The White Knight & Black Valentine Series (Book 4): Kill Them All

by Brand, Kristen

  As he lowered the rocket launcher, he felt neither sadistic glee nor regretful sorrow, just the satisfaction of a job well done. The others clapped him on the back and murmured compliments, and they started up the engine to return to the mainland, leaving the flaming wreckage of the other boat behind.

  I stood in the middle of the hospital hallway, not realizing I’d forgotten to breathe until my lungs burned. Inhaling shakily, I stared forward at the white steam shrouding the corridor ahead. I couldn’t move. Too many choices lay before me: shooting him point blank and watching blood and bone fragment get blown out the back of him; gripping the handle of a knife and plunging it into his chest again and again; or maybe just gasoline and a lit match.

  My rising rage was a heady feeling, leaving me dizzy. I remembered what I was here for, remembered the life I’d built over the past five years and everything I still had to lose. I felt as if I’d climbed a ten-foot wall and was wavering at the top, unsure whether to trespass or go back the way I’d come. I closed my eyes, but the avalanche inside me had already begun. There was no stopping it now.

  I found the man’s pain sensors and set them alight.

  My eyes snapped open at the sound of his scream, and I strode forward. The man had dropped his gun and was writhing on the floor, and though the others couldn’t see him, the sound of his tortured screams sent a wave of panic through them. What just happened? one of them thought. What could make someone scream like that? asked another. They peered through the steam as if expecting a monster to lunge out at them.

  You shouldn’t have come here, I spoke inside their heads. You shouldn’t have messed with me and mine.

  Oh, the terror they felt. It put a smirk on my face as I walked into the steam. One of them completely lost his cool and was about to shoot blindly into the whiteness in a desperate attempt to hit me. I knocked him out telepathically before he could try, and he was close enough for one of the others to witness him crumple to the floor. The poor man had no way of knowing if his friend was alive or dead, and having seen no sign of attack pushed him over the edge. He turned and fled.

  I stepped out of his way as he rushed past me. Smart man.

  The screams of the man who’d fired the rocket launcher were growing hoarse but no weaker. Another man frantically wished Ember would show up and save them.

  Ember. Where was she? She could have already reached Dave while I was wasting time like an idiot.

  I reached into every man’s mind I could touch and knocked them out like I should have done in the first place. Telepathically, the hallway grew silent, but the man who’d fired the rocket launcher still screamed in agony even louder than the fire alarm. I wasn’t about to let him escape into unconsciousness. I walked forward until I felt Julio’s mind. He was hanging back, trying to figure out what the hell was going on before he dove in.

  It’s me, I said telepathically. I’ve taken care of them. You can stop with the steam.

  The heat was suffocating, drenching me in sweat. But when Julio turned it off, the water spraying from the overhead sprinklers no longer evaporated and gave me a sudden, lukewarm shower. The steam dissipated, letting me see Julio as he stepped out of an empty patient room down the hall. He wasn’t in jeans and a T-shirt anymore. He wore a black uniform trimmed with fiery red and icy blue, his bulletproof vest displaying his trademarked double-F symbol. His mask was small, which had been a good move on the part of whoever designed the costume; there was no need to cover up a face like that any more than absolutely necessary.

  “Ember got past me,” he said quickly. “We need to hurry. What happened to him?”

  He couldn’t ignore the screaming man, not when he had to nearly shout to be heard over him.

  “No idea,” I said blandly.

  Julio gave me a look but obviously felt too rushed to press me. “Come on.”

  The moment he turned around, I pointed my gun at the head of the man who fired the rocket launcher. As much as I wanted to give him a slow, agonizing death, this might be my only chance, so I had to take it.

  “Val! What— Don’t!”

  Julio had turned back around, damn him. His hands were half-raised, and he approached me the way someone might a raging a grizzly bear.

  “He fired the rocket launcher.” My voice came out almost tonelessly. “He’s the reason Dave’s in a coma.”

  “And you think Dave would want you to murder him in cold blood?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t ask him, can I?”

