What had happened that night had scared the hell out of her, but it had also made her realize something. Until that moment, her life had been in constant flux, everything defined by when she was moving on next. Nothing had ever been permanent, including any relationships, and she’d run away from everything.
The flashbacks as he’d grabbed her at the bar had rammed the truth home to Payton. She couldn’t outrun what happened to her. She’d moved halfway across the country and her kidnappers were still ghosts trailing at her feet, snapping at her mind every time someone moved suddenly or she was all alone. The man last night had also taught Payton that she needed to stop chasing the shadows and open her eyes to the dangers that were standing right in front of her.
He hadn’t been working for some freaky underground kidnapping ring. No, he’d been just a regular asshole, but he’d still nearly raped her. The world was a cold and frightening place that morning, but it had also defined Payton. Made her something. She was a fighter, a psychic.
And she didn’t need to run.
7
Payton walked into the juice bar and sat down, exhausted and facing another class. The night before, it had been almost as if magic had become possible, but that didn’t mean she was giving up on the lessons. They’d given her strength she didn’t know she had, strength that she’d used at first when the drunk had grabbed her. Payton wasn’t ready to give up the idea of holding her own physically if the other psychics—shit, that still sounded completely crazy—ever found her again.
“Hey.” Lainey came in from the back. “Ya still at it?”
“I’m still here, aren’t I?” Payton raised her head long enough to glare at Lainey, but she just smiled in response.
“That’s what it takes.” Lainey pulled up her arm and flexed her non-existent bicep. “I’m thinking of going back at it. I could do with some better tone.”
Payton cracked a smile. What was it about Lainey that always put her in a better mood? “What should I order today?”
“You need protein and vitamins. We’ve got a kale egg-white wrap with black beans that’s perfect.”
“Is it any good?” The idea of kale for breakfast—well, anytime, actually—wasn’t very appealing.
“It’s got what you need,” Lainey said as she shrugged.
“Alright. Also, pass me a blueberry smoothie to wash the greens away.”
Lainey laughed. “Sure.”
Payton took her breakfast to the beach and sat down in the sand. The events of last night were still playing out in her head. There was the man writhing on the ground as she twisted his head, probing for secrets.
It hadn’t been a dream. She would have needed to sleep for that, and she had been wide awake.
The energy, whatever it had been that caused the flash, still rested deep inside her. It was softly simmering beneath her mind, and she could summon it out at any time. Payton closed her eyes and flexed it lightly. There! Just like a muscle she was working on in the gym. The energy could move and twist inside her head. It was something that needed to be controlled, needed to be practiced and honed.
She stretched her mind down and found it, pulling it up just enough to feel it surrounding her body, then let it fall again. It came more easily every time she pushed and flexed at the light within her head, but she had to practice if she was going to perfect it.
She took a sip of her smoothie and lay down in the sand, closing her eyes and letting the feeling wash over her. Who was she now? What was she? Had she been born with this or did the terrifying experience of being kidnapped somehow unlock something within her? Payton mentally rolled her eyes at the thought. She wasn’t from the X-Men, nor had she been bitten by a radioactive spider lately—that she knew of, anyway. God, maybe this was something everyone could do and the entire world had been keeping it one giant secret.
Yeah, right.
No, this was different. She knew that much. The more important question was could she do anything else?
Her thoughts snapped to a halt when someone tripped over her foot.
“Oh, my God. I’m so sorry.”
Payton’s eyes flew open and she skidded backward in the sand, her pulse racing. But it wasn’t her kidnapper that stood before her. Instead, her assailant lay sprawled in the sand next to her. The man with the mess of brown hair from the advanced Krav Maga class.
“Are you hurt? I zone out sometimes when I’m running and I didn’t see you.” He swiped a hand over his face and then messed up his hair further by tugging on it with his fingers.
Payton smiled. Messy suited this guy. “It’s okay, I’m fine. You’re in my class at the gym, aren’t you?”
“Yeah.” He lifted his head slowly, taking in her legs, then her stomach and breasts, where his gaze lingered briefly, but he refused to meet her eyes. Payton frowned. That should have pissed her off, but there was something different about this guy. His shoulders hung low and even as he spoke, his eyes moved constantly around the beach, like he was afraid of what lingered in his own shadow. Payton could relate.
He caught her staring at him and his cheeks reddened. “Saw you in the gym yesterday.” His voice was low, and something quivered low in her belly at his soft, rumbling tone.
“You’re in the melee group, right?”
“Yeah.”
“How do you defend yourself against six trained fighters?”
“Takes work.” He started walking up the beach and Payton followed. “I’m Cole.”
“Payton.”
“You’re just starting?” He licked his lips after the question. Geez, the man looked nervous just talking to her. Was he that damaged?
“Yeah.”
“How’d you hear about it? II mean. . . .”
“I don’t look like the kind of girl who joins a martial arts group?”
“Well, no. I don’t mean to be rude.”
“You’re right. I’ve never done anything like this before.”
“Do you have what it takes?” They’d walked right up to the gym doors while they talked and she hadn’t even noticed. Payton looked up and met his eyes.
