The guards looked at each other. "I'm sorry, but we're supposed to watch over you," one of them said.
"Yes, I know!" I said, exasperated. "But Lily isn't answering her phone and by the time she sends someone, Ethan will be gone. At least one of you should go outside and stay in the shadows until I find Sinclair and Kayla."
"Tom, you should go."
Tom nodded. "I'll report to you if I see Mr. Marlau."
"Great." I clapped him on the shoulder and he left. Tom could alert me if Ethan tried to leave the university, but he couldn't follow him since it would be too obvious Tom was my bodyguard. It was better to send a carrier after Ethan because only a carrier could follow him anywhere, even without a visual. Speaking of elements, they were starting to seriously wear me down. I'd need someone's help to stay in control in an hour or two. Lack of sleep and agitation were more than I could handle.
Luckily for me, Sinclair's and Kayla's rooms were so close to each other that I could knock on both doors at the same time. It didn't take them long to open and squint at me through their sleepy eyes.
"I need you both to get dressed. Hurry!"
They obeyed without questions and I leaned on the wall while I waited for them to get ready. I glanced at my phone, but neither Lily nor Adrian had tried to call me or left me a message. Where were they? I threw my head back and sighed. If the police didn't let Adrian go soon, they might find out about Paula's disappearance and decide that Adrian had something to do with it, even though that was impossible. It wouldn't be the first time someone overlooked facts to blame a carrier for something.
"I'm ready," Sinclair said, straightening his black shirt.
"I need you to follow Ethan. Make sure he doesn't see you. If you notice any suspicious activity, alert me immediately." I met his eyes. "Paula is missing, so if you see her or feel her element..."
"I'll call you," he finished the sentence for me. "Got it."
"Thanks." I managed to give him a small smile. "Now go."
He nodded his dark head at me and strode down the hall. Kayla came out of her room a second later, still trying to tame her long, red curls that spilled around her shoulders like a lion's mane.
"You'll have to stay with me," I said. "I'm not feeling particularly strong this morning."
"I can do that." Her hazel eyes were bright and clear as if she hadn't just woken up. My phone rang, startling me. Lily's number flashed on the screen and a wave of relief overcame me.
"Lily! Thank God!"
"I can't believe you didn't try to tell me what you were planning to do. We should have discussed your decision. You know I'd never agree to such a thing! I guess that's why you called in the middle of the night to tell me. Now I can't even talk you out of it." There was a hint of anger in Lily's voice.
"What?" Either my brain was extremely slow or what she was saying didn't make any sense.
"You know I didn't want any protests and you invite all carriers and those with weak and impure elements to come to the main city square tomorrow to show their displeasure with the new law," Lily said disapprovingly.
"What? I don't know anything about any protests."
"You don't know? But you're the one who sent out the invitation. It's all over the news and everywhere."
"I did not send any invitations," I said, frowning. "I wouldn't do that."
"Then why did you call?" Lily's anger faded.
"Paula is missing. You need to send a team to find her." I went on to tell her everything Ryan and I knew about Paula's disappearance, including Ethan's possible involvement.
"We should bring Ethan in for questioning," Lily said. "He might tell us more than he told you. You don't really intimidate him."
"No. We'd have a problem if he's actually innocent in the whole thing. Besides, I don't think he'd tell you anything. It's better to follow him." If he was involved in Paula's disappearance, he could lead us straight to her if he didn't know he was being followed.
"You're right, but now I'm suspicious about him too. I saw the news about your break-up."
I rubbed my face, wishing I could just lie down, sleep and wake up from this nightmare. "Wait, when did the news about the protest appear?"
"Umm..." I heard the clicking of a keyboard. "A couple of hours after the news about Ethan and you breaking up. Oh, God."
"What?"
"The news about the protest is higher rated in importance than your break-up. That doesn't make sense. The government would want to prevent the protest, not advertise it everywhere!"
Maybe the government wasn't happy that I broke up with Ethan so fast, but I doubted it they cared now. Their priority would be covering up the protest so their precious new law could be implemented without problems. The story about my break-up would be a great distraction, so why weren't they using it? "That's weird. But do you know who sent out the news? Because it definitely wasn't me. What if carriers are trying to contact me or create a scandal?"
"I'll try to find out who the organizer is. My techs just told me the websites with the news aren't hacked. It all looks like a legit announcement."
"What if someone is using my name to try to gather as many people as possible for the protest? I work for a governmental organization, so people could think it's safe to come. It's public knowledge the government wasn't pleased when I revealed some of their secrets about the disease, so it makes sense I'd be the one to organize a protest against the new law." Would I ever get a break from people who were trying to use me for their cause? I guess not. "So what do I do? Should I try to cancel the whole thing?"
"No," Lily said. "We should wait a couple of hours to see what the government will do. It's possible the news slipped under their radar, so they might try to do some damage control. Of course, there's always the option that they are involved in the whole thing somehow."
"But why would they want a protest against their favorite new law? It doesn't make sense." I put my hand on Kayla's shoulder to stop elements from assaulting my consciousness.
