Page 7 of Act of Brotherhood
Bastard.
There had been others like Mengele. Sick fucks who hid behind the label of science, doing as they pleased. Some were brought to justice. Many weren’t. And others were supernaturals who had managed to go below the radar. Garth could only hope time had ended them and that they weren’t still conducting their tests.
One look around the lab told him his hope was pointless. There were simply too many similarities to the past to ignore. And if Garth noticed it all, Hans and Jannick had to as well.
Jannick was also part of Team Eight. Garth had specifically requested the brothers be on his team when they’d come on with PSI after being freed from Nazi labs. Garth knew that even though neither man would ever admit it, they needed to be around one another. That they were each other’s pillars of support.
It was a twin thing.
Garth wasn’t sure where Jannick was at the moment. He’d splintered off earlier with Hans and the rest of the operatives to finish clearing the lower levels, so odds were, he was close. And he no doubt was having as many issues with what they’d discovered as Hans.
Garth knew that during their tragic past, Hans and Jannick, had been held captive in facilities built to hold supernaturals, and the testing they’d been forced to endure would have killed a human within seconds. Yet the twins had been forced to live with the torture and experiments for years. Their hate of Nazis knew no limits. They held no shame for being German, but they held much hate for Hitler and those who had done the man’s bidding willingly.
Garth put a hand on his friend’s shoulder and gave a gentle squeeze, in an attempt to show support for the man, as he could see the inner turmoil the scene before them had caused.
“There is more,” said Hans, his words clipped. “Jannick and the Fang Gang are in the labs beyond this one. Brace yourselves.”
“It gets worse?” asked Rurik, disbelief in his voice.
Hans nodded but said nothing more as he went through the lab and to a large metal door. It was the kind of door one expected to find on a commercial freezer in a restaurant. Not in the basement of a mansion. Of course, there was a whole lot of shit in the mansion no one would have guessed would be there. Hans opened the door and stepped back.
It was Garth who went through the door first. He stood in stunned silence for half a second, taking in the sight before him.
There were rows of metal cribs that resembled cages, like one would see in a hospital, lining one side of the large stark white room. The majority were empty but not all of them. Some held children of varying ages.
Garth fought to keep from being sick at the sight of it all. In that moment, he knew his heart wasn’t totally hardened from life. That it wasn’t frozen as his father’s had been. It could still feel, and it was shattering for the children. In all his life he’d never harmed a child. The very idea of doing so sickened both him and the wolf he carried within him.
Children were to be protected, no matter the cost. They were gifts from the gods.
The Fang Gang operatives were busy listening to orders that Auberi barked at them. Many of the operatives had children in their arms. Auberi had trained as a doctor more than once throughout his long life and was more than capable of taking charge of the dire situation, despite the fact the guy was an asshole.
If memory served, the vampire had also fallen behind enemy lines during World War II. Garth didn’t know the details, but he knew enough to understand Auberi hadn’t been spared torture and testing either. Neither had a number of the men in the Fang Gang.
Landros, who had been shot in the leg during the taking of the estate, held a little girl who looked to be around the age of three or four. Her huge blue eyes were haunted and hollow. Her long black hair was matted in spots and Garth wasn’t sure if it was curly or snarled from lack of care. What hedidknow was that she was grossly underweight, as were all the children from the looks of it. The neglect was palpable, and made him want to kill every person who’d had anything to do with it.
Rurik wouldn’t need to bother with the dirtbag outside. Garth planned to puree the fucker himself.
The need to step closer to the little girl in Landros’s arm came over him, as did an immense drive to protect the child, no matter the cost.
Landros apparently felt the same way, because his eyes flashed to black and back to brown again quickly. It was a warning from his vampire to Garth.
Come closer to the child and risk its wrath.
Garth wasn’t sure exactly how old Landros was, but he knew the man came from Ancient Greece. He also knew he had a history as a warrior, as did most of the men in PSI, and Landros had personal demons. Ones that didn’t have fangs.
They’d sparred a number of times over the centuries, and they’d even fought on opposing sides during wars in the past. Garth knew what the Greek was made of; a fight between them would be epic.
Still, for the little girl, he was willing to do whatever it took to be sure she was safe.
She twisted slightly in Landros’s arms and buried her tiny face into his chest. She peeked out at Garth and offered the smallest of smiles, instantly calming his stirring beast. “Is she okay?”
Landros shook his head. “I don’t know. My gut says she’s not, and I smell something strange upon her. Do you? It’s sickeningly sweet.”
Taking a deep breath, Garth caught the faint undertones of something else. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but it was there. His beast began to beat at him slowly from within. It didn’t like the scent…or what it meant.
Danger.
Death.