  “You shouldn’t have to.” Julio’s voice was low, certain. He continued to take slow, careful steps closer, his hands raised. “This isn’t self-defense. This is murder. How are you going to look him in the eye when he wakes up?”

  “If he wakes up,” I spat, not taking my eyes from my target as he clutched his head and arched his back in pain. The water from the fire sprinklers fell like rain, flowing in rivulets down my face and threatening to make my grip on the gun slip.

  “Don’t do this, Val,” Julio pleaded. “Please. I’ll have to take you in. You know that.”

  “You don’t like it? Turn back around.”

  Before I could decide to pull the trigger (It would be so easy. The hard part came after.), the gun turned burning hot. I dropped it with a hiss and glared at Julio, his forehead still scrunched from the focus of using his powers.

  “I won’t let you do it,” he said.

  “You think you can stop me?”

  His mind was in range, and I seized it. Then I paused. I could do it; nothing physical was stopping me. I could force Julio to hold still, shoot the man who’d fired the rocket launcher, and then erase Julio’s memory of it all. That wouldn’t be enough, though. I’d have to hide the man’s body to stop suspicion from falling on me, and there was a chance Julio would regain his memories someday. I’d have to regularly sweep his mind to make sure that didn’t happen, but I saw him pretty often; I could manage that easily enough.

  Why wasn’t I doing it, then? I looked into Julio’s eyes, felt the pleading desperation coming off him in waves. Sighing, I released his mind.

  I blamed the eyes. Those big, brown puppy-dog eyes were how Dave always got me, too.

  Julio smiled weakly, but before he could say something sappy that I’d have to smack him for, a loud crash came from down the hall.

  Julio and I stared at each other.

  Dave.

  Chapter 13

  Without a word, we sprinted down the hallway. We left the area where the sprinklers were going off, the alarm fading behind us. Soaking wet and down one pistol, I reached under my blazer and pulled another from its holster. The distraction let Julio pull ahead of me, or maybe that was because he was younger and in better shape.

  Dave’s door came into view, and I stretched out my senses, feeling… absolutely nothing. Dave was presumably still in a coma, but I should still be able to sense Bianca and Ember. What was going on?

  Julio reached the door first, and I knew from his expression that something was terribly wrong. I caught up a second later and saw it: the room was empty. Even Dave’s bed was gone.

  Breathlessness and fear joined forces to create an awful pain in my chest. I flashed back to just after the boat had exploded and the sheer terror I’d felt at not being able to find him. I couldn’t help him if I didn’t know where he was. I had to find him, but with him still in a coma, my telepathy was useless.

  Gunshots came from further down the hall. Julio and I didn’t even glance at each other; we just charged toward it. I stretched out my senses as far as they would go and brushed something familiar: Bianca. I slipped into her mind just in time to feel her panic as a huge piece of medical equipment flew through the air and slammed into her.

  I jerked back, air leaving my lungs with an “oomph.” Phantom pain struck my stomach and chest, and I bent over.

  Julio stopped and looked back at me.

  “Go,” I rasped, waving him forward.

  Shooting me a worried glance, he ran on. I took
a moment to convince my body the pain wasn’t real before straightening up and dashing after him. Concern for Bianca overshadowed my worry for Dave for a moment, and I wondered how I’d ever face Sara if something happened to her.

  “Ember!” Julio shouted.

  I caught up with him a second later. Two feet to our left, Bianca lay crumpled on the floor beneath a bulky white piece of equipment. Her eyes were closed, but she groaned and broadcasted pain telepathically, so I knew she wasn’t dead.

  Ember stood ahead of us, though if I hadn’t seen her powers in action before, I might not have recognized her. Her eyes glowed a fiery red-orange, and her skin was covered by black armor as smooth and glassy as obsidian. It molded perfectly to the contours of her face, making it seem like it was her skin.

  Did I mention it was bulletproof?

  She didn’t say a word. Looking between the two us, she smiled fiercely and held out her hands. The message was clear: “Come and get me.”

