Pasha folded her arms and looked cross at her brother. “And then?”
“And then we make plans. If we could eliminate Crichton, that would help our cause. We want to eliminate anyone who was involved in the fight, but we need to get the leader of the vampires. The others might decide it’s too dangerous to bother trying to keep the region as their own. Without a compelling leader, that might be the end of it,” Adonis said.
“No. We have to terminate every bloody one of them,” Pasha said.
“I agree,” Zachary said.
Carissa agreed. So did Danai.
Michael nodded.
Rachael said, “If we don’t get Crichton early in the game, he can continue to make new vampires to fight us. Like Adonis said, if we can take him down, some of the vampires might make a run for it. I agree that we should terminate all of them who were involved, but we need to stop Crichton from creating more of a mess for us.”
Everyone agreed and then someone knocked on the door. Adonis looked out the security peephole and smiling, he shook his head. He opened the door and welcomed Grandma and Grandpa into the room.
Grandma had to hold Carissa’s baby first before she got lots of hugs.
Pasha swore the baby looked even older than the last time she saw her a month ago. She had woken, her red fuzzy hair longer, and when she’d been on her tummy before Grandma picked her up, she was raising her head and looking about. Her eyes were blue, but that could still change. Though Carissa's eyes were blue also, and her hair was just as strawberry blond. Pasha’s five-year-old nephews were both blonds, though their father had dark hair and the mother's hair was a light brown. All of them had brown eyes. The boys were tall for their age, just like their father had been. Pasha couldn’t wait to see them at the airport and help get them safely here.
Her grandparents were in their seventies, older when they had the kids and both were white-haired, distinguished looking, Grandma's hair long and in a tail, Grandad's hair curly and short. Both were consummate hunters with years of experience, and she was glad they were here to help. They often gave advice when Pasha's dad and mom were trying to decide a course of action for the clan. Nobody mentioned her parents. She assumed the grandparents didn't want to show any judgement about what had happened to the whole clan while her parents had been away. Nor about why they weren't here now to help in the fight against the vampires who had killed so many of their family members.
Pasha was glad the rest of the family was together now though. It gave her a sense of belonging, of camaraderie, and a feeling they'd come out the victors this time.
Adonis gave his grandparents hugs, and Danai, Pasha, and Carissa followed suit. Then Adonis introduced Rachael, as his mate, the coming baby, Michael, and Zachary.
They were thrilled to meet the new additions to their extended family.
“I’ll go down and have some people moved from their rooms so we can have them cleaned and the family can have them right next to our rooms,” Zachary said. “I’ll get one for the grandparents, one for Carissa’s sister and her family, and one for meetings and anyone to use while taking care of the kids, if they need to.” He figured that way they wouldn’t have to move the kids from place to place if someone else took care of them for a while.
“We’re going to take a nap before we have to hunt down vampires tonight,” the grandmother said as Carissa took her baby back to change her diaper.
“I was hoping you’d help me protect the kids since Carissa wants to fight and we’re not sure if her cousin will too,” Danai said.
Zachary wasn’t sure if Danai said it because she really did want help, and that was understandable if someone did learn they were in one of the rooms and came to terminate them, or if it was a way to keep the grandmother out of a fight she might not be able to win.
“Oh.” The grandmother looked at her mate and they held each other’s hands in an endearing way. “What do you think, Oscar?”
“I think the kids would love it if you stayed with Danai and helped to protect them. They adore you.”
“All right. If Carissa wants to fight, I’ll stay with the kids and Danai. She can’t be alone if we have trouble here at the hotel.”
Danai told them about how she and the others had been turned and what that meant to them.
Zachary expected the grandparents to be shocked.
“It’s a brand-new world out there,” their grandmother said, serious as could be. “Just the fact Zachary could get us rooms together and that he and the others could control the hotel staff and the policemen so that Crichton can’t get to them means we have a little better security.”
“I’ll say,” their grandfather said. “We sure need something to help even the odds. We can’t turn humans into hunters like Crichton can turn humans into vampires which gives us a decided disadvantage.”
“Do you have to drink blood?” the grandmother asked.
“Sometimes, yes,” Danai said. “But we can get it from the blood bank. We can hear their telepathic communication if they’re close by, so we can monitor what they’re up to. And we can communicate with them and with each other. They don’t know that we can do this so they’re not guarding their telepathic communication from us.”
The grandmother smiled. “They don’t know you’re hunters turned.”
“No, it gives us a real advantage,” Adonis said.
“All we have to do is show our canines and they think we’re one of them.” Zachary glanced at the time in the room at the alarm clock. “We have to get to the airport to pick up the rest of your family.”
He prayed they wouldn’t have any trouble while protecting the two little boys and their parents.
Carissa motioned to one of her bags. “I have an arsenal of hunter weapons in there that I took from my home. Take what you need to arm our cousins.”
Chapter 10
At the airport, Pasha anxiously watched for the arrivals heading for baggage claim. Since Zachary didn’t know what her family looked like, no one had any family photos on them, he was observing other people at the airport, searching for anyone who might be a vampire on the prowl, attempting to locate hunters with the intent to kill.
“We should have had them come earlier.” Zachary thought the hunter family would have been safer arriving during the day.
“This was the earliest and the last flight they could get on because there are four of them.”
“True. Though if I had been with them, I could have persuaded the airline to bump others so they could fly when they needed to.”
Pasha raised her brows at him. “Wouldn’t that make you a bit of a rogue?”
“Not when we have a hunter family to protect.”
She smiled at him.
He’d halfway expected Pasha to say something to him when he announced to everyone that she was going with him to the airport and not waiting for Adonis to say who went where. Zachary was well-aware Adonis was in charge of this mission, but Zachary wanted to help protect Pasha’s family, and prove to her how useful his vampire skills could be if they needed them.
He looked around again at the tons of people getting off the newly arriving planes. “They can’t carry their blades on the plane. I’m just concerned the vampires will be watching arrivals too. If they have any idea who they’d missed during the onslaught and what they look like—”