It was shaping up to be a nice spring day, but she was ready for nightfall. They’d decided to do their own hunting a little early that night since they needed to get the show on the road, and the Vampires in question tended to stay in their confines most of the time. There were four different locations all within a few hours’ drive of their headquarters. She would be traveling to a warehouse on the outskirts of Osceola, Kansas, which wasn’t far at all. She wondered if Sam and Laura had arrived yet. What she wouldn’t give to be at the airport to greet them. Which of the four locations would they head to, or would it be another place, something to throw them off? The Vampires would have no way of knowing they’d split their team and planned on taking all four cells out at once, would they? She didn’t know what Holland was capable of these days.
Aaron had maps spread all over the conference table in the back of their office, and he was puzzling over them as she walked in. “I’m so shocked to see you staring at papers,” she said, trying to keep her tone light as she embraced him and gave him a quick kiss.
“I know. I really don’t do enough of this,” he agreed. “The Tokyo team is moving into position now. Moscow will be right behind them. We are going to be extremely busy momentarily.”
“Yeah,” she mumbled, glancing over what he had in front of him. It appeared to be detailed maps of every attack site, including Melbourne, and they were laid out in order of when and where the hunt would commence. She trusted her people to stay on top of things, but she definitely wanted to keep in contact with her teams this time after what happened with Becky. She didn’t know if she could’ve done anything to prevent her death, but she imagined she’d feel better about the situation if she would’ve been monitoring it and knew the answer to that question. Now, there was no way to tell.
“Have we instructed them to leave their IACs on?” Cadence asked.
“Yes, the leaders anyway. I don’t know about the rest of the team members. I’m still debating.” He had his hands on his hips, looking from Tokyo’s map to Moscow’s to Melbourne’s.
“Jamie sure is something else.”
He laughed. “I have not seen him that giddy since… for a long time.” She knew what he was getting at. Since before Ellie died. “He’s going to be even more useful than before.”
“See? Aren’t you glad we thought of this?”
“I have to admit, it was a good idea. As long as… there don’t end up being any negative side effects we aren’t aware of.” He ran his hand along his jawline, and she wondered if he still thought his recent break down might’ve had something to do with the serum. She didn’t think that was at all possible, especially since Holland had been forced out of his mind, and he was fine now, but since Christian had made the suggestion, it was hard to completely put it out of her thoughts as well.
“Jamie suggested we go ahead and give the okay for Margie and Grant to do it so that they have X-ray vision.”
He nodded. “Already done.”
She wanted to be surprised but wasn’t. “How come you didn’t tell him? That’s his sister, you know?”
“Is she? I didn’t realize.” He winked at her, and Cadence felt her knees weaken slightly. “I know, but Margie and I made a deal a long time ago that her business is her business. She asked, and I thought it was a good idea.”
Cadence nodded. Not knowing the whole story, there was no reason for her to assume Margie was in the wrong for wanting to keep things that way. “I talked to Cass. Did she fill you in?”
“She did. I think Holland will be more than a little distracted when this thing starts to go down, but by the time we roll out, she’ll know what’s up, and most of North America is going to get hit with some pretty crazy shit.”
“Yeah, I was wondering about that, too.” Changing the subject, she asked, “Do you think this baby is going to be a threat?”
“I have no idea. I wish I could see it, to have some idea what it is. Do we really think it’s a demon?”
“I don’t know. Have you ever encountered a demon before?”
He was reflective for a moment; Cadence could see his mind playing back over almost two hundred years. “There’s been a few times when I thought maybe we had, but I never knew for sure. It makes you wonder what else is out there, you know?”
“I definitely know.” She thought about her sister floating above the bed. It made sense that someone who was half-Vampire could do that, but it was still hard to swallow. It didn’t matter at the moment, however. She needed to concentrate on the known threats. “How long until Margie gets to Melbourne?”
“About an hour. So things are about to get interesting.”
Cadence looked across the room to the chair behind her desk. Where would be the most comfortable spot to oversee multiple attacks on different continents? Here or at home? She stifled a yawn and realized she was going to need some caffeine. “I think I’m going to run this from home.”
“Okay.” There was a questioning lilt at the end.
“Do you need to be here?”
Aaron glanced at the maps on the table. “Yeah, I think so. I work better from here.”
She nodded. She didn’t. It was too… officey or something. “All right. I might come back later if things are going bad. Or if things are going good. I don’t know.”
He chuckled at her and opened his arms. Cadence walked into them, reminding herself not to get distracted, but it was hard when she felt like he’d been away from her for so long, and now he was back. He kissed her temple, and she fought the urge to sweep all of the maps off of the table and have her way with him.
“Maybe when all of this craziness is over, we can finally get some real wedding plans down on map paper,” she said gesturing at the display in front of her. They’d done plenty of discussing and even had the invitations picked out, but they hadn’t been ordered yet, and they would need to start getting serious about it all soon if they were going to keep their September date.
“When this craziness is over, we should all have a lot more time to relax. I’m not sure what it’s like to live in a world without Vampires because I never have, but I can’t imagine it’s nearly as stressful.”
Cadence held both of her hands still on his chest and took him in for a moment. Of course, she had been under the impression she was living in a world without Vampires for over nineteen years. She couldn’t understand how a person could grow up the way Aaron had, fearing for his life and the lives of his loved ones all the time, knowing there was something out there that could get you at any moment. The fact that he had even kept his sanity was commendable; the fact that he was coordinating all of this, that he’d run this entire operation for decades, was even more impressive.
“I love you,” she said, staring up at him.
“I love you, too,” he replied, leaning down to kiss her.
When he pulled away, she muttered, “Oh, good. No Han Solo answer this time.”
He smirked, like he had a vague recollection of what she was talking about, but he wasn’t actually there. “I’ll see you in a little bit.”
“Okay. Good luck.”
“You, too. We’re going to need it.”
