The Virus Within: Blood Moon (Book 3)

Chapter 4

As the hours crept by, boredom tried to set in, but my Nightstalker instincts came in handy and spurned every attempt, keeping me focused. The downside was that it made every minute just as aggravating as the one before it.

My eyes strayed to a burned-out house beside the highway, whose structure was still mostly standing. Bright green spray paint on the blackened door proclaimed, "It took a bit of work, but I got the spider!!!"

Jess would have appreciated their effort.

If they harm her, nothing will protect them, I silently vowed. My mind persistently circled back to the chase at hand. Had they just taken Nicky, they likely would have bitten off more than they could chew. But they also had Jess, and she wasn't quite as talented as Nicky was when it came to getting loose.

I also had a sneaking suspicion this group was forcing their cooperation by threatening to harm the other if they tried anything, but I couldn't dwell on that since rage swamped my mind if I considered such thoughts. It was so intense it stole the blues out of the sky and the greens from the grass, leaving me with red vision.

"Have we passed another one of Nicky's clues yet?" Nina asked. "It's been fifteen minutes, and we usually find one roughly every ten."

I hadn't been aware she was keeping track – which was a very Nina-like thing to do – but her words made worry flash through me since I hadn't picked up her scent recently, and she had been leaving the spitballs at regular intervals.

"We found her previous clue after the last major intersection," Daniel said, "and I didn't see any sign of them turning around, although they wouldn't have left any obvious signs if they went down one of the small side roads we passed."

Nicky had been leaving us clues on a regular basis, so we hadn't wasted time checking the numerous smaller side roads. So far, this group had only turned at larger intersections. If this was a new tactic of theirs, I didn't like it.

"Should we drive another five minutes and hope we find something?" Daniel asked. "I'd hate to turn around and check every side road only to discover she was being watched too closely for ten minutes to leave something behind."

If we doubled back too soon, we'd lose a lot more time than if we turned back just before our next clue. The decision was agonizing.

"Five more minutes," I finally said, knowing it was going to be the longest five minutes in my entire life, apart from when the seizures had turned me into a Nightstalker.

I stared at the road ahead, desperately wishing we'd come across another clue or round a corner and find them stopped, although we were too far behind to realistically expect such a windfall.

My nose scoured the air for any hint of their passage. I didn't even care if one of the men spit out the window like they had a few times. Surely one of them needed a bathroom break... Such things were infrequent though, and just like most of our trip, my nose wasn't picking anything up.

When the truck slowed down, I knew our five minutes were up. I gritted my teeth and exhaled in frustration. My grip on the handles tightened – not for balance – but in response to my internal rage. The group must have turned off without us realizing it. So now we had to figure out which one of the twenty or so side roads they had snuck down.

At this point, I was very grateful Nicky was dropping hints so frequently. Had she not been, we wouldn't have caught on so quickly. Hopefully she left her next clue close to whatever turnoff they'd gone down, although if she'd dropped it near the highway, I would have smelled it. She was overestimating my nose if she thought I'd detect such a tiny clue from a hundred feet away while riding in the back of a pickup truck.