Absolution (38 page)

Glory dropped to the ground, crying out as her injured arm hit the floor with her body weight on top of it. Matthias’s bullet dug a trench into the pew where she’d been sitting. Rolling underneath it, she riveted her attention on the heavy pulpit, where dozens of preachers had probably stood over the years, pounding out the gospel.

Well, today’s gospel was that good conquers evil—at least she hoped it was. Matthias’s footsteps grew louder as he approached, and she heard another bullet hit the gun’s chamber. With a burst of energy, using everything she had left, she honed in on the pulpit and heard the crack of wood as it dislodged from the floor, the gale of wind it created as it few overhead, and the thud as it reached its target.

Matthias hit the carpeted floor with a grunt, the pulpit on top of him looking as big as her old VW Beetle.

Glory’s eyes met the wide, angry stare of Matthias beneath the pews for a second before she scrambled from her hiding place and used her good arm to pull herself to her feet. She ran for the back exit of the church and into the damp night air that still smelled of smoke.

She knew Matthias was only temporarily stunned, and getting out from under the pulpit would be easy work for a vampire.

She had to get to the woods.

CHAPTER 38

M
irren shoved a heavy planter out of his path, then ducked behind a car just as another shot few past. When Glory had said she could create a diversion, she hadn’t been kidding.

But he had lost sight of Matthias, and Will had disappeared as soon as the chaos began. If he was following orders, Will would be setting fire to every house belonging to one of the lieutenants, including his own, as well as city hall. Matthias had already taken care of the clinic.

Aidan had taken an injured Krys to Omega, and by now, Hannah and Glory should be safely in the shelter as well. Mirren’s job was finding Matthias.

He poked his head out from behind the planter, and nothing happened. Good thing about Matthias being backed by mercenaries rather than scathe members or anyone else who had pledged fealty to him was they ran like rabbits when it no longer looked like a win so they could live to fight another day for another payoff. Mirren should know; he’d been one of them once.

When no one shot at him this time, he slowly rose to his feet, senses on alert for attacks. A movement from his left caught his eye, and he saw a figure in the door of the church. Dark pants, white shirt. Matthias. A gunshot sounded from that direction, and Mirren staggered as pain knifed through his left shoulder. His bond to Glory twinged like a rubber band popping against the inside of his rib cage. She wasn’t in Omega. She was in the freaking church with Matthias, and he’d hurt her.

Damn it. When she didn’t argue with him about going into the shelter without him, he should have known she had no intention of doing it. Mirren checked the ammo in his own gun and raced toward the church. He paused outside the door as a crash sounded from within and nudged the door open a few inches wider using his foot.

“Stupid bitch. I might have to regroup before tracking down Murphy and Kincaid, but I will kill that girl today.” Matthias grunted as he shoved a heavy wooden pulpit off him and rolled to his feet, muttering to himself.

Mirren stepped into the church, taking aim. “Don’t think so, old man.” He fired as Matthias whirled, catching him in the shoulder, but underestimated how fast the guy could move. Instead of running away, he few at Mirren, fangs bared, and sank them into Mirren’s neck, ripping away flesh that had barely healed from the silver bullet that had torn into him in New Orleans. They hit the floor, but before Mirren could get a firm grasp on him, Matthias was gone, his shadow following him out the front door.

Shit.
Mirren wanted to chase Matthias down, but he needed to find Glory. Exiting the back of the church, he focused on the woods—probably where she’d run—and then glanced up at the sky. The moon’s position told him he had only two hours left before dawn, maybe a few minutes more. His neck hurt like a mother, but it would heal during daysleep. Glory’s injury wouldn’t.

Taking cover behind the first tree line, Mirren ripped off his long-sleeved T-shirt and tied it around his neck to soak up the blood, then he settled back on his heels.
Glory?

No answer. He wished he’d had the chance to ask Aidan about how to find her using the mating bond, but he’d been too damned freaked out about being mated.

Glory!

She either wasn’t conscious or wasn’t listening.

Damn it
. Mirren flinched as another explosion sounded from west of town. Toward his house. He hoped to God it was Will destroying the place; the last thing they needed was Matthias or one of his flunkies finding the entrance to Mirren’s quarters and uncovering Omega blueprints. The papers didn’t have the location of the property, but it would tell someone an underground shelter was being built. If they ever got a chance to regroup and rebuild—if any of them lived through this shitstorm—they would be leaving no paper trails.

Would Glory head back there? She didn’t know that many places in Penton yet, and very few of the tunnels. Or would she take shelter nearby, hoping to find him?

For the next hour, Mirren searched around every building in Penton, trying to reach Glory mentally, without success. He checked the superette, including the stockroom where she’d spent so much time practicing her telekinesis. The theater. The café. Even the old ruins of Clyde’s restaurant. Scented the air around the mill, but she hadn’t come that way.

