Free To Kill An Angel by M. Leighton

house.  It was an old house, sort of off the beaten path.  It didn’t take me long to figure out why it was so secluded.  He was keeping a woman there.  A woman and her son.”
    Annika’s eyes darted to Cade before she continued.
    “The woman was beautiful.  She had dark hair and eyes, and she looked like an angel.  I watched her house until he left and then I went and knocked on the door.  It only took me about ten seconds of talking with her to figure out she was under the influence of his blood.  I knew I would never get any information from her, so I thought to follow Sebastian.  I kept up with him until he stopped in a town in Colorado called Buford. 
    “But just like before, I lost him.  He can just vanish.  It is incredible,” Annika exclaimed, her voice saturated with admiration.  When she saw that no one else shared her fascination, she cleared her throat again and continued.  “Luckily, after a few days of sniffing around, I saw your picture in the local paper in an article related to missing persons.  That is when I knew without a doubt that Sebastian had something to do with your disappearance. 
    “I have traveled around America for nearly five years, seeing the sights and looking for signs of you.  I found nothing so I ended up going back to Texas to try to catch up with Sebastian again.  I had a feeling he would return to visit the woman and the boy eventually, so I hung around there until he visited them again a couple of months ago.  When he left, I followed him as far as Virginia before I lost him again.  That’s where I was when I saw the newspaper article about a rash of missing kids in South Carolina.  There were a few pictures.  Two of them were really blurry, but I still recognized you. I’d know your face anywhere.”
    The smile that Annika aimed toward Bo made me distinctly uncomfortable.  It hinted at a history that made me feel queasy.  Bo seemed not to notice.  He was too wrapped up in her story.
    When it became clear that Bo wasn’t going to respond, Annika’s smile faded and a ghost-of-a-frown appeared. It looked like a tiny dent between her tawny brows. 
    Though it didn’t seem that he really saw me, Bo glanced toward me before he turned back to Annika and prompted, “And then?”
    “Well, the rest is pretty much history.  I came down here and asked around until I found out where Sebastian lived and…well, here we are.”
    Narrowing his eyes first on Annika and then on Cade, Bo asked sharply, “And how did he get to be a part in all this?”
    “Uh, I saw him in town a couple of days later and he recognized me from the first time I visited his mother.  He’d heard that I was asking around about a man named Sebastian and mentioned that he was looking for him as well.  We sort of hit it off and decided we might make good travel companions.”
    Something about her vague answer made me suspicious of what she wasn’t saying, but I thought it best to keep that to myself for the time being.
    “This all sounds very…convenient, but none of it explains how you came to the conclusion that he’s my brother.”
    Annika snorted.  “Look at him!  You two could be twins.”
    Both Bo and I turned to Cade.  His eyes shifted lazily between us, not the least bit ruffled by our examination.
    Annika was right, though.  Bo and Cade were amazingly similar, right down to the intensity that shrouded them like a thick cloak.  Bo began to scowl as he inspected Cade.
    I was wondering about their physical characteristics just as Annika voiced a thought that explained away the doubts I was having.
    “Your mothers must have looked a lot alike, because other than your swagger and your smile, neither of you look like Sebastian.”
    “Swagger?  I don’t have a swagger,” Bo snapped defensively.
    Annika smiled.  “Then that is another thing that has changed because you used to dominate any room you walked into.  You certainly got my attention.”
    Although Bo ignored