by May Dawson
When he was near the window, I bolted up and opened the door. His head twisted around, his squinting red-soaked eyes finding me for the first time, before I slammed the door behind me. I ran down the hall, frantic to find a hiding space, since I couldn’t escape the locked ward itself.
This was the worst fucking game of hide-and-seek I’d ever played in my life.
I was turning around, desperate to find a place to hide, and so I almost missed it.
At the end of the hallway, at the door, a flicker of blue satin.
I ran towards it as Tom barreled out of the room, knowing that if I had chosen poorly, this was my last chance at escape. I was trusting a ghost to save me.
But not just any ghost.
My ghost. My sister.
My heart pounded in my chest as I ran on those leaden legs that couldn’t last much longer. I ran hard and frantic as I could for the door. Tom’s footsteps thundered behind me.
The door ahead of me flew open.
Chapter 12
I stumbled into Levi’s arms. His arms closed around me, and for a second, I felt enveloped by the warmth of his powerful body. A sense of well-being flooded me, quicker than sense. But I could feel his intense focus on Tom, who was barreling towards us.
Levi shoved me roughly behind him. He stepped forward, his fists coming up, taking on a fighter’s posture.
Dr. Parrish was there in the hall with me, her eyes wide with alarm. “Are you all right?”
“You have to stop him.” I gestured towards Tom. “He attacked me.”
She looked past me, quickly taking in the situation, and cursed. “What the hell is going on today? I thought this was my team.”
“You want us to believe you didn’t have anything to do with your team trying to torture us all?”
She shook her head. “It must have been Mr. Joseph. You have to believe me, Ellis.”
Well, no. I really didn’t.
But she was already on the move, slipping between Levi and Tom. “Tom, stop. You can’t hurt them—”
Tom shoved her out of the way. She stumbled against the nurse’s station, catching herself with her hands, just as Tom slammed into Levi. Levi leaned into him, locking his arms tightly. The two of them slammed into the ground.
Tom punched wildly, and I saw one punch connect with the side of Levi’s face. His head jerked back, slamming against the linoleum. I pressed my hand to my mouth, frantic to help him, but not knowing how.
Then suddenly Levi was on top of Tom, pinning him down. He punched him hard, his hand on Tom’s collar, and I heard a crunch as Tom’s head rocked into the linoleum too.
“Stop,” Parrish said, trying to grab at Levi’s shirt, leaning into the fight carefully. “You have to get out of here, Levi. You have to help your brother.”
Levi paused for a second, his arm still cocked back, his chest rising and falling hard. Then he punched Tom again. There was a spurt of blood.
“Stop,” Parrish said again. “You’re not a monster, Levi. You don’t want to be responsible for his death.”
“And he’s not going to come after us again?” Levi asked. “You’re right, I’m not a monster. But you tried to make us into monsters, didn’t you?”
“Levi,” I said urgently. “Where is Ryker?”
Because all that mattered was that my boys were safe. I didn’t care if Tom lived or died. But I cared about Ryker and Levi.
Levi dug his knee into Tom’s lower abs as he pushed himself back and stood. He took a quick step away from the groaning, gagging man who curled onto his side.
“You have to run,” Parrish said. “They’re going to come for you. And now I don’t know if I can protect you.”
Levi nodded curtly. He rested his hand on my shoulder, looking into my face as if he was checking to see if I was okay. His eyes were fond, protective, even with someone else’s blood sprayed across his shirt. I nodded, hoping my eyes told him that I was fine.
I’d always be fine as long as I had him and Ryker.
“Doctor,” he said. “Where’s my brother?”
“They took him to the tenth floor.” Parrish said. She went quickly to the lock-box at the nurse’s station, the one where the weapons were stowed. “We had talked about stress-testing you all, but I didn’t agree…”
Levi tucked a strand of hair back behind my ear, the gesture quick and fond. “You ready for a fight, pretty girl?”
“Yeah,” I said. My voice came out broken, rough, my throat still raw from the near-drowning. But my voice was still fierce. “I’m ready.”
