Wicked Thing (C.O.A Series Book 2) (42 page)

Lexy smiled innocently at the newbie and announced, “Good, you’re up. We should get back to the motel and find the others.”

As Molly followed them she gave them all of the information she could recall, “They’re not at the motel. I heard them talking about frying the Ankh in a storage container. The kind of hot one chucked me into the trunk and made some kind of crude comment about how easy I’d be to toss around in bed and then he sprayed something in my face. I don’t remember anything after that.”

Lexy grinned, knowing it was Tiberius, Molly was talking about. She’d never even had the misfortune of meeting any of the other clans. This was her first trip to the rodeo.

Grey smiled and said, “My face still smarts, I’m driving this time.”

Lexy didn’t argue, she’d had her fun.

“So, we’re looking for a storage container in the desert. How hard can that be to find?” he proclaimed as they pulled away from the crash site.

They drove past the motel and carried on further down the only visible road until they saw a barely noticeable dune buggy trail.
Bingo!
She didn’t even need to say anything, Grey veered off of the main road and carried on down a side road that led off into a hilly area of desert, using nothing but instinct the three travelled into the barren land and as the temperature rose they discovered the inconvenient lack of air conditioning in the now sweltering heat. They saw the cloud of dust from another vehicle’s tires and headed in that direction.

Chapter 23
I Crashed into You

T
hey drove towards the cloud of rising dust. It was much further away than they’d initially thought it was and by the time they had an actual visual on the storage container, their captive clan had already managed to escape. Lexy grinned.
If this had been Tiberius’s plan, it was rather impressive.

Molly announced, “There are cases of water on the floor in the backseat. Do you want one?”

Lexy glanced back at her and answered, “Oh, that’s amazing, I’m so thirsty. I’d love one.”

Their fellow Ankh sprinted towards their vehicle seriously stoked and even more so when they realized they still had Molly.

Frost leaned into the window of the vehicle and chuckled, “I have to know how this happened.”

Grey grinned as he gave them an explanation that sounded so much better than the truth.
He had her back as always. The real story sounded far too reckless to be repeated.

Lily of course, looked gorgeous as always, even though she was sweaty and covered in sand. She raked her fingers through her damp midnight hair as she opened the car door and asked, “Where did you find this car and how does it still run?”

Grey glanced at Lily, passed her a bottle of water and said, “Let’s just say our options were limited. We should get out of here. They’ll be back soon, and I’m sure they’ll be seriously pissed off.”

Oh, that was the understatement of the year
.

As Frost got into the backseat of the sketchy looking vehicle they commandeered from Triad, Lexy glanced back at him and prodded, “How in the hell did they capture all of you?” She passed Frost a bottle of water.

Frost shrugged, twisted off the lid and replied, “I came too, sweating to death and chained to the wall in the back of that sweltering storage container. I have no bloody idea how it happened.” He chugged the entire bottle of water and then began passing the bottles of water to everyone else.

Melody piped in, “We all woke up there, except for Kayn.” She passed a bottle of water to Kayn.

Kayn twisted off the lid and downed the entire bottle and then she started to explain, “I went to sleep early and when I woke up my hands were chained. Kevin was in my room and he used some kind of spray chloroform on me. I came to and I was in the backseat of his car. Stephanie said he left me ungagged because he wanted to talk to me. They were talking and I overheard Stephanie say that they hadn’t found Grey or Lexy. So, I bit a chunk out of my shoulder to signal you guys. Then they brought me to that stiflingly hot storage container and chained me to the wall, with everyone else.”

That’s weird…their symbols hadn’t been triggered.

Frost spurned the tale on by saying, “Oh, Don’t stop now. You’re leaving out the best part of the story.”

Kayn met Frost’s penetrating gaze, glared at him and replied, “What part is that?”

Frost smirked and teased, “Kevin kissed her before he left.”

Grey chuckled, “While you were chained to the wall in front of everyone…Kinky.”

There were important pieces missing from this story.
Lexy asked the obvious question, “How’d they chain you to the wall?”

Kayn said, “I’ll be right back.” Lexy watched as her fellow Dragon ran back towards the storage container and reappeared holding the chains that had been used to restrain the entire group.

Lexy grinned as she saw what Kayn was holding in her hand.
These were used to restrain immortals. They’d been used on her before
. Lexy took them off of her and said, “I see what they used. These are pretty fool proof. How did you get out?”