“I’m determined to find out.”
Cole walked over to the mats. “That’s how you do it. One day at a time.” He nodded at her and then walked into the advanced classes’ room. Payton took her place on the mat and waited for Aaron to start the class, but her eyes lingered on Cole’s back.
Aaron walked across the line, looking over each of the students and grabbing her attention as Cole disappeared from view. “Welcome to week two of Beginner Krav Maga. If you’ve made it this far, it’s an achievement. Several students have already moved on. You’ll find that the class thins every single day. This isn’t easy, and it won’t be something that you learn overnight, but it could save your life one day.” He went into the fighting stance and waited for the students to follow suit. “Today we will be learning basic defensive and counterattack measures.”
Rico walked up from the behind the register on cue and stood next to Aaron. They faced one another and took up the position. “Now, think of me as a young woman walking through the night. Suddenly, a strange man comes up to me, reaches out, and tries to punch me.” Rico threw a wide punch, and Aaron held his hands up on the side of his face, blocking the punch and throwing another straight at him. “This is how you stop an outside attack. Now,”—he faced the group—“get into position.
Payton put her hands up as Aaron came by to help each of the men standing in line. When he got to her, he nodded and smiled. “You get some practice in?”
“Yeah. I guess you could say that.”
“Good. Now, hold your left arm so that it’s blocking your face. Then, put your right hand in front of it.” He threw a quick punch and Payton knocked it away with her left hand, simultaneously driving her fist toward his face. She was so forceful that he flinched and a thrill ran through her. Aaron smiled at her and Payton couldn’t hold back her grin in response. “That’s it, you’re doing it. Keep practicing.�
� He walked to the front of the line.
“We’ve been talking about fighting positions, kicks, and punches, but there’s something else that’s vital to your training. This is not to be taken lightly. I’m not going to tell you to practice this. But if you’re trapped one day and you don’t have any other choice, you need to know how to make a decisive knockout or even a fatal blow. You’ve probably heard that there are kill spots on the human body, where one hit will drop a man, or worse. This is absolutely true, but you need to know what the hell you’re doing and mean it. For you beginners, this is where you start. These are called soft spots, places in your body that are vulnerable. One of the most well known soft spots is the philtrum.” He pointed at the place between the bottom of his nose and his upper lip. “A strike here can be incredibly painful and also damage the nose and teeth.” He used his hand to push his nose up. “Another spot is the solar plexus. Strike here hard enough and your attacker can have problems breathing. There are also places on the shoulders and hips that can make limbs non-functional for a short time. All these can be used to immobilize an attacker so you can get to safety.”
A shiver ran through Payton at his words. This was what she wanted to know. Payton might not be strong yet, but she was small and fast. With enough practice along with her newly found abilities, she could actually stand a chance next time.
Aaron spent the last half hour of the class detailing other spots, how to use them, and basic defensive measures against the same attacks toward them. At the end of the class, Payton felt too buzzed to go straight back to her tiny hotel room, so she walked into the packed juice bar and waited until Lainey was free.
While she waited in line, her thoughts flashed back to the night before. Would she have been able to defend herself without her newfound power had she known what she’d learned today? What about her power? Was it something she could reproduce, or had it been a one-time thing in response to the attack? Payton wasn’t sure she wanted to find out.
She was so distracted that she didn’t even notice she was at the front of the line until Lainey came up to her. “Hello!” Her bright attitude picked Payton up again. She was beginning to feel attached to Lainey already. Maybe she could even make a friend this time. A real friend.
“How are you, Lainey?”
“I’m great. Sure is busy in here today. How are you doing?”
“Alright.”
“You seem different—pensive. Is your training going well?”
“Yeah. I’ve been learning all the different ways to kill people.” Payton laughed.
“That sounds fun, well, sort of. Maybe I shouldn’t say that out loud.” Lainey laughed.
Payton shook her head, chuckling to herself. Trust Lainey to bring her out of her funk. She always did. “Can I get protein bar and one of those smoothies?”
“Sure.”
Payton handed her the money and looked back at the crowd while Lainey made her drink.
The night Payton had woken up with the blonde woman—Keila, don’t forget her name—standing over her played over in her mind. When they’d fled and she’d heard footsteps rushing down the hall toward her, she’d let the energy burst out without even realizing what she was doing. She recognized what it had been now, though she had no idea of the affect it’d had. Had it done anything that night? Was it the cops the guy was so scared of coming down the hall, or something else? She hadn’t stuck around to find out.
Lainey handed her the food and Payton went to sit down in the back, letting her mind wander. She felt the light grow inside her and she played with it. She could do it—twist that light and move it around the room, picking the minds of the people there. Could she use whatever it was whenever she wanted, right there even, without hurting anyone? She trapped the light back inside of herself. No, she didn’t know enough about it yet to risk it.
Payton slumped back and took a sip of her drink, and her sight caught something. There was a girl sitting at the bar, trying very hard to look like she wasn’t staring at Payton. She was failing miserably. What was going on in her mind? Was there something there worth perusing? Her brown hair accented piercing emerald eyes, and when they made eye contact, her very soul seemed to shout out at Payton. Payton had to know.