He nodded curtly to Dr. Parrish, passing close by her. He pulled two swords out of the lockbox. Then hand-in-hand, we ran for the stairs.
The concrete stairwell was windowless, lit by intermittent bulbs that gave off a faint buzzing; the light barely brightened the murk of this space. The steps seemed to be crumbling beneath out feet as we climbed to the next floor, and I wrapped my hand tightly around the metal railing, trying to keep my feet underneath me when I was still sick with adrenaline and fear. I stumbled and landed heavily on one knee, and I gasped at the pain that ran through my kneecap up my thigh.
“Ellis.” Levi stopped on the landing and turned back to me. His voice sounded harsh to me. Stern.
I stumbled to my feet and up onto the landing with him. I looked up into his handsome face, those deep blue eyes of his regarding me coolly, and said, “I’m trying.”
“I know,” he said. And then his hands were on my waist. He drew me against his body.
I felt his warmth, the hardness of his body, the sense of comfort that always washed over me when I was near him. My lips parted to tell him that I was fine, that he could count on me.
But he pressed his lips against mine.
His mouth was soft and tender, not like his hard-planed body under my palms. I breathed in his scent, which was so different from Ryker’s; he smelled like sawdust and leather and bitter chocolate to me.
Then thought left me. Instead, I pressed myself against him, frantic for more of him; I could feel his leanly-muscled thigh and the rough denim of his jeans between my legs. His hands were hot against my hips, and I could feel each individual finger like a brand on the wet spandex covering my ass.
Gently, he disentangled himself from me, pushing my hips away from his; he leaned his head back against the concrete wall as if he could barely separate from me, could barely draw a breath. Embarrassed, my cheeks flaming, I took a step back. He had kissed me first, sure. And I had responded like I was in heat.
“Sorry,” he said. “I know you aren’t ready. But we have to help Ryker.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I’m not sure how stopping to make out helps Ryker.”
And then I realized that my voice had come out normally. My lungs no longer burned. I bounced up onto my toes, surprised to discover that my muscles were responsive again, my body energized.
“You’re the fire,” he said. “And we feed the flames.”
“That sounds like another one of those mysterious one-liners you guys all like to toss around.”
Somewhere in the distance, a claxon alarm began to blare, a steady, dangerous beat. They were coming for us.
He shook his head. “Not just a one-liner.”
“I’m going to have complicated feelings about this later,” I said. “If we aren’t dead.”
“Promise, we won’t be,” he said. “And promise, there’s nothing complicated.”
I thought about how I’d slept all tangled up in Ryker’s arms the night before, and I thought he had to be crazy.
Guilt washed through me as I thought of Ryker’s warmth and kindness. I didn’t even know if he was okay. How could it have felt so right to kiss Levi? I had been so hungry for Levi’s lips, his hands, his body against mine. Even though I liked Ryker so much.
But Levi was bounding up the steps ahead of me, and we had Ryker to rescue.I sprinted after him. I could feel guilty later.
At the top of the landing, there was a door and a la
st set of stairs with a sign that said ROOF. Levi waited with his hand on the doorknob for me to join him.
“Let me go first,” he mouthed.
I nodded. He swung the door open and went around the corner, fast and dangerous. In his tall, powerful body there was such lean confidence, such pure fighter, and I couldn’t help the way I felt attracted to him. I followed after him into a long, dimly lit room. It was empty.
I thought about how Parrish had said floor ten, and how it had seemed like Levi had known what she meant.
Our floor had one long hall running down its length. But now, Levi went quickly on quiet feet towards the other door, just as it opened. Two men came through it.
As soon as the first one was inside, Levi jumped up, grabbing the exposed metal ceiling beam, and swung his legs into the man. He dropped, and Levi dropped with him. He landed on his feet, already stepping over the man’s body. He spun towards the second man, who suddenly backpedaled, trying to get back through the door. For the first time, I saw his face again: the guy they called Beefy, the one who had choked me out on my mother’s lawn.
