Chapter Four
Devlin walked down Hollywood Boulevard, his senses on hyper alert, ready for an encounter with one of the soulless. Unfortunately, none were around but at this point, he’d settle for someone else, anyone else willing to do something stupid. Anything to take away some of his frustration. Unfortunately, no one challenged him. The air of menace he broadcasted around him was clear for any idiot to see and kept the stupid at bay. Too bad, he had a lot of pent up angst with nowhere for it to go.
After walking a few blocks through the rougher parts of the city, he turned around to head back to his car. Other than earlier tonight at the concert, he hadn’t been able to find any soulless around. Even though they’d had reports that more of them had been spotted in the area than usual, two hunters had gone missing and were presumed dead. That’s what he wanted to warn Eva about, but when he finally had her alone, other thoughts crowded it out.
There were still plenty of hours left before the sun came up; there should have been a few out in this seedy atmosphere drinking it in. He got to his car and headed for his place in the Hills. He was exhausted in more ways than one. Why did he bother?
She hated him. No. That’s not quite true. He damn well knew she was attracted to him. She couldn’t quite hide the way her heartbeat increased when he was near her, or the way her pupils dilated, like a woman in lust. She’d just chosen not to act on the attraction, maybe to hate him because of it. This thought gave him pause.
If she felt attracted to him, maybe he could work with that. In the months since he’d been in LA, he hadn’t been with a woman. Hell, he hadn’t been with a woman since the first time almost a year ago when Evangeline had agreed to a video chat with him. He’d told himself he had no time for a relationship. Not even just for a night. But he’d wanted Eva ever since the first night he’d seen her on that tiny screen.
It had been late. He’d just gotten back from one of the worst fights of his life. He’d stopped two soulless from feeding off a woman. He’d been by himself and these two were strong, maybe not Oldens, but old enough. If he hadn’t had some soulless blood in him or been less trained, he’d be dead. As it was, he’d been wounded. But the loss of a little blood wasn’t going to stop him from chatting with Evangeline as soon as he realized she was online. When she invited him to video chat, he’d agreed but first he needed to clean himself up.
He’d always been curious about what she looked like, but didn’t want to be the one to suggest they do a live video chat. He didn’t want her to think his only interest in her was based on what she looked like. He was curious, but that wasn’t the only thing about her he found interesting. Their online interactions were mentally and emotionally stimulating. After chatting with her online about a game program, computer glitch, or just about their day, he always felt better, energized. So he wouldn’t miss an opportunity to finally see what she looked like. So when he had a chance to see her, he’d wanted to make a good impression.
“Let me run and get a beer,” he’d typed, stalling for time.
He was bloody. He’d taken a slice in his side. His shirt was torn and dirty from the fight and his face was sweaty. He’d quickly cleaned himself up, wrapped a bandage around his side, changed his t-shirt, and grabbed a beer. For a human, the wound would have required a trip to the hospital or probably been fatal, but because of his soulless blood, he wasn’t easy to kill. Although it would take all night to heal and hurt like hell to sit in the chair, but Evangeline was worth a little pain. He’d sleep and heal after.
“Hello.” She smiled. “So we finally meet.”
When he sat in front of his computer and looked at the screen, he damn near slid off his chair. And not because of any wound in his side. She was beautiful. Her hair hung in waves beyond her shoulders. Her skin was the shade of caramel candy and her eyes were bright and round. The color like the amber ring his mother used to wear and her lips seemed soft and plump. He wanted to touch and taste. Damn.
“Ah…yeah.” Damnit, he sounded like a moron. He was tripping over his tongue. He’d been drawn to her wit and knowledge about computers for months now. They’d met in an online computer forum, when he was looking for a solution to a problem he was having. She solved it for him.
“It’s nice to finally put a face to the person I’ve been exchanging information with,” Evangeline continued.
She was a self-proclaimed computer geek and sci-fi junky like him. Though, she looked like no geek he’d ever known. Judging from the appreciation lighting up her gaze as she studied him as acutely as he studied her, she liked what she saw. So did he.
That had been the beginning of many online video chats. He loved chatting with her. That had been the start of, well something—he wasn’t sure what.
