“I did the best I could,” Wyatt insisted.
“But you left her out there,” was his father’s response. “On her own.”
“She was not alone.”
“She was not protected.”
Wyatt shifted, new things crossing his line of vision. Ellie was sitting in a low chair, her expression caught between jealousy and confusion. She began to rise, as though she intended to move to Wyatt’s side, to offer consolation. But then he turned. And in his vision Dylan saw something she had thought she would never see again.
Davida’s face.
So surprised was she, Dylan spoke her name. Davida’s eyes widened, as though she had heard the words, as though Dylan was actually in the room with her instead of Wyatt.
“Where are you, Dylan?” she said, her voice as clear as it had ever been in the visions Dylan had had of her.
Instantly a vision of the room where she lay filled Dylan’s mind, including the raised platform and its view of the grass and plants down below it. As the vision faded, Davida’s face came back into quick clarity.
“We’re coming for you,” she said, leaning in closely, her hands reaching for Dylan’s face. At the same time Dylan felt Wyatt’s confused reaction to the touch, she could feel soft caresses on her own cheeks, as though Davida was actually in the room with her, as though it was really Dylan she was touching.
Dylan sat up, touching her fingers to her own face.
“What was that?” she whispered to the empty room.
What was happening to her?
Chapter 34
She should have been surprised when the door opened and Wyatt walked in. But, somehow, she wasn’t.
An hour had passed. And then another.
But here he was.
“We have to go,” he said quietly.
Dylan’s heart skipped a beat as she studied him. His eyes were dark as he studied her in return. But she wasn’t sure what was more intense in his stare, his relief at finding her alive and well, or his irritation that she hadn’t jumped up and—what? Jumped into his arms?
“We have to go get Sam.”
Wyatt shook his head. “There’s no time for that. We have a specific window and we have to use it.”
“We have to get Sam.”
Wyatt grunted. “You’ve already gotten me into trouble,” he said, strutting across the room toward her. “I won’t let you do it again.”
He grabbed her wrist, pulling her up from the straight-backed chair where she sat. Dylan climbed to her feet, but yanked her wrist from his grip as soon as she was solid on her feet. “You lied to me.”
His eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”
“You lied to me,” she repeated, shoving a finger into his chest. “You, who got so angry when you thought I lied to you about Stiles. You lied to me.”
“We don’t have time for this.”
“You knew who I was. You made me go with you for a specific reason.”
Wyatt’s eyes focused on Dylan’s, a cloud of emotion moving slowly through them that she could read, as though his eyes were a book left open to the climax of the story.
“I didn’t lie. I just left out a few details.”
“Was it always your intention to bring me to those people?” She gestured behind her, indicating the distant chamber where she had met Lily and Luc.
“Of course not.” He stepped back slightly, as though wounded by what she had said. “I was bringing you to my father.”
“Why?”
He rolled his eyes. “We really don’t have time for this.”
She smacked her hand hard against his chest. He grabbed her wrist before she could move away, tugging her hard against him until the line of his hip was pressed against her belly, his chest against the soft curve of her breast. He bent low so that his face was just inches from hers. As he ran the tip of his tongue slowly over his bottom lip, she found herself remembering what it felt like to have that lip pressed to her own, to taste the salt and meatiness of his inner essence.
“I saved your life,” he said breathlessly. “And now I’m going to do it again if you will just stop this interrogation and let me.”
“Why?”
He threw his head back on his spine, his eyes moving to the ceiling that towered a dozen feet above them. “Woman,” he grunted. His eyes fell back to her face. “Don’t complicate things. Just let me do this.”
Her heart skipped a beat, and her breath left her lungs with a suddenness that made her gasp as he pressed his forehead lightly against hers. And then he was gone, tugging her along after him as he made his way to the door. Dylan pulled away again, running to the low table in front of the mirror to retrieve her compass and other items. She slipped them into a tiny pocket deep in the folds of her dress before going to him and allowing him to take her hand again, a look on his face that told her that was the last bit of nonsense he intended to put up with.
Wyatt opened the door just slightly, peeking out into the hallway as he kept her hand caught tightly in his fist. And then he pulled her along into the corridor, stepping high over the prone body of the guard who had been standing outside her door when Ruby and Becky took her to meet Lily and Luc.
Wyatt walked quickly. If he hadn’t had her hand in his, she might have fallen behind before they had gone more than a few yards. He never hesitated, never lost his way. He knew these corridors as well as Ruby and Becky did. Dylan wanted to ask why, but footsteps on the stones ahead of them forced her to keep her questions to herself.
Wyatt pressed her against the stone wall, his breathing so rough that his chest seemed to be playing out a staccato against her as the footsteps came so close she was certain they would be caught. But then laughter erupted behind them as Wyatt moved closer, burying his face in the hair escaping from her braid along the upper curve of her jaw.
“Young love,” a voice said.
Wyatt waited until the footsteps and laughter faded. Then he grabbed her hand, entwining his fingers with hers, and pulled her farther down the corridor.
