She wouldn’t promise him. No, she couldn’t promise him. But she couldn’t deny him either.
He leaned forward, pressing his mouth to hers. And then they were kissing as if they needed each other to complete their next breath. It was raw, and needy, and hot.
Arden pulled back, gasping.
“This isn’t goodbye,” he said, stepping away.
She watched as he slipped inside the door and out of her sight.
CHAPTER TEN
Arden’s unit was near the top of the housing wall. A sea of doors, all mismatched, poor lighting, and the crumbling exterior made the apartment block look haunted. What the structure had been prior was no longer discernible. Brick extensions had been added between previous buildings, grouping what had been separate structures into one long wall that spanned several blocks. The streets had been domed for travel, with housing above creating cutouts where the walkways intersected.
Precarious stairwells dotted the structure. Some only accessed floors near the bottom, while others extended higher, bypassing the floors beneath. Inside the units, the floor plans didn’t make sense, and the walls were too thin to stop neighbors from overhearing.
Inside her family’s home, several shadows moved behind the murky glass. Their images were distorted like grotesque marionettes, illuminated by the dim glow of lights. It wasn’t unusual to have visitors at this time of the morning. The Lasair members often used her house as a gathering place. It was a central location, directly in the middle of their town, but, more important, it had quick access to the outer spokes of the city where they could use the bolt-holes for the majority of their jobs.
Arden wasn’t up for visitors, especially during the twilight hours of the morning. Not when she felt this unsettled. The pieces of armor she usually hid behind had cracked, leaving her feeling exposed and vulnerable. It worried her. All she knew was that she didn’t want to face anyone before she could come to terms with what it meant.
Dade’s kiss had shaken her to the core. Even though she still felt its high and the ghost of his lips on hers. The walk home hadn’t cooled that any. Its memory made it harder to resist seeing him again. Already she wavered.
She firmed her resolve for the fifth or sixth time since she’d left him. She would not be swayed. That was it. She’d never see him again.
Pausing before the warped front door, she took a deep, calming breath to center herself. She lowered the hood of her cloak and straightened her shoulders, and then she pushed her way inside.
The minute she walked in, Arden knew something was very, very wrong.
Colin sat hunched forward on the edge of the faded orange couch. His head was bowed, resting on his fisted hand. What caught her attention was not his body wound taut, but rather the blood splattered across him. It dotted his clothes, a large swath over his middle. Long streaks had dried down his arms, and matted in clumps in his hair.
Arden’s heart lurched. Followed by a pounding, pushing pressure on her ears. She found it hard to swallow. Colin hurt was her worst nightmare.
Then she realized little things. The blood didn’t start from any specific place on his body. And he didn’t appear injured. She was moderately reassured the damage wasn’t his.
She exhaled.
Knowing that he wasn’t in imminent danger of bleeding to death eased her anxiety. The pounding in her head lessened, and she was able to draw a full breath for the first time since she’d stepped into the room. It calmed her enough to absorb the rest of the scene.
Uri paced the living room. His path wound him in and out of the rickety furniture. He ran his hands repeatedly through his hair, making it stand on end. His face was drawn and haggard, and his skin was more translucent than it had ever been. She could see the blue veins running down his arms as he gripped and regripped his fists.
His body vibrated with suppressed rage. While he walked, he mumbled under his breath. And then he swung his fist out, connecting with the wall. He screamed at the same time, a heartbroken wail of a sound. Plaster fell where his fist connected. When he pulled his fist away, it was covered with blood.
“Uri?” Arden asked, not sure what she should say. Worrying that he’d crushed his hand, she shut the door and took a few steps into the room. She stopped short before she got close to him.
When he turned, she saw that his nose sat at a funny angle, dried blood underneath. His eyes were wild. Uri, who was always in control, always the bedrock of calm and unfailing strength, was gone. That scared her more than anything.
