Reckoning (24 page)

Rick burst into the room with his gun drawn.

“Do something,” Agent Davis screamed at Rick.

“Juliet, stop.”

I kept moving toward Rick, and he shot me in the arm. A stinging sensation followed as it tore into me. The end of a pellet poked halfway out of my skin, disrupting my power. Frantic to protect my sister, I lowered Maisy to her feet and grabbed at the pellet. Before I could pull it out, two humans were on me, slamming me to the floor, bruising my jaw. They kept their knees on my back and on my legs as they handcuffed me and attached shackles to my ankles.

A female agent pushed her way into the room and held her hand out for Maisy.

My sister was crying, looking fearfully at me. “I’m okay, go with her. She won’t hurt you. She knows what will happen to her if she does.” The agent raised her eyebrows, shot Rick a nervous glance, then escorted Maisy from the room.

As I lay on the ground with the dirty floor against my face, I didn’t take my gaze off Agent Davis. “The second I get the chance, I’m coming for you,” I said.

He hauled himself to his feet, dripping blood, and hobbled over to me. Putting his hand on the side of my cheek, he pressed it harder into the floor until my jawbone creaked. He put his lips against my ear. “You don’t know what the hell you’re up against.” Pulling back, he said, “Trying to rescue Maisy worked out real well for you, didn’t it?”

Rick shoved him away. “You’re out of line.”

Agent Davis stood. “Don’t try to pull that seniority crap on me. Have you forgotten what’s at stake?”

“I can’t allow you to violate Article 3 of the Hostile Alien Treatment Convention.”

“Brutality is the only language these monsters understand. I know how to control them.”

Rick got in his face. “Yeah? Is that why she kicked your ass? Because you know how to control them.”

Agent Davis looked ready to explode. Rick pushed his jacket to one side and put his hand on the butt of his gun. To the humans holding me down, he said, “Escort Agent Davis to the hospital to have his injuries taken care of.”

One of the humans hesitated. “But sir—”

“Go,” Rick said firmly.

“Where is the agent taking my sister?” I asked as he helped me up.

“She’ll be moved to a room in the White House.”

This wasn’t good. I’d screwed up. Instead of helping, my actions pushed events into fast-forward. “Can you help me get her?”

He reached for my arm. Twisting the pellet back and forth, he wiggled it until it popped free. “No. Too much heat.” He pressed his thumb and index finger on either side of the hole, pinching my skin to stop the bleeding.

“He would have killed Maisy,” I said. Nausea rose within me.

“By attacking him all you did was prove to the president Supernaturals are dangerous and need to be eradicated. Agent Davis wanted you to react so he could catch you out of control on video. You played right into his hands.”

I could apologize for the way I’d acted, but it would be a lie. The truth was, I wasn’t sorry for going after the agent. I wanted to kill him. In any species, those who hurt children were the kind of monsters who deserved to die, and I didn’t mind being their escort to death.

“Are you taking me to the prison sector?” I was having trouble enunciating the words.

“For what? Protecting your sister?” He shook his head. “No and I’ll put Davis on report for what he did. Probably won’t do a whole lot of good. He comes from a long line of FAD agents. His uncle heads up the unit, so I doubt anything will be done.”

He removed my handcuffs and the shackles.

“What about the human I killed?”

“There are no videos showing you killed him. It’ll be Agent Davis’s word against yours.”

I rubbed my wrists.

Rick started walking out of the room. “If Agent Davis does get you somewhere alone, I suspect he’ll try to kill you and make it look like you attacked him.”

I fell into step beside him. “He really hates Supernaturals.”

“He does. His twin brother was killed the first day of the war by a Supernatural.” Rick held open the door. Outside, the temperature had dropped and a light snow fell. Rick shrugged out his jacket and handed it to me.

“Thank you.” I put it on. “So we’re clear, I am going to kill that agent.”

“You can do that in cold blood?”

“Sure. I’ll pretend to be human.”

Rick sighed.

“My destiny is to save the humans. Do you have any idea how hard it is to fight to save people like Agent Davis?” I put a hand over my rebelling stomach.

He frowned. “Are you okay?”

I nodded even as the pain in my stomach grew stronger. I suspected the use of my power had tasked one of the fail-safes to its limit.

“You fight even for jerks like Davis because life is full of tough choices, Juliet.”

“What choice? I’m only fighting because my sister is a prisoner,” I said.

He shook his head. “I don’t believe you’d sit back and watch the Supernaturals slaughter all the humans even if we didn’t have Maisy. You’d fight for us. Not because it’s your destiny but because that’s who you are. You’re the girl who will do what’s right regardless of how unpopular that choice is.” Rick paused as he stopped at the Jeep. “I don’t agree with my colleague on much. But one thing we do agree on is you were wrong to trust the Supernaturals. They’re on Riley’s side. Not yours.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because you defend the humans and the half-humans. Riley’s father made sure your people would fear and loathe humans and half-humans like your sister.”

I felt like he’d sucked all the air away from me.

Rick nodded. “Yes, I know what the children are. I’m the only one who does. I intercepted the lab reports before they reached Agent Davis’s desk.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Nothing. Go back to the obstacle course.”

My head spinning, I started walking off when Rick called out, “Juliet?”

“Yes?”

“I’m glad you kicked my colleague’s ass. He had it coming. But don’t kill him. Killing a federal agent will put you on the FAD’s Criminal Alien list. All right?” He didn’t keep watching to see if I agreed or not.

My body was on fire. My muscles cramping. Flashes of color exploded behind my eyes and sweat poured from my body. My power raced through me, coasting through my organs. Every bone in my body ached as the force of my power heated up the marrow.