Dylan began to recognize sections of the corridor as they moved lower and lower inside the building. When they came to the place where she was fairly sure they would turn to go to the room of metal boxes, she stopped. Wyatt yanked at her hand, but she planted her bare feet as hard against the stone as she could.
“We have to get Sam.”
Wyatt glanced down the corridor to their right before his eyes fell on her. “We don’t have time.”
“Make the time.” She pulled her hand from his. “He saved my life while you were off doing…” She waved a hand vaguely in the air. “…whatever. I owe him this.”
“Dylan, there are people waiting for us.”
“So is Sam.”
He shook his head, moving slightly to look down the corridor behind him. Then he sighed. “All right.”
Dylan ran down the corridor, her feet silent on the stones. She stopped just before the corridor opened into the narrow, box-filled room. They could hear the soft, even breathing of the guard left behind to watch over Sam. He was sleeping.
“Stay here,” Wyatt hissed in her ear.
Dylan nodded as Wyatt moved around her and stepped into the room. His footsteps were not as silent, but the even breathing of the guard never changed. She moved forward so that she could see what was happening. Sam saw Wyatt coming toward him, but Wyatt gestured for him to be quiet. Questions etched Sam’s smooth skin, but disappeared when he caught sight of her just behind the guard.
Wyatt laid his hands on the bars and rattled the door, but nothing happened. He touched the place where the guard had taken the long, thin stick away and glanced back at Dylan. He shook his head.
Instead of giving up, however, Dylan moved into the room. Wyatt shook his head furiously, and Sam quickly repeated the gesture. But she ignored them both. As she reached Wyatt’s side, an alarm went up outside in the outer corridor. They looked at each other and then turned. The guard was no longer sleeping.
“What’s this?” the guard asked, amusement mixed with drowsiness making him sound like he’d had a few too many sleeping pills last night. “A prison break?”
“Where’s the key?” Wyatt asked.
The guard laughed. “Like they would trust me with that.” His eyes fell to Dylan. “I would guess that alarm is for you, sweetheart,” he said.
Dylan backed up, her spine pressed hard against the metal bars of the box’s door. Sam touched her hands where they were resting behind her. She moved one hand up, feeling the metal for the smooth square where the stick—the key—had been. She closed her eyes, imagining the mechanism releasing. The click was loud in the small room, causing the guard’s eyes to widen.
“What the hell?”
Wyatt advanced on the guard. “We’re walking out of here,” he said, even as Dylan grabbed Sam’s hand and pulled him out of the box. “So you can get out of our way or you can fight.”
The guard studied Wyatt, studied his sword as he slowly began to back up. It looked as though he was going to let them go. Until footsteps sounded on the stones behind him.
The guard moved forward, pulling his own weapon from a smaller scabbard on his side, an object that looked like Wyatt’s six shooter, but longer, thinner.
“Back up,” the guard said. “Back into the cell.”
Wyatt stood his ground.
Sam pulled Dylan back behind him and moved up against Wyatt’s back. He said something Dylan couldn’t hear and pulled the six shooter from Wyatt’s waist. In a quick movement that was as graceful as a music note, Sam and Wyatt traded weapons. The guard raised his own, but before he had responded, Wyatt and Sam were both armed and facing him. The sound of Wyatt pulling back the hammer on his six shooter crackled through the room, echoing off the walls.
And then chaos exploded into the room.
A dozen Redcoats filed in behind the guard. The guard smiled, aware that there was no way Wyatt and Sam, even with their impressive weapons, could best that many experienced warriors.
And then the gargoyle arrived.
Chapter 35
“Get back!”
Wyatt pushed both Sam and Dylan behind him, rushing them inside the box Sam had just vacated. The gargoyle turned on them. He was taller, bigger than the two they had faced before. He was the color of marble, like the others, but his head looked as though part of it was once bronze and had become the green of decay. And his eyes were gray…a familiar gray.
Wyatt snatched his sword from Sam and slipped his six shooter back in its holster in one quick movement. As he raised it, Dylan rushed forward. She grabbed his arm.
“Don’t,” she cried. “It’s Stiles.”
The gargoyle’s eyes fell on Dylan for a long second before he turned with a hard, low bellow. And then he attacked the guards.
In seconds, they fell. The guards were no match against the gargoyle and his long, golden ax.
Wyatt watched, confusion washing off of him in waves. The moment there was a space through which they could run, Dylan grabbed his hand.
“We have to go.”
The three of them ran up the corridor and burst into the long hallway Wyatt had been leading her down before their little detour. They could hear more footsteps, these quick, as though guards were running. But the immediate area was clear.
“This way,” Wyatt said as he rushed off to his right.
They ran too quickly. Dylan’s chest constricted, her air coming in such quick puffs that she never got a full, deep breath. And as they turned a corner, they found themselves coming face to face with another large group of guards. They backtracked, but they could still hear footsteps behind them.
