Never Let Go

by Cynthia Eden

  He flew around the corner and caught sight of the guard who was lying spread-eagle in the middle of the hallway—a hallway that led straight to Cecelia’s and Elizabeth’s quarters. But as he approached that guard, Sawyer realized…

  He’s different. The guard wasn’t breathing. Wasn’t unconscious like the others. Sawyer’s fingers went to the man’s throat. Dead. The guy’s neck had been broken, he could see it now. A vicious twist had ended the fellow’s life in an instant.

  Sawyer rose. The dark tendrils of emotion were trying to wrap around his mind, trying to pull him into a killing frenzy, but that’s not me.

  He stalked forward just as a woman’s scream broke out. Cecelia’s scream. Her door was shut, but Sawyer just kicked the thing inward.

  Another body waited for him, just a few feet beyond the door. A guard who was on the ground. Unconscious this time, not dead. Sawyer could hear the faint rasp of his breath. Sawyer didn’t waste time on that guard. He stared straight ahead instead.

  Cecelia wasn’t screaming any longer. He didn’t see her…I know she’s here. “Cecelia!” Sawyer bellowed. “Dr. Gregory!”

  He heard a faint click, and automatically, Sawyer glanced down. The click had come from the band around his ankle. Sawyer tensed, knowing this could be it. He could explode right then and there. So much for escape. For freedom.

  I’m sorry, Elizabeth.

  But he didn’t explode. Nothing happened.

  “I’ve got her.” Five’s amused voice drifted to him, and Sawyer’s head snapped back up as Five moved out of the small bathroom, holding Cecelia tight. “I’m taking good care of Dr. Gregory, don’t worry.”

  She was trapped in his arms, pinned against him, and he had his gun to the side of her head.

  Sawyer stared at Five a moment, then shook his head because the surge of fury had risen within him again. Attack. Destroy. Kill.

  “She played with our minds.”

  A bruise slid across the top of Cecelia’s cheek. Her hands had been bound together—looked like with some kind of torn bedding. And a gag was in her mouth. Again—a strip of bedding? A jagged piece of sheet?

  “It’s time for us to play with her,” Five said. “I was going to leave the gag out, but, jeez, the woman’s screams make my head hurt.”

  Attack. Destroy— “No!” Sawyer shouted, determined to block out the dark urges inside of himself and to stop Five. “This isn’t the plan! We don’t hurt her! We subdue the guards and we get out, that’s all!”

  Five leaned closer to Cecelia. He pressed a kiss to her temple. “It’s my plan. It was always my plan.”

  Sawyer’s head felt as if it was about to burst.

  “You still don’t get it, do you? What we are? What we can do?”

  “I get that you’re screwing things to hell and back—and that you’re scaring the shrink!” He needed to get her away from Five. Without hurting her.

  “You think she’s scared?” Five laughed. “Good. I like it when they’re scared.”

  “What the fuck is wrong with you?” Sawyer lunged closer, but Five immediately aimed the gun at him. “Stop that shit! You know I’ll just dodge if you fire at me!”

  “Because we’re stronger, better, than the humans.”

  “We are humans,” Sawyer reminded the bastard.

  Five smirked at him. “We are fucking gods.” Five kept the gun aimed at Sawyer. “Gods who were locked in hell. But we’re breaking out, and the world is never going to be the same again.”

  “Let her go,” Sawyer ordered fiercely.

  “Why?” Now Five seemed legitimately confused. “You don’t care about her. She’s not the one you want. I left you with your doctor, didn’t I? Pretty Elizabeth Parker. I let you keep her, and when I left you two…” His shoulders rolled in a shrug. “Weren’t you holding her just as I’m holding Cecelia?”

  No, fuck, no. “Mistake,” Sawyer snarled. “My head…it’s wrong.”

  “No, it’s right. We’re right, but you can’t see that yet. You’re still limited and don’t understand what we’ve become, but I do.” And his smile lit his face. “It started with us being able to share thoughts, but our bodies adapted. Our brains changed. That’s what we do, you see. We change. We adapt. We grow ever stronger. Once our brains started the telepathic communication, it was only a matter of time before we could do more.”

