The Mind Keepers (The Mind Readers)

by Lori Brighton

  “No!” I tried to surge forward, but he disappeared. Gone. The bench, the room, everything disappeared while I floated in an inky world of nothingness. “Maddox!”

  “…need to leave soon…” Cameron’s voice wavered in and out of focus as I fought my way through the cloud of unconsciousness. Where was she? Why couldn’t I see her?

  “You can’t just run in there without knowing the facts, especially when she needs time to gain her strength, get used to her powers,” my aunt replied.

  They were arguing about something. I tried to concentrate, tried to forget Maddox. Slowly, ever so slowly, I felt my consciousness begin to take form, a thickening of matter, the weight of my body pulling me down. I cracked my lids just enough to see the ceiling. It was darker, dusk crawling across the walls. For a long moment I just lay there, not speaking, not moving, attempting to understand what had happened, what was reality and what was dream.

  “I’ve been there,” Cameron replied, hovering near the windows with arms crossed, that stubborn look upon her face a familiar and welcome sight. “As a visitor and as a prisoner.”

  I understood now why I’d been pulled back. They were talking about Maddox and the compound where he was kept. I understood, but it didn’t make it any easier to accept. I wanted to sink back into sleep, to find Maddox within that unconscious reality and demand answers.

  But Cameron was on a warpath. She couldn’t go there alone, she would need my help. More than ever I was determined to find Maddox—the real and solid Maddox—and get the truth once and for all. I started to shift, but my body ached like I had the flu, and a groan slipped unheeded from my lips.

  “Nora?” Cameron rushed to my side, her brows drawn together in sisterly concern. “Are you okay?” When I didn’t immediately answer, she settled on the bed next to me and pressed her hand to my forehead. The slight jarring of the mattress sent my world spinning.

  I shoved aside her hand, her touch only making the ache worse. Even the air hurt my skin. “What is it? What happened?”

  “You fainted.”

  I stiffened, my pain almost forgotten in my shock. “I don’t faint.”

  “You did this time, Sweetheart,” my aunt said wryly.

  Sweetheart. The word reminded me of Maddox. I glanced around the room, confused. “How long?” My voice came out husky, while my body felt heavy, not my own. What had happened to me? The source. I knew without doubt it was the source taking over my body like a damn virus. I resisted the urge to shiver.

  “About forty minutes.”

  I managed to sit up with Cameron’s help. Forty minutes, I’d been out for forty minutes. But no, not just out. I’d been with Maddox. If I truly had these new powers, if I could truly mind travel, then that meant I’d truly been with Maddox.

  “How long will it take for her to get used to the abilities?” Cameron asked our aunt.

  She just shrugged, ever helpful.

  Cameron frowned, returning her gaze to me. “I was born this way,” she said. “Guess that’s why I didn’t go through all this.”

  “Lucky me,” I muttered.

  “Your body just needs to get acclimated to the power,” my aunt explained, settling in the gingham pink and white chair near the window. “I was the same way the first couple months.”

  “You all right?” Cameron whispered, ignoring our aunt.

  “Your sister here,” Aunt Lyndsey started, “thinks we are going into the compound, guns blazing.”

  Cameron rolled her eyes. I knew the look well; Aunt Lyndsey was annoying her as much as me. Cameron was hoping for my support, and she’d get it. “Aunt Lyndsey, can you, um, get me some water or something?”

  She lifted a brow, the smirk upon her face indicating she knew exactly what I was asking: Can you leave me and Cameron alone so we can talk in private? Sorry auntie dear, but I trusted you about as much as I trusted Maddox. I waited until she finally left the room, waited until she was so far away I could barely sense her energy. Only then did I speak.

  “I dreamt of Maddox again.”

  Cameron was silent for a moment. “You mean you visited him?”

  I nodded. “I think so.”

  She jumped to her feet and paced the room. I could practically see her mind spinning. She was as freaked out by the prospect as I was. “I knew it. I knew you could travel.” She spun around to face me. “What happened? Tell me everything.”

