by JL Terra
At the end of the alley, two guys turned the corner and headed toward her.
Mei gritted her teeth. They looked like trouble, but it was hard to tell from this distance. One was taller. That was about all she could make out of them, apart from the white hair on both of their heads, almost glowing in the light that reflected from a window above.
Yes, she carried a gun, but that didn’t mean she wanted to use one in the city where the street corners had a microphone system to pick up exactly that sound and then inform the police that the shooting had occurred. She approved of the system when it was used to save innocent lives and help to curb crime, but when she was the one holding the gun, it was a whole different story.
Mei didn’t need attention drawn to her. She’d had enough of that already after what had happened at the center that morning. Sheila had been texting and calling ever since. The police wanted to talk to Mei and get a statement. Of course, Sheila would think that was a perfectly normal thing to do. Too bad Mei couldn’t afford to have her personal information on any electronic record.
She’d lived her entire childhood on the run with her mom. In hiding. Safeguarded. She’d still been captured as a teen, held for days and experimented on. There was nothing special about her. She knew that now. After all, if there was, then her hands would be burning right now.
But here she was, standing in front of these guys without a weapon to defend herself and with no ability to command the sword so that she could deal with them quietly. It was little more than an annoyance at this point. Kind of like the lingering questions over who that man was who’d shown up at the center this morning and what he wanted with Bella. Not to mention where the teen was right now, considering she hadn’t replied to any of Mei’s texts.
The guys were close enough now she could make out their faces. These two guys were the ones from outside the house earlier. Was the sword simply not appearing for the same reason it hadn’t before? Not until she had been upstairs and the danger had been imminent. It was possible this situation was not one where she was at risk. However, this alley meet-up was obviously no coincidence. Not with the way these two guys were watching her as they approached.
If this went sideways, Malachi would probably step in. After all, the whole point of him being in town was to watch her back, right? Follow her.
Mei curled her hands into fists and then stretched her fingers out. Nothing. No burn.
No sword.
That had to mean no danger, right?
And yet, they kept coming.
“Let me guess, Ricardo sent you?” As she spoke, she noted the fact that they both had weird, red eyes. Coupled with the white hair, they looked markedly different than they had earlier, outside Bella’s home.
“Since you’re here, you can tell me where Bella is.”
They only crept closer. Neither said anything as they closed in.
Mei waited for the burning in her palms.
But it never came.
Back at the house, she hadn’t even needed the sword. Sure, the guys might have smacked her around a little bit, but she had floored all three of them and left Ricardo with a broken nose. No fuss. No weapon. Now Mei just wanted to find Bella before they did—so she could make sure she was safe. She was afraid Ricardo was going to take his frustration with her out on Bella because he knew they were friends.
Neither of the men had said anything still. But now they were close enough to reach and try to grab her.
Mei wished again for the burning of her palms. What if the last time had been the last time? Maybe the sword would never show up again, and she’d never know what she was supposed to use it for. Not that she wanted to know; she’d lived enough life to know that some things were better left alone.
The taller one, the younger guy, grabbed her arm. Mei twisted her hips and slammed her fist into his stomach. He doubled over, coughing. The older guy who seemed to be in charge lunged for her other arm.
She tried to twist the other way, but he locked up on an underhook before she could get out of reach. The first guy recovered and regained his grasp on her. Now each had a hold on one arm and they pushed her forward, moving as though trying to pull her arms behind her back. Mei winced at the wrench in her shoulders and gritted her teeth but didn’t give them the satisfaction of crying out. As if.
Then she lifted a foot and slammed it into the younger guy’s knee. He went down, which caused him to let go of her arm. She used her free hand to grab the older guy’s shirt. He seemed to be attempting to drag her along. Like he was trying to force her somewhere. A van, like last time?
She wasn’t about to allow that to happen again. She wasn’t planning on going anywhere with this creep.
With his grip on her arm, and her grip on his shirt, she brought up her knee the same way she did to the guy in the entryway of Ricardo’s house. But unlike that time, it didn’t work. He twisted at the last second, and her knee glanced off his thigh.
Pain ricocheted up her leg. He grunted. The grip he had on her arm squeezed in a way that distributed pain up and down her arm. He swung his free arm toward her and she timed a jab at his head at just the right moment. Their hands collided in a tangle and her forearm slammed into his. She winced.
Wasn’t Malachi watching this whole thing?
Couldn’t he help at least a little?
The younger guy launched up and slammed into her. She fell to her back and cried out as her hips slammed into the ground and he landed on top of her. All the breath escaped her lungs in a rush.
She yelled, “Malachi,” at the top of her lungs.
There was no response.
The man on top of her grabbed for her arms. Presumably trying to pin her. Before he could, Mei brought both hands up between his arms and then used her right hand to strike the heel of it in an upwards motion. She meant to slam it into his nose but instead caught the edge of his jaw. It served the same purpose, though, when he started to slide off her. Mei got her leg out from under him and kicked him in the stomach. The younger guy collided into him, and he fell to the other side while the other one landed on her.
