"He didn't get that one right, did he?" A surly nod to his right made her gaze trail to the final section of the diorama.
Theda took in the last scene, the one she'd taken the horseman costume from. The religion-monger in that scene was tied to a wooden stake, a bushel of twigs and wood at its base.
"It's not exactly how you executed me, is it?" she asked him.
Ezekiel had the grace to look away. "Not exactly."
They hadn't truly spoken about how he'd managed to get her out of the laboratory by faking her execution, how he'd used an already dead body to fool the bloodthirsty mob outside. It was a distasteful memory, but a necessary one she knew.
"Maybe it's what he thinks will happen--the beast, I mean. You know, eventually." She couldn't tear her eyes away from the Theda mannequin. It looked so tortured, the features so distorted by terror. She wondered if it was an accurate reflection. She'd been frightened enough since the Apocalypse that her face felt as though it was in a constant state of fear.
Ezekiel followed her gaze. "I don't think burning at the stake is what he has in mind. As horrific as that might be, the Beast has a much more active imagination."
She shuddered at that and felt his fingers wrap around her elbow, trying to tug her away. "Don't look at it," he said. "Just pass me the clothes so we can get out of here. This place is..."
He didn't need to finish for her to understand. She knew exactly what effect this place had on people. Even knowing she was leaving it behind, she felt its malevolent air.
She held the coat out for him, waiting for him to take it with the pants and put them on. She watched him shrug his arms into the black coat and pull on the boots, and in an instant he became her bounty hunter again, the Beast's general, the Pale Rider. Just seeing him standing there sent a surge of confidence through her. She looked around the room again, letting her gaze linger on the macabre diorama.
"You know," she said, her eye catching on a matchbook that had the boutique's logo on its front. "It's actually kind of comforting to see how much I've survived. All laid out like that, kind of makes me feel strong."
"You are strong." His gaze met hers in a way that fueled the small spark of power coiling within her chest.
"Let's light it up," she said.
"Light it up?"
She nodded. "Burn it down. Send it all to ash."
"It won't all burn," he said.
"It doesn't need to. Just this."
"Sasha will send all of his expendables in to fight the blaze."
She shrugged. "Let him. It won't matter." She lifted the matchbook, flipped open the cover to pull out a stick. She pulled the head across the phosphorous and held it to the religion-monger's wax finger. The flame flared up with a bright yellow tongue to lick at the wrist.
She wasn't sure, but she thought she was smiling. She thought of how easy it would be in the chaos to run for Bridget. How casually three horsemen could stride from this den with a drugged spitter in their wake as the boutique fired its way toward heaven. With Ezekiel rescued, with Cain whole and rejuvenated, the Red General was as good as dead. The Beast would lose his religion-monger, his Pale General, the hold he had on Ezekiel by keeping Bridget. All with this one small flame.
It was laughably simple.
"I think Cain was right," she said. "The shell has cracked and I'm on the other side."
The blaze had begun to eat away at the wax Theda's arm, catching on the coarse linen dress and dancing up toward the distorted face. Theda felt something spread its wings within her, a phoenix maybe, fanning its birth with the heat of the flame and she held her hands to the warmth.
"Most definitely on the other side."
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BOOK 3
Chapter 1
Curls of smoke dug down into Theda's throat, scooping out each molecule of life-giving oxygen from the deepest caverns of her lungs, creating a vacuum that made her suck for air. The feeling was not unlike the first moments of godspit high when bliss all but paralyzed her lungs, except now the reason for the euphoria was completely different.
She looked over her shoulder as she stood deep in the bowels of the spitters' den, casting a glance about Sasha's precious boutique. She eyed its dozens of mannequins and costumes, its props, the door to the lounge where until it had housed an imprisoned Ezekiel, it kept a troop of spitters in a kind of drug-hazed stasis. She took in the vile apartment with a righteous sense of joy. She'd come here to rescue her general, to face the demons that still lurked in her psyche about this place, and she'd done it. She'd lit the damned boutique alight, making the petroleum in the wax figures sizzle and and melt, sending grasping fingers of black smoke toward the alarms. She'd rescued her general. She'd faced her fears, and now they would flee this shithole. The elation mounted proportionate to the height of the blaze.
She had ahold of Ezekiel's massive hand as they fled the outer boutique toward the exit where Cain waited, no doubt bleeding still from the gunshot wound she'd delivered to his chest in order to gain entry. Even that was okay. Cain was the immortal man, marked by the god, protected. He'd wake unharmed. They'd get to Bridget. They'd get to Ami. They'd put down that feral Kat they had to dope to the gills with godspit, only keeping her alive in case they couldn't find Ezekiel.
Everything was possible.
The outer boutique was as large as a gymnasium, and by the time they reached the door, she was panting for breath. Even so, it was a marathon as good as Philippides had run and she felt the way he must have when he'd finally reached Athens and choked out Nike. She had only to open the door and she was free of this place forever. The victory all but spoken.
