Read Online Summoner of Storms by Jordan L. Hawk - Free Book Online

under his skin, reflecting
back Caleb’s tension. “There.” A splash of red on the grass
near the edge of the woods. Someone shot while trying to run?
    But a little splash wasn’t enough to explain
the strength of the scent. Time to play tracker dog again, I
guess.
    Caleb led the way to the woods, pausing to
touch the bloody grass. “Still tacky.”
    “No more than an hour old,” John said.
“Probably less.” Tiffany didn’t say anything, and Caleb remembered
this blood probably belonged to someone she knew. Maybe even a
relative. Maybe a child.
    Caleb stepped into the thick woods. Shrubs
and small trees snagged at his coat, and sticks popped under his
boots. He didn’t know anything about the woods, but even without
his amped-up sense of smell, he could have followed the blood
trail. Drips and drops spattered leaves and the ground.
    The land sloped gently down toward a creek.
The rusty stink grew stronger. “Hello?” Caleb called. “Is someone
out here? We’re here to help.”
    “It’s Tiffany,” Tiffany added. “Anyone here?
Marcus? Charlene?”
    Was that a moan? Caleb turned in the
direction of the sound, and spotted the edge of a green shirt, just
visible on the other side of a fallen tree on the creek’s edge.
    A man sprawled there, legs stretched out in
front of him, his shirt and jeans soaked with blood. From the
amount of gray in his hair and wrinkles around his eyes, he looked
to be in his sixties. His breath rattled ominously, and his polo
shirt sported a black hole just under the pocket.
    “Uncle Frank?” Tiffany holstered her gun and
fell to her knees by the man.
    He blinked sluggishly. “Tiffany?” he asked,
his voice so faint even Caleb had to strain to hear.
    “Yeah, it’s me.” She reached for his shirt,
but he weakly batted her hands away.
    “I’m done for.” A racking cough seized him.
When it ended, he spat out bloody froth to one side. “SPECTR did
this. Came and took everyone. I tried to run, thought I could get
help...”
    “Shh. It’s okay.” Tiffany gently peeled the
edges of the shirt away from the wound. Fresh blood oozed free.
    “Why? Why’d they take everybody? The girls
are just six.” The old man swallowed convulsively. “You got to get
them back, Tiff. You got to.”
    Tiffany bit her lip. “I will, Uncle Frank. I
swear.”
    He didn’t answer, just let out a long,
rattling breath before failing to draw another. Tiffany sank back
onto the forest floor and put her hand over her eyes.
    Fuck. Caleb exchanged a glance with John,
neither of them sure what to say. Tiffany had lost her mom and an
uncle in just over twenty-four hours, and now SPECTR kidnapped her
young cousins on top of it?
    “I’m sorry,” Caleb said at last,
helplessly.
    Tiffany didn’t move. “Me too.”
    Caleb peered around at the still woods. “Why
would SPECTR do this? Kidnapping people now? What the hell?”
    John holstered his Glock. “Hostages? To
convince the Vigilant to turn themselves in?”
    “Maybe.” A horrible thought occurred to
Caleb. “You don’t think Forsyth grabbed them to put demons in them,
do you?”
    “Goddess,” John whispered, half-curse and
half-prayer. “I hope not.”
    “How did Forsyth even know to send his goons
here?”
    “A mole? Interrogating someone they’d already
captured?” John leaned past Tiffany and gently shut the dead man’s
eyes. “Without an empath, we can’t know who might have been
compromised.”
    “Fuck,” Tiffany whispered. She dropped her
hand and stood up. She stared at her uncle for a long moment, then
turned away. “Come on. We need to get out of here.”
    Caleb gestured to the body. “Shouldn’t we...I
don’t know, do something?”
    “We don’t have time to dig a grave. A pyre
would give off too much smoke—someone might come to investigate.”
She wiped a tear from her face. “The living have to come
first.”
    Caleb glanced back at the body. It didn’t
seem right to leave him there.
    “ It is only a