by K. A. Linde
* * *
—
Reyna tore off her workout clothes and stepped into the scalding shower to rinse off her workout. Her muscles ached in the best way. But it was her mind that never shut off.
Sometimes when she closed her eyes at night she still remembered the person who had reached for her in Everett’s apartment. She could feel their hand clamp down on her arm. She could see their masked faces. Smell the fear in the air. Sense the disaster that was unfolding around her. Sometimes that hand dragged her under and the nightmares started. Sometimes she was lucky and it was only the needles that blurred her sleep. But usually it was B.
She shuddered at the images that unfolded behind her closed eyes. The water hit her in a fierce spray. She didn’t think these memories would ever leave her alone. When something traumatic happened, there were only two choices: sink into the pain or grow around it. It never went away. It became a part of her.
Reyna shut off the water with a sigh. She wasn’t going to sink into that pain. She would have to rise above. Take back control of her life. One step at a time.
She toweled off and wrapped her long dark hair up on the top of her head before exiting the bathroom. She screamed when she saw someone was in her room.
“Jesus,” Reyna cried. “Some warning next time, Jodie.”
“Sorry. Thought you were going to move into the shower, you were in there for so damn long.”
“What are you doing here?” Reyna asked as she yanked jeans and a T-shirt out of her closet.
“I hate this place. I mean, I don’t hate it as much as Visage, but I still hate it. How can you stand to stay cooped up like this? I can’t keep breathing recycled oxygen. I need to be free.”
“We are free.”
Jodie snorted. “Then try to walk out the front door and see if they stop you.”
They would. Reyna knew they would. Sydney had made it clear that she was too valuable to leave. Her and Jodie’s blood unlocked the answers to questions they had long been asking. No one was going to let them out to do whatever they wanted. On some level she understood it, but she’d been a prisoner once before and she didn’t relish being one a second time.
“Maybe we can try to get out of here?” Jodie suggested.
Reyna stepped out of the closet. “There’s no way out of here other than the heavily guarded way we entered.”
Jodie sighed. “There has to be another way in and out. We’ve never seen Sydney in this building but we know that she’s here. How does she get around? How is she so secretive? Plus, aren’t there other sleeper agents? They wouldn’t want to be seen if they’re playing spy, right? No one is supposed to know who they are? Which means we can find another way out.”
Reyna stared at Jodie for a split second before her jaw dropped. “Oh my God, I know how they’re getting around.”
Reyna stepped back into the closet and jiggled the doorknob that was all but invisible normally.
“Christ on a cracker, is that a secret door? Tell me it’s a secret door.”
“Beckham used it,” she whispered. She’d been trying not to think of him or the fact that he hadn’t been back. She still hadn’t seen him in over a week. “It’s locked from the outside though. I don’t know what security is on the door.”
“Fuck yes.” Jodie jumped up and rushed over to where she was standing. Jodie slid a bobby pin out of her lush black curls and was digging around in the lock. Reyna knew how to pick a lock, but she had only ever tried it on the shitty ones back in the warehouses. She couldn’t imagine that Elle would be stupid enough to have locks that could be easily picked.
Click.
The door swung outward soundlessly. Reyna stared at it in both shock and awe. “I can’t believe you did that.”
“Hell yeah, my best friend taught me before…” Then Jodie trailed off as if realizing that she was divulging information about herself for the first time. She shook her head coming up out of the haze and held her hand out to Reyna. “Now, are you ready to go? Now or never.”
Reyna knew that she shouldn’t go. It was reckless and potentially dangerous. She should stay where she was and wait for someone to give her an assignment that she could stomach. But God, she didn’t want to live that life. She didn’t want to stay on a leash and sit down when she was told to and bark on command. Almost eleven weeks post-kidnapping and she’d only seen the sun for a few scant minutes. She needed more.
“All right. I’m in, but only for a minute, Jodie. I don’t want to get caught and get in trouble. I just want to see the sun for a bit.”
“Excellent! Whatever you say,” Jodie cheered as she rushed out of the door.
Reyna took a tentative step forward, glancing at her surroundings. She kept expecting someone to burst into the room and tell them not to leave. But no one came.
Reyna took one step out of the room and then another. No alarms blared. Nothing happened at all. She just walked into a neatly maintained corridor.
“Let me look at the door,” Jodie said. She messed with the handle a few times and then after another minute, the door was rigged so that the lock never clicked into place. “Easy peasy.” She opened and closed the door to show Reyna. “This is going to be fun. I swear.”
Reyna tried to relax as she and Jodie walked down the innocuous corridor. There were other doors along the way. Jodie tried a few of the handles but they were all locked like Reyna’s. Jodie shrugged and they continued on. The secret passageway was pretty boring once they got through it. Reyna had thought maybe it concealed an underground airplane or at least secret rooms that only top-level Elle members could access. Something! But all she got were more blank hallways and a stairwell. They went up five floors before the stairs abruptly ended.
Jodie pushed through the doorway first and into a tightly closed room. The doors were steel with heavy plated armor and a series of security measures to keep anyone from coming in…or out.
Reyna sighed. “Guess this is the end of the road.”
