Cora and Alma had set up a folding table outside the RV and were working from the comfort of their custom wheelchair by the time I returned from my swim. I pulled on sweat pants and a teeshirt and came out to join them, careful not to disturb the sleeping kid. We sat in the sunlight, me checking over and cleaning my guns, them typing away and occasionally saying things to each other in their private mix of Spanish and English. I figured if anything important came up, they’d let me know so I zoned out a little, enjoying the California sun and the sea air.
Jaq went out to get more food. I’d long ago stopped feeling bad about using his almost-teleportation abilities to get food delivery. He had explained to me that when he’d said he was there to help however I needed as long as I understood he would never and could never commit an act of violence, even in self-defense, that meant using his abilities for whatever I needed. Even if that need was a fully loaded pizza at two in the morning.
Cecilia hadn’t answered texts and I was starting to feel a little concern. We didn’t have a secure way to contact her aunts, though we had their phone numbers. But every phone call might be a line that could connect us to them, and thus cast suspicion on them if Marcus died. It seemed unlikely that Judith wouldn’t protect the Rivers once I’d succeeded in killing her son, and I was already probably part way down the road toward starting a war with the wolf pack, if I could find a way to direct them at the Cross family. I had to hope my hints to Russel the night before were the lead he’d follow up first, but I was worried his people would put tiger and tiger together and come up with me being the one who killed one of them at the restaurant.
“Jaq will be here soon, I guess I’ll go check on the kid,” I said after I finished putting my Glock back together.
“Hopefully another good meal in her will help convince her that we don’t mean her any harm,” Alma said. “She looks like she only got scraps before. Eats like it, too.”
I opened the RV door and had one foot inside when Cora’s yelp of surprise stopped me.
“Cecilia is calling,” she said.
I turned back and crouched beside the table. Cora hooked the call into the computer and put it on speaker.
“Cecilia?” she said.
“No, it’s Benita,” said the woman’s voice. “Cecilia is gone. He’s taken her.” Even through electronics I recognized her, and the sound of desperation in just those few words.
“Taken her? Where? Tell me what happened,” I said, coming around the table so that I was able to talk over Cora’s shoulder.
“She said she had to go let in some contractor, her landlord asked her to. Maryanne drove her. But then they didn’t come back. When I went to check, my sister was tied up in a closet and Cece is gone. Maryanne is here, she’s being seen by the paramedic. She told the police it was a man, that she didn’t see his face,” Benita said. Her voice dropped lower. “I told them this was my phone. Maryanne told me it was him, but we can’t tell the cops that. They can’t do anything and I don’t want anyone to think she saw anything.”
The rush of words stopped and I heard murmurs as though Benita had to muffle the phone.
“Sorry,” she said after a few moments. “I have to go with my sister to the hospital. Please, find him. You said you’d help her, so please just help her.”
“Did Maryanne tell you anything else? Where he might have been going? Was he alone?” I clenched my fists and then forced my fingers to relax.
“Him. And two others, she thinks. They hit her hard, she’s got a concussion and bled a lot. Please. I have to go. Don’t let him kill our baby. You swore you’d help.”
“I’ll find her,” I told Benita, hoping I wasn’t making empty promises. “Keep this phone on you.”
She hung up and I stood.
“Can we find him? Think he’ll head up to his penthouse with her?” I asked the twins.
“Maybe. You planning to go full The Raid on him after all?” Cora started typing and clicking furiously, pulling up files that I assumed held all we knew about Marcus Cross.
“I think we’re long past the point where subtle is required,” I said. I picked up my Glock and stepped into the RV. “I’m going to change.”
I had to go into the sleeping hall to get the clothes I needed, pulling the curtain back and letting some light in.
“Hey, Dani,” I said to the shadowed lump on the lower bunk. “Food is almost here.”
It took me a moment to realize that the silence greeting me was true silence. No breathing, no faint rustle of sheet or blanket or rub of cloth. Nothing.
I turned on the overhead light and yanked the blanket back.
No kid. Just a lump made of two pillows. I couldn’t believe I’d almost fallen for it. I wracked my memory, trying to think when I’d last confirmed she was here. When I’d grabbed a teeshirt and sweats after my swim I hadn’t really looked, just ducked in quick and quiet to get what I needed. She might have been here, she might not have been. How the hell she got out without us noticing and where she would go with no shoes or money was another question.
“Dani is gone.”
“What do you mean by gone?” Alma said. The twins turned their heads in unison toward me as I came out of the RV.
“She’s gone, as in the bird has flown the coop. I’m going to try to pick up a trail, she’s on foot, how far could she get?” I pulled on my boots, sitting on the low step of the RV to tie them.
Jaq stepped out of thin air, a stack of pizza boxes in his arms.
“Trouble?” he said as he lowered the boxes and caught sight of our faces.
