by SM Olivier
I continued to use my empath gift as we got closer to the door and felt the nervous, excited, feelings exuding from the room. I got another feeling of fear and anger, before it was snuffed out. I grabbed Troy’s arm and shook my head.
“He’s dead,” I told him urgently.
Troy looked at me in confusion.
“The guy that was with us.” I hated myself in that moment. He was a part of our team, and I never even bothered to remember his name. He died, and I couldn’t even give Troy a name. My throat was thick with tears. “We need to find everyone else,” I pulled my zip ties from my pack. I wove the zip tie through the handles of the double doors.
“Don,” Rachel whispered with tears welling in her eyes.
Troy took his own zip ties out, understanding what I was doing and added a few of his own. They wouldn’t be able to get out anytime soon, we hoped.
“How very smart of you,” I heard a vaguely familiar voice say with a gleeful, snarky tone. Then everything went dark.
I blinked sluggishly. I was lucid, barely. I tried to move but realized my hands and feet were bound and tied to a chair. My head felt heavy. I could barely lift it. My head throbbed and there was a ringing in my ears. I didn’t recognize where we were.
I gasped as more things came into focus. I looked across from me. Troy was sitting in a chair with his arms tied behind his back. His feet were bound to a chair. His blood trickled from his nose and mouth, and his left eye was swollen shut. He wasn’t moving, and I began to panic. I heard sobbing to my right and saw a disheveled distraught Rachel. She was bound as we were.
“He didn’t do anything,” she cried.
My blood ran cold, until I noticed her eyes were looking across from her, to my left. Steven was tied to the chair as we were, but there was a bullet hole in his head. I immediately threw up when I saw his brain matter on the wall behind him. I barely had time to empty the contents of my stomach on the floor beside me.
“Well, well, well look who’s finally awake,” Ned squatted in front of me with a sadistic smile. My eyes widened in surprise. “What’s wrong, Princess?” he asked with feigned sympathy. “Not so tough without all your men, are you?” he taunted me.
I glared at him and imagined him putting the gun he was waving in front of my face, into his own mouth and pulling the trigger.
He started to chuckle as if he knew I was trying to use my gift. “Ah, ah, ah,” he tsked as he shook his head and pulled one of the females I had carried outside to the van into his side. She smiled at him and gave him a lingering kiss. “My girl here is blocking you. Did you know Collin trained her? The same Collin you were so distraught over losing.”
“I would clap,” I said snidely. “But I can’t.”
He reached out before I could blink and slapped me with his gun. I saw stars behind my eyelids. I bit my lip to refrain from crying out. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. “You think you’re so strong, you have all the Bell clan groveling at your feet and jumping to your every whim. Look at you now!” His eyes were almost maniacal as he grinned at me. “I deserved to stay on my team. They were my team for four years. You ruined that!” He screamed at me, spittle flying from his lips, hitting the side of my face.
“Don’t be delusional,” I said through clenched teeth. “You’re a coward. That’s what got you kicked off the team. If your team can’t trust you to help them when they are in danger, how do you expect them to want you to watch their backs? Look at you now. You have four of us tied to your…” I looked around the room. “Thirteen. You got your little feelings hurt and what…you turn. Just like that. So easily bought. Just like a common whore.” I spat out.
He reached out again and smashed a fist to the side of my face. I couldn’t stop the cry that left my lips. He laughed in satisfaction.
“Ned,” Michael’s voice said over my shoulder. “Knock it off.”
He walked around in front of me. My eyes widened in surprise when I noticed that he wasn’t tied up. “I’m sorry, Blake,” he said earnestly. “I had to do it.” He shrugged. “It wasn’t supposed to end like this.” He looked over at Steven. “We planned to detain you and secure you. That’s it. No casualties. He went rouge.”
“Why?” I gasped out with a dry throat.
“I had to,” he explained. “I have a mom who needs medical treatment. I don’t make enough money. It’ll take me forever to climb up the ranks to make that kind of money.”