  The question caught me off guard, and I flushed. I wasn’t used to sharing personal things, and there were some majorly personal things in that vision or dream or whatever it had been. “I…we…”

  “Never mind.” She shook her head, knowing how much I hated to talk. “But did he say anything important?”

  I took in a deep, trembling breath and managed to walk to the window. It was late evening. The sun had moved behind the tree-line. The yard looked dark and cold, lonely. “He helped.”

  Cameron paused next to me, the light from the waning sun highlighting her face. I realized in that moment that I found comfort in her presence. She was my sister. My only family, really. If anything happened to her…

  “Helped?”

  I rubbed my aching forehead. “After I’d started dating him, S.P.I. caught me a second time. All along I thought he had led them to me. He claims that he was the one who helped me escape.”

  Cameron frowned. “I hate to say it, but he could be lying.”

  I quirked a brow, surprised by her cynicism.

  “What?” She frowned. “I’m not as trusting as you think.”

  Yeah, I wasn’t going to respond to that. Instead, I looked out the window onto an overgrown backyard. The swing-set could barely be seen through the weeds. Had they played there often? A shimmer of energy swept through the yard, rustling the grass and leaves on the trees, and I wondered briefly if it was the ghostly energy of one of my siblings.

  “Nora?”

  “Lyndsey told me that she’s the reason I was captured. That S.P.I. actually followed her to Savannah.”

  “Oh.” Cameron sank onto the chair where our aunt had been sitting moments before. Neither of us said anything. I continued to stare out the window as Cameron merely sat in that chair. “So he helped you escape, just like Lewis helped me escape the island in Maine.”

  Oddly, I wasn’t thinking about Maddox, but I was wondering if my sister and brother had had fun in that backyard. Had they invented games, used their imagination, dreamt of a better world and a better family, as I had? Why? Why were they gone when I was still here? Luck? Fate?

  I sensed Lewis right before he appeared in the doorway.

  “It doesn’t change the fact that he stayed with S.P.I.,” I said softly. “Even after knowing what they had done to me, how they tortured me…he stayed.”

  “So what if we don’t go there just to help Maddox,” Lewis said.

  Cameron stood. “What do you mean?”

  “You know I don’t trust him.” He moved into the room, crossing his arms over his chest. “In fact, if it was up to me, we’d leave him to rot.”

  Exactly what I’d always thought, so why did his words rub me the wrong way now? I sighed and rested my forehead against the peeling window frame. He’d still betrayed me by staying. I wasn’t the sort of woman who forgave and forgot after a few flowery words.

  “Lewis—” Cameron warned, ever the peacekeeper.

  “Hear me out.”

  I turned toward him, interested, despite myself. “All right, what’s your plan, Captain America?”

  He settled on the edge of the bed. “What if we go there not only to save Maddox, but to take down the system once and for all?”

  Chapter 6

  “Just to make it clear, I have a bad feeling about this,” Aunt Lyndsey murmured as we hiked through the woods. In her cargo pants, military-style boots and jacket, she looked like a female version of Rambo. We’d even smeared black paint across our faces to make sure our pale skin didn’t reflect in the light.

  I had a feeling too, a fee
ling that she could kill just as easily and efficiently as any assassin. Heck, I kind of respected her toughness, her lack of emotion and weakness. I’d been that way until Mom had died. I’d been strong, unbreakable—or so I’d thought. After all, I’d survived torture twice. Now I felt like I was constantly tumbling around and around in a dryer, no idea which way was up or down.

  I shook my head, releasing a breath of air through pursed lips. I was determined to maintain control. And so I pretty much ignored her as we hiked, as I’d been ignoring her most of the day. She might not agree with our plan, but she was outnumbered in votes. Besides, this was our party she was crashing.

  “You really think we can just waltz up there?”

  I clenched my jaw so tight to keep from saying something that my teeth actually hurt.

  “Got a better plan?” Cameron spit out for me.

  I grinned; thank God for small favors. Aunt Lyndsey would make anyone’s hackles rise, even my saintly sister’s. My aunt sure as hell didn’t worry about speaking her mind, something else we had in common.

