by Sarah Biglow
Declan was dressed when I returned. He’d found the coffee pot and had already started it percolating. I liked the look of him in my space. Sharing breakfast with him felt all domestic, but in a good way. I wasn’t sure I’d ever find something like this. He doesn’t know everything yet. I silently told the little voice in the back of my head to fuck off.
“It’s disgustingly hot outside so I’m not sure how good this is going to be,” I announced and set the take-out bag on the counter.
“So, you have any plans for today? I thought maybe we could hang out or something,” he said. “Though I probably should grab a shower and a change of clothes,” he commented and looked down at his rumpled polo shirt.
“Not if we didn’t leave the apartment,” I hinted and leaned in to kiss him.
“As much I like that idea, I probably need to let my parents know where I was last night and everything.”
I nodded. “After breakfast then.”
Reheating dinner turned out to be a bust. Too long in the heat had done terrible things to the sauce. So, I rummaged through my refrigerator finding some eggs and sausage. It wasn’t the world’s greatest breakfast, but it would do. We sat across from each other at my tiny kitchen table when Declan set down his fork and asked, “So, how long do you think we have to stick around with Kirkpatrick? I mean I get they want to study us or whatever, but we have to be able to move on with our lives. Get jobs or do whatever we’d planned on, right?”
“I’ve been involved with them for a few years now. They pay me enough to live here. Would I like to eventually go somewhere else and get out of Everston? You bet. But, for now, I’m happy where I am. I’m still learning the limits of my powers. Until I know for sure they won’t evolve or do anything strange, I’m staying put,” I replied. I wanted to tell him the other reason I was sticking around, but I knew it wasn’t the right time.
“I don’t know what else there’s to learn about mine,” he said and dug his fork into the remains of the food on his plate.
“Wait a minute, we just learned you can heal and recover faster than most people from serious injury. That’s a pretty big deal.”
“I guess so. And believe me, being able to heal fast is great and all but what does it really matter?”
“It matters a lot. Think of the possibilities. If they can figure out what part of your DNA allows you to do that, there are so many ways that it can help people.”
“I never really cared about the science stuff behind it. Or never understood it. Biology wasn’t my best subject.”
I could feel he was looking for a way out of Kirkpatrick and Lena’s grip. “Look, if you don’t want to work for Kirkpatrick anymore, I’ll help you leave,” I said, knowing I was entering dangerous territory.
“I like helping people. I’ve always liked that part of this but the whole company thing. I don’t know, it kind of rubs me the wrong way.”
“I understand, believe me. Like I said, if you want out, I will help.”
‘Thanks.”
The conversation died down as I finished the last few bites of food and set the plates in the sink. “I’m going to grab a quick shower,” I said, stopping short of offering to let him join me.
“I’ll be here.”
I grabbed clean clothes and headed into the bathroom. I let the water steam up the room before getting in. It felt good to let the water wash away the worry of the last day. It was the first time in the last three years I’d really felt nervous about being around people at headquarters.
I emerged ten minutes later to find Declan just sitting at the table, my phone where my coffee cup had been only a short time ago. “Some dude named Felipe has been blowing up your phone since you went in there. Is he like an exe or something?” he said.
“No, he’s just a friend. I told him about our … fight. He’s probably just making sure I’m okay.”
“He’s texted you like twenty times. Maybe you should text him back.”
I shook my head. “He’ll calm down.”
In the back of my head I knew I should see what he’d sent to me, but I wanted to be here and present in this moment with Declan. I was resolving to not think about the future and that meant letting the other people in my life wait for just a hot minute. It couldn’t be all about answering to them at the drop of a hat. “You ready to get out of here?”
“Yeah. When we get there, just give me like twenty minutes to clean up and change. After that we can head out and go wherever. Doesn’t matter to me.”
“Sounds perfect.”
We walked out into the oppressive heat and I climbed behind the steering wheel. I leaned over and kissed him long and slow. I put the keys in the ignition and revved the engine. The roads were empty as I pulled out onto the dirt road that would eventually turn into the far end of Main Street.
Without warning, the truck started drifting to the right. I pressed my foot down on the brake, but it had little to no effect. “Hold on!” I gripped the steering wheel tight spinning it as fast and as hard as I could in the other direction, finally managing to get back to the road.
“What the hell was that?” Declan said, his hand gripping the door handle tight enough to bend it out of shape.
I had a sinking feeling it was more of a “who” than a “what”. But, even if Reese had figured out I was up to something, he wouldn’t run me off the road. Would he? I needed to focus on getting us to a safe place. Declan’s house was out of the question now. So, without answering Declan’s question, I floored the accelerator and heard the tires squeal as they fought against the unseen force keeping us from moving.
“Seriously, what is going on?” Declan shouted.
“I’m going to get us out of here,” I said and rolled down the window. A bright blue ball of flames flickered to life in my palm. I lobbed it along the body of the truck in the general direction of our attacker. My foot was still pressing the gas pedal to the floor and we sped forward, slamming me back into the seat, knocking the breath out of my lungs.
