by Jordan Dane
“Go. Now,” she told him.
Rayne didn’t turn her head. She held her breath, praying her sister wouldn’t see them leave out the side. She walked him to the exit door that gaped open. The door alarm had been the blaring sound she’d heard before. She rushed him through the door and into the cool night air, thankful when they finally reached the darkness beyond the lights of the municipal building. The cops had arrived. Their red-and-blue lights spiraled across the front of the building, cutting through the night sky. They had to get out of there before they were questioned.
As they approached her Harley, Gabriel slowed and stopped.
“I know I haven’t given you much reason to have faith in me, Rayne. After what happened in there, I’m not sure I can count on me, either, but I do want to help you find Lucas.”
She nodded and watched him struggle with more he wanted to say. She waited for him to find the words. Whatever doubts she had about him, they had vanished under the weight of her unexplained yet undeniable need to look after him. Something in this runaway boy felt important, and the fact that he had a bond with Lucas made it easy to trust him.
“Right now, the way I am, I’m a danger to me...and you, if you stay.” He stuffed his hands into his pockets. “I could even be bad for your brother. The thing is, I need answers. I need to know what’s happening to me.”
“How are you going to do that?”
“I have a place I can go, but I’ve never brought anyone else. It could get tricky.”
“You don’t want me to go with you?”
“No. I didn’t say that.” He grabbed her hand. “But I’m giving you the choice.”
Before he said another word, she squeezed his hand. “Then I’m in.”
He looked worried and had trouble looking her in the eye. That should have triggered questions, but she only had one.
“Will this place have food? ’Cause I’m starving.”
“We’ll see. I think I could scrounge you a PBJ.” He smiled and kissed her on the cheek. “I feel the urge to thank you.”
“If it helps, you owe me big.” She grinned, but that faded fast when she saw the look on his face.
“I don’t know what happened in there.” Gabriel got serious. He even looked scared. “Ever since I first saw your brother in my vision, this thing I do has felt weird. I’m not sure I’m in control anymore. That’s why I want you to think twice before you come with me.”
“What do you mean?”
“This time I shotgunned without Hellboy. It all happened so fast, I never felt him and I definitely didn’t go through him.”
Rayne thought about what she’d seen of Hellboy. Gabe could’ve shut him out to protect him, and that was why the dog couldn’t break through.
“But I thought he was your power. Doesn’t everything happen through him?”
After Rayne thought hard, she remembered that the blue flames had consumed Gabe in the library. If he didn’t feel Hellboy and hadn’t gone through him to summon his ability, then the strange, chilling fire had always been his.
Gabe stared at her a long time until he finally shook his head.
“Whatever I connected with in there, I think your brother had something to do with it. I felt the others, the ones in my sketchbook. It’s like...they’ve become a part of me I can’t shake. I reached out this time and something grabbed me back. It wouldn’t let go.”
Rayne touched his arm.
“Did you feel Lucas? Because he wouldn’t hurt you, Gabriel. I know him.” She ran a hand through her hair. “God, listen to me. I don’t understand this. How could any of it come from Lucas?”
Rayne couldn’t move. She stood in the parking lot next to her Harley, staring up at him. All she had wanted was to find Lucas. If Gabriel was right, his bond with Luke might’ve forced him to cross a line, a point of no return. His mind link to her missing brother had triggered something in him—something dangerous.
If he couldn’t control it anymore, what did that mean?
“I don’t know what to think, either, Rayne. I can’t remember everything, but this was something major. I didn’t like it. Not even a little. It was as if all those faces in my sketchbook suddenly came alive, like I knew ’em.”
She pictured his drawings, and the faces haunted her mind, too.
“Oh, hell,” Rayne gasped. “Your sketchbook.”
“What?”
“Your backpack. Where is it?”
Gabe stared at her with his eyes wide and shook his head in stunned silence. They both knew the answer as they turned toward the museum when another police cruiser pulled into the parking lot. No way could they go back inside.