"Well, I have some ideas." Lily sighed. "Maybe they hope not many people will show up because they won't trust you, so the protest will be doomed to fail, which would discourage others from trying to organize another one. The second option is that they're trying to fool us into believing this is a free country, but they're in fact planning to take pictures and try to track down all the carriers who come to the protest. I'm not sure that would work, but they might be able to catch sloppy carriers."
"Awesome," I said dryly. "But finding Paula is our priority."
"I know. I already sent a team. We'll find her."
I wanted Lily to promise me that her team would find Paula, but I knew she couldn't do that. A tear slid down my cheek as I slipped my phone back into my pocket. Paula had always been there for me when I needed her and she'd forgiven me for all the horrible things I'd done to her. I could never live with myself if I didn't do everything to find her. I had to be strong for her. I had to.
Chapter 22
My heart did a little jump in my chest when Adrian and Alan walked through the main door. Bruises covered Adrian’s handsome face and there were dark circles under his gray-blue eyes. I wanted to run to him and throw myself in his arms, but the hall wasn’t empty, so I caught his eyes and jerked my head in the direction of my room.
Kayla had to come with me to my room, and she held her hand on my back so I wouldn’t lose control of myself. When Adrian finally came, Kayla turned her head to give us some privacy, even though having privacy was impossible when she couldn’t break her contact with me. That didn’t stop me from pulling Adrian into my arms, making him wince. I stepped back and lifted his shirt up, revealing a map of dark bruises.
“Are you alright?” I couldn’t keep the worry out of my voice. If I ever found out who had done that to him, they wouldn’t get to live long.
“I’ve had worse.” A smile quirked his lips.
“Did you at least freeze those guys to death and show them not to mess with a carrier?”
“No, because that was what they expected so they could file charges against me for the assault of police officers.” Amusement flickered in his eyes. “They didn’t know who they were dealing with, so they had to let me go.” He tipped my chin up and gently pressed his lips against mine, then stared into my eyes, cocking his head. “What’s wrong?”
“Paula is missing.” I started retelling him everything I knew about Paula’s disappearance.
“That son of a bitch! He has to know more about what happened to her.” Adrian’s eyes darkened and I had to put my hand on his shoulder to stop him from going after Ethan.
“I sent Sinclair to follow him. If Ethan is hiding Paula somewhere, he’ll lead us straight to her,” I said, pleading him with my eyes to stay with me. “And I don’t think you should pay another visit to the police soon, so leave Ethan alone.”
“You’re right.” He licked his lips, the tension leaving his shoulders. “We need to find Paula. Let’s hope they aren’t keeping her in an element-proof room.”
My phone vibrated and a message from Lily flashed on the screen. “The scientists in the lab aren’t answering Lily’s calls.” I frowned.
“That’s strange,” Adrian said. “Someone should be working at this hour.”
“Yeah, and there are at least a dozen of them who could pick up the phone.” I chewed on my lip, wondering how to put all the recent events together. “Someone actually announced a protest against the new law in my name and now this happens. Do you think it could be connected?”
“Do you think there is a group of carriers like Lily’s group? Maybe they don’t know about Lily and they realized the scientists are investigating the disease, so they decided to find out who those scientists are and what they’re doing.”
“I don’t know. Maybe one of the carriers needs an element donation or someone doesn’t want the scientists to research the disease. There are too many people who would want to either stop us or figure out what we know.” My phone vibrated again, announcing a call from an unknown number.
“Ria,” a distorted voice said, reminding me of a computer.
“Who’s that?” Anxiety clutched its fingers around my throat.
“The president of the country, my dear.”
“You don’t sound like him at all.” The president’s annoying voice had cut itself into my memory and he definitely didn’t sound like a robot. But why would someone want to impersonate the president? And why would someone think I’d fall for it?
“Of course I don’t. This conversation needs to stay private, so I made sure you can’t record this and use it against me one day.”
I really didn’t like where this was going. “Why should I trust you?”
“Because I have your friends under my supervision.”
“What do you mean?” I squeezed the phone in my hand, afraid to breathe. Even if this guy wasn’t the president, he had Paula and the others. It had to be him.
“Didn’t you notice your scientists were missing?”
“If you’re really the president, you can’t simply kidnap people for no good reason!” I took a deep breath to calm myself. “What did you do to them?”
“Don’t worry. They’ll be safe as long as you do what I tell you to.”
“What do you want me to do?” I didn’t believe a word this guy was saying, but I wanted to know what his intentions were.
“I’m sure you heard about the protest tomorrow. I want you to go there and hold a speech.”
“What? Are you insane? The president would never ask me to do such a thing.”
“You don’t believe me? Fine. Come to meet me in person in an hour. Someone will come to pick you up. But don’t even try to bring any weapons or eavesdropping devices with you because my security will find them all and destroy them. You won’t even be able to prove we had a meeting. Be ready.” The line went dead.
“Did you hear that?” I looked at Adrian, my eyes wide.
He nodded. “I think it’s really the president. Anyone else wouldn’t have bothered to impersonate him since they already have the scientists and Paula.”
