United (The Guardians Book 2)

by Jessica Roe

  It didn't matter how evil he'd been. It didn't matter how many people told her she'd done the right thing. She would never, ever forget the look of betrayal in his eyes as he'd taken his last breath, as he'd died right there in her arms.

  There was no way she could tell Chase any of that; she still couldn't even bear to talk about it out loud, not even to Terelle or Cadby or anyone else who cared about her.

  Chase seemed to sense that she wouldn't talk, because he shrugged one shoulder and pulled a what the heck face. “Meh. Doesn't matter anyway. I suppose it all worked out in the end. For me, anyway.”

  Gable had been very, very wrong. There were no similarities between her and Chase, not even sick ones. Despite all his talk, Chase had never cared about Pablo, not like she had. He'd used him in his pathetic climb to the top, pure and simple.

  She shook her head, the horror and the heartache overwhelming her in ways she'd thought she'd never have to feel again. “I always thought you were such a solid guy. You seemed so. . .good. The one bright light in the dark world we lived in.”

  With wide eyes, he placed a hand over his heart. “I am a good guy, Gable! I'm exactly who you thought I was before. Nothing's changed. I'm just opportunistic, and there's nothing wrong with that.”

  “Opportunistic!” she cried. “You kidnap people, Chase. Actual people! You lock them away and you torture them and you experiment on them. I saw them down there – there was barely anything left of them. It's evil! Pure evil.” She rubbed her free hand over her face, then slammed her fist back against the door furiously. “Jesus! All those times I confided in you about Sacha and you knew where he was all along, you bastard. I trusted you!”

  He threw frustrated hands up in the air. “You don't get it! Do you know what it's like growing up with three perfect older brothers, Gable? Do you know what it's like to grow up with a controlling bastard of a father who is constantly comparing you to them, who is constantly telling you that you'll never live up to them? That you'll never accomplish as much as they have? I was never good enough for him. Even when I told him I was moving to America, you know what he said to me? He said don't bother, son. He told me I'd fail here just as I'd failed everything else.”

  So Pablo had been like another father figure to Chase, Gable realized. A better one; the first to ever believe in him.

  They really were alike – Pablo had been a father to both of them when they had needed him most.

  “So this is all over daddy issues?” she demanded, unable to keep the disgust out of her voice.

  Tutting, he shook his head at her like he was explaining something simple to small child. “You don't get it, you just don't. But you will. And so will dear old Dad. I'll show that bloody arse who has all the power.”

  She scoffed. “In case you hadn't noticed, your whole operation is a bust. You failed. Your lab rats escaped and your guards are being slaughtered. Hell, the whole building is tearing itself apart around you. You don't have power, Chase. All you have is epic failure. Pablo died, and you thought you could just step into his shoes but you can't. You're not him. You'll never be him.”

  He scowled. “No, I'm better than-”

  The building gave a dangerous tremble, and they book glanced up quickly.

  The leeches must have all been taken out, Gable realized, and Ward was losing control again.

  She was running out of time.

  “Where's the key?” she yelled over the steadily rising noise, no longer trying to be subtle. She held onto the door behind her with one hand to keep herself standing.

  Also sensing time was running out, Chase staggered back over to the cabinets and yanked a few more files out, throwing them haphazardly into the box. He tried to tape it together but the earthquake was making him unsteady and his hands shook too much so he threw the tape aside angrily.

  He glanced up at Gable imploringly and took an unsteady step towards her. She lifted her gun higher, but he just sighed. “You're not going to shoot me, Gable,” he called knowingly.

  She willed herself to pull the trigger. Willed herself.

  It had broken her into a million pieces, but she'd been able to kill Pablo for the greater good. It hadn't been easy, but she'd done it. So why couldn't she kill Chase? Was it because she still couldn't quite grasp who he was now, instead of who she'd always thought him to be? Was it because despite seeing him standing before her, she could still remember what it was like to think of him as that sweet, innocent guy she'd thought she'd had to protect from their dark world? Or was it something else? Had spending all this time with the Guardians softened her? Changed her? Did she have morels now?

