Queen of Quarantine

by Caroline Peckham

  I smiled darkly at her, accepting the knife that Saint passed me as Jonas tried to fight against my hold on him, stamping on my feet and throwing elbows back at me. But I ignored every attempt he made and every hurt he caused me, focusing on the idea of our girl suffering and the knowledge that I was about to pay him back in kind.

  I swept the blade across his throat, spraying an arc of blood out over the streets below and listening to him choke on it for several long seconds before shoving him out to die.

  I didn't waste time watching him fall, turning back to Tatum and yanking the restraints off of her as Saint took the knife back from me and made the nurses get to their feet.

  They were crying and begging but the coldness in Saint's gaze held no mercy for them. They had been a willing part of this. They’d been onboard with kidnapping Tatum, making her suffer, watching the sickness eat away at her strength bit by bit while stealing her blood until eventually it would have killed her. So fuck them.

  “You still need me to fly this thing!” the pilot cried, clearly having seen the way this had gone.

  "Shut the fuck up," Saint snapped, his words for all of them. "Or I'll throw you out of the door too."

  They miraculously quit their petrified pleading just as I managed to pull Tatum into my arms, my throat tightening with the desire to rip this fucking gas mask off of me and lose myself in the taste of her lips.

  "Nash," she murmured, her skin so pale it made my heart race and she sagged against me as I heaved her into my arms. “Where are Blake and Kyan?”

  “They’re okay,” I promised her, hoping I wasn’t fucking lying because I had no real idea how that fight had gone back at the lab and the comms had been quiet since we’d parted company.

  Tatum sighed in relief before her eyes fluttered shut and my heart leapt as I feared the worst, before she opened them again. She looked seriously weak, her skin pale and drawn and she started coughing as I held her, turning her face from me like she wanted to protect me beyond what the mask was doing. But this thing was the best money could buy and I wasn’t worried about that.

  "What's wrong with her?" I bellowed, looking around at the nurses as Tatum seemed to struggle to even stay conscious.

  "Swear you won't stab us and we will tell you everything," one of them begged, her eyes on the knife in Saint's hand.

  "Done," he agreed without even glancing toward me and Tatum, his focus on the last remaining threats.

  "Her body is struggling because we took a lot of blood from her. She's been exposed to a high level of the Hades Virus to force her to produce plenty of antibodies so that we could harvest them. That’s why she has symptoms, she’s been pushed beyond what her immunity can cope with all at once," the nurse choked out. The other one seemed to be too terrified to even speak.

  "Harvest?" I snarled in disgust, pulling Tatum closer to my chest.

  "What treatment does she require?" Saint demanded, ignoring me like he already knew exactly what the nurse meant by that and I bet he fucking did – the fucker had probably become a self-taught virologist in the time we’d spent hunting for her with all of his online courses and bullshit. Not that I was faulting him for it.

  "M-mostly just rest, time to recuperate. She needs to replenish her blood levels and fight off the virus. She should make a full recovery though," the nurse said, almost smiling like she thought she was saving her ass by letting us know that Tatum had a good chance of getting better.

  "So she has no desperate need of a medically trained nurse?" Saint confirmed and the dumb bitch actually shook her head.

  "No. Just rest and lots of nourishing food and-"

  Saint shoved the two of them so hard that they fell backwards out of the open door without even seeming to realise what had happened until it was too late. Their screams carried back to us as they fell to their deaths and I couldn't find it in me to feel a single molecule of guilt over them. They'd chosen to take part in this. They'd chosen to hurt our girl. Their morals were clearly beyond questionable and I didn’t even care if they’d been telling themselves that they were trying to save the world to justify her sacrifice. Because Tatum Rivers was worth more than the rest of the world in my opinion. Retribution was a bitch.

  Saint cast one long look at Tatum as I tightened my hold on her, reaching out to smooth his fingers over her knotted hair as he looked down at her through the visor of his gas mask.

  "Don't stop fighting now, siren," he commanded and she shook her head minutely as she held his gaze.

