She closed the trunk. Now she worked on the door lock, popped that open, and slid behind the wheel. The ignition worked the same way. She pressed one shoe on what she assumed was the gas pedal. The engine revved higher than she thought it was supposed to, yet the car didn’t budge. Oh, she had to put it in gear first. Reverse gear. She moved the stick shift into the R position and stepped on the gas again. The engine roared and the car stayed put. She had no clue how to drive.
“Stupid parents, stupid Mentafixol!” she cried. In frustration she slammed both fists on the steering wheel and used her mind to shove the car backward.
To her astonishment, this worked. Her stomach lurched as the car skidded back a few feet. The tires squealed, dragging against the asphalt. Her skin tingled.
“All right, then.” She picked the whole car up—just an inch off the ground was all she needed—and backed it carefully out of the parking space. When she’d cleared the cars on either side, she moved the car forward, slowly at first, faster as she realized she was able to control such a huge object. Her eyes watered at the force of the headache she was giving herself, but she couldn’t let those Goths have Elijah.
She planned to speed the Pontiac around the corner of the building and onto the road through town, hoping to catch up with the SUV and force the Goths to release Elijah somehow. But a flash of light glinting on glass and metal signaled that the SUV was rounding the corner of the building. She should have known the Goths wouldn’t escape down the road with Elijah and be done with it. They wanted her too.
She considered ducking, so the Goths couldn’t lock on to her and control her mind. But before she could move, the SUV came out of its turn, and the windshield cleared the white glint of streetlights. A young man in a cowboy hat was behind the wheel. A dark-skinned woman stared at Holly from the passenger side. The man hit the gas, and the SUV leaped toward her.
Instinctively she backed the car across the lot along the length of the hotel, away from the SUV. And she realized that if she was able to do this, either the Goths wanted her to do it, or they weren’t able to control her mind after all. Maybe, like her, they could use their power only within a certain range? That would explain why the man gunned the engine again, gaining on her, trying to catch up with her.
She stopped their SUV and firmly held it in place.
After backing up Shane’s car a few more yards, she set it down. Her head throbbed. She found it difficult to concentrate on too many things at once.
The man and woman in the front seat of the SUV talked to each other, then turned around to talk to the people in the back. She had to save Elijah before they figured out how to beat her at this game. Still holding the SUV in place, she opened the back door on the side where Elijah had entered and lifted him out.
She’d experienced some strange things in the past twenty-four hours. But nothing had brought home to her how different her life would be from now on like the sight of Elijah floating through the air toward her, toes an inch from the ground, backlit by the streetlights over the hotel parking lot, while he gestured and mouthed something to her that she couldn’t understand.
She stopped him beside the passenger door of Shane’s car, expecting him to open the door himself. He didn’t. He was shouting through the window at her. Afraid to lean across the seat and open the door physically in case the Goths made a move while she wasn’t looking, she lifted the handle and pushed the door open with her mind. Sparkles swirled around and through her, but multitasking was giving her a migraine.
“—changed my mind!” Elijah was shouting. As she set him down on the seat and closed the door behind him, his voice boomed inside the enclosed space of the car. “Holly, I changed my mind about staying with you. I need to go with them.”
“Shut up!” Holly shouted through her headache. For fear he’d open the door and run back to the SUV again before she could stop him, she pressed against his chest, keeping him in the seat. Still she held the SUV, but now she wasn’t sure what to do. She couldn’t drive away for fear the Goths would follow her and overtake her and come within range to control her mind like they had poisoned Elijah’s. Her hands were full, or at least her brain was. While she remained unsure, the Goths conferred with each other, plotting their next move.
“Holly, let me go. I have to go.”
“Shhh, baby, hold on.” She reached across the seat to rub his thigh. With her mind she rocked the SUV onto two wheels and considered flipping it on its side. It was boxy, and the effort hurt her head. She set it down and started over. Rocking it backward seemed easier. It tipped onto its curving hatchback and rolled until it teetered on its rounded roof. Because she was angry at the Goths for brainwashing Elijah, she gave the SUV a push on one bumper, sending it spinning.
