by Zizi Cole
18
The next week went by uneventfully. Mia and I worked even harder on our training. She wanted me to be prepared if I came face to face with the son of a bitch that was putting us through this. She beat my ass in a big way. If need be, Mia was dangerous.
I was spending more time on my feet now that I had some of the moves down. Mia smiled as I blocked a side attack and tossed her on the mat. She stood up and popped her neck. “Now, the fun can begin.”
What she meant by “fun” was that she was planning to stop going easy on me. She went at me like she was seriously trying to kill me. She swung a punch that I attempted to deflect. I misjudged it and she ended up punching me in the eye. I hit the mat, cursing. I looked up at her to see her staring at me with her eyes wide. I took her moment of distraction to sweep her legs out from under her.
The practice became increasingly brutal. She got me on the ground and was sitting on me with her hands on my throat like she was trying to strangle me. She applied light pressure on my windpipe. Not enough to hurt me, but enough for my brain to register that I was in a precarious situation.
I felt energy building in my chest. I wasn’t sure what kind of energy it was, but I didn’t have to wait long to find out. Suddenly Mia flew off me and hit the wall. I scrambled up and over to her. She sat against the wall, dazed for a moment.
“Are you okay?” I asked, turning her face towards me.
“Yeah,” she breathed. She looked at me sharply. “How in the bloody hell did you do that? And a better question is, can you do that again?”
“I don’t know. I don’t even know how I did it,” I confessed. “It just felt like there was pressure in my chest, then the next thing I knew, you were against the wall.”
Mia rubbed her head. “Yeah, I didn’t see anything, but it felt like I was kicked by a horse in the chest. Good thing your dad had the good sense to hang mats on the wall.”
I smiled. “Wasn’t Daddy. Momma was the one that had the mats hung on the wall after the other girls from the cheer squad came over and I was on the top of the pyramid and fell off. I hit the wall and cracked a rib. The next day, they had someone here putting the mats up.”
“Either way, I’m glad it was there,” she told me sincerely.
I stood and offered her a hand up. I knew we were done with the workout for now since she was clearly having trouble getting around. Too bad we didn’t have the hot tub to sit in after this round. We could definitely use it. Then I got an idea.
“You know Momma had a steam room added to the pool area last year, right?” I asked her.
“Yeah, what about it?”
“We could go sit in there since we aren’t allowed to use the hot tub right now, per Cole and Jake,” I told her.
She smiled. “That’s a great idea. My whole body hurts right now.”
We went into the steam room, undressed, and wrapped ourselves in towels. As we entered the room, I turned on the steamer, and cranked it up. I poured water over the coals of the heating element in the room to produce the steam. I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes. I could feel all the pain from our training throbbing; I felt like my whole body was one giant ache.
Steam began to fill the room as my muscles started to relax one by one. I felt like my bones were melting away. It was glorious. I hadn’t felt so relaxed in weeks. I wasn’t even relaxed when I crawled into Jake’s bed at night. I could sleep, that wasn’t the problem. I had all this sexual tension building and I couldn’t do anything about it. I had just forced myself to sleep as he rubbed my back or held me close.
I could feel Mia looking at me. It seemed like she could read my mind by her expression. I glanced at her from under my eye lashes and could see her staring at me hard. I had a feeling this conversation wasn’t going to be much fun for me. I sighed.
“What’s on your mind, Mia?” I asked, pointedly keeping my eyes closed.
“Have you slept with him yet?” she asked with a smile in her voice.
Not quite what I expected, but still not the most comfortable conversation that we could be having.
“Almost every night,” I answered honestly. I had been sleeping with him. But it was just sleep.
“Ha, ha,” she said sarcastically. “You know what I mean. Have you fucked him yet?”
I shrugged. There had to be a reason for her to be asking me these questions suddenly. “Why do you ask?”
“Just curious,” she said, leaning her head back against the wall. “Why haven’t you?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe we want the anticipation to build. Or better yet, because he doesn’t want me like that anymore. That could be a good answer.” I groaned. The thought of him not wanting me made me want to vomit. I didn’t want anyone knowing how weak I was when it came to that man. Weakness was vulnerability, and I couldn’t afford to be vulnerable.
“Oh Lex, you really are blind.” Mia sighed dramatically. “Everyone can tell that he’s walking around like he has the biggest case of blue balls seen on this side of the Mississippi River. And he’s biting everyone’s heads off.”
“I haven’t noticed him acting any differently.”
“You wouldn’t because he doesn’t treat you differently. He wants you and doesn’t want to push you away. Maybe you should just jump his bones and get it over with. Maybe you both would be able to sleep better at night. I know I’d be able to tolerate his ass a little better.” I could hear the laughter in her voice.
I shrugged. It wasn’t going to happen, so it was probably best if she didn’t dwell on it. Who was I kidding? I needed to stop dwelling on it. I thought about him all the time, day and night. I had to get him off my mind.
After about thirty minutes, we decided it was time to get out of the steam room. I stood up and went to push the door open. It didn’t budge. I pushed again. Still nothing. I looked back at Mia who was sitting there watching me with a frown.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“The door won’t open,” I told her, my voice starting to raise an octave. I wasn’t claustrophobic, but I didn’t like the feeling of being trapped. I pushed at the door harder. It didn’t give at all.
