Taken By Choice (Taken Trilogy Book 3)

by Jessica Frances

  “What—?”

  “What am I doing here? Have you not figured it out yet?”

  “Look, can you guys catch up later? I need to take him to medical.” I try to propel us forward, but Charlie won’t move.

  “You work for my dad, you’re just—”

  “Wrong. I don’t work for your dad, never have, not really.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means I joined the army three years ago and then eighteen months ago I was put on assignment to annoy the crap out of you to see how you controlled your blackouts.”

  “You were sent to annoy him?” I gasp.

  “Well, it wasn’t so hard to do. He annoyed me a hell of a lot more than I annoyed him.”

  “Why did Stan do that? Is that when he found out about Charlie’s ability?”

  “Oh, please, Charlie’s freak show wasn’t that hard to deduce. They’ve known all along about him. I was just there to push his buttons. I helped him screw up his dad’s building schedule a lot.” Adam laughs and this time I hold Charlie back from moving closer.

  “Hey, why don’t you just shut up?” Ethan pushes Adam’s arm. Thankfully Adam holds his hands up in surrender. The last thing we need is another fight.

  “I’m just answering the woman’s questions. I mean no harm.” He smiles sweetly at Ethan, turning that smile onto us. “Well, I could have been worse. I could have been that kid’s uncle. Now, that is a fucked up story.”

  “Leave Will alone,” I snap at him.

  “I feel sorry for the kid. His mom died and then his fate was sealed. They planted Talon in early to marry his aunt when he was a baby. Beat him by accident the first time, saw him healing from it. From then on, they wanted to see how fast he healed and what levels the healing worked from. Twisted, right?” Instead of looking disgusted, he looks impressed.

  “So they knew about Will when he was a baby?”

  “They knew about all of you straight away. How do you guys not know this stuff?” Adam laughs again. “Next, you’ll say you don’t know about the tests.”

  “What tests?”

  Adam really does laugh this time, causing Ethan to shove him again. He keeps pushing him until they’re out of our way. As much as I want to ask Adam what he is going on about, I don’t want to hang around to see another fist fight.

  I get Charlie out into the hallway and we head for the stairs.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” I ask him, watching as he stops us moving and steps away from me. He pulls up his t-shirt and wipes his nose with it, spreading blood over his shirt. It at least looks like it’s stopped bleeding, but I try not to look too closely.

  “It’s stopped bleeding.” Charlie tentatively moves his fingers to his nose to touch it, wincing when he makes contact.

  “Can we maybe hurry up and get to medical?” I beg.

  “It’s not an emergency. I’m okay I think. At worst, it’s just broken.”

  “Well, I’m not the best person when it comes to being around blood, so…”

  “Sorry. I can go by myself?” he offers.

  “No, I’ll stay with you. Just, can we hurry up?”

  “Sure.” Charlie wraps his arm around me again and this time we move quickly down the stairs. “What do you think asshole meant about tests being done?” he asks curiously.

  “I don’t know, but no doubt, when we do eventually find out, it’ll be horrible and sick.” I sigh, emotionally trying to prepare myself for whatever explanation we’ll get.

  “I guess that maybe we weren’t randomly given these abilities.”

  I remain quiet at that, not being able to fathom that such tests could have ever taken place. It must have been a lie, no way were we tested on. For one, we live in completely different places and we’re all different ages. Also, why only nine of us? Why aren’t there hundreds or thousands of us? Maybe he means other tests? Like the ones I had run on me when I first got here?

  “So if Will’s uncle was working for Stan, and asshole Adam was keeping an eye on me, who was keeping an eye on you?” Charlie asks me as we reach the hospital doors. When we walk through them, I’m thankful there is no sign of Will’s uncle, Talon.

  “I don’t know.” There really isn’t anyone. Perhaps a lawyer at work? Or my boss, Jeff?

