Cadence could hardly believe her ears. It made sense that Holland would try something like that if she had enough control over him, but to think he’d been sitting at his desk writing that horrible phrase over and over again. She buried her face in the crook of his neck, thankful they’d figured it out when they had.
“I’m sorry, Cadey.”
“It’s okay,” she whispered back, knowing it wasn’t his fault.
“Guess the joke’s on her,” Jamie said, his voice completely serious. “You can’t kill yourself.”
Cadence snickered, knowing deadpan Jamie when she heard him. She looked up at the Healer over Aaron’s shoulder. “True, but thanks to the titanium bullets, he could’ve done the first part.”
“Maybe you should let me move those to a secret location for a while?” Jamie suggested.
“No, it’s okay,” Cadence said before Aaron could even answer. She took a step back so that she could look him in the face but didn’t let go of his hands. “That’s not going to happen. In a minute, we’re going to let Cass back off, and then you’re going to fight Holland off yourself.”
For the first time in as long as she could remember, he looked scared. It wasn’t an expression he wore well since most of the time, nothing seemed to frighten him, but he nodded slowly, and she smiled, hoping to reassure him that she believed he could do it.
“Should we rip the Band-Aid off then?” the doctor asked, coming back around to the front of the desk.
Still nervous, Aaron nodded. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“Why don’t you have a seat?” Jamie suggested, his physician persona taking over. He directed Aaron to his chair behind his desk. “Try to relax, think about who you are, what you stand for, how you feel about all of us—well Cadence and I anyway, maybe not everyone.” Cadence chuckled again. Funny Jamie was so rare. “And when you’re ready, let us know, and Cadence will give the signal to Cass.”
“Okay,” Aaron took a deep breath and leaned his head back against his chair, closing his eyes.
“Cass, can you slowly unblock her?” Cadence asked, not even knowing if such a thing were possible.
“I’ll try,” Cassidy replied.
Cadence’s eyes were glued to Aaron’s face as Cassidy began the process of releasing the Kraken. His eyebrows began to knit together slowly until a pained expression overtook him, and his forehead crinkled in concentration. Jamie took a step back to her, wrapping his arm around her, and Cadence found her hands bound in front of her, pressed beneath her chin.
After an eternal minute, Aaron slowly opened his eyes. Cadence meant to draw in a deep breath but realized she’d never released the last one, so she stood there motionless, waiting.
“Well…” Aaron said, drawing out each letter of the word, “I can definitely feel her in there, probing. It’s… odd.”
“But you’re still with us,” Jamie reminded him.
“True. But… I feel like Regan MacNeil fighting Pazuzu.”
“Huh?” Cadence whispered to Jamie.
“The Exorcist,” he replied. She nodded, getting the idea. “She knows you’re on to her, right?”
“I think so. She doesn’t seem thrilled with the idea that I don’t want her in my head anymore.”
“Does she seem to be weakening at all?” Cadence asked, dropping her hands down but otherwise keeping her stoic stance.
“It’s hard to say. I feel like maybe she’s fighting me; she really doesn’t want to go. But I also feel that I’m doing a better job of pushing her out. It’s like the angrier she becomes, the stronger I get.” He was breathing a lot more evenly now, and Cadence could see the confidence growing with each passing moment.
“Good.” Jamie’s head was bobbing up and down like a coach watching his star running back headed toward the end zone. “You’ve got this.”
Aaron raised his hand, like he was going to run it through his hair, a nervous habit he’d had for as long as Cadence had known him, but he caught himself and returned his hand to the armrest, remembering her warning from earlier. “I think… I think it’s going to be all right.”
She finally exhaled all of the air she’d collected earlier and refilled her lungs, relief settling in. The idea that some monster had been camped out in her fiancé’s head for weeks was more than a little alarming, and she wondered if Holland had gained any information from her infiltration. She had wreaked enough havoc, that was for certain, and bought herself a lot of time. But now that Aaron was back, and Holland was away from her playpen, they needed to strike.
