“Hi, how are you feeling?”
“Adelaide, where is everyone?” he asked instead of answering her.
Her stomach turned.
“I’m not sure. We just barely got away,” she said.
Adam groaned and abruptly struggled to sit up straight.
“I have to go help them.”
“Adam,” she started but found nothing else to say. She couldn’t tell him if there was anyone left to save. Her heart thundered all over again. “You can’t move. You’ll make your injury worse.”
“My family…”
She pressed a hand against his chest to prevent him from budging again. She was forced to acknowledge that Adam was somewhat right in that they’d need to move out of the cave. Adam could barely walk though, and the trek to the end of the tunnel would be a long one. She looked to their left again.
“Look, I can get back to the house and get us another car out here. While I’m in the house I can see where everyone else is,” she said. She knew that it was a dumb plan but desperate, it was the best one she had.
Something indiscernible flashed over his face and was gone before Adelaide could pinpoint it.
“Okay,” he whispered weakly.
She nodded and stood slowly. She would be leaving Adam alone and possibly putting herself back in the center of a shade battle. It took her a minute to gather the courage necessary and then she rushed back to the house. Climbing up from the tunnel under the patio, she nearly had a heart attack.
“Angie!” she shouted, hands shooting up in the air, before the redhead had the mind to blast her away.
Angie stepped out from behind a support frame of the house. Her expression wild, she sized Adelaide up before any sign of recognition flashed over her face.
“Adelaide! You’re alive!”
“I am. You too, apparently,” Adelaide huffed back. She lifted herself out of the tunnel and crawled to her feet. “Where are the shades?”
Angie whimpered.
“I fought a few off but most ran away. They came for Leon. I tried to stop them but there were too damn many,” Angie said and her voice broke. “You’re bleeding, Adelaide.”
Adelaide glanced down. Her clothes were stained and her hands still dirty. She wiped her palms on her jeans again.
“It’s Adam’s. Please help me, he’s hurt.”
A frantic expression registered on Angie’s face.
“Where is he?” Angie asked.
“Down in the tunnel,” Adelaide said. “Where is everyone else?”
Angie blanched.
“I don’t know if anyone else is left. I couldn’t find them after the attack started.”
“Well, then it’s just you and me. We need to get Adam and go,” she hissed.
Angie looked too traumatized for Adelaide’s statement to sink in.
“Let’s get the car keys,” Adelaide said.
The redhead looked like a zombie as they trekked inside. Crossing the threshold, Adelaide stayed on high alert. Head on a pivot, she sized the place up. For being the center of the action, she saw little destruction. She spotted a chair strewn in the middle of the living room and papers knocked from the counter. The basement door was open, but, like the first floor, it remained quiet. Something told Adelaide she wouldn’t find the others mages in their rooms now.
“Leon was here the last time I saw him. He was here…”
Angie’s ramblings faded to a whisper.
“He’s obviously not now and we shouldn’t be either. We can’t stop moving. If the shades attack, we’re doomed.”
Angie suddenly looked at Adelaide as if they’d never met before. Adelaide ignored it and hoped Angie would follow as she kept moving. She spotted a glint by the coffee table and raced after the silver keys. Snatching them, she punched the remote and heard a car chirp outside.
“Let’s go. Adam is at the spring—we’ll have to park and carry him out. Once we get him in the car, we’re gunning it all the way to the nearest hospital,” Adelaide said firmly. Angie shook her head.
“But everyone else…”
“No one else is here. Wherever they are, we can’t help them now,” she hissed.
For all of the adrenaline pounding in her veins and the panic heavyset in her mind, Angie fell apart ten times worse. But then her whole family probably lay dead somewhere.
Adelaide reached out and gripped the woman’s shoulder. The touch seemed to snap her out of it and Angie nodded madly. Without another word, they raced toward the car. Adelaide took the driver’s seat and peeled out back to the rocks. She gripped the wheel tightly while waiting to find if Adam still clung to life.
Twenty-three
“Where am I driving?” she questioned irately. She forced the pedal all the way down until the speedometer hit its max. At this speed, everything blurred together and looked like a mass of nothing but orange and green. Despite their speed, it felt so much longer than the trip to the house had. They were down to a quarter tank of gas and the asphalt road appeared to continue on forever.
“Just keep going!” Angie answered from the backseat but Adelaide knew the redhead wasn’t paying attention to where they were. All of her attention fixated on Adam. Their attempt to carry him from the tunnel took more of a toll on his body, and the consciousness that he’d recovered was fleeting.
Adelaide desperately shook foreboding thoughts out of her mind and concentrated on her driving. They’d been lucky so far, no shades, but Adelaide wanted to be ready in case they did come.
The car finally approached an intersection and she kept the pedal down with every intention to blow through their stop sign.
“Stop!” Angie suddenly cried.
Adelaide pumped the brakes to slow the car. It groaned until it skidded to a halt. The entire cabin lurched forward and the seatbelt crushed her. She wrenched it off in a hurry and sought the source of Angie’s urgency. She stared at the backseat and the pale-faced Adam, suddenly feeling too scared to inquire about his condition.