  Chase stepped even closer, close enough to touch. He pushed her gun down with two fingers then held onto her arms, much like she'd done to him earlier.

  It was then that Gable noticed something that made her go hot and cold, all at once. Her heart raced in her chest. Around Chase's neck lay a silver chain, and hanging from that chain, almost hidden beneath the collar of his white shirt, was a plain, silver key, no bigger than her pinky finger.

  Could it be. . ?

  Of course that's where it would be. He wouldn't be foolish enough to leave it anywhere but on his actual body.

  “You're not getting the key,” Chase told her, speaking slow as if she was a crazy person he was talking off the edge. He had no idea she'd found it. SHE'D FOUND IT! “I'm leaving now, but you can come with me, Gable! The two of us can leave all this behind, take the key and leave. Just you and me! I know you've always cared about me and. . .” He laughed and shook his head, staring right into her eyes. “God, Gable, from the first day I saw you I just. . . You were incredible. Even all dirty and unkempt and covered in filth from the streets, I knew you were something special. You were too wrapped up in your wolf then, but I swore to myself that one day, when I had more power, I would own you.” Chase spoke as if that was some kind of a prize, like it was something that should make Gable happy. “So come with me! We can start afresh. Together! I can give you anything you could ever want!”

  If Gable had thought she'd been disgusted before, it was nothing to how she felt after hearing those words. The idea of her and Chase. . . It was abhorrent. And that he truly believed she would accept was madness. That was all it could be. Where Pablo's evil motives had always stemmed from the darkness he'd witnessed over his long life, Chase's all came from that fact that he was clearly one crazy mother crapper.

  She let him pull her even closer, then she murmured just loud enough for him to hear, “You make me sick.”

  He pulled back, his nostrils flaring in pure fury.

  The floorboards beneath them creaked ominously as the earthquake grew worse, and Gable could tell the building was just minutes away from collapsing completely. She was surprised it had even lasted so long.

  A booming crash almost knocked her off her feet, and she looked on in horror as the room right next to them completely caved in, taking the wall between the two rooms and a little corner of theirs with it. The two of them watched in frozen silence as bricks and rubble and floorboards all fell into the gaping hole, taking even a desk chair with it.

  “Bollocks!” Chase cursed, the display rushing him into action. He span and grabbed up his box. “Time to go!” Without so much as a backwards glance, he lifted his hand up to the key around his neck.

  “Wait!” Gable yelled desperately. Chase held all the cards, and there was nothing left she could do. She clicked the safety back on her gun and threw it to the side as a show of faith, where it disappeared in the hole in the floor. “I'll come with you.”

  Chapter 32

  Gable

  Chase grinned, huffing out his relief while genuine happiness shone in his eyes. “I knew it, I knew you cared. Come on!” Tucking the box firmly under one arm, he held out his spare hand for her to take.

  Gable stepped forwards, and suddenly the door slammed open behind her.

  “Gable!” Zay sounded so relieved to find her alive. He looked rough – that last
fight had definitely taken it out of him. He was bruised and scraped and his black vest had a big rip across the center, and underneath that she could see a red slash – probably a shallow knife wound. His shoulder was hanging oddly, most likely dislocated, but he was still standing. He was tough as hell. “Ward lost complete control when his powers turned back on. Queenie's getting him out of here. We need to leave, now! The fight is over – the guards have been overpowered.” His eyes flickered to Chase like it was the first time he was noticing him standing there, and then to the hand Chase was holding out for Gable, before landing back on her. “What's going on?”

  Zay had come back for her, at the risk of his own life. Even when the building was collapsing around them, he hadn't run with the others, he'd stayed to find her. If she'd had the time, Gable would have been overwhelmed.

  “Gable, come on!” Chase instructed sternly. His eyes were wide and wild, and he was glaring at Zay like he was an intruder there to steal his woman.

