Another thoughtful pause. “You may be right. I’ll ask them.”
He smiled. “You see? We’ll figure it out.” Rising, he took her hand and drew her up to stand before him. “We can do anything as long as we’re together.”
She smiled up at him. “I believe we can.” Sliding her arms around his waist, she leaned into him for a hug.
Bastien held her for many long moments, so fucking glad they were together. He would do anything for her. Anything. And hoped she knew it.
“Let’s go to bed,” he murmured into her hair. “We’ll tackle number three tomorrow.”
Nodding, she let him guide her back to their king-sized bed.
Chapter 8
Richart, Étienne, and Sheldon crouched in the crawl space beneath Krysta’s house. Bullets still whizzed past overhead, and damned if it didn’t look like a grenade had exploded in the small kitchen. Something had blown a hole in the floor over there.
Sheldon gaped at the chaos above them.
“Can you believe this shit?” Étienne muttered.
Richart shook his head. “How much damage do they think we can take?”
“A hell of a lot, apparently, but they must know Krysta can’t.” Fury ignited within him.
The ground beneath the house was uneven, so the crawl space was about five and a half feet high on one side of the house and only about a foot high on the other.
Richart stuck close to the ground and crept over to the vertical wood slats that enclosed them. “Come here.”
Étienne crawled over to him, Sheldon at his side.
“See? There in the trees just off the yard. There. And there. They have the house surrounded.”
“Stupid bastards are risking shooting each other through the house.”
Richart chuckled. “That would be convenient.”
“There’s a farmhouse in the distance there, beyond the trees. If you teleport us there, we can come up behind them and take them out instead of bursting out of this place and giving them instant targets.”
“Sounds good.” Richart looked at him a moment. “Is Krysta the reason you’ve been so distracted lately?”
“Yes.”
“I know you’re pissed that they put her in danger, but don’t follow Bastien’s example. Try to leave a couple alive for questioning and read the mind of every man you can before you kill the rest.”
“If I must.”
The brothers reluctantly donned the head coverings, which looked like rubber ski masks, then added shades and gloves.
“I hate this shit.”
Richart nodded. “Makes me feel like I’m suffocating.”
“Let’s do this fast, then.”
“Wait,” Sheldon said. “What do you want me to do?”
Étienne and Richart looked at each other and said, “Stay here and keep them busy.”
Sheldon frowned. “Kinda boring, but I’ll make it work.”
Shaking his head, Richart touched Étienne’s shoulder.#p#分页标题#e#
Sunlight bathed them as they appeared beside the farmhouse. In unison, they stepped back into the shade.
As younger immortals, they could not tolerate full sunlight without wearing the protective suits the network had designed. They wouldn’t burst into flames or explode the way movie vampires did. They would instead quickly begin to sunburn, and things would go downhill from there.
Older immortals, at full strength, could withstand several minutes before they would begin to suffer consequences. David could endure several hours. Seth was completely unaffected by daylight.
Étienne envied him as he shifted in the uncomfortable suit. Damn thing chafed. “You take the west and north. I’ll come up behind them on the east and sweep around to the south.”
“Be careful.” Richart vanished.
Étienne raced eastward, entered the trees, and circled around to head back toward Krysta’s house. Whoever this new group hunting immortals and vampires was, they were well funded and large. There were at least two dozen soldiers on this side of the house, arcing around to the south.
Someone on the other side cried out.
Étienne smiled. Richart had already gone to work. And few could compete with him in combat. How could you shoot or stab what kept disappearing?
Étienne swooped down on five soldiers who seemed intent on filling this side of the house with enough holes to make the damned walls collapse. Their thoughts focused on shooting blindly into the house, wondering if anyone was actually in the house, if this was just a bullshit mission, and if the guy who had just cried out had been hit by friendly fire.
The fact that the latter didn’t seem to bother them much spoke volumes about their character.
Knowing the immortals needed information, Étienne tamped down his desire to make these pricks pay for trying to kill Krysta and knocked the first two unconscious. The other three spun around.