  “What happened here?” Doctor Pratt ushers Charlie to a bed and carefully looks him over. I see she is gentle with him and eventually leads him into another room as I pace around the small area in front of the beds.

  I let my mind wander about the possibility of who could have watched over me. Perhaps because they didn’t know what my ability was for so long that they didn’t feel a need to watch me? Or maybe they just put spies in school and after that it wasn’t necessary? I can’t believe we were spied on. That is so sick, and just shows how far into crazy Stan has taken this.

  Behind me the doors open, but I don’t turn around to see who it is. I let my eyes roam to the door Charlie is behind. I hope he hasn’t broken anything and that really is just a bloody nose.

  “Zoe?” a voice calls out behind me.

  As I turn around, I forget entirely how to breathe.

  Chapter 13 – THE BETRAYAL

  Frank stands before me and I watch him hesitantly open his mouth to talk to me. “Hello, Zoe.”

  His words cut right through me. I’m frozen in shock.

  “I know I’m the last person you were expecting to see and I’m sorry I hurt you and your mother. It wasn’t my choice to leave you both.”

  My mouth drops open. I think my stomach is lost somewhere on the ground. I know all my blood feels like it exited my body at once. Am I about to faint?

  Frank died. My stepdad died when I was eleven. This isn’t possible.

  “This must be quite the shock, perhaps you should sit down.” Frank reaches out his arm towards me and I quickly take several steps backwards.

  He watches my retreat and frowns. “Please, just hear me out. I can explain.”

  “Explain?” I don’t understand what he means. Who is this person?

  “I know you’ll have a lot of questions for me, and I promise you I will answer every single one of them as honestly as I can.”

  “Promise…” I whisper his word back to myself. I feel like the word winds me. This man in front of me, this is supposed to be Frank? The man who promised to love my mom for eternity? The man who promised to look after us? The man who promised not to leave us like Dad did?

  “I really think you should take a seat, you look unwell,” he suggests, taking a small step towards me, but halting himself before he gets too close.

  “You’re working for P.A.G.E.? You were who they sent to keep watch over me? You became my father and married Mom just to watch me?” I accuse, finding my voice as well as my anger.

  “It wasn’t like that exactly.” He eyes me carefully, but he doesn’t say anything more. I assume it’s because he can’t argue with the truth. “Zoe, I truly did love your mother. I love you,too—”

  “NO!” I scream out, surprising myself as well as Frank who jumps at my sudden outburst. “Get away from me,” I demand.

  “Zoe?” When Charlie’s voice sounds from behind me, I turn and move towards him immediately.

  “We need to go.” My voice wavers. I’m only seconds from bursting into tears.

  “Okay.” Charlie eyes Frank behind me, but doesn’t ask me anything further. He takes my hand, ignoring Doctor Pratt’s protests while leading me passed Frank. I keep my eyes down, but notice him reach out for me in the corner of my eye. I see Charlie push him away.

  We burst through the doors and I take the lead, moving to the door we have used to get outside for training. It’s locked.

  “Zoe, what’s going on?”

  “I need air,” I explain, my eyesight blurring as tears finally stream down my face.

  “Okay.” He takes my hand and we keep moving down the hallway. We find several more locked doors and windows before we find one being used as a service entrance
. Several crates of food are being delivered and we sneak passed easily. I see on the ceiling a camera following our every move and I wonder if someone will come for us or if we’ll be left alone. We clearly aren’t escaping. We’re missing Rose and Will for one, and we still have tracking devices in our arms.

  Charlie walks me around a corner and we sit down on a window ledge outside. The air is cold and smells of rain. Even though it’s pitch black out, I feel like we have eyes on us.

  “What happened back there? Who was that guy?” Charlie asks me carefully.

  I shake my head, bursting into tears. How could Frank do this to me? To Mom? How could he lie and deceive us like that? Mom has been a completely different person since she lost Frank. We even had a funeral for him. He had been loving, caring, reliable Frank. He had been the father to me that my own dad couldn’t be.