Finally, he went back through the church, grabbed one of the fluorescent lanterns, and ran into the woods behind the building. If she’d fed this way, he might be able to find a clue where she’d gone. To the east was Aidan’s house, to the west, his own. He walked slowly westward, searching for a scent or a footprint—something that would tell him she’d been here.

He fought giving in to the foreign, hot fear that threatened to consume him. It burned his gut and brought everything he saw into sharp detail. What was the use of having the skills of a master vampire—the mental communication, the heightened senses—if they couldn’t help you protect one little human?

He circled back and tried the eastern route, toward Aidan’s. After ten minutes, he stopped. Only an hour till dawn and he didn’t have a fucking clue what to do.

Then he smelled it. Blood. Glory’s blood. Squatting with the lantern held in front of him, he scanned the ground several seconds before he saw it. A patch of wet fabric that looked black to him in the lantern light. But his nose knew what his eyes couldn’t tell him—it was red with blood, and it was Glory’s. She was going to Aidan’s.

Mirren ran the third of a mile toward Mill Trace, the quiet cul-de-sac where Aidan lived in a big old turn-of-the-century Southern mansion. The Calverts had lived next door, but Mirren shut off that line of thought. He couldn’t dwell on Melissa and Mark.

Aidan’s house was a smoking outline. Small fres still burned in places, and two of the outer walls had collapsed.

Glory!
Mirren ran toward the house. He wasn’t a praying man as a rule, but he did now, in case somebody was listening. Praying she could hear him, could answer him. But in his head dwelt only silence and the growing buzz of fear that he’d have to find a place for his daysleep before he found his mate.

Already, he could feel his muscles growing heavy, but he pushed through the parts of the house he could get to, looking for another sign or scent. After ten minutes of smelling nothing but ashes and burned wiring, he hung his head. He had to find shelter for the day. If he let himself be fried by the sun, he’d never find her. She was still out there. Their bond wasn’t broken.

Mirren thought about trying to get through the burned ruins of Aidan’s house into the safe space or running into the woods and trying to find the tunnel they’d used earlier. Only a few hours ago, but it seemed like a century since the lieutenants had heard the first explosion and rushed toward town.

Aching with predawn fatigue, Mirren walked around the littered, half-burned grass of Aidan’s side yard and circled to the back. The man’s greenhouse was still intact—guess Matthias’s men hadn’t thought to burn that down, but it would be handy. There was a tunnel straight from the greenhouse to the clinic, and even though the clinic had burned, the tunnel should be lighttight enough for daysleep.

Mirren stopped at the greenhouse door, glancing down the aisles to make sure they were empty. All clear. He stepped inside and walked along a row of some kind of fancy night-blooming flower that Aidan liked to grow. The man—

Oof.
Something few at Mirren’s head and clocked the ear above his ravaged neck before he could duck. A terra-cotta pot filled with dirt and flowers crashed to the floor at his feet, and he ducked as another pot few at him.

“Glory!” He yelled it this time, not bothering with the mental crap she wasn’t listening to. “It’s me.” A third pot few at him, but hovered midair in front of him, then crashed to the ground.

“Mirren?” Her voice was muffed, but it was her. He followed the sound until he found her, curled up in a corner of the greenhouse, beneath a potting table. She stared up at him with wild eyes that darted from his face to the space behind him and back.

Relief flooded his veins like a good whiskey used to do when he was still human. She was safe. Hurt and traumatized, but safe.

He reached out to her, but stayed his hand when she cringed from him. “It’s me, Glory. Can you climb out? We need to get below. It’s almost dawn.”

“Mirren?” Shaking, she tried to scoot from the corner toward him but cried out when her injured arm hit the ground.

“Damn it.” He grasped the edge of the table and upended it with a crash, scooping her into his arms and using his elbow to hit the tiny panel in the back of the greenhouse that opened the tunnel hatch.

It slid back with a creak. “Think you can get down? It’s steps, not a ladder, so you won’t need your bad arm.”

She nodded, and he set her down, keeping his hands on her waist until he was sure she was steady enough to make it by herself. She stumbled a little on the first step, but caught herself on the rail and went down. Mirren glanced around before following her. Should he set fire to the greenhouse?

Will had left it unburned, so maybe he had a reason. Shrugging, Mirren descended the stairs and pushed the button to slide the door shut above them.

He pulled Glory into his arms, careful not to jostle her shoulder. Even with a layer of ash and mud and blood, she still smelled like Glory, and he sent up a second prayer, this one of thanks.

Glory woke to utter darkness and panic, her breakneck heart rate only slowing when she felt Mirren’s body next to her. The tunnel. They were in the tunnel. Mirren had found her, and they were safe, at least for now.

At least this tunnel was concrete and tile, not dirt. In those frantic few minutes before dawn, Mirren had used his combat knife to dig the bullet out of her shoulder while she screamed. She’d tried to be strong and clench her jaws, but God, it had hurt. Still did. Such a painful throb, she was surprised she’d been able to sleep.