Arden swallowed. She’d missed whatever awful thing had happened. She’d been off traipsing around, kissing Dade, when she should have been with her family. Truthfully, she felt afraid to find out what had caused this panic. Because she knew it would change things. Reset her life back to where it had been. Just like she knew would happen if she let herself get sidetracked by a pretty face.
Where was Niall? Whatever errand he’d been on tonight should have long been over. Unless he had gotten caught in a raid. Confusion and fear over what that might mean sizzled up her spine.
Arden’s mother shuffled into the room. She looked tiny and frail, her skin parchment thin. She’d lost most of her hair due to malnutrition and neglect. What was left of it hung in a stringy, uncombed cloud. She’d given up on life a long time ago. All Arden remembered was growing up with a mom who was just this side of a zombie.
Mostly, Arden attempted to reason through why her mother was broken. Sometimes she grew angry with her for it. She hated her mom for giving up, for not having the strength of character to face each day and fight back. Then she became ashamed of those harsh feelings. Creating a circle of frustration from which she couldn’t escape. Because of that, she tried never to let these thoughts bubble up anymore, though they did, and to accept that people weren’t as driven as she was.
Her mom held a tea tray, with chipped and mismatched teacups. She set it on the tiny table in front of the sofa. Then she stood up, wringing her hands. “We’re out of chamomile. I didn’t know what to do.” Her gaze darted around the room, never settling on anything. She didn’t seem to notice that Arden had come home.
The boys didn’t pay any attention to her either.
Uri stopped his pacing. His hand came up to his nose. With a crack, he snapped it back into place. Then resumed walking. The tissue around his nose appeared puffy. When the swelling went down, it wouldn’t heal well. Not that it mattered. Uri had broken it several times before, so it hadn’t been straight for years.
Colin continued to stare at the floor. Arden wished he’d look up so that she could figure out what was going on.
Her mother nervously went about pouring, her hand shaking as she tipped the spout, spilling more liquid outside the cup than inside. Her erratic behavior appeared more flighty than usual, indicating the onset of a breakdown.
“Um, I didn’t know what to do. I heated the water. And I . . .” She blinked twice.
It was then Arden realized there was no tea at all. Just hot water, the liquid clear where it pooled in running puddles on the table. Her mother continued to pour despite the mess she made.
Arden jumped forward to stop her mother from emptying the teapot’s entire contents onto the table. She placed her hands over her mother’s, easing her back. “It’s okay, Mom. I got it.”
In the back of the house, her dad started hacking, a rough cough followed by a wet sound Arden knew was blood. She didn’t need to see it to know what was happening. The same thing played out each night, only growing worse with time.
Her mother reacted to her father’s cough with a small jump. She twiddled around, glancing to the back room, before turning again to Arden. Confusion clouded her eyes.
“I’ll figure something out,” she promised her mother. Not knowing herself if she meant the tea, or her father, or the situation between the two boys. “Why don’t you take care of Dad?”
“Right.” Her mom nodded absently. “I’ll just . . .” She looked to the back room from
where more hacking coughs emanated. “I’ll see what your dad needs.”
Her dad had suffered in the mines. He’d worked for years digging belowground, toiling as a mine rat. All he had to show for it was the mine cough. Then he’d started to display the more horrific symptoms of Violet Death, which had only morphed into an addiction to Shine that he’d developed in order to ease his suffering. He was now little more than bedridden. The symptoms were exacerbated by lack of vitamin D. He was too sick to visit the sunbeds. And the government had labeled him beyond help. Which meant that they’d no longer authorize the sale of VitD to him.
Her mother wasn’t much better. The stress of caring for her husband along with her own use of Shine left her in a perpetual fog. Neither one asked where she and Niall acquired the drugs they brought home. Arden doubted either parent knew they were affiliated with a gang. They were completely unaware of her illegal enterprises. If they were asked, they’d say Arden participated in all the after-school activities.
Nothing could have been further from the truth.
