“Explain.”
“She kind of went alien ninja on my butt.” Grabbing a rubber band out of her pocket, she twisted her hair up in a messy knot. “She threw me against the wall.”
My brows shot up in interest. Well then…
She rolled her eyes. “Not in that way, you perv. She’s like a souped-up freakin’ mutant. She even did the whole glowworm thing, too.”
Lifting my fingers, I rubbed my chin. “Did she tell you anything useful?”
“She demanded to know why I was there, and then she said I shouldn’t be there. That I needed to leave here and take my chances outside the protection of the beta quartz. I asked her why she was in his house, and all she said was that she kept escaping him. I’m guessing Vaughn? She said they were coming, but she didn’t make a lot of sense, Daemon. I think she’s cracked. And she flipped out when I mentioned Dawson. She didn’t give me much of a chance to push the questioning. She removed me from the house.”
“Dammit.” I turned sideways, hands clenching. “Besides getting a hold of one of the DOD officers, she was my last hope to find out where Dawson could be.”
“I did find something else.” She dug into her pocket, pulling out the scrap of paper. “I found this.”
I took what appeared to be a money transfer slip. The amount was freaking astronomical. An address was scribbled on it, along with the letters DB.
“Do you think DB stands for Dawson Black?” she asked.
“It could.” I clenched the paper tight. “Can I use your laptop? I want to see where this address goes.”
“Sure.” She quickly grabbed the laptop and clicked out of some website and then handed it over to me.
Sitting beside her, I quickly typed the address in Google maps and the directions popped right up, along with satellite images. It was an office building in Moorefield. I grabbed a nearby notebook. Turning past English notes, I found a blank page.
She watched me write the directions down. “Are you going?”
“I want to, right now, but I need to scope out the place first. Tomorrow I’ll check it out, then go back later.” I shoved the piece of paper into my pocket and then faced her. Our eyes met. “Thank you, Kat.”
“I kind of owed you something, right?” She rubbed her arms, chasing away a visible shiver. “You’ve saved my butt a lot.”
“And what a lovely butt it is, but you risked too much by doing this.” I reached behind her, tugging the quilt off. I draped it over her shoulders, holding the edges close as I searched her face. “Why did you do this?”
She lowered her eyes. “I just was thinking about everything, and I wanted to see what was in there.”
“It was crazy dangerous, Kitten. You can’t do anything like that again. Promise me.”
“Okay.”
I caught the edge of her chin, tilting her face up to mine. “Promise me.”
Kat sighed. “I won’t. Okay. I promise. But you’ve got to promise me the same thing. I know you can’t drop this. I understand that, but you have to be careful, and you can’t sneak off without me, either.”
“This shouldn’t involve you.”
“But it does,” she insisted. “And I’m not a fragile human, Daemon. We’re in this together.”
“Together?” A slow smile crept over my lips. “Okay.”
Her answering smile was tentative. Hopeful. “So, that means I go when you check out the address.”
I nodded. “Tell me how you know they’ve been watching us?”
Kat drew in a deep breath. “There were photos. Lots of photos, Daemon. From the time I moved in here and up until a few days ago.”
“Jesus.” I scrubbed my hand down my face.
“The night I got sick and went into the lake? They had a photo of that. They’ve been watching this entire time. They…they have to know something happened to me and you were involved.”
I reached over to her, folding my hand over her knee. I squeezed gently. “Lets not jump to that conclusion yet, Kitten. They’ve always been up in my business. The pictures aren’t that surprising. That’s what the DOD does. They monitor and chronicle us. If they’ve known that I’ve healed you or told you about us, you…we…”
“Wouldn’t still be here?”
I nodded again.
Kat looked a little better. “What do you think Bethany meant by ‘They are coming’?” she asked.
Leaning against the couch, I tossed my arm along the back. “I don’t know.”
“I guess it might not mean anything. I mean, she was kind of whacked out.”
Staring straight ahead, I let that process. If Bethany wasn’t right, what did that mean for Dawson? “I can’t help but wonder what my brother is like right now. Is he like that? Whacked out? I don’t think I could…deal with that.”
It hurt to admit that, to speak it out loud.
Kat inched forward, halting when I looked at her again. A second passed, and then she wiggled her way over so that she was pressed against the side of me. I inhaled sharply when she rested her head against my shoulder.
“Even if he is…whacked out,” she said. “You can deal with it. You can deal with anything. I don’t doubt that at all.”
“You don’t?”
“No.”
Lifting my arm, I curled it over her shoulders and then lowered my chin to the top of her head.
“What are we going to do, Kitten?”
“I don’t know.”
“I have a few ideas.”
“I’m sure you do,” she replied, and I heard the smile in her voice.
“Wanna hear about them? Although I’m much better at the show part rather than the tell.”
“Somehow, I believe you.”
“If you didn’t, I could always give you a teaser.” I paused, enjoying the moment of lightness. “You bookish people love teasers, don’t you?”
She laughed. “You’ve been doing your research on my blog.”
“Maybe,” I replied, gathering her close. “Like I said, I’ve got to keep an eye on you, Kitten.”
Chapter 25
We checked out the address found on the bank transfer the next day, on New Year’s Eve. The whole plaza was packed with cars. I pulled the baseball cap low and then climbed out. It had stopped snowing and the parking lot had been plowed, but a thin layer of ice and snow remained.
The number on the address turned out to be a lawyer’s office, based on the plaque outside. Above the entrance and the large windows were the same damn reddish-black stones Kat and I had seen at the warehouse. Jackpot. Opening the glass door, I walked inside the lobby. Keeping my chin down, I bypassed the elevator and went for the stairwell. I passed the windows, seeing little white boxes tacked along the top of them. My gaze flipped to the ceiling, and I saw a glass-breaking sensor. The building was obviously wired for security.
On the third floor, I found the office at the end of the hall. Unlike the rest of the offices on the floor, this one had the stone above the door and over the small window. I could see that there were people inside the waiting room. On the door a sign had been taped. Closed For New Year’s Day.
Perfect.
I hurried back to where I parked the SUV. Getting in, I tossed Kat a quick grin and pulled out of the parking lot. “It appears to be a lawyer’s office. Has at least two floors above the main one. They’re closed for New Year’s and obviously on Sunday. Bad news is they are outfitted with an alarm system.”
“Crap. Know a way around that?”
“Fry their systems. If I do it quickly enough, I shouldn’t trigger an alarm. But that’s not all. Above the entrances and windows is that same damn blackish-red gemstone.” I smiled. “This is good, though. Whatever those stones are, they have to mean something.”
“What if it’s guarded?” she asked.
I didn’t answer, because I think she already knew the answer. The office looked legit, but it was obviously connected to everything going on. I had to get in there.