Angie sprung out of the car and left Adelaide to watch her go. The redhead raced straight into the intersection and jumped up and down. Then Adelaide noticed the second car coming down the road and felt the hint of a mage’s aura. The silver car slowed and pulled up next to them. Only then could Adelaide see the driver and recognize her as Charlotte, Tony’s mother, the plump woman wearing the face of a bulldog. Window down, she leaned out to speak with Angie.
“What’s going on?” the woman demanded.
“We’re taking Adam to the hospital. Everyone else is missing.”
Charlotte’s face darkened.
“Tony contacted me. He escaped with Priya but Preeti and Leon were taken. I need to see my son now. Reconcile later and be safe,” Charlotte said.
Charlotte gunned it as soon as Angie was off of the street. She hopped back in the backseat and they took off too.
“That’s so good that Tony and Priya are okay. I was too afraid everyone was caught, but I was separated from the rest.”
“You’ll see them again,” Adelaide said but her statement felt hollow.
When Adelaide finally spotted the city, she could have cried in relief. Letting off the gas enough to merge them safely into the sparse, but upcoming traffic, she followed the signs toward the hospital. Streetlights slowed them down but they mercifully managed to avoid a traffic jam.
“How is he doing?” Adelaide finally asked the question she’d been dreading.
Angie let out a long breath.
“Well, he’s alive,” Angie said.
They pulled straight up to the front doors of the ER. Angie hopped out again to retrieve the help of staff members. They brought out a gurney and pulled Adam from the car. Angie and the group raced with Adam into the hospital.
After the commotion, it took Adelaide a moment to shift the car back into drive and pull away from the curb. The car gave out a few dying huffs and she parked in the first available spot. In her rearview mirror, the ER doors waited. In front of her,
she saw the city.
She numbly turned off the car and tossed the keys in the passenger seat. All of the anxiety that got her here now left her shaking and incapacitated. Adam was safe now and there was nothing left that she needed to do.
Adelaide suddenly didn’t know what to do. She could ditch the car here, catch a bus, and disappear. It made sense logically, but she lacked the strength to get out of the car.
“Adelaide, get a hold of yourself,” she said aloud. “Mistel is right about you. You can’t be weak and be a survivor. You can’t undo anything. You’ve done all you can.”
She failed miserably at convincing herself.
She wasn’t sure how much time passed before she numbly sought out the door handle. The hinges groaned when she pushed open the door. Standing outside now, the cool breeze brushed her face and helped snap her from her daze. She looked at the hospital.
Maybe if she knew that Adam was going to be all right, she could go home and stop feeling completely ashamed of her actions. Adam was never supposed to be involved in this and that thought drove her forward.
The ER was packed. People fought over the hard plastic seats in the waiting room and others congregated around vending machines. There was a line at the front desk so she skipped it and walked straight down the hall. The patients’ rooms were marked with dry erase boards and shielded by green curtains. She spied through the cracks for a familiar face as she walked. She reached the end of the hall and doubled back to find no one.
“Hey,” she reluctantly waved down the first man wearing scrubs. He stopped and blatantly looked her from bottom to top. While the outfit she wore clung tightly to her body, she suspected he stared at the blood instead. “I need to find a patient that was just brought in here with a bad injury. I don’t see him so where is he?”
“If he’s not here, he’s been discharged or admitted. Maybe they ordered him to surgery if his injuries were bad enough. I’d try admitted patients upstairs, but you need to sign in up there before they will let you see anyone.”
At least he hadn’t suggested the morgue. She hurried upstairs, out of the ER, to the admitted patients’ ward. She cruised up to the front desk and slammed her hands down to get the nurse’s attention.
“I need to see Adam Colton,” she said. As the pressure in her head and chest grew, she couldn’t manage pleasantries. She earned the appropriate narrow look from the nurse.
“You can’t pass this point unless you are family,” he said.
She opened her mouth to protest but someone beat her to it.
“Ralph, it’s all right. She’s his girlfriend,” Angie’s voice called. The redhead came up behind Adelaide and with a soft touch, led her to the left. Ralph growled at the desk but did not stop them.
Adam’s room was apparently the last one in hall and the walk to it felt like forever. Angie’s utilization of the term ‘girlfriend’ hadn’t escaped her thoughts until she was only feet away from entering. Adelaide stopped outside.
“Adelaide,” Angie whispered, “he’s going to be okay. We got him out in time.”
“Okay?” Adelaide parroted.
“The wound was more superficial than I thought but he nearly died from blood loss. They gave him a transfusion and stitched him up. He is doing so much better but they’re keeping him here for monitoring overnight since I had to lie and tell them he was in a car wreck.”
Adelaide nodded. Blood loss was an easy fix when caught in time. Her eyes returned to the room and she suddenly felt cold.
“If he’s all right, I’ll let him sleep,” Adelaide said as she fell back a step. Angie’s hand rose and blocked her way.
“Don’t leave, go see him. He’s conscious. He’s asked about you so I’m sure he wants to see you,” Angie said.
Angie sounded sincere and it made Adelaide’s heart ache.
“I can’t…” Adelaide started to whisper but her throat went dry.
