Besieged by Rain (Son of Rain #1) Read online

  I hoped that we could find Ben sooner rather than later. I wanted the situation resolved before anyone else lost their life. I also hated the thought of my friend trapped in a fae court somewhere, or that somewhere out there another innocent person would soon lose their life because we’d missed some clue.

  Eth finished up his cereal before tipping the bowl to his lips and drinking the milk. “I don’t know, man, surely at some point we have to admit defeat.”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “How can you say that? What if Dad had given up on Lou?”

  Eth flinched at the accusation in my tone. Despite the years that had passed since Lou had been rescued from the fae and returned to us, her disappearance was still a major cause of heartbreak for our family. She’d been just a toddler when she was switched, and it had taken Dad years to get her back. We couldn’t give up on Ben after only a few days even though he was an adult capable of taking care of himself. If he’d truly been kidnapped, and wasn’t just trying to cause his father some grief, it was likely that he wouldn’t ever be able to break away, at least not unassisted. We couldn’t just abandon him to whatever fate awaited him at the fae courts.

  A moment later, Eth had his stoic mask back in place. He brushed his hand across his almost military-short hair, flexing his muscles in the process as if trying to remind me that he could beat me into submission if we argued—or at least he thought he could. “I almost forgot you like to hold on to things forever. How long have you been pining over that girl who disappeared on you back in Ohio?”

  It was my turn to react, but I tried to minimize the chance for him to see the impact his words had by masking my expression before I spoke. “One, I haven’t been pining.” I held up my hand, counting as I went. “I was concerned. She left so suddenly, and I was worried that something might have happened to her.” It was a lie. I knew exactly why she left and that, aside from the threat my family posed to her, she’d never been in any danger—if anything she was the danger. That didn’t mean I was pining though, not exactly.

  Unless of course dreaming about her, being unable to get her out of my head, and needing to see her one more time was pining, which I didn’t think it was. Sure, I’d set up at least twenty different auto searches on every database we had access to, all with emails directly back to a personal email address I’d set up specifically for the purpose, before wiping the existence of them out of the Rain’s search log.

  Maybe I’d even gone so far as to upload an image I’d lifted from my high school’s security camera feed into a beta version of some facial recognition software that I’d had a little input into the design of. I may have had alerts linked to all of those different searches so that I was notified by text and email the instant any of them resulted in a hit.

  It was even possible that I’d scoured every single book and database available to me to try to research precisely what sort of creature she was. All signs pointed to something that seemed impossible due to their rarity in the world, a creature of fire and renewal, but it was also the only thing that made sense.

  None of those things were the same thing as pining though. “And two, that’s got nothing to do with this so shut up.”

  He laughed, knowing that he’d successfully gotten under my skin, which was probably the whole point of his comments anyway. “Keep telling yourself that, but know that there have been many, many nights when we’ve shared a room that I’ve heard you getting out of bed to go jack off in the bathroom at some ridiculous hour of the morning.”

  I tried not to let him see that he’d hit too close to the mark with his observation.

  “Why are you up anyway?” he asked, changing the subject in victory. “As you pointed out yourself, it’s early. It’s not like you’re in the bathroom having a good time.” He waved his open fist in the air in mimicry of an action he clearly knew well. “So . . .?”

  I shrugged. “I just couldn’t sleep, and then I thought I’d be able to beat you to the little food remaining. Obviously I lost that race.”

  He snorted. “What can I say? You snooze, you lose.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You could at least—“

  “There’s no point batting those big brown eyes of yours in an attempt to make me feel bad,” he said. “I’m going to bed, not out for more milk.”

  I gave him the finger and tried to find something else to satisfy my hunger; at least the physical one in my stomach. My other hungers would have to wait awhile longer—maybe even forever.

  CHAPTER TWO

  TWO HOURS LATER, I was in three layers of clothes, trawling through a dumpster near the strip club that Eth and Dad had visited the night before, looking for any evidence that might point to where Ben could be.

  “Of course Eth and Dad would get booze and naked women while I get stuck dumpster diving with a princess,” I muttered as I tossed yet another bag of worthless trash to one side.

  Lou tsked and, if I’d been looking at her, I probably would have seen her rolling her eyes. Her snotty attitude was starting to grate on me—more than usual.

  I popped my head up to admonish her and saw her playing with her hair. Three weeks earlier she’d turned up with her new style—platinum blonde, trimmed short at the back with some weird asymmetrical bit at the front. I seriously didn’t understand girls—my sister in particular. “Can’t you at least help me out?”

  Her nose wrinkled in disgust. “There is no way I’m getting in there.” She had her whiny voice on, which only served to make me more pissed at the circumstances.

  “I would have thought, as someone who’d experienced the fae’s particular brand of hospitality, that you of all people would want to help rescue Ben.”

  “Fuck you, Clay. Of course I want to, but that doesn’t mean I’m about to go climbing into a dumpster. I’m a fighter, not a dumpster-loving hobo.”

  “Well, can you at least look around where they found the body rather than standing there picking your fucking nails?”

  “I have looked.”

  “Well, look again.” I went back to searching through the filth.

