Bad Storm

by Jackie Sexton

  “I know.” I said. I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it. “And I know they’re thinking about it too. I mean, I want to believe that Aamir means well. He’s just, he’s not a bad guy. I feel it—or at least, I felt it.” A blush crept up on my cheeks, and Sierra turned her head, catching my embarrassment.

  “Do you still—”

  “No,” I interjected quickly. “I want to be with Trent. There’s no question. But I don’t want to believe that my judgment was so awful…I mean, I thought he genuinely cared about me. And I care…or cared about him. I know we can’t really ever be friends, but I at least thought that I could respect him…”

  Sierra’s green eyes bore through mine. “Maybe you can. Maybe it’s not him that’s doing all this.”

  “I mean, I really don’t think he is,” I admitted. I knew I had my bias, and it was probably really hard-headed of me to refute all the evidence otherwise. But then I recalled that moment with Gita, when she took away my energy…

  “But he could just be a pawn,” I said slowly, the pieces coming together in my mind. “Crap Sierra, I think we’re on to something. I mean, it’s not like I get this magic stuff, but if I’ve been in contact with Aamir, maybe there’s some way that one of those nymphs could get to me…”

  “Nymphs…” Sierra screwed up her face in concentration, as if she was trying to recall the word. “Oh, right. The ones who manipulate the energy of the empaths.”

  “Yeah. And Aamir is an empath. I don’t know how it all works, but there’s a way that this is not his doing…”

  “Maybe he promoted you guys as a way to communicate to you,” Sierra suggested.

  “But couldn’t he just text me?” I wondered, feeling for my phone in my pocket. It had been suspiciously free of messages lately.

  “Maybe the nymphs can intercept technology. Or like, the head honchos of the Cyrus organization.” Sierra sounded super-excited, like she had just figured out some huge conspiracy.

  “Maybe…” I mused. “Well, let’s try to get some sleep. I’m pretty tired,” I admitted.

  “Alright,” Sierra agreed, turning over on her side. “Just don’t go disappearing on me.” She yawned.

  “Don’t worry,” I said, my eyes drifting shut. I was surprisingly exhausted, especially mentally. “I’ll stay put…”

  I woke up gasping for air. It must have been about two in the morning when I awoke. It was suddenly, with a start. I couldn’t explain it, but I knew it was trouble.

  There was a swamp and fear. It wasn’t a dream, but rather an image that I couldn’t erase—it was happening at that very moment. Someone needed my help.

  I looked over at Sierra’s sleeping body. She was out like a light. And I could sense that no one else was in the house. And it was pouring out. The beginning of the storm.

  I needed to do something—to act. But I didn’t know how, or who was trying to reach me.

  Then I remembered Aamir’s necklace, hiding in a shoebox beneath my bed. Maybe, just maybe, it could help.

  I knew it wasn’t what the pack wanted, but there was a strong pull inside of me.

  He told me to wear it if I was ever in trouble.

  Well, there was no doubting that I was in trouble. And it was possible that he or his people were causing it.

  I sat up slowly, watching Sierra’s chest rise and fall. She didn’t stir. I got up slowly, my heart racing at a hundred miles per hour.

  I just needed to communicate the issue with Aamir—at least ask him if he knew anything about Lark.

  I just couldn’t continue to be a victim the way I had been. I felt the strong urge inside of me to move. The fear and the swamp kept fading in and out of my mind, like a familiar scene from a movie.

  I tip-toed quietly out of the living room and into the hallway that led to the front door. Brandon’s keys were still hung up on the key hook—it was pretty typical of him. He was constantly relying on someone else to let him in.

  I took them and opened the front door quietly, but it still creaked. I was lucky that Sierra sleeps like a log. It’s nearly impossible to wake her up. I locked the door behind me, the cool, stinging air reminding me that the storm was beginning. I knew I shouldn’t be out. But it was just a tropical storm. I had walked through one before…

  And since my moped wasn’t there, I had to walk, trekking through the harsh whipping winds, feeling an intense jolt of thrill and energy inside of me. What was I doing, walking around in the middle of night, alone, like a weirdo?

