Page 29 of In the Monster's Wake
Because Jasper was sure that if someonewaswatching him, it could only be Kester.That meant that he needed to be careful and not do something stupid like confront the monster.If Kester wanted to talk to him, he wouldn’t be hiding in the shadows.No, he just wanted Jasper to know that he was there.He no doubt enjoyed this kind of mental torture.
Jasper didn’t want him to feel like he had won, so he kept his back straight and walked into the building.Was he afraid?After everything he’d heard about Kester, he definitely was.He wasn’t a fool, and he knew how dangerous Kester was.Jasper might have been a hunter once, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t be hurt.
And if there was one monster who could hurt him, it was Kester.
Chapter Nine
“How is the investigationgoing?”Leroy asked Jasper as he pushed past Corey and walked into the apartment.
Jasper and his friends needed to be more careful when they opened the door.Hell, maybe they should stop opening the door when someone knocked.It would make their lives more complicated, but they wouldn’t have to deal with Leroy regularly.
“What are you doing here?”Jasper asked.“I was just leaving, so you can’t stay.”He wasn’t about to force Corey, who was the only one in the apartment apart from Jasper right now, to hang out with his father.
Leroy looked Jasper up and down.“And where were you going?”
Jasper crossed his arms over his chest.“I’m not sixteen.Where I’m going is none of your business.”Although maybe Jasper should tell him that he was headed out to see Archie.They didn’t have an appointment or anything, but Jasper wouldn’t be solving this investigation by staying at the apartment.
Archie had better things to do than babysit him, though.He had a job, while Jasper had taken time off his to find Kester.It wasn’t a great idea.Jasper couldn’t spend his entire day looking for Kester, and Archie had other jobs to deal with.That gave Jasper too much free time, and while he’d been using it to dig into the hunters’ archives, it hadn’t told him much.He could go out on his own, but frankly, Kester scared him.He was pretty sure that if he was to encounter the monster again, things wouldn’t end the way they had the first time around.He doubted he’d make it home in one piece—if he made it home at all.
“You need to take this seriously,” Leroy snapped.
Corey glanced at Jasper, then stepped out of the living room.He was abandoning Jasper, but Jasper didn’t blame him.He’d be running, too, if Leroy weren’t his father and he wasn’t obligated to deal with him.
“Iamtaking this seriously.I already fought this monster once, remember?I know what he’s capable of, and I don’t want anyone else to get hurt.It’s just not as easy as you make it sound.”
“You’re home instead of being out there hunting.”
Jasper glared—not that his father cared.“I was heading out.You’re the one slowing me down.”
“You were going out to hunt the monster?”
Jasper understood why his father wanted Kester hunted.The monster was hurting people—hurtinghunters.As far as Leroy was concerned, that was one of the worst things anyone could do.Still, there was a certain urgency in him that made Jasper wonder if there was more to the situation.He already knew his father was hiding something.He needed to find out what that something was.
“You told me everything you know about Kester, right?”he asked.
His father’s attention shifted to the rest of the apartment.“I told you everything I knew.You went through the archives, too, didn’t you?You know everything hunters know about Kester.It shouldn’t be a problem for you to find him.I can help you if you need me to.”