Yet, the night they finally did meet in person changed everything. Her aunt’s bookstore burnt down and what had been revealed to her about him put a stop to whatever that something was supposed to be. She found out that night he was a hunter of soulless. While he found out she was a Chronicler of their lives and what that meant. Seemed they both had secrets. He couldn’t forget that, she wouldn’t let him. Oh, that first night she’d told him in no uncertain terms exactly what his profession meant to her.
“Chroniclers and hunters do not mix. Cannot,” Evangeline had stated flatly.
He’d frowned as he loaded two atlas sized Chronicles into the back of her car. He was helping her move them to a new holding place. “Why? What difference can it possibly make?”
She sighed. “How much do you know about us?”
“Not much, I only recently found out about you all, but I have a feeling I’m going to learn more. A lot more.”
“Devlin, we bear witness to the acts of soulless and hunter alike. We must remain neutral in this war. We aren’t supposed to interact with either side.”
He glanced at the books he’d just placed in the car and back toward the remains of her aunt’s burnt out bookstore. “Doesn’t appear to be the case anymore. Because it’s hunters helping you all tonight after the soulless tried to kill your aunt.” It was Samuel and the hunters, who helped save the contents of their store and were helping now.
“Yes I know, and we appreciate it. But this ends for you and me now.”
He frowned, confused. “Ends? What?”
She’d glanced away then.
He’d like to think he’d seen remorse and sadness for a split second in her eyes, especially for what she said next.
“At one time I thought…” She shook her head. “Never mind, it no longer matters. If you and I have to work together on soulless business, fine, but that’s all you and I will ever talk about. Please don’t contact me about anything else anymore. It’s over.”
What. The. Fuck. It wasn’t until that moment he realized there was something between them to be over. Something that scared the shit out of him and something he would lose before understanding what the hell it was he gave up.
She turned away to go back to the building next door, but he’d automatically grabbed her arm, stopping her. “What if I don’t accept that?”
Eva turned those amber eyes on him, and he gazed into her anguished soul. “You have no choice.” She shrugged out of his grip and walked away from him.
Tonight was the first night he’d actually spoken to her face to face since then. Not a day had gone by that she hadn’t been in his thoughts. Now that he’d seen her again, spent time with her, things between them would only get worse. He didn’t know what madness drove him, but he would be unable to stay away from her now. That was his last thought before he crawled into his bed.
The damn ring on his cell phone woke him up before he was ready to get up and he wasn’t happy about it. He glanced at the name on the screen. The person on the other end had his attention. It was Willy.
Willy and her sisters made up the Chroniclers. The way he understood it, there were always seven, and Evangeline was one of the seven but she was also part of the next generation of seven Chroniclers. Devlin wondered if she had six siblings, she’d never mentioned it. He had to remember to ask her why seven of them, and if they had all already been assigned cities. He knew Wilhelmina and her other aunt Winfred helped train her because Evangeline’s mother died when she was young. Although he didn’t know what happened to her or Eva’s father. Was he alive or dead? He had a lot of questions that he was fairly sure weren’t going to be answered any time soon, if ever.
“Hey, Willy. What can I do for you?”
“Devlin, I’m sorry to wake you,” Willy said. “But we’ve found some information. I’ve passed on most of it already to Evangeline, but the rest is for you. She’s in danger, Devlin.”
“What? What are you talking about?” He blinked, wide awake now. Six months ago he hadn’t even known about the Chroniclers, and he assumed most soulless didn’t either. “Why would she be in danger?” But his thoughts flashed back to last night. She was not the usual type of prey the soulless targeted. They preferred to hunt those emitting strong negative emotion they could ramp up. Unless he pissed her off, she appeared nothing but serene; she’d been trained to hide her emotions. He had his suspicions already though. Something wasn’t right—three of them had been after her last night. “She was attacked last night, Willy. But she’s fine,” he added quickly, so she wouldn’t worry.
“I was afraid of that. It’s why I had to call you, to warn you.”
“It wasn’t like a regular attack for them though, it was as though they’d been tracking her.”
“They?”
“Yes. Three of them.”
“Oh, merciful Father.”
Devlin could hear the deep breath Wilhelmina took to calm her nerves in fear for her niece. “Yeah. But we got to her in time.”
“That’s not usual,” she stated.