  But I was on a mission, and as quickly as I thought those things, I pushed them out of my mind.

  The streets were empty—not a soul or car in sight. Thankfully my apartment was close by enough that I was there in less than ten minutes—though it felt like forever, watching the palm trees whip around, the wind howling viciously in my ears, like angry ghosts.

  Back in the apartment, I rushed over to my room, pulling the necklace out from under my bed, holding the hot pendant in my palm. I shivered, just looking at it. There was a part of me that told me ‘no, don’t do this.’

  But the guilt took over, reminding me that Lola could be in trouble. She could be in major trouble.

  And it was all my fault.

  I took a deep breath and unclasped the necklace. I brought it around my throat, the pendant falling just beneath my collarbone, warm and comforting. It was like Aamir’s touch, strangely, pulling me into a calm, Zen state.

  “It’ll be fine,” I muttered to myself. He was coming, and everything would be sorted out.

  I stood up off the carpet and walked back out of my room to the living room. I hadn’t really thought my plan through past this point, but I knew it was what I had to do. I had to go back to the house and wait for the guys.

  I searched the hall closet for my umbrella and rain boots, the howling wind outside exacerbated by an onslaught of noisy, torrential rain.

  “Well, this will be fun,” I muttered. I didn’t have the option of riding my moped, since it was still at the venue, but I knew that the storm really wasn’t supposed to get nasty until 3 AM or so. I checked my phone—I had an hour.

  Pulling on the black, rubber boots, I thought for a moment I should stay in my apartment. It was safer, and I knew it was the typical Floridian thing to snub my nose at a tropical storm like it was nothing. But I hated the idea so much of Trent coming home and not seeing me, of getting worried. And I knew he didn’t have his cell phone on him.

  It just seemed so logical.

  I opened my front door, the wind much stronger than before. It was pushing back hard against me, and I suddenly had doubts about making the trek back.

  But the soothing necklace betrayed my better judgment, and I felt bizarrely calm as I stepped out and locked the door behind me, opening my umbrella and taking my first few steps down the stairs.

  And that’s when it hit me, like a ton of bricks.

  Like, literally I fell back on to the steps, hitting my head hard against the cement stairs.

  “Fuck!” I howled out in pain. I couldn’t even open my eyes, the pain was so overwhelming. And something, or someone, was pressing me down, keeping me from moving.

  “Gotcha,” came an eerily familiar voice. I opened my eyes slowly, the stinging tears making it hard to see.

  But in the faint yellow light of the street lights, I could make out the shadow of a face, covered in a familiar black hoodie.

  “Lark,” I muttered, anger, pain and confusing all seething inside of me.

  “The one and only,” she said with a wicked laugh. then she tossed me over her shoulder like a bag of flour, and she was off, ripping through the hectic night wind.

  Chapter Eight

  It was the place I had dreamed about. Dark, dingy, the gutted out inside of an old diner.

  The crab shack.

  They had claimed the old crab shack. But why hadn’t it been more obvious?

  I couldn’t think about anything else as I struggled against the metal diner chair, my arms ti
ed behind the back of the chair with some invisible rope or curse.

  I was sweating profusely, my legs sticking to the cheap plastic seat cushion beneath me.

  And before me, was a familiar, tall, statuesque woman with hair the color of midnight and searing blue eyes.

  “Gita,” I grimaced, trying to intimidate her, and failing miserably.

  “Save your breath you impure infidel,” she growled, narrowing her eyes at me. She was sitting on the old counter, her legs crossed casually and resting on the red cushion of a bar stool, some of the stuffing ripped out and falling over her heel.

  Yeah. She kidnapped me, tied to me to a chair with witchcraft, and was wearing heels.

  I hated her on oh so many different levels.

  “I don’t know who you think you are, interfering with my brethren and turning yourself into some monster’s bride, but I’m going to make an example out of you.”

  “Where’s Lola,” I seethed, still struggling futilely against her magic chains—or rather, the chains she had made Austin, Fun Aim’s roadie, bound me with. I wasn’t going to give in without a fight—I had spent so much of my life in fear thanks to bossy, pretty girls like her.

