Despair: A Deadly Seven Novel, page 15
“I thought it would be looked after,” she said, unable to hide the strain in her voice. “I thought maybe if it was, then he could still be using the place.”
“He could still be inside,” Axel pointed out.
“Maybe.” But she wasn’t convinced. The place looked deserted.
Hand in hand, they walked to the front porch and kicked the door in. The smell of gas was instant. It watered her eyes.
“Nope.” Axel tried to drag her out, but she tugged him back in.
“We have to check.”
There was something urging her in, and she couldn’t explain it. A gut feeling. An instinct.
“Fuck.” Axel gritted out and propped the door open to let air gust in. “I’ll see where the leak is coming from.”
He moved, but her fingers tightened around his hand. For some reason, she couldn’t move. The sight of the house assaulted her. Inside, her childhood remained.
Nothing was out of place.
Unlike the yard, in here it was frozen in time. From the foyer entrance with its fake flower arrangement, to the living room beyond and the leather couches facing each other, a scratch down one almost invisible in the dust of time. Vases and knickknacks on the buffet were also dust ridden. Cobwebs laced between flower stems.
Those couches facing each other.
She vividly remembered the day she arrived. She’d come from a second lab where Julius had put her after the fire. He brought her here to give her a home, he’d said. But she’d sat across from him, looking up at him from the far side of the coffee table separating them, and all she could think was that he was over there, and she was on this side.
Little did she know she would never succeed in crossing that divide. Daisy cleared her throat.
“I’m okay.”
Axel glanced down at their joined hands. “Come with me to the kitchen. If the gas is on, I need to turn it off.”
She nodded and stayed with him, squeezing his hand. He made short work of checking the stove top, found all gas knobs had been turned on, and promptly switched them off.
“Deliberately switched on,” he mumbled. “From the concentration of the smell, it’s been on for a while.” He shot her a concerned look. “Like someone was waiting for you. We need to be careful. I need to open windows and flush the gas out.”
He leaned across and opened the window over the sink, then tried to leave her—she assumed to open more windows. Another nod from her but she felt helpless. Her training went out the window. She didn’t want to let go of him.
“We’ll go wait outside until it’s safe,” he suggested, eyes stark. “Together.”
She could sense he was concerned.
“I’m okay,” she told herself as they walked back to the entrance, intending to leave as he’d suggested, but she stared through to the living room once more and frowned at a clean spot on the buffet. A dark ring in the dust stood out. Odd. “Something’s missing.”
With her eyes locked on the buffet, she stepped forward and wished she hadn’t.
Trip wire.
An explosion ripped through the house, shaking its foundations. Her gift surged outward, protecting them. Two kinetic powers clashed—one natural, one her—causing a second blast of force. They jerked backward and fell. Their hands broke apart. The sense of despair suddenly strangled her. She gasped and clutched herself, curling into a ball.
“Daisy.” Axel held her up. “We have to get out. The kitchen is on fire. It’s spreading. It’s a miracle we haven’t been fried, but I think you saved us somehow. I saw the explosion come and then hit an invisible wall.”
“Ungh.” She shook her head, unable to focus on the fire or what she’d inadvertently done. “Something else is wrong. I feel… I feel…”
She tried to focus on the despair. On the bone chilling darkness spreading from her gut. So many… she glanced up, moved around a few steps, and homed in with pins and needles prickling the back of her neck.
“There are people here,” she blurted.
Her eyes stung as the fire heated up the house. Flames licked up the walls, propelled by the gas leak. With supernatural speed, it spread throughout the house and try as she might, she had no idea how to repeat what she’d just done to protect them from the blast.
Axel glanced up. “Fuck. I can hear them.”
Daisy couldn’t move. Her lungs wouldn’t work. Her brain stopped. It was stuck in a loop. Fire that had almost killed her as a child. It was happening again. Trapped.
Axel went into business mode. He yanked Daisy’s hand hard. The despair winked out with his contact, and she snapped out of her daze.
“But we have to save them,” she blurted as she stumbled after him out the front door.
“I’ll get them. Wait here. Call your family.”
He deposited her on the grass and turned back to the house, searching up and down until they both saw it at once. The tiny attic window. A face peering out of the gloom.
“Max,” Daisy breathed, shocked. “They’re here. The mates. I can sense multiple types of despair. It must be all of them.”
“I need a ladder,” Axel said and started jogging around the house.
“Garage,” she suggested. “There used to be gardening tools in the garage.”
The fire was still contained at the house, so when they arrived at the garage, and broke in, it was safe to enter.
“How can I help?” Daisy followed him. “What if I break the attic window while you get the ladder?”
“No. The fire is spreading fast. I need to vent it first.” He searched the dim room covered in disused garden supplies and boxes. “Go call your family.”
“But…” She had to do something.
Her family wouldn’t get here on time. She wanted to run in and help them… but she couldn’t move. Her feet were glued to the floor.
“Daisy,” Axel barked. “Get safe and let me do my job.”
She blinked. “You’re a firefighter.”
“I got this.” He clapped her on the shoulder and then jogged out of the garage with a ladder under one arm and a crowbar in the other, tossing over his shoulder, “Get me the garden hose.”
