His teasing made me giggle. “Let me send everyone a quick text so they know what you’re going to do.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Jet and Mica’s texted replies came quickly. They were fully supportive of Flint breaking in.
“But how are you going to do it without getting caught?” I asked Flint.
Wind whipped over the building and howled through the alleyway. My initial excitement had worn off, and reality was settling in. “What if someone sees you?”
“I’ll be fast,” he replied. “Besides, it’s late. Who will see?”
In a blurred move, Flint was at the building’s edge. Six feet down was the fire escape stairwell. He leapt over the edge gracefully and landed on the balls of his feet.
I watched from above with wide eyes as he once again turned into a blur. The next time he appeared, he was on the ground. I blinked, and he was gone.
Breathing heavily, I raced to the back of the building but didn’t see him. I raced to the front—still no sign of him.
I hurriedly texted Mica. Which way did he go?
He must be in the back. I don’t see him out here.
After running across the rooftop to the back of the building, I gazed below.
A dark shape stood near the back door. I switched my vision. A colorful cloud appeared around the shadow. Flint. I shook my head at the lack of security lights. If the dark-clouded man wanted to break into this building, the back door would be the best way to do it.
My heart pounded against my ribs as I watched Flint. The seconds ticked by. This is taking too long!
If someone drove into the back parking lot they’d be able to see him, and then they could call the police. Meanwhile, I was stuck up here on the roof.
While I knew I could get down eventually, doing so wouldn’t be easy on my own. I certainly wouldn’t be as quiet as Flint.
I was just about to type a text to Raven when the door opened.
Flint silently entered the building.
With each second that passed, my worry grew. I was about to call Flint’s cell phone when the door opened again. He silently emerged before turning into a blur.
Racing back to the stairwell, I opened my eyes wide as I tried to catch sight of him.
Out of nowhere, an arm encircled my waist from behind.
I shrieked.
A large hand covered my mouth before Flint’s scent surrounded me. “Shh . . . We don’t want to let anybody know we’re up here.”
Excitement danced in his eyes when he whirled me around. I punched him lightly on the shoulder. “You scared me on purpose!”
He chuckled deeply. “Now you know how I feel about all the dangerous things you do.”
I tried to scowl, but all I ended up doing was laughing. “So what did you find?”
“Her last name is Jonas, and her first initial is A. Couple that with her address, and we should be able to find her information in the school’s database. With any luck, I’ll be able to hack into the system within a few hours of getting home.”
I wrapped my arms around him and kissed him again. In the cool wind, his warm lips felt smooth and firm.
A buzz vibrated my pocket, interrupting us. I pulled my phone out to see a text from Mica.
I think we have trouble. Flashing lights are coming our way.
My grip on the phone tightened. I tilted the phone for Flint to see. “Do you think it’s the police?”
He raced to the front of the building with me hot on his heels. Sure enough, about five blocks away was a police car. Its lights flashed brightly in the dark night. It was heading our way, but its siren was silent. That wasn’t a good sign.
I hurriedly typed in a response to Mica. You guys better get out of here. Just to be safe.
Her response was immediate. I already told Jet and Raven. They’re leaving too.
Two figures stood up from behind the dumpster across the street. From how high our rooftop position was, I barely caught Mica and Jasper’s outlines as they ran under a streetlight. They retreated farther into the alleyway behind the building across the road.
I ran to the back of the building looked over the edge toward where Raven and Jet had hidden. They were running too. Distant footsteps reached my ears as the two of them sprinted in the opposite direction.
Flint was still at the front of the building, watching the activity below. When I reached his side again, he said in a quiet voice, “It looks like they’re coming here.”
The police car pulled up to the curb below, its lights continuing to flash. Two officers stepped out onto the road. One hiked his pants up higher as his radio crackled on his shoulder.
I gripped Flint’s arm tightly as the police officers strode to the building we stood on. For a moment, a horrifying thought entered my mind. Did the dark-clouded man return? Did he break into the building somehow without us knowing? Did he attack her after all?
But since the officers didn’t seem in a hurry, I didn’t think that was the case. Before the policemen climbed the steps to the building, a figure appeared below.
Since we were so high up, I couldn’t make out features, but the woman had pajamas on. She pointed across the street and behind the building.
“Can you hear them?” I asked Flint quietly.
He shook his head.
The female resident suddenly lifted her hand and pointed toward the roof of the building, where Flint and I stood. The policemen arched their necks and glanced skyward. I pulled Flint away from the edge and hunkered down. My eyes flashed wide. “Holy crap! Do you think they know we’re up here?”
I gazed at the roof’s hard surface beneath our feet. My mouth dropped as something occurred to me. Considering the next words that flowed from Flint’s lips matched my thoughts, we’d obviously reached the same conclusion.
“The residents on the third floor can probably hear us running around.” He scowled. “That woman probably knows that somebody is on the roof, or at the very least, she suspects it.”
Before I could respond, Flint peeked over the edge again and hissed in a breath. “Shit. They’re heading toward the fire escape.”
The sound of the ladder being pulled to the ground came next. The rickety sound echoed through the alleyway below.
“What are we going to do?”
