39. The Villain
THE VILLAIN
“Oh shit, I forgot to tell you. Whisp texted me yesterday, he thinks Weave got a lead on those text messages.”
“He did?” Violet sat up from where she was lying on me. Stupid me for thinking she’d be too comfortable to move. “How? What kind of lead?”
“I’m not sure how, but he said all the texts were sent from a three-block radius in Mountainside. He was taking Poison Weasel to case the area.”
She laughed. “Poison Weasel?”
Ah, fuck. An inside thought slipped out.
I sighed. “You know who I’m talking about. Don’t look at me with the disapproving look. Anyway, they’re going to keep eyes on it all week and he promised to come by next Monday after you get home from work to give us both a full report.”
Her smile was bright as she studied me.
“You like having a little team.”
“I don’t have a team.” I rolled my eyes. “I have one guy that I’ve been kind of working with. That is not a team.”
“Hem and Weave may not know you’re alive but Whisp has definitely recruited them to the team. It’s so cute: a band of supervillains working together to take down an evil underground organization.”
“Wouldn’t that make us superheroes?”
“Naw, you’ve killed way too many people for that. Plus, superheroes are too righteous and boring anyway. Supervillains are way hotter.”
“Is that so?” I asked, smirk growing on my face.
“Absolutely.” She nodded.
I started to pull her back in but the most obnoxious ringtone I’ve ever heard basted through the room.
“Sorry, it’s Amber.” She sighed and reached for the phone but stopped before she answered. “Could you make some popcorn?”
“Are you kicking me out?”
“Never.” She leaned forward and pressed a soft kiss to my lips. “I’m trying to divide and conquer so we can get to our movie faster. Please?”
I sighed as I got out of bed, kissing the top of her head. “You know I can never say no to you.”
She grinned at me as she answered. “Hey, bitch. What’s up?”
I made my way downstairs to make the popcorn. Two minutes later, I could still hear Violet laughing so I decided to putter around a bit more. Took some more time to melt extra butter, filled two more bowls with chips and chocolates. When five minutes passed, I made my way back upstairs.
“Sunday night, I promise we can go out then, okay?” She waited a few seconds and laughed again. “Not yet. Soon.” Another pause, that was when she noticed me with my arms full of treats. “I have to go. Sunday night, I promise.” She sighed. “Bye, Amber.”
“What was that about?” I asked setting all the bowls down on my nightstand.
“Just Amber being Amber.” She smiled. “What movie do you want to watch?”
“I get to pick?” I climbed into bed and pulled her into my arms. “Hm, this is a lot of pressure. I never get to pick.”
She looked up at me, shaking her head. “Then I’ll pick.”
“No, don’t be silly. I’m thinking action. Expendables maybe. Does that work for you?”
“Hell yeah! Let’s blow shit up!” She grabbed her laptop and got everything set up before looking back at me with a huge grin on her face. “What? Why are you looking at me like that?”
“I just really fucking love you.”
“I love you too.” She leaned over and kissed me softly. When she tried to pull away, I tugged her back into me, kissing her deeper. “But the movie,” she mumbled.
“Later. Right now, I’m going to love you. And you’re going to let me.”
She hummed. “Yes, sir.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to run away?” Violet asked the next morning. She was playing with my wedding band, twirling it around my finger while she lay on my chest.
“Are you sure you’re okay to leave all your friends behind? All those kids you work with? Scarlett?”
I propped my free arm behind my head so I could get a better look at her. She sighed, eyes fixed on the black band she was still twirling.
“I just want to be able to walk down the street with you. Wear this beautiful ring out in public.” She reached for her own ring, hanging from the gold chain I got her for Winter Solstice. “Instead, I feel like I’m hiding you, and I don’t like it.”
“I’ll talk to Eva when we get home.”
She propped herself on one elbow to look at me. “Really?”
I nodded. “I’ve been thinking a lot. Landon and Carson—” she grinned wide. Damn it, she’d gotten these names in my head and I was using them. “They’ve come back with nothing for months. I think I was just being overly sensitive. If I’m being totally honestly, I miss her.”
Violet brushed the hair from my eyes and kissed my forehead. “I know, baby. And I know she misses the hell out of you. Every time I see her she asks if I’ve heard from you. It’s getting harder to lie to her.”
