Surge: Bolt Saga Volume Five (Bolt Saga #13-15)

by Angel Payne

  And it’s freaking me the hell out.

  Simply put, Flare wants to come out and play today. As in, Emma can just go book herself for a mani-pedi and let electric supergirl do alllll the work—only the mutant’s also out to completely redefine “work” while she’s at it. Flare doesn’t just want to be Team Bolt’s lead blonde today. She’s not settling for simply being the flame in my blood. She wants it all. The power in my muscles. The revs in my nerve endings. And yes, even the motivation in my mind.

  Which scares me the most of all.

  Who the hell am I kidding? There’s not a lot that isn’t scaring me in some way, shape, or form these days. Okay, fine; really only twenty-one—but when they just happen to be the first three weeks after a girl’s wedding day, she gets a drastic discount on the overly emotional express.

  Even if the ride takes her down to the training-room mat, parking her knee in the middle of her husband’s best friend’s back, ordering him to say stuff he probably hasn’t even muttered for his girlfriend.

  His girlfriend—as in my sister.

  As in the figure barging into the training center with vexation to match her light-red mane, huffing in furious time to her resonant stomps. “Baby girl, if you let any more of the sunshine in, I’m going to align your Jupiter, your Mars, and steer your stars into the cooler!”

  But not even ’Dia’s threat about tossing me into the lead-lined closet, installed into the ridge’s training center as a safety precaution at Reece’s order, makes me relent the pressure on Sawyer. “Daddy,” I rasp with gritted glee, leaning farther over him. “Say it, Folic Acid. Call me Daddy.”

  My use of his military call sign has the guy growling and then lurching, but that’s it. My hold, informed by his diligent training and enforced by my fired-up strength, has been executed perfectly—a certitude I feel in the guy’s convulsing muscles, with the instincts one only gets from doing this stuff day in and day out for nearly four months—but I also want to hear him admit now.

  So maybe I don’t just want it.

  Maybe, just maybe, I’ve freaking earned this. Deserve this.

  “Emma! For fuck’s sake.” Not that Lydia understands any of that. Yes, my sister is a trained athlete. Yes, she’s spent years honing her physical skills as opposed to the few weeks I’ve spent at it, but preparing for tennis matches is a hell of a lot different than readying for battle. With electric mutants. And possibly even their leader, who clearly has a handle on her numerous powers better than I do, not to mention the army of brainwashed mortals she’s now amassing. Which likely includes our own mother…

  So, yeah. Nothing like a little insecurity and fear to amp the voltage count in a girl’s senses.

  “Em. Damn it. You’ve proved the point. You won the round. Now stand the hell down. Or roll the hell off. Or…whatever!”

  And make it really freaking simple to ignore her screaming sister.

  “Hey! Are you listening to me? What the hell has gotten into you?”

  Hearing her shriek the words makes them reverberate inside my own skull. Whoa. What the hell is wrong with me? I’m used to the mitochondrial mayhem that spirals in time to my emotions, and I’ve learned to reload that shit onto a separate emotional hard drive in order to keep it in check—but right now, it’s not working. My system has hacked both drives, smashed them together, and then used my pent-up frustrations and impatience to set them aflame. Everywhere I look inside, there’s only white-gold fire laced with brilliant blue intensity.

  And it’s beautiful.

  Sunbeams through a storm. Luminescence and lighting.

  And I never want to let it go…

  “Emma.” Lydia is closer now. Much closer. Practically looming over me as I keep Sawyer pinned. “Rein it back now, sister, or I’ll do it for you!”

  At once, I jerk my head up. Blaze a glare into her that’s as fierce as the fires exploding from my pores. I know this. I see this, reflected in the flares of her eyes and even in the places where she’s nervously wetted her lips, the shine looking like rain puddles in a new dawn.

  And isn’t that my perfect segue.

  A new dawn…

  “Rein it back.” At once, my brain registers the strangeness of my echo, despite not being able to stop it. Still, holy freaking shit. I haven’t sounded like this much of a mouthy teenager since I was a teenager. And I haven’t sounded like this much of an arrogant bitch since…

  Never.

