Evolution (Evolution Series Book 1)

by Kelly Carrero

“Jade?” Ahh, there was the voice I knew and loved. I was slowly rousing from a deep sleep, but I couldn’t manage to open my eyes. Thinking that he was curled up beside me only made me want to stay asleep more, untouched by the nightmare that had become my life.

  “Jade,” Aiden’s loving voice called to me again. “You’ve gotta wake up.”

  I tried to reach out to him, but my arms wouldn’t move. I was still so sleepy.

  “Jade, please wake up!” Aiden’s voice no longer sounded like the happy, loving voice I’d heard only moments ago. It sounded desperate, but I was still so sleepy.

  “Please wake up. I need to know that you’re okay.”

  “But I’m so tired,” I moaned. “Just give me another few minutes.”

  “Jade, you gotta wake up! You’re in danger. Don’t you remember? The tranquilliser…”

  Suddenly, memories came flooding into my mind. How I’d found Chelsea. Her theory that she was mistakenly taken instead of me. The psycho. The tranquilliser gun—Oh, my God. Where was I? What had he done to me?

  I needed to open my eyes, but my body was not responding to my demands. I wasn’t about to give up, though. I had to keep fighting to gain control of my body. It was the only way I stood a chance against him. I needed to be at my best, or at least have my wits about me.

  A few moments later, I managed to open my eyes a few millimetres before they closed again. All I had seen was a blinding light. I knew I had to open them again, but my eyelids felt so heavy. I concentrated all of my energy on forcing them open, but all I could see was the blinding light hovering above my face. I squinted, trying to see anything beyond the light. It was too much, and I had to close my eyes again.

  “You have to try again,” Aiden insisted.

  I forced my eyes open, and although the light was not quite as blinding as the last time, I still could not see a thing. I managed to turn my head slightly to the left. I saw what looked like a table, but I couldn’t be sure because my vision was still blurry.

  I closed my eyes, hoping that the next time I opened them, my vision would be restored.

  Once again I opened my eyes, and my heart stopped as I realised that what I thought was a table was actually a trolley, and sitting in the middle of the trolley were surgical tools lined up in a perfectly straight line.

  Tears started welling up in my eyes. The situation I was in was far worse than I could have ever imagined. All the bad things that I had feared would happen to Chelsea were nothing compared to what I was about to face.

  “Good, you’re awake.” It wasn’t Aiden’s desperate voice filling my head. It was the voice of a monster.

  I followed his voice. He was standing at the bottom of my makeshift bed, and I gasped in horror as I realised I was only wearing my bra and undies. My heart hammered inside my chest as I thought about why he had undressed me. What he had planned for me.

  “If he touches you…” Aiden’s voice was filled with such anger. The next time he spoke, his tone was much calmer. “You’ve gotta keep him talking. I need more time.”

  “How much more? You’ve gotta get me out of here. I don’t want him to…” I couldn’t finish my sentence, but I knew he would understand what I meant. The thought of the kidnapper touching me made me want to scream, shout, and curl up into a little ball and cry my eyes out.

  None of those things were going to help me. The only chance I had was to give Aiden more time, so that is what I had to do.

  I closed my eyes and tried to centre myself. I couldn’t show any fear. That would only ignite the power he already felt he had over me. But at the same time, I couldn’t piss him off, because that would only fuel his anger and make him kill me that much sooner. It was a fine line I would have to tread, and I would have to get it right.

  “You can do it. Just believe in yourself.”

  “Thanks, but I don’t think I can do this with you talking to me at the same time.” Instantly, I felt bad about what I had just said. “It’s just… I’m not as good at this whole having two conversations thing as you are, and I’ll probably stuff up.”

  “You don’t have to say another word. I’ll keep my thoughts to myself.”

  “Thanks,” I replied, relieved that he hadn’t taken offence.

  “Just one last thing. I love you.” Even at the worst of times, hearing him say those three little words filled my heart with strength and hope.

  “I love you, too,” I said before closing my eyes, trying to focus my full attention on buying more time. It’s funny how the whole conversation I’d just had with Aiden would have taken ten times as long if we’d actually had to talk—the mind can think a lot faster than the mouth can speak.

  Once I had centred myself, I opened my eyes and began playing my part. “Who are you?” I asked. Although I was pretty sure he wouldn’t give me his real name, I needed to keep him talking. The more he talked, the more chance I had of getting out of there.

  He tilted his head to the side. “You don’t really expect me to tell you that, do you?”

  I shook my head and kept thinking, tell me your name, tell me your name.

  “Michael,” he blurted.

  The look on his face made me think that he hadn’t meant to tell me. So I quickly asked another question to keep him from wondering why he had given me his name. “Why me?” I asked, my voice cracking.