  Well, not today. Not if my life depended on it.

  Which it did.

  “So concerned for your little bitch friend,” she smirked wickedly. Lark laughed behind her, turning her head from the window for a moment to sneer at me. It seemed like she was keeping guard or something. Austin had his arms crossed over his chest, standing right in front of me, as if waiting for Gita’s commands.

  “Don’t call her that,” I said, suddenly terrified that they had hurt her. Austin snickered.

  “Oh, a soft spot for the one who put you in this position, huh?” she laughed cruelly.

  “What does that mean?” I asked, even though I knew that I probably didn’t want to know.

  “She wants you dead, Bailey. We used her to tap into your mind. That’s how we knew where you were.”

  “Bullshit,” I said, feeling a tremor of fear come over me. I fought hard to keep the grimace on my face, to keep her from winning. But she was already getting to me, making me wonder if all this wasted effort on Lola was going to get me killed…

  “I like your spunk,” Gita laughed. “Too bad you went and wasted it on being a dog’s bitch. It’s a shame you have to die.”

  “Don’t call me that!” I yelled.

  Gita shook her head, closing her heavy lashes. “We’re going to have to shut that filthy mouth of yours.” She snapped her fingers, and Austin looked at me intensely—suddenly my lips were stuck together by some invisible force, like glue was binding them shut. I tried to yell, but it just sounded like a muffled noise of a child screaming into a pillow. From what I could tell, Gita was transferring the energy to Austin, meaning Austin was an empath.

  “Now, where was I? Right. We were going to sacrifice you.” She turned her head to look out the window, and then turned back with a wicked smile.

  “The weather is fabulous, isn’t it?” I could only think as hard about my panic as I could, and scream Trent’s name over and over again in my mind.

  “Don’t bother trying to be better than it. This storm isn’t ordinary, it’s cutting off all of that sick mental communication you dog people have.” She stood up, sliding her lithe body off the counter.

  “Now, with the power of three, this storm will give me the life force of one.”

  I had no idea what she was talking about, but Austin didn’t seem phased at all. Lark, on the other hand, turned around with a perplexed look.

  “Three? I thought you said two.”

  “I lied,” Gita grinned, before sauntering towards Lark, staring straight at her. Lark looked like she was getting tired, and she held her hands to her face as she cried out, “no, you bitch!”

  Then she passed out on the floor, lifeless. Her brown skin turned gray, and then cracked, chipping off slowly into dust until there was nothing but a pile of dust in black clothing.

  “Now,” Gita turned to look at me, taking slow, steady steps in my direction, until she was standing next to Austin. “You’re number two. Don’t worry, you’re no vampire. You’ll have a body your loved ones can find and mourn over.”

  I was silently screaming, trying to call Trent. But it wasn’t working—just like Gita said it wouldn’t. And after I saw her kill Lark in cold blood, I knew she wasn’t bluffing.

  I was going to die.

  She pointed a red, polished finger forward, dragging it down the side of my face.

  “What’s this?” she said, her eyes glowing with curiosity. She moved her hand down to my throat, where the pendant sat against my skin. Then she looked angry.

  “Aamir made this,” she said, her voice hushed. Then her eyes flicked back up to mine. “That idiot gave this to you.” She curled her hand around the pendant, and tugged at it harshly, the chain digging into my skin. I wanted to yelp, but it was muffled.

  “Never mind him,” Gita snapped. “Austin, are you prepared to receive her energy?”

  “Ready,” he replied, his face hard. The nice, buoyant guy I remember joking with Aamir was completely gone.

  “You see, Bailey,” she said my name like it was poisonous. “I’m going to take your life force away, your energy. But Austin here, he’ll turn it into something constructive. See, the storm gives us one life once we sacrifice three. He’s going to secure your power, and use it to wipe out that nasty little pack of yours. That way you heathens are eliminated, for good.”

  ‘No,’ I thought. I was screaming in my mind, relentlessly, but in vain. I couldn’t believe that this was going to be the end, but when Gita stared at me, her gaze cool and filled with that penetrating heat, all I could think about was Trent.