They were at the door, as good as gone when Ezekiel crushed her against the wall with his full weight. She didn't even have a chance to grip the handle and yank the door open. She looked up into his green eyes, found his face so close to hers she could taste his breath. Her heart squirmed in her chest as she read his gaze. This man, this man had been what it was all about. She couldn't drink in enough of him. She couldn't feel enough of his arms as they wound about her in a possessive embrace that also sent more than a message of gratitude.
"What are you doing?"
His hands were working at the buttons of her leather pants. "What does it look like?"
"Have you lost your mind?" She looked over his shoulder, knowing the flames would ravage their way toward them, that the alarm would sound, that Sasha's men would storm the area. "There's no time."
"I don't need much."
She could already feel him against her. The heat that suffused her cheeks had nothing to do with the growing rise in temperature. It was foolish to want him at such a ridiculous time, foolish but undeniable.
His hand burrowed into the front of her pants and his finger slid beneath her panties toward her core. "It seems you don't either," he rasped.
She knew he was right, she'd been so relieved to see him, so excited to feel such victory, that her body was already pressing against his, straining to offer him better entry.
"Th
is is crazy," she said, struggling to maintain a rational mindset as he worked his hands down her thighs, peeling the material away as he went. He let go her legs long enough to splay his fingers across her ass cheeks, then to pull her hard against him. For the life of her, she couldn't figure out how he managed to get his pants down without letting go of her hips. But he'd managed it. He'd managed it and was already lifting her onto his member.
"We need to get out of here..."
"Stop talking," he said.
She thought she might struggle her way off him, but the head of his massive shaft had begun to pierce through and a gasp of pained pleasure escaped her throat. She went limp with the relief of him filling her.
"Sweet fuck." He groaned against her neck at first entry, then when he realized how slick she was, how ready to pull him inside, it became more of an invasion, his cock seeking the deepest sanctum of her body.
She was pressed hard against the wall as he ground into her, burying himself so deeply that she couldn't catch her breath. He thrust twice with such violence that she felt him shudder through his release and even then he didn't relinquish his hold on her. Instead his hands climbed from her hips so that one arm could wrap around her waist and the other flung itself across her shoulders. With her pinioned so, he added her weight to his strength as he rammed her further down onto his cock, driving deep enough that she winced, planting himself there as though he wanted to take root.
"Why isn't it ever enough?" he mumbled into her neck.
"What does that mean?"
He caught her eye with his. His thumb moved across her lips. "It means you're all I thought about in that damned tank."
She wasn't sure why he looked so shame-faced, or why he found a way to primly button her pants without so much as a finger grazing her skin. She thought maybe the admission had unmanned him somehow. She wanted to reach out to him, to convince him she still saw him as the mighty Pale Rider. That his voluntary capture and imprisonment made him mean even more to her; he was part of her, suffering for her. What he'd done to save her, what he'd always done: killing for her, protecting her, risking his life for her. She was the one who should be ashamed.
"Sorry," he said without looking at her. His fingers fumbled with his jeans, closing them over his hips.
"Sorry?" she said. "What's there to be--"
The alarm cut in finally, squealing its knowledge of smoke and fire and a breech of the boutique. There wasn't time to say more. They had to get Cain. They had to get--
"Bridget," she said, realizing as she thought of Cain that she hadn't told Ezekiel that the son of Adam had found his sister.
He froze midstep and eyed her, green eyes shuttered. "Have you seen her? Is she okay?"
Theda's answer lost itself in the timbre of a tenored male voice coming from the doors.
"Depends on your definition of okay."
She knew the voice. Oh, how she knew it. As long as she lived, she'd know that voice. Her fingers twitched, unable to contain the trembling she was already suffering; instead the shivers streaked through her skin like it was a breathing transmitter. She whirled to face the door. Sasha, finally. He still wore his hair red, the lips painted a bright cherry color to match. Several of his henchmen filed in behind him, fanning out to block the door. Theda counted six of them beside Sasha; two more rushed past them with extinguishers. Fat chance they had of putting out that fire. Theda almost laughed.
Ezekiel spoke first. "Where is she?"
"Busy," Sasha said.
Theda watched as Ezekiel's back tensed. She imagined that beneath that black duster, the muscles along his torso stood out.
"You don't exactly have much time," Ezekiel said almost politely. "That fire..."
Sasha lifted a shoulder almost delicately. "A drama proprietor who doesn't plan for a wax fire isn't much of a proprietor." He inclined his head toward the back and Theda followed his gaze with a lump in her throat.
What she'd thought were a pair of men intent on fighting the blaze, instead slapped their hands against two broad stainless steel buttons along the wall. Several fireproof doors slammed down into the floor, effectively cutting off the blaze in the costume area from the rest of the boutique.
"The air exchangers will pull all the oxygen from the room. In about five minutes, the fire will be out."
"I didn't realize you still had such technology," Ezekiel drawled.
Again that delicate lift of a shoulder. "It's expensive, but necessary."