Mia walked over to the door and pushed. When nothing happened, she looked at me, her eyes widening. She pushed it again and I could see the muscles in her arms straining. The door still didn’t move.
“Why don’t we push together,” I suggested, trying to stay calm.
Mia nodded. We leaned into the door together and started to push. We were both putting all of our weight on the door and it still wasn’t opening. I was starting to panic. We had to get out of that box. I slammed my fist on the door.
Mia took my arm, led me back to the bench, and motioned for me to sit down. She sat beside me, staring at the door. I looked back and forth between her and the door, then a thought occurred to me. I looked at the thermostat that was in the corner by the door. The thermostat had been installed so we could make sure the room wasn’t too hot. I saw the temperature was slowly starting to rise.
“Mia, we have a problem,” I whispered.
“No shit, Sherlock,” she snorted. “What gave you the first clue?”
I looked at her. She was still staring at the door. I touched her arm so she would look at me.
“The temperature is rising. That means someone messed with the controls outside the room before we were trapped in here,” I told her. “In other words, if we don’t get out of here soon, we’ll be cooked alive.”
She slowly looked towards the thermostat that I was staring at. We watched the temperature rise another degree together in silence.
“We have to think,” she told me. I could hear the resolve in her voice. “We are going to get out of here. I don’t feel like being cooked like a turkey today.”
I agreed with her whole heartedly. I didn’t want to die in the steam room of my own damn house. I looked around the room and didn’t see any alternate way out. I frowned.
“Do you know when Jake or Cole is sup
posed to come back to the house?” I asked her.
She shook her head. “No, they don’t tell me their plans.”
Damn. This meant we were on our own. I looked at Mia. I knew she was as clueless as I was. I tried to hold back my tears. She didn’t need me to break down on her now. What we needed was strength. I couldn’t be the sniveling wimp. If we were going to get out of this, I couldn’t break down.
“Okay, we’re going to get this door open,” I told her. “What do we have between us that we can use?”
“You mean besides nightmares and the occasional astral projection or vision?” she replied. “Nothing, unless you shoved your cell phone up your ass before you came in here.”
I rolled my eyes at her. I had to appreciate her sarcasm, though. She wasn’t panicking, but I could tell she was worried. Her sarcasm usually increased when she was feeling a lot of emotion.
“You forgot empathy and mental instability,” I quipped. “But seriously, if we have these special abilities and our mothers were witches, then we should be able to break out of this little box of hell.”
She looked at me. She seemed to be trying to assess my mood. I was determined we weren’t going to be stuck in this box forever. We just had to concentrate. We could and would figure this out.
I crossed my legs and closed my eyes. I decided to try to tap into the family resources like I did the other day when I was looking for the book with my mind. I wasn’t sure what I was doing but I knew it was better than just sitting there waiting to boil to death. I took a deep breath and reached out to grab Mia’s hand. She held on tightly. I could feel the energy flowing between our joined hands. Mia squeezed my hand. She was feeling the energy as well.
Instead of focusing on the door, my thoughts went to Jake. I could see him standing in an office having a heated conversation with someone. I couldn’t see who he was talking to or hear what he was saying, as I was only focused on Jake and trying to reach out to him.
He stopped talking and looked around the room. He had a confused look on his face. He turned back to the person he’d been talking to. He said something and turned to rush out the door.
I hoped he wouldn’t be too late.
19
I don’t know what came over me, but I knew I had to get back to Alexandrea. I could have sworn I smelled her perfume while in the office. It also felt like someone had been watching me, trying to tell me something. I knew in the pit of my stomach that she was in trouble, and I couldn’t let anything happen to her.
I would be lucky if I didn’t lose my job since I walked out in the middle of a heated discussion with my boss, the director of the DAMNED agency. He had been trying to convince me to take an out of town assignment. If I was reassigned, I wouldn’t have been able to keep an eye on Lex and protect her.
I sped through town, trying to get to her as fast as possible. I knew that time was of the essence. I wasn’t sure how I knew that, but I did. When it came to Lex, I seemed to always know more than I should, except where it counted. I couldn’t seem to figure out who was behind torturing her. I knew that it would come to an end one way or another, and I felt it was soon.
I flew through a red light, almost causing an accident. I knew the police would probably be called and they would be on my ass, but they would just have to follow me until I got to the house and made sure she was okay. I glanced in my mirror, surprised that I wasn’t being followed yet.
As I turned onto the country road that led to the house, I heard an eerily familiar voice whisper in my ear.
“Hurry,” the voice whispered. “They need you.”
It couldn’t be. I knew that voice as well as I knew my own mother. It was Lex’s mother, Emma. I spent enough time with their family that I would never forget her voice. Hearing the ominous warning, I pressed down harder on the accelerator. The truck lurched as it went faster. I simply had to make it in time to save her. I didn’t know what was wrong, but I wasn’t going to let anything happen. As each minute slowly ticked by, the knot in the pit of my stomach grew heavier.