  “Please tell me what’s happening. I want to help you.” Charlie wraps his arm around my shoulders, then with his free hand, he shifts my hair behind my ears and wipes away my tears.

  “He’s my stepdad.”

  “That man in there is your stepdad? He was who was keeping watch over you?” He sounds outraged on my behalf.

  I nod into his shoulder.

  “That is fucked up.”

  “I loved him. My mother loved him. He tricked us.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  I look back out into the darkness, wishing I could be anywhere else with Charlie right now other than stuck in this place.

  “How could he have lied to us like that? My mother…” My voice hitches and I feel fresh tears spring to my eyes. Why didn’t I ever get a bad feeling about him? Shouldn’t my instincts have been working back then, too?

  “He’s obviously a very good liar and a jerk. You can’t blame yourself for caring about someone you thought you could trust.”

  “I hate him. I hate that he lied to me and Mom. I hate that when he died he took the mother I knew with him. And I hate that he just took away every good childhood memory I have.” Most of my happy memories involve Frank. Now I realize all of them are fake.

  “He can’t take them all. What about Dana? You have so many happy memories of her. He can’t touch that.”

  I know he’s right, yet that doesn’t really make me feel better.

  “Mom hasn’t ever been the same since he died. She became a workaholic and being my mom was a second priority. She still grieves for him. How could he do that to her? How could he just leave her like that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Why do they keep hurting us? Why did they pick us for this? What did we do that was so horrible that we deserved our lives taken away from us?”

  “I wish I could answer those questions for you. We’ll get out of here soon, I promise. We’ll get far, far away from them all.”

  I nod into his shoulder before moving in closer to him for warmth. As I snuggle up to him, I notice the blood down the middle of his shirt.

  “How is your nose?” I think to ask, grasping onto a change of subject.

  “Sore. It’s broken, apparently. Doctor Pratt set it back, which hurt like hell, and I think, other than strapping it, there isn’t a lot she can do.”

  “Poor Will. That man looks scary as hell.”

  “Yeah, he’s another one who’s had it tough. Tougher than any of us.”

  Charlie is right; my life might not be perfect, but I do have a mom who cares about me as best as she can, a home I never had to worry about losing and I never went without. Even now, after losing Dana and my old life, I have Charlie. Will might have Charlie, Rose and me as his friends who care about him, but he doesn’t have anything else. What right do I have to complain?

  “I should go check on him.” I don’t make any attempt to move.

  “You’re ready to go back in?”

  “Yes.” I snuggle in closer to Charlie, ignoring the near dried blood there, and close my eyes. Charlie’s arm tightens further around me and he doesn’t point out that I’m contradicting myself.

  ***

  When we make it back inside, we’re eyed carefully by guards. There are several more than normal through the hallway and I suspect they were sent to ensure we didn’t try to make a run for it.

  “There you are. How’s your nose?” Rose is waiting for us, leaning against the wall opposite the staircase on our level.

  “Sore. How’s Will?” Charlie looks around us, perhaps trying to see if he’s hiding somewhere. I notice in the brighter lights that his eyes are darkening and he’ll definitely be bruised tomorrow. Seeing him hurt causes my heart to ache and I have to resist wrapping my arms around him to try to keep him out of harm’s way. I can sense a panic building inside me, knowing how much danger Charlie is in here; how much danger we’re all in. How, when we are sent out on missions, they are likely to have us in life and death situations. I’ve already lost so much; there is no way I can survive losing him, too.

  Charlie gives me a concerned look and I glance away, knowing I was staring. The panic doesn’t leave me. I fear it never will.

  I miss what Rose says about how Will is and, needing a break, I leave them to go search for him. I hear Charlie call out my name, but I quickly make it to Will’s door and knock. I don’t get any response.

  “Will, it’s Zoe; can I come in?” Still nothing. “I’m coming in, okay?” I wait a few more moments and then open the door.