Kayn explained, “I got them to touch each other and then I drained all of their energy and used it to overpower the spelled chains. I ripped the lock off the storage container and opened the door first then I ripped all of their chains off the walls, and removed their cuffs.

Mel piped in, “And then we pulled all of them outside into the sand.”

Molly was seated between her and Grey in the front of the car and she glanced over and smiled at Grey silently thanking him for not telling the others how recklessly she’d behaved earlier. He winked at her as everyone else piled into the back of the car. It was already bloody sweltering outside. They were packed like sardines in the back and they desperately needed that current of air from the open windows so Grey started the car and they peeled away. Lexy smiled, wondering if Tiberius had come to yet. She was looking forward to bumping into him again just so she could witness first-hand the fury of his reaction to being buried in the buff. She glanced into the back as Kayn and Frost began to argue about that kiss from Kevin and Lexy smiled.
She’d stay right out of this one it sounded far too much like the fights she’d been having with Grey over Tiberius
. She tried to tune them out for a while and she’d almost done it when Grey started to chuckle. Her Handler was finding the whole situation rather entertaining.

Grey teased, “I’m a little disappointed that you’re not wearing superhero underwear today.”

What was he talking about now?
Lexy peered back at Kayn and she had been kidnapped wearing a tank top and underwear. Lexy grinned because she’d learned that lesson long ago but inevitably she still ended up naked on occasion.
She’d been lucky. It was more than that
…she knew her internal warning system was much stronger than most of the others. She was usually given plenty of warning if she chose to listen to it. The tires rattled over the road that the wind had covered with a thin layer of sand and small pebbles. When they picked up speed it sounded like someone was shaking a rattle full of sand.

Kayn tapped Molly on the shoulder and said, “I’m glad you’re still with us.”

Molly smiled as she glanced back at Kayn and answered, “I’m glad I’m still with you guys too.”

Melody reached forward and squeezed Molly’s shoulder and added, “That was a close one.”

Lily flipped her damp ebony hair over one shoulder as she added, “It was too close. She’s only sixteen. We have to keep her until she’s eighteen. I talked to my father. Their group might have to stay close to us for a while. They have another teenage boy named Dean. So we already have three and this never happens. They are going to pass them off to us and then shadow us as our back up.”

Lexy smiled at Molly, but didn’t say anything. She was glad they hadn’t lost this one but they would at some point. They couldn’t spend two years running with her, when they had other jobs to do, and training for the next batch of newbies. At a certain point it had to be all about forming a bond between the new members of clan Ankh so they’d have a fighting chance to survive the Testing. The odds of keeping her until her eighteenth birthday were not very high and if she was taken by another clan too close to the Testing it would throw everyone else off.

Lexy was brought out of her own thoughts and back to the conversation the others were having as Kayn asked, “How old is Dean?”

Lily turned around, and her raven mane whipped around wildly in the wind from the open windows as she responded, “He’s almost eighteen, and by almost, I mean his birthday is either today or tomorrow.”

This Dean kid was almost officially clan Ankh
. Lexy glanced at the tiny doll-like features of the girl sitting next to her and wished she was the one that was theirs. She looked much younger than the rest of them did. Molly was sixteen but she looked like she was only thirteen at best. The scenery changed and all of a sudden the monotony of the desert became scenic canyons of clay by the side of the road. This also reminded her of the in-between. It wasn’t that long ago that she’d been training Kayn, Zach and Melody to stand back up after plummeting off of a cliff similar to this one. The trio had come a long way since then and she was proud to say, they’d exceeded all of her expectations.

Zach tapped Grey on the shoulder and mimicked a small child on a family vacation as he teased, “Are we there yet?” Greydon swung his arm in the back seat and Zach ducked out of the way.

Grey scowled as he hissed, “I will pull this car over, maim you, and leave you incapacitated by the side of the road as an afternoon snack for the buzzards.”

They all started to laugh and Lexy’s stomach cramped.
She could be hungry. They’d skipped breakfast.
She looked at Grey and he kept glancing in the rearview mirror, interested in the drama that was unfolding in the backseat.
Eyes on the road, Greydon
.