Deep inside, the power rolled up her body and stretched out. It had nearly reached the woman when a vision of the man from the night before— lying on the ground writhing from the force of her psychic burst—slammed into Payton’s mind and drew it back.
Was her power fatal?
Payton had no idea, but she wasn’t about to risk it on an innocent she didn’t know. She tore her eyes away and took another sip of her drink, trying to ignore the woman who had stopped trying to be discreet and was now staring right at her.
8
That morning the very air seemed to have taken on a soft glow. A few weeks had passed since Payton had arrived in San Diego after having experienced the worst trauma in her entire life. It had destroyed her confidence and reduced her to a shivering ball of fear and paranoia. Nothing aside from her need to survive mattered, and then she discovered something inside herself.
The world was changing, and so was her outlook. The beach wasn’t a place where danger could pop out at any second and Rita’s bar wasn’t a den for depressed psychopaths and drug addicts. Her morning run was soothing, rather than being part of her plan to save her life.
Determination had tempered her body and her mind, allowing her to branch out and become a person so different from the one she’d been when she’d fled Chicago that she was starting to feel rejuvenated rather than bogged down.
There were no shadows creeping in the night, and her kidnappers didn’t climb out of a hole in thin air to slit her throat. She was alive and thriving.
That morning when Payton woke up, there was a patch of purple flowers growing in the cracks in the pavement. They looked like daisies with black centers, and she didn’t know why, but she had to have them. There was one cup in her entire apartment, a white mug that she’d stolen from the bar so that she could still get her coffee fix when she was at home. She filled it with water and then went outside and gently picked the blooms, careful not to damage the stems. They looked beautiful in her living room window that faced the sea, and contrasted perfectly with the soft beige sand in the distance. Payton sighed. The apartment could be a home, if she’d let it. Maybe it was possible for her to put down some roots, find a real place. Get some nice furniture, maybe even begin decorating. For the first time in her life, she felt the urge to call somewhere home.
That need to put down roots stayed with Payton when she stopped at the juice bar to get a bagel and a smoothie. Lainey was there, talking to some other customers when she came in, but she hurried things up when she spotted Payton and ran over with a skip in her step. “You’re doing the melee for the first time today, aren’t you?”
“How’d you know?”
Lainey grinned. “A little birdie named Aaron might have let it slip.” She frowned. “Be careful, okay? You could really get hurt if you’re not careful; you know that, right?”
“Uh-uh.” Payton smiled and flexed her arms. “These babies are getting bigger every single day.”
“Ha! We’ll see. Now, do you want to try the wrap again?”
“No.” Payton made a face. “Greens and I do not get along at breakfast time. Give me the whole-grain bagel.”
“Yeah. I don’t blame you. Coffee or smoothie? You’re gonna need all the energy you can get, working with the advanced group.”
“I think I can handle it. I’ll get a smoothie.”
Payton grabbed her drink and walked out onto the sand. Despite what she’d told Lainey, really she was half excited and half terrified of facing the melee in class. The idea of facing six other class members solo was daunting, despite her new outlook on life. It wasn’t like she could use her power, either. She’d been too scared to try anything with it again since that incident outside the bar. But sometimes, lying in bed at night alone,
she would close her eyes and she swore she could almost see the light inside her; shining and twisting inside her mind, growing stronger along with her. It was a terrifying and exhilarating thought.
Stepping onto the still-cool sand, Payton spotted Cole sitting by himself at the water’s edge. He was staring out into space, his fingers tracing lazy shapes in the sand. She plopped down beside him. “How’s it going?”
Cole looked up at her and chuckled to himself. “Are you sure you should be fraternizing with the competition?”
“What?” She playfully punched him in the shoulder. “There’s no real competition. I’m going to beat you senseless, and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it.”
“Oh, yeah.” He grinned and Payton’s eyes widened. It was the first time she’d seen him really smile, one where it traveled right up to his eyes, and his whole face was transformed.
“Yeah.” She smiled back before turning and taking a bite of her bagel, watching the waves curl before hitting the shore.
“It’s nice out today,” she said. A sea breeze kicked up around her and blew Cole’s still-lengthening hair to the side. He reached up and tried to put it back into place, but it just kept blowing back again, so he let it go. His eyes never left the ocean and he didn’t reply. Okay, time to try something different.
“What do you do for living?”
Cole’s gaze never left the waves. “I’m a cop, but I’m on leave at the moment.”
“Paid vacation, huh? Did you kill a bad guy?” Payton cringed as soon as the words left her mouth. Shit, she’d only been trying to bring out that smile again.
Cole let out a deep breath. “No, but I wish I had. How about you?”
Okay. Wow. “I’m a bartender at a dive not far from here.” She took another bite of her bagel. “But that’s just for now. I think I’m still trying to figure that one out.”
Payton (Dreamcatchers Romantic Suspense Series Book 3) Page 5