“All right. We’re good,” Aaron said, and Cadence believed him, despite the lingering fear she could still detect in the corners of his eyes. “But if I should slip away again….”
“We’ll send Cass in to find you,” she assured him with a nod.
“Great. Now, we have a hell of a lot of work to do,” Jamie reminded them.
“You’re right, we do,” Aaron agreed. “Do you remember most of what we talked about earlier?”
“I remember,” Jamie nodded.
Aaron was out of his seat. “Why don’t you get Elliott, Hannah, and Christian together. Run with the ideas we started on earlier, see what develops. I’ll let the Area Leaders who are under direct threat know that they need to be planning attacks as well. Not hunts—full out attacks on all of those Vampire groups that are threatening to knock down our doors--and then we’ll look at what our next steps are. We are going to need Cassidy to find a position on Holland’s lair while she’s away, but since it’s 4:00 in the morning, we’ll let her do that tomorrow. I know she’s still up, but she needs to get some sleep.”
“I was going to go over and talk to her,” Cadence noted, now that he’d stopped giving directions long enough for her to speak.
A crooked grin spread across Aaron’s face, one with a bit of mischief about it she hadn’t seen in a while, and her eyebrows shot up. She knew that twinkle in his eye, though for a while she’d thought perhaps she’d never see it again. “Tell her you’ll be over first thing in the morning.” He took a step toward her, his arms open, and Cadence moved into his embrace. “Or maybe second thing.”
“Uh… I think this might be my cue to leave,” Jamie said, taking a giant step backward.
“Nah, you can have the office,” Aaron replied without shifting his eyes off of hers. He reached up and cupped Cadence’s chin, his palm caressing the side of her face. “We’ll leave.”
The feel of his hands on her was enough to make her forget all of the earnestness involved in catching Holland, and she leaned in to meet his lips as they crashed down against hers. She opened her mouth and welcomed him in; it had been too long since she’d tasted him, and she felt a surge of energy between them as they reconnected. It was almost like the first time he’d kissed her. A bolt of electricity sizzled up her spine, and she pressed herself against his body, the urgency in his kisses letting her know he felt it too.
His lips released hers, and it was hard for her to let him go, but his arms stayed around her, his breath still hot against her cheek as he asked, “Race you home?”
The corner of her mouth pulled up in a devilish grin. “You have no idea how fast I am now.” She raised her eyebrows and lowered them rapidly, and then took off for the door in a flash, his hands still entangled around her waist as the couple shot out of the building to the solace of their own apartment, choosing to take the stairs instead of waiting on the elevator.
Falling in a tangle of sleeves and pantlegs onto the bed they’d shared so many times, Cadence felt a burning deep within her. She’d missed the smooth contour of his chest muscles, the way his biceps flexed when he pulled her close. His tongue traced down the length of her neck while his hands searched down her side as if it was all uncharted territory, and Cadence found herself breathless, the longing inside of her nearly sending her over the edge of rapture before they’d even begun.
“I love you, Cadence,” Aaron whispered between kisses gently laid in the tender haven between her neck and shoulder. “Thank you for not giving up on me.”
Letting go a raspy gasp, she replied, “I love you, too.” She shifted beneath him and slid her hand up his stomach, feeling the ripple of muscle there, before she rested her palm on his pectoral and pressed back just enough to get his attention. “Listen, I lost you once before, and I will never let that happen again, okay? So… promise me, no matter what occurs, no matter what kind of bullshit Holland or anyone else throws at us, we will always find each other again. Okay? Always.”
He ran his hand across her cheek, brushing her hair back and smiled at her, his blue eyes sparkling, and Cadence’s heartbeat staccatoing. “I promise, Cadence. Nothing will ever keep us apart. Nothing.”
That was all she needed to hear. She dragged her hand back the way it had come, wrapping it around him and pressing him down as she rose to meet him, finding his lips with hers and completely surrendering herself to the man she’d chosen to spend her life with, knowing full well, no matter the circumstances, she would always choose him again, every single day.