She didn’t feel guilt over this deception. It was easiest if her parents didn’t get involved. If she were caught or her parents were grilled for information, the less they knew the better. It might even keep them alive for the little time they had left.
It also allowed the Lasair to hold meetings in their house. Her parents never asked about them. Like now, with two highly agitated men in her living room, no one questioned the oddness of this.
“What happened?” she asked.
Colin looked up, his eyes bloodshot. He opened his mouth, shut it, and then shook his head. Looking down again.
“They took Mariah,” Uri shouted, hitting another hole in the wall.
“Stop,” Colin said, sounding defeated. “Breaking your hand is not going to save her.”
Arden knew she wouldn’t get answers from Uri. He was too far gone in his crazy headspace. Instead, she concentrated on Colin. Arden sat next to him, getting him to look straight at her. “Start from the beginning.”
Colin licked his lips. “We were on the far side of the club, opposite from the bolt-hole.”
Arden nodded, not saying aloud that she’d made it to the bolt-hole with Dade, so she already knew that hadn’t been their path of escape.
“Our best option was to blend with the crowd. We were almost out, but they . . .” He scrunched his brow, shaking his head. “They were expecting us. They knew who we were. They had intel on us, or our masks, or something.”
That wasn’t good. It meant that every member of Lasair had to change his persona and be more vigilant. That they’d even been marked showed a clear lack of security on their part.
“The govies let the others run by and focused on us. We fought.” Colin shrugged. “I’m not sure what happened. Uri and I were in the middle of kicking some ass when I was distracted by a scream. I looked up and—”
Uri cut in, yelling, “They took Mariah.”
The blood made sense now.
Arden’s dad coughed in the background, breaking the tension of the moment. It was a reminder that they all needed to hold it together.
Colin cleared his throat. “Uri went after her. But there were too many of them. It was suicide.” He shook his head. “I grabbed Uri, held him back, and we were able to fight our way out.”
“I could have gotten to her,” Uri said, turning his rage on Colin and leaning down aggressively. For a moment, Arden thought he’d lose it and take a swing at Colin.
Colin didn’t help the situation. He stood, getting right up in Uri’s face, and raised his voice. “No, you couldn’t. We can’t rescue two of you.”
“Keep it down,” Arden hissed. She didn’t need to deal with two testosterone-challenged jerks coming to blows in her living room. Let alone drawing the attention of her mother. It would take more of Arden’s energy to get her mother refocused and out of the way again.
This was her fault. If she had been with them, perhaps she could have helped Mariah. Yes, Mariah had been trained to fight as they all had, but sometimes backup helped. Yet instead of fighting with her family, she had been with Dade.
Worse, she’d taken him into Undercity.
Her head needed to get in this game pretty quick before they lost anyone else. Her self-flagellation helped clear her indecision and harden her resolve, if not her heart.
“Where’s my brother?” Arden asked, her worry clear.
Colin shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Arden pulled out her datapad and sent a quick ping. The reply came almost immediately.
“He’s on his way,” she said, and exhaled. “Another few minutes.”
She didn’t put into words the rushing relief she felt that her brother was okay. Instead, she cleaned up the mess her mother had made and then went into the kitchen to make fresh tea. There was nothing more to do while they waited. If she didn’t do something with her hands, she’d go crazy.
The tea took little time to boil and steep. Arden set the tray down on the coffee table, sat next to Colin, and poured herself a cup, again at a loss for what to do.
Colin whispered so Uri couldn’t hear. “This shit is only getting worse.”
“I know.”
“If the govies turn up the heat, then Niall is only going to get more aggressive about his insane plan.”
Arden nodded.
“If you leave, I’ll go with you,” he said. There was a plea in his voice that hit her in the gut.
Arden watched Uri continue to pace. She considered Colin’s offer for half a second. Then guilt and family solidarity kicked in. “I can’t.” She hated herself for saying it. “You know we can’t.”
Colin frowned but nodded, not looking her in the eye.
