Into The Fire (The Ending Series) (18 page)

There was a loud crash outside, followed by another, and everyone
turned to me, waiting.

It took me a moment to realize what they were waiting for.
“Gabe’s the one responsible for Becca’s death…he’s the guy who’s with Dani.”

My little-girl body was broken. The featureless woman who
haunted my dreams stood, looming above me. Even without eyes she was watching
me…waiting for me to die. I could feel hot blood covering me. My head felt
dizzy, and my vision was blurring.
Where am I?
The faceless woman
reached for me and I squealed, trying to get away, but my body remained
paralyzed and nothing but sobs escaped my little-girl lips.

“There you are,” a familiar voice said. The faceless
woman was gone, but I knew I wasn’t alone. “I was wondering when you’d die.” My
eyes were glued open, but my vision was blurred so I couldn’t see who it was—but
I didn’t need to see her. I recognized the hair-raising lilt in her voice:
Clara.

I gulped for air as my heart lurched. Grabbing at my
throat, I tried to breathe, but I couldn’t. “Finally,” was all she said as I
caught a flash of her blue eyes and blonde hair. But it was too late.

I started awake, snapping my eyes open. I was lying on my
back, and I felt suffocated and disoriented. Nothing smelled familiar. Not the
scent of fabric softener on my sheets or the comforting smell of leather and
hay from the barn…
where am I?
I sat up. My eyes darted around in the darkness,
gradually discerning my surroundings as I recalled the musty-smelling house we
were staying in…and the feel of Jake’s inferno-like body beside me. His
presence eased my mind a little, and I exhaled.
It was just another stupid
fucking dream.

Rubbing my toes against the flannel lining of my sleeping
bag I’d rolled out over the bed, I let the feel of the soft, well-worn fabric
distract me from my rapid breathing and sweaty hands. Moonlight shone through
the narrow windows on one wall, and Jake’s long, deep breaths soothed me.

As my mind calmed, I could feel Jake’s emotions churning:
concern—regret—uncertainty. He was awake.

“I tried to wake you,” he said in a quiet rumble.

“Jake,” I breathed, looking down at his shadowed outline. I
wanted things between us to be normal, comfortable, even if it was just for the
night.

He seemed to know my question without me having to ask it.
He raised his nearest arm, welcoming me to tuck myself in beside him. I lay
back down, my head resting perfectly on his shoulder. Snuggling into him, I
hoped the feel of his body would drive away the unsettling memories of my
nightmare and make me feel like there was still something good in my life,
still something worth holding on to.

I placed my palm on the t-shirt covering his chest, and the
rhythmic thumping of his heart was all the reminder I needed to know I was safe…for
now, at least. His arms tightened protectively around me, and I lifted my head
to kiss the side of his mouth.

“Sorry I woke you,” I whispered, letting the familiar sound
of Cooper’s tired sighs distract me.

“I wasn’t asleep,” he said hoarsely, and out of habit, I
stroked his chest with my thumb. “Was it about your mom again?”

My feet found his at the foot of our joined sleeping bags.
“Yeah.” I was tired of wondering if the dreams would ever end.

Will I ever know what Mom really looked like?
I hated
not remembering anything about her, but I’d been too young when she’d died, and
the hand-carved box Dani and Jason had brought from home was the only tie I had
left to my parents. As frustrated as I’d always been with my dad for hiding it
from me, I was also strangely relieved. I had something to look forward to
now—potential answers. I needed to open the box, to find out what it contained.

A surprising flood of hope washed through me at the thought
of opening it, and my eyelids slowly drooped closed as I drifted into
unconsciousness.

12

DANI

MARCH
17, 1AE

I squeezed the doorknob and, not knowing what to expect
inside the bedroom, felt my palm slick with sweat. Questions ran through my
head.
Will it smell like death? Will it smell like rotting meat? Has Cam
been decomposing, melting into our bed?

Twisting my wrist, I let the door creak open. I instantly
focused on the bed, on its unmoving occupant. Something was wrong.

The room didn’t stink of death and decay, as it should have
after holding my boyfriend’s dead body for so long. And the body was covered by
a sheet.
I didn’t cover him.

“What the…” I began in a hushed tone as I moved closer to
the bed…to the body. I reached for the sheet and pulled it back from his face. The
body was neither bloated nor decayed. It also wasn’t Cam.

“Oh my God!” I wailed, falling to my knees beside the
bed. “Jason! No! NO!”

I clutched on to his cold, motionless body, my fingers
digging into him as I willed his life force to return. I reached out with my
mind, searching for his, but there was nothing to find. As I stared at him,
begging him to come back to me, dark splotches of blood began to leech through
the front of his gray t-shirt.

“No, Jason! This can’t be happening!” I cried, lifting
the hem of his shirt to reveal that the smooth skin and hard muscle of his
abdomen and chest was riddled with bullet wounds. I tried to stop the bleeding
with my hands, but the viscous, red liquid welled relentlessly, forcing its way
between my fingers.