  I was onto the second bin when my cell phone chimed twice. Irritated at the distraction, I climbed out of the dumpster, ripped off my gloves, and then pulled my cell from my pocket. For a moment, I just stared at it in disbelief. The facial recognition software had sent me an update with a hit.

  “What is it?” Lou asked.

  “I’ve found him.” I threw my cell at her so that she could see the hit I’d got. The software had sent the name of the search—Benjamin Rogers—and his location. Within seconds of each other, I’d gotten two hits. Both from the Bronx River Houses, and both in the same frame. “Call Dad. I’ll get cleaned up and meet you at the car.”

  During the drive, Lou bitched and moaned about how much I stank. I wanted to slap her. It wasn’t like I’d selected Eau de Garbage when I’d gotten dressed that morning. Maybe if she’d helped out a little more, I wouldn’t have had to stay in the dumpster for so long. Or maybe we’d have both stunk, but either way it would have made her back off.

  Instead of debating further with Lou, I decided to concentrate on the possibilities that the lead from the software presented. If it did help us to find Ben, it would be a great boon for the Rain. It meant that the software worked exactly as we’d anticipated, and hoped.

  I couldn’t help thinking of my more personal desire though, as the need to be close to Evie again bubbled in my stomach. If one out of the two searches I’d run so far was successful, could the other have the same luck?

  Evie’s details had been the first I’d entered, but I couldn’t resist the perfect opportunity to test the system further when Ben had disappeared. Maybe there’s a real chance it will lead me to her.

  I pushed the errant thought out of my mind and focused on locating Ben. If Abe was right, if a fae court had actually kidnapped Ben, it was highly likely that it was the same bastard court responsible for Lou’s torture.

  Dad had killed the three f
ae he’d found with her in the abandoned motel room, but I wanted to make every one of their kind suffer for the agony they’d caused my sister. I eyed the sleeves on her jacket, which were both pulled down to hide her scars. Getting some revenge would definitely be a bonus for my sister; for my whole family. Each of us enjoyed being the one who fired the bullet that finally brought one of those fuckers down. Even if the ones responsible for her pain were dead, only vengeance against the whole court would show them that they picked the wrong family to fuck with. If that moment came during this case, we’d probably leave the reward of firing the kill shot to Lou—she deserved to be the one who extracted that final revenge.

  With the traffic, it took us a little over forty minutes to drive to the Bronx and another ten to find somewhere to park. When I finally found a space, I took the key from the ignition and tucked it up behind the sun visor.

  To any normal person, it probably seemed strange, but we always left our cars unlocked and ready to go just in case we were separated. Any one of us could be in need of a quick getaway. Murphy’s Law dictated that it would always be the one without keys who’d need them most, so we didn’t tempt fate. I could still remember the arguments between Eth and Dad after the first time Dad had shown us the trick. Eth was adamant that it was asking for the car to be stolen, while Dad argued that the easiest way to keep a car safe was to make it look like it was too easy to steal. It worked especially well when we were parked in a bad neighborhood. People assumed it was a police sting or that it belonged to someone powerful enough not to be fucked with and would leave it untouched. Regardless of whether Dad or Eth was right, the technique was pretty much a habit for me now.

  “Let’s do this,” I said to Lou as we both prepared our guns for the mission ahead.

  We caught up with Dad and Eth, who’d managed to make it there before us—no doubt largely in part due to Eth’s crazy driving—and had already scoped out the area.

  “We haven’t seen anything yet,” Dad said. “But the buildings are all centered around a courtyard. We can start there and fan out. Clay, can you get a copy of the photo that triggered the alert?”

  I nodded as I pulled out my cell and logged into the Rain interface. “Give me a sec.”

  A minute and a half later, I showed them the picture that had caused both alerts to signal me. In it, the doppelganger Ben had a steel grip around the bound arms of another, captive version of our friend. It was clear the real Ben was being guided toward one of the buildings. Despite the fact that only one of them was the true Ben, they looked identical. Even the typical fae arrogance on the captor’s face didn’t look out of place on Ben’s features—in fact, it was remarkably similar to the expression he wore when he knew he was getting lucky.

  “It’s definitely a doppelganger,” Eth said, stating the blatant fact. “At least that explains the bodies.”

  It didn’t take us long to work out the exact location the CCTV footage was from based on the background in the still.

  We headed into the building, unsure of whether or not we were walking into a trap, but ready to put our complete trust in each other like we always did on a case.

  A thud and crash sounded upstairs. Although the sounds weren’t exactly uncommon, or unexpected, considering the area, the timing was far too coincidental to be ignored. With a few hand gestures, Dad indicated for Eth and me to take the lead. Silently, we moved in formation until we had the door to the apartment with the noises surrounded. A muffled shout within seemed to confirm it was the right room.

  With a nod, Dad signaled for Eth—the strongest of us—to kick in the door. With a loud thump, it swung open wildly to reveal two Bens, each a perfect replica of the other, both staring at us in surprise. Neither of them was bound, but both bore rope burns around their wrists.

  “Shoot him. He’s the doppelganger!” They both cried in unison, their voices almost perfectly in sync.