  “What?” Zay's face paled as he realized what was going on. “Gable, no!”

  Ignoring him, Gable darted past his outstretched arms and took Chase's hand.

  “Hold on to me,” he told her, grinning smugly as he pulled her tight to his chest. His face dropped when he tried to pull his hand free to reach for the key and she wouldn't let it go. “Gable, I need my hand to use the k-”

  “Sorry, friend,” she spat, twisting his hand until she felt something crack. He cried out, and she used the distraction to rip the key chain from his neck.

  “What are you doing?” he practically screamed. “I thought you understood! Wha-”

  “I'll never understand, you sick freak.” Letting his hand go, she punched him as hard as she could. He flew back in a shower of nose blood, his box dropping to the ground and splitting open. Papers drifted up and scattered everywhere.

  She glanced at Zay, who grinned at her. “I never doubted you,” he lied, and she quirked an eyebrow in response.

  In all of the commotion, a picture on one of the papers caught her eye, causing her heart to skip a beat. Was that Sacha?

  She dropped down to investigate, and then something roared deafeningly around them as the ceiling gave way.

  “GABLE!” Zay barreled into her, rolling her out of the way just as the ceiling collapsed, right where she'd just been crouched. She felt chunks of rubble and shards of plaster cutting into her sides but she ignored the pain and focused on what was important, like the fact that Zay had just saved her from being crushed.

  Chase, on the other hand, had not been so lucky. He was buried, completely and totally. There was no way he could have survived it.

  Zay glanced behind him and gulped, realizing that they had only just stopped inches away from rolling into the hole in the floor. “We need to get out of here. Like right the hell now!” he yelled into Gable's ear.

  “Our exit is gone!” She nodded over at the doorway, blocked by more rubble.

  He grabbed her hand and pulled her up. They couldn't go through the next room without the ability to fly over the gaping hole, so there was only one other option. Tugging her towards the window, he wasted no time sliding it up. Below them, the grassy area between the two buildings was filled with Outcasts.

  “It's our only way out,” he said. “It's not too high, right?”

  She grimaced. It was only a two story drop, but still. . .

  The floor gave another dangerous shake beneath them, and she knew they were all out of options.

  They climbed onto the ledge of the window. Zay took her hand in his and squeezed, and they glanced at each other. Gable couldn't help but feel a sense of deja vu as she thought back to that day on the boat. She shoved the key into her pocket.

  “One,” he counted down quietly. “Two. . .”

  They threw threw themselves off the ledge before he could get to three.

  It wasn't far, but Gable's ankle gave way when she landed on it badly. She stumbled to the ground with an annoyed cry.

  “You okay?” Zay asked, having fared much better than she. He squatted down next to her and she winced when he pressed gentle fingers against her ankle. “Just twisted, I think. Let me find something to wrap it.”

  “It's fine,” she said, shaking him off and climbing unsteadily to her feet. There was simply no time for a twisted ankle. She'd done her duty, she'd found Pablo's partner, found the key, and now she had to find Sacha.

  Holding onto Zay's shoulder for balance, she searched, her head darting from side to side as she looked.

  Nearby, Outcasts were crouched together in groups with their arms over their heads, too traumatized to run, even as the earthquake continued to move the ground. On either side, both buildings were falling down.

  “Zay!” she heard Queenie call. “Gable!”

  She was holding onto Ward not far behind them. He was on his knees, gripping his head and moaning.

  “Can you stop?” Zay called out to him.

  “I'm trying!”

  Zay grimaced sympathetically. “Sorry about this, buddy.” Then without hesitating, he clocked Ward on the back of his head with his gun. Ward dropped down, unconscious.

  “Zay!” Queenie protested.

  He shrugged. “He'll thank me later.”

  The earthquake stopped. There was a collective sigh of relief, though things were still hectic.

  Gable left Zay, limping through the crowds. Now that the earth was standing still, finding Sacha would be much easier.

  She span in a circle, scanning faces.