“Jason! Please! I can’t lose you, too…not after Cam. I
can’t lose you…can’t lose you…”

With a gasp, I sat up in bed.
It was a dream
, I told
myself.
Just a dream. Jason’s fine.
I kept repeating it as I stared at
the far wall of the bedroom. The sun had yet to rise, so the dull, pre-dawn
light streaming through the window made the paint appear a sickly gray instead
of off-white.

Jason usually rose with the sun; it was one of his quirks.
I, on the other hand, was more of a night owl, preferring to loll in bed in a
state of lazy half-sleep for hours each morning. The rigid travel schedule we’d
stuck to over the last few months had been a lot easier on him than on me, especially
since he’d practically functioned as our alarm clock. In my opinion, his
morning perkiness was completely unnatural. Still, I would welcome it in a
heartbeat if it meant I could be with him again.

Smiling at the thoughts of Jason, I stretched and lay back
on the mattress, pulling the covers up to my chin. It was cold, sleeping
without him beside me. After spending most of my life yearning for him and
settling for unrequited love where he was concerned, it was odd that being
separated from him hurt so much. But it did. My entire being ached for him—a
dull, incessant pain centered in my chest that throbbed with each breath. I
felt wrong…incomplete.

With that thought, I decided not to wait until the sun rose
to try to contact him. I needed to hear his voice, so to speak, to reassure
myself that he really was okay. I needed to know that he was out there, alive
and waiting for me to return to him.

I closed my eyes, just as I’d done the previous evening when
I’d contacted Zoe, and searched for the cluster of minds belonging to my
friends. They’d moved again. I found them a little further to the west. Thankfully,
unlike last night, Jason’s mind blazed near the others.

When I reached out for his mind, something happened that I’d
only experienced while talking in animals’ minds.

“Red,”
he whispered, and then he stopped speaking to
me with words. He showed me what he wanted more than anything at that moment,
to hold me close against his body…to feel ourselves connected in that most
intimate way…to know I was safe because he was touching me, shielding me from
the rest of the world.

I could almost feel him, as if an ethereal version of Jason
was with me, acting out what he was imagining. It made the pain from missing
him—from needing him—increase to nearly unbearable levels. It also made me
instantly and uncomfortably aroused.

“Oh God,”
I groaned. “
It was like you were
here…how’d you do that?”

“Really? I don’t know, Red,”
Jason responded, melting
my heart with the sound of his voice, even if it was only in my mind.
“I’ve
been waiting for you for hours, thinking about you. I just…I don’t know.”

Listening to him speak, I could almost imagine that he was
lying beside me, holding me close. Tears welled in record time and streamed
across my temples.
“I miss you so much,”
I told him, unable to keep a sorrowful
wobble from my words.

“Fuck, Dani, I—I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
He
sounded utterly lost, desperate.

“It’s fine,”
I told him.
“I’m just so happy to
talk to you. I’ve been sort of…well, worried, but that doesn’t quite cover it.
Zo told me you got shot.”

“Barely,”
he grumbled.

“And that you got a bad cut on your face?”

“Can we not—”

If he didn’t want to talk about it, that was fine, but I
needed to know one thing.
“Are you going to be okay?”

He didn’t hesitate in answering.
“Not until you’re back
here.”

My tears increased.
“Oh, well…that’s just…really, um, nice.”

“Zoe told me you were being mind-controlled by some
General. What the fuck did he…tell me what he made you do,”
Jason demanded
roughly. Though he didn’t say it, I knew he was thinking of Mandy.

“Honestly, not much. But then, he didn’t have control of
me for very long. Mostly, he just made me forget things and want to obey him,”
I explained.

“So, nobody’s touched you? Nobody’s hurt you?”
His
voice was filled with barely controlled rage.

“No, no, I’m fine.”
I paused, unable to rid my mind
of the images of him hurt…bleeding…dead.
I frowned and blinked rapidly,
annoyed at myself for being unable to restrain the sadness pouring from my
eyes.
“Jason…if I lost you…I don’t know what I’d do.”

“Red, I…me too,”
he said, making my heart flutter.

“I wish I could kiss you right now,”
I told him.

Jason chuckled, low and rough.
“I wish I could do more
than that.”

I sighed, remembering the feel of his body against mine.

“How are you feeling? Are you tired? I don’t want you to
overwork yourself,”
he said, letting his overprotective colors show.

“I’m starting to feel it.”
I frowned, not wanting to
say goodbye, but even with the power boost from the neutralizer, I was starting
to strain to maintain the connection.
“I should probably go. Can we do this
again tomorrow?”

“Definitely,”
he agreed.
“Be careful, Red.”

“You too,”
I said before reluctantly letting the
connection go.

It’s going to be a long day.

As I wandered across the street in the late morning, kicking
the stray rocks and pieces of garbage scattered on the asphalt, I thought about
my mission for the day. I was heading for the cluster of buildings Gabe had
pointed out as converted storage warehouses. I had a limited amount of time to
gather as much information as possible on what we were up against, and that
included doing a rough inventory of the Colony’s supplies—weapons, medications,
food, and otherwise.

