Fight With Me

Chapter 9

Hope's POV

I opened my eyes to see Mr. Dorian and Dr. Saltzman staring at me.

"Arlington National Cemetery," I said, my voice hoarse. "They're still in Virginia. There was a man who took them. He said he's planning on me coming to rescue the twins, then he can kill me. He said my family hurt his or something; he wants revenge. But the girls are okay—they're bound in chairs but otherwise unharmed."

A sigh of relief escaped Dr. Saltzman, but it didn't last long. "Alright, Arlington is about four hours away. Let's prep."

I headed to my room, putting on music while I packed a suitcase. When "Someone You Loved" came on, it reminded me so much of Josie. I still had her hoodie on, and I didn't have the heart to take it off. I finished packing and met Dr. Saltzman downstairs.

"Kaleb, MG, Raf? What are you guys doing here" Dr. Saltzman? asked, MG responded, "Super squad is here to help."

Mr. Dorian came around the corner last and said, "Alright, let's go."

I hopped into the front seat with Dr. Saltzman driving, while MG and and the boy I now know as Kaleb hopped into the back row, and Mr. Dorian and Rafael sat in the middle row. We wanted to leave now so we could do some recon before running in without preparation. Dr. Saltzman looked over at me, "You should try to sleep; we won't have the chance for much more in the near future."

I glanced to the back seats and saw MG, Kaleb, and Raf all asleep. Mr. Dorian was reading a book about the Peryton on his phone. It was hard to argue with Dr. Saltzman when I hadn't slept in 48 hours and had expended a ton of energy doing the pink crystal visual teleport.

"Wake me if you need me," I said, leaning my head against the window and watching the woods pass by. I pulled out my headphones and started playing "HOLD YOU DOWN" by X Ambassadors. Finally, I succumbed to sleep.

Alarics POV

We had been driving for about two hours now, and it was 1 AM. Just two more hours to go. I looked over to see Hope finally asleep. She had been through so much lately; I knew she needed this rest. Dorian and the boys were also sound asleep in the back. I had music playing quietly over the radio to help me stay awake.

About ten minutes later, Hope started to mumble under her breath. I looked over to see what she was saying. "Josie," she trailed off. There was definitely something going on between the two of them that was causing Hope to dream of Josie.

We finally arrived at a hotel that was within walking distance of Arlington National Cemetery. "Hope," I lightly called her name. She sat up quickly and opened her golden wolf eyes. She blinked a couple of times before they cleared. "How did you sleep?" I genuinely asked, but I was also curious if she would mention her dream.

"Fine," she said, leaning her head back against the window as she rubbed some sleep from her eyes.

I turned around to look toward the back of the car. "Alright, guys, we're here. Let's get inside, then we can sleep for a little longer." I hopped out of the car, followed by Dorian, who helped me check into the hotel. We got two adjoining rooms with two queen beds and a living space each.

I went back out to the car and saw the boys and Hope grabbing suitcases. They followed us upstairs to the rooms. "Alright," I handed each of them a keycard. "These are for your rooms." I turned to look at the boys and Hope; there were four beds in these two rooms, so each of them should grab one. "Get some more sleep. We have a long day ahead of us." Each room also had a pullout couch, so Dorian and I set them up and fell asleep quickly.

Hope's POV

I woke up to see MG still fast asleep on the bed next to me and Dr. Saltzman asleep on the pullout couch. I went into the bathroom and took a quick shower before returning to the room. I pulled out my phone and saw that it was about 8 AM. Grabbing my key card for the room, I carefully opened the door and stepped outside.

From here, I could see the tombstones in Arlington National Cemetery. The view I had right now didn't match the view I saw when I was with the twins. I tried to gauge where the window would have been facing out from. I knew we were probably in a second-story house, and it faced Arlington, but Arlington was around 600 acres. We would have to set up a perimeter later to look for the potential window.

Stepping back inside, I saw Dr. Saltzman stirring awake.

Dr. Saltzman's POV

Hope and I hopped into the car while everyone else was still sleeping. "Alright, what are we looking for?" I asked, looking at Hope since she saw the view out of the window.

"It's a second-story window overlooking the headstones," she replied. "It looked like the house was across the street. If I remember correctly, there's a huge tree in the front yard that blocked part of the view."

"Okay, so we're looking for a house with a tree in the yard and a window facing Arlington. This is going to take a while."

Hope and I were driving around when she told me to slow down and pull over. She pointed up ahead at a yellow house. "There, I bet that's it," Hope said, sounding confident in her answer. But we couldn't just barge into some random person's house.

"Okay, we'll stake it out for the next hour and see if anyone comes in or out."

Hope's POV

Those crime shows made stakeouts look fun, but we didn't have soda and junk food to entertain us. I looked down at my hand and saw it was finally healed. Mr. Dorian and I had been sitting there for about 45 minutes when a man exited the house. He fit Josie's generic description of the man who talked to them.

"Dr. Saltzman, that's the guy who threatened me."

He looked up from his phone and saw him. "We found them."

A sigh escaped my lips as we turned to head back to the hotel.