“We can’t be sure that he has Paula.” I didn’t know whether the scientists had been taken from their homes or from the lab, but Paula clearly hadn’t been nowhere near the lab when she was taken.
“We can’t, but it would make sense that he took someone close to you.” Adrian took my hand in his and traced comforting circles on my palm.
“But why is he doing this? Why does he want me to hold a speech at the protest? Why doesn’t he stop the protest?” We had too many questions and few answers.
“I don’t know. Call Lily. She’ll know what to do.”
As I dialed Lily’s number, I tried to figure out what game the government was playing. Maybe Lily could help me make sense out of it. The only good news was that Paula and the others were probably alive. For now.
Chapter 23
A tall man in a black suit came to the university, his eyes hidden under opaque shades, and I immediately knew he was from the government.
“You should come with me,” he said, his face devoid of any emotion. He was here only to take me to the president and nothing else. My guards appeared behind my back in an instant, but the man waved them off. “Miss Milanez will be safe with me.”
“Yeah, right,” I mumbled, and turned to my guards. “It’s ok. Stay here.”
They nodded, but their eyes were wary. It didn’t surprise me that they didn’t trust the man. As I followed my mysterious new guard down the hall, I heard whispers and felt everyone’s eyes on me. Oh yeah, I was a nice source of amusement for everyone, especially now that probably everyone knew about the drama that had happened with Ethan.
Lily had managed to visit me earlier and told me to try to remember as many details as possible about the place where the president would meet with me. I even had weapons and a tracking device hidden on me, and Lily hoped at least one of those would pass undetected. The chances that the president was in the same place as the hostages were slim, but I had to be ready for anything.
As I got in the back seat of a black Audi, I hoped I’d be able to stay in control. Touching Kayla had helped me, but my wandering thoughts could easily upset me. It was impossibly hard to stop thinking about the worst. Once again, I assured myself that Paula would be fine, but the fear I would lose her still gripped my insides.
The car stopped in front of a hotel and I was ushered into the lobby. The president was waiting for me in the VIP area, which was heavily guarded. Two of his guards stepped forward and ordered me to stop so they could pat me down for weapons. It didn’t take them long to find the gun tucked inside of my left boot, but they found the knife too, even though the knife was hidden in the special sheath that could be barely felt and couldn’t be detected with any device. Lily had hoped they’d stop looking after they found the gun, but I wasn’t so lucky.
Despite my protests, one of the guards slipped his hand under my shirt and found the tracking device under the clasp of my bra. It was hard to keep still and wait for them to finish because I just wanted them to stop touching me. Their elements were buried deep inside of them, but they bugged me nevertheless. After they were done, they brought some sort of device and scanned me with it. God, they were good. Too good. One of the guards took my arm and placed an element-blocking bracelet around my wrist. Only then was I allowed to approach the president.
“Hello, Ria.” The president was seated in a big leather chair. His grayish hair was carefully combed and his black suit was impeccable as if he was about to have a press conference. His merciless green eyes gleamed with smugness. He had me right where he wanted me and that pissed me off. “Please, take a seat.”
I sat down on a big cream couch, opposite from him. The guards stood near the door, their eyes trained on the wall in front of them, which meant that the president trusted them not only with his life, but with his secrets too. I had three elements, so breaking through the bracelet wouldn’t
be a problem, but I doubted I could win against the president’s guards, let alone get the president to confess where he was keeping Paula.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked. Obviously, the president was the one behind Paula’s kidnapping, and not an impostor.
“I found out about your allegiance with those filthy carriers,” he sneered.
“What? I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I frowned, hoping I was convincing enough.
He raised his finger in the air to shush me. “Don’t bother. I know about Lily.”
I kept my face blank and rested my hands in my lap. “I have no idea who that is.”
“Really, Ria? You can’t keep denying that you know what I’m talking about. My men have seen her with you.”
“Then, please, point her out to me. I’d never trust a carrier, so clearly someone is trying to trick me.” I willed him to believe me. No matter who had seen Lily and me, they couldn’t prove we were working together against the government. Unless the president showed me the proof, I’d never admit anything.
“You’re not a good liar.” He pressed his lips together, an angry tick starting in his jaw. I was pissing him off. Good. Did he really think I’d break so easily and confess everything? Any carrier could have told him about Lily, so there was no need for me to jump to conclusions and assume he knew all about her.
“Fine. You don’t have to help me. I’ll find this Lily myself.” I crossed my legs, leaning back. “Why don’t you let the scientists go? I’ll hold the damn speech if you want me to. But those people whose lives you’re threatening work for you, actually. There’s no point in holding them somewhere against their will.”
“No, Ria, they don’t work for me. They were supposed to work on the newest device to detect carriers, but we found evidence in the lab that they were researching magic disease instead.”
So the scientists had been taken from the lab, not from their homes. “What evidence? I don’t know anything about science, but don’t you think they should study magic disease if they want to create a device for detecting carriers?”
Restless (Element Preservers, #4) Page 13