She felt rooted to the ground like a coward and had more difficulty gathering her courage together now than she did for battle.
She could feel the hotness of her cheeks and the dryness of her eyes. Her hair made up a tangled mat and her clothes virtually disgusting rags. She wiped her face in a pathetic attempt to remedy her appearance. After a minute, she gained the courage to enter the room. The heavy door swung shut behind her and the sound made Adam stir. Adelaide maneuvered to the bed corner to see him clearly. His skin had more color now and his hair was tame. He smelled of antiseptics and was covered in white bandages.
“Adelaide,” he called softly.
She resisted the urge to retreat.
“Hey, how are you feeling?” she asked.
He sat up abruptly. The action must have been painful, but if it was, he kept the grimace off his face. He locked eyes with her then.
“I am alive. And you are too, apparently,” he said.
“Yea.”
His demeanor changed in seconds. His hand shot out and caught her elbow. Her surprise gave him enough of an advantage to pull her forward. She stumbled, stopping only when the bed would allow her to move no further.
“I saw what you did, Adelaide. Or whoever you are…”
“Adam!”
“Tony was right about you. You show up and so do the shades. You show up and half my coven might be dead. Who are you?”
Adam’s aura flailed dangerously. His grip tightened around her elbow to the point of agony.
“Adam, it’s not…”
“It’s not what? Not what I think? What do I think? What should I think? I’m not an idiot, Adelaide, despite the fact that I’m sure you think I am for fooling me for so long.”
She squeaked. Her elbow burned but she failed to break his grip. Her other hand grabbed his and tightened to maintain some control.
“Let me go,” she begged.
“I should kill you,” he hissed.
Everything about his face in that moment told her that he was absolutely serious. Her breath left her and fear replaced it.
“Adam,” she whimpered his name.
Adam suddenly released her and she pin-wheeled backward. Hitting the wall, she clutched her aching elbow. By the level of pain, she guessed that he nearly broke it.
He turned his face from her in a show of zero fear.
“You’re lucky because I’m not about to go homicidal in a hospital.”
“Adam, I brought you here,” she reminded, but it sounded pathetic.
“I’m not sure why you felt the need to bring me here or if this was an accidental route on your escape plan. I’m going to find my brother, and, after that—after that I’ll deal with you,” he sniped.
She did a double take.
“You can’t go after Leon. You have no chance of freeing him!” she hollered before she could prevent the words. Adam said nothing.
The better half of her mind told her to run now—somewhere she knew Adam could never catch her. But still her mouth rattled off her panicked thoughts. “You almost were killed. Do you want to get die for real? They took Leon back to the Hawthorn coven which, might I remind you, is a damn powerful shade coven.”
“Get away from me,” he said.
“Adam, at least let me explain. I don’t want to see you get hurt,” she pled.
“Get out now or I’ll change my mind about killing you here!”
Finally, she reluctantly obeyed and left the room. Angie stood by the wall, clasping a yellowing magazine and dull smelling coffee.
“Adelaide, what’s wrong?” the woman asked her.
“Nothing.”
“Seriously?”
Adelaide stopped and paid attention. While Adam had seen Adelaide use her aura in the tunnel, Angie never did. And, based off of the woman’s reactions, Adelaide knew that Adam hadn’t shared her secret. As far as Angie was concerned, Adelaide was still human and still on good terms.
“Adam’s going after the Hawthorn shade coven to try and get his brother back. He’s going to get killed so you to talk him out of it!�
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Angie shushed her quickly before frantically looking around. Despite her concerns, those who lingered in the hall seemed to be wholly caught up in other things.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Listen to me. Adam knows the people that took Leon and Preeti are the Hawthorn shade coven. He plans to go after the shades to get them back.”
Angie tilted her head inquisitively.
“Even if we knew it was the Hawthorns, we don’t even know where they are,” the woman said.
The Coltons might not have known where they were, but Adelaide did. She’d been there once upon a time, deep in the woods of Washington.
“Besides, this isn’t something we should talk about here or now…” Angie added.
Adelaide refused to let it go. After all of this, she couldn’t let it go.
“Angie, you have to talk him out of it. I’m begging you. I can’t see Adam dead.”
Twenty-four
She used her fingernails to tear at her scalp, her flesh, and the layers of grime that stuck to her. The scalding water did little more than turn her skin red and flood her lungs with steam. Dirty, pink water pooled around her feet. The massive water heater in the hotel allowed her to linger indefinitely in the shower with her thoughts. Despite her virtual begging, Angie had been unsuccessful in convincing Adam to give up his plan. Adelaide had finally gotten agitated enough that she fled the hospital and sprung for the first hotel that gave her an open room. She didn’t even feel bad about maxing out her Visa to do it.
She twisted the nozzle to stop the cascade of water and reluctantly stepped out. Her new clothes and makeup waited for her on the counter. Her entire world might have been falling apart, but she wouldn’t look bad while it happened. The old but familiar procedure of layering and brushing actually made her felt better. When she adorned the tight, low cut clothing, she stepped back from the mirror. She felt more like herself and less like someone pretending to be an angel. She gave a hopeful smile to her reflection right before a knock sounded at the door.
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