“So what’s going on?”
Willy hesitated.
He could tell she didn’t want to answer and even if she did, he wasn’t sure how much of the truth she would tell him. Even though there was an alliance of sorts between their people, it was understood they still kept a lot of information close to the breast and doled out what they did know with gaps. “Come on, Willy. If you want me to protect her, I need to know.”
“Very well. I think she’s been targeted because the soulless have somehow found out not just about us, the Chroniclers, but also about the missing Chronicles.”
“Missing,” he frowned. “How could they be missing? I thought you and your sisters had all the records since the beginning of the hunters.”
“Before that actually, when the first Chronicler became aware of the fallen and began the records, two of our volumes are missing that cover that time, but there is also one we’ve recently found out about that we believe predates even those. If it exists, it’s one that goes back to the beginning and Chronicles the banishment of the angels.”
“But that’s…impossible.”
“So are soulless.”
“You know what I mean. How far back are we talking here? It would have to be a time when language was written.”
“Mind you, we’re not sure it does exist but we’ve found hints. We need both of the missing Chronicles to be sure. And we believe that lost Chronicle goes back even further than that.”
“Which would make it the oldest written language in history.”
“Yes.”
“And invaluable.”
“For many reasons. But the ones that concern us are certain references we’ve found in obscure Chronicles. The database makes it easier for us to cross reference information. It’s not much but enough for us to know there was a first Chronicle. The question is, does it still exist? If it does, it’s also one penned by Archangel Gabriel himself. One that talks about how to bring about the end of days.”
“Wait, did you say Archangel Gabriel?”
“Yes. At least, we believe so. We found reference to God’s strength or strength of God. That could refer to Gabriel.”
“Ah huh.” His head spun. Angels, soulless, now heaven forbid, the Archangel himself, top dog. There was also Adam, first man who disappeared supposedly hunting down his son Abel, so why the fuck not? Now all they needed was an Eve and the picture would be complete. “And do you mean what I think you mean, by the end of days, as in the apocalypse? The end of the world as we know it? Now, I’m no bible expert, but if you’re of the Christian bent, isn’t this God’s plan?”
“Not this one. In this particular version the other side triumphs if it’s brought about in the wrong way by the wrong people.”
“I see, so that would be bad.”
“Very.”
Devlin rubbed his eyes. “What exactly…no strike that. Do you know what’s supposed to happen? And how do we stop it?”
“No, we can only guess and not very well. And how we stop it is to get our hands on that first scroll before the soulless do.”
“Ah.” Now he finally heard something he could actually deal with. “What do you need me to do? Do you know where I should start looking, and what’s this got to do with Eva?”
“Evangeline is the key.”
“What? I don’t understand?”
“She is to lead the next generation of Chroniclers, and she will also bring into being the generation to follow.”
A light bulb went on in the dark recesses of his mind. “Are you telling me she’ll be the mother of seven Chroniclers? Are there always seven?”
“Yes. One is always marked as the mother of the next seven and she bears the mark.”
Shit! “What the fu—who’s the father of these seven?” The thought of her with some other man had him breathing hard. His fist clenched and one hand wrapped around the handle of the short sword never far from his side. All he wanted was a name, a direction to go to gut the fucking bastard who thought he’d bred seven brats on Evangeline. His. Damn it, she was his. But oh fuck, seven. Willy was speaking but his thoughts were so jumbled he hadn’t heard a word she’d said. “Sorry, Willy, would you say that again?”
“Pay attention. She’s found him, but she just doesn’t know it yet.”
His breath came out in a hiss. “Who? Who is he?”
“That I cannot tell you.”
It had to have been someone she’d met in the last couple of months since she arrived in LA. He’d seen her meet someone at the coffee shop a few days ago. Could that be the guy?
“Okay, Willy, don’t worry I’ll take care of it.” He hung up the phone. He’d take care of it all right. This guy was a dead man. He couldn’t sleep anyway, he got out of bed and headed for the bathroom.
In record time, he was ready. He placed his sword in its harness on his back and made it to his front door before he came to a stop. “Whoa!” He dropped his head against the door and slapped his palm against the faux wood. Hard.