“Did you tell Will? Did you tell Terrance? We could have helped you out." I had to swallow the tears that threatened to spill over as I looked over at Steven. “You played with his daughter. You were treated like family. How could you do this? Why?”
“When Horatio comes, I’m a free man. I never have to work ever again, and my mom can get the treatment she needs,” he explained passionately. I could see he was sincere, and he thought it was going to be an easy job, but I still felt betrayed. I knew Will would have helped had he just asked.
“So, Nadia has to grow up with no father. Dave’s wife will no longer have a husband. Lyle’s daughter will never know her father. Don doesn’t get to walk down the aisle with his fiancé this summer. What about Oscar? Were their lives less important than your own?” Rachel yelled at him hysterically. It didn’t surprise me that she had taken the time to know the members on our team.
Michael flinched with every word she said. “No, no,” he said with remorse on his face. “I’m sorry,” he stated before he pulled out his own gun and lifted it, pointing it towards Ned and his girlfriend. “Do it now,” he looked at me urgently, before I heard his gun go off.
“No,” I heard Ned yell as his girlfriend collapsed to the ground.
“Now, Blake!” Rachel yelled at me as I saw other girls and a few guards, rush towards their fallen friend.
I looked up as I saw a ball of fire soar across the room. Troy was no longer slumped forward and bound. He was now launching himself towards me as I heard a boom in my ears. I saw the others leap into action, and I imagined a force field around us, protecting us from the people now rushing us. I saw now that every female we came to rescue was in on this trap. My head ached but I needed to protect my family. I needed to snap out of the grief trying to consume me.
I saw Troy had created another diversion, lighting a fire in a pile of discarded skids in the corner of the room. Some girls screamed in panic, trying to get the fire out.
I was able to erect a force field, but not before blood began pouring from Michael’s ears and mouth. I could hear the sickening gurgle coming from his mouth. I looked up in shocked horror as I watched a woman looking satisfied at her work. She turned to glare at me.
“Not today,” I muttered to her as I told her to sleep. She collapsed, her head bouncing off the pavement. I wanted to exact vengeance on her, but I couldn’t. I stared in shock at Michael. He had betrayed us. He had cost us so many lives tonight, but he had bit off more than he could chew. I truly believed he thought it was going to be a simple job. I believed he wanted to help his mother. He hadn’t realized the price of her health would be so high. He knew he was going to die. He had hoped for clemency. His head turned my way, and I could see him mouth. “Sorry, sorry,” before the light in his eyes went out.
I closed my eyes and felt the tears fall from my eyes. People like him and Collin had made a deal with the devil, not realizing what a steep price it had been to pay. Some people may think they didn’t deserve anyone grieving for them, but in their last moments of life, did their last-ditch effort of redemption, wipe away their prior sins?
Troy produced a small flame and burnt the rope binding my arms and legs. Then he went over to Rachel and severed her bindings.
“Now what?” Rachel sobbed softly as she came over to hug me.
I was trying to rub the feeling back into my arms, but hugged her when she rushed to me.
“Who has their phone,” I said urgently as I watched more people run into the building. I knew time was running out for us. We were horribly outnu
mbered. Horatio was here. I could feel him. There was a searing pain in my head. Icy coldness enveloped my brain. He was trying to get in.
“They took ours,” Troy cursed as he walked up behind us to embrace us.
I felt panic war with reasoning, but a flash of us sitting in a diner came across my memory.
Jax! I screamed out.
What’s wrong honey? He asked immediately.
Tell Micah to come get us, I pleaded with him.
What’s wrong?! He demanded
It was a trap! We’re in trouble! I explained
Sending him now! I could hear his dread as if he stood next to me.
Jaxson…
Yes, love?
I love you too… I whispered my confession.
Micah appeared beside us in less than five seconds. The girl looked better than she had, and she was now in a completely different outfit. He gaped at the amount of people surrounding us.