“We have to get to the end of that corridor,” Wyatt said between gasps of air. “That’s where the exit is.”
“We need a distraction,” Sam said.
Dylan moved to the corner, watching as the guards searched each corridor and door they passed. “They’ll be here in a minute.”
Before the words were fully formed and out of her mouth, the guards at the backside of the corridor turned a corner and spotted them. Yelling announced their location, causing the other guards, the ones Dylan was watching from her spot at the corner, to come running.
“We’re trapped,” she said.
Wyatt and Sam both grabbed her hands. And then she felt that familiar breeze in her hair.
The guards pulled up short, confusion in their faces. They turned in circles, looking all along the corridor. They walked right up to the space where Dylan, Sam, and Wyatt stood, but it was as though they could not see them.
“Where are they?” one man asked.
Wyatt looked at Dylan, his forehead creased. She shook her head to indicate it wasn’t anything she had done. They both looked at Sam, but he was clearly as confused as they.
The guards wandered around for a few minutes, grumbling among themselves. Then one of the men suggested a hidden doorway. They began moving down the corridor, touching the stones in the wall. One even brushed against Dylan, but it was obvious he remained unaware that she was standing there.
They stood that way the better part of forty minutes, until the last of the guards finally gave up and wandered back the way the three of them had come. Wyatt immediately tugged at Dylan’s hand and dragged her down the opposite corridor. Sam followed closely behind.
The warm breeze that met their faces as they rushed out of the building was delicious. But the danger was far from over. Guards were scattered among the trees. They could hear them more than they could see them. A snapping twig here. An unexpected bird call there. Wyatt moved slowly, every step deliberate. Dylan picked along the path behind him, conscious of her bare feet as she also chose her steps with care. They walked a mile this way, maybe farther, before they realized it had been a while since they last heard indications that the Redcoats were still around.
“What do you think?” Wyatt asked, as the three of them moved into a tight circle, resting for the time being on their haunches.
It took a second before Dylan realized both Wyatt and Sam were looking at her. “I don’t know,” she said. “You have more experience with this sort of thing,” she said, looking pointedly at Wyatt.
“Yes, but you seem to be…in tune with this sort of thing.”
Sam nodded. “You knew the gargoyle was Stiles.”
“It was his eyes.”
Wyatt shook his head, glancing back the way they had come. “I knew there was something wrong about him.”
“Why was he helping us?” Sam asked.
Wyatt and Dylan looked at him and then each other, but neither had an answer. It seemed like a rhetorical question anyway.
“Where are we going?” Dylan asked.
“There’s a safe place,” Wyatt answered, his eyes on the ground as he spoke. “It’s an hour’s hike from here. But we can’t lead any Redcoats to it.”
Dylan half nodded, her eyes moving around the trees that surrounded them. There was still no sound, no proof that anyone was near them. But she couldn’t imagine the Redcoats had given up so easily. She thought about Stiles, thought about the odd breeze that seemed to have followed her through her first few days alone in this desolate landscape. Had it been Stiles who led her to water? Was it Stiles who saved her life before Wyatt came around? If so, why did he warn her not to trust Wyatt?
And why had he saved them from the Redcoats when all the other gargoyles seemed to want Dylan dead?
She closed her eyes and tried to focus on him, but nothing happened. She had the feeling that Stiles was not someone she could listen in on without his full cooperation.
So she focused on the Redcoats, straining her mental ears to listen for any thoughts that might belong to someone near them, someone who meant them harm. She had never really tried to focus on someone she didn’t know before, someone whose face she couldn’t picture and whos
e essence she couldn’t feel. She wasn’t sure it would work the same way it had with Donna and Davida, with Ellie and Wyatt. And Sam.
But then a thought came to her, loud and clear.
Run, it said.
No urgency, no panic. Just a simple command.
Yet, she recognized the thought. And she knew it wasn’t a warning. It was a taunt. A player in a game accepting temporary defeat.
It was Lily.
“We should go,” Dylan said.
“What about the Redcoats?” Wyatt and Sam asked at almost the same instant.
“I think they’ve given up for today.”
“How could you—” Sam began to ask, but Wyatt stood and began to walk away before the words were even out of his mouth.
“This way,” he said.
Chapter 36
Sam gave Dylan his boots, assuring her that they were only rubbing uncomfortably on his sore ankle. She wanted to refuse, but the bottoms of her feet were so raw that it was becoming more and more difficult to want to put one foot in front of the other. So she took them after he promised to ask for them back when his own feet began to hurt.
They walked in single file, Wyatt at the front and Sam in the back, as though it was a necessary thing to keep Dylan from the freedom of leading or of the leisure of falling behind. After the day they’d had, she supposed she understood Sam’s need to always keep her in his sights, and Wyatt’s controlling need to be the only one who could lead them to the hidden safe house. But still…something about it just annoyed her.
FOUND (Angels and Gargoyles Book 1) Page 15