Not now.
* * *
Dr. Haugstad drove her Mercedes down Wilshire Boulevard. In case they found the boy, she’d come with two of Alexander’s men, and one of them sat next to her in the front seat, trying to get a fix on the GPS location they’d been given. The coordinates were for Mia Darby’s cell phone, but with a complex as large as the L.A. County Museum, pinpointing the exact location would not have been easy until Fiona saw the flashing lights of several police cruisers. She didn’t bother with locating a suitable and legal parking spot. She followed an ambulance onto the property.
“This has to be it,” she said. “I don’t believe in coincidences.”
“Close enough.” The man nodded.
The minute she parked and saw the damage, the busted front door and the strange animals and distraught people running from the building, her heart elevated to an alarming rate. If Lucas had been cornered in the building, she had a suspicion of what might’ve happened if he felt threatened. She hoped he hadn’t been arrested. That would only complicate things.
“Quickly, we must find Mia Darby,” she ordered her men and got out of the car. “She could prove to be an invaluable asset, but not if she talks to the authorities. And you...” She pointed to one of the men. “See if there are any surveillance cameras inside. We need those recordings, at least a copy of them. Pay whatever you must.”
Fiona picked up her step and followed her men. When she got inside, she stood in silence as her eyes took in the shocking aftermath. She wanted to remember everything. She had a feeling what happened here would be of great significance.
She didn’t have to look for Mia Darby. The girl came to her with trembling hands and shaky voice.
“You should have seen it. I don’t know what happened. I can’t find my sister and Lucas....” Tears fell now. The girl looked as if she’d collapse.
“Mia, please focus.” She took the girl by the shoulders with a firm grip and looked her in the eye. “Tell me what you saw. Every detail, no matter how trivial.”
The Darby girl rambled about blue lights and animals and people fighting in the middle of an earthquake. If Fiona didn’t know any better, she could have sworn the girl had experienced a psychotic break. Shaking with adrenaline, Mia recounted her story, sounding as if she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder. Fiona had many questions that would have to come later.
Now they had to assess the situation quickly and mitigate damages. She’d overheard witnesses talking about it being an earthquake, and another person thought it had been an underground gas explosion because of the color of the flames. But without books being burned and no other building in the complex affected, Fiona felt satisfied the police would need time to sort things out. They may never come up with an answer, but she had her own theories. Although she had to get the Darby girl out of there to question her under a controlled setting, one question could not wait.
“I need to know more about this blue light you saw. Could you pinpoint where it came from?” Fiona had to whisper. She didn’t want anyone else to hear, especially the police, who were questioning others.
“Yes. It came from over here. The back corner.”
Mia Darby led her down two rows of shelves to a spot where books were strewn on the floor in a heap. Something had definitely happened where they stood and Fiona foun
d a backpack on the floor. The bag was unzipped and she saw a book and a spiral notepad inside, but she didn’t have time for anything more than to grab it before the authorities did.
“Thank you, Mia. You’ve been a great help.” She embraced the girl and let her cry for as long as it took to give the illusion that she cared. “Unfortunately, my dear, we must leave now. It’s not a good idea for you to mention any of this to the police. I hope you understand.”
“Uh, y-yes.” The girl nodded and wiped her face.
“I’ve got my car, but give me your keys. One of my men will drive you home and I’ll follow. You’re in no condition to be behind a wheel. We’ll talk more while things are still fresh in your mind, but afterward I can give you something to help you sleep.”
After she got the girl’s car keys, Fiona wrapped her arms around Mia and walked her outside. By noon tomorrow, she’d have a full report for Alexander Reese and she’d have time to examine the contents of the backpack. Thanks to the Darby girl, Fiona had a pretty good idea what might’ve happened. Her mind raced with possibilities. She could barely contain her excitement.