  I looked between them, wondering whether there was some easy test to distinguish the real Ben from his fae doppelganger. I turned to Dad for guidance, but before I could even open my mouth, Lou’s gun went off, and one of the Bens—I wasn’t sure which—fell to the floor.

  Eth and I leaped backward in shock at the unexpected gunshot.

  “Holy shit!” Eth exclaimed.

  Crimson fluid flooded from the gaping hole where the back of Ben’s head used to be, and with the doppelganger no longer alive, the body instantly looked a little less like the real Ben. The skin was already paler, fading to a darkened tan.

  The Ben that remained standing blinked at Lou. “How’d you know that he was . . . that I was . . .”

  He seemed to be in shock, and I couldn’t blame him. I was barely understanding it myself, and I was long used to Lou’s snap decisions.

  “I had a hunch, so I followed it,” Lou said with a shrug.

  Ben’s eyes rolled back in his head, and he keeled over next to the doppelganger. The three of us had practically grown up with him—albeit in small doses—but I knew he had a strong constitution and could kick some serious ass when he needed to. It was testament to his ordeal with his doppelganger that he’d succumbed to unconsciousness—or maybe it was the possibility that Lou could have easily killed him if her hunch had been wrong.

  “We need to get him out of here,” Dad said.

  “I’ll take him. I might be able to help him,” Lou said with genuine empathy in her voice. Even though we had no way of knowing what he might have endured—or whether he’d escaped relatively unscathed—none of us were willing to argue with Lou about her being involved in his debriefing. Of the four of us, she had the most experience with the fear of capture and the reality of torture.

  “Fine. Louise and I will take the Chevelle and drive Ben to Abe’s place,” Dad agreed. “I’ll call him on the way so that he can meet us there. Ethan, you and Clay clean up here. I’ll meet you back at Bayview to debrief with the Assessors in an hour. Remember, this wasn’t just any normal case. This was a direct attack on one of our leaders, and we need to be prepared to ensure it can’t happen again.”

  After Dad and Lou had left, Eth and I wrapped the body and carried it downstairs before throwing it into the trunk. We’d find a quiet spot by the river and burn the dead fae—it was the easiest way to dispose of these creatures for good.

  As I climbed into the car, my cell chimed again. Assuming it was Dad letting us know something about Ben, I checked it. It was another alert, which I almost dismissed. I assumed it was probably just a new sighting of Ben, from when Lou and Dad helped him out of the building, because I hadn’t had an opportunity to turn off the search. But then . . . then the details of the alert caught my eye. Once they had, I couldn’t do anything more than stare at it in disbelief.

  Blaze.

  Tremors overtook my hand, and I could barely read the next words—the ones that might offer me salvation.

  Blaze was the codename I’d set up on my searches for Evie. I’d tried to be clever because I couldn’t have anyone stumble across a search for Evelyn Meyers. Even the nickname I knew her by would be too obvious to my family if they found it.

  It’s her.

  I took a shaky breath and concentrated on the screen, on the address, on the possibility that I might have actually found her.

  6380 South Boulevard, Charlotte, North Carolina.

  “Clay?”

  It’s really her!

  “Earth to Clay!”

  “Huh?” I looked up from the cell and remembered where I was. For a moment, I’d been so completely lost in my exhilaration that I’d forgotten I was still on a case and that my brother was right beside me.

  “Are you going back to Hell?” Eth asked.

  “Yeah, of course.” Before climbing into the passenger’s seat, I looked down at the details again to ensure that I wasn’t just seeing things. The second my belt was buckled, I was back on my cell, pulling up a copy of the photo that had triggered the alert.

  If I’d seen the photo without the confirmation,
I probably wouldn’t have looked twice at the brunette within. I would have assumed that there was no way the pretty girl with a mess of curls around her face was Evie. Having the confirmation though, I could see it. Even through her getup, I recognized the curl of her lip and the set of her cheekbones. It was a damned good disguise, but I could see the truth buried beneath it.

  Since I’d last seen her, she’d grown some wicked curves, but she was still the same girl I’d spent so many nights dreaming about. The one I’d fantasized about more times than I could count and whose image was the only one I saw whenever I needed to work off a little tension with some self-love. Even the few encounters I’d had after being pushed toward a woman during a night out with Eth were quickly chased into the past when I thought of the one who had turned my life upside down after only a few short months of teenage flirting.

  Eth’s fist struck my shoulder. “Are you even listening?”

  “Huh?” I tried to rewind my mind a few seconds to see if I could recall him asking a question—I thought he’d mentioned something about a place to dispose of the doppelganger’s body. “Uh, yeah, sounds good.”

  Reluctantly minimizing the photo, I entered the corresponding address into a search engine. A few seconds later, I had an image of a group of shops; the exterior of one seemed to be a possible match for the things surrounding Evie in the CCTV still.

  This is it.

  I could barely believe it. My heart raced as I flicked quickly between the two photos.

  I’ve found her.

  “Are you all right, bro?” Eth asked. “You’re acting like a dumbass. What are you even looking at?” He took his eyes off the road to reach across the car for the cell.

  I yanked it from him at the last second. “It’s nothing,” I all but shouted. “Just pay attention to the road in front of you, will you?”