  It worked. “Ahh... now that’s the million dollar question. What makes you so special?” He paused in thought, circling me as if I were some mythical creature the world has been trying to capture, and he was about to unlock the secrets to my existence.

  “Let’s see. If we look at this from a psychological profile point of view, we should rule out some of the possibilities.” He sounded like he must have some experience in that field. Maybe he was a psychologist or a police officer.

  “Could it be that you remind me of my negligent mother, and somehow I am trying to find a way of punishing her?” He paused for a minute, considering that theory. “No. No, you don’t.” Michael continued to circle me, watching me with morbid curiosity.

  “Maybe it’s because...”

  A thought suddenly came to me. And if it worked, I’d be free in no time. Just before he had told me his name without wanting to, so maybe I could ‘tell’ him to free me—could it be that simple?

  As he continued to rule out the various psychological profiles of a killer, I focused on ‘making him’ let me go. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. Nothing ever seemed to work when I needed it most. It was hopeless. I was at the mercy of the psycho, and even though I was supposed to be able to friggin’ transport, control people’s actions, and have the strength of Superman, yet whenever I needed them, I was just as normal as the rest of the human race. My only option was to keep him talking, which seemed to be working quite well, I thought, as I tuned back in to what he was saying.

  “No. I think whatever it is, it definitely isn’t anything as superficial as the way you look. You see,” he paused to pick something up from the trolley before continuing, “I think that it might have something to do with what’s underneath… all this.” He waved a scalpel inches from my body.

  The sight of the knife glistening under the bright light brought the fear of God into me. “He’s going to kill me,” I cried silently to Aiden.

  “You’ve gotta calm down and try to get yourself out of there.”

  “I can’t. He’s about to carve me up.” No matter how much I knew that I had to calm down, every time I saw the gleaming surgical tool in that psycho’s hands, my mind went reeling in fear.

  “Look, he can’t kill you. We can’t die.”

  That’s what I was afraid of most of all. I would have to live through being carved up like a Thanksgiving turkey, praying to God that I would just die, but knowing death wasn’t even a possibility for me.

  The psycho, still looking at me like I was the biggest mystery in the world, came to a halt at the left side of the bed.

  He bent down and ran the scalpel across my sto
mach, gentle enough not to puncture my skin. He was toying with me.

  “No, please, no!” I cried as he rested the tip against my bare skin.

  His only reaction was a sadistic smile, which quickly disappeared as he once again became fixated on what lay beneath my skin.

  I realised then that there was no way I was getting away. There was no way he was going to let me go. I was about to go through the worst imaginable horror, and just like a nightmare, I couldn’t die, which only made me that much more terrified.

  “Keep trying. You can’t give up,” Aiden pleaded with me.

  “Now let’s find out what makes you so special,” the psycho said, then slowly pushed the knife into my skin.

  “Get the fuck away from her!” Aiden’s voice screamed through my mind.

  The moment the scalpel punctured my skin, I let out a blood-curdling scream. I wasn’t screaming in pain, but for Aiden.

  For some reason I couldn’t feel the pain as Michael slowly dragged the knife along my body. I absently wondered if that was also one of my abilities, being able to switch off the pain receptors to my brain when needed.

  Suddenly, Michael stopped dead in his tracks. I looked up at his face; it had turned pale. His mouth was hanging open. His eyes were wide, and they were no longer looking at me.

  I followed his gaze. Standing on the other side of me was the person I wanted with me more than anyone in the world.

  “Aiden?” I whispered, afraid that if I said it too loud, he would disappear. He didn’t.

  Aiden stood there, a little shocked himself. His expression quickly changed from shock to anger when he saw me lying strapped to a bed, half naked, with a small, bloody line across my bare stomach.

  “I said, get away from her.” Aiden’s voice rang through my ears, confirming he really was there and not just a figment of my imagination.

  Even though I felt the knife pull out of my stomach, I couldn’t seem to take my eyes off Aiden. It was strange that I could feel that, yet I still couldn’t feel the pain from the damage it had done.

  “What the hell… How did you get here?” the psycho finally managed to ask, holding the blood-covered knife above me but pointing towards Aiden.

  Aiden didn’t respond. He just kept staring at the blood on my stomach. When he did speak, his tone was icy. “You will pay for this.” He raised his eyes from mine to Michael’s. I had never seen Aiden so angry, but at the same time so calm. He did not take his eyes off Michael.

  Suddenly, the psycho dropped the knife and lifted his hands to cradle his head as he screamed in agony. “Stop. Please, stop!” He fell to the floor.

  Aiden stood perfectly still, not taking his eyes off Michael. Aiden looked like he was in some sort of trance. He was so completely focused on Michael, as if in that moment, nothing else in the world existed but the psycho convulsing on the floor.