  Dripping onto the tile, I reached for her mind only to hit a wall. It wasn’t like trying to read an unconscious person’s mind and finding nothing. Her thoughts were there, but they felt blurred and distant, and I couldn’t reach them. It almost felt like someone who’d been trained to put up psychic shields, but Ember hadn’t had that kind of skill last time I’d mind-controlled her.

  “You’re under arrest,” Julio said. “Any chance you’ll come quietly?”

  She ripped another piece of equipment from the wall and flung it at us, which was certainly one way to say no.

  Julio and I dove aside in opposite directions, and the heinously expensive machine smashed to pieces on the tile between us.

  “Knock her out!” Julio shouted like I needed to be told.

  “I already tried! She’s blocking me somehow.”

  A puff of air from her nostrils was the closest Ember came to a laugh. With her smoldering red eyes locked on mine, she reached up and tapped the side of her head with a clink, a very satisfied smirk on her face.

  Was that armor somehow shielding her from telepathy? Wonderful. I was so glad I had my powers back.

  I shot her in the chest. The bullet didn’t penetrate her armor, but the force knocked her back a step. She snarled and charged me.

  I scrambled up as her booming footsteps echoed down the corridor. Instead of turning and running like any rational person, I kept my feet planted until the very last second. When Ember threw a punch, I sidestepped and drove my foot into the back of her knee.

  It was like kicking a flagpole. Instead of taking her down, it just sent a painful jolt up my leg. So much for that brilliant plan. Her elbow shot at me, and I barely jerked back in time. If I’d moved any slower, she would have smashed my face in. I backed away, needing time to think. I couldn’t survive a fist-fight with Ember, much less win it. I needed a new strategy, but before I could think of one, she came after me, closing the distance between us.

  Dave’s in there. Bianca’s voice filled my head alongside an image of a door on the other side of Ember. She’d hidden him to buy time. Then her memories flashed though my head, an explanation at the speed of thought.

  Ember and another of Jean-Baptiste’s men had cornered her. She’d telepathically trapped the man in a waking nightmare, but Ember’s armor had blocked Bianca’s powers the same as it had mine. Ember had fought back, and her attack had broken Bianca’s concentration, freeing the man to run into Dave’s room…

  He’d been alone with Dave for almost a whole minute. I had to get in there. Julio staggered, meaning Bianca must have sent him the same message.

  I shot Ember again, clinging to a sliver of hope that the bullet might have more of an effect at a closer range. It didn’t. She paused to brace herself and then kept coming.

  Shit.

  A wave of heat filled the hallway. Julio. What was he doing? I knew it was possible for him to roast people alive with his powers, but he’d never do it on purpose. That was part of the whole superhero deal. Ember stopped and looked at him, evidently wondering the same thing.

  The hallway grew hot enough to fry eggs, and the overhead lights flickered and sparked before dying. I realized Julio was targeting the fire sprinklers on the ceiling when one of them started to literally melt. With one sprinkler damaged, the whole system in this part of the hallway went off. The alarm wailed, and hot water sprayed us.

  Ember looked up, the water running down her glossy face like rain on a statue. When she returned her gaze to Julio, she tsked and strode toward him.

  Julio gave a smirk worthy of a supervillain as a blast of cold hit the hallway. The water turned to ice, and an indoor hailstorm pelted Ember. I backed up, since even though Julio had enough control to only freeze the water over Ember, the sudden cold sent a vicious shiver through my wet body. Ember struggled forward, struck by chunks of hail big enough to shatter car windshields.

  I didn’t want to leave Julio alone with her, but I had to get to Dave. Behind Ember’s back, I ran for the room where Bianca had stashed him. Before I reached it, the man Ember had sent after him came into telepathic range.

  I felt his hands clasp a soft pillow as he smothered Dave with it.

  I seized him with mind-control and lifted his arms so forcefully that I pulled one of his muscles. Then I cut the strings keeping him conscious and heard the thump of his body hitting the floor as I rushed into the room. I reached Dave’s bedside (His face was still achingly slack, his skin so pale.) and put my hand an inch over his nose and mouth. He was breathing.

  I sighed. All in all, a pillow was a horribly ineffective way to try to kill someone.