  Still, she wasn’t as annoying as the mosquitos that swarmed us, following in a cloud that would have been unbearable if we hadn’t been wearing pants and long-sleeved shirts. Yep, we were like a little army, traipsing through the underbrush, preparing to attack. The operative word was little. Could we really take an entire compound?

  “I’ll head to the north end,” Lewis said, shifting the backpack higher up on his shoulders. “Set off the grenade and hopefully draw them to me.”

  My aunt had come with her own arsenal, and none of us had asked where she’d gotten the weapons. But then again, she claimed we didn’t need them, that we were more powerful than anything man-made. She apparently had never been in a gun fight with an S.P.I. agent.

  “I don’t get it,” Cameron said, shaking her head. Sweat glistened across her forehead, and I had a feeling I looked just as stressed. But then hiking through the woods in the humid North Carolina spring with little sleep the night before would do that to a person. “There’s no noise, no cars, no energy.”

  I didn’t miss the glance Lewis sent her. I had a feeling they had some sort of mental communication going, although I couldn’t prove it. I looked away, feeling as if I was intruding on a private moment, and at the same time wondering over the envy I felt. I could never have that bond with Maddox. He would never—could never—truly understand me. So why had I felt such a connection with him?

  I noticed Lewis frown. Most likely he’d been lecturing her on why it was a bad idea to save Maddox. I didn’t blame the guy, any boyfriend would be jealous of Maddox. I swiped my forehead with the back of my hand and pushed thoughts of love and romance from my mind.

  Cameron was right. There was no energy. Weird.

  “Bad feeling,” my aunt muttered.

  I frowned, knowing exactly why she was so insistent on sharing her thoughts…she wanted me back at the house. I could tell Cameron and Lewis agreed. They didn’t think I could handle the extra flow of energy coming through me. Maybe I wasn’t ready, but no way in hell I was going to stay behind. I had a feeling too, a feeling I needed to be here, although why, I wasn’t sure.

  My foot sank into the muddy creek bed while my mind wandered. “Damn.” I pulled it free, shaking the mud loose and trekked up the small bank. It had changed in the year since I’d been here, hoping to sway Cameron to our side. Funny, it seemed like a million years ago when she’d been working for my father and S.P.I. “How much longer?”

  Lewis lifted the GPS system that hung from the strap on his backpack. “Quarter of a mile.”

  He’d been quiet most of the trip, unnaturally so, and I had a feeling he was worried about Cameron’s attachment to Maddox. He should be. Maddox was sexy, and when he was out to charm someone, they didn’t have a chance. I frowned at the thought, an irrational flicker of jealousy springing to life. But Lewis was gorgeous and kind, and there was something about the way he brooded silently, stoically, that made you wonder what he was thinking. If Cameron screwed up her relationship with him, she was an idiot. Especially if she gave it all up for a guy who had chosen S.P.I. over us.

  I rolled my eyes to stare at the canopy above. I was being ridiculous. Cameron was in love with Lewis. And Maddox…well, he was no doubt still in love with himself. I shoved aside a tree branch a little too hard and it snapped, gaining me a glare from my aunt. Damn it all, I had never lost my attraction to Maddox, and deep down, I still cared. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t. But I refused to get my heart broken again. Maybe I’d save his sorry ass, but then I’d be on my way back to Maine.

  “Keep alert,” my aunt said. “Use your powers to search, but not too far. Sense for humans, if you can.”

  I reached down for the pistol that was usually at my side; just touching it made me feel better. But it was gone. I’d gotten rid of it after mom’s death. Cameron didn’t want guns around the kids.

  “You don’t need it,” my aunt said softly, somehow knowing. “Your powers can work better than any weapon.”

  Easy for her to say since she actually knew how to use her abilities. The energy rushing through her wasn’t making her all loopy and crazed with weak emotions. It was like I had a supernatural version of PMS. I took in a deep breath and unclenched my hands, reaching out with my senses. There, I could feel it, the pulse of energy from the life around us. It tingled against my skin, making me incredibly aware of the liveness of it all. Comforting. It was a calm, natural energy. Trees, birds, squirrels, a deer or two. Nothing human.

  I paused for a brief moment, letting the silence surround me. “I don’t sense anyone, I don’t think.”