  “Well, all right, sister of mine.” But there’s more of my mouth, taken complete hostage by an irritation I can’t control any more than a three-year-old without a nap. “If you insist.”

  I actually shock myself by complying with her command, pushing backward and rolling easily to my feet. The action frees Sawyer, who’s all too eager to spring to his own full stance…

  Or does he?

  It’s nearly impossible to tell.

  Because he’s nearly impossible to see.

  “Sweet Jesus kissed Houdini,” Lydia gasps.

  “Mother of holy fuck,” Sawyer snarls at the same time.

  “Errrmmm…” I manage softly. “Abracadabra?”

  The air stills and thickens—not that the palpable soup helps the situation. There’s still nothing left to see of Sawyer, beyond his upright head and braced boots—the only visible parts of him, in the aftermath of the energy still sizzling from my spread fingers.

  The explanation for the shocker is easy to deduce. Just like what happened out on Rindge Dam before the wedding, I was concentrating on heeding my sister’s decree, yanking my powers back in and not out—only this time, Sawyer was in my way instead of a particle board cutout. Consequently, I sucked the waves of his visibility right off the air, as well.

  My sister whips her stare back toward me. “What the living hell did you do?”

  “And how long have you been able to do it?” Sawyer jumps in at once—prompting her to spin back at him.

  “Are you serious?” she charges.

  “As serious as I am invisible,” he returns.

  “And now you’re giving me jokes?”

  He shrugs. At least I think he does. “I held back the one about asking if you could get the Twix out of my pocket.”

  I compress my lips. Fast. Sawyer isn’t so ready with his own composure, already surrendering to a string of chuckles.

  Lydia remains in fuming mode, looking ready to spit tacks at us both—until her guy’s head starts “floating” on the air in her direction. His booted feet are right beneath him—and help him to rush over as ’Dia scurries backward, gasping in horror.

  “Hey.” His bark stops her retreat but not her gape. “Sparky, come on. It’s still me. I’m still here.”

  “The hell you are.” Lydia snaps her glare back to me. “Bring him back. Now.”

  I want to laugh again but can’t. I’m not even feeling bratty, rebellious, or gloriously mighty anymore, either.

  Actually, I’m not feeling anything except a lot of nauseous.

  Still, I mumble, at least loud enough for the two of them to hear, “Ahhh, shit.”

  “‘Ahhh shit’ what?” Lydia insists. “You—You know how to reverse that, right?”

  I’m also the one now swiping my lips with one hell of a nervous tongue. “I—well, we—Reece and I—just found out about it before the wedding, during field training out at the dam.”

  Sawyer’s disembodied face warms with a smile. “Where Reece pushed you in some new ways—making the new power manifest itself. Nice.”

  “Okay, why are you being such an adolescent about this?” ’Dia seethes out a growl as punctuation. “This isn’t some new game for your DS, Sawyer. This is your—what the hell?”

  I almost echo her when following the trajectory of her rolling eyes—to the spot where Sawyer is supposed to be.

  Where even his face and feet have disappeared.

  “What did you do with him now?” ’Dia yells at me.

  “I—nothing! Lydia, I swear! I—”

 
Am suddenly, unequivocally proven true on my assertion—as my feet are swept out from under me and I fall back onto the mat with a wham that sounds worse than it is. That doesn’t stop Lydia from screaming as if I’ve been taken down by a ninja on crack, flipping my instincts back to their original mode. Inside two seconds, rein in becomes strike back once more. The flares fly in my blood, stripping my control of the atmosphere around Sawyer. He’s back again, fully visible—including the wicked grin he flashes as I redirect the momentum of his attack, making him fly over my head into what should be an ass-over-elbows tumble. But he’s Sawyer freaking Foley, and he knows better. He ducks, rolls, and recovers during the time it takes me to regain my footing and spin around to face him.

  “Ohhhh, shit, shit, shit!” Lydia’s wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time mumble accompanies her flight off the mat as Folic Acid and I circle each other. We pace and toss mocking snarls, savoring our standoff with sneering joy.

  Sure enough, as soon as Sawyer catches enough of his breath, he jogs his jaw as preface for his deceivingly friendly drawl. “So. Nifty little trick you got there, missie.”

