Page 63 of Cruel Destinies

A stab of panic struck me like a knife to the back.Shea, you’re on his radar now.

“But if any of the others come out, you’re to grab them. To make sure that you do, your Initiate, Piper, will be by your side from now on.”

I did my best to hide my disappointment. Now, I not only had to worry about security cameras watching me. Piper would be keeping an eye on me, too. But maybe that wasn’t so bad. In the last conversation we’d had, I told her about some of the not-so-great things about being a vampire, and they seemed to have an effect on her. Perhaps I could pursue that some more?

“I’ll be glad to have her help.” I nodded toward my Initiate, who was still standing awkwardly, looking out of place.

Hadrian kept his hand firmly on my shoulder and looked at me for a long moment.

“I need my daughter, Julian,” he said with a cold seriousness that sent chills down my spine. “She’s the key to a locked door full of answers.”

I nodded. “We’ll get her.”

“Keep my tablet,” he said, glancing down at the screen, then brought his light blue eyes back up to meet mine. “I’ll be watching.”

The vampire leader moved away, stepping past my still unconscious neighbor, and headed for the door.

“What about my neighbor?” I called, stopping Hadrian as he was reaching for the doorknob.

He threw me a cold look. “She’s your problem.” With that, he swung the door open and stepped out. The door closed, and I found myself alone with Piper and my inert neighbor.

Sighing heavily, I stared at the unconscious woman, shaking my head. “He leaves messes everywhere he goes.”

Chapter 20

Caesar

“Watch and be amazed!” Kai touted.

It was our lunch hour between classes, and I had been pulled into the glass-partitioned research lab in the section where the heart of engineering took place for the school. There were all sorts of machines and devices of every size and shape pushed to the sides. Only a handful of them were out, as a few dedicated students were working on projects for Kai’s class.

“Would you get on with it already?” I groused. “Having to see you in your smart clothing isn’t exactly what I’d had in mind when you said you wanted to show me what you’ve been working on.”

Kai gave me a sly grin, snapping his fingers. “You’d rather see me in no clothing, then?”

I rolled my eyes. “Kai, that is hardly—”

“Trust me, that’s precisely what you’re saying,” Kai cut me off.

He brought the hand he’d held behind his back forward. Clasped between his fingers and palm was a skinny, tubular object that had a cable sticking out at the top.

I glanced at the device, then back at Kai. “It looks like a stick of dynamite.”

His sly grin broadened. “In a way, it is. You know why? Because it’s going to blow your mind.”

Before I could complain about the corny joke, Kai slid the cable into one of the inputs on his smart clothing. In an instant, the parts of the kitsune covered by his clothing completely disappeared, leaving only Kai’s head and neck, his arms from his biceps to his fingers, and his legs from just above the knees down to his toes, visible.

“Whoa!” I breathed.

Kai looked down at his missing body parts, then made eye contact with me again. “Mind blown?”

“Sufficiently,” I mumbled in agreement.

“Can you imagine what we could have done back in our glory days with this kind of tech?” He held the device in front of him. “Jade would still be alive.”

I stiffened at the mention of our fallen comrade, my heart melting at the look of grief that passed over Kai’s features. Jade had been my friend, but she had been Kai’s lover. He had lost more than I did when she died.

Kai cleared his throat, his expression returning to its usually playful demeanor. “Remember our infiltration of the theater in Pierre? Hadrian wouldn’t have even known what hit him. We could’ve stopped him in his tracks back then.”

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