  My eyes went from Aiden to Michael. I watched as he twisted in agony for what seemed like five minutes, but I knew it was probably only seconds. Then there was silence. Michael was no longer moving. His body lay limp on the floor, no longer a danger to anyone. I didn’t have to ask. I knew he was dead.

  Aiden’s stance changed back to the one I knew and loved. The anger in his eyes was gone. They were once again filled with love and concern.

  He removed the straps that bound my hands and feet to the bed and shoved them in his pocket. The fear slowly drained out of me as he lifted me into his arms and held me tightly.

  I didn’t know what happened to Michael, and I really didn’t care. I was safe and in Aiden’s arms, and that was all that mattered.

  “I’m so sorry,” he whispered in my ear.

  “What for?” I pulled back so I could see his face. “You saved me.”

  “I should never have let this happen. I was supposed to protect you.”

  “And you did.”

  “Not soon enough.” He sat me down on the table, my legs dangling over the side so he could inspect the cut just below my belly button. It didn’t look as long and deep as it had when Michael was cutting into me. Aiden had been right about being able to heal quicker than most humans.

  “It looks pretty superficial now. I think I got here before he did any serious damage.” He wiped the blood from my stomach with his thumb and wiped it off on his shorts.

  “How did you get here?” The last I knew, he couldn’t transport. But then again, until the previous night, I couldn’t either.

  “I have no idea. One minute I was at home, living this nightmare through your thoughts, and the next I was here.”

  “So your transport abilities are coming now, too.”

  He thought about it for a moment, then shook his head. “I don’t know. It was more like I was being summoned by you.” He shook his head again. “Nah, that doesn’t make any sense. Nobody can bring someone to them. That’s just silly. It must be something like what you did. I must be able to transport myself to someone without knowing their location, too.”

  I thought about what he had said. I had called out to him. Maybe I did bring him to me. But he was right, that didn’t make any sense. The probability of him getting his transportation ability just in the nick of time was much higher than me being able to bring whoever I wanted to me, like I was somehow able to control the world—yeah right!

  “God, you’re facetious,” Aiden said, stopping me from trying to work out the impossible. “We may as well get this over with as soon as possible. I think you and Chelsea have both gone through enough. Where are your clothes?” His eyes were scanning the room.

  He stopped searching. “Found them.” He bent down and retrieved his own T-shirt, which I had fallen asleep in the previous night.

  My attempt to cover up was in vain. “The bastard cut the bloody thing off me,” I said in disbelief, holding out the tattered shirt.

  I looked over to Aiden, wondering what I was going to do. I really didn’t want to walk out of there half-naked. And of course he was no help; he was shirtless, too.

  Aiden nodded towards Michael’s lifeless body.

  “Hell no. I would rather be naked than wear anything of his.” Suddenly, I was okay with my bra and knickers. The alternative was too repulsive.

  Aiden walked over to Michael’s body, bent down, and picked him up, slinging him over his shoulder with ease.

  “What did you do to him?” I asked, hopping off the table.

  “The doctors will probably put it down to a brain aneurism.” He headed towards the door.

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  He let out a sigh before turning around to face me. “Can’t we do this later?” He noted that he was carrying an eighty-five kilo man over his shoulder.

  I knew that Michael’s weight wasn’t the issue, which only made me that much more curious to know what he was hiding from me.

  “I’m not hiding anything from you. It’s just that… I’m still trying to figure it out myself.” He walked over to me and grabbed my hand. “I’ve never done anything like that before.”

  “Oh, God. Sorry. I didn’t think.” I looked at him in a whole different light. He had just killed a man. Even if he did it to protect me, the fact remained that he still killed someone. And I didn’t think it was something that he could ever be okay with.

  Aiden dropped his shoulder, allowing Michael’s body to flop to the ground. He wrapped his arms around my waist and looked into my eyes with such pain in his. “Having to deal with ending someone’s life is nothing to compared to losing you. The pain I felt when I saw him….” He cringed. He was obviously thinking about when he saw Michael slicing into me as if I was no more than a piece of meat. “I would kill a thousand men if it meant saving you.”

  I leant into Aiden, resting my head against his chest. I always knew he would do anything to protect me, but hearing him say those words somehow changed things. In that moment, I knew he would always be there for me. No matter what, I could always count on him. But I’d be dammed if I was going to make a habit of him hav
ing to go to such lengths again.

  “Come on.” He leant down and kissed my forehead. “The sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can get home.”

  We made our way back to the cage, where Chelsea was still being held captive. She was in shock at seeing Michael’s limp body slung over Aiden’s shoulder.

