A Cat's Chance in Hell Read Free

still being maintained were the security lights, which were supposed to enable police to patrol it at night. There were eight foot security fences surrounding the perimeter of the stadium, but vandals, drug dealers and teenagers had long since cut holes in the fencing, so the place was essentially open to anyone who wanted to get inside. Tonight Byron; their boss and head honcho at the SMV, aka the Societas Malus Venatori, would’ve made sure that a police patrol, including one of their covert team members, would do a sweep of the place and clear out anyone loitering. The place would be deserted tonight. At least until the Demons turned up.
     
    They left the lights of the City behind and as they sped towards an area where fewer lights blinked in the dark, Kyle knew they were nearing the light industrial and agricultural area that surrounded the Stadium.
    There was a parking area on the far side of the stadium which wasn’t fenced off. Kyle directed Gabi to it and they found that some of the other members of the SMV had already gathered. The stadium loomed large and ominous in front of them; huge openings in the walls that once allowed public access to the interior and now looked like dark maws waiting to swallow unwary trespassers. Gabi parked the blacked out van near the others, turned off the engine and threw Kyle the keys.
    “ I’m going to get dressed and kit up. See what else you can find out,” she ordered, climbing into the dark depths of the van. She didn’t need any light, Gabi could see perfectly well in the dark.
    “ Yes, Ma’am!” Kyle shot back, throwing her a mock salute, and getting out of the van. He pretended to realign his neck, and check his arms and legs were all in one piece after the wild drive.
    “ Idiot!” she hissed from inside the van. “Don’t think just because I can’t see you I don’t know what you’re doing. Now get going or I’m going to spit on all your knives and make them rust!”
    He sighed dramatically. “You can be a cruel, cruel woman Gabrielle Bradford. You know exactly how to poke at all my soft spots,” he lamented mournfully.
    “ The only soft spot around here is your head!” Her retort was muffled by clothing.
    He chuckled and sauntered off to join the others. A team of three was busy climbing back through a tear in the fence and they quickly loped over to report the area clear. He touched base with everyone else who had already arrived; none of them had any more information than he did, so he headed back to the van to update Gabi.
    When she emerged from the van, a bystander probably wouldn’t have known it was the same woman. As she stepped into the dull light thrown by the security lights he could see why they called her Angeli Morte. Angel of Death. That was the name she’d earned for herself among the greater supernatural community, though her fellow Hunters tended to use a different nickname for her, one that Kyle had been calling her for years. She was dressed in black, toughened leather pants, a tight-fitting Kevlar-reinforced jacket and black flat-soled boots and with her hair tied up in a severe knot. She’d made no attempt to hide the myriad of weapons attached to her body in every conceivable way. She appeared cold, ethereal and deadly. Kyle knew just how deadly. She was one of more recent additions to the Hunter squad but she’d already notched up the highest number of clean kills. She stepped out of the van and began pacing back and forth across the tarmac, stopping every now and then to stretch out or warm up her muscles, running through short sequences of complicated martial arts moves.
    Due to Gabi’s hair-raising driving they ’d made good time to the stadium. They had ten or fifteen minutes before they could expect any kind of action and he’d gone to the calm, quiet place he went to when a difficult fight was staring him in the face. He leaned back against the van and watched the members of the other Elimination Teams arrive and begin