“Hadley’s in there?” Carter asked, gazing through the decrepit chain link fence toward the huge building a quarter mile ahead of them. “You’re sure?”
His heart had been beating out of control for the last two hours as Strickland’s vaguely defined deadline loomed closer, his omega hovering on the edge of slipping out at any second. When Kat had called twenty minutes ago, saying she’d narrowed the search down to the abandoned Eastman Manor ten miles southeast of Red Oak, the relief had been overwhelming.
But now, looking through the rusted fence at the completely dark mansion in the distance, he wondered if Kat had made a mistake. The three-story manor was surrounded by overgrown hedges and low scraggly trees, kudzu covering the entire side facing them. He didn’t see any vehicles and it didn’t feel like anyone had been there in a long time. Which was probably true, at least according to the information Carter had found on his phone.
Kat stepped forward, holding up the glass jar from Hadley’s office. It was lit from within by a vivid green glow and the twisted paper clip that had been lying on the bottom earlier was now floating in mid-air, frantically tapping against the side of the jar closest to the manor.
“Hadley’s in there,” she said softly. “It’s a big place so we’ll have to get closer before I can say exactly where, but this is definitely the place.”
“I’m picking up the scent of more than a dozen people and several vehicles,” Mike said, lifting his nose to sniff the air. “We’re too far away to know for sure if it’s Hadley, but nothing else explains so many people being here.”
Carter wanted to believe that with all his soul, but if they took the time to make a move on the manor and they were wrong about Hadley being here, there’d be no chance of starting over and finding his soul mate before it was too late.
“If we’re going to do this, we need to move,” Hale said as he approached, carrying the bags of tactical gear that he and Trey had picked up from the compound earlier. Without knowing what they were getting into, they’d packed everything they could grab, including harnesses and ropes for rappelling and explosives for breaching doors. “It will take us a few minutes to locate Hadley if she’s in there and then more time to find an entry point. I doubt Strickland is sticking to any particular deadline and we may not have any more time to waste.”
“Should we wait for backup?” Trey asked, joining them with more gear bags. “Knox, Turner, and his team from the marshals are still ten minutes out and Gage didn’t think he’d be able to get anyone here for at least thirty or forty because they’re still wrapping up that raid on the last of the drug labs.”
Mike looked at Carter. “It’s your soul mate so you make the call.”
Carter took a deep breath and gave the only answer he could.
“We move in now.” He glanced at Trey. “Call Knox and Turner and let them know the situation. Hopefully, they can get here in time to cover whatever secondary entrance we can find on our way in. Whoever Gage ends up sending us will just have to support us on the fly.”
“What about the rest of us?” Kat asked. “We’ll need to be a lot closer for the transfer spell to work. And I need time to set up my circle.”
Carter looked from Kat to Karissa, then Lydia and Kamden. “I’m fine with whatever you guys need to do, and we’ll try to give you as much time as we can. But if we discover that Hadley is in imminent danger, we’re going in whether you’re ready or not.”
He felt for Kamden and Lydia, but Hadley’s life was on the line here. He wasn’t taking any chances.
“I have no intention of getting in the way of Hadley’s rescue,” Kat assured him. “Just be aware that once I start the transfer spell between Kamden and Strickland, I won’t be able to stop it, not without hurting Kamden. Worse, I’ll likely be completely immersed in the spell and unable to do much of anything to help you. If it looks like you’ll need me to stop, do it before I get in too deep, okay?”
Carter nodded. “Copy that.”
He was still pulling on his tactical vest and loading his M4 carbine when Mike ripped a section of rusted fence away like it was tissue paper. Without a word, he and Hale moved toward Eastman Manor at a fast run, heading for the north side. Carter checked his radio and grabbed his pack full of extra gear, throwing another glance at Kat and her crew to make sure they had their radios on and were ready to move. At a nod from Kat and Karissa, he headed through the opening in the fence with Trey right behind him.
Carter sniffed the air, trying to pick up any of the scents that Mike had talked about, but the wind was coming from behind him, and his omega nose simply wasn’t good enough. It scared him more than a little that he couldn’t smell Hadley at all. She was his soul mate. He should be able to smell her, right?
Pushing that thought aside, Carter led Trey toward the south side of the manor, scanning the heavily shrouded structure for any signs of life as well as a way into the place.
Carter had Googled the manor as soon as Kat told them about it. He hadn’t bothered reading all the details, but Eastman Manor had been built by a rich industrialist in the 1890s for a family that saw themselves as the next Carnegie, Rockefeller, or Vanderbilt. But then World War I happened and the Eastman family lost all of its male heirs and its fortune. By the early 1930s, the property had been sold, starting a slow downward spiral that had seen the thirty-room manor used as a mental institution, a recovery center for injured war veterans, a convent, and a boarding house for battered women. The last attempt to resurrect the place had been as an upscale bed and breakfast in the eighties, but that had floundered in less than two years, leading most locals to simply accept that the manor was cursed. It had stayed empty ever since.
While the age and original grandeur of the manor had initially put the place on their shortlist since Strickland liked old places, it was the Olympic-sized swimming pool that had sent Kat in this direction with her charmed jar. An empty pool would serve as a place for the hunt that Kamden had described.
Carter prayed that Kat was right and that Hadley was in there somewhere. If not, he was going to lose his mind. Or more precisely, his omega would completely take over and run wild.
He and Trey were about a hundred yards from the back side of the manor when he finally picked up Hadley’s familiar scent. His omega instantly went on high alert, snarling at him to throw himself through the nearest window and find his mate now.
“Calm down, dude,” Trey said, grabbing Carter’s shoulder and stopping him from doing something likely very stupid. “I smell her too, but going in without a plan will only get her hurt.”
Carter knew Trey was right, but it was still damn hard to fight the instincts swirling around inside him. He forced himself to take several long, deep breaths, begging his omega to stop fighting and work with him.
If you don’t take a back seat and let me drive, we could get our soul mate killed.
Carter expected his omega to growl in defiance, but surprisingly, he felt that part of his werewolf nature back off. Suddenly, he felt calmer and more himself than he had in a long time.
“Carter. Trey.” Mike’s deep voice was soft in his earpiece. “Get over to the west side. I think we’ve found the swimming pool. Hadley’s scent is stronger over here, along with a lot of other people.”
“Can you smell Strickland or any of his spawn?” Carter asked, already turning and sprinting toward the west, relief rushing through him at the confirmation that Hadley was here.