The front door opened, and Niall walked in with Kimber. His entrance was loud and clunky, and he didn’t look happy. They both appeared a bit strung out, their eyes glassy, pupils blown. Niall took in the room at a glance. Then he walked over and set down a smallish package on the coffee table. Arden knew that if she looked inside, she’d see at least thirty disks of Shine.
Her parents’ drug use had spiraled in the last few months. Where once a box this size would last her parents a month or more, now it wasn’t lasting the week.
Instead of being relieved that Niall had arrived, Arden found that her anxiety grew. With the way he looked, this could get ugly. Niall wasn’t known for his gentleness and understanding.
She set down her mug. Pushing her shoulders back, she steeled herself for a fight. She’d faced worse.
Niall pulled out his datapad, turning it so they could see the screen, and pressed “Play” on a news-vid from Club Doom. There was smoke from the percussion bombs and chaos everywhere. Lines of govies stood shoulder to shoulder outside of the building in their govie-greens and riot gear, clear shields in front of them, stun-sticks at the ready.
Watching the scene made Uri go crazy again, his muttering louder now. He didn’t seem to be paying attention to any of them. He kept hitting things. His knuckles now raw pieces of meat, splattering blood on the furniture.
Niall focused on Arden and Colin. Colin’s anger at Uri had long fizzled out, replaced by an ache that felt palpable.
“How much did you mess up?” Niall asked. He directed the question to both of them, but she knew he was really asking her.
Arden wanted to argue that the raid couldn’t possibly be their fault. She bit that back, though. She had been in charge of the op. And she should have been paying better attention. She’d failed her team. She deserved to be reamed out, or worse. Her performance was unforgivable.
Out with it. Pull it off like a quick-seal.
“The govies took Mariah,” she said.
Niall’s jaw bulged back and forth as he ground his teeth. He narrowed his eyes at Arden, saying to her, “I left you in charge.”
She felt every bit of the weight of the criticism. The words hit like phase-fire to the dead center of her heart. Her breath stuttered, and she lowered h
er eyes, not knowing what to say. Whatever she said would be an excuse.
“Did you see her taken?”
And there was the crux.
Arden shook her head, looking at him. “I wasn’t there. Uri and Colin were surrounded.”
Kimber made a noise that sounded like a disbelieving snort.
As much as she felt guilty, that angered Arden. Who was Kimber to pass judgment? She narrowed her eyes at the other girl, silently daring her to speak, or better yet, to say something later when they were alone.
“It’s not Arden’s fault,” Colin said. “You know how it is in the clubs. We’re not always together.”
Niall frowned, neither forcing the issue nor letting Arden off the hook. “If Mariah has been taken, we have a limited window before they transfer her outbound.”
If that happened, they’d never have the opportunity to save her. She’d be lost to them. Arden didn’t want to imagine the torture they’d inflict on Mariah. It was better to focus on what they could do at this moment than the “what ifs” if they failed.
Kimber cleared her throat. “Staging a rescue would jeopardize our plans for the next shipment. We can’t do that.”
Uri growled, throwing a lamp. It smashed against the far wall. Arden didn’t flinch, knowing the projectile wouldn’t hit her. Still, it set her heart to racing.
“We have to think in terms of survival,” Kimber pressed on, seemingly unconcerned with Uri’s outburst and not even reacting to any of the animosity Colin and Arden were throwing her way. “We can’t sacrifice everything for one person. Mariah knew the risks. She shouldn’t have allowed herself to get caught.”
Uri redirected his rage at Kimber. If he looked scary before, now he looked downright lethal. He took several steps toward her before Colin stood up to stop him. Niall stepped in to shield her as well, blocking her from Uri’s line of sight.
Arden feared they wouldn’t have much usable furniture left if this kept up. Or that Kimber would be choked, but that wouldn’t be too bad. She deserved it. Still, they needed to get this conversation back on track.
The Breaking Light (Split City Book 1) Page 9