  Sawyer’s head felt as if it were going to explode any second. He took another step closer to Five and Cecelia. He could grab the doctor and yank her to safety—

  “It’s not just thoughts we share. It’s emotions, too. Only I’ve realized that when it comes to the emotions, you’re not the Pack leader any longer.” He laughed. “I am. I’m stronger than you are in that particular area. We all have different strengths, have you noticed that? Landon did, he let it slip to me one day, and since then, I’ve been working to perfect my area of strength. I can make the rest of the team feel what I do. I can get you to experience everything I do…”

  Attack. Destroy. Kill. The red fucking haze… “It’s you?”

  “Feel it, don’t you? The rush, the craving. We were made to kill, and there is nothing like the thrill of an attack.”

  Cecelia heaved in his hold, but Five just held her tighter. The gun was still pointed at Sawyer.

  “I felt the rush of emotions on our missions, they gave me a dark taste when we’d take out the enemy. They made me remember things,” Five’s voice dropped. “And now, no one will stop us.”

  “I’m stopping you. Let her go.”

  Five blew out a hard breath. “Real bullets are in this gun. Not the tranqs. I can shoot you, but I don’t want to do it. You’re part of my team. My pack. Landon said we were a perfect pack, and we are, and pack members don’t turn on each other. They protect each other.”

  “Let her go.”

  “We’ll take her with us when we fly away. Cecelia and your Elizabeth. You can have as much fun as you want with your doc, and I’ll play with mine. It will be the start. Just the beginning—”

  No, it wasn’t. “This isn’t who we are. We’re supposed to protect.”

  “But you don’t want to protect, do you?” His eyes gleamed. “You want to kill, just as I do. And then you want to take. You want to take and take and take. And the thing you want to take the most? The thing you want to control the most? It’s Elizabeth. I feel your emotions, too. She’s an obsession, isn’t she? Burrowing deep into you. You can take her now. No one can stop us. She’ll be yours forever.”

  A quick gasp came from behind Sawyer, but he didn’t look back. He knew who was behind him. He’d caught the scent of strawberries and he’d known she was creeping up the corridor. Elizabeth should have run away. Why hadn’t she run away?

  “Look, she wants to be with you. How sweet. She came to find her missing test subject.” He laughed. “Step closer, Elizabeth. Come to Sawyer’s side.”

  Elizabeth advanced. She clutched a laptop under one arm as she glared at Five, and she gripped a gun in her right hand. “Let her go, now.”

  “But it took me so long to get her. So long to sneak into her room. I’d watch her. I’d think about touching her.”

  Cecelia slammed her head into Five’s. He swore and jabbed the gun’s barrel to her jaw.

  “I’ll make you want me, Dr. Gregory. I’ll get in your head, too,” Five promised.

  The hell he would. Sawyer leapt toward the bastard. Cecelia’s attack had given him just the opening he needed. He surged forward and he grabbed for the gun, but Five’s attention had snapped back to him. Five swung the gun toward Sawyer and fired.

  The bullet missed Sawyer. Told you I’d freaking dodge it. He drove his fist into Five’s jaw, and the guy’s hold on Cecelia loosened. The shrink jumped away from him and ran to the doorway. To Elizabeth? “Get to safety!” Sawyer yelled.

  Five kicked him in the gut.

  Bastard.

  Five aimed his gun again, but before he could shoot, Five was being hit—hit by the tranqs in Eliz
abeth’s gun as she took aim and fired. He jerked back at impact, but the guy just laughed. “Won’t…stop me…won’t…”

  “I’ll stop you,” Sawyer promised. He drove his body into Five’s. They fell back, and the weapon slipped from Five’s fingers. They were pounding each other, hard, fast, brutal. But Five…He isn’t as strong as I am. Sawyer had always held back with the guy during training, he’d held back with them all because he hadn’t wanted Jamison to see the truth.

  My strength is greater than anyone else’s. Had Five been right? Did they each have an enhanced power that would—

  “See?” Blood dripped from Five’s mouth and nose. “You…like it, too…”

  Like it? Blood. Pain. Death.

  Sawyer heard the clatter of fleeing footsteps.

  Five’s eyes sagged shut. “They won’t…get away.”

  “Yes, they will. Because your ass is done. You won’t touch either one of them ever again.”