  "Never," she swore.

  Saint nodded once, giving me a look that said he was trusting me with her then strode into the cockpit, taking a pistol from one of the dead guards as he went and pointing it at the guy's head.

  "You can't kill me," the pilot gasped, seeming to realise that he was the only one left, though while we were fuck knew how high up above the city, he couldn't exactly get out of his seat to try and fight us off. "You need me!"

  Saint sighed like his patience was being tested beyond measure and I got the terrifying impression that he was about to do something insane as he gave the control panel a considering look.

  I sat down quickly, strapping Tatum into the seat beside mine before buckling myself in too and winding a protective arm around her as she leaned her head against my chest.

  "I knew you'd come for me," she murmured, seeming to fight for every word she spoke.

  "Always," I agreed, holding her as tight as I dared while she was so frail. I was so fucking relieved to have her back, so glad to be touching her, holding her, it made everything else pale into insignificance.

  “For so long I thought the only real meaning my life held was in seeking revenge for what Troy Memphis did to my family,” I said to her in a low voice, not even certain she could hear me over the roar of the helicopter. “But I was so fucking wrong. So, so wrong, Tatum. Because fearing for your life almost destroyed me. It made me realise that I have so much more to live for than some vendetta. I love you. I love you with everything I am and everything I’ll ever be and I’m sorry if I didn’t make it clear how strongly I felt that before now, or if you ever felt you ranked below my desire to-”

  “I love you too, Nash,” she replied, her voice stronger than it had been up until this point and I looked into her blue eyes, wishing I could rip this mask off and just fucking kiss her. “And don’t worry. Because we are absolutely going to get that revenge.”

  Saint fired his pistol before I could reply and the entire helicopter lurched violently, nosediving towards the ground and making me yell out in fright. He killed the fucking pilot! Holy mother of fuck!

  I wasn't afraid of much in this life or the next, but falling out of the sky and being incinerated in a helicopter crash was a pretty fucking terrifying concept.

  "Saint!" I bellowed as my gut plummeted and I twisted my head to see him ripping the pilot's corpse out of his seat behind the controls.

  "Calm down," he snapped back, like we weren’t moments away from colliding with one of the many towering buildings below us. "I am more than capable of flying a basic model like this."

  I just fucking gaped at him as he took the pilot's seat, grabbed hold of the joystick looking thing in front of him and began to battle against the tailspin we'd begun to fall into.

  My heart raced and thrashed in my chest as I saw my death flashing before my eyes and Tatum's hand found mine, squeezing tightly for a brief moment before falling slack again.

  We lurched to the left then somehow the helicopter righted itself and we were soaring away across the city.

  As I tried to catch my breath, I brushed Tatum's hair out of her eyes and found her struggling to look up at me as she seemed on the edge of passing out.

  "The vaccine," she breathed, her voice so weak I could hardly make out the words. "In the silver box. It works."

  Her gaze flicked to the far side of the helicopter and I followed her line of sight to a silver box which was strapped to the wall there.

  "Well, fuck," I b
reathed as I stared at the most valuable commodity on the planet right now, tugging my girl closer as I bathed in the feeling of her body against mine and Saint flew us towards the crescent moon in the distance.

  What the hell were we gonna do now?

  "W e've got her," Saint's voice came over the comm at last and my heart soared as I took cover behind the elevator bank, pink smoke swirling around us as my shoulder brushed Kyan's.

  My chest was heaving and a layer of sweat was making my Kevlar vest feel like a straightjacket, but there was no way I was taking it off. Especially after seeing it save Kyan’s life.

  "About fucking time," Kyan snarled, his visor peppered with blood splatter and a savage, triumphant grin making his eyes blaze as he looked at me.

  A relieved laugh spilled from my lips and if we didn’t have armed men hunting us down and trying to kill us, I would have whooped in triumph too.

