Seventeen
Just after sunrise the next morning, Finn put in a call to Nix’s cell phone. He figured if anyone from the rogue group was still watching, he was safe to call the daughter of his father’s girlfriend. Thus far, no one had suspected him in Tobias’s murder. When she answered and realized it was him, she put him on speakerphone. Finn let her and Tobias know what had been happening, and gave them directions to the mine. “I’ll meet you there around noon,” he said. “I have a little business to take care of first.”
“Business such as?” Tobias asked.
“Liuz has sentries posted. I have to take them out before we can even hope to get into the mine.”
“We can help you with that, you know.”
Finn snorted. “They’d smell the two of you coming a mile away. It’s better for me to do this on my own.”
“All right.” Tobias shushed Nix when she started to object. “Trust me, honey, Finn will be all right. They won’t know what hit them.”
Finn felt burgeoning pleasure at the unexpected praise. “You know, for a vampire, Caine, you aren’t half bad.” He laughed at Caine’s pithy response and rang off.
While mentally preparing himself, he physically geared up for battle. He attached his holstered Glock to his belt, shrugged into the scabbard sheath that held a short sword between his shoulder blades, then finished dressing. Before heading out the door he grabbed a plastic bag—he’d need that for his clothes later on. He hadn’t thought about it last night, and had to shake a lot of dirt out of his clothing before he could redress.
Two hours later he paused about half a mile away from the mine. Stooping behind a large boulder, he got undressed, putting both his clothing and his weapons into the bag and stashing it between a big boulder and a smaller one.
With a slight grunt he focused his energy inward and reached for his chameleon ability. In a few seconds he was a mountain lion again, panting through the pain of the metamorphosis. His eagerness to take care of business helped mitigate the discomfort, though, and he was soon on his way.
The sentry who’d been on the ledge above the mine was higher up, in a spot that would be easier for Finn to reach. He ran his wide tongue over his whiskers and padded forward. He stalked toward the guard, sometimes moving only a millimeter at a time. The sun was nearly overhead when he was finally able to pounce on the man from behind. Finn quickly chomped down on the sentry’s throat, ripping away his ability to scream and ending his life.
As he padded off, he knew it had taken him longer than he’d anticipated to reach the sentry. He had to take out the other two quickly, before Tobias and Nix started up the trail, or this fight would be over before it got started. Liuz would realize that Tobias wasn’t dead, which would lead him to the realization that Finn had not carried out his orders. That would make him realize Finn wasn’t on his side after all, and things would go seriously downhill from there.
The other two guards were easier to take out than the first one had been. It was over before either of them could get off a shot. Finn clamped his powerful jaws in the vampire guard’s shoulder and dragged him into the brush to hide him, then did the same to the other pret. Once finished, he loped back to where he’d left his clothing and weapons.
He pushed his chameleon demon back and shifted to his humanoid form. He closed his eyes and leaned against the side of a large boulder, panting through the last of the transformation, and tried to ignore the fatigue tugging at his muscles. He got dressed and rearmed, then made his way back to the mine, this time on two feet. As he approached the entrance, he smelled the sweet grass scent of heather and stopped moving. He looked around but didn’t see anyone. Yet, as soon as he took a step toward the mine Keira stepped out into the direct sunlight.
She wore black pants that hugged her shapely legs, a knit top, and thick-soled boots. When she shot a quick glance around, he saw that her gorgeous hair was in a tight braid wound around the back of her head. She turned toward him and stared. “That’s far enough, Finn,” she said. “Did you do something to