She jolted into action, went straight to where she remembered the outside faucet to be, but discovered no hose. Damn it. She turned the faucet on, anyway and willed herself to move the water with her mind. All she could manage was spluttering and spraying.
Stupid idea, anyway. God, she was stupid. Useless.
She ran back to the front yard and, with her blood slowly freezing in her veins, she watched her mate set up the ladder and climb onto the roof. He shouted through the window not to break the glass until he’d vented the room to avoid a backdraft.
The flames were growing, getting thicker and hotter and louder. Daisy’s vision started closing in as she pulled out her cell phone and struggled to breathe. With shaky hands and blinking to see straight, she dialed Parker.
He answered in two rings.
“Daisy.” His deep voice was a welcome baritone warming the ice in her veins.
“Pigeon…” she choked.
“What is it?” His tone sharpened. “Where are you? Are you hurt?”
“I’m… I’m okay. It’s the house… They’re here. They’re here.”
A pause. “The mates?”
“Yes,” she gasped, pacing. “The house is on fire. Axel is trying to get to them in the attic, but… I don’t know. The flames are spreading. There was a gas leak… I don’t know!”
“Sit tight. We’re on our way.”
He cut the call and she collapsed into a crouch, steadying her woozy self with fingers on the crisp grass. A loud crash drew her attention back to the house, now billowing with black smoke.
Axel was sliding from the roof top, angling his feet for the ladder. Did it work? Did he find a way to vent?
He must have. He hit the glass window with the crowbar, but it wouldn’t break. He tried again and again, then seemed to communicate with whoever was through the window. A desperate look came over him and he glanced down at her, his brows lifting in the middle.
She jogged to the base of the ladder and looked up.
“It’s made of something tough,” he shouted down, shaking his head.
Memories crashed into Daisy, memories she’d tried to suppress. Hours, days, weeks locked in the attic. It was her prison cell for when she’d failed to complete her training required. It was the place he sent her as punishment. But she’d forgotten about the window. She could always see the sky through it. She wasn’t even sure if she had tried to break it and escape. She had nowhere else to go. But he’d always told her she’d never get out.
“Try your gift,” Axel suggested.
“I can’t even move the water from the tap to the house,” she exclaimed, exasperated.
“You can do this,” he said down to her. “I’m sure of it.”
She shook her head and stepped back.
“Daisy. Look at me.” His gaze was hard and steady. Sure. “When we pulled you through the drain with Parker, do you remember that grate? It had been welded shut. I always thought it was a miracle we broke it. I thought maybe it was all Parker and his brute strength, but there was a part of me that wasn’t satisfied with that answer. Now I know why. Our bond had triggered then, didn’t it?”
She paled but nodded. When her fingers had brushed his through the grate, that’s when she’d felt all sense of despair dissipate from her gut.
“Are you saying I helped move that grate with my gift?”
“Yes.” He turned back to the window to address them inside. “Step back. The glass is going to break.”
Then he slid down the ladder like a pro, his boots hitting the ground with a thud.
“Now, Daze.” He faced her toward the window. “Focus on the window. Break it. Same thing you did for the grate. Deep breath. Go.”
There was something about Axel’s confidence. Something about the way he believed in her. It clicked another broken piece into place. She sharpened her stare on the window, glared, and then pushed her awareness outward. Like a fumbling child first learning to walk, she felt her mind grasp at the solid surface. An invisible hand in her control… but harder, more lethal. She tested the window, felt herself slide into the minuscule cracks, and then pushed everything she had into those tiny spaces with a scream of effort.
Every cell in her body swelled. But she kept pushing with that gift, kept swelling until the dam broke. The glass shattered and blew off the frame.
Axel used his body to shelter her from shards falling on them like acid rain. The instant the glass settled, he was back up the ladder, his body moving before her mind had caught up.
Something warm trickled down from Daisy’s nostril. When she wiped it, her hand came back smeared with blood. Dizziness swarmed her mind and her vision blurred but she took a few deep breaths and reined herself in.
A cloth was thrown over the broken windowsill. A hand emerged, then a head of dirty brown, wavy hair.
Lilo.
nineteen
AXEL ALVARES
It took mere minutes for Axel to extricate everyone locked in the attic and help them down to the yard across the street. Daisy, who’d been pale and stilted throughout the fire had woken up the moment Lilo climbed out the window.
She’d helped the pregnant woman down with care, murmuring softly into her ear, no doubt telling her about the family being on the way.
Except Lilo’s husband, Axel realized. Griffin was locked away in a cell, blacked out and beholden to the whims of his sin.
Joe, Liza’s mate, was the last through the window with Max climbing out just before him. By the time they all got down and safe, Daisy had enlisted a neighbor to help supply cups of water and blankets to the distraught victims. The elderly couple who owned the house directly opposite were more than happy to help.
The mates were dehydrated, hungry, tired, and all shell shocked. But as far as Axel could see, they were in one piece and uninjured.
Axel kept away other neighbors wanting to help put out the fire. “Leave it to the professionals,” he said.
