes, Della’s phone rang. Expecting it to be her mom, she hurried and caught the call without even looking at the number. It wasn’t her mom. Burnett again—needing to see her. She took off, and swore not to think about her mom again. The camp leader was waiting on his cabin’s front porch. Not a good sign.
She followed him into his back office because Holiday had someone in hers. He leaned against the desk and motioned for her to sit down in the chair. One glance around, and Della knew Holiday had done a room makeover—a crystal paperweight sat on the desk, along with more colorful pictures of Hannah, Burnett’s little pride and joy. In the corner of the room hung a plant, a live plant. The room no longer looked so stark.
Or it didn’t until Della noted Burnett’s expression.
Something was wrong.
“What is it?” Della asked.
“We tried to run down Damian Bond in California. He’s not staying where he told the girlfriend he was, and he was let go from his stunt job two days ago. But I checked, and so far, he’s still scheduled to fly back on Friday afternoon. So I was thinking, why don’t you take tonight off, stay here, and get some rest.”
“It’s because I slept late yesterday, isn’t it? I was fine today.”
“It’s not that,” he said. “Well, maybe a little bit. You’ve been going nonstop. I know you were out running last night until almost two. You
can’t keep pushing yourself like this. I know, I’m an agent. You need to calm down, breathe.”
Della held her temper in check. “I’m fine. I don’t need that much sleep anymore. You should know that, too. And I’m still breathing. Can’t you hear me?” She inhaled.
He frowned. “I can see it in your eyes. This case is all you think about. You have to learn to let go. It can eat you up inside if you don’t learn to set it aside.”
“I’ll let go and relax when we find Natasha and Liam. You told me yourself, they don’t have much time.”
He exhaled in frustration and Della sensed that he knew something more. What was he not telling her? “There’s something else, isn’t there?”
When he didn’t answer immediately, she wanted to scream, but she forced herself to stay seated and ask again in a calm voice. Hey … if he wanted her calm to work on the case, she’d give him calm … even if it killed her.
“What are you not telling me, Burnett?”
He moved around the desk and sat down in his chair. “One of the other weres who was arrested finally decided to talk yesterday. He validated what Jason Von told you. And what the Vampire Council dug up in their files. But…” He paused. “He also said it was four weeks ago when they took Liam. He knows exactly because it was his brother’s birthday.” Burnett shook his head. “Della, there’s no way they could have survived this long.”
Still holding her emotions in check, she said, “You were there when the ghost did her thing. She spelled out ‘alive.’ You saw it. How can you still question it?”
“Even Holiday said that ghosts sometimes … get confused. It could be Natasha is the ghost and she doesn’t want to accept—”
“No.” She shook her head. “We don’t know that they put them in that tunnel, or whatever it is, four weeks ago. They could have just locked them away recently.”
Burnett’s expression stayed firm, and Della saw it in his eyes. He had proof, or he thought he did.
“What else? Just tell me what you know,” she said and her heart gripped from what she knew she didn’t want to hear. What she knew she didn’t want to believe.
He let out a deep breath. “I wanted Holiday to be here. She’s supposed to be done in just a few minutes.”
“I don’t need Holiday, Burnett. I just need to hear what’s going on.”
He nodded. “They were kidnapping fresh turns and using them to host underground fight matches.”
Della remembered the vision she’d had yesterday … now it made sense.
Burnett settled deeper into his chair. “We discovered the same thing happening in Dallas and were able to stop it. We arrested those involved there, and even freed several of the fresh turns that were being held. They were actually bringing them in from other countries.”
Della kept listening, but so far, he hadn’t said anything that proved to her that Natasha and Liam were dead.
“Until the other rogue spoke up today, we didn’t know it was happening here. He gave us the names of those responsible. At five this morning, we arrested three of them. We think this Damian Bond could be one of them as well.”
“So this is good news,” Della said. “We’re getting closer to finding them. Why are you—?”
“There’s more.” Burnett folded his hands on the desk. “We’re told that when the first arrests went down in Dallas, they sent word to their Houston partners and were told to eliminate the evidence.”
“Eliminate?” Della repeated. “They killed them?”
He nodded. “We’ve been informed of a mass grave. It’s in a junkyard where they destroy and bury cars.”
Just like that, Della remembered the noises she’d heard in the vision, the sounds of large equipment. Doubt started pulling at the threads of hope she held so tight to her heart.
“The FRU is still collecting the bodies, and we’ll take them in to be identified. I know you don’t want to believe this, but there’s a good chance Natasha and Liam are among the victims.”
Tears filled her eyes, but she didn’t care.
Find Natasha.
The voice whispered in Della’s head. Was the voice wrong? But what about the vision—the vision of the woman murdered by someone so like her father and uncle? Questions started bouncing off her sore, unraveling heart.