When he turned his back, Levi caught him around the shoulders. I could see the tension in Levi’s body, all through his broad shoulders, as he grabbed Beefy’s head in his hands and snapped his neck cleanly. Beefy crumpled to his feet.
Levi reached back, holding his hand out to me, and I took the hand that had just killed two men and stepped over their bodies, following him into the next room.
Ryker lay on his side, his knees drawn up towards his chest. He was pale and still, his eyes closed.
Levi ran to him. “Ryker.”
His voice was low and guttural, full of brotherly love and fear, and I ran after him. The two of us knelt as he pressed his fingers into Ryker’s throat. My palm slid under Ryker’s wet flannel shirt, feeling for the intake of his breath, and I felt the slightest rise of his chest just as Levi said, “He’s alive.”
I breathed a sigh I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. “What happened to you guys?”
“Knowing Ryker?” he said. “When he couldn’t take the torture anymore, he projected. We have to hope he wakes up soon, though, cause I kind of need him to help us fight out of here.”
“Can you bring him back to us somehow?”
Levi raked his hand through his blond hair. “I don’t know.”
“Can I?”
Despite our desperate plight, there was a flash of humor across Levi’s face. “You think you can Sleeping Beauty my brother? We can try. We can heal you, and you can heal us. That’s supposed to be the way it works. But I don’t know if it works when he’s made the decision to check out.”
“Supposed to be?”
He shrugged. “I’ve read that in the Mythos. But actually doing this? It’s a new one on me.”
“So that kiss was…”
“Based on theory,” he said. The tiniest smile curved his lips up. “And pretty damn great.”
I felt myself give, a release of tension, and I smiled back at him. Then I leaned over Ryker’s inert body. His face was so handsome, even asleep, with those cheekbones so sharply defined and the solidness of his defined jaw. Feeling more than a little weird, I took his slack face in my hands. I pressed my lips to his lips tentatively; they were cool and firm and lush. I sat back on my heels, waiting for magic to happen.
Ryker’s lips were still faintly parted, his eyes closed.
“Okay, I guess we do this the hard way,” Levi said. He grabbed Ryker’s wrist in one hand and pulled him up to his feet, leaning over and putting his shoulder into Ryker’s abs. Then he boosted his brother over his shoulder, one arm wrapped around Ryker’s thigh, the other wrapping around Ryker’s bicep.
“He’s not heavy, he’s my brother.” Levi groaned. “Take the sword.”
I bent and wrapped my fingers around the leather-wrapped hilt of the sword. It felt heavy and awkward in my hands, but I stepped in front of Levi as we headed for the door we’d come from.
“How are we going to get out of here?” I asked. I didn’t know how many people worked here, keeping those like us imprisoned, but I imagined every one of them was on their way to make sure we never escaped.
“Hell if I know,” Levi said. “Something will come to us.”
Maybe I was never going to have to deal with those complicated feelings after all.
We made our way down the stairs again, moving fast. Our feet clattered over the cement steps. I glanced back over my shoulder, but Levi was close on my heels despite carrying his brother in a fireman’s carry, Ryker draped over his broad shoulder.
I turned the corner, and the door flew open behind us. Levi turned, already easing his brother to the ground, and I held the sheath of the sword out to him. As Ryker sprawled across the cement floor, Levi grabbed the hilt and turned with it, drawing the sword out in a blur of silver; he whirled on the man who had tumbled out of the doorway. There was a gun in his hand, but Levi brought the sword in a smooth arc across his chest.
The man fell forward. Then gun went off with a roar, a powerful sound that echoed through the tiny space, making my ears pop painfully. The air was filled with the scent of gunpowder and sulfur.
“You okay?” Levi asked, pushing the man away, down the stairs. The body tumbled down the cement steps, leaving a trail of blood behind.
“Yep.” I was already bending to check on Ryker. He was still and quiet as ever, in the awkward pose where Levi had dumped him.