Then she turned Shane’s car in a one-eighty and raced toward the opposite side of the parking lot. Luckily there was an opening in the fence, leading to an alley between the backs of buildings on one side and the towering mountain on the other.
Elijah said, “I don’t want to go with you. I’ve changed my mi—”
“They’re controlling your mind, Elijah,” Holly burst out. “Get over it. I can’t do this by myself.”
He leaned away from her and peered into the side mirror. “She’s turning the SUV back upright.”
“Who?” Holly cried.
“The girl in the front seat. Violet. She’s a levitator like you.”
“Are they coming after us?” Holly sped the car faster, crossing her fingers that no gorillas chose that unfortunate moment to stumble into the alley.
“I can’t read them now,” Elijah said. “They’re out of range. But I don’t think so. Before we left, they were surprised at how strong you were. They had thought it would be easy to capture both of us. Now they just want to get home and report in and figure out what to do next.”
“Report in to who?” Holly exclaimed. “Where’s home?” She took one last glance in the rearview mirror, but the SUV wasn’t creeping down the alley behind them. She turned between two buildings to reach the main road.
He shook his head. “It was really strange. I could see some things about them, but I couldn’t read them as well as I read you. I can’t get in someone’s brain and root around wherever I want. I can read only what they’re thinking about at that second. With these people, I couldn’t even do that all the time. I only got bits and pieces if they were distracted. When you opened the door of the SUV, you surprised them, and I caught this rush of thoughts from all of them.”
Holly stopped the car with its bumper nosing into the main street. She and Elijah looked up the road toward the hotel, but they didn’t see the SUV. Happy gorillas and miners danced with each other under the stars. Holly and Elijah looked down the road. Empty. She moved the car into the street and turned in the empty direction, toward Vegas. Now that her adrenaline was draining away, the car felt heavier than before, and her head hurt worse.
“The girl with red hair—April—changed my mind,” Elijah said. “As soon as I saw the SUV through the doors of the restaurant, I knew they wanted to take me. I tried to run, and April talked—well, thought—me out of it.”
“She did the same thing to me,” Holly said. “She and the guy in the backseat were outside my apartment that night I let you have one of my pills. I wanted to wake Kaylee and warn her, but then it didn’t seem like a good idea.”
“Holly!” Elijah exclaimed. “Maybe you could have told me that four days ago.”
“It didn’t seem like a good idea!” At the risk of running the car over the cliff—and she wasn’t sure she could hold them up if that happened—she turned to him and laid her outrage flat for him to read. Yes, it sounded ridiculous that she’d let this girl control her mind, but how could he berate her when he’d just been complicit in his own abduction?
He watched her darkly for a moment. Then he rolled his shoulders, popped his neck, and settled against his headrest. “The guy in the backseat, Carter, is a mind reader. The guy driving, Na
te, is like April—he can change minds—but his power is weaker than hers. When April changed your mind, did you think you could almost shake it, almost?”
“No. I didn’t even understand my mind was being controlled, until now.”
Elijah talked over the end of Holly’s sentence as if she hadn’t spoken. “I kept thinking I might shake it. I knew what April was doing. When she got distracted, I thought I could get out from under her. But Nate was right there to back her up.” He looked over at Holly and seemed to snap out of his musings. “Anyway, the levitator, Violet, was doing most of the work.”
“Why did she let me turn their car over?”
“You were holding the SUV away from you.” Elijah held his hand out to demonstrate, and she was amazed all over again that he knew this. “That was really smart of you. You have a longer range than she does. Violet does not like you.”
“And I have the warmest regards for Violet.” Holly had never so much as pulled a girl’s hair in the middle school bathroom for stealing her boyfriend, and now she faced a grudge match against a chick with magical power.
Elijah chuckled. “She was trying to keep me in the SUV, too, but you won that fight.”