“We didn’t even get outside,” Jodie grumbled. “Maybe we can get through the security.”
“It’ll probably alert someone that we’re here.”
“Probably,” Jodie grumbled. “Fuck! We were so close.”
Reyna knew this whole thing had been too easy. They weren’t worried about anyone getting out of their room, because there was no way out of their bunker. They were as good as trapped.
Trapped. Oh fuck. Reyna put her arms around her stomach and backed away from the door. Her back hit the wall and she tried to breathe in through her nose and out through her mouth. But she felt sick at the very thought. She couldn’t be trapped again. She needed to get out. She needed a moment to live again.
She was still trying to get herself under control when the door behind them opened.
Shit, they weren’t supposed to get caught! They were only supposed to be here a minute and then go back. She hadn’t anticipated getting caught before they even made it outside. She had known it was a possibility, but still! This was not how this was supposed to happen.
Then the figure walked into the room and she nearly groaned. Trouble was in the building.
“Well, well,” Gabe said with a smile, “what do we have here?”
“Who the hell are you?” Jodie asked.
Reyna cringed. “This is Gabe. We met at my meeting with Sydney.”
“And you must be Jodie,” Gabe said, offering her his hand.
Jodie stared down at it then crossed her arms. “We weren’t doing anything.”
“That so?” His eyes crawled back over to Reyna’s and he arched an eyebrow. “Tired of being cooped up?”
“Amen to that,” Jodie said.
Gabe grinned at them both. “How did you get up here anyway?”
Neither of them responded and he just laughed.
“Pick t
he lock in your room? Yeah, I did that too when I first got here. Got me in some real trouble with higher-ups, but they kept me around. They need people like me.” He eyed them both. “Like you two too, as far as I can tell.”
“I don’t want to be used,” Reyna said.
“That’s all life does. Chews you up and spits you out. Get used to it.”
“How about this,” Gabe said, holding a hand up. “I have somewhere I need to be. I’ll be gone two, maybe three hours, tops. Why don’t you two come with me? Then when you come back, we can talk about how you can benefit from Elle by working with them. How does that sound?”
“Did someone send you to do this?” Jodie demanded. “Because if this is a trick…”
“It’s no trick. I’m doing you a favor.”
“No one does favors for free,” Reyna told him.
“And I’m not doing it for free. It’s a deal. I help you out for a bit and you come back and try to help our rebellion. Deal?”
Reyna’s eyes swept to Jodie. She lifted one shoulder. Reyna frowned. Yeah, they probably shouldn’t be leaving the premises for a couple hours, but they would be with Gabe. He was probably lying about this not being sanctioned from the higher ups. Why would he help them out anyway? She might as well take advantage of the opportunity if she could. Another one wasn’t about to come around.
“Deal.”
Chapter 15
Piled into Gabe’s heavily tinted black SUV, they zipped out of an underground garage and onto the road leading into the city. Reyna drank in the sights around her. It had been so long since she had seen much of anything of interest. The sensation was like being dunked into a cold pool.
Her eyes flitted over the last large building and she nearly choked. Her hand flew to her chest as she all but craned her head out the window to get a better look.
Gabe glanced at her. “What’s up?”
“That building,” she breathed.
“Yeah? Didn’t you see it on your way in?”
Reyna shook her head, but it was Jodie who spoke. “They blindfolded us.”
“Oh yeah. Shit,” he muttered as if he’d forgotten protocol. “Well, if either of you are a Visage spy then I’m fucked.”
“What is that building?” Reyna asked.
“That’s our front. The building is home to a popular real estate company, but we live underneath it. Gives us cover to move during the day if we have to and no one looks too closely at what’s below since the place is legit.”
Reyna sat back heavily in her seat. That building was the front for Elle. She couldn’t believe it. And yet, it made perfect sense.
It was the very building that Beckham had taken Reyna to the night he’d had her take photographs of Visage from the rooftop. After they’d had a long talk about the two factions of vampires—those who thought of humans as equals and those who thought of humans as food—things had gotten pretty hot and heavy. Even then, he had been showing her this other world, trying to draw her into it, and she had never suspected.
Her heart panged at the memory. Where was he now? And how had their relationship disintegrated so completely, like sand through her fingers?
* * *
—
It was nearly a half hour later when Gabe finally parked the SUV in a shady parking garage with a busted entrance ramp, graffiti, and shattered lights. Reyna rolled her shoulders and hopped out of the car, looking cautiously out into the darkness. They were not in the best part of town. She was glad for her jeans and T-shirt combo, but it was actually fucking freezing and they hadn’t prepared for that.
“Hey, come here,” he said to both of them as he popped the trunk. “This is the best I can do.”
He tossed Jodie a long-sleeve flannel shirt that she held tightly around herself then passed Reyna the leather jacket he had been wearing on his way over.
“Put this on too,” he said, tugging a baseball cap low over her eyes.
He handed another one to Jodie, who looked at him like he was insane. “This is never going to fit over my hair.” She pointed at the mass of kinky curls on her head.
“Best I can do.”
Jodie muttered obscenities under her breath before trying to mash her curls down on the top to get the cap on her head.