“You need to get her out of here and then come back for us. You’ll have to be quick,” I said urgently as I grabbed both of his hands and looked in his eyes. He looked close to panicking. “Take Rachel first,” I urged him.
“We can take you all,” the girl insisted as she held me with one hand and Micah with the other.
“Hold on tight to me,” Micah said with less conviction.
At the last second, I reached out to grip Steven’s arm. I wasn’t going to leave him behind.
A moment of clarity dawned on me as I realized why he hadn’t been in the picture. The other people hadn’t been in Ella’s picture because they hadn’t made it.
Chapter 29
“You need to take Troy and I back,” I said resolutely. “Right outside the building.”
Everyone looked at me in varying stages of shock.
“We need to end this,” I said through the silent tears rolling down my face.
We had found a quiet place outside of the private airstrip where we had landed, but the place was crawling with Horatio’s men.
“We can set the whole place on fire while he’s still in there,” I stated with determination. “He’s probably still looking everywhere in there for me.”
“Do you think this will help?” Rachel asked hesitantly.
I knew she thought I was talking out of anger, and I was, but we had a chance to take him down and we needed to take it, so logic was in there somewhere too.
Before I could even plead my case, we were standing outside of the building once more. We could see the fire from one of the rooms above. There was screaming, and I could see people trying to run from the building from the entrance we had entered earlier.
“Micah-,” I began.
“No, we’re sticking together. Ella told me we needed to stick together,” Micah said stubbornly.
I grabbed Troy’s hand and he nodded at me. I could see the hesitance in his eyes, but he was going to do what I felt was necessary. He was supporting my decision.
I closed my eyes and imagined the anger I felt for Horatio. In his quest for dominance, he had harmed too many innocent people. He had greedily coveted things and people that weren’t his to control or use. As I felt our connection reach its crescendo I lifted our arms towards the building. I watched as the ball of flame the size of car erupted from our hands.
We stumbled as the backdraft pushed us back. The building immediately began to go up in flames. The flame greedily fed by the breeze of the cold autumn day. The smell of smoke nearly choked us. We systematically made our way around the building, helping the flames spread faster.
“Time to go,” Troy said firmly after watching the building begin to crash.
“I want to make sure he doesn’t escape,” I said obstinately.
“We can’t,” Micah cried out as we saw the dark shapes running towards us, yelling, their bodies outlined by the fire behind them.
“We need to go,” Troy said in a clipped tone.
I looked at Micah, Rachel, and Sierra’s faces. They were scared. We needed to get to safety. My quest for vengeance would have to wait.
“They’re coming to get us,” Troy stated as he leaned back in the booth.
I had healed all the wounds on his face, and he had washed the blood off in the small bathroom located in the back of the diner. Unfortunately, I was unable to heal my own wounds. I looked like I had jumped in the ring with Mohammed Ali, did several rounds with him, and lost horribly.
We had to sit and wait for a rescue team to get us. Leaving in the helicopter that brought us here was out of the question. The place was crawling with men in black. We had to wait when all I wanted to do was go home to all my guys, curl up, and go to sleep. Maybe when I woke up, I would find out this was a dream. A horrible, messed up, dream.
We were all sitting in a booth in a small obscure town, far from Detroit. We had received odd looks when we came in, but it was growing late, and we were hungry. We smelled of smoke and fire. I tried to do the food justice, but I just couldn’t. My mind kept going to Steven. We had hidden his body in some woods close to our rendezvous point.
Troy pulled me closer to his side, caressing my arm as he kissed my temple. “Eat please,” he murmured quietly.
I looked up at him, feeling numb and hollowed out. “You too,” I responded back to him.
I was so tired and hungry, but my mind wouldn’t stop replaying everything repeatedly. I couldn’t help but wonder if I would have just spoken up, if the results would have been the same. If I had told Will that we all felt wary, would he have done something about it? We had received reports that all the other missions were successful, but the feeling of failure would not leave me.