  The sound of the fire trucks and police sirens approaching were growing louder by the second and I peeked out of my hiding place to take a glance towards the stairs, wondering if we should make a run for it.

  I ducked back into cover just as a bullet flew towards my head and my heart leapt as bits of the wall sprayed over me as it hit.

  "I took control of the heli-" Saint's voice was lost to the roaring sound of an engine and I exchanged a look with Kyan, wondering if I'd just imagined what I thought he'd said. "Plan X," Saint added in a firm voice.

  "Plan X?" I questioned, activating my comm and wondering if I'd misheard him.

  "I assume you're capable of carrying out that simp-" his words were drowned by more roaring and as the flash of red and blue lights flared through the glass front of the reception, we were left with no more time to confirm what he'd said. But it had been pretty clear. Plan X it was then.

  Saint had contingencies for his contingencies, and we’d spent the day in the car watching Jonas’s house memorising each of them and his code names for them so I knew exactly what he wanted. But shit, I hadn’t in my wildest dreams expected to be implementing Plan X.

  "Let's get the fuck out of here," Kyan growled, checking the assault rifle he'd stolen and tossing it aside when he found it was all out of ammo.

  "Easy," I agreed with a frown, wondering how the fuck we were supposed to do that.

  The emergency exit was on the other side of the room and no doubt surrounded by cops even if we could make it there with the guards still firing on us. I could see the squad cars lining up beyond the glass front of the building through the haze of pink smoke too, the police leaping out and aiming weapons our way.

  We were surrounded. And I sure as fuck didn’t want them catching us. Not least because then Troy would definitely figure out who had rescued Tatum and we couldn’t let him find her again.

  Kyan pointed to a sign for the restrooms in the rear corner of the reception area and took off running with no further explanation than that, firing wildly towards any guards who might see him.

  I sprinted after him, keeping my head down and conserving the last two bullets in my pistol just in case.

  Kyan shoved through the door but just as I darted in behind him, a shot crashed into my spine and I was knocked from my feet onto the tiled bathroom floor.

  I groaned as Kyan slammed and locked the door behind us, prizing my cheek off of the tiles and hoping to fuck that they were just damp because they'd been mopped recently. Why the hell did men’s restrooms always have such gross floors? I certainly didn’t aim that badly.

  "Get up, buttercup," Kyan growled, heaving me to my feet despite my curses as the pain of the bullet's impact through the Kevlar made me wince.

  Fuck getting shot. Fuck it right up the ass.

  Kyan plucked the bullet out of the bullet proof vest and slapped it into my hand, letting me look at my would-be murderer for a beat before we were moving again.

  "There aren't any windows in here," I said, trying not to panic, but seriously, we were fucked if we couldn't get out of this building.

  "Yeah, so no one will expect us to escape this way," Kyan agreed before moving to the cubicle at the far end of the room and kicking the door open.

  I hurried after him and found him standing on the lid of the toilet as he jammed his hunting knife into the edge of the vent there. He ripped the grille from the wall and tossed it aside, quickly followed by the fan before looking at me.

  "It's gonna be tight," Kyan warned and I glanced at the hole in the wall with a frown.

  Before I could voice my concerns about getting trapped in there, Kyan had already heaved himself halfway up into it. A loud banging sound came a moment later and I moved to brace his legs for him while he worked to break the outer grille too.

  The sound of it shattering carried to me and Kyan started heaving himself forward, cursing as he went. I shoved him hard when he seemed to get stuck, my hand smacking his ass as I forced his big body forward and suddenly he fell through to the far side.

  The sound of someone trying to break down the bathroom door made adrenaline spike through my limbs and I shoved the cubicle door closed before locking that too. I doubted it would do a whole hell of a lot to save my ass, but maybe it would buy me a few more seconds.

  I climbed up to the hole left by the broken vent and forced my way into it, wondering how the fuck Kyan had made it through as I got jammed inside it almost instantly.

  I cursed and Kyan's hands found mine from outside, tugging me roughly and damn near ripping my arms from their sockets, but it worked.