“You’ll need these too.” He produced two dull black bracelets.
“What the fuck is that?” Jodie asked.
But Reyna knew. “ID bracelets.”
“Yeah. They’re required in the city now for basically everything. These aren’t programmed to you and there shouldn’t be any cops nearby, but it’s for appearances.”
Reyna slipped hers on and felt the weight like a shackle around her wrist. Jodie irritably added hers to her wrist. Gabe already wore his.
“What happened to curfew?” Reyna asked. There had been one for the city after the fires. The curfew and the bracelets had come together with the start of the Blood Census.
“The old mayor lifted it. Said it was only temporary, but the bracelets stayed. So, we’re straight.” Gabe nodded his head toward the stairs and they followed. “Now this place, it’s a vamp-free zone. So you should be safe, but be sure to stick close to me at all times. I can protect you if anything happens. And remember, we really don’t want you to be seen. The last thing we want is Harrington’s guys to swoop back in and try to abduct you, okay? I can protect you from a lot, but I don’t know what I’d do if that happened. So let’s not let it.”
“We don’t want to go back. Don’t worry. We’ll stay close,” Reyna said.
It was only when they turned the corner and Reyna got a good look at the building they were about to enter that she started to sweat.
“We’re going to Ferrier House?”
Gabe’s eyebrows shot up his forehead. “You’ve been here before?”
“Yeah. I saw you fight once.”
“Yeah?” he asked, beaming.
“You’re a fighter?” Jodie asked, eyeing his body corded with muscle. He was only about average height but he looked scrappy.
“Yeah. I dabble here and there.”
“Why are you bringing us here?” Reyna groaned.
“Where did you think we’d go?” Gabe asked. “I have some business. Plus, this place is as safe as it gets as far as you’re concerned.”
“The last time I was here, there was a riot!”
“That almost never happens.”
Reyna shook her head and tried to calm her racing heart. Just because there had been a riot the first time she had been to Ferrier House didn’t mean it was going to happen again. Except she couldn’t shake the feeling that she usually found trouble wherever it was lurking.
An enormous bouncer loaded with weapons grunted at them as they approached. “Gabe.”
“Brought some strays,” Gabe said with a fierce grin. He greased the bouncer’s palm and the guy pocketed the cash.
“They’re not your usual.”
“Nah. Have to keep them fresh.”
“No fangs, right?”
“No guns. No fangs. No trouble,” Gabe quoted the motto for Ferrier House back at the bouncer. The guy nodded and the door popped open for them. He gestured for the girls to go in first.
“You frequently bring girls here?” Jodie asked with a grin.
“Girls are an easy cover.”
“I’m sure,” Jodie drawled.
Reyna wasn’t paying attention to their conversation as she stopped short in the doorway. When she had last been at Ferrier House, it had been a fighting ring. Now it was completely bedecked in flashing red lights, half-naked women, and club music. The transformation was complete with an enormous bar on one side and a dancing platform for the talent, which mostly consisted of women in lingerie seductively dancing for the crowd.
“What the hell,” she muttered.
&nbs
p; “Pretty crazy, huh?” Gabe asked, running a hand back through his russet hair.
“I thought it was a fighting house.”
“Yeah. It cleans up pretty nicely when it wants to.” He reached out for her hand and she pulled back hastily. “Just to get us through the crowd.”
Reyna chewed on her lip and nodded, taking his hand. Jodie slapped her palm into Reyna’s and as a trio they snaked across the room. She kept her head low, but it didn’t seem to matter much anyway. The room was dark enough that Reyna could hardly make out more than a couple feet in front of her. She didn’t think anyone was going to be checking under her baseball cap.
“This is amazing,” Jodie cried behind her. “I cannot wait to get out on that dancefloor!”
“Jodie, we probably shouldn’t.”
“This is our one night of freedom. I am not squandering it.”
Reyna bit her lip and said nothing. She used to throw herself into everything without a care in the world. Now she was afraid to go out on the dancefloor? Maybe Visage really had broken her down. Scrubbed away the parts of her personality that she had loved the most.
They stopped and Gabe spoke to the bartender, a busty blonde who eyed him like a choice piece of meat. Jodie was already dancing to the music, lifting her arms and swinging her hips to the rhythm.
Gabe drew Reyna close, slipped an arm around her waist, and said into her ear, “I have to meet up with a contact. You two can stay and dance. Just stay near the bar and out of the lights. I need to be able to find you. I’ll be back in ten minutes. Sonya can locate me if you need me before then,” he said, nodding his head at the bartender.
“Okay.”
“Chin up, babe.” He knocked her chin playfully with his fist and then winked before he disappeared again.
Jodie had already found a group to dance with. She reached her hand out to Reyna, who obediently moved toward her friend. They were both dancing and trying to forget the cares in the world. Jodie turned to face a sexy Hispanic man with total arm porn. Reyna closed her eyes and tried to meld into the crowd with Jodie. All she wanted was a few hours where she didn’t have to think. Jodie tugged her close and their bodies moved in perfect harmony. She had been in a big nightclub like this a total of one time and it had ended poorly. Though they’d had seedy bars back in the warehouses and she knew how to move.