He took a bite of his biscuit before placing it to my lips. I grudgingly took a bite of it, even though it tasted like sawdust in my mouth.
“You never told us your name or story,” Rachel finally said, after hours of silence. It was like she was waking from a dream as she looked at the exotic looking female sitting across from us.
She was slightly taller than me, but more curvaceous. She had long dark hair and large dark eyes. She had a great complexion and beautiful olive skin. She wasn’t classically beautiful, but someone that would still turn heads. She hadn’t spoken much, and I could tell she was just being respectful of our solemn dispositions.
“Sierra helped me.” Micah smiled in adoration at her, and I could tell he had a crush on her. “I could only take one person with me, but with her, I could bring you all.”
Sierra blushed a pretty shade of red. “My name is Sierra. I’m nineteen years old,” she said hesitantly as she eyed us skeptically. “My parents passed away when I was young, so I lived with my Grandmother. She—" She struggled with her next words. “She died last year. I was a student in New Jersey. A few months ago, I was slipped a drug when I was out drinking with some friends. I woke up in this facility that was run by…” she paused, shuddering, “…that monster. When I was given the drugs, at first they worked, but as each day passed I became more aware of my surroundings. I’m pretty sure my gift level is too high. I wasn’t supposed to be there tonight. One of the other girls started having complications with her pregnancy, so they pulled her at the last second.”
“So, you’re aware of the gifted community. What is your gift? Are you—" Troy started asking. We can see the discomfort on his face as he tried to delicately ask if she was pregnant, his gaze on her flat stomach.
“I am gifted. My Grandmother was gifted. My Dad, her son, had not been and, no” she stated emphatically. “Thank the Lord, no! They were actually getting pretty frustrated about that. They,” she shuddered. “…tried numerous times, but it wasn’t working. I am like a…catalyst. I can make any gifted person stronger than they already are,” she almost said smugly. The more she talked the more fire I saw in her spirit. She was a strong girl. “Although,” she pointed a fork at Troy and I with a shrewd look, “I don’t think you two need any help in that area.”
“Those other girls, some of them were pregnant, were they there
willingly?” Troy asked as he fed me some of his biscuits and gravy.
Once again, I grudgingly took a bite. He was concerned about me. His constant looks told me as much.
“Oh yeah,” Sierra rolled her eyes. “There were a lot of us that weren’t there by choice, but then these two bitches came in and they started acting like everything was great. That we were honored to bring strong, gifted children into the world. Some of those girls ate that stuff up. They forgot that they were brought there against their will. All the ‘test subjects’ were there against their wills. We were like damn science experiments.
“They became…complacent. They became…brainwashed. It was like they became different girls. They got their implants taken out. I guess they were running low on the implants. The guy who created them was taken. Was it you guys who took him? ”
“But you didn’t buy it?” Rachel almost sounded impressed by her as she nodded assent at her question.
“No,” she rolled her eyes. “Have you ever seen the movie Mean Girls? Think Regina George. This bitch was Regina. With her pretty blond hair and blue eyes.”
I gasped as I looked over at Troy. I knew we were thinking the same thing. “Do you remember her name?” I asked quietly.
“Bridgette and her little side kick Tamara,” Sierra snorted. “They were inseparable until the Monster decided to make them join his sick little experiments. He put them through the same procedures we went through. Bridgette, the Monster’s daughter, seemed reticent at first, but that girl has some major Daddy issues. Eventually, she was proud to do whatever Daddy wanted her to do. Tamara got knocked off her high horse really quick. She was terrified. Her daddy was livid, but that didn’t stop the Monster.”
I had to stop myself from getting physically sick. His black heart had known no bounds. What monster would put his own child through that, without her consent? I almost felt smug, almost. Zach Young had picked the wrong side, and I’m sure they were all regretting their decisions now.