“You need to tell me what’s going on,” Declan ordered.
“Someone is after us. Someone with powers. I slowed them down but this isn’t over. Hang on.”
“Someone with powers? You mean they’re trying to kill us again?”
“Looks like it,” I answered and pulled off the dirt road onto what was little more than a cart track through an abandoned field. The truck jostled along the uneven terrain, clearly not happy about plowing through tall grasses.
I could see the other end of the field and the road that connected it to one of the other backroads in town. We’re going to make it. The front tires hit a rock sending us airborne. Just when I thought we would come back down, gravity went haywire and the ground was above us. I reached for Declan’s hand and held tight as darkness consumed me.
Chapter Fifteen
Declan
Light and sound assaulted my senses as everything came back to me way too fast. My ears rang and my eyes watered. I coughed and something in my side sent lances of hot pain through my entire torso. I blinked to try and clear my vision finding myself hanging upside down. How’d that happen? I groaned and wiped at my face. My hands came away covered in soot and I coughed again.
“Henry?” I croaked.
No answer.
I tried to look around and realized now that the car was upside down, hanging from a tree. My head pounded and my brain was fuzzy, but things were starting to click back into place. Someone had tried to run us off the road. I yanked on the seatbelt that felt like a boulder crushing my ribs and the buckle came free, sending me on a collision course with the dashboard and windshield.
It was then that I realized the soot and coughing was from a fire raging beneath the hood, likely in the engine block. The steering wheel was also a melted mess beneath Henry’s hand. His head hung forward, hair obscuring his face. I reached over, ignoring the pain in my ribs to brush it aside. He had a big cut on his forehead. I felt for his pulse and sighed when I found it t
hrobbing steadily in his neck.
We needed to get out of this death trap before it exploded. I did my best to slide back giving myself some room and started to kick at the windshield. My hands might be like steel, but it didn’t mean the rest of me wasn’t equally as strong. My ribs ached with every movement, but I ignored them. After three solid kicks the glass shattered, spraying little shards everywhere.
“Hang on, I’m going to get you out,” I promised Henry and let gravity take me out of the truck. I winced as my back made contact with the fiery hood.
My legs buckled under me when I hit the ground. The flames licked at the edges of the truck’s frame. I didn’t have a lot of time, but I needed to take stock of my own injuries before I tended to Henry. I felt my ribs and found the sharp point of one poking out through my side. I’d clearly broken it in the impact. It also explained my pain when I coughed and took more than shallow breaths. I needed help, but my phone was still in the truck—probably useless at this point.
‘Spencer, if you can hear me, I need help. Hurry. Please!’
I had no idea if he’d be able to hear me all the way out here. We hadn’t really talked about what he’d been doing in terms of testing his own abilities. I had to hope it was enough as I regained my balance and trudged back to the driver’s side of the truck. Henry was still hanging there, silent and unmoving. If I hadn’t already checked for a pulse, I’d question whether he was alive. I thought I could hear the wail of sirens in the distance, but it could have just been wishful thinking.
“Fuck,” I swore as my hands tugged on the superheated handle of the driver side door. Henry’s power had probably melted the damn thing shut. I balled my hand into a fist and started punching the glass of the window until it, too, shattered. I ignored the tiny cuts as I struggled to free Henry from the seatbelt. We must not have hit the tree hard enough to trigger the airbag which only increased my fear that his injuries were worse than they appeared. He slumped forward when I ripped the seatbelt material free of the buckle.
“I got you,” I said and did my best to hoist him out of the truck without opening the door.
I managed to get him away from the wreck right before the fire finally hit something extra combustible. The entire truck went up in a plume of dark smoke and angry orange flames. I coughed and dragged Henry as far as I could manage away from the scene and toward what I thought was the road we’d been aiming for.
I’d been so focused on getting free I didn’t stop to think about our attacker. Something—a piece of metal—hit me from behind and darkness clouded my vision. A second blow sent me to the ground with Henry’s weight on top of me and the world went dark.
I couldn’t say what roused me the second time. I opened my eyes slowly and panic took over. My head ached, but I was still definitely alive. Where am I? And where’s Henry? I tried to sit up, but the pain from my ribs stopped me.
“Take it easy. You’ve been through quite a lot,” a deep voice said off to my left.
“Where am I?” I wheezed.
“Somewhere safe,” he answered.
I tried to take in my surroundings. Thick wood-paneling boxed me in on all four sides. I was laying on a bed pressed up against one of the walls and when I lifted my hands to my face, I found an IV in my left hand. I tried to pry the tape away, but the owner of the voice appeared and gently took my hand in his.
“I know you are disoriented and scared right now. But you need to try and stay calm.”
“Henry?” I said, my mouth dry.
“His injuries were more severe than yours. We’re treating him now.”
“Is he going to be okay?”
“With your help, we think so,” he answered. He looked almost familiar, but I couldn’t place him.