  I fell out of the hole in the wall and scrambled to my feet behind some bushes. Kyan pressed a finger against the ventilator on his mask as he warned me to be quiet.

  I nodded my agreement and he pointed towards the building on the far side of this little area of green, giving me all of half a second's warning before taking off towards it.

  I stayed low like Kyan, ignoring the flash of red and blue which showed around the side of the building and thanking our luck that the police didn't seem to have the place entirely surrounded yet.

  My heart was racing as I sprinted after Kyan, over to the next building then down an alley which ran along the back of it. We vaulted a wall then ducked down another alley and somehow, we made it to Saint's mom-mobile where he'd parked it up in the shadows.

  Plan X was one of Saint's contingencies for this all going to shit, and he'd made certain that each of us had a key to the mom-mobile on us in case we got split up. I yanked mine from my back pocket, unlocking the car as we closed in on it.

  Kyan went for the driver's seat, but I was faster, laughing as I knocked him aside and leapt in. Kyan grumbled as he slid over the hood and got in on the passenger side. I locked the doors because I couldn't actually allow myself to believe that we'd escaped yet then started the engine.

  My heart was still racing, but as I turned us around to exit onto the street furthest from the cops, I couldn't help but let out a whoop of laughter and Kyan started chuckling too. Against the odds, we’d somehow made it out and I couldn’t believe our damn luck.

  I had to force myself not to drive too fast as we sped away from the lab and left our problems in the dust. But by the time we hit the highway, I slammed my foot down on the gas and really made the mom-mobile work. To be fair to Saint, he had clearly bought the best soccer mom wagon money could buy and the thing was a beast, but I'd never admit to him that it actually drove pretty damn nicely.

  "Are you there yet?" Saint's voice came over the comm just as I turned us off of the highway towards the empty farmland we'd chosen at random for our rendezvous point in case things went to shit. I only remembered where it was because Saint had fucking drilled the coordinates into my mind a million times, and I'd used the sat nav to get us here. Meticulous asshole.

  "Coming up on it," I confirmed.

  "Good. We'll have no time to waste once we land." He cut the communication off and I glanced at Kyan.

  "He seriously stole their chopper, didn't he?" I said, my eyebrows arching.

  "O
nly Saint Memphis," Kyan replied, shaking his head as we came to a stop.

  No sooner had we stepped out of the car into the cool air, did we hear the unmistakable sound of a helicopter drawing close and I watched as the chopper lowered down onto the field beside the road.

  "Blow this thing up, Kyan," Saint barked as he hopped down, carrying a silver box in his arms and striding towards us. “With a bit of luck they’ll think it crashed and all the dead bodies we scattered over the city were people who either jumped or fell from the aircraft before it hit the ground.”

  Kyan gave him a sarcastic salute as he stalked forward to carry out Saint's command, but my eyes were fixed on Monroe as he leapt down, cradling an unconscious girl in his arms.

  I ran to open the back door of the car for him before retrieving the blankets Saint had stashed in the trunk. The moment he climbed in with Tatum, I wrapped them around her and climbed in behind him.

  "Is she alright?" I asked, trying not to freak the fuck out at the sight of her lying there looking so damn frail.

  "Don't worry about me, golden boy," Tatum murmured without opening her eyes, her hand reaching out in my direction.

  I ripped my bloody, dirty gloves off and took her fingers in mine, wrapping them up tight and lending her my warmth as a smile touched the corners of her lips.

  Saint climbed into the driver's seat and he glanced back at us, nodding once as he determined that we were all breathing. He shoved the silver box into the gap between the chairs and I eyed it curiously for a moment before turning my attention back to Tatum.

  Kyan ran to leap back into the passenger seat and Saint tore away from the helicopter a moment before it went up in flames with an enormous boom that made the entire car vibrate.

  "Are you okay, Cinders?" I breathed, my eyes still on my girl.

  "I am now," she replied softly. "I'm back where I belong. With my Night Keepers."