Ugh. She managed to inhale enough to yell, “I could use some help, here!”
The man on her now couldn’t be budged, despite her repeated attempts to get enough of a hold on him to shove him off her.
He reached for her neck, apparently having abandoned his plan to drag her to their vehicle. Now he was just going to strangle her to death.
Mei tried to suck in a breath. No air. The weight of him on top of her chest, along with his fat fingers closing around her neck, would be the last thing she remembered of her time on earth. Was Malachi just going to stand there and watch her die? She shoved again at the man on top of her. Still nothing; he was too heavy. White spots flickered in the edges of her vision. This wasn’t the way she wanted to go out. Being strangled to death took a few minutes, which almost made it worse because she would know what was happening the entire time. Mei would much prefer to go out quickly.
The younger man slammed into the one on top of her, dislodging the grip on her neck. They hadn’t coordinated this attack at all.
Mei sucked in a free breath. “Malachi!”
Finally, the response came. “Admit you need my help.”
He wanted her to ask? “No!” She yelled the word back, her voice breathy. As if she was going to admit out loud that she needed his help?
She could want it. Mei could also admit to herself that it was true that she needed him. Right now. But saying things out loud gave them power. He knew that as well as she did.
Which was why he was going to make her say it.
And exactly the reason she didn’t want to.
As the two men grappled for the chance to be the one to take her out, Mei managed to scramble out from underneath them and kick one in the head.
“I don’t need your help!” She yelled out into the air, hoping Malachi heard her.
Admittedly, she could have used it. But that didn’t me
an she wasn’t fully capable of taking care of herself. After all, she’d been doing it for years now. Nothing changed simply because Malachi had come along.
She scrambled over onto all fours. Before she could stand, one or both of the guys jumped on her back. Mei slammed into the ground. Her jaw glanced off the asphalt, and she hissed out all the frustration and pain she was feeling. The guy posted his hand on her ear, forcing her cheek against the greasy pavement.
“Fine,” she muttered to herself while struggling to keep her face from being ground into a powder. Having acouple hundred pounds of weight on her back was no joke. “Malachi!”
“You’ve got to yield to the fact you need my help. That’s how this works.”
She’d thought that was what she was doing. “So you can wade in like the hero, and not like some creepy stalker following me around because you’re grossly attracted to me?”
She wanted to know if he had feelings for her, though probably right now wasn’t the time to challenge him so she could find out.
The man on her grabbed a handful of her hair. Uh-oh. That wasn’t good.
She felt the dark wig she'd grown accustomed to wearing start to slip from where it had been adhered to her skin. She groaned in frustration. Enough. She was done with being on the ground. Attacked. Tossed every which way. Messed around. Holding a sword. Not holding it. The thing appeared when it wanted and didn’t when she actually needed it. The whole situation was maddening.
“I’m not attracted to you. That isn’t what this is.” His voice was close. He’d come over.
The guy on her back lifted up in the direction of where Malachi stood and took a step forward.
“Oh no you don’t.” She clawed her way up off the ground and jumped up behind him, grabbed the guy’s jacket, and used it to swing him back. He slammed into the second one, who seemed to be shaking off dizziness.
The two of them faced the attackers. Side-by-side against the threat.
Don’t go there.
Fine, she liked him. Problem was the whole fact that it was a terrible idea. After all, she wouldn’t be able to hide from him, and he’d realize all her secrets.
The two men stood. One pulled a needle.
Injection. That was what had happened to the redheads who’d been killed. Drugged and taken, then murdered. For what?
This couldn’t be a coincidence. Not with her life, or line of work. Or the truth of what lay under her dark wig.
Something she hadn’t thought related to anything but an inherent power inside her, acting of its own accord. Until she saw those photos—the series of victims who all shared a correlating characteristic with her.
Killed, because someone was hunting her.
She pressed her lips together and tried to fight off the wave of fear and exhaustion. Pain. Danger was nothing new in her life, but she didn’t know how to shoulder the fact she was responsible for the deaths of so many. She’d tried to avoid the weight of that blame for a long time, knowing all the while it would eventually catch up with her.
All of it had the cumulative effect of making her want to collapse and descend into oblivion. Preferably in her bed, after she took an extremely hot shower and washed off this terrible day. But if she pushed herself and tried to ignore it, her body would eventually shut down.
The needle guy started toward her, apparently unconcerned that Malachi was beside her. Would he defend her? That was why he was here, right, despite him not wading in until now? His agenda was irrelevant. She didn’t even care what he wanted, or what made him act like this.
Yeah right. She wanted to shake her head, but then they’d all know she was talking to herself.
He held the needle up and glared at her with those red eyes. The white hair continued to shock her—it was as if both men had gone gray in the last few hours despite not aging a day in any other way.
Both reminded her of the man who had stumbled into the center, acting out of it, just asking for Bella. Unwilling to converse, let alone cooperate.