I couldn’t let Agent Davis see me like this. He would use it to his advantage and kill me. I ran toward the barracks, praying, hoping I could reach the back of it, out of sight of the camera while the fail-safe continued to self-destruct. I’d known as I’d used my power to get to Maisy the fail-safe was in trouble. I’d felt the pull in my body. The twinge of warning. But when it came to Maisy’s safety, nothing else mattered.

I made it to the back of the barracks before I fell and the pain became unbearable.

RILEY

Adler rounded up the Supernaturals, and they were waiting for me when I arrived in the woods. I was still troubled by the display of power I’d seen Juliet use. No wonder she’d never acted concerned we were fighting on opposite sides of the war. With that kind of power at her disposable, she was untouchable…unless… I held my hand up to stop the murmuring.

I looked at Adler. “Get back onto the base. I need a box of the pellets the humans dipped with oil from the Void.”

“The pellets don’t affect the humans,” he reminded.

“They’re for use against Juliet. Once we secure those, we make our move.”

A Supernatural ran into the woods. “Sir? It’s Juliet. She’s at the back of her barracks. I think… I think she’s dying.”

A heartless king would have given the Supernatural a cold look. He would have shrugged a shoulder and said he hoped she was dying. The girl who would betray me. One less problem to worry about. If I didn’t have a heart, I could do that. Feel nothing. But I did have one. The color drained from my face, and my palms were clammy.

I’d seen what happened to Juliet before when a fail-safe blew. The pain would increase as the temperature of her body rose. If she had a secondary fail-safe, it might kick in and it might not. It depended on whether or not her power shut it down. It was the most destructive force I’d ever witnessed.

I raced back to the base and slipped through the fence. When I reached the back of the barracks, there were a group of Supernaturals standing around Juliet. Staring. None of them helping her.

She was on her knees, with her arms crossed over her chest, her teeth sunk into her lower lip to keep from crying out against the pain. I had the ability to absorb pain from any Supernatural, but I’d never been able to take it from Juliet. The first time I’d tried to help her, her power had left a painful burned spot on the side of my neck and hadn’t given an inch. It fought me each time I tried to stop it from killing her.

Seeing her agony, her pain, I couldn’t simply watch. “Get the hell out of here,” I snapped at the bystanders, and they scattered.

Pulling her against me, I wrapped my arms around her, concentrating, trying once again to take the pain from her.

Chapter 19

JULIET

My power wasn’t willing to subside without a fight. When a fail-safe weakened, my power saw it as a foreign invader and attacked it, but was unable to dial the temperature back down naturally. In trying to save me, it also tried to kill me. The pain increased in intensity, and I shoved my fist into my mouth to keep from crying out. I didn’t want to alert anyone.

Riley kept concentrating, refusing to give up. My power reacted strongly, heating up my skin, trying to force him away from me by making my skin hot enough to burn him. The skin on his arms reddened, but he kept holding on.

The edges of my vision tunneled. An iron grip fastened around my lungs, refusing to allow them to expand. This time, surely, my power would kill me.

“Let go before it kills you,” I said, feebly trying to push Riley away. He was strong but not strong enough to absorb my power.

He put his hand between our bodies and shoved the shirt of my uniform up. Pressing his hand against my side where Henry had installed the fail-safes, he used a short burst of his power, burning through my skin. He made a direct hit on the weakened fail-safe, destroying it.

My power abated like a full sink of water slowly draining away. I rolled over onto my side, drawing my knees up against my body, and cried.

Riley examined the burned areas on his arms.

“You saved me.”

He stopped his examination. His throat worked. “Because despite everything I know, I still love you.”

“And I love you,” I said.

He scooted closer and smoothed my sweat-dampened hair away from my face. “Then
why
?” Not understanding. Wanting to hope, to trust, to believe, and I couldn’t give it to him.

I cried harder and shook my head. If not for that stupid curse, I could tell him everything.

* * * *

Half an hour later, feeling like I’d been dragged along a highway for miles, I was back at the climbing wall. The mood was subdued. Nixie greeted me with tear-filled eyes. “I heard what happened to Maisy and with you. Are you okay?”

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.

Adler hovered near the wall as I walked up to him. His usual cocky confidence was missing. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he said, “I’ve never had a mission go wrong before. I don’t know how they found out where we’d hidden the children.”

“Did you double cross me?” I asked, putting a hand against the wall for support. Every time a fail-safe blew, it left me weak.

“What? No!”

“Did you trust someone new?”

He scratched his head, taking a moment to think it over. “No. I feel terrible about what happened. I can contact my father and let him know where Maisy’s being held. He can get into the White House.”

I studied him, wondering if he was truly a traitor. “How well did you know Ide in school?”

He blinked. “Not well. We had a history class together. I always thought he was kind of weird. We never really talked.”

“Huh,” I said.

His eyes narrowed. “What are you accusing me of?”

“Why? Feeling guilty?”

“Power down, Juliet.”

I spun around at the familiar voice. The quick action made my side hurt. Stone.

“Hey.” He hugged me gently and whispered, “Riley left the base for good this time. It’s about to all go down.”

My stomach dropped. I pulled back, not bothering to hide my dismay. I couldn’t try to stop Riley. In my weakened state, fighting wouldn’t be a good idea.

Stone flicked a glance at Adler who was listening intently to our conversation. “Dude, take a hike.”

Adler’s expression darkened, but he walked away.

“I know Riley hasn’t told you what’s going on, because he didn’t want you to worry, but Ide plans to release the Night of Grief. Riley can stop that by bringing him the president. The plan is to act normal until it’s time for the Supernaturals to attack the base. You’ll need to back us up on this.”