She wiped the tears from her eyes. “How long … before we know for sure?”
“It could take up to a week to confirm identities of all the dead.”
Della stood up. “Fine, but until you find Natasha’s and Liam’s bodies, I’m going to keep looking. And I won’t believe they’re dead until I see them on the morgue table myself.”
“Della, you need—”
“No!” Della said. “I’m going to keep looking.”
“Where? You’ve run out of leads.”
Call from Miao Hon. The words suddenly echoed inside her head. Not from memory, but obviously sent by the ghost.
But why? The answer came to her with clarity. The same reason she’d sent her the picture. Her aunt knew something that Della needed to know. And just maybe it would be the information she needed to find Natasha.
“No, I haven’t,” Della said. There was still the one she’d been avoiding.
She left Burnett, not looking back when he called her name. She flew off the office porch and headed to her cabin. She found the photograph in her nightstand drawer, and then she left. She took off and jumped the gate. She knew it would sound the alarm and Burnett would know it was her.
She didn’t care.
She needed to get to the one person she thought would understand how she felt. The person who could help her do what she had to do.
Chase.
Chapter Thirty-three
Chase was on his front porch when she cleared the top of the trees. He had his phone in his hand, his gaze focused upward, as if watching for her.
“She’s here,” she heard him say as she moved in.
Probably Burnett, more than likely pissed she’d left without permission. Who was she kidding? He was definitely angry.
She didn’t care.
Chase ended the call and dropped the phone on one of his wicker patio chairs.
She landed on his front porch with a not-so-graceful thump.
She didn’t care.
He launched forward as if to catch her, but she’d already caught herself on the front porch rail.
He didn’t have a shirt on. He obviously hadn’t been expecting company.
She didn’t care.
The dampness on her face told her she was crying.
She didn’t care.
He looked at her with concern, tenderness.
And damn it, she cared. She cared about Chase. She knew he cared about her, too. How she’d come to this point, she didn’t know, but it wasn’t important right now.
“That was Burnett,” he said.
“He told you?” she asked, her emotions swirling inside her, almost making her dizzy.
“Only that you were upset about some news and had taken off. He started to explain, but I saw you and hung up. What’s wrong?”
“They think they’re dead.” Her sinuses stung and she had to swallow to keep more tears from falling.
“But we know they’re not,” he said and came closer. She could smell him, the outdoorsy scent of wind and some natural herbs.
When he reached for her, she took a step back. She had to tell him. Then she wanted him to chase off all her doubts, to convince her that her fears held no merit. “But some of what they said makes sense.”
“What makes sense?”
“Burnett said there was a rogue were gang setting up fights between them for entertainment. Remember they said they wanted them to become murderers?”
“I remember, but how does that—?”
She told him about the organization in Dallas, how the FRU wasn’t aware others were doing it, about how those doing the same thing in Houston were told to eliminate the evidence.
His eyes widened
with her news. “But they could still be alive. That doesn’t mean they killed everyone.”
Her vision blurred a little more from the watery weakness. “They found a mass grave. It’s beneath a junkyard.” She swallowed again. “Remember the sound of equipment we heard? What if that’s what it was? What if…?”
Doubt filled his eyes, but then he blinked and it was gone. “No. What I remember was them talking, kissing, laughing, crying. I remember them being alive. So, no,” he said with the assuredness she wanted … she needed … to hear. “I don’t believe it. We’ve been them. We’ve felt what they feel. They aren’t dead. They’re alive.”
“But what if we’re wrong?” Della’s stomach knotted. “What if they just want us to know?”
“Know what?”
“I don’t know … maybe that they loved each other.”
He shook his head and then moved to her and put a hand on each of her shoulders. “They are alive. I believe that.”
“I want to believe it.” A tear slipped from her lashes.
He pulled her against him. She rested her head on his bare shoulder, gathering comfort and strength in his embrace, by his nearness. But she hadn’t come for this. She knew what she needed to do. What she felt almost certain the ghost wanted her to do.
She pulled back. “I need you to loan me your car.”
“To go where?”
“I’m going to see my aunt.”
“Because of the picture?” he asked.
“Because the ghost wants me to.”
He reached back to the wicker chair and snagged his phone and then grabbed a T-shirt that hung off the back. “Did she tell you this … that she wanted you to go to your aunt?”
“Sort of.”
“Sort of how?” he asked.
She held out her hand. “Are you going to loan me your car, or not?”
“No. I’m going to come with you,” he said. “But I want to know what’s really going on first.” At her small nod, he looked back to the door. “Let me grab my keys and shoes. You can tell me on the drive.”
* * *
She gave Chase the address and he punched it into his GPS. He asked her if she wanted the top up or down. She said up, just because she was afraid of being this close to her old neighborhood and being spotted by someone else who knew her.