“Good to know,” Holly said. “Maybe we’re not as bad off as I thought back there. Maybe I’m stronger than anybody else with this power.”
“They want to find out,” Elijah said.
The tunnel loomed just ahead. Holly dreaded moving the car through it. She sank under the pressure, berating herself that she’d felt so cocky about her power five seconds before.
“Can you please calm down?” Elijah growled.
“Calm down!” she shouted. “Weirdos find us in the middle of nowhere and try to kidnap you, and you want me to calm down?”
He took a breath before he said, “Exactly. I’m going through my feelings plus your feelings, and it’s a little overwhelming.”
“Don’t be such a baby,” Holly snapped. “I just overturned a car with my head.”
“Fine.” He curled in the corner, as far as possible from Holly. He really did look green. He hugged himself. “Can you please calm down?” he repeated weakly.
Holly felt terrible. She’d never intended to make him sick. She tried to clear her mind—
—and then the world went black. The car had entered the tunnel. She had no idea how to turn on the headlights. The mountain overhead threatened to crush her.
“No, it won’t,” Elijah said quietly. “You can see the starlight at the end of the tunnel. Just look straight ahead.”
Holly tried to follow his advice, but the car was too heavy, her head hurt too much, the mountain was too big, the tunnel was too dark.
“Holly,” Elijah said.
She fumbled on the dashboard in front of her and turned on the windshield wipers.
“Holly,” Elijah said.
If only she could find the button for the headlights . . . but she couldn’t turn it on with her mind if she didn’t even know where it was. By the time the car emerged from the tunnel, she’d fallen so far into panic that getting out from under the mountain didn’t get her out from under the horrible crushing sensation, and Elijah was yelling, “HOLLY, YOU HAVE GOT TO PULL THE FUCK OVER.”
With a gasp she cast around for the nearest spot on the shoulder wide enough to hold the car without it tipping over the edge. She sped the car forward to the parking lot of the scenic overlook and abruptly dropped it. It bounced once on its tires, jolting them both on the seats.
Elijah escaped out the passenger door and ran up the dusty path, all the way to the overlook, as far away from her as he could get without falling into the canyon. He sat on the boulder where they’d talked before, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, hands hanging slack—but he never looked down. He didn’t seem to be watching Holly, either. He focused over her shoulder, on the tunnel, waiting for the SUV.
Holly knew how he felt. Even relief was no longer a relief. With her mind she reached into the ignition and turned off the idling engine. She cranked down the window and called, “Are you okay?”
He nodded. His voice sounded small in the vast night as he asked, “Are you?”
“Now I am.” Or was she? She should stay diligent like Elijah and turn around to face the tunnel, but she felt like she’d been steamrollered. She could hardly keep her eyes open.
“Stretch out in the backseat, and I’ll drive home,” Elijah called. “I can deal better when you’re asleep anyway. And try to have sweet dreams this time. No more zombies doing ballet.”
Holly laughed. Zombies doing ballet—she didn’t remember dreaming something so ridiculous, but it did sound vaguely familiar. Then she heard the first part of what he’d said. “Home?”
“I want to stay ahead of them,” he said. “I don’t think they’ll attack us again until they’ve regrouped, but I want to know they’re behind us, not ahead. Something tells me we should get back to Vegas before they do.”
Obediently she crawled into the backseat and stretched out. Lying down felt delicious. But she wished she were lying in the hotel bed instead, and she were not beat, and they were not pursued by mind-controlling Goths who shopped at the thrift store. She wanted the time alone with Elijah that they’d promised each other in the restaurant.
He opened the door and knelt beside her. “We’ll get it.” He kissed her forehead.
She raised her chin, wanting more. But he was looking out the back window, watching the tunnel. Then she heard him cranking down the driver’s-side window.
“It will be windy tonight with the windows down,” she protested sleepily. “Cold.”
“I need the white noise,” he said. “To drown out your thoughts.”