  Something crashed behind me, and I spun around to see Ember stride into the room. With her skin like volcanic rock and eyes glowing like embers, she was a veritable demon come to life.

  I took aim and fired. Ember braced herself and took the hit, and I squeezed the trigger again and again until I ran out of bullets. It didn’t faze her. She crossed the room as I dug for the third gun in my purse, but it was too late. She didn’t attack; she just shoved me aside like I was nothing. I banged my head as I hit the floor.

  Dazed, there was a moment as I stared up at the ceiling that I thought I was back in prison at the Inferno. Something about the tint of the round, industrial lights pulled at my memory. It brought the feeling of crushing despair I always associated with that place. Shaking it off, I groaned as I sat up—and saw Ember’s arm around Dave’s neck.

  I sprang up with a cry. She’d propped him up into a sitting position, his neck clamped within the crook of her elbow as she pushed and squeezed. Her powers made her one of the few people capable of strangling him.

  I grabbed her arm and pulled, but it was useless. She jerked, and the small force was enough to throw me off. I drove my fist into her jaw, the back of her neck, everywhere that would usually be a pressure point. All I managed to do was split my knuckles. Bleeding and panting, I stepped back and stared at her. What could I do? That armor covered every inch of her, and she was too strong. No weak points to exploit, not while she was shielded from my telepathy. She was going to kill him right in front of me, and I was helpless to stop it. Ember clenched her jaw as she tightened her grip, her eyes blazing—

  Her eyes.

  I leapt on her and jammed my thumb into the glowing red-orange orb.

  She dropped Dave with a yell, and her hand whipped out and smacked the side of my head. I hit the floor hard, but it didn’t matter. Between the bright spots dancing across my vision, I could see Dave had fallen back onto the bed. His left arm was hanging off the mattress, his head tilted to the side, but his chest rose and fell as he drew breath. Ember was bent over beside him, clutching her eye.

  “Fuck,” she spat, the first word I’d heard her say.

  I pushed myself up, the chorus of pain in my skull swelling to a crescendo. The movement drew Ember’s attention. Her left eye blazed with more red than orange now, and she fixed me with a murderous glare.

  My legs tensed. Would I be able to dodge her ag
ain in this confined space? One hit, and I was finished.

  “Enough.”

  Julio staggered through the door. He sounded exhausted, and he grabbed the doorframe for support as he stretched out his hand toward Ember. It was his broken hand, the white cast standing out starkly against the black of his suit. His breathing was ragged, and he grimaced.

  Then he let loose.

  The chill I’d felt when he’d turned the fire sprinklers to ice was nothing compared to this. My ears popped, and glacial cold hit me like a sucker punch. I gasped, and my breath rose in front of me like in an icy fog. My clothes, soaked with water, had turned stiff with ice. My arms wrapped closely around me by instinct, and I curled in on myself to preserve body heat. It hurt. The cold cut my skin and penetrated me to the bone. I didn’t want to breathe, didn’t want to let more of the icy air into my lungs.

  But I didn’t have it nearly as bad as Ember.

  She cried out, hunched over so far that she was nearly bent in two. Shivering so violently that she looked about to fall over, she staggered toward Julio. Her movements were stiff, and a thin crust of ice formed on her armored face. Julio was freezing her solid.

  She dropped to one knee, hugging herself as she shook. Weakly, she raised her head to look at Julio, who still had his hand extended and his brow knit in concentration. I didn’t need telepathy to feel the battle of wills between them. Clenching her jaw, Ember heaved herself back up, and after swaying unsteadily, she took another step toward him.

  I was reluctantly impressed—but not so much that it stopped me from grabbing a chair and bashing her over the head with it.

  Something cracked, and she collapsed. The chair slipped from my cold, numb fingers, and I stepped back to catch my breath. At my feet lay small shards of glittering obsidian: Ember’s armor.

  I felt her fear as she groped the back of her head to find where her armor had shattered. That was all the opening I needed to seize her mind.

  She went still, and I turned to Julio. “I g-got her,” I said through chattering teeth.