A Crystal child could have done this. She desperately wanted that to be so and she wanted it to be Lucas, the boy she had discovered. All of her testing and experience through her studies with the church gave her the instincts to recognize these human abominations. Being a doctor, she wanted to better understand what had made them mutate, but through her beliefs, she passionately held that these children were another plague on mankind.
Only a very powerful Indigo could have accomplished this level of chaos—an evolving Crystal child of great magnitude was in the process of “becoming,” but what had triggered him? She had to know. Perhaps Mia could fill her in on more, and the backpack could also hold answers if she got lucky.
She should have been alarmed by what she had seen in the museum and heard from the Darby girl, but a peculiar adrenaline raced through her veins like ice water that made her hyperalert. Everything she and Alexander had undertaken for the sake of humanity lay ahead of her. The Darby boy. It had to be him. They were getting closer. She felt it. Soon she’d have the boy under lockdown in Ward 8 at Haven Hills—completely under her control.
Before she got into her car, she gave an order to the man who had stayed with her.
“Get a team to hack into the traffic cams for the parking lot and the surrounding streets. Unless the Darby boy and the other sister were on foot, we could find something useful.”
Fiona breathed in the night air and stared back at the museum exhibit hall with the spiraling police beacons strafing the entrance of the building. She wanted to remember this moment. It felt like a significant turning point—one that she had instigated with Lucas Darby.
* * *
Lucas struggled to open his eyes and be free of a familiar torment—the nightmare that had escalated and forced him to run away from Haven Hills. Trapped in a twilight sleep, he felt his consciousness lift from his body. He could look down and see his thrashing arms and the sweat that clung to his skin, but he remained tethered to the body that had failed him and kept him a prisoner.
It hadn’t been the fever that kept him from opening his eyes. It had been the dream.
A red-and-white sign posted over secured double doors made him flinch. Ward 8. He felt his arms and legs tied down to a cold gurney. Stern men dressed in white ignored his pleas for help. They took him to a cold room with bright lights. His heart pounded loudly enough for him to feel a punishing throb in his brain. He knew what would come. The dream never wavered. A faceless woman dressed in white always brought pain. Even her voice made him cringe, yet it came muffled as if she spoke underwater.
“No!” he cried, but no one ever rescued him.
Lucas didn’t know what he saw. It could have been stirred by a memory struggling to surface, or someone else’s panicked vision or a dose of paranoia over his uncertain future. In the throes of the dream, that didn’t matter now.
He would have to endure it as if it happened to him.
Chapter 11
Outside L.A.
10:30 p.m.
Rayne filled up her Harley with gas, and with Gabriel directing her where to go, they left L.A. behind. When wide highways turned into two-lane roads, he got quiet and slumped against her back with his arms around her. She knew he had to be exhausted and needed to sleep. He still hadn’t told her where they were going, but simply being alone with Gabriel felt like enough.
Before they’d left the museum parking lot, he’d asked her again if she still wanted to come with him. Her answer hadn’t changed, but she’d had plenty of time to think. Miles of night road, with flashes of Gabriel convulsing in blue flames, had their way of niggling at her insides. Rayne felt good that he still wanted to help her, but she knew that his demons had caught up to him.
Nothing about their situation felt right or good. Whatever Gabe’s problems, they’d collided with her search for Lucas. She understood why Gabe needed answers. He didn’t want to make things worse, but she couldn’t help be worried for Lucas, too. She prayed she’d made the right decision to stick with Gabe. Not knowing how bad things were for Luke made it easy for her to picture terrible things.
Darkness made a perfect canvas to imagine her worst fears.
City lights and concrete gave way to a canopy of moonlight and stars over her head, and the wind buffeted her body. Her headlight swept past tall grasses that whipped by her in a blur alongside miles of fence posts. Painted center stripes dotted a never-ending ribbon of asphalt that led farther away from towns and people. She had no idea where he would take her, but the drone of her engine lulled her into thinking they were safe for now, even though she had a bad feeling it would only be the calm before the coming storm.