Levi had the man’s gun in his hand; he pulled open the door he’d just come from and glanced in, swore, and then I heard the pop-pop-pop as he fired the gun rapidly down the hall. As the noise faded, I heard the sound of footsteps on the stairs below us.
“We’re trapped,” I said. “We’ve got to go back up.”
Levi nodded, already bending to grab his brother. “Lead the way. Hopefully they’re scared of floor ten too, anyway. Might be a good place to take a defensive position.”
I took the sword he handed to me and ran up the stairs. Below us, I could hear the thunder of feet on the stairs; the men coming after us were coming fast. I opened the door to the tenth floor and the three of us limped fast through the antechamber and into the room where we’d found Ryker. Levi nodded at the door behind us, and I stopped to close and bolt it. My fingers were shaking.
“Why are you scared of floor ten?” I asked in a soft voice, turning around.
The door at the other side of the room stood open. It had been painted with wards.
“This has always been a place for torture,” he said. “First the patients who were tormented here. Then the Hunters, the Liliths and their angels who were tortured here for our secrets. I’ve never been further than that next room. But there are supposed to be dark things…”
He trailed off. “There’s no easy way out. If we can find a narrow place to take a defensive posture, if we can take out everyone who comes after us like at the gate of Thermopylae, if we can get them rattled by the ghosts… maybe we can get enough space to eventually make an escape.”
“And here you said you didn’t have a plan.”
“It’s not a great one.” He headed for the open door. “Close it behind us, would you? Let’s lock ourselves in with the evil dead.”
Chapter 13
“Why are they doing this to us?” I asked Levi as he eased Ryker down to the grimy floor. He joined me, nodding at a table in the corner, and together we pushed it across to block the door. The table legs screeched across the floor, the noise making my teeth hurt. The single exposed bulb in the ceiling did little to illuminate to the room and less to calm my fears.
“They got impatient and decided to stress-test us. See if your powers would come out under… stress.”
I bit down on my lip. “They expect me to get control of the fire-thing when I’m terrified?”
I was doing better when I had Ryker to talk me through the nightmares. That was my best chance at getting control of my powers.
“Don’t be terrifi
ed.” Levi pushed his back against the table, his big hands resting on the table edges, and shoved it the last of the way on his own. For the first time, in the dim light, I realized that the table had shackles.
“We’re trapped in a building where men with guns are trying to kill us—”
“Buck up. They’re probably trying to take us alive.”
“—and where our best option is to lock ourselves in with evil poltergeists, and I’m not supposed to be terrified.”
“We have each other.” Levi said. He left Ryker there on the floor for a second, and sprinted across the room to the other door.
“That might count for more if my powers actually did kick in.” My hands were shaking like a coward.
“I’ve got faith in you with or without your powers, Ellis.” Levi knelt to gather his brother up. “Next room.”
Together we ran into the next room. There was a long hall here, lined with cells. As we entered, I heard a distant scream of anguish.
“Ghost?” I whispered.
Levi didn’t bother to answer. I took the handle of the door in my hand; it was a heavy steel-reinforced door, warped so that the bottom scraped painfully across the linoleum, and I could barely shut it behind us. My fingers fumbled as I engaged the locks.
“Let’s take one of these cells at the end,” Levi said. “It’ll give us a place to keep Ryker safe. I can take them one at a time as they come in the door.”
“And we’ll be trapped.”
“What’s a little more trapped at this point?” Levi asked.
I had the strange sense that part of him enjoyed the fight. This place felt like no place to fight mortal men; I felt like the hands of wraiths would curl out of the walls and pull me into the ether.
We headed into a cell where a steel bunk was still cemented to the wall. Levi settled Ryker on the narrow mattress. The room was dark, and when Levi tried to flick the light switch outside the cell door, it didn’t work. He left me for a second, and I heard him running down the hall, slamming all the cell doors closed. They would have to hunt for us, room-by-room. Then he came back and closed us in. As the door swung shut, the thin light from the hall disappeared, and the room went as black as the sensory tank.