  Or it should be. . .

  Where the hell was he?

  Zay had been right before – the fight really was over. Outcasts sat and stood and lay all around her; alive, dead, injured. Some rejoiced, some whimpered in pain, some screamed, laughed, sang, cried over their losses. Those who weren't too badly injured were helping others in much worse condition.

  Many of the guards had been left alive. A lot of them had been overpowered and tied up by Outcasts hell bent of revenge but some of them were simply sitting together in groups, weaponless. They were staring down at their feet, silent, and Gable realized that they were the ones who had given up. They'd seen that they were on the losing side and decided they'd rather face their punishment than fight to the death.

  And they would be punished. She had a feeling those Guardian prisons were about to get seriously overcrowded.

  But she didn't care about them, not right now. There was only one person she cared about, one person's face she wanted to see. She stopped in the middle of the grass and span in circles, searching.

  Dread began to set in with a sickeningly heavy weight at the bottom of her stomach when he didn't appear.

  Zay caught up to her again and grabbed her shoulder. “With everything going on I completely forgot the key! We didn't-”

  “I have it,” she replied distractedly before he could crap his pants.

  He threw his head back and blew out a long puff of air, his whole body relaxing. “Thank fuck.”

  At least, she thought she had the key, but she didn't feel like telling him that just yet. If the key that had been around Chase's neck wasn't the actual key then. . . Well, then they were kind of screwed.

  She glanced back up at the building they'd jumped from. For the briefest second she thought of Chase; trapped, alone, almost certainly dead. She felt a heartbreaking pang in her chest, not for the Chase she'd just encountered, but for the one she'd thought she'd known. The sweet, thoughtful guy she'd relied on so much back when she'd first started working for Pablo. Later, when she had more time to dwell on it, she knew it would probably break her.

  But she couldn't think about him right then; he didn't deserve it.

  All she could think about was-

  Something horrifying occurred to her and all the air seemed to leave her body at once. If Sacha wasn't out here then. . .what if he was still in there?

  No.

  Without a single thought for her own safety, she ran as fast as she could on h
er damaged ankle towards the building, not a care that she could be running straight for her own death. If Sacha was still in there, then that was where she needed to be.

  She hopped over a pair of outstretched legs, twisted around a couple of hugging Outcasts. Pain shot up her calf, but she'd dealt with worse before. Her mind was focused on only one thing.

  Mere feet away from the building, a pair of strong, familiar arms wrapped around her from behind. Nicky swung her away from the deadly death trap, dragging her back to safety.

  “Let me go!” she screeched. “I need to get in there!”

  BOOM!

  The impact of the building finally giving in and collapsing in on itself sent out a ripple strong enough to knock those closest off their feet. Nicky covered Gable's body with his as shards of glass and plaster and chunks of brick exploded out and settled over them.

  Gable shoved him off and pushed onto her knees. There was nothing left of the building now but a pile of rubble.

  An agonized scream ripped its way from her throat.

  Nicky grabbed her face between his hands. “There was no one left in there!” he told her urgently. His eyes were wide and sad; he was terrified of what she might do next to endanger herself. “We checked everywhere, including what was left of the cells below. We got everyone out.” He swallowed, hard. “Everyone alive.”

  He was telling her that the only ones left inside were already dead. No. She refused to even comprehend what he was implying. Sacha was not dead. He wasn't. Because if Sacha was really dead then. . . God, he just wasn't.

  Choking out a sob, she yanked herself from Nicky's grasp and clambered ungraciously to her feet, ignoring him when he called after her. She would find him. She had to find him. She scanned each and every face around her as she limped through dying and injured guards and Outcasts. She pushed through those standing in her way, dismissed the hands that reached out for her.

  She spotted Queenie and Cadby and the other members of her team aiding those in need, reassuring them, patching them up, and a part of her thought she should help. But the rest of her was too selfish to put finding Sacha aside, even for a few moments. She had to find him. Why couldn't she find him?