  “Aiden?” Chelsea was obviously trying to work out what he was doing there, but then quickly turned her attention back to Michael’s body. “Is he….” She couldn’t finish her sentence.

  “Yes, Chels, he’s dead,” Aiden assured her.

  “But how?” She didn’t understand, and quite frankly, neither did I.

  Aiden didn’t respond to her question. He inserted the key he had grabbed off the hook on the outside door and opened Chelsea’s cage door, dumping Michael’s body inside.

  Chelsea leant back as far as she could in her chair, like every millimetre she was able to distance herself from the body was necessary. She looked confused as to why Aiden was dumping his body next to her and why he was wiping everything with his tattered shirt.

  Still ignoring Chelsea’s question, Aiden turned to me. “I’m going to need you to stay here. You need to pretend Michael took you two, and he just dropped dead in the cage. The autopsy should confirm your story.”

  “Why can’t I come with you?” Before he could respond, it dawned on me. “My fingerprints.”

  “They will already be everywhere, and this is the only way to explain them all.” He snapped those damn zip ties all too easily.

  Chelsea made no attempt to get up. I guess she was still confused as hell about why Aiden was there and what we were talking about. “What’s going on?” she asked, rubbing her wrists. “And why are you in your underwear?” She directed her last question at me.

  “Don’t worry, she’ll go along with your story,” Aiden said, referring to Chelsea.

  “What story?” Chelsea asked. She was getting frustrated that her questions weren’t being answered.

  “I don’t want you to leave,” I said softly, tugging on his shorts.

  “Come here.” He wrapped his arms around my waist and kissed me. “I will be just outside waiting for you. Call the police in a couple of minutes. That will give me more than enough time to find my way out.” He leant in for another kiss and turned his head to Chelsea, still holding me in his arms. Neither said anything. I knew that he was making her confirm my story.

  He turned back to face me. “I’ll see you soon, okay?”

  I nodded.

  “I love you,” he whispered into my ear, then kissed my forehead.

  “Love you, too,” I whispered. Aiden handed me the keys, headed out of the cage, and closed the door behind him.

  The moment he was gone, the room no longer felt safe. Even though I knew that we were no longer in danger, it didn’t feel the same as when Aiden was in there with us.

  A moment later, Chelsea let out a short, sharp scream. “He’s dead,” she whimpered.

  I quickly rushed over to Michael’s body and pretended to get the keys out of his pocket. “Let’s get out of here.” I jingled the keys in my hand.

  As soon as we were out of the cage, we went in search of a phone. Before long, we heard the wailing of the police sirens, which were getting louder as the police cars approached.

  The two of us stood on the footpath outside the creep’s house, waiting for the police to arrive. It was easy to understand how he’d been able to keep Chelsea in his basement for three days without anyone knowing. There wasn’t a chance in hell anyone would have heard her scream. He lived in one of those cliff face houses in the Gold Coast hinterland, his nearest neighbour half a mile away.

  When the police arrived, Chelsea backed up my story of how Michael had suddenly dropped dead inside the cage—there was no mention of Aiden ever being there. It still surprised me how he could erase all of Chelsea’s memories of him being there. I wasn’t sure why, considering all the other incredible things I’d witnessed him do.

  The ambulance arrived shortly after the police. The EMTs checked us over to make sure there were no immediate injuries they needed to take care of, but we were in pretty good shape considering everything that had happened. I didn’t need to worry about explaining the slice across my tummy, as it had healed to no more than a tiny scratch. Besides, both the police and EMTs were more concerned as to why I was only wearing my bra and undies. It took some convincing on my behalf that I had not been sexually abused, but they believed me in the end.

  Before they would let us go, they insisted we had to go to the hospital for a thorough check-up. Apparently, that was non-negotiable.

  “I’ll meet you at the hospital,” Aiden promised.

  I hopped into the ambulance, looking around for Aiden, but I could not see him. At least I had Chelsea by my side, and I could tell she was glad to have me with her, too.

  For the entire trip to the hospital, I thought about how lucky I had been that Aiden came to me when I needed him the most and what would have happened if he didn’t.

  Thank God Aiden developed his ability to transport the same way I could. I just wished it didn’t have to go that far before he was able to come to my rescue. Even more so, I wished that I knew how to control my own abilities so I wouldn’t have needed rescuing. I wondered what else I might be able to do when my abilities got stronger. Would I be able to read people’s minds like Aiden? And what had he done to Michael? I shuddered at the thought of the power Aiden had over people.

  The ambulance officer thought I was still cold from shock and pulled out another blanket to wrap around me.

  “Thank you.” I gave a slight smile to the officer. It was easier to pretend I was cold than to explain the real reason behind my shudder.

  Chapter 19