  “But it needs work,” I return. “That was what you were going to say, right?”

  His gaze narrows, but the centers still sparkle. “Hey, finishing my thoughts is her job.” Then turns those minty greens toward Lydia for a fast wink.

  “Damn straight it is,” she replies, twirling a strawberry curl and eyeing him like a kitten staring down a six-and-a-half-foot ball of yarn.

  Someone’s decided to jettison the anger and reclaim her mojo.

  But I can’t share the light moment. I try—dear God, I do—but just like that, I’m reduced to an emotional puddle, once more edgy and bitchy and violent. I look away, ashamed of my yearning to visually erase Sawyer again. Or stab my hands up at the skylights and melt all the panes to sand. Or march the hell out of here, retreat to my upstairs patio with three tubs of Ben & Jerry’s Half Baked, and cue up every Spotify angst mix for my headphones.

  And barely silence my scream of outrage.

  None of this is close to fair. Three weeks after my wedding, my sister gets to moon with her boyfriend like some saucy streaming romance scene while I’m not even able to track my husband’s phone to where he really is in Spain.

  My husband.

  Who hasn’t even spent one night with me as my husband.

  Whom I miss with a need that burns in my blood more intensely than the solar power infused into it.

  Not. Freaking. Fair.

  A realization that’s as unsettling, unnerving, and uncontrollable as it is utterly unavoidable.

  And there it is. Yet another new reason to scream the roof down.

  I’m desperately, achingly in love with the man who pulsed his way into my senses fifteen months ago. But I’ve also prided myself on avoiding the Class-One Clinger game—not nearly as easy as it looks when Reece Richards is the man in the equation. It’s taken determination, discipline, and conscious personal decision to be a separate entity from the god I feel wired into, all the damn time.

  Even now.

  When the wires are stretched across borders, oceans, time zones, miles, hours…

  Days.

  Okay, screw the ode to bitchy and pouty. Why not move on to pissed and lippy while I’m feeling so inspired? “Actually, I’m relaying my husband’s thoughts,” I snip. “As he communicated them to me within twenty-four hours of our wedding—informing me that instead of enjoying my honeymoon with him, I’d be getting tossed around on mats by you and stress baking my way into diabetes. So can we maybe just waive the ‘new powers’ processing fee, get the paperwork filled out, and get down to business?”

  By the time I’m done letting all of that jettison out, my chest is pumping, my blood is burning, and the fringes of my gaze are bright gold—only making it harder to take the quantum-level Zen of Sawyer’s calm reply. “Let’s have at it, baby girl.”

  “Oh, dear hell.” Lydia flashes a glower I’ve never seen off a tennis court. “Did you really just bait her like that? Really?”

  Sawyer swings his brilliant gaze to her. “Just some playground trash talk, Sparky.” Then leans down and in, smushing his lips to one and then the other of her cheeks. “Don’t you worry none, Ma. I’ll be careful with my Red Ryder carbine-action two-hundred-shot range model BB gun.”

  I snort and cross my arms. “You’ll shoot your eye out. But please do not let that stop you.”

  Lydia glowers. “It’s not his firepower I’m worried about.”

  “Gee, thanks.” I use the snark to camouflage the true pangs that take over—though my effort’s a wasted one and I know it from the second the door opens and the air is tinged by expensive French perfume. While the scent gives Angelique away as the newest arrival from the patio between the training center and the ridge’s pool deck, I also already know who’s not far behind. Sure enough, she’s hand-in-hand with Wade now. The writing’s been on the wall about the two of them since before they teamed up with me on that mission of insanity to Palos Verdes—if I can get away with even calling it a mission anymore—yet sometimes, nothing but seeing is believing. And sure enough, our head tech geek and supercharged empath give us plenty to see.

  And even more to believe.

  Damn it.

  Because that little part about Angie and her superpowered intuition? It’s all true—and proved completely as much—as her stare lands on me.

  Remains on me.