I pulled into the driveway and slammed the truck into park as I jumped out. I ran to the house, bursting through the door. I stopped. It was completely silent. Where the hell were they? I looked around the rooms of the main floor. They weren’t in the kitchen, study, or living room. I ran towards the workout room. They weren’t in there. I looked around, trying to figure out where they were. I knew they were in the house, just like I knew they were in trouble.
I heard the voice again. “Hurry.”
The door to the pool room rattled. I raced to the door, dread filling my stomach. I hoped not to see them dead in the pool or hot tub. I ran into the room and stopped. Nothing. Someone should have been in here. As I turned to walk out of the pool room, I noticed the door to the steam room. I stared at it. What in the hell? I walked over, eyeballing the statue that was pushed up against the door. I moved the marble statue that was blocking the door out of the way.
I pulled the door of the steam room open. Steam and intense heat rolled out of the room. Lex and Mia were laying on the bench holding hands. Their skin was bright red. They didn’t look like they were breathing. I rushed into the room. I gently picked Lex up and carried her out into the pool room. I set her down in a pool lounger and went to get Mia. I knew I had to get them out of the heat before I determined if they were okay. I picked up Mia and carried her to the lounger next to Lex. I set her down and stood between the chairs.
I pulled out my phone and called an ambulance. I checked to make sure both women were breathing so I could report it to the dispatcher when she answered the call.
“911, what is your emergency?” the dispatcher answered pleasantly.
“I need an ambulance to 2340 Pheasant Drive. I have two female vics who had been locked in a steam room for an undetermined amount of time. I need first responders here ASAP, as well as the Sheriff’s department and a forensic team,” I told the dispatcher.
“Sir, are the victims still breathing?” she asked.
“Yes, breathing is shallow, but visible. Both victims are unconscious,” I explained. I could hear the clicking of the keyboard as the dispatcher put in the information. I could also hear her call out to the response teams.
“Sir, if you could stay on the line, I will have responders there immediately,” she said.
“No.” I told her. “I need to get off this call. Have them come into the house through the kitchen. Tell them to go down the short hall and on the left is a door to the pool room. That’s where we are.”
I hung up and dialed another number. “Cole, you need to get back to the house ASAP. The girls were attacked while we were gone. This ends now. I will not have her in jeopardy like this.”
“Are they okay? What happened?” Cole asked. I heard a car door slam and I knew he was on his way.
“I think so, I have an ambulance on the way. I found them trapped in the steam room of the house. I haven’t had a chance to check out the settings or anything. I also don’t know how long they were in there,” I explained. “They have to be okay. I won’t let them be anything else. I promised to protect her.”
“On my way,” Cole said, hanging up.
I dialed one more number. I could hear the sirens in the distance and I knew I still had time to make this call before anyone showed up to assist.
“Put me through to him,” I told the secretary before she had a chance to speak.
“One moment,” the secretary said, putting me on hold.
“Morris, you better have a damn good reason for walking out of our meeting like that,” Director Hanson said as he picked up the line.
“Sir, Ms. Cooper and Ms. Capone have been attacked. They were locked in a steam room. If I hadn’t come into the situation as I did, they would have died in that room. I had a dispatcher send an ambulance and a team to investigate the incident,” I reported.
“Are you any closer to figuring out who’s behind this?” he asked, warily.
“No, sir
, but agent Evans and I are on it. We’ll have the perp taken care of immediately,” I promised.
“If you can figure out who’s behind it,” the director reminded me.
I ground my teeth. “I will figure this out.”
There was a heavy silence. “In light of the newest situation, I‘m going to postpone the reassignment. I want you with Ms. Cooper around the clock until you get this bastard.”
“Why the change of heart, sir?” I asked.
“I was friends with her father. I don’t want to see anything happen to that girl. Those girls. I know what potential they have if we can get them to tap into it. We need them alive.”
“Yes, sir.” I ended the call just as the paramedics swarmed the pool room.
The paramedics checked vitals and temperatures. Their temperatures were elevated and their vitals were low. It had been close. I took a shaky breath. Too close. I almost lost her. I wasn’t going to stand for it. I wouldn’t lose her again.
The paramedic looked at me. “They look like they’re going to be okay. I checked their vitals. They’re low, but not life threatening. Their temperatures are a little elevated which is to be expected after being exposed to an intense heat for as long as they were. I am going to say, any longer and we wouldn’t be the ones examining them. They’re lucky that you showed up when you did. I’d like to take them to the hospital overnight for observation.”
As I opened my mouth to respond, I heard Lex moan softly. I dropped to my knees beside her and stroked her hair. I brushed it out of her face. Her eyes fluttered open and she reached a shaky hand to my face.
“You came,” she whispered, and closed her eyes again.
Cole burst through the door and strode over to us. He got an update from the paramedic and crossed his arms.
“There is no way they are going anywhere,” he stated.
I agreed with Cole. I wasn’t going to let these women leave my sight. I pulled my badge out of my back pocket and showed it to the paramedic. “If you want to send a nurse over, that’s fine, but we’re going to take charge of them. I’ll sign any papers stating that we’re refusing to have them taken to the hospital.”