  I see Will sitting on the edge of his bed, his eyes glued to the wall opposite him. His roommate isn’t anywhere in sight.

  “Will, are you okay?”

  He shrugs at me and I take it as a positive sign that he responds in some way.

  “Do you want to talk about what happened back there?”

  “No.”

  “Okay, it’s just that’s a pretty big thing that went down, seeing your uncle again. He seems like a real bastard.”

  “He is. I’m sorry Charlie got hurt.”

  I shrug it off. “Charlie is fine, already released from medical. It’s you I’m worried about.” I sit down next to him, leaving plenty of room between us when I see him tense up.

  “I’m fine.” He shrugs again, but I can see it’s forced.

  “It’s okay if you’re not. I just saw someone from my past I hadn’t expected and I’m definitely not okay.”

  Will is silent and I wait for him to talk. I have to wait several minutes before he manages to say something. “I just wish he would leave me alone,” he whispers.

  “Ethan keeps telling me I’m supposed to face my fears and, once I get over them, then nothing can scare me. Maybe this is a test for you. Once you get past this then your uncle won’t be able to hurt you anymore.”

  “I don’t even care if my uncle hurts me; I just hate how I feel around him.”

  “How do you feel around him?” I hope I’m not pushing my luck, not only do I have Will talking to me, but I have him opening up. This is rare.

  He’s suddenly quiet and I begin to fear he isn’t going to answer me, however thankfully, he does. “Angry. When I was hitting him I didn’t even really know what I was doing. I don’t want to be like him.”

  “You’re not like him; you’re the opposite of him,” I try to reassure him.

  “What if I’m not, though? What if I’m just like him?”

  “You simply have to trust me on this. I see into the future, remember?” I smile at him, hoping to get him to crack a smile, too.

  “And what do you see?” He finally looks at me, his eyes begging for me to give him some hope. That look breaks my heart.

  “I see a boy who turns into a good, mature man. A man who protects the people he loves, not hurts them.”

  Will looks away from me, but I can see my words have given him something to think about.

  “We’ll be here with you, Will. You won’t have to face your uncle alone. I can’t imagine how you lived with someone like that.”

  “It wasn’t so bad when he was sober.” He shrugs.

  “Oh, Will.” I feel p
ain for what Will’s been through at the same time that anger burns deep inside of me. I have even more hatred for this place and what they’ve done to us. “You mentioned an aunt once; what was she like?” I pray she was good to him.

  “She was okay. She drank, too.”

  “Was she ever abusive to you?” I ask, hoping he doesn’t feel like I’m prying.

  “No, but she never stopped him.”

  “I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

  He shrugs again. “I sort of miss the streets, these walls are suffocating.” He lightly brushes his fingers along the wall beside his bed.

  “That’s where you met your friend?” I remember him telling me about the friend he lost before he was taken.

  “Yeah, Gavin. He looked out for me. He was my first friend.”

  “Why was he on the street?”

  “He lost all his family’s money, gambling. He left them to stop hurting them.”

  “How did you meet?” I ask, hoping to keep this conversation going. This has to be a record for how many words Will has spoken to me at once.

  “I met him on my first night out on the street. He looked out for me.”

  “I’m sorry you lost a friend.”

  “I’m sorry I lost him, too.” I see Will is shutting down again and soon he’ll go back to Silent Will.

  “If you ever want to talk, I’m here for you, anytime.”

  “Thanks.”

  With that, I get up and leave. When I get back to my room, I don’t see Charlie. I assume he’s left to shower, so I grab my things to do the same.

  When I make it into the showers I spot Rose by the sinks. She looks up at me when I enter.

  “You got Will to talk?”

  “Yeah, he spoke a bit.”

  “He wouldn’t answer when I knocked.”

  “He didn’t answer me, either; I just entered.”

  “Oh.” Rose looks away from me and back at her own reflection.

  “You know the old Rose wouldn’t have let a closed door stop her. She wouldn’t have even let a locked one stop her.”