“Do you trust me?” Flint’s dark gaze bored into mine as the evening wind whipped his chestnut hair around his face.
I nodded. “With my life.”
“Climb on my back. We’re getting out of here.”
I gripped his forearm tightly. “But what about the girl? What if he breaks in after we leave and attacks her?”
Flint’s eyes softened. “The police are here. They’ll probably be here for a while. She’ll stay safe. Now, come on. We need to go.”
I swung onto his back just as the sound of the policeman’s boots began running up the rickety stairs.
Flint’s hands encircled my thighs. “Hold on.”
The entire world turned into a blur.
I closed my eyes tightly as Flint rocketed us off the roof. For a moment, we were airborne. I kept my arms and legs wrapped tightly around him and didn’t dare breathe. I was too frightened that I would distract him and we’d plummet to our death as he leapt to the next building.
We landed with a thud, but he didn’t stop there. Flint sprinted again, and once again we were airborne. It took me a second to realize what he was doing. He was running and leaping from building to building with me clinging to his back, just like Spider-Man on the big screen.
A shout sounded behind us. I didn’t know if that meant we’d been spotted by the police or that the policemen were shouting to each other.
We didn’t stop to find out.
Nausea rolled through me as Flint landed on another building. When I opened my eyes, I darted a look behind my shoulder. I had no idea which building had been the girl’s. Rows of apartment buildings lined the block behind us.
“How are we going to get down?” I asked him.
&
nbsp; “It looks like the building ahead is a story lower than this one. I’ll jump us down there, and then we’ll see if we can climb to the ground.”
A rush of air swept over my face as Flint leaped. The world again became a blur.
I dared to open my eyes. I gulped. In that split second, fifty feet of air separated us from the ground. If Flint missed a step or slipped on the roof, both of us could plummet to the ground below. And regardless of our powers, neither of us would survive a fifty-foot fall to concrete.
My body jolted abruptly when Flint landed on the lower roof. He had just jumped us down fifteen feet, and the sudden landing jarred my shoulders. When I hissed in pain, his grip tightened around my thighs.
“Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
I shook my head even though fire burned my limbs. “I’m fine. Keep going.”
He raced to the edge of the building. That was our last hope for getting down. We’d reached the end of the block. At least the police hadn’t driven this way.
“Do you see anything to hold onto?” Flint leaned over the edge. Shiny black shingles lined the roof’s surface. The moon continued to shine down, and the wind ruffled the hair around my shoulders.
“There’s a gutter system right there.” I pointed to the corner and swallowed a wince as I moved my shoulder. “Do you think that would work?”
“It might for you since you’re so light. I’m not sure if it will hold me. I’m going to set you down. Do you feel steady?”
“I’m fine.” I didn’t tell him that my shoulders hurt so badly I feared I’d torn a muscle. Right now, that didn’t matter. We just needed to get down to the ground safely and get home.
Flint slid me off his back and held onto me until I gained my balance. I crept to the edge of the building and gritted my teeth against the pain in my muscles. Hunkering down, I held on carefully to the edge of the roof before swinging my legs over.
“Lena . . . be careful.” Flint’s chestnut hair waved in the breeze as he stared down at me.
I forced a smile and held tightly to the gutter system. It was smooth and felt flimsy. I swallowed sharply. It didn’t feel sturdy at all, and I could just picture it peeling away from the building with me plummeting to the ground while holding it.
“Here goes nothing.” I loosened my grip on the roof’s edge. The entire gutter system was holding my weight.
Flint’s eyes widened with horror at my next actions. Sliding down the gutter system while using it like a fireman’s pole had seemed like a good idea. That was until the ground rushed up to greet me.
“Lena!”
Swallowing a scream, I tightened my hands around the gutter and squeezed my legs while flinging my cloud off my shoulders and down below my feet. Between my tighter grip and the cushioning cloud, I slowed just enough to keep from plummeting to the ground.
I let out a loud umph anyway when I landed, and the force of it made my jaw snap. I winced when I bit my tongue, but I hadn’t broken anything. Mission accomplished.
“Lena?” Flint’s voice carried from above. “Are you okay?”
I gave him the thumbs-up sign since a trickle of blood filled my mouth. I had definitely bitten my tongue.
With a pounding heart, I watched as Flint swung over the ledge of the roof. Unlike the apartment building that the girl had lived in, this building was sided. It had no brick to hold onto or any kind of architecture that would help someone scale its side. All that it had was the gutter system for gripping.
Holding my breath, I watched as Flint carefully clung to the side of the gutter. It squeaked menacingly.
Oh crap.
Seeming to sense that it was about to snap, Flint loosened his grip. He slid down it at an alarming speed.
My eyes widened with terror since he wasn’t slowing and would hit the ground in seconds.
Instinctively, I gathered a large energy ball and blasted it beneath his feet.
His sliding slowed, thanks to my ball, but the gutter system squeaked more loudly. When he was ten feet above the ground, Flint launched himself into the air and flipped into a backward somersault before landing on the ground. He bounced on the balls of his feet before standing to his full height.
My heart pounded. Breathing heavily, I said, “How is it that I’m still not used to how you can move? I thought for sure you were going to break a leg!”