  You think the other test subjects are like you, One? Or do you think they’re like me? Five’s voice whispered through his head. We fooled the general, we fooled Landon, we fooled…you.

  Sawyer froze with his fist still raised. The urge to keep punching was so strong. He wanted to hit and hit until Five was obliterated.

  Attack. Destroy. Kill.

  But those dark urges couldn’t still be coming from Five. Could they? The guy was out cold now. Sawyer had felt it when Five passed out. So if those dark and insidious urges weren’t coming from Five…

  Then who the hell else is it? Who is sending that shit into my mind?

  His head whipped toward the door. Elizabeth and Cecelia were gone. They were running wild because he’d told them to flee. But had he helped them? Or had he sent them running straight to death?

  “Elizabeth!” Sawyer bellowed.

  ***

  “Elizabeth!”

  She jerked at the roar of her name, but Elizabeth didn’t stop running. She and Cecelia were rushing down the hallway, flying away as quickly as they could. Elizabeth clutched the laptop to her chest. She’d dropped the tranq gun—she’d emptied it into Five’s chest so the gun had been useless.

  Cecelia had yanked the gag out of her mouth, but her hands were still bound. They were running down another twisting corridor and all Elizabeth could think was that there should be more guards there. Someone should appear. She’d had to go through so many check-points when she first arrived at the facility. They had to reach some kind of safety. They had to—

  An alarm started blaring. The lockdown alarm.

  Cecelia staggered to a stop. She looked back at Elizabeth. “They’re locking us in.”

  Then that meant the guards on the surface—the guards outside—had found out about the chaos inside the place.

  “They’ll trap us in here,” Cecelia said, voice shaking. “They’ll trap us with the test subjects.”

  With Five? With others who might be like him?

  “We need to get out of here before those doors seal up,” Cecelia cried. “Hurry! This way!” She turned right and another corridor waited. But at the end of that corridor…

  Someone was standing there. He was so far away she couldn’t see him clearly. He was tall, muscled, wearing all black.

  “This is the first check point to get up to the surface. That’s got to be a guard. He’ll help us. It’s going to be—” Cecelia stopped. Went dead still. “Three.”

  Three?

  Then Elizabeth got a better look at the man standing there. A man with his legs braced apart and a gun gripped in his hand. Not a tranq gun, but a rifle. One with a scope on the end. One that he was—pointing at us.

  “Get down!” The shout came just as a big, hulking shadow appeared and hurtled at Cecelia.

  Cecelia hit the floor, and Elizabeth jumped back—back, then down because Three had just fired his weapon. She felt the bullet whip right by her face. It had been that close.

  She turned her stare on Cecelia and saw that Two—Flynn—had her secured beneath his body on the floor. “I’ve got them!” Flynn yelled.

  No, no, he didn’t have her.

  “Drop the weapon, Three!” Flynn ordered. “We need to get out, now!”

  But Three wasn’t dropping his weapon. He was taking aim again. And the gun was pointed at Elizabeth. She sucked in a breath and tried to figure out how she was going to survive.

  “Three!” Flynn yelled. “Drop it!”

  “Attack,” Three said quietly, but his voice seemed to echo. “Destroy.” His voice slid over her body. “Kill—”

  Sawyer jumped in front of her. She was crouched on the floor, holding that laptop, sure she was about to feel a bullet tear into her chest once again, but Sawyer stepped in front of her.

  “If you want to hurt the doc, you’ll need to shoot me first.”

  Three hadn’t fired. Not yet.

  “Drop that rifle, now!” Sawyer thundered.

  She couldn’t see around Sawyer’s body. Elizabeth began to creep back. Flynn had risen, and he held Cecelia cradled in his arms.

  “Run with her, Two,” Sawyer urged. “Run hell fast and don’t trust anyone but me.”

  Flynn rushed away without a word.

  “Elizabeth!” Cecelia yelled.

  Elizabeth flinched. She rose to her feet, but kept her body hidden behind Sawyer’s form. She didn’t know what the hell was going to happen next—

  The alarm…stopped.

  “That’s it,” Three called out. “Now we’re locked inside. Just like we wanted.”

  Like they wanted?

  “The guards from above won’t be able to gain access to us, not with the modifications I made to this entrance. And we can haul ass out to the helipad. Free and clear.” Three’s footsteps shuffled forward.