Before leaving for his lab earlier in the morning, Gabe had
drawn me a rough map of what he called the “warehouse district” and had labeled
each building with a letter. As I approached the sprawling building marked with
an “A” on the map, I folded up Gabe’s sketch and stuffed it into the left
pocket of my heavy, black raincoat. Luckily, the weather had remained too warm
for snow, but that just meant the precipitation resulted in something I was far
more familiar with—drizzling rain.

Glancing around to ensure that nobody was watching me, I
reached for the door handle and twisted. It was locked.
Damn!

Instead of standing in front of the door looking like I was
trying to figure out how to break into the makeshift warehouse, I turned and
walked away. I kept my pace even, neither rushed nor lagging, all the while
glancing along the outer walls of the building, seeking a way in. There were
dozens of windows, probably all locked.

I scouted the entire perimeter without luck. There were no
convenient open windows, no doors accidentally left unlocked. Staring forlornly
at the main doors from the sidewalk beside the building, I thought,
Come on,
universe, toss me a bone here…

He walked around the nearest corner of the building at that
exact moment—the yellow-armbanded guard who’d propositioned me when I’d been on
my way to meet with General Herodson. He was built thickly, and from the way he
carried himself, I could tell his bulk was all muscle. I guessed he was around
my age, maybe a few years younger. With his fairly attractive face and light
brown hair, he looked like an all-American boy next door.

It only took him a few seconds to recognize me, but I knew
the moment he did. He narrowed his eyes and grinned wickedly. As he prowled
forward, I started to back away, shooting furtive glances around me as I
searched for the best escape route.

“Well, well, well, little darlin’,” he drawled. During our
last encounter, I hadn’t noticed his Texas twang through the haze of my
concussion. “How about you and me have a little fun?” His eyes glinted
predatorily.

“Thanks for the offer, but I can’t right now,” I said,
impressing myself with the steadiness of my voice. “I’m a little busy with,
uh…recuperating.”

He kept coming, his pace increasing. His eyes scanned me
from hood-covered head to sneakered toe. “You look just fine to me.”

“No, I’m really not.” I brought my hand up to my neck,
searching for the cord carrying my red card. It wasn’t there.
Oh no!
“I
have a pass…from my doctor.” I shoved my hands into my coat pockets, hoping I’d
stuffed the card into one of them instead. All I found was Gabe’s map. “I, um,
guess I left it at home.”

“Don’t worry, darlin’. I’ll do all the work, so you can just
keep on recuperatin’,” he told me, leering.

Without hesitating, I turned, intending to flee to Gabe’s
lab. It was only a few blocks away, and I was quick enough that I had a good
chance of beating the guard there. Unfortunately, my toe caught on a portion of
the sidewalk that had been pushed up by a tree root. I tripped over the crack
and skidded to the concrete face-first. I barely noticed my stinging palms or
my torn jeans and scraped knees because
he
was there, pulling me up and
dragging me back toward the main doors of Warehouse A.

I wanted to scream, to fight, to claw out his eyeballs…but I
was wearing yellow armbands, and struggling noticeably would alert the guard
and any onlookers to my unusual, non-mind-controlled status. I was expected to
go with the reproductive flow, as per the General’s usual directives. My
choices were death or pretending nonconsensual sex was consensual; it shouldn’t
have been a hard decision, but it was.

“Please…don’t do this,” I whispered.

He responded by wrapping his unyielding arms around me from
behind, restraining both of my arms at my sides. He was just too goddamn
strong.

“C’mon, darlin’,” he said as he released one arm to unlock
the warehouse door. “This can be fun. You’re the one makin’ it difficult. Why
not just relax and enjoy it?”

If I get the chance, I’m so going to kill you!
But,
in the back of my mind, I wondered if the General’s directive was the only
reason he was behaving so aggressively toward me. Maybe he’d been a sweetheart
prior to the have-sex-with-whoever-you-want compulsion.
So…can I kill him if
he’s little more than a puppet?
He wasn’t like Mandy or Mr. Monk, or even
like the Crazy I killed in the stable; his death wouldn’t be justified.
There
has to be another way…

I stopped struggling, instead working on calming myself. I
took slow, even breaths, hoping that doing so would steady my racing heart and
bring rational thought back to the forefront of my mind. My captor’s hold
loosened as he registered my supposed compliance.

“There we go, sweet thang. That wasn’t so hard, was it?” The
way his arms were wrapped around me had transformed from aggressive and
forceful to a mockery of tenderness, and he lowered his head to kiss my neck. I
shivered involuntarily at the gentle contact, my skin crawling.

Pretend it’s Jason
, I told myself, thinking this
stranger’s touches would seem less repulsive that way. Jason might never
forgive me for what I was about to do, but he definitely wouldn’t be able to if
I was dead.

Closing my eyes, I pictured him: his powerful body, intense
sapphire eyes, and short, jet-black hair. I imagined how safe I would feel if
it was him embracing me in the warehouse, breathing against my hair and unzipping
my coat to access what lay beneath.

Caught up in my fantasy, I whispered, “Let me see you. I
need to see you.”

But when he turned me around to face him, I became all too
aware that the man lowering his face to mine was
not
Jason.

And still, I let him kiss me.