  And how much he needed to know that I loved him.

  But just as I felt the tingling, draining feeling, Austin said in a low gravely voice, “he’s here.”

  She snapped her gaze away from me, and I took a deep breath in from my nostrils, regaining what little composure I had. Thankfully, she didn’t get to far in draining my energy.

  Gita ran over to the room and turned her gaze to Austin, snapping her fingers. Austin nodded curtly and followed behind her, crossing the room in several impressive steps.

  The door to the shack swung open, revealing Aamir in the doorway, staring them down with an intensity I had never seen before in his normally calm brown eyes.

  “What the hell, Gita,” he said angrily, his words like rolling thunder.

  “Why hello, Aamir. Nice of you to join us. Unfortunately we’re a little busy right now,” she sneered, jerking her head in Austin’s direction. He raised his hands up, and Aamir went flying back out into the torrential rain.

  But Aamir came back with in seconds, raising a hand and sending Austin flying to the other side of the room. He collided with the wall with a loud “thud” and slid down to the floor, a crumpled, unanimated body. He groaned, and it was the only thing that indicated he was alive.

  Suddenly, even Aamir filled me with fear.

  “Gita,” he growled lowly, “what is this?”

  “This is what happens when you start fraternizing with the enemy, Aamir. I had to put you in your place. To remind you what being one of us is about.”

  “You are absolutely insane!” He looked in my direction and raised his hands. I felt a warm energy come over me, and suddenly, my wrists fell to my sides free. I opened my lips, warm with a tingling sensation.

  “This is not going to make you The High Priestess of Cyrus. This is going to get you ostracized!”

  “We have very different opinions,” Gita said with a small laugh. I was so annoyed, so enraged, that I could hardly think or hear anything but her shrill, obnoxious laughter. I charged at her, running square into her back and knocking her to the ground.

  “Get off of me!” she screamed. I raised a hand and curled it into a fist. Without even thinking I struck it into her pretty face so hard that my own knuckle
s ached.

  Aamir pulled me off of her, but he wasn’t very forceful about it. It was more like he was helping me up than anything.

  “She’s not worth your time,” Aamir growled, staring down at her with the most intense contempt I had ever seen.

  Gita’s face had a bright red mark on it, and I realized with shock that I had caused it. I looked down to my own hand, as if trying to figure out how it happened.

  “Whatever,” she hissed, “even if you got in the way, that little blonde one is still going to die.”

  “She what?” I said, slightly hysterical. A grin crept across her lips, and I knew that my reaction pleased her.

  “You heard me. That same Lola that betrayed you? She’s the other sacrifice. We were just waiting until we got a hold of you before disposing of her. She was our link into your mind, so we knew the perfect moment to send Lark after you. Then, we went out and left her to brave the elements. The storm likes to devour one sacrifice on its own.”

  “Where is she?” I wailed, throwing myself at her again. Aamir caught my arms, keeping me from tearing up her stupid face. The image of the dark, stormy swamp came back to mind.

  “As if I’d ever tell you,” she jeered, standing up from the floor and brushing the dirt off her skinny jeans. “Besides, she’s probably already dead by now.”

  “No,” I said, the thought running through my head in horrific cycles. It just couldn’t be. Lola couldn’t be dead.

  But just as I was about to loose it, the thought struck me. She was in my mind, right? She knew what was going on with me. Maybe she knew what I was thinking.

  ‘Lola,’ I concentrated, shutting my eyes and holding my hands to my face, blocking everything else out. ‘Lola, please, tell me where you are.’

  “If you’re trying to talk to her, tough luck. She’s so dead,” Gita sneered.

  “Can it, Gita,” Aamir growled.

  I panicked. Nothing was happening.

  ‘Oh my God, she’s dead,’ I thought in a panic.

  But then I felt it. A strong pull inside of me, leading me outside into the horrific, insane storm. The wind was even stronger now, pulling my hair in all directions. I stepped down the old wooden steps, yelping as a frond flew into my face.