“What the fuck am I doing? I can’t kill her lover.” It should have been me. “Seven!” His entire body shook. “Damn it anyway. I just wanted to sleep with the woman, not marry her. And seven kids.” He shuddered. Great! Now he was talking to himself.
He pushed himself away from the door and spun around heading back to his bedroom. He didn’t have to kill the future father of her children. He’d just have her first and then if this other guy was it for her, no harm no foul. Yet somewhere deep in his soul, he knew it for a lie. Roughly, he yanked off the loose fitting shirt he wore and removed his harness with the sword. But he kept the knives in his boots. Even though the soulless shunned the daylight hours, only the Oldens could go out during the day, and even then not for long. As far as he knew there were no Oldens in LA, but he couldn’t be too careful. He needed more sleep, in the last twenty-four hours he’d had about four, maybe when he got up he could think straight.
A few hours later, he headed back out for the second time, while his destination hadn’t changed… his reasoning had. He slammed his car door after he got in. Evangeline wasn’t home. He should have known; she was probably at the bookstore getting it ready for the opening. All Chroniclers ran bookstores, it’s where they sometimes hid the Chronicles themselves. Eva came to LA to open up a new branch, since the area seems to be a rising hunting ground.
The hunters were charged with protecting her too. They’d already helped rebuild her aunt’s store in New York. Stronger than ever. The Chronicles there hadn’t been harmed from the fire that had destroyed her aunt’s place because they were actually hidden deep underground. The bookstore itself served as merely a front, the entrance to an underground cavern housing thousands of Chronicles. He wondered if all the hiding places were like that.
Evangeline’s new place might be one of the few exceptions, since one of his people were one of the contractors, so he knew there were no hidden underground caverns connected to her store. Especially in a place known for its earthquakes. But Eva was a new breed of Chronicler and used modern technology to her advantage. All she needed was a laptop and a secure server.
For the last few years, Evangeline had been placing the vast majority of their files on a secure database. It made it easier now for them to find information, harder to lose anything. Which is how they’d come across the references to the lost Chronicles and their real significance. The Chroniclers were entering into a brave new world, an electronic one. He wondered if Evangeline kept any paper files or if she entered all her observations digitally on a computer. Knowing how computer savvy she was, he’d bet her entries were all online.
He wasn’t going to chase Eva down at her store, besides it wasn’t open yet and it still had work to be done on it. But he would call her and maybe arrange to have a late lunch with her. Yeah, that was a good idea. Normal. Like a date but not really a date. Since they did need to discuss what Wilhelmina told him about the missing book and come up with some sort of plan. Yeah, that was good. And if he were lucky, lunch would turn into dinner and desert could be her back at his place. He grinned, feeling much, much better about things.
Devlin took out his cell and called her. He knew the number by heart but it was in his contact directory. He’d never deleted it. When she answered the phone, it took him a moment to respond. It had been six months since he’d heard her voice on the phone. All she said was hello and the husky note had him twitching. God, he missed her. The sound of a car horn behind him brought him abruptly back to reality.
At least she answered the phone, she had to have known he was on the line. Months ago when he’d tried calling her to talk to her about them, their relationship, she’d refused to take his calls. She’d blocked him, but he knew once she’d moved to LA, Willy told him he’d be able to contact her if there were any problems. “At least you answered this time,” he said. He couldn’t seem to help being an ass. What was it about her that brought out the best and worst in him?
“I could just as easily hang up.”
“Don’t. This is business.” Sorta.
“Okay, fine. I assume you’re calling because Wilhelmina spoke to you.”
“Yes. Are you free for lunch later?”
“Lunch? Why?”
“You need to eat, so do I, and we need to talk about things,” he stated.
“As long as those things have to do with the lost Chronicles, then fine.”
Whatever she wanted to believe. As long as she agreed. “I’ll pick you up in about an hour.” He didn’t want to seem too eager.
“That time works, but just tell me where and I’ll meet you.”
“If you’re going to argue with me about everything…”
“I’m not arguing with you. I’m having lunch with you, but I need my car. I have an errand to run after lunch.”
“What kind of errand?”
“None of your business.”
“What if I’m making it my business?”
“Text me when you decide where you want to have lunch.” Then she hung up the phone.
“Damn it! When will I learn?” He growled but there was no one listening.