Lexy’s stomach twisted into a tight knot once again and she glanced out of the window. They appeared to be all good, but they were on a winding canyon road with treacherously sharp corners. Molly was sitting between her and Grey. Her Handler’s thoughts were indeed sidetracked but he appeared to be concentrating on the road.
Was it hunger or a warning?
Lexy made sure she had her seatbelt on just in case and could tell that everyone in the front seat had theirs on but the back seat would be a shit show if they crashed because they were sitting on each other’s laps. She shrugged it off because they were immortal and nothing was as big a deal when you knew your death wasn’t a permanent state. They hit another straight stretch and Lexy decided that it must have been hunger pains because everything appeared to be fine. She closed her eyes for a minute and just listened to the humming rattling of the tires but there would be no possible way to take a nap with the stimulation of the drama that was unfolding between Frost and Kayn in the backseat. She smirked and glanced over at Grey, as the wind tussled his hair. He winked at her, grinned and then peered into the rearview mirror. They were definitely a distraction. They’d been arguing and flirting since they’d gotten into the car. Lexy was just about to say something when Frost whispered, “Don’t be mad. I was just jealous, that’s all.”

Kayn whispered back, “Forget about it. I was shocked to see him, and I was frustrated and angry. I’m sorry. I took it out on you.”

Grey turned around and teased, “Awe, is everybody friends now?” Lexy stomach cramped and she doubled over. When she looked up Trinity was driving directly at them at full speed.
Crap!
Glory from Trinity was the driver and she had this enormous shit eating grin on her face.
Karma was such a bitch.
Lexy braced herself with an excited grin on her face as the car load of Trinity smoked them dead on with a loud crash; their car lurched, spun around and flew into the barrier.
Yup, they were going over the frigging cliff
. It was far too late to yell at them to put their seat belts on as the second impact tossed the vehicle over the side of the cliff.

Molly cried out, “We’re going to die!”

Everyone in the car grinned.
The newbie didn’t get it yet. Death wasn’t permanent, but yes, it was going to suck.
The first impact with the cliff tore the back passenger side door off. Kayn grabbed for Molly’s arm and only had the opportunity to squeezed it for a split second before being launched out of the torn off door, when the vehicle flipped and smashed again. Lexy tried to brace herself on the dash, knowing there was likely to be a couple of hard impacts before the big one at the bottom. On the second hit both of her arms snapped and glass from the windows flew everywhere. As the car plummeted towards the bottom of the ravine she only had one thought.
Please, let there be no fire
. On impact her neck snapped and then there was nothing...

Lexy heard the sound of whispering voices, they seemed to be coming from a distance and the voices were followed by the humming sound of a car’s engine but she couldn’t open her eyes. Lexy passed out again and when she awoke her head was hot and pounding. She opened her eyes, they felt like they were on fire and her vision was blurry. Everything was still spinning, as her brain fought to restore her equilibrium. Lexy managed to shift her heated torso a bit so she could get a good look at the backseat. She was instantly relieved to see how many bodies had remained inside of the car’s compacted interior. The frames of older vehicles definitely held up better than most of the newer models. She’d been in a rather humorous amount of car crashes in her time for this was the number one way the clans took each other out. It was a simple effective way to render a large group of clan utterly useless so you could capture a new recruit.
Hell, she’d done it last night to Tiberius. Karma could always be counted on to serve you exactly what you deserved.
She tried to move just her fingers and her ears began to ring.
Well, there was a bright side…at least Trinity hadn’t buried them six feet under in the desert.
Lexy struggled to move her limbs again and nothing would budge. She grinned; her arms were riga-mortise stiff.
Had she died? Sometimes she couldn’t tell.
Lexy knew the drill, if she waited until her ears stopped ringing, she’d have better luck operating her limbs. Once she was able to focus properly and the sound had dulled to a muffled hum, Lexy noted that everyone was in the car except for Molly, Melody and Kayn.
Shit happens…they must have been tossed out.
Her mind brought her back to the voices she’d heard while coming too and the sound of the engine.
Molly had been taken.
She stretched, cracked her neck and cleared her throat. When she’d been critically wounded her healing ability always worked by order of operations. Usually her head, neck and torso were repaired quickly. Everything would be mended long before she could move her limbs.
Man, Trinity was organized they must have had a car waiting at the bottom of the ravine.
Lexy felt the heat travel down her arms and she knew that it would only be moments before she’d be completely healed. She undid her seat belt and reached over to Grey, when she gave him a poke, his body slumped towards her with his eyes wide open.
Well, he was definitely dead
. She could see now that both of his legs were crushed under the compacted dash.
Lovely.
Lexy got out of the car, knowing she was going to need back up from Melody on this one.
The vehicle was absolutely demolished
. Melody’s body was easy to find; it was lying right beside the wreckage.