Hell Transporter (Between) by Cyndi Tefft

and stroked my hair like he’d always done before.
    I pulled back and gave him a brave smile. “Hungry?” I asked and he nodded.
    The butter had barely begun to melt in the cast iron skillet when Aiden arrived. I practically raced to the door and threw my arms around him.
    I’m fine, love. Don’t concern your Da. His voice was tender with a slight tone of censure. My lip quivered as I looked at him, but I nodded. “Smells good, lass. Mind if I join ye?” he asked, loud enough for my dad to hear from the living room.
    “Aiden, come to see me off?” Dad asked, heading into the kitchen to shake his hand.
    “Are you leaving today, then? I’d be pleased to help you pack,” Aiden offered and Dad laughed.
    “I’ll bet you would, son. I’ll bet you would.”
    “Dad,” I said in my most threatening voice, “be nice.” He turned an innocent smile to me and invited Aiden to join us for breakfast.
    When Dad was finished loading the car to go, he started to shake Aiden’s hand goodbye, but then muttered something under his breath and yanked him forward into a hug, smacking him on the back. Then Dad looked him in the eye, one arm gripping his shoulder.
    “Remember what I said.”
    Aiden nodded somberly and replied, “Aye, sir. That I will.”
    Dad pulled me into a big bear hug. “I love you, sweetheart.” His eyes misted up when his arms relaxed around me. He kissed me on the forehead and gave me another quick squeeze, then turned and got into his car. We stood in the drive, waving to him as he drove away, the dust from the road swirling in a cloud behind him.
    As soon as Dad was gone, I wheeled on Aiden. “You didn’t find anything?”
    He shook his head. “Nae, I searched the woods all through the night and couldn’t pick up the trace.” The set of his shoulders and clench of his jaw told me that guilt was eating him alive. “It’s gone.”
    ‘For now’ is what he didn’t say, but it came across loud and clear.
    “Was that…?” The words lodged in my throat like a wadded up ball of sandpaper. “…what I think it was?”
    Aiden hesitated, like he didn’t want to tell me, but finally he nodded, his face grim.
    “A hell transporter.”
    Hearing the words fall from his lips mowed down my last shred of self-control. Fear slammed into me like a runaway semi-truck and I started to shake all over.
    “But why? What does it want? To… to kill us?” My voice came out in a horrified squeak. My mind conjured up images of Aiden being torn to pieces by the evil creature, blood everywhere, screams echoing through the woods. I squeezed my eyes shut as tight as I could to block it out. “What are we going to do?”
    Aiden gripped my shoulders with both hands. “Lindsey, we cannot let fear overtake us. The enemy wants us to be afraid so we make mistakes. I won’t let that happen.” His eyes held my own with fierce determination until I finally nodded, though my insides still churned with terror at what could happen. “We will defeat the beast. I won’t let any harm come to ye. I promise.”
    “But how?” I asked and immediately wished I hadn’t because I wasn’t prepared for his answer.
    Aiden’s face crumpled into a frown. His fingers curled into tight fists at his side.
    “I don’t know.”
    He strode across the dirt driveway to the woodpile and grabbed the axe with one hand. He placed a new log on the chopping block, swung the axe up in a wicked arc and brought it down with brute force like he was cleaving the beast’s skull in two. The loud crack reverberated through my bones. The pieces of wood rolled in opposite directions, bleeding splinters onto the ground. The axe stuck in the block and Aiden yanked it free, then grabbed another log.
    “Think,” he said under his breath before hoisting the axe up for another blow.
    Crack!
    “What do we know about the beast?” he asked to the woods in general while he bent to throw the broken pieces onto the pile. He recited the details of his first