"You know even without a weapon, I can take down each one of these guards," Ezekiel said, but while his tone was casual, the snakelike shivering of each muscle in his neck was a definite threat.
"I know it better than most."
"Then give me Bridget and let us pass."
Instead of a reply, Sasha craned his neck toward Theda, catching her eye. "Does she know why you're here?" The outright smirk and patronizing tone made Theda's feet move on their own. She didn't realize she'd begun to charge him until Ezekiel had her by the elbow and was pulling her backward.
"She doesn't know," Sasha said and grinned. "I thought not."
"She knows."
Sasha lifted a zealously groomed brow, but otherwise said nothing to Ezekiel, choosing instead to direct his attention to Theda.
"He broke the box, you know," Sasha said to her, nodding toward the lounge where she knew they'd left the wooden crate and metal cylinder behind. "Put his feet right through it, even under the influence of several smears."
"Several?" Theda squinted at Ezekiel. "How many did Kat give you?"
Ezekiel shook his head, but Sasha piped up for him, seeming to relish the tidbit of information.
"Not enough, apparently. We had to order the isolation chambers from the doctor's lab."
She imagined again how narrow the tank was beneath her hands as she tried to free him, thinking that if good ole Doctor Hurte had designed it, then there was no way it was roomy. She remembered the eye, Ezekiel's eye, peering out at her.
"Then you were--"
"Aware," Ezekiel finished for her. "Yes."
She felt sick just thinking how small the cylinder was compared to his width. "You were aware. In that chamber." Despite the ball of stone in her stomach, she needed to hear it again. He had to confirm it. She thought of his confession about how thinking of her kept him sane inside of it, and she gripped her stomach as she waited for his answer.
"Yes."
The flat way he said the word made her waver on her feet.
"The whole time," Sasha concurred, his voice a purr of kittenish delight. "Drugs wear off quicker on a horseman than it does for most, I suspect." He quirked his head at Ezekiel. "How long would you say godspit lasts on a general of the Beast's army?"
Ezekiel said nothing. His fingers clenched into fists. Theda had the feeling the answer was one she didn't want to hear. She imagined Ezekiel in that cylinder, aware of how trapped he was, unable to escape, every movement using up his air.
The pistol found its way into her hand as she imagined him waiting for Kat to return or for the Beast to show up. She could see his determination to remain calm even through the gloom of shadow that encased him. Her mind raced over that image and into Ezekiel's brownstone living room, onto the blissed out image of the Red General that they'd left with Ami, thinking him safe because she was blissed out and unaware.
She was thinking of Ami still when she leveled the barrel at Sasha, imagining that Kat had undoubtedly been conscious while they'd plotted, thinking the Red General was safely out for the count and oblivious.
Theda didn't take the time to aim; she just squeezed the trigger.
Sasha fell like a puppet with cut strings. His henchmen buzzed to life around her but she didn't care. She kept seeing Ami beneath the Red General, this time with his eyes bulging, face blood red as the breath was squeezed from his lungs. Just another gasper statistic, the Red General had called him.
Then she squeezed the trigger again, and again. It took three shots before s
he realized she was sobbing each time the gun sounded. Three shots before she remembered three was the same amount of smears that remained to them while they'd planned Ezekiel's rescue. She recalled how she'd eyed the drug that rested on the coffee table, thinking even then how needy it was, how using it desensitized her and insulated her from all the things she didn't want to recall. She'd been given a choice back at the brownstone, to run or to fight. Three smears to choose from and only one was inert. She had the sinking feeling she'd made a selection back then that she didn't understand and that somehow that choice left Ami far too painfully aware and vulnerable. She'd saved Ezekiel, yes, but at what cost to Ami? The guilt tingled down her spine.
In that moment, the want for godspit so overpowered her that it loosened the gun from her grip. If it made a sound as it struck the floor, she didn't hear it. All she heard was the whisper of her addiction begging her to remember how good the bliss was at swallowing up the darkness. And in the moment when her muscles cramped with the need to fix, she thought she heard the addiction trying to shush her to sleep.
Chapter 2
She thought she heard Ezekiel's voice urging her against the darkness, coaxing her back to their present reality, except that voice wasn't pleased that she'd shot Sasha. In fact, he seemed terribly and inexplicably upset. She swung her gaze to him as the henchmen advanced on him.
His gaze settled on her in the most pitiful way.
"What have you done, Minou?" he said. "What have you just done?"
"I fucken made a choice, that's what I did."
Whatever he thought of that answer didn't matter as the first of the henchmen fell upon them. At first, she had the ridiculous thought that they would try to disarm her, but they went for Ezekiel instead. Of course they would; he was the Pale Rider, a far greater threat than a mere pistol in the hands of a girl. Any fool would know that. She found herself thinking that even if it was true, that same fool would know better than to square off against the general.
Theta Waves Box Set: The Complete Trilogy (Books 1-3) (Theta Waves Trilogy) Page 37