“Dani is gone and Marcus kidnapped Cecilia.” I stood up. “Welcome back.”
“I’ll put these inside,” Jaq said. “Then help you search?”
“Thanks,” I said. I started moving in a circle around the RV, looking for a trail. Sand had blown over the asphalt of the RV Park lot, but there was enough of a breeze that any easy trail had been wiped clean. The strong sea air also helped mute and wipe scent traces, and I was no bloodhound. I raised my head and tried to pick up any hint of wolf shifter. No luck.
“Kira! Incoming!” Alma’s cry was half a second behind the movement that caught my eye and the sound of engines.
Three big open bed trucks turned into the deserted RV park, coming in fast, full of people holding guns that glinted in afternoon sun. I reached for my gun and realized I’d left it inside. Sloppy, I’d been so worried about the kid I hadn’t even thought to take a weapon. I turned and sprinted back to the RV, putting it between me and the oncoming danger.
“Get inside, I’ve got the chair,” I told the twins as they scrabbled to get their laptops shut. “Jaq, get ready to drive!”
I thrust their wheelchair into its special compartment on the side of the RV and slammed the door shut. The first truck came around the front of the RV and skidded to a halt fourteen-ish feet away. A body flew from the back, rolling and landing in a bloodied heap at my feet.
Looking down, I hardly needed to see copper-gold eyes near swollen shut or her reddish brown hair streaked with blood. I knew it was Dani. Still breathing at least.
Russel jumped down from the back of the truck. Two wolf shifters with assault rifles pointing at me stayed in the back behind him. The other two trucks surrounded the RV front and back, each sporting its own duo of shifters with automatic weapons. The shape looked similar to a Kalash, or known usually in American as an AK-47, but the barrels looked modified, the magazines longer than I was used to. I didn’t like that unknown factor one bit.
Six shooters, three drivers. That made it ten shifters, counting their Alpha. Not insurmountable, but the guns were a problem.
“I’m sorry,” Dani said. “He made me tell him, I couldn’t, I thought if I went back he’d leave you alone but…” Her words slurred wetly together.
“Not your fault,” I said to her. “I know where the blame goes here.”
“Why don’t we go inside and have a chat?” Russel said, grinning at me.
One of the men behind him called a warning as the sound of a shotgun racking cracked next to us. Cora stood with a grenade in her hand, her other hand on the pin. Alma had a shotgun in her hands, trained on Russel.
“Now now, we don’t want anyone to start shooting. My pack has a lot more guns. Special rounds in those, too. You wouldn’t like them.” Russel raised his hand, forestalling his pack.
“This shotgun has special rounds too, pendejo,” Alma said, teeth bared.
“Try anything, comemierda, see where it gets you,” Cora growled beside her.
Dani groaned and tried to get to her feet. I reached down and picked her up, shaking my head at Cora and Alma. Now was not the time for suicide heroics. Dani hissed in pain as I lifted her to my chest.
“Come on in,” I said to Russel. “Just you,” I added.
“Of course,” he said, the same gross self-assurance and utter hubris oozing from his expression. “Not them,” he added, looking at Cora and Alma.
At my nod they stepped out of the RV, sliding along the side to lean there, glaring. Alma held the shotgun pointing down and Cora had released the pin but still clutched her grenade with a snarl.
“Don’t do anything I would do,” I murmured to them as I backed with Dani into the RV. Alma kept her eyes on the trucks but dipped her chin at my words. Cora gave no sign she’d heard me but I had to trust the twins could handle themselves until I figured a way out of this.
Russel followed me into the RV where I laid Dani down on the couch. She whimpered and curled into a ball on the bench, terrified eyes still trying to apologize to me. I didn’t look toward the cab, knowing if Jaq didn’t want to be noticed, he wouldn’t be, and I wasn’t about to draw attention in case Russel had no idea a fourth person was here.
“A couple rules,” Russel said from the door. “The engine of this thing starts, my pack will shoot. Those two out there so much as twitch? They shoot.” He tapped his ear, turning his head slightly to reveal an earpiece and mic set up not dissimilar to the ones we often used. “I give the word? They shoot.”
“How do you know this thing isn’t armored?” I asked him. My hand slid toward my Glock where it rested behind the pizza boxes.
“It won’t matter, not with the rounds we’ve got. And if you think they won’t shoot with me in here, abandon that idea. They’ll do what I say. So let’s have a nice talk. Starting with your real name, sweetheart.”
I glanced down at Dani as Russel stepped fully into the RV. I sensed no lies from him, read only threat in his face and eyes. The time for fighting would come soon, but for now it looked like we’d been out-maneuvered and I was going to have to listen to this dead asshole walking say whatever threatening, pointless shit he wanted to say until I could find a way to turn this to our advantage.
“I’m Kira,” I said, baring my teeth at him. “You wanted to talk? So fucking talk.”