“I expect you to check in with me every morning. After you’ve fed. I don’t want to hold your hand, but I do want to make sure you’re taking care of yourself.”
Had he given the instruction to any of the others, Kaj knew he would’ve been met with resistance. That wasn’t the case with Mirakel. The male wanted structure, always had. And these past few weeks … hell, ever since Kardobahn was killed had likely been hell for him. Because Kaj had thought they’d been killed, too, he had taken off in an effort to find safety, slowly working his way back to the angels for refuge. Now that he was here, now that they were finally in a place to start rebuilding their regime, it was time he took the reins.
“I’m going to talk to Briony. I’ll request she not feed any of the others until we figure out how to move forward.”
He knew it really wasn’t his place, but right now, it had to be done. Kaj couldn’t afford to be down even one vampire, certainly not Mirakel. And eventually, it wouldn’t matter anyway. Now when Kaj freed the Fae indefinitely. He figured now was not the best time to relay that little detail to Mirakel, though. Not until he had a sit-down with Michael and figured out the terms.
“Thank you,phaal,” Mirakel said, bowing before him.
With a renewed sense of purpose, Kaj set forth to take care of the most pressing things. He expected once those were out of the way, the rest would fall into place.
He could only hope sooner rather than later.
“Hey, guys, I think I might havesomething,” Oliver called out to the males currently congregating at the nearby desks in the war room.
“What’s up?” Miklós asked, spinning in his chair to peer back at him.
Oliver tapped a few keys, sending the image on his computer screen to one of the monitors on the wall. “Looks like you’ve got an influx of demons converging on a small town in Texas.”
All eyes shot to the screen, then a few shifted back to him.
“Where’d you get that?” Kandarie asked.
“I set up an algorithm to monitor traffic cams in and around the locations you’ve pinpointed as possible places for theamsouelots,” he explained. “It sends me an alert when there are four or more figures in one place, provided they’re lacking a heat source.”
“Holy shit,” Reidar muttered as he moved to stand on Oliver’s right. “That’s fucking brilliant.”
“Not too bad for a human,” someone teased.
Oliver grinned. “I had to work on it a bit. Kept getting alerted to college frat boys who’d stayed out in the cold too long.”
Someone chuckled.
“Someone needs to alert Aphotic and Decebal.”
“Already done,” Oliver informed him. “Just wanted to let you know in case someone needs to send in the cavalry.”
“We’re whole right now,” Reidar explained. “All thelieterrasare out with their respective warrior. As are theladeares. So Aphotic’s got sufficient backup. As long as he knows what’s coming his way, he should be good.”
Oliver nodded as he watched the image play.
“What else are you watching?” Miklós asked, rolling his chair over and propping an elbow on his desk. “Looks like you’ve got theimpietanscovered. Any tricks up your sleeve regarding shadow beasts?”
“I’ve started putting something together, but I need unique factors to focus on.”
“Demon dogs,” someone stated. “Only they roam in human form.”
“Not helpful,” he answered. “But I have hacked into all the cams in the area. I’ve entered Asmia’s physical description in the event she happens to be out and about.”
“Doubtful,” Reidar grumbled. “If I were Perfidious, I wouldn’t let her out of my sight.”
Yeah, that was what Oliver figured, too, but it didn’t hurt.
“Maybe we should hit up Bijou. She’s probably got the most experience with shadow beasts. Maybe she can give us some pointers.”
Oliver didn’t look at Miklós, hoping the angel wasn’t including Oliver in thatwe. He wasn’t sure he was up for a conversation with her.
“I’ll call her. See if she can come down here,” Reidar said.
