Page 21

Thaddeus waved his hand. “Sofia said as much. You’ll find him and take him out. Best to let him lead you back to Isabella. That way, you can kill two bad shifters at once. But, there’s something else bothering you. Tell me, Talon. Perhaps I can help.”

Talon could feel his grandfather staring at him with a shrewd expression. He rose from the bed and walked over to the window to stare out. The moon cast a glow across the vast lawn. Unease rose inside him when the sense of being watched flickered through him. He reached out and closed the heavy fabric drapes.

“Talon?”

He turned and studied his grandfather’s time-worn face. The animated excitement had changed to concern. He shoved his hands in his front pockets, carefully weighing what he was about to say. He finally decided to refrain from mentioning his suspicions until he had proof.

“It’s nothing to concern yourself about. Once we know who the men were working for, it will give us a better idea of what we are up against,” he said.

“The humans—?” Thaddeus asked.

Talon smiled. “Are safe for now. Michaela has ordered additional security and asked the SBSI to oversee it. We’ve collected samples from the mercenaries and are running their DNA through the database. It’s only a matter of time before we find a thread that leads back to the source.”

Thaddeus nodded and yawned. “You won’t stop searching, will you? For more humans. You’ll keep looking, won’t you, my boy?”

“Yes. We’ll continue searching.”

Thaddeus sighed and slid down under the covers. “The Guardians live, Talon. I told you we would. Mark my words, King Or’Ang’s kingdom is out there somewhere, too. The humans will know. They will help you find it. They will help you find it.”

Thaddeus’s voice was barely audible by the end of his declaration. He had misjudged just how exhausting all the excitement had been for the old shifter. He gently lifted the covers and tucked them around his grandfather before he turned off the bedside lamp.

“If there are more humans, if they know where King Or’Ang’s kingdom is, we’ll find it. I promise,” he murmured, resting his hand over his grandfather’s wrinkled one for a moment before he quietly exited the bedroom.

He stood outside the closed door for a moment and breathed deep, calming breaths. He hadn’t spoken to the others about what he thought he had seen in the forest. A part of him hoped one of them would have mentioned seeing or experiencing something unusual, but no one had.

Was it just my imagination?

The image of eerie, ghostly shadows flitting through the forest canopy played in his mind. None of the other Guardians had said anything. If they had witnessed something, he was certain they wouldn’t have kept quiet about it.

Had it been nothing more than a play of the light on the snow?

He pushed away from the door and walked across to his suite of rooms. Entering his bedroom, he closed and locked the door. He undressed, placed his dirty clothes in the hamper, and stepped into the shower. Under the soothing warmth of the massaging jets, he closed his eyes and focused on remembering the details of their earlier mission.

The air had been cold and still. Light, fluffy flakes still occasionally fell as he soared on silent wings above the canopy of the forest. The group had divided into four teams. He had taken out the two shifters nearest the cave while Sofia and Juliette focused on the men in the helicopters. Mateo and Miles were to neutralize the second team while Xavier and Danielle had taken care of the last group of mercenaries.

He braced his arms against the side of the shower as he remembered how he had veered off from the group. His focus had been on the two shifters moving up the narrow ridge when a slight movement below him caught his attention. He had almost missed the figure covered in white fur. She was swiftly moving across the fresh snow, appearing and disappearing from view among the thick branches.

He remembered looking back toward the two shifters. They were a few hundred yards from the entrance. He had been torn between ensuring the safety of all the humans, and that of the woman. He assumed the petite figure was a human woman from her size, the way she dressed, and the primitive weapon she was carrying.

The decision was made for him when he saw a lone figure dressed in white, military camo following her. The human would be trapped between the merc behind her and the two in front. It was imperative to the mission that he prevented the two mercs closest to the humans from taking them as hostage. The collateral damage would have been horrific if he hadn’t stopped the men, especially once they knew they were compromised.

He had circled back around, weaving between the branches. He was less than three hundred feet from the shifter when the merc had disappeared. It had been as if the ground had opened up and swallowed him. He had flown over the spot, but the snow was pristine, as if no one had been there. The only evidence that he wasn’t hallucinating was the line of footprints leading to the spot where the shifter had disappeared.

When he looked up again, he swore he saw ghostly shadows moving through the woods. They had been moving in the opposite direction of the cave. Worried about the other two mercenaries, he had resumed his mission, intending to return to the spot to investigate once he had eliminated the urgent threat to the humans.

He clenched his fist and banged it against the shower wall. There had been no time. At least, not to do it safely without fear of discovery. He barely had time to eliminate and dispose of the two mercenaries before the human had appeared. Shortly after, she and Tracy Bearclaw had ventured out of the cave.

He had followed them, watching over them as they discovered the evidence left in the snow of their would-be attackers. He had sensed they were being watched. Hell, they weren’t the only ones. There had been someone or something else in those woods—something not natural.

“But what? Ghosts? I don’t believe in ghosts. More mercenaries? Then why didn’t they help the others?”

He ruled out more humans. It was inconceivable that they could have vanished without a trace. At least not under the watchful and intense scrutiny of himself and the other Guardians. That still didn’t answer what had taken the one mercenary, leaving behind an eerie silence in the air.

He ran his hands over his wet hair and face, feeling the droplets slide down his skin. He finished drying off and changed into a pair of loose-fitting pajama pants before leaving the bathroom. As he entered his bedroom, he didn’t bother to switch on a light, preferring to rely on the faint glow of the moon spilling through the window. He was drawn to the arched frame, haunted by the memory of being watched when he had been in his grandfather’s bedroom. He cautiously pulled the sheer curtain aside, revealing the view of the dark, meticulously maintained lawn and gardens.

“Is there another threat that we aren’t aware of? Someone other than Isabelle Wyland?”

His murmurs filled the room, leaving behind a ghostly echo of his innermost thoughts. The thought of another threat, one that he couldn’t identify, filled him with worry. He had a strong aversion for loose ends, always seeking closure and resolution. His agenda for tomorrow included a thorough examination of the reports and a meticulous analysis of the satellite images. He would find out if he was seeing things or if ghosts were more than just legends.