Please, I'm begging you ... Don't do this!
Can't you understand? I love him! He means everything to me ...
He released her from his loose hold, but even after the contact was broken, her warmth stayed nestled in the cradle of his palm as he fisted his hand and brought it back down to his side. Corinne quietly cleared her throat, folding her arms across herself. "Please tell everyone in the Order - Andreas Reichen and Claire too - that I will be eternally grateful for all they've done."
Hunter inclined his head. "Live a good life, Corinne Bishop."
She stared at him for a long moment, then gave him a faint nod and pivoted to rejoin her mother. As the two females started for the house together, Victor Bishop stepped into Hunter's line of vision, his head turned to watch the women walk back up the driveway. When they were well out of earshot, he exhaled a low curse.
"I never dreamed this moment would come," he murmured as he looked back at Hunter once more. "We buried that girl decades ago. Or, as it turns out, what we thought was that girl. It took a long time for Regina to give up hope that there had been some mistake and the body my men pulled out of the river months later wasn't actually her daughter."
Hunter listened in silence, watching Bishop's face twist and redden with emotion as he spoke.
"It nearly destroyed Regina, losing Corinne. She kept hoping for a miracle. She held on to that hope for longer than I imagined could be possible. Eventually, she did let go." Bishop ran his palm over his creased brow and slowly shook his head. "And now ... thanks to God and the Order, tonight she finally has her miracle. We all do."
Hunter did not acknowledge the praise, nor the outstretched hand of the Darkhaven vampire in front of him. He kept his eyes trained on Corinne's retreating form as she and her mother walked the remainder of the long driveway, then entered the open front door of the warmly lit house up ahead. He watched until the door was closed behind them and he was assured that his temporary ward was fully transferred to the shelter of her family's arms. In the lengthening quiet, Victor Bishop cleared his throat as he let his hand drift back down to his side. "How can I ever repay the Order for what you've done here tonight?"
"Keep her safe," Hunter said, then he turned away from Bishop and walked to his waiting vehicle at the street.
A furious throb was drumming in Lucan's veins as he sat with several members of the Order in the compound's tech lab. His elbows planted on the edge of the long conference table, he and the others listened in disgust as Gideon reviewed his findings concerning Murdock, the Enforcement Agent who'd fled the scene last night at the private club in Boston and had yet to surface anywhere.
"In addition to the sip-and-strip clubs he tends to frequent, our boy Murdock also seems to prefer his blood Hosts on the rare side - as in very young. There's more than one blemish in his records with the Agency for solicitation of an underage human, and not just solicitation with intent to feed. Also some citations for excessive force among both Darkhaven civilian populations and humankind. Keep in mind, this is just the shit in his general file. If I dig any deeper than the surface, there's bound to be a whole other pile of nasty on this guy."
Gideon had hacked in and pulled up the vampire's records from the IID, the information database that logged nearly every known Breed individual in existence. There were exceptions, of course, namely Lucan and an untold number of other early-generation Breed born centuries before any kind of technology had been in place. Lucan glanced at the flat-panel monitor where a photograph of a prissy brown-haired male with an oily, too-smug smile filled the screen.
"What about family? Anyone we can squeeze for intel on this ass**le's possible whereabouts?"
Gideon shook his head. "Never took a Breedmate, and there is no recorded kin on file anywhere. Another thing, Murdock's only been local for the past fifty-odd years. Before that, back around the time of his documented problems with kids and violence, he was part of the Agency in Atlanta. Looks like the director of that region personally recommended Murdock for transfer and promotion to his position up here."
Across the table, seated in black fatigues and patrol gear like the gathered male warriors, Nikolai's mate, Renata, scoffed. Her chin-length brunette hair swung around her jaw line as she leaned back and crossed her arms over her chest. "What easier way to get rid of a problem than packing it up and shipping it somewhere else? I saw plenty of that going on among the orphanage staffs in Montreal."
"Sounds like this scumbag Murdock needs to be put down," Rio said from the other side of Niko and Renata. His topaz eyes smoldered with contempt, making the web of combat scars that riddled the left side of his face look all the more savage.
Another of the warriors, Kade, gave a nod of his spiky-haired dark head. "Too bad Hunter and Chase didn't finish him off at the club last night. Might've done the world a favor."
"Murdock is scum," Lucan agreed, "but if there's any chance he might be connected to Dragos or his operation - even remotely connected - then we need to make sure he keeps breathing long enough to lead us there."
"What about Sterling?" It was Elise who spoke, her voice tentative as she turned to look at Lucan from her seat between him and her mate, Tegan. While the rest of the assembled group had been occupied with talk of their missions and the new priority of locating Agent Murdock, Elise had been quiet, pensive. Now she wore her worry in the flat press of her mouth and in the stormy lavender of her eyes. "He's been gone for nearly twenty-four hours. Has there been any word from him at all?"