  Unswerving. Unrelenting. Unnerving. No; worse. She’s unhinging me. Literally pulling the lid of my composure off its hinges and seeing right into every detail of me. Despite my answering glare—and my silent order at her to get out of my psyche—she just keeps staring and feeling and knowing all this ugly crap that’s going on in my head and my heart. Worse, I’m not sure what to do with how she reacts to it all. Her expression seems like a cross of bewilderment and wonderment, which I have to accept as better than sappy sympathy but still hits me with matching confusion—which does not help me in the effort to regain control over all of this angsty garbage.

  Sawyer’s hefty whomp, resounding through the barren room like he’s just broken boards instead of smacking his palms, orders me back to full attention. “Mr. Tavish,” he declares, nodding toward Wade. “Just the right arrival to the party, at just the right time. No offense, Angie.” He bows toward Angelique, who mirrors him with a serene dip of her wigless head. “We just happen to have a new development in the team’s powers roster, and some logistics team interpretation would be welcome at the moment.”

  Wade jumps his tawny brows. “A new development? In what way?”

  Sawyer swings half a grin back my way. “Think you can recharge for another round, Mrs. R?”

  Before he’s done, I’m brandishing a full smile along with palms that glow like miniature suns. While this isn’t my complete happy place, because that can only happen if I’m at my husband’s side, I embrace this as the next best thing. Preparing myself to be better, bolder, stronger, faster—so that when I am beside Reece, I’m not just “Mrs. R.”

  I’m Flare.

  In all her blazing, brilliant, badass glory.

  Channeling the heat of her power into every crevice of her being and every cell of her blood…

  As I do right now.

  Remembering the truth that guides her from the inside as well the skills that grant her confidence on the outside…

  As I do now.

  Twining the force of her physical might with the will of her spiritual guidance, to make her a being worthy of standing at the side of Bolt.

  As I hope I do now.

  Crouching low. Bracing my feet. Readying my arms. Homing my focus. Yes, even freeing my mind from any more thoughts of Reece.

  All right, trying to.

  And realizing, as Sawyer prepares his own stance for our next spar, that banishing Reece Richards to even the back of my mind is like ordering the tide to back off the shore or assuming leg warmers will never be a trend again.
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  Or telling thunder to stop stalking the lightning.

  Yep. I’ve officially become thunder.

  A new kind.

  My storm front is white instead of black. My power isn’t sound but light. I’m a burning billow of magnificence and radiance, filled with strength and ready to rock this challenge…

  Until suddenly, I’m not.

  “Wh-Whaaaa?” The stammer belongs to me, but it’s been surrendered to a muted, cotton-thick fog. My arms and legs feel swaddled in the same strange stuff. “Wh-What the h-h-hell?” I don’t think I’ve meant the words more. One second, I was hunkered low and battle-ready. Then the next…

  Flat on my back, gaping up at lights and walls and a ceiling that won’t stop madly spinning—at least when I can glimpse them through the press of faces directly over me.

  “Fuck,” Sawyer mutters.

  “You want my feedback on this?” Wade injects.

  “You seriously asking that?” Sawyer spits.

  “Shut. Up.” Only when Lydia seethes at both of them do I start to get really scared. Dee Dee doesn’t sound like that unless she’s scared. To add weirdness on top of freakishness, Angelique leans over, fully in my view again. Her face is set with even more befuddling lines than before.

  “What is going on?”

  Just like that, I’m back to giving my karmic screen test for the moody bitch in the room—and I already can’t stand myself by worse degrees than before. But for some reason, despite the self-loathing backlash, I can’t seem to help it. My query takes on a second meaning. What the hell is happening? Did Faline somehow implant me with a remote-control device and is only now activating it? But if that’s the case, why can’t I hear her inside my senses like Reece did? And if not, then why do I still feel like some crazy alien being has plunked down roots inside me and is slowly taking over?

  “Okay, does anyone want to remember we’re in Southern California and not somewhere between Gotham and Riverdale right now? Juggie? Betty? Batman?”

  I’m ready to keep going, but Angelique’s heavy sigh takes over the air. Still, ’Dia’s the one who takes hold of my hand and gently pulls me upright while explaining, “You’re the one who can probably answer that question better than us, baby girl. You just went from super solar girl to the pass-out queen inside of three seconds.”