  “Careful,” Cameron whispered. “They have chips that can block their thoughts.”

  “Yeah, I know,” I snapped back. They acted as if I was some sort of newbie, when I’d been doing this longer than they had, when I’d gone through more torture than any of them. I rubbed my temples, which brought on a wary glance from my aunt. Frustrated, I dropped my hands to my side, quickening my steps and pulling ahead of the group. Yeah, I was short-tempered, angrier than normal. No big deal, I could still fight. I knew when my body needed rest, and right now was not the moment. I paused at the crest of a small hill.

  Cameron stopped next to me. “I’m not sensing anything.”

  “Fence is ahead,” Lewis said softly, gazing through the trees. “Should I head north?”

  He was right. I could see the shimmer of light reflecting off the metal.

  “No,” my aunt replied. “I can’t sense anyone either. No one’s here, at least not close.”

  Lewis shrugged off his backpack and settled it on the ground. “I wouldn’t trust the feeling. We all know they’re great at deception.”

  “Agreed.” Lyndsey slowly scanned the hills. “Keep watch, keep your senses open.”

  There was nothing other than the breeze through the leaves. Suddenly no birds chirped, no insects buzzed, everything felt as if it had been placed on pause.

  Lewis took out a pair of binoculars from his backpack and held them close to his eyes. “I don’t understand.”

  “What is it?” Cameron asked.

  He handed them to Cameron. “The fence is busted. Falling apart.”

  I grabbed the binoculars from her hands and looked. Sure enough the fence was half-destroyed. Slowly, I handed the binoculars to Aunt Lyndsey, my heart sinking. “That sort of decay…they had to have abandoned the camp almost immediately after Mom died.”

  “It’s empty.” Cameron bolted down the hill and up the next. “Oh my God, we’re too late.”

  “Damn it, Cameron,” Lewis snapped, rushing after her and leaving his backpack behind. “You need to be more careful.”

  “Does she always rush in like that with no thought to her own safety?” my aunt muttered in disgust.

  “Yeah,” I said softly, picking up Lewis’ backpack. “She lets her emotions get the better of her.”

  Not me, at least I never had before. But maybe if
I had I could have saved Maddox. Gone. He was gone. But where? My aunt followed, watching them like an audience member watching a foreign film with subtitles, as if she didn’t understand. I knew the truth at least: Lewis wasn’t just annoyed that Cameron had rushed headlong toward the compound, but he was angry that she was so concerned about Maddox she would endanger her life for him.

  That should have been me. I should’ve been packing the car the other morning insisting we save Maddox. I should have been rushing toward that compound, heedless of my own safety. So why did I feel so numb, my legs leaden? Cameron and Lewis had managed to make it to the fence before we caught up to them. Cameron ducked through the hole in the wire and waited impatiently for us on the other side. The second set of fencing wasn’t even up any longer.

  “After you,” my aunt said as she gripped the loose fencing and pulled it aside so I could easily enter.

  I didn’t thank her as I ducked low and followed Lewis and Cameron, my instincts on high alert. I was too concerned with Maddox, too confused over the empty camp. We couldn’t be late. Maddox was still alive, I’d just visited him last night. My attention snapped from corner to corner, building to building. The grass was overgrown, weeds having crawled across the gravel drive. A few abandoned jeeps were rusting in the far corner. Where the hell was he?

  “Damn,” Cameron hissed, looking just as frustrated as I felt. “Where could he be?”

  Lewis gripped her arm. “We shouldn’t go any further. It’s not safe.”

  She jerked away. “No, not until we know for sure. Not until we check every inch of this prison.”

  “Why do you care?” I finally snapped, my emotions and worry getting the better of me.

  She turned her startled gaze my way. “Because he’s a human being who doesn’t deserve to be tortured, doesn’t deserve to die.”

  “Or is it because you like him?” There, I’d said it. Part of me was horrified, part of me relieved.

  Her shocked gaze gave way to fury. She tore her attention from me to pierce Lewis with her unrelenting attention. Lewis hadn’t said a word, but I knew he was awaiting her answer as much as me. “Are you freaking joking?”