“Who are you?”
“Enough questions for now.” He held up long bands of gauze. “I’m going to wrap your ribs to help with the healing. Try to stay still okay?”
I gritted my teeth through the pain as he wrapped the gauze tightly. I could almost feel the broken bones trying to knit back together. It was hell, but I suspected it would be over soon enough. The doctor—at least I assumed that’s what he was—injected something into the IV in my hand. I didn’t have time to question it. The sweet pull of something strong wrapped around me, sending me into a deep sleep all over again.
When I woke up for the third time, I felt much better. The ache in my side was more of an occasional pinch and my head was clearer. I was able to sit up without wanting to vomit. All of those were good signs. I was still in the wood-paneled room, but I was alone. I yanked the IV out of my hand and left the room behind. The doctor had been right in thinking that the gauze would aide in the rapid healing, but I needed to find Henry. I needed to see for myself that he was going to be okay. And then I was going to find whoever was after us and give them the beatdown they deserved. I heard voices down the hall and one of them sounded like Henry.
“Henry!’ I barreled through the door and into the room where his voice was coming from. I found him sitting up in bed. His forehead had a much smaller bandage than I’d expected and his breathing seemed normal. I spotted a pair of IV bags, one with a clear fluid and one with what looked suspiciously like blood hanging from a pole over his left shoulder.
“You look better,” he offered.
“You said his injuries were worse than mine. How is he sitting up talking?” I demanded, eying the doctor warily.
“We should have this discussion somewhere more private, Mr. O’Bannon.”
“How do you know my name?” I stared at Henry who was looking anywhere, but at me. “What the fuck is going on?”
“Perhaps I should leave you two to talk first,” the doctor said and he quickly retreated from the room.
“Henry, who is he? Where are we?”
He exhaled slowly. “His name is Clayton Kirkpatrick.”
“Wait … Tina’s psycho mad scientist father!?”
“He’s not a psycho or a mad scientist,” Henry said softly.
“And you know that how?”
“Because I’ve been working for him these last three years.”
“No. You were working for Tina’s mother,” I countered in confusion.
“I’ve been spying on the company for him.”
I shook my head. None of this made any sense. Why would he be spying for the man who made us into fucked up lab experiments? “No. That’s not true.”
“It is. Declan, I’m sorry. I thought I was being careful but I slipped up and they figured it out. I never meant to put you in any danger.”
“Did they tell you to get close to me?”
“No. They had nothing to do with how I feel about you. Felipe warned me it would be dangerous but I told him I didn’t care. That I should be happy and go out with whoever I wanted.”
“Your friend who was furiously messaging you before we ended up in a fucking tree?”
“He was warning me to watch my back, to be on alert. I should have listened. I thought I sensed someone following us last night and this morning. But I didn’t want to believe that I’d messed up that badly. I didn’t want to worry about what would happen when they did find out. I just wanted to be with you.”
“I can’t believe this. How do I know you’re even telling me the truth right now?”
He touched the side of his neck. “The blocker tech that Lena gave me, to keep Spencer and Marisol out of my head. They had to remove it after the crash. Get him here. He’ll know if I’m telling you the truth.”
Spencer. I’d forgotten about my mental plea for him to find me. If he’d actually gotten it, I had little doubt Tina would have tracked my phone to the crash. But, how were they supposed to find us here? Wherever here is? “He doesn’t even know where we are. I don’t know where we are.”
“Clayton will give you a phone. Call them. Get them all here, quietly. It’s time they knew what was really going on.”
I didn’t know what I believed, but I knew my friends would help me f
igure this shit out. If that man was really Tina’s father, I was honestly giddy to see her rip him to shreds. So, I marched out into the hallway and back to the room I’d been in. Clayton stood in the middle of the room, like he’d been waiting for me.
“Henry says you can give me a phone. I’m not talking to you or listening to whatever you have to say until my friends are here though.”
“Of course.” He pulled a phone from his pocket. “There’s a pre-programmed text ready to be sent with our GPS coordinates. You just need to put Tina’s number in there.
“You’re really her father?”
He looked away. “I’m not much of a father. We will talk when they arrive.” He left the room. I dialed Tina’s number and waited while it rang.
“Who is this?” Tina snapped on the other end of the line.
“Tina, it’s me,” I said.
“Declan? Shit, you’re okay?”
“Not sure about okay but I’m alive. I’m going to text you some coordinates. Bring Spencer and Marisol, but no one else. And don’t tell anyone. There’s someone you all need to meet.”
Chapter Sixteen
Henry
I hated seeing Declan look at me like I was a stranger. The rational part of my brain told me it was to be expected. I’d kept this whole side of myself from him. I’d kept it from a lot of people. I hadn’t done it to hurt him and I’d committed to my role as spy long before he came along. But I also understood his hurt and sense of betrayal.
“Look who’s not dead,” Felipe said, appearing in the doorway to my room.
“Yeah, just barely.”
He cocked his head to one side. “What, no sassy response?”