“I know.” I ran my thumb over her cheek. “I know and I’m sorry I made you lie for so long, but I’ll talk to her. The second we get home. And I’ll make sure she knows it’s not your fault.”
“I’m—” she cut off, pulling away. Her eyebrows scrunched in confusion. “Where did they go?”
“What?”
“Your shadows? Did you give them a job?”
“No, what—”
I looked down at myself. They were gone, all of them. Not even a speck of shadow was coiling me.
“Something’s wrong.” I sat up.
“What—” she stopped short at the sound of gravel crunching.
We’d left the balcony door open because she’d been overheating a lot lately. I was hoping that meant her powers were manifesting and those sparks meant fire was coming.
I grabbed her hand and snuck over to the door. Staying out of sight, we looked at the scene in front of us. There were a dozen black SUVs pulling onto her driveway. The first few had five people in each vehicle, fully loaded with tactical gear, semiautomatic weapons, and ski masks.
Violet stared at me. “Do you think they know you’re alive and it’s The Culling coming for you? Or the unknown group coming for me?” she whispered.
“I don’t know. But if I can’t access my shadows…” I trailed off, surveying the scene. This was not fucking good. “If I tell you to hide here so I can lead them away, will you fight me on it?”
“No. I’ll just slow you down. But I don’t love the idea of separating. Can you access your ice?”
I reached into myself, the core of where my powers usually sat. Nothing. “No. But I don’t need them to run, or fight. Even before my powers, I was pretty deadly.”
She gave me a half-hearted smile. “I have no doubt.”
Her attention went back to the cars. They were still pulling in to fill the driveway and completely blocking the road leading up to it.
“Why are there so many of them?” she asked, maybe reading the same question on my face.
“I don’t know. But I’m going to get them as far from here as possible and take them out one by one. I’ll be back for you as soon as I can then… Let’s run. Anywhere you want, we’ll start over.”
She grabbed my shirt and kissed me. Deep and desperate. If I thought about it too much, I might have realized she was kissing me like it was the last time she ever would. Instead, I let myself get lost in her for a minute; tangled my fingers into her hair and tugged her as close as I could.
“I love you,” she said pulling away.
“I love you.”
The cottage had a walk out basement that was about a quarter of the way down the hill.
Usually I wouldn’t want to give my enemies the high ground, but they were currently closing in around the main floor exits and I didn’t exactly want to jump out a window.
So we were working with what we were dealt.
Violet was safely tucked away in a hiding spot she wouldn’t even tell me about. My only job was to get as many of these people as far from her as I possibly could. Luckily, we had spent so much time running around these woods, I knew exactly where to go.
I waited until most of the team was preparing to breach the cottage before sprinting for the tree line.
I managed to make it most of the way before someone noticed and was fully in the forest before bullets started flying.
When the yelling started, I risked a glance back.
Good. More than half were making their way to the woods after me.
The second I was out of view, I went up the closest tree.
It only took thirty seconds for them to pass under me.
Shit, they meant business. They were fanned out in a standard clearing formation, which probably meant they were some kind of special forces, whether it was ex-military or one of those highly trained private security forces, I couldn’t be sure.
It didn’t matter. I did special training, too, and they were on my turf. I could pick these guys off before they even knew what hit them. So that was exactly what I did.
I got to them one by one, stealing weapons as I went along.
I went through ten guys before I managed to get my hands on a hunting knife.
Breaking a few necks was fine but I wanted these people to suffer.
Whether they were after me or Violet, they stormed onto her land and were making a mess of her favourite place.
I wanted them to choke on their fucking blood and struggle through their final moments of life.
“Charlie Team, status report.” The radio on the guy I’d just killed chirped.
I picked it up and stared at it for a few moments while I debated my next move.
It was about five minutes since I left Violet at the cottage.
There were a dozen SUVs with five people in each.
That made sixty pseudo soldiers. I had about fifty looking for me…
I needed to get the attention of the rest, but I should really take out some more of the current ones before I called for the backup…
I was running out of time. The longer I was away, the higher chance V had of getting found. I held onto the radio, securing the ear piece in my ear before I pushed forward. I took out another fifteen before I was spotted.
“Found the boyfriend! Northeast side of the property!”
Husband. Idiots.
They didn’t start shooting, which I found a little weird but hey, I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth—or whatever the saying was. So I ran.