This was the biggest mistake he saw in his job. Civilians thought they could put out fires with garden hoses or buckets. They forgot about the gas lines running through the walls. There had already been one explosion. All it took was for another to turn them all to cinders.
There were things he could do, but he knew that the moment he turned his back, someone would try to jump in and help him. It wasn’t worth it to save a house. Especially one Daisy had such bad memories in.
He stood behind the white picket fence in the elderly neighbors’ yard, watching the fire glow and crackle from a safe distance. Others watched from their property lines and gossiped amongst themselves, but for the most of it, they’d heeded his warning not to get close.
They’d been so lucky. If he’d not opened the kitchen window and left the front door open… if Daisy hadn’t been able to shield them with her gift…
Daisy came to stand with him, but then Misha, the blond woman with curly hair launched into her, wrapping her in a tight embrace.
“Thank you,” Misha, cried. “I knew you would find us. I knew it.”
Max, the tall, tanned Australian owner of Nightingale Securities walked over to Axel. Joe, the only other male there was FBI. Axel hadn’t officially met any of them so he introduced himself.
“I’m Axel,” he said, holding out his hand. “Daisy’s mate.”
Joe’s thick Italian brows lifted. He shared a look with Max who immediately narrowed his eyes at Axel. They both shook Axel’s hand when a brown-skinned woman with fiery eyes stuck out her hand to him, too.
“I’m Bailey,” she said. “Tony’s mate. Is he… are they all okay?”
“They’re okay except…” His voice trailed off and he couldn’t help looking to where Daisy tossed a blanket over Lilo’s shoulder and handed her a cup. Dr. Grace Go, Evan’s mate directed the water to those who needed it most. She had dark circles and sallow skin herself but must have been keeping tabs on the health status of her fellow prisoners. She must be a good doctor if she continued to put the needs of others before herself.
Bailey gasped, “Griff? He’s not…”
Axel’s gaze snapped back to her and the men. “He’s alive and uninjured. He’s just not himself.” He lowered his voice, not wanting to alarm Lilo. “He’s been locked up because they can’t control him. He’s gone dark.”
“Liza?” Joe clipped.
“Sloan?” Max added.
“They’re both fine. They should be on their way here.”
Fine wasn’t exactly the right word, but again, he didn’t want to worry any of them. He also didn’t think it was his place to announce the inner workings of the Deadly Seven. He made his excuse and went to Daisy.
“Do you need anything from me?” he asked. “Has someone called the fire department?”
Grateful violet eyes washed over him. It was enough for him to see she felt adrift. She glanced at an elderly couple keeping their distance on the front porch.
“I told them to call,” she muttered, “but they seem a bit skittish.”
He touched her shoulder and said with a calm tone, “I’ll sort it out. You keep updating these guys on what’s been happening. They want news and I don’t want to alarm them.” He paused. “I told Joe, Max, and Bailey about Griff.”
She sighed. “Okay. I’ll break it to Lilo.”
Axel walked up the porch steps to the elderly couple.
“Hi, folks,” he said. “My name is Axel. I’m with the CCFD. I’m off duty, though. We need to call the local department about the fire.”
“It’s done,” said the man, scratching his long beard. “Are they okay? What happened?”
The old lady’s eyes narrowed. “I always knew there was something off about that man over the road. He didn’t treat that girl right. No sir.”
“And the state of that yard?” The man shook his head.
“Thank you for your help and hospitality,” Axel said. “We’ll be out of your hair as soon as we can.” Sirens in the distance carried. “Looks like the locals are here. They’ll put the fire out, but until then, it’s best you stay safe here on the porch.”
They nodded to him.
“You need anything else? Food?” the woman asked.
A cell phone rang from somewhere. Axel frowned and scanned the yard to see Daisy pull hers out and answer. He turned back to the couple and answered their question. “I’ll let you know. Thank you again.”
“Suppose we’re lucky we ain’t so bad as the city folk right now.”
“Mm,” his wife agreed.
They continued talking quietly amongst themselves as Axel jogged down the steps to Daisy’s side, tensing as he passed Lilo with her face buried in her hands sobbing and Grace and Misha trying to console her. Daisy must have told her about the state of her husband.
“They’re all alive and fairly well,” Daisy said into the handset. “I’ll put her on.”
Daisy held the cell out to Misha. “It’s Wyatt.”
Misha shot a guilty look at Lilo, but then the moment she put the handset to her ear she burst into tears. Daisy spoke up so everyone could hear.
“They couldn’t track down a helicopter, but their boat has landed on the mainland. They should be here in fifteen.”
“Do you think that’s wise?” Joe said, folding his arms. “I mean, all of us in one place at the same time. It can’t be a coincidence the house set on fire the moment you arrived.”
“How did you know we were here?” Bailey asked.
“Daisy had a feeling,” Axel answered.
“A feeling.” Max’s brow went up.
Axel could see the suspicion in his eyes and shut it down immediately. “She used to live here. Her suspicion had nothing to do with you all. It was sheer luck that we happened across you. Your family has been searching night and day for you, and with the city bridges blown—”
“All of them?” gasped Bailey.
He nodded. “Every access into the city has been destroyed. Replicates have been deployed. Faithful still loyal to the Syndicate are wreaking havoc.”