Before he could jab her with the needle, the other man’s attention shifted to Malachi. His red eyes widened. His mouth dropped open, and he made a moaning noise for a second before his head dipped and his upper body folded forward. “My lord.”
Uh…what now?
Before she could figure out what that was all about, needle guy launched at her. She struck his arm and the drug went flying. She heard it clatter to the asphalt a split second before he latched onto her. She realized too late that his mouth was open.
A thud sounded. Malachi.
The man’s teeth were bared, heading toward her neck.
Shock paralyzed her. What on… Mei forced herself to move.
At the same time, Malachi slammed a gun down on the man’s back, and those teeth sliced into her shoulder instead of her neck, glancing off her skin like knives.
She cried out; her leg gave way and she landed on one knee. Footsteps pounded the asphalt.
“Mei!”
Her shoulder burned, and she tried to stand but couldn’t make her limbs move. Couldn’t speak. Her head swam.
“Mei!”
She collapsed onto the asphalt and blacked out.
Chapter 5
Mei blinked and looked at the room around her. She was at home. She knew that much. But the room spun, and her vision blurred. Pain rippled through her, wrenching and contracting every muscle. She writhed on the couch while her skin burned hot and sweat dripped down her face.
A cool cloth touched her forehead. She hissed at the feel of it against the heat of her skin. Her back bowed off the couch into a severe arch and she managed to let out a strangled cry of pain and frustration.
“I can’t call Remy. There’s nothing she can do.”
Mei couldn’t answer. There was no way her mouth could form words right now when she could barely think at all. The fire inside her continued to blaze her skin until she felt like her whole body was about to go up in flames. The pain came at her relentlessly. Like a knock on a door she wanted to answer but couldn’t. It just wouldn’t go away. Constant, scorching pain.
Even after everything she’d been through in life. Being shot, kidnapped, and experimented on…she had never felt anything like this. She just wanted it to be over.
Darkness attempted to overtake her. To pull her down into its cavernous depths. A place where her nightmares reigned, and Mei had to fight to keep hold of her sanity.
Her arms were bound at her wrists to the table under her, her ankles too. A needle jabbed into her arm. He had already taken far too much blood, making her head swim. He ran it through his machines, muttering to himself and shaking his head as he jotted observations in his notebook. He added a new drug to her IV, and she woke up facedown on the bed. Still secured. Panic raced through her. He swore out loud and lightning birthed in her hip. It didn’t let up until he moved away from her, taking with him a huge syringe of cloudy liquid.
Heavy hands shook her awake. “No, don’t do that. Stay here. Don’t go there with him where you’re helpless. Not when you escaped that place and you are far from powerless here. Stay with me. Here, where I can make sure you survive this.”
She knew his voice. The comfort of his hands wasn’t as familiar. Still, she wanted to be wherever he was.
But Mei wasn’t entirely sure that survival was what she wanted. She couldn’t last much longer. She knew that much. Peace and rest were just out of her grasp, and if she allowed herself to fall into the darkness, she just might be able to take hold of them. Even if it was a sea of nothingness swallowing her down.
She wanted to feel nothing. Certainly not the terrible pain inside her right now. To feel nothing would be worth the risk—and she had never before wished for death.
He needed to stop trying to save her and let her go so she could be free of this torture. It wasn’t like they were anything more than colleagues, even if he did have a basic care for her as another human being.
She tried to speak but could only moan her disapp
roval. Her mind wanted to scream at him. Just let me go to sleep forever.
She had never allowed a man in her life tell her what to do. Not even, Ben, the man she’d considered her father, had been able to make any kind of decree and have her actually follow it. Never mind that he hadn’t been able to fulfill that role in her life. At least, not until more recently when she’d joined his team and her respect for him had grown to the point where she might actually think about doing what he asked of her.
But this was different. It wasn’t like she was in any condition to stand up for herself at the moment.
Ben wasn’t here, though. Neither was her mother—who always knew what to do.
This was…Malachi.
She managed to moan some semblance of his name. The cloth dabbed her forehead again, then her cheeks. The coolness of it felt good, but it wasn’t enough to touch the raging heat inside her.
He mumbled, “Remy.” Even in her disoriented state, she recognized the name of her best friend. Everyone called Remy when they needed help. She could literally do almost anything.
As if reading her mind, he continued to carry on a conversation with himself, “She won’t know what to do. This is beyond even her.”
She felt herself come unhinged. Like her entire body was going to go up in flames. She started to panic. Thrash around.
The cloth touched her again. This time it was almost as hot as she was, causing her body to contort again. Every muscle tightened. Her joints wrenched, and she heard a snap. Ice cold fire rippled through her hand.
“Okay. Enough of this. Time for Plan B.”
She didn’t know what Plan B was, but she wanted him to try it. Anything. Now.
She heard a grunt and the touch of warm skin pressed against her mouth. Tangy, metallic liquid touched her lips and trickled into her mouth, the taste saturating the back of her throat. Her stomach rebelled against it, and her throat tightened, trying to stop the invasion. A lump rose, and she choked on the first mouthful.