Something had happened to Gabriel and they couldn’t leave that behind or deny it or ignore it. He was right about needing help, and if he had a place to go where he could get answers, he needed to do it. They’d both brought their troubles with them, and it would only be a matter of time before they had to go back and face them.
Near Ludlow and the Bristol Mountains, she felt a distinct chill in the air as the elevation changed. Gabriel had her turn off onto a narrow road. She didn’t catch the name of it, only that signs marked with the name Devil’s Playground made her feel uneasy. She knew the Mojave Desert wasn’t far, but in the dark she’d gotten turned around. When they drove up to a dirt road and a gate with a lock on it, Gabriel had her stop and he got off the bike. Without hesitating, he entered a code that opened the gate. For a moment, he looked surprised that it worked.
“What is this place?” she asked.
“If things don’t check out, we may not stay,” he said. Before she asked anything else, he said, “I lived here for a while when I was a kid.”
That was all Gabe said before he climbed onto the Harley and waited for her to hit the gas. But when a cloud drifted over the moon, it blocked out the stars and cast them deeper into darkness. Even under her helmet, Rayne heard the haunting wail of a coyote in the distance and she knew exactly how the animal felt to be isolated and alone.
The private dirt road had no-trespassing signs posted as they first rode in, and her headlight caught the glint off the eyes of animals in the pitch-black. She never got a clear look at what they were before they bolted, but she felt them watching. When the road took a turn up a hill, she felt the strain on her Harley and had to lean into the climb. Gabriel did, too, and he tightened his hold on her.
Enormous trees lined the side of the road, and boulders had been split to cut the pathway up the mountain. In daylight, she had a feeling the view would be breathtaking. But at night, her headlight captured the sheer drop-offs hidden in shadows, and that made the ride more ominous.
As the dirt road flattened out, they rounded a curve and she got a glimpse of lights on the horizon. When they got closer, she slowed down for a better look. A massive stone wall surrounded the biggest estate she had ever seen. Gabriel had take
n her to a mansion in the middle of nowhere—a compound that looked more like a menacing fortress. She gripped the handlebars tighter. When she’d first met Gabriel, she got the impression he came from money. Real money. If he had any history with this place, she had guessed right about him, but that didn’t make her feel any better.
Gabriel yanked off his helmet as she slowed to a stop at the crest of a hill, and she did the same. Rayne breathed in the night air and felt a soft breeze through her hair. She stared at the stone front filled with dark windows that looked like eyes and eerie spires that reminded her of only one place.
“Hogwarts. You’ve brought me to Potterville.”
“I thought you trusted me, Rayne.”
When she heard the smile in his voice, she took a deep breath and glanced over her shoulder. The moon had painted Gabriel in its bluish haze and made his eyes more haunting.
“Yeah, I do. Especially now that I know you and Harry are BFFs.”
Being a smart-ass helped her deal with the wad of fear knotting in her belly.
“Follow my lead and no questions. Remember?” He put his hands on her hips. “I may not be welcome here.”
Not asking questions had suddenly turned into the impossible, but she kept her mouth shut and handed him her helmet. She wanted to feel the wind on her face as she rode toward the impressive front entrance with its wooden doors made for a giant.
She trusted Gabe, but whoever lived in a place like this, they’d be another story.
Downtown L.A.
Having Lucas in her bed when he was injured and sick had been necessary. Kendra wanted him with her, for many reasons. He’d been delirious and plagued by nightmares. He needed her. In his more lucid moments, he didn’t remember the dreams, or perhaps he didn’t want to talk about the hallucinations that had tortured him. She certainly understood that.
But after the fever broke and he was getting better, she felt the flash of heat to her face whenever she touched his bare skin to dress his wounds. The way he watched her, comfortable in their silence, Lucas stared at her with eyes that seemed older than his fifteen years. He was physically beautiful, and from what she sensed of his gentle nature, he had a soul to match. After he connected with her—when their bond went both ways—she felt an addictive rush that she never wanted to end.