He chuckled and walked gracefully toward me. “Thanks for slowing me down. That helped.”
His words made me smile despite the metallic taste of blood in my mouth. I scanned the road. It was dark and quiet. No cops.
“I’m not sure how we’ll get back home,” I said quietly, “but we better get moving. Who knows if the police caught a glimpse of us or not. They could be looking for us.”
Flint grabbed my hand and pulled me into a jog. “You’re right. Let’s go.”
Pain cut into my shoulder at his pull, but I took off at his side. Our feet tapped on the pavement as our pace increased.
Despite the burning that had set into my shoulder muscles, I kept up with him, only because he kept his speed to that of a normal human’s. At the next block, he pulled out his cell phone and called Jet.
“We’re two blocks south from the building.” His words were even and cool despite the fact that we were sprinting. “The police officer started climbing the fire escape. We had no choice but to go from building to building until we could find a way down.”
I grinned as air flowed steadily in and out of my lungs. I could just imagine Jet’s envious expression as he imagined Flint and me leaping across buildings. The twin hadn’t made it a secret that he would have preferred Flint’s powers over his own.
Flint was silent for a second before he said, “Yeah. That sounds good. Meet us there in a couple of minutes.”
Flint shoved his phone back into his pocket and gripped my hand more tightly. “They’ll pick us up at the next block. This way.”
He led me down the next street. A few dogs barked in yards that we passed. Since we were farther away from campus, the apartment buildings had fallen behind us, and we were in a residential neighborhood. Most of the houses were dark, but a few had lights on. I could only hope that if anyone peeked out their living-room window, they would assume we were a couple of college students going for a late-night run.
A few cars drove by at the next block, and I let out a sigh of relief when I saw a familiar vehicle waiting on the side of the road.
Flint and I slid into the back of the SUV with a grinning Raven and Jasper. “How the hell did you get away?” the twin asked.
Jet pulled away from the curb and started driving toward home. Mica turned in her seat to listen from the front.
“Have you ever seen the movie Spider-Man?” I smiled.
Jasper’s eyes widened. “No way! Did you seriously leap from building to building?”
I laughed when Jet mumbled something under his breath from the front.
“That would pretty much describe how we got away,” I replied.
Raven’s eyes swirled orange embers as he smirked at his brother. “Nice one, Flint.”
Flint just shrugged. “Desperate times . . .”
Jet flashed us a look in the rearview mirror as we passed under a streetlight. “Don’t rub it in.”
CHAPTER NINE
Back at our apartment, Di was still awake. Black yoga pants and a black T-shirt covered her tall frame. She waited in the living room. A single lamp illuminated the space by casting a golden glow over the ceiling. The clock in the hall had just struck two in the morning.
She crossed her arms when the six of us pushed through the front door. “I’m glad to see you all arrived safely. I tried to warn you about the cops in the vision I received, but none of you answered your phones when I called.”
Jasper shrugged off his coat. “You were a little late on the warning, Di. We were already running away when I missed your call.”
She shook her head sharply. “I should have concentrated harder, but I
was distracted by this little one.” She pointedly looked at Susannah, who was seated on the couch.
Susannah’s knees were drawn to her chest, and her large, luminous blue eyes were wide. “Sorry, Di. I didn’t mean to get back so late.”
Jet groaned and kicked off his boots before strolling into the living room. His curly dark hair was disheveled from our nighttime excursion. “Please tell me that guilty look isn’t from ruining my car.”
Raven’s eyes swirled brighter. “I have a feeling he’s not going to like the news,” he said under his breath to me.
Flint chuckled. I knew he’d heard Raven too.
Susannah shook her head at Jet, her long hair swaying around her shoulders. “It’s still in one piece . . . mostly.”
Jet collapsed onto the couch across from her. “Seriously? Okay, spill it. What did you do?”
Susannah wrung her hands and looked at the seven of us. Di stood near the corner of the room with her arms crossed. From the looks of it, Susannah had already received an earful from Di.
“I may have . . . um, hit a tree.”
“But you’re okay?” I peeled off my coat and sat on the chair by the couch. My shoulders still hurt, but after I rolled them a few times, they felt a little better. I no longer thought I’d torn muscles, but I’d probably be sore the next day.
I tucked my hands under my thighs to warm them up. Our apartment was cool. Someone had left a window cracked open. Flint came up behind me. I felt his presence as Mica, Jasper, and Raven joined us too.
“I’m fine. But the back door of your car . . .” Susannah eyed Jet. “May have a dent in it.”
Jet dropped his head into his hands and moaned. “Ah, man!”
Jasper laughed. “Glad you made it back in one piece, Suze.”
Mica plopped down beside Susannah. “No kidding.” She turned to face her. “So why didn’t you come back earlier? We were hoping you could tell us what you saw.”
Susannah ducked her head again. “I knew Jet would be mad at me.”
Mica raised her eyebrows. “So you were avoiding us?”
Jasper clapped his brother on the back. “Don’t worry about it, Susannah. He’ll get over it. Serves him right for loaning you his new car when you’re still learning how to drive.”
The Complete Lost Children Series Page 84