  Sawyer was tense and as still as a statue. “The guard behind you is dead.”

  “No, the two guards behind me are dead.”

  “Put down the rifle, Three.”

  “Not until the threats are eliminated.”

  Was she a threat? Elizabeth wanted to turn and run, but she was afraid any movement from her might set off Three.

  “There was a flaw in your plan,” Three announced. “I’m correcting the flaw.”

  “What flaw?” Sawyer demanded. There were no weapons in his hands, but…what was tucked into the back of his pants? Was that a knife?

  “We can’t leave anyone alive inside of Lazarus. If we do, they’ll just come after us.” Three’s voice was calm. “We have to burn the place to the ground. Destroy everyone and everything here before we vanish. Attack,” he said flatly. “Destroy. K—”

  “Kill,” Sawyer finished. He shook his head. “No. Those aren’t my orders, dammit!”

  His position had shifted just a bit—just enough for her to glimpse the terrifying image of Three lifting his weapon once more and aiming it at Sawyer.

  “But you aren’t the one in charge anymore,” Three told him flatly. “You’re not—”

  He was going to shoot!

  Sawyer’s right hand flew up. The object that had been tucked into the back of his pants—the knife was now grasped in his fingers. He threw it, and it flew toward Three, flew fast and hit with deadly accuracy.

  It hit Three in the throat and he fired the rifle, but the shot just blasted into the wall. Three dropped the gun and frantically clawed at his throat. Blood was pouring from his wound, and Elizabeth cried out in horror. Then she spun and she ran—ran as fast as she could to get away from Sawyer.

  But he was running after her. She could hear the thud of his footsteps chasing her down. She shoved her hands against nearby doors, but they were locked. Everything was locked. The facility had shut down and she was trapped inside, trapped inside with killers. With men who’d become monsters.

  With a lover she didn’t know any longer. A man who terrified her.

  And there was no way out.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Sawyer grabbed Elizabeth’s arm and spun her around, but when she w
hirled toward him, she brought up the laptop, and she slammed it against him. Hard.

  “Shit! Doc, stop! I’m in control, okay? I’m not going to hurt you!”

  “In control? You’re out of control! You all are! You’re killing each other—you’re attacking—”

  He blocked another hit from the laptop. “They’re going to release the gas in five minutes.”

  She stopped hitting him. “What?”

  His jaw locked. “It’s shut down protocol. I planned for it.” He just hadn’t planned for the rest of the fucking madness. “They’ve sealed us inside. They think we can’t get out. They’re going to release the gas so that anyone here will be rendered unconscious, and then more guards will come back inside to take over. To lock up the test subjects.”

  Her eyes were wide. Her face was too pale. And she was staring at him as if he were a monster. I am. I just killed one of my teammates.

  But what Elizabeth didn’t know…Three had sent him a message. Right before he’d tossed the knife, Three had told him…I’m going to put a bullet between the pretty doctor’s eyes. Drive it right into her brain. She’ll be dead before she hits the floor.

  Sawyer had stopped him. He’d stop anyone who came at Elizabeth.

  “Maybe you need to be locked up, did you think of that?” Elizabeth shouted at him. He still held her left arm in his grasp, and Elizabeth tried to jerk away, but he wouldn’t let her go. “You guys are insane, you are—”

  “We’re sharing thoughts and emotions. And someone is poison in our group. It’s bleeding through to us all. It’s been happening for a while, only I didn’t realize how deep the darkness was spreading.” Like a freaking virus.

  Her lips parted. She blinked. Shook her head. “What?”

  “I know it sounds crazy, but it’s true. Someone is in our heads.” He thought it was Five but the guy had been unconscious when he left him. So how come Three was still intent on murder? “The team and I—we can communicate telepathically.”

  Again, she shook her head.

  “We’re fucking dead men walking…we can communicate telepathically.” He used his hold to make her move with him. They had to get out of that place before the gas released. Five minutes. “But it’s not just thoughts that we are sharing. It’s emotions, too. Dark and…shit, twisted desires, okay? Things are wrong. I swear, it’s like someone is pumping poison right in my brain. Trying to make me do things, terrible things.” I won’t hurt you.