She snuggled against the seat back for warmth. Then he was leaning close over her, tucking warm fabric around her. His T-shirt. She inhaled the smell of him. She recognized his spicy scent from when she’d whispered with him in ninth-grade English class. His mind-reading ability had been unleashed in the past week, which made him seem sometimes like a different person. But he smelled the same as always.
Elijah took a few last slow, relaxing breaths of Las Vegas interstate air, steeling himself for what was coming. He heard Holly finally stirring in the backseat, and he felt her waking up.
Having her asleep had done wonders for his mind-set. He’d gone almost back to normal. He’d been able to have complete thoughts about their situation.
He wasn’t sure anymore what exactly had transpired between him and Holly’s dad in Mr. Diamond’s office that night so long ago. He doubted he’d really given Mr. Starr that black eye—especially if Mr. Starr was a levitator like Holly. He knew he hadn’t imagined Mr. Starr’s virtual hand around his throat. That had been too real.
Now there would be another confrontation. Holly had passed from Mr. Starr’s hands to Elijah’s. He had a responsibility to take care of her and keep her safe. He’d failed miserably at that in Icarus—she had come to his rescue. He wouldn’t fail her again.
Resolving this, he almost enjoyed the rest of the long drive. When the sun came up, the wind was warm on his bare chest. He fished in the glove compartment, under the gun, and brought out Shane’s Wayfarers. Glancing in the rearview mirror, he decided he looked like an early astronaut, about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime, cruising Cocoa Beach with a bikini-clad beauty dozing in the backseat. Several of the truck drivers he’d been traveling with since St. George seemed to think so too. When they passed Elijah or he passed them, they glanced down knowingly at Holly’s long bare legs and gave him a thumbs-up.
Just as the Pontiac drew even with the billboard championing Holly’s likeness on Interstate 15, she woke. She sat up slowly. In the rearview mirror, Elijah watched his T-shirt slide off her slender torso and into the floorboard. She stretched her arms over her head and yawned, spangled bikini top rising to meet a new day.
“Good morning, sunshine,” Elijah called over the wind and the radio.
“Mmph.” Long brown curls whipping aro
und her head, she tumbled between the seats into the front.
“Hey,” Elijah protested. “We’re doing seventy. This is dangerous.”
“Don’t be silly. I have telekinetic power.” Her voice was muffled by the seat as she pitched over into the floorboard, sequined butt high in the air, legs flailing. The truck driver nearest them honked and waved frantically. Elijah acknowledged him by lifting one finger from the steering wheel.
Holly righted herself, wiped her hair out of her eyes, and glanced over at Elijah. He felt her examining his bare chest and approving. He grinned at her, wagged his eyebrows behind the Wayfarers, and took her hand.
And just for a moment, they were a brand-new couple returning from a wild road trip together, basking in the morning sun, and looking forward to the possibilities offered by the rest of their day in Vegas.
Then her hand slipped out of his. She brought her purse up off the floorboard, fished in it for cosmetics, and adjusted the rearview mirror so she could see herself as she applied them. Elijah understood that the heavy makeup went with the outfit, but he missed that bare-faced girl from the hotel room. Even now she wasn’t bare-faced, but with some of her makeup rubbed off through a night asleep in the backseat, she did resemble a high school girl about three hours into crashing a kegger.
“I guess our next step is to talk to our parents,” she said while holding her lips still to apply lipstick, so it came out more like, “I hess our neck hep i oo alk oo our arents.” He wouldn’t have understood her if this were all he had to go on, but he could read her mind too.
She glanced at her watch. “That will be interesting, because as we speak, my dad is performing an impossible feat of physical stamina.”
Elijah eyed her warily. “You’re not barging in on your parents’ act, are you? Something tells me we shouldn’t advertise our powers to the general public.”
“We have to barge into things, for our own safety.” She swept powder across her nose. “We know there are people around who can control our minds. The only way we can get around them is to surprise them. Otherwise our parents may